19th Sunday after Pentecost 23 Oct 2011 Sermon

19th Sunday after Pentecost 23.10.11 The whole truth

A social worker said to me recently that in her job she mixed with many clergy and she did not care what denomination they might be; she just works with all of them. This is a very typical comment these days, expressing a sort of ecumenical openness to all comers.

It is a good thing to respect people for their basic worth and dignity. However it does not follow that one’s religion is a matter of secondary or no importance. This would be faulty logic. It is right to want to respect everyone but wrong if in doing that we lose sight of the importance of truth in our spiritual lives.

We used to have a big problem with sectarianism in Australia, where Catholics and Protestants were openly hostile to each other. We are largely over that problem but now we might have the opposite one instead: namely, religious indifferentism.

In the interests of keeping the peace we have reached a point where many no longer think it matters in the least what people actually believe, as long as they are allowed to believe it!
Whether the beliefs are actually right or wrong is not an issue.

In fact, though, the possessing of religious truth is a matter of utmost importance. For one thing our salvation could be at stake. If we do not know the truth of what we should believe or how we should behave how can we know if we are at rights with God?

For another thing, and even more important, God deserves our best efforts to know as much about Him as possible and to have accurate knowledge. We pursue accuracy in all sorts of other fields, such as science, engineering, courts of law, calculating interest rates, keeping statistics, counting votes – surely we can do as much for God Himself.

In the same exaggerated ecumenical spirit it is considered that any effort to convince others of the truth of one’s own beliefs is ‘poor form’, a violation of the other’s right to privacy. It is also considered as a kind of arrogance. Who do you think you are to be telling me what to believe?

But if what we believe is true should we not try to tell others about it? If we had discovered a medicine that would cure all the diseases of the world would we not make it known? We have something better still, a medicine which will bring eternal happiness.

It may be we will be interrupting people’s lives and their established order but they will thank us later. The apostles did not apologise for bringing the Gospel to other nations; nor did Our Lord Himself apologize for bringing a New Covenant.

As to being arrogant we are not just lecturing people what to believe. True religion should also produce true love, and true behaviour. If we could manage to live what we believe there would be no contradictions. The truth of the Gospel remains intact, whether we live it or not; but if we want to ‘sell’ it we must live it better, along the lines of today’s Epistle: no lying, stealing, unjust anger etc.

The lady who works with all ‘denominations’ must think that ‘Catholic’ is just one of many versions of Christianity. Many people think this, including a lot of Catholics.

But it is not so. We are not just a ‘denomination’. The Catholic Church is simply THE Church, the only Church. The others are ‘ecclesial communities’ but not in full union with the Church. They may be better people than we are but they are in a leaky boat. We need both the boat and the people to be good!

In any case what could be better for overall tolerance than if we all believed the same things? So the desire for the Catholic Church to include every person in the world is, among other things, a push for greater unity and peace.

Our Lord calls us to the banquet (today’s Gospel). This presupposes that we are all coming to the same thing, all of one mind. With His help we can be truly one, in belief and action.