A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint John. Of course, this is a continuation day after day. It makes the gospels look as if they were the Encyclopedia Britannica, you know. So you know my recommendation is to sit down when you have about twenty minutes and read one of them from beginning to end. It's the only way to do it.
You don't even read the comic strips as we read the gospels, you know. So, gee, our lord said to his disciples, see this is all part of a very strong narrative from Saint John chapter the fifteenth. So anyway, our lord said to his disciples, when the paraclete comes, the spirit of truth who comes from the father and whom I myself will send from the father, he will bear witness on my behalf. You must bear witness as well. Take we have a part to play which is indispensable to god's plan.
For you have been with me from the very beginning. Now I've told you all about this to keep your faith from being shaken. Not only will they expel you from synagogues, a time will come when anyone who put you to death will claim to be serving god. All of this they will do to you because they know neither the father nor me. But I told you all of these things that when the hour comes, you may remember my telling you of them.
And this is the gospel, the good news of the lord. Praise The name of the father and of the son, of the holy spirit, amen. It's especially true during this season after the resurrection of our lord, when we're reading from the book of the Acts of the Apostles, we should say acts of apostles, that we should sit down and read the acts of the apostles as a book because it is kind of a book. Whatever you may say about the scriptures is that they are scripture. They are written.
That's one thing we can be sure of. There's not much else, but we can be sure of that. They are written. And that they have to be treat treated as the written word with the respect that the written word entails and the problems of the written word. You see, how much talk you hear about the I've been dealing with these fundamentalists and evangelicals.
They talk about the the New Testament. How often do they refer to the book of the Acts? That's just as much part of the word of God as the as the four gospels. Now Catholicism is a present tense phenomenon. That again is a fact that nobody can deny.
And a very sensible question is where did it come from? And if there's a book involved, where did the book come from? And secondly, if you have a book, who says that book is inspired by god almighty? Who says it? A group of people take takes a group takes up the New Testament.
They sit around their fireside, and they discuss it. What are they discussing? Where did they get it? What does it mean? Who tells who's supposed to tell them?
Or who's not supposed to tell them? I don't know. But these are very absolutely factual questions, which any reasonable person has to ask. The first thing you ask about a book is who wrote it. Are we sure he wrote it?
That means authenticity. Are we sure he wrote it? Then you may ask, well, why did he write it? What language was it written in? Well, if there's one thing sure that the New Testament and all parts of it were not written in English or French or Spanish or Italian or German or French or any other modern language.
That's one thing we can surely say. And if it is the word of God, who says it's the word of God? Where did that idea come from? Saint Paul sits down one day and takes a pen in hand and dashes off a letter. And a hundred years later, somebody says that's the word of god.
Who says it? Why? What by what authority? Does it does the book speak for itself? No book speaks for itself.
These are just plain honest to god facts. And a reasonable person who has any confidence in man's intelligence has to answer them or go out and and go bowling or swimming or something useful. Now the the book of the acts of the apostles, it's one of the most dramatic books of the New Testament. It gives you what happened after our lord's resurrection. It tells you what happened in the first days of Christ's church if there was a church.
And if there wasn't a church, then why bother? So doesn't it behoove us to try to to go back and read what happened in those early days? It'll be an eye opener to you if you'll just pick up the book of the Acts of the Apostles and read it. You will see there the twentieth century church of Jesus Christ. Controversies galore, disputes, animosities, envy, pride, tradition fighting against progress.
You'll see it all there. And you think of our holy father right now coming into South America once again, trying to bring what's he bringing? Who is he? Who is this man that's parading around, calling himself a pope? Where did he come from?
By what authority does he speak? In the name of god almighty. And believe me, this pope's not afraid to do it. He's not afraid to do it. But by how does he get that way?
In other words, he doesn't come with a book. He comes as the pope. He comes as the successor of Peter as he more than once has said. I speak as the successor of Peter. I speak.
He doesn't come and hand out ZRX copies of a book. Now these are very solid questions that and what I said yesterday, our our young people are not getting a hold of these things. They're living in the froth of our religion. And when the crunch comes, you know what happens. No one buys a glass of beer just to drink the phone.
And yet that's what's being peddled to our youth, phone. Now religion regard is a gift of god with his faith. Let us never forget it. Never forget it. Faith in Jesus Christ is a gift of god.
And you can't argue with a gift. It comes and it goes. But that's where we have to begin. But on the other hand, you don't renounce your intelligence and your reason when you say, my lord and my god, I believe. Help thou my unbelief.
You do not renounce your reason. And I would have been with Thomas. After all, he is the one who gave us the strongest argument that Jesus Christ rose from the dead. Unless I put my hands in his wounds and my hand in his side, I will not believe. He was justified in that.
And our lord recognizes it, and he makes a special visitation to Thomas. But all Thomas could say then was, I believe, help thou, my unbelief. So that to be a to be a a persuaded Catholic, not someone just living on the top of the wave, it means that you're using your mature adult intelligence to say, my lord and my god. I believe. Help thou my unbelief.
In the name of the father, the son, the holy spirit. Amen.