9781644135945

The Light of the World
they knew God, they have not glorified Him as God; . . . but became vain in their thoughts, and
their foolish heart was darkened. . . . And as they liked not to have God in their knowledge, God
delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient; being
filled with all iniquity, malice, fornication, avarice, wickedness, full of envy, murder, contention,
deceit, malignity; whisperers, detractors, hateful to God, contumelious, proud, haughty,
inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, foolish, dissolute, without affection, without
fidelity, without mercy” (Rom 1:21, 28- 31). What St. Paul saw and experienced, modern man
has confirmed, whose first principle is: Away with God and with belief in Him, in Christ, in
things supernatural, in the life beyond. There is only one god: man himself, humanity. Man is
his own law-giver, his own law, his own judge. It would be immoral for man to fulfill a law not
made by himself, even if it were the revealed will of God. Away, therefore, with the doctrine of
Original Sin, of a hereditary corruption. Human nature, as it is, is good, is beautiful, is pure, is
holy. What need man do besides follow his nature and live his life fully by surrendering to his
instincts and desires? Why should we need a Redeemer, a God become man, a Church, divine
help and grace? Such is the spirit of modern man, autonomous and liberated from God. He is
a god and a law to himself. We need not be surprised when we hear of injustice, untruthfulness,
egoism, corruption, and boundless moral misery on every hand in the world today. “As they
liked not to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense.” Thus
they are slaves of sin and unbelief, of the denial and hatred of God, making gods of themselves.
“The end of them is death.”
The new man. “Now yield your members to serve justice unto justification. . . . But now
being made free from sin and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification,
and the end life everlasting” (Epistle). In virtue of our baptism and of our having
become united with Christ, who is the vine, we have become the “good tree,” living branches
of Christ. “Every good tree bringeth forth good fruit,” not merely useless leaves (Gospel).
Our Lord demands fruit. “Not every one that saith to Me: Lord, Lord, shall enter into the
kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father who is in heaven, he shall enter
into the kingdom of heaven” (Gospel). This is the new man, the Christian man. But this new
man must die to concupiscence, to the allurements and desires of the flesh, to inordinate
devotion to earthly goods and pleasures, and to the desire for worldly honors. Instead of
these things, the new man must be a good tree that brings forth good fruit, living for God
in all things. He must first of all seek God and His will alone.
The liturgy today wishes us to examine ourselves seriously. “By their fruits you shall know
them” — the old man and the new man. “Now the works of the flesh [the old man] are manifest,
which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions,
emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, envies, murders, drunkenness, revellings,
and such like. . . . They who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God. But the fruit
of the Spirit [the new man] is charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity,
mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity. Against such there is no law” (Gal 5:19–23).
“As you have yielded your members to serve uncleanness and iniquity unto iniquity, so now
yield your members to serve justice unto justification.” In baptism we yielded ourselves, soul
and body, to serve justice and the will of God. This devotion of ours to God and His holy will
we deepen and renew every day in the Sacrifice of the Mass. We put whatever we may have or
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