A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. When John, that is John the Baptist, caught sight of Jesus coming toward him. He ex John ex exclaimed, look there, the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. It is he of whom I said, after me is to come a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me. I admit I did not recognize him.
Though the very reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel. Then John gave this testimony also. I saw the spirit descend like a dove from the sky, and it came to rest upon him. But I did not recognize him. The one who sent me to baptize with water told me, when you see the spirit descend and rest on someone, it is he who is to baptize with the Holy Spirit.
Now I have seen for myself and have testified. This is God's chosen one, and this is the gospel of the Lord. Praise to you, lord Jesus. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen.
I wanna go back this morning to this first letter of Saint John. The very opening sentence is this, if you consider the holiness that is God's, you can be sure that everyone who acts in holiness has been begotten by God. You see, this is just the absolute simple God given truth that we are called to holiness. You don't hear that word very much. How many how often do you hear anything like any emphasis given to reading Saint Francis de Sales, Introduction to a Devout Life.
Or Thomas A. Kempis, Imitation of Christ, the following of Christ. We've gotten a long way from these things. We've gotten so much talk about love of neighbor, community, society, social responsibility, social obligation. You know that we are on on the way.
And in some way, in some instances, we have already arrived at a very false and a very sad misconception of what life's all about. Of what life's all about. Remember, is no reality to society or to community except the individual human being. And it's that individual human being who is called by God and who says, yes, Lord, here I am. No one can do that for you.
Oh, yes. People can help you to do it. We need our neighbor to do it. We have responsibilities to our neighbor to help him do it. And that's one of our primary responsibilities.
Not to make him more comfortable in this world, but that he will use this world more comfortably, but by that I mean more efficiently, in order to secure his salvation. What do you mean by this thing called salvation? We mean the pursuit of holiness. That's all. That's absolutely what we mean.
We mean we're trying to make our lives reflect God. Be ye perfect as I am perfect. Christ said that. It isn't that we're going to be perfect. Remember, the very definition of an ideal makes it impossible to attain.
Keep that in mind. Ideals don't exist in the real order unless you're now now Platonist. And so we are called individually to say, Lord, here I am. Notice present tense. Not yesterday's person, not tomorrow's person, the person I am today.
As you are in those pews right now beginning this third day of the new year. You're you're you're here to answer the call of of God himself. You're here this morning beginning a new day to fulfill what was either you made the commitment or somebody made it for you and baptism. Baptism. That you were going to carry this light, that you were going to wear this garment, you know, the whole rigmarole.
What does it mean? What does all this business mean? Unless it's reflected in the actuality of daily living. When you say carry the life and carry this garment through life unsullied, what are you talking about? Remember, this altar rail doesn't commit mortal sins.
Is that a great is that a great attribute of the altar rail to be sinless? Those pews are sinless. Is that a great attribute? So when you when you could fear before God and say I'm sinless, well, what? Well, it's only a beginning.
It's a very important beginning, but it's just the beginning. That's not the equivalent of being holy necessarily. It's a it certainly is a necessary condition. But but remember, sinlessness is negation, and virtue can't be a negation. It's got to be something absolutely positive, the realest of the real.
I I don't see, we we get so messed up with words and with movements and with attitudes that we forget. There's a story I think by James Barry of where a very devoted husband, every time his wife sits down in a rocky chair, he brings over a footstool to put under her foot. She doesn't need that footstool. He got in the habit of doing it when she had a broken leg, but she hasn't had a broken leg for years. But he still goes through the motions of putting the stool under her under his good wife's foot.
Has no meaning anymore. So our lives can become that way. We can become, you know, mixed up with things. I mean with things, with actions, with the externals of religion. Religion.
Of all of this talk about community and going out and being part of the society and the responsibilities of society, we are all guilty. You know when someone took a couple shots at Reagan, the editorials in the Washington Post, society is guilty. Oh, you know all that's a lot of clack trap. The only reality to society are the individuals in that society. An abstraction can't have a responsibility and that's all society is.
Now, I'm not in the least minimizing the importance of man's social nature. I'm not in the least minimizing our responsibility to our my neighbor, but I immediately recognize two prior responsibilities. Neighbor doesn't come first. Neighbor doesn't come second. Neighbor comes third.
The first commandment is, thou shalt love the lord thy god with thy whole heart, with thy whole soul, with thy whole mind, with everything you are. Then love your neighbor as you love yourself. Notice notice that. The standard of loving neighbor is yourself. Obviously, therefore, you've got to love yourself if you're going to have any standard.
Do you love yourself? Today, you since John Stuart Mill pranced around over in England, you've heard so much about altruism. Norris, that isn't Christian at all. That's not Christian. Why should I look to why should I prefer my neighbor over myself?
Why? God didn't tell me to do it. Who else told me to do it? John Stuart Mill? Who's he?
And so let's come back to some honest to God realities because God is a reality. And the first thing is God. Not me or my neighbor or my job or my health. You know, used to you don't hear it much anymore, but it was slammed all over the newspapers. When you've lost your health, you've lost everything.
I thought immediately of a man like Steinmetz, even in the in the natural order. What a ridiculous thing to say. I think of a woman like miss Mary Merrick, when you've lost your health, you've lost everything. How silly can you get? Are we just to be good first class animals, taken care of in a zoo?
And so let's come back to what Saint John's telling us, that God is holy. He calls us holy. And notice, that's an individual commitment. Nobody can do it for you. Nobody can achieve it for you.
People can help you to do it, they can't do it for you. And God isn't going to do it for you. That's the part he leaves to yourself. You when he calls, you have to say, God, Lord, Jesus, here I am. In the name of the father, and of the son, and holy spirit.
Amen.