The Sunday Sermon Archive

Dear Friend,

Let us consider today the virtue of Faith. Our Lord tells St. Thomas that those who believe without seeing are blessed. This is where God's providence has placed us _ we must believe without seeing.

When we consider our lives and the lives of the saints who have gone before us, we often feel that somehow we have been slighted or that perhaps we are less worthy of God's graces and mercy than they were. We imagine that our faith would be so much stronger if we could only see and touch Christ as St. Thomas did. Or, if only God would manifest Himself to us in some way, we would be much better Catholics.

It is as if we think that God has grown tired over time, or that He is grown weary of helping us, or that He is perhaps incapable of doing for us what He has done for so many others. All of these are blasphemous thoughts which should be quickly dismissed as the evil temptations that they are. God is all powerful, all good, and all loving. All that He does for us is ultimately for our own good and in our own best interest.

Then why are there so few true miracles today? Perhaps the answer is given by Our Lord Himself: "An evil and adulterous generation seeketh for a sign: and a sign shall not be given it, but the sign of Jonas, the prophet." (Matt. 12, 39)

The sign of Jonas the prophet is Christ Himself who died and rose again the third day; just as Jonas was in the belly of the great fish for three days, Christ's body was in the tomb for three days before He rose from the dead.

This is the only sign that is given to an evil and adulterous generation. Would we have more true miracles with signs and wonders? Then, the solution is simple we must put aside our evil and adulterous ways. Otherwise, we will only have signs enough to condemn us.

The historical fact of Christ's resurrection should be sufficient grace for us all to believe and transform our lives, but it all too often is not and proves only enough to condemn us to eternal hell fire.

For those who have the true faith, that is, those who not only profess with their lips, but put the faith into practice, these find sufficient grace in the historical fact of Christ's resurrection and in the ordinary things of their day.

We may be forced to live in an evil and adulterous world today but, we are not condemned to be one with this evil and adulterous world in which we live. On the contrary, we are called to separate ourselves from this and unite ourselves to Christ and His Church. If we will cooperate with the graces that we have already been given, we will find and build up the courage to follow Christ. And in following Him, our faith will grow stronger. Eventually, if we continue in this receiving and cooperating with each of God's graces we reach the point in our lives where we will no longer need all the signs and wonders.

For example, once we have attained a true and strong belief in our Lord's real presence in the Holy Eucharist, we no longer need any miraculous sign to prove His presence to us. Our Lord once manifested himself in the Holy Eucharist and the priest and people requested that the bishop come and see this miracle. The bishop did not go. He simply replied that this miracle was for those who doubted. He believes and does not doubt, and so does not need to see this miracle.

This is the faith that we must develop so that we may be among the blessed that our Lord refers to when He says: "Blessed are they who have not seen yet, believe."

Such faith is based upon the simple word of God. We believe all the truths which the Holy Catholic Church teaches because God has revealed them. And He can neither deceive nor be deceived.

Let us take to heart this very important lesson that Our Lord teaches us through St. Thomas. Let us avoid the sins of the evil and adulterous generation. Let us distance ourselves from the evils and adulteries of this world. In this innocence and purity, if God deems it in our best interest not to manifest Himself directly to us, let us pray and beg the intersession of St. Thomas that we may develop a strong and unmoving belief so that we may be among those whom our Lord calls blessed.

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