In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen. But once again, we have some words of our lord here. Notice they're his words. This is not a parable. This is not a story that he told.
This is what he how he instructed his apostles. This is all part of that same discourse, and it tells us what our what Christ thought about sin and its consequences. First of all, that sin is possible and actual. That's the point that's point number one. That's very contrary to what much of what you hear today, that practically it's impossible for us good human beings to commit mortal sin.
And that's right within our midst. Some notable theologians teach this, you know. Yet, if you take a text like this, certainly Christ emphasizes the fact, the actuality of sin, not the possibility, but the actuality. He also emphasizes need of reform, which means the possibility of reform. You don't reform unless you're something to be reformed from.
Now the other another item, the second factor that our lord emphasizes is punishment. Punishment, downright punishment. That there's going to be a judgment, and you're going to be judged on what you have done, not what I've done, but what you have done, and what I have done. And I will pay a penalty. You can this is beyond all dispute.
Now either Christ was playing games, that he was just talking hot air, or that our lord meant what he was saying. Take your pick. But if you think that Christ was serious here, then there's food for thought here for our own lives. Now, you see today, I've said this so many times, we are in a world that is not only non Christian. That's point number one.
Don't ever think you're living in a Christian world. You're not. You are not living in a world that even believes in God. We have it on our money, but who cares about that? In God, we trust, but the dollar bill counts more.
We are not a God fearing nation. Neither you can say the same thing for the whole Western world. Remember, this is one of the complaints of the Eastern countries about us, that we are downgrading ourselves. We are degraded people. And all you have to do is turn your radio on your car and listen to this some of this junky music that's coming over.
And this is what is influencing our young people's lives. It absolutely garbage, and some of the lyrics are awful. Take this thing called New York. And so we've got to come back to some realities of God and ourselves. We are living we're not living even in an atheistic world, but I respect an atheist.
See, an atheist is a a a man or a woman who stands up and says, look, there is no God and prove it to you. I can argue with him. He he may be a very sincere searcher. Think how many very prominent well, that's not a multitude because they they don't come in with great numbers. But there have been a number of communists who became believers and who were atheists, who became theists, that is believers in God.
Some became Christians, a few became Catholics. Whitaker Chambers became a Quaker. The point is many of those men and women became fervent Christians, which is precisely what you'd expect because they were fervent atheists. It's a story of Saint Paul. Now coming to Saint Paul, to coming to our blessed Lord, when Paul or Christ spoke to the people, any old people, whether any part of the whole Mediterranean Basin.
When he spoke, he was speaking to people who believed in some god or gods, who believed in that he some kind of an hereafter, who believed that there was a power greater than man running the show. That's not true today. That's not true at all. Look at our look at our attitude in as regards civil and and criminal law. Pure positivism, pragmatism, utilitarianism.
Pure, unadulterated in many instances, in most instances. Just just look at the argumentation for this in this matter of abortion. So don't mistake it. You're living in a very difficult world. It's much worse than the world Christ lived in or the apostles lived in, much worse.
And you see, it has all the aura of tranquility, of of of peace in the world's terms, quotation marks. It has a comfort, security. We're trying to make this world utterly secure. That's the reason Doycek Levesque said any kind of socialism, he rejected because it was anti Christ. Because it shifted the center of interest from man's true salvation hereafter to some kind of salvation in this world.
And we're doing the same thing pretty much with what this thing called liberation theology, or Marx Christianized Marxism, if you can imagine such a contradiction in terms. And yet that's being proposed by Catholic and Catholic priests. So don't mistake the enemy. Don't mistake your opponent. And it's not always easy to know what you're dealing with because you're in the world, you have to use the things of this world, you have to fulfill your duty in this world, you have to live your life in this world.
As Newman said, you have a work to do, and unless you do it, it will not not be done. These things are all true. You're going to work out your salvation, not in the world yesterday, or in the world tomorrow, or next year, or when you were a little child making your first holy communion in great piety. Oh, no. You are going to work out out your salvation today.
Today. Because that's the only reality. Today. The present tense. Not this afternoon.
Right now. And So let's come back to the seriousness of the Christian message. The Christian message is not a in in a certain sense, is not very comforting. It's very disrupting. And let me tell you folks, that I'd made I didn't make that discovery.
Just remember what I read yesterday or the or the previous Friday, where Christ said, I have come not to bring peace but the sword. To spread dissension, Christ said. To set blood relations against one another, even to their condemning one another to death. Christ said that, that he would be a sign of contradiction. So if you're going to be a follower of Christ, you know what to expect.
On the other hand, you know also what to expect in the line of his promises. And if we follow him, if we give him our best, if we try, we can't lose. We can't possibly lose unless our faith is in vain. And as Paul said, unless Christ be risen from the dead, your faith is in vain. So our great hope is not merely in the crucifixion of Christ who redeemed us.
Our great hope and the seal of Christ promises is not the cross, but the empty tomb. There is where we put our trust, in the promises of Christ. We know that we have not here a a permanent eternal city. We are here on borrowed time. This is a temporary situation for all of us.
So crucially important, however, that it determines eternity for each one of us individually. In the name of the father, and the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.