Homily for Jubilee Mass
for the Christian Brothers
Oct. 12, 2021
1 Cor 1: 22-31
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph’s Home, New Rochelle,
N.Y.
“Christ Jesus [is] our wisdom, our righteousness
and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor 1: 30).
Our religious life serves 2 purposes within the community of the disciples of Jesus, i.e., the Church.
The 1st purpose concerns our own holiness as
followers of Christ. We’ve found in him
the power that overcomes weakness and the wisdom that enlightens our
ignorance. By ourselves we’re too weak
to defeat sin. Christ forgives us and
makes us holy (righteous and sanctified).
By ourselves we don’t know how to please God and how to discern truth
and goodness. Christ teaches us thru the
Gospel and thru his living body, the Church.
By our union with Christ, our singular focus on Christ within our
religious calling, we are made holy. We
don’t make ourselves holy; or in the old lingo, we don’t consecrate ourselves
to God. Rather, we’re foolish and
weak. Christ, our wisdom and power,
consecrates us to God—makes us holy and pleasing for the service of God.
The 2d purpose of our religious life is our public
witness. Our individual lives and our
community life as brothers tells the entire Church and the entire world that
Christ is wisdom, Christ is strength, Christ is light, Christ is truth, Christ
is life. The world certainly hesitate to
believe all that, and sometimes Christians themselves forget it. So both need the steady, fervent witness of
religious.
What a glory it is for us, then, to see and hold precious our brothers who have answered Christi’s call to personal holiness within the family of Edmund Rice and who have borne faithful witness for so many years. May God continue to bless them, and thru them all the rest of us!
No comments:
Post a Comment