A reading of the holy gospel according to Matthew. Jesus said to the crowd, I solemnly assure you, history has not known a man born of woman greater than John the baptizer. Yet, the least born into the kingdom of god is greater than John. From John the baptizer's time until now, the kingdom of god has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force. All the prophets as well as the law spoke prophetically until John the baptizer came.
If you are prepared to accept it, he is Elijah, the one who was certain to come. Heed carefully what you hear, and this is the gospel of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen. During this holy season of Advent, this is the first appearance of John the baptizer, and his appearance is very dramatic. There is one little idea here that may escape us.
Our blessed lord is speaking. Please notice that. And he says, and I quote, I solemnly assure you, history has not known a man born of woman greater than John the baptizer. Now that is a pretty sweeping statement. There were many great and glorious and noble and heroic men born.
And Christ says very plainly, and he says, I solemnly assure you that none born that no man up to this time has been greater than John the baptizer. Now listen at what he says next. Yet, yet this is our blessed lord speaking. Yet the least born into the kingdom of god is greater than John. Think about that a minute.
That the Christ says that John was the greatest of all men born of a woman up until this moment. And then he write immediately. The very next sentence, Christ says, the least in the kingdom of god is greater than John. In other words, do we Christians recognize who we are? And the answer is we don't.
We don't think about it enough. And even when we think about it, how much do we try to do about it? Do we recognize in ourselves what has happened to us? Today there is such an attitude, an atmosphere, a climate, say name it as you will, which tries to obliterate differences. There's a a far sweeping attitude which says what you think, what you believe, these are immaterial added things.
Don't bother about them. What matters most is just how we get along with one another. Now remember, is that if there is any such thing as truth in the world, if there is any such thing as truth, if there is any such thing as goodness in the world, then its opposites cannot be good or true. You cannot put these things together. It's impossible.
And so this effort to make us all on the same level, to minimize differences and even to deny them or to say, well, whatever the differences be, they make no difference. It's not important what religion you have. That was said very publicly not more than a few days ago on a national network. That your religion makes no more difference than the color of your face. Now these are the things we're faced with, but our blessed lord says that John the baptizer was the greatest of men born of women.
And then he add this, that the least in the kingdom of God is greater than John. Now who's in the kingdom of God? Is everybody in the kingdom of God? Well, the fact that Christ says the least implies that there's something more. Not everyone is in the kingdom of god.
And how do you get in the kingdom of god? The ordinary, normal procedure is baptism. Notice what I said, the normal, ordinary procedure. It's not the only way, but there is certainly some kind of a difference. There is certainly something which marks, something which characterizes, something in fact which transforms, transforms those men and women who do or do not enter into the kingdom of God.
That those in the kingdom of God are immeasurably different, immeasurably different from those who are not in the kingdom of god. This you you see, there's so much talk today about people not recognizing their worth, that they feel so unworthy, that they feel so rejected, that they feel of no account. How can a Catholic ever have such an idea? How can a Christian ever harbor such a thought? If they're Christians, if they are Christians in fact as well as in word.
Today, we are celebrating the feast of Saint Lucie, and Lucie means light, looks. She was a fourth century martyr in Sicily, and in that part of the world is a tremendously popular saint, has been and is. She's the fourth century, and she pledged to God her virginity and she gave all her wealth for the poor. And in return, she was treated with the gift of martyrdom. Now here's the point I'd like to make about Saint Lucie.
In the account of her martyrdom, which may or may not be very authentic, but this idea has come down the centuries that when she refused to offer sacrifice to the gods, which is a very simple little thing to do, when she refused to do that, the prefect says, well, why don't you? And she says, my body is the temple of the holy spirit. And the prefect said, well, if that's true, I'll take care of that. I'll condemn you to live with prostitutes. And Lucy then, according to this story, said, alright.
You may very well do that, but you will not take away my virtue of chastity. Now this is a saint in the fourth century. Now how authentic or not that story is, the point is this, that tremendous idea that virtue consists in something more than the physical has come down the centuries. And this is what we must realize in our lives as members of Christ, as citizens of Christ's kingdom, that we are not dealing here with merely the pragmatic norms of conduct, well, of which there are plenty of examples in this country. We are utmost champions of the pragmatic and the utilitarian norms.
But what we are saying is this, that we realize in our minds and in our hearts who we are. And that having realized that, having accepted this tremendous truth, then we act upon it. Then we act upon it. Because action is important. It's not enough just to say I believe, I know.
That's not enough. As Peter as James said, faith without good works is dead. So there's no idea of or there's no effort here to minimize the physical. There's no effort here to minimize works as we say. There is no effort here to minimize action of which we have loads of it today.
We are not here denying the importance of productivity. You hear this all around you. But what is more important is what we realize that we realize the truth of a matter, that we realize who we are, that we are born by baptism or its equivalent into the kingdom of God. And that in that kingdom, great as John the Baptizer was, Christ said, the least of you the least of you is greater than John. Think of that in terms of your personal worth.
In the name of the father, of the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.