Dedication of the Lateran Basilica 9 November 2025 Unity
Our Lord Himself prayed for the unity of His disciples, as we see in John 17,21… that they may all be one.
He must have been looking into the future when He prayed that prayer! What a tangle we have made of it, dividing and subdividing in so many ways, thousands of groups.
Only God can answer His own prayer. Father, may they all be one. He will not force us but He will make the way clear.
Today’s feast reminds us that God does value the unity of His disciples.
The Lateran Basilica is the Cathedral church of Rome. Rome is our spiritual centre, so its cathedral represents the unity of the Catholic Church, worldwide.
Have we kept that unity? Partially, imperfectly. The rest of the process we are still praying for!
Unity stems from Christ Himself. He founded the Church to be a visible link with Himself. And a source of sacramental help. Those who belong to this Church are united with Him and with each other, and will be nourished by the Good Shepherd.
Our Lord said He would found the Church on rock and now we have become a big rock. Not, however, a rock that is meant to crush, but to be a foundation on which we can stand. (Eph 2,20).
The existence of the Church gives us a secure foundation for our individual lives. Without the Church we would not know Jesus Christ. It was the Church that gave us the Bible. It was the Church that has preached and taught the Gospel in every age since the time of Christ.
It is the Church that guides us on
matters of belief and practice.
Many challenge the Catholic Church’s claim to teach the truth. We do not make this claim out of any sense that we are better or smarter than other people; only that Our Lord has guaranteed that the Holy Spirit would guide the Church in all important matters. He will teach you all things (Jn 16,13).
This is divine activity not human. We do not claim credit for it; we simply recognize the action of God when He does act.
We can have cultural differences regarding clothes, food, music and the like. We can have different personal preferences, for all sorts of things.
But we cannot have different beliefs when it comes to basic doctrines and practices, things which determine whether we are still with Him, or against Him.(Mt 12,30)
We use our intellect to see why the Church teaching is true. We will never win an argument with God! We can come around to seeing the truth and the value of all His teachings.
We do not always practise what we preach. Should we change the preaching or the practise? We cannot change the word of God, but we can grow in our understanding of that word, and with God's help put it into practice.
Today, we gather around the one altar, offering one perfect sacrifice to the Father.
The splendour of many of our churches expresses the love for God that we wish to achieve and give back to Him. We can worship in a stable, but if we have the means we also beautify our churches as an aid to prayer and an inspiration to do good.
May He accept our humble praise from this church on this day. May He grant the prayer that Christ Himself made: that we all be one!
No comments:
Post a Comment