A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Matthew. Jesus said to the chief priest and elders of the people, What do you think of this case? There was a man who had two sons. He approached the elder boy and said, son, go out and work in the vineyard today. His son replied, I'm on my way, but he never went.
We've all heard that. Then the man came to his second son and said the same thing. This two sons did what the father wanted? His his listeners answered, the second. Jesus said to them, let me make it clear that tax collectors and prostitutes are entering the kingdom of god before you.
When John came preaching a way of holiness, you put no faith in him. But the tax collectors and the prostitutes, they believed in him. Yet even when you saw that, you did not repent and believed in John. And this is the gospel of the lord. Praise the lord.
In the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy spirit, amen. This is just one illustration of why Jesus was not extremely popular with the leaders of the Jewish people. Remember, here he is face to face with the men who are the religious leaders, the bright lights, the educated men, the men in whom the people place confidence, these are the men who were close to the temple, who were close, we assumed to God. And face to face, our Lord tells us that tax collectors and prostitutes will be preferred over them. So you can see he our blessed lord wasn't exactly encouraging the high priest, the elders, and the leaders of the people to admire him.
They put him on the cross. Today, we are celebrating the feast of Saint John of the Cross, who was a colleague of Saint the church, is a priest, is a religious, and we the church encourages us to follow his example. Well, just yesterday, we were asked to follow the example of somebody else, Saint Lucie. And tomorrow, we'll be asked to follow the example of another saint. Well, all I can say is if you try to follow the example of all the saints of the holy Roman Catholic church, you are going to be torn apart completely.
It'll be impossible. Because each and every saint is a unique creation of God. And when the church encourages us to imitate, to follow them, you wanna take that with a peck of salt. In contrast to Saint John of the Cross, who was a man whose life was confined and defined by religious order, living in a community, which he, with Saint Teresa, restructured, brought it back to pristine discipline, a man who was a poet, a writer, who has left us several extremely learned books. I suppose they learned, I can't get much out of them.
Of course, he was a poet, and I guess that puts a barrier between him and me. But anyway, I'll take it. I'll take the people's word for it and think they know what he was saying. He was supposed to be a very illuminating writer. Now in consciousness, remember, his sixteenth century is living in Spain.
The Protestant Reformation is going on up in Europe and over in Switzerland and and somewhat in France, and then in England, we have all the turmoil there. And here down in Spain, practically get no echo of all that. Now in contrast, go to the eighteenth century, and just by coincidence, I ran across the saint of the eighteenth century. That's, remember, that's the age of enlightenment. That's the age when man's reason took over.
And as Henri Guillaume points out, that's when when faith, hope, and charity left. This man's name is Joseph Benedict Lavere, L A B R E. Lived a life of thirty five years and died in 1783. He lived through our revolution. Now, this young Frenchman, he come from Boulogne up in the up on the chapel, okay, at Harbor City, Marine City, up on the English chapel, where he was one of 15 children, had six of them who were priests.
From a very early age, he knew he was called to be a Baptist. Three times he went into a trappist monastery, three times he was invited to leave. He went to a Cistercian monastery on the advice of his superiors, spiritual directors. They thought they'd be happier without him. He was asked to leave.
He went to a Carthaginian monastery, and they told him they'd be happier if he left. And yet all the time, he knew he ought to be addressed. He knew that that was was god god was calling you. You know where he wound up? By being a first class bum.
I mean that literally. He was so at the under under level of of good bummering that even the bums looked down on him. And that turned out to be his vocation. He left his home one day, put a coat on, put a girdle around his waist, put a big heavy rosary around his neck, carried a rosary in his hand, and set out on a pilgrimage that lasted twelve years when he died at the age of 35, practically in church in one of the churches of Rome, and immediately was held as a saint. They had to call in they had to call in the police force and the militia.
He died on a holy Thursday. And all all his life, he tried when he was wandering around, mostly around Lower France and Italy, going around to the different places of pilgrimage. All this time, he never begged. He would take what people gave him, use what he absolutely needed, all the rest he gave away. All he had was a knapsack on his back in which he carried a brief air, he stayed in the office every day, he tried to follow the traffics' rule, and he lived not in poverty, as the United States government defines it, but with absolutely nothing.
He was bermon ridden. He stank. He was a saint. You wanna imitate him? My point is this.
When you go through the roster of saints, they are so unlike. They are even contradictory. You compare him with Saint John on the cross. Where where's your comparison? They're both saints in the church of Jesus Christ.
They are both our friends. They are both our brothers. We're in the family with them. And the point I wanna make is don't fight your vocation. Vocation means calling.
Vocation means calling, and each and every one of us has it. And Cardinal Newman stressed this in season and out of season. The Opus Dei movement today stresses it in season and out of season. It's the theme on which I was brought up in my earliest years with the Christian brothers. You have a place in this life.
You have a calling to fulfill. You have a work to do, and it's not over in that other field. It's not tomorrow. It's not beyond the horizon. It's at your doorstep today.
What's your job? What are you committed to? Do it. But Christ never said you're going to like it. All that this man, Lager Blaber, l a b r e, don't get him mixed up with anyone else, all that he wanted to do was to be a traffickist.
And he wound up as a judge of a pilgrim, absolute pilgrim, wandering around from one pilgrimage place to another for twelve and a half years when he died, and was a plain saint within hours, literally, according to the New Catholic Encyclopedia. Now, we're in the season of Advent. We are called upon to renew our faith, our love, our dedication, our commitment to Jesus Christ. What does this mean, in fact? Does it mean getting all psyched up about the creche and cribs and bright lights and and Christmas carols and wishing everybody a happy Christmas and a peaceful New Year, what the heck that means?
Is that all it means? Or does it mean renewing our living Christ? And what does that mean, in fact? That means doing our job in the company of Jesus Christ, doing his work, the opus dei, the work of the Lord. And that is as varied, it's as complex, it's as different, it's as contradictory as the saints.
One thing they all have in common, and that's love of God and love of neighbor as themselves. Three commandments, and they live in the call to which god called.