Sermons & Tracts 3 part 1/12

SERMONS ON THE SAINTS. SERMON 188. On the feast of St. Vincent. 1. Introduction. Although, most beloved, one faith makes the glorious passions of all the martyrs, whom places distinguished by regions have merited, venerable to all with undistinguished honor; nevertheless those claim for themselves a special dignity in this homage of veneration, who both raised up the Church of God above the rest by their teachings and aided it by their patronage. Among whom we justly, with catholic zeal, celebrate the blessed levite Vincent, by whose confession and death we without hesitation acknowledge Christ preached to the unbelieving.

That he might the more zealously commend the devotion of the faithful to God, burning with a loftier affection of charity, he at length faithfully offered himself to death: namely, that the strength of faith, founded on the most solid rock, Christ, might be given to his followers to imitate; and also that the seed of apostolic preaching, disseminated by him to many, made safe by the help of his intercession and filled full with the fruit of perfect consummation, might at last be stored in the heavenly barns. Let those, then, who are his own venerate him the more, whom even strangers admire: so that he may show himself the more bountiful in benefits to those to whom he shall know himself the more beloved in joys; and in his solemnity there may arise a richer scope of gladness, from which the effect of faith has grown. 2.

The levite, a minister of the Lord's blood. Unconquered by torments. Finally, this man's spirit shone with so great a gift of virtues that, upheld by the office of the sacred ministry, he who was to follow the Son of God our Lord in his passion, might first minister the chalice of that same Christ unto salvation to those who believe. Happily made drunk in mind by drinking it, he undismayed approached the madness of the raging enemy, savage against Christ; modest, he endured it; secure, he mocked it: knowing that he was prepared to resist, not knowing that he was exalted because he conquered: because, protected by spiritual arms through love of him whom he resisted, by his aid he, invincible, by bravely suffering conquered whatever of punishments the wrath of the raging one contrived against him.

Therefore neither the red-hot plates of the fiery pan, nor the little rack, nor the iron claws and hands, nor the fearful strength of those striking, nor the pain of his torn limbs, nor the crackle of the fire and the injection of salt into his open bowels, availed Dacian in any degree to subdue him to his command: but while the swelling of his madness grew to such a point that, exulting, he might boast to have either conquered or slain one subdued by such great pains of sufferings, he, frustrated of the hope he had conceived, from the very place where he had seemed to appear the victor, was thence compelled, defeated, to blush; since by however harsher a penalty God's Martyr was pressed, by so much the more ample constancy of confession did he exult. 3. The working of the devil in Dacian, of Christ in Vincent. Vincent is tortured in secret.

Wherefore, brethren, it pleases us to survey or recall more plainly even the last things of his very passion; so that your Holiness may observe to what point the devil led on his minister by wiles, and how Christ preserved his servant even to the end. From which this indeed was marvelous, that in as much as this man was outwardly crushed and confined by manifold kinds of punishments, so much inwardly, with the inner man rejoicing, was he enlarged: and by however much the other was outwardly puffed up with the boasting of temporal power, so much inwardly, weighing that he was despised, tormented in the inner man, was he choked. Therefore, seeing himself despised, he raged, and found no one on whom he might now inflict vengeance.

For he saw the hands of the raging executioners find in him more of wound than of body: and that his sole vigorous spirit reproached its folly with that very rule of truth by which it provoked him. Wherefore, believing that he would avert the cause of his confusion if he removed from sight the person who had scorned him, and that Dacian would blush the less if the people did not see Vincent, he ordered him to be removed from public view. But that not even thus he might lack torment, he is laid down upon a broken potsherd where he lay; so that the force of the sharpness might rend all the more the mangled mass of the body cast upon it, and his limbs, given back to torments, might meet the fragments that would cut them. 4. He is healed by God, and dies on a soft bed. Yet blind cruelty is deceived in its opinion of conquering.

For divine goodness, accompanying its beloved yet more in his confession, brought a new light into the darkness, and rendered the dark dungeon a splendid tabernacle. The healing hand of God cherished his numbed limbs, and with a more graceful increase of former health made good the injuries of his pierced side. The keepers, therefore, struck by the unwonted brightness of this light, were stunned: nay, the mind of the pale doorkeeper trembled with dread at the voice of the Angels chanting a hymn to God. The lifeless minister ran to the president, whom the report of the messenger was to strike more gravely than the blow of a sword: and when out of the greatness of the matter he could not keep silent what he had seen, trembling seizes the judge, grief lacerates him, fury inflames him.

And lest Vincent, conquering amid punishments, should obtain the glory of martyrdom, Let him be brought forth more quickly from prison, said Dacian; lest, while we persist in punishing the rebel, we should rather seem to crown him with victory. He is therefore brought forth from that pit of the foul prison, indeed more beautiful by heavenly grace, and, were he still to suffer, more robust. But when the mind sees that the desire of one stretching toward the call of the kingdom is to be broken by no kind of punishment or death, the envious mind bids props of a gentler couch be substituted, and that he be comforted with a more soothing rest: namely, that if, the executioner being removed a little, he should breathe out his soul in quiet, he might be said to have not been slain, but to have died: as if he did not perish by the punishment with which the punishment itself likewise perished. 5.

His body cast to the wild beasts. Meanwhile the heavenly hall receives the blessed Vincent, and endows him with the gift of blessed felicity. At his entrance the angelic spirits rejoice, and all the fellow-citizens, the saints, together give congratulation. And we give thanks to you, Lord Jesus, that the soul worthy of fellowship with you, which steadfastly bore the torment, deceitfully fled the deference offered; and which, being content that the persecutor should rage, disdained that he should spare. Therefore, knowing of his holy departure, the mad judge—Dacian, not knowing that Christ had conquered in Vincent—promises himself vengeance by the exposure of that corpse, of whose power he groans at the victory. For he orders the lictors to cast the body to be devoured by wild beasts and dogs, his pride of fury thus begun:

that with such food he might fill the belly of those whose mind he himself bore. 6. A raven guards, a wolf venerates. But so that, by the divine benefits increasing, a grace of greater victory might be conferred on Vincent, a raven is sent, a bird hostile to corpses, to guard, hungry, the body's exposed banquet. Hence, most beloved brethren, hence mark the distinct services of merits. Elijah of old, warily shunning the impious hands of Ahab and Jezebel, is fed in the desert by ministering ravens: but Vincent, the champion of truth, slain by the fury of Dacian, is exposed to the beasts to be consumed, yet by the serving raven is preserved unharmed. Elijah therefore obtained, by divine command, with ravens supplying, that he might be nourished (1 Kings 17);

it was granted to Vincent, with the raven likewise serving, that he should not be eaten. And that the raven might show itself designated a guardian from heaven, it drove off from afar with no sluggish onset the other approaching birds; among which it also, beating off with feathers and wings, drove far away a huge wolf approaching nearer, as one who would presume with sacrilegious audacity to defile the entrusted treasure. But that wolf, by a certain bearing of itself, stupefied, indicated that it had come not so much to inflict injury as to increase the pomp of the miracle. O shameless fury, and foolish madness! The raven serves, the wolf venerates; Dacian persecutes, nor blushes to wish, still fierce, to destroy him whom tamed bestial savagery was busy to protect. 7.

Sunk in the sea, he is restored to the shore. Hence, to conceal the Martyr's praise, he chose not now a secret place but the deep; believing that not enclosures but the seas would keep faith with him for the hiding of his glory: as though the same were not Lord of the element through whom lately the hidden things of the prison had shone for him, radiated with heavenly splendor. The body is given to sailors to be sunk in the waves; that at least the waters might serve to aid him for whom the land had failed for conquering the soldier of Christ. And so, having sailed for the most part over the whirlpools of the strait, the cast-out body, amid the engulfing seabirds, was overtaken by the most mighty right hand of God; and that hand which had borne the spirit into heaven, soon brought the body back to the sepulchre.

Thus the preacher of truth, dearly beloved, is neither conquered by the pains of torments, nor overcome by the straits of the gloomy prison. Cast to the beasts, he is not torn apart; hidden in the deep, he is not concealed; but is restored to the shore, and made famous by proclamation: so that he who had truly confessed the name of the Godhead might in truth experience the supports of the divine goodness present to him. His glorious life of virtues the grace of a precious death so adorned, that what he taught by living he steadfastly established by dying: and it was consequent that he should attain by death to the vision of him whom by the praiseworthy conduct of his life he had ever borne witness to, knowing that from contempt of the present life arises the glory of eternal blessedness;

our Lord Jesus Christ granting it, who lives and reigns God forever and ever. Amen. SERMON 189. On the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. 1. The prophecy of Jacob concerning Benjamin is fulfilled in Paul. Today from the Acts of the Apostles this lesson has been pronounced, where Paul the apostle, from a persecutor of Christians, was made an announcer of Christ. For Christ prostrated the persecutor, that he might make him a teacher of the Church: striking him and healing, slaying and giving life. The lamb slew the wolf, making a lamb of the wolf. For thus it was in the illustrious prophecy, when Jacob the patriarch blessed his sons, touching the present, foreseeing the future. It had been foretold what befell in Paul.

For Paul was, as he himself testifies, of the tribe of Benjamin (Phil. 3:5). But when Jacob, blessing his sons, had come to bless Benjamin, he says of him: Benjamin is a ravening wolf. What then? A ravening wolf always? By no means: but he who in the morning shall seize the prey, in the evening shall divide the food (Gen. 49:27). This was fulfilled in the apostle Paul; for concerning him too it had been said. Now, if you please, let us hear him seizing in the morning, dividing the food in the evening. 2. Paul, the wolf seizing in the morning. Morning and evening are set for as if it were said, Before and after. So then let us understand: First he will seize, afterward he will divide the food. Consider the seizer:

Saul, it says, having received letters from the chief priests, went, that wherever he might find Christians he might drag and lead them to the priests (Acts 9:1-2), assuredly to be punished. He went breathing and panting slaughter; this is the one seizing in the morning. For also when Stephen, the first martyr, was stoned for the name of Christ, Saul too was more evidently present: and he was present at the stoning in such a way that it was not enough for him if he should only stone with his own hands. For that he might be in the hands of all who stoned, he himself kept the garments of all: raging more by helping all, than by stoning with his own hands (Acts 7:57). We have heard, he shall seize in the morning; let us see how in the evening he divides the food. 5. In the evening he divides the food.

Paul, a pattern for those beginning to believe. Prostrated by the voice of Christ from heaven, and receiving from above the interdict against raging any longer, he fell on his face; first to be prostrated, afterward to be raised up; first to be struck, afterward to be healed: for Christ would not live in him afterward, unless there were slain in him that which had ill lived before. What then, prostrated, does he hear? Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goad. And he: Who are you, Lord? And the voice from above: I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you persecute. His limbs still laid on the earth, the head cried out in heaven, and did not say, Why do you persecute my faithful ones; but, Why do you persecute me? And he: What do you bid me do?

Now he prepares himself to obey, who before raged to persecute. Now a preacher is formed from a persecutor, a sheep from a wolf, a soldier from an enemy; he hears what he ought to do. He was indeed made blind, that his heart might shine with an inner light. The outer light was for a time withdrawn from the persecutor, that it might be restored to the preacher: and yet at that very time when he did not see other things, he saw Jesus. And so from his very blindness was formed the mystery of believers, that whoever believes in Christ ought to gaze upon him alone, and to count the rest as if not born. Let the creature grow worthless, that the Creator may grow sweet in the heart. Let us see, then. 4. Saul's monstrous reputation. He was led to Ananias, and Ananias is interpreted Sheep.

Behold, the ravening wolf is led to the sheep to follow it, not to seize it. But lest the sheep should be terrified of the seizing wolf, the very Shepherd from heaven who was doing all things announced that the wolf would come to the sheep, but would not rage. And yet so monstrous a reputation had preceded that wolf, that the sheep, hearing his name, could not but be troubled. For when the Lord Jesus had announced to that same Ananias that Saul had come, and that he should now believe, and that Ananias ought to go to him; Ananias says: Lord, I have heard from many of this man, how much evil he has done to your saints; and now he has received letters from the chief priests, that wherever he finds followers of your name, he may drag them off. But the Lord to him: Let be;

I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name (Acts 9:13-16). A wondrous and mighty thing is done: the savagery of the wolf is forbidden; the wolf is led captive to the sheep. But so great a reputation of the ravening wolf had preceded, that at hearing his name the sheep feared even under the hand of the shepherd. He is strengthened; let him not now think him raging, let him not fear him fearing. From the Lamb slain for the sheep, the sheep is made secure about the wolf. 5. However much we may suffer, that which we hope for outweighs it. — I, he says, will show him how great things he must suffer for my name. Where there is terror, there is salvation. He who acted against the name of the shepherd, suffers for the name of the shepherd. O savagery! O mercy! You see him prepare the sword: he is to follow, not to destroy;

to heal, not to slay. Christ said, I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name. But to what end? Hear him who was suffering: The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory that shall be revealed in us (Rom. 8:18); as if he should say, Let the world rage, let the world roar, let it inveigh with tongues, let it flash with arms, let it do whatever it can; what will it do against that which we are to receive? I weigh what I suffer against that which I hope for: this I feel, that I believe; and yet that which I believe is greater than that which I feel. Whatever it is that rages for the name of Christ, if it may be lived through, is tolerable; if it may not be lived through, it causes one to migrate hence: it does not extinguish, but hastens the very reward, the very sweetness;

which, when it shall have come, will be without end. The work is with an end; the wage is without end. For even the laborer would fail on the way, unless he attended to what he was to receive. For when you attend to what you are to receive, all things that you suffer will be vile to you, nor will you deem them worthy in comparison with that which you receive. You will marvel that so much is given for so little labor. Our way is Christ; attend to Christ. He came to suffer, but also to be glorified; to be despised, but also to be exalted; to die, but also to rise again. 6. The usefulness of Paul's conversion. Considering these things, dearly beloved brethren, let us not despair; because, although we are sinners, we have a great Physician. Hear the Physician himself: I came not, he says, to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Matt. 9:13).

Now the usefulness of this deed done is this: the Apostle himself commemorates it in his Epistles. For he says that the pardon of all his sins was for this reason given to him, that no one should despair of himself who has been involved in great sins and entangled in great crimes: as though he were not to receive pardon, if he should be converted to him who, hanging on the cross, prayed even for his persecutors, saying: Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do (Luke 23:34). That man was made from a persecutor a preacher and leader of the Gentiles. Who before, he says, was a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious (1 Tim. 1:13). Do you see the desert to which punishment was due? Therefore punishment is not repaid, but he obtains mercy in place of punishment.

For by grace we are saved from our sins; our Lord Jesus Christ bestowing it, who lives and reigns forever and ever. Amen. SERMON 190. On the Chair of St. Peter, I. 1. The reason for the festival. The institution of today's solemnity received the name of the Chair from our elders, for the reason that Peter, the first of the Apostles, is reported to have taken up today the chair of the episcopate. Rightly, therefore, do they keep the Birthday of that see of the Church, which the Apostle took up for the welfare of the Churches, the Lord saying: You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church (Matt. 16:18). The Lord therefore named Peter the foundation of the Church:

and therefore worthily the Church venerates this foundation, upon which the height of the ecclesiastical building rises up. Hence fittingly the Psalm that was read says, Let them exalt him in the church of the people, and praise him in the seat of the elders (Ps. 106:32). Well did God command that he be exalted in the Church; because it is worthy that this foundation be honored in the Church, through which one ascends to heaven. Therefore that which is kept today as the birthday of the chair, honors the priestly office. This the Churches confer upon themselves, for whom it is necessary that they have so much the more of dignity, as the priestly office has more of honor. 2. A superstition introduced on this day. Holy souls are already with Christ.

Since a religious observance has rightly introduced this solemnity into the Churches, I marvel why among certain unbelievers so pernicious an error has today grown up, that they bring food and wine upon the tombs of the dead; as though souls that have gone forth from bodies should require carnal food. For feasts and refreshments the flesh alone requires; but the spirit and the soul do not need these. Someone says he prepares for his dear ones what he himself devours; what he furnishes to the belly, he imputes to piety. Cease therefore, brethren, from this gentile error of unbelief.

For holy souls, which in this world are either pure through innocence of life, or are purged by the satisfaction of penance, are received by our Savior, and are to be believed to be with him, according to the saying of the Apostle, I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ (Phil. 1:23). The souls, therefore, of our brethren and parents are by no means delighted with carnal foods: they can be offended by these rather than delighted, if, while they abide in their sacred seats, you should believe them to be on earth. Cease therefore from these errors, and, as it is written, Savor the things that are above, not the things that are upon the earth (Col. 3:2):

that, rejecting the superstitions contrary to our faith, while you readily do those things which are pleasing to God, you too may be able to be with Christ forever. May He Himself deign to grant this, etc. SERMON 191. On the Chair of St. Peter, section 1. This feast coincides with Lent. Although the solemnity of today's festival is rightly honored by us — because in keeping the Nativity of the Chair we venerate the episcopate of the apostle Peter — nevertheless, whenever this solemnity falls within the days of Lent, the reverence of those holy days ought to make it the more pleasing to us. For God has fittingly bestowed on us the Nativity of the Chair amid the very beginnings of the fasts, so that what was formerly a matter of intemperance may now be one of sobriety;

what belonged to gluttony may be one of abstinence; what was of sin may be of sanctity. And since unbelieving men seem to be drawn to this superstition under the guise of piety, let us show them by what better means they may be able to help the souls of their departed. 2. By what ways the dead may be aided. Let the devout pray daily for their dear ones, let them appeal to the Lord with a mournful voice, let them pray for pardon of the errors and remission of the lapses of the dead; let them feed the hungry, clothe the naked: so that whatever has been left undone through the negligence of the departed may be fulfilled by the faith of the living. Let each one also employ the prayers of the saints for his dear ones, let him offer sacrifices, and commend them to the Lord with priestly intercession. And if perhaps it be required of us on what authority this is said:

since this is not our own teaching but that of the Churches — and if of the Churches, then surely of God, for the teacher of all the Churches is God — thus we shall answer them with His words: These are the things which can help your dear ones, these are the refreshments of those at rest, these are the remedies of the dead. 3. Feasts placed at tombs profit them nothing. But the foods and drinks which are set upon graves, if any care of this superstition pertains to the dead, can harm rather than delight them. If anyone offers wine to one whom he knows to be tormented for the intemperance of wine and gluttony, this is an insult rather than a kindness, a reproach of the crime, not an office of charity.

So it is that to departed sinners there seems to be brought by their dear ones not so much the consolations of love as an accumulation of the torments of conscience. These things we have said concerning sinners. But if the one for whom these things are prepared is a saint, they in no way pertain to him. Let each one of you do that which we said above, so that through prayers, through almsgiving, through sacrifices, through oblations he may both benefit his departed and profit himself: that is, if the one for whom he does these things is a sinner, that his sins may be lightened; but if the one for whom he offers sacrifices to God is a saint, that he may deserve to be with the Saints forever — our Lord Jesus Christ Himself granting it, to whom is honor and glory unto the ages of ages. Amen. SERMON 192. On the Chair of St. Peter, III. 1.

Peter profited by his own errors. The dignity and meaning of the name of Peter. You know, most beloved brethren, that the most blessed Peter, in the Passion of the Savior, profited by his own errors, and after he had denied the Lord, became better in the Lord's sight. For he became more faithful after he wept that he had lost his faith; and thus he found a greater grace than he had lost. For, like a good shepherd, he received a flock to be tended: so that he who had before been weak in himself might become a firm support to all; and he who had wavered under the trial of questioning might establish others in the steadfastness of faith. Finally, for the solidity of his devotion he is called the rock of the Churches, as the Lord says: You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church (Matthew

16:18). For he is called rock because he first laid the foundations of faith among the nations, and, like an immovable stone, holds together the structure and mass of the whole Christian work. Peter, then, is called rock on account of his devotion; and the Lord is named rock on account of His power, as the Apostle says: For they drank of the spiritual rock that followed them; and that rock was Christ (1 Corinthians 10:4). Rightly does he merit fellowship of the name who merits fellowship also of the work. For in the same house Peter lays the foundation, Peter plants; the Lord gives the increase, the Lord supplies the watering. Peter therefore profits by his temptations, rejoices in his weepings, grows through his perils. 2. Peter's steps upon the waters. He is sustained by faith.

It is more wonderful than the passage of Israel through the sea. For thus, when the rash wayfarer steps upon the waves in the sea, he staggers in his gait, but grows strong in his affection: he is imperiled in body, but does not fall through devotion; he sinks by his feet, but is upheld by Christ's right hand. For faith upheld him whom the wave was engulfing: and him whom the storm of the billows was troubling, the love of the Savior confirmed. For Peter was walking on the sea more by love than by his feet (Matthew 14:29). For he did not see where he might plant the print of his foot; but he saw where he might fix the footstep of charity. For placed in the boat he gazes upon the Lord; and, led by love of Him, he goes down into the sea. He does not think of the slipping waters, nor of the running currents:

and while he looks upon Christ, he does not look upon the element; he believes that faith finds a solid footing even amid the waves. Though the sea be tossed by billows, though the deep be troubled by winds, yet Peter's path, which leads to the Lord, is not troubled. Peter therefore walks upon the waters, and beneath his feet the soft wave does not give way. We read in the Old Testament that the sons of Israel walked through the Red Sea by dry paths, and that, for the security of those who trod it, lest a single one should slip, it was changed into a kind of solidity (Exodus 15). How much better here, when, as Peter walks, the wave is neither changed nor injured; the water is neither made solid nor recedes? Better, I say, is it where the same wave that surges also sustains;

where the same flood that engulfs also serves. There, that the people of Israel might be carried through the sea, nature had lost its own passage: here Peter is carried upon the waters, and the streams do not lose their own course. 3. When faith fails, the path fails. Only through perils does one come to Christ. The rash wayfarer, then, the Apostle, takes the way of a new journey: now he climbs the mass of the curving flood, now he descends the hollow of the subsiding wave, and amid the sea's billows there is no lack for him of ascent and descent of that journey. But when, troubled by the winds, driven by the storms, he begins to fear what he had believed, at once the flood is withdrawn from him, the wave is drawn away. For soon, when faith grows weary, the path too grows weary.