FROM THE PASTOR’S DESK
My Dear Parishioners
Christ tells us in today’s Gospel that, “your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.” In this one sentence, Christ calls us to great things and reminds us of our purpose. This teaching comes during the Sermon on the Mount just after we are given the Beatitudes and just before we are told that Christ came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it. This context can help us to understand how important this teaching is. Our Lord is giving us his new law, a law that fulfills the old law. This law is not merely a set of rules, but a map to return to the Father so that he may be glorified and in turn glorify us and draw us to himself in Heaven. With this context in mind, let us turn to today’s Gospel.
First, Christ says that “your light must shine before others.” What is this light of which our Savior speaks? How does it shine? The Rite of Baptism is illuminating here. After the person receives the gift of Baptism, they are given a lighted candle. The celebrant of Baptism then says, “Receive the light of Christ.” They are instructed that this light of Christ is to be kept burning brightly. The light our Lord speaks of is the light of his own life. In John 15, Christ teaches us that he is the vine and we are the branches: that his life flows into us as long as we remain connected to him, and we do this by keeping his commandments. (John 15:10)
What, then, are these commandments? In John’s Gospel we are told it is to “love one another as I have loved you.” St. Matthew outlines what this looks like in the Beatitudes, which Christ teaches us immediately before today’s Gospel. But here we must expand our view a bit. The verses in St. Matthew’s Gospel immediately after our reading ends is, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place.” (Matthew 5:17-18) This means that while many of the ceremonial laws no longer apply directly to us, and the method of entering into covenant with God is now baptism (instead of circumcision), God’s commands in the Old Testament still apply. We read in Isaiah, “share your bread with the hungry, shelter the oppressed and homeless; clothe the naked.” These are not questions, but commands from God. The Lord says through Isaiah that if we do these things, “your light shall break forth like the dawn.” Furthermore, to do this we are to remove “oppression, false accusation and malicious speech.”
To let our light shine, then, we must live our faith, and our faith is not lived simply by reading books and saying nice things to one another. Our faith is live by doing real and concrete actions to help those around us and to bring the glory of God’s kingdom into the world. This leads us to the next teaching.
Second, Christ says, “that they may see your good deeds.” This may seem counterintuitive, because almost everybody I know remembers the verses “take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them” and “when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right is doing.” Even more, these verses are in the next chapter of St. Matthew’s Gospel! (6:1, 6:3, respectively) This may appear to be a contradiction of what our Lord has just said, but let’s look more closely. In these later verses, Christ says being seen cannot be why we do these holy things, but he does not say that people cannot see our righteous deeds. Too often, us Catholics (and many other Christians) ignore Jesus Christ’s direct and clear call to care for those around us and to glorify God through our actions, citing a distortion of these verses. We must do these things: God himself commands us to do good deeds and to care for those in need! If people see us do them, so be it. This leads me to my final point.
Finally, Christ says, “and glorify your heavenly Father.” Our good deeds should be done for one reason: they glorify God. God is glorified through worship and praise, but he is also glorified when his children imitate him. He is glorified when we live out the call of our Baptism: to allow the light of Christ to shine through us into the world. We must do good and holy deeds. We must not be afraid to do them publicly. We must seek not to glorify ourselves through these actions, but to glorify God.
Today’s readings are quite clear: we must put our faith into action, and this means that we must take care of the disadvantaged, the poor, the homeless. We must look for those who have been rejected by our world–and often, even by us–and treat them with the dignity and respect that they deserve. They deserve dignity and respect because they, like us, were made in the image and likeness of God. Christianity, since its very beginning, has been marked not by words, but by action. The words matter. The beliefs matter. But our faith in God and our beliefs are demonstrated by the way we live our lives and by the actions we choose to do. Today’s scriptures remind us that all our actions must be directed to one goal: giving glory to God.
Peace,
Fr. Monteleone
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