A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Mark. Our lord and his disciples came down from the mountain and began to go through Galilee, but he did not want anybody to know about it. And he was teaching his disciples in this vein. The son of man is going now notice, this is what he's telling his disciples what's going to happen to him, but, apparently, they never caught it. Man, the son of man, our lord said to them, is going to be delivered into the hands of men who will put him to death.
Three days after his death, he will rise. Though they failed to understand his words, they were afraid to ask Jesus any questions. So they returned to Capernaum. That's up in the northwest corner of the lake. And so they returned to Capernaum, and Jesus, once inside the house, began to ask the disciples, what were you talking about on the way home?
At this, they fell silent. For on the way home, they had been arguing arguing about who was the most important. So Jesus sat down and called the 12 around him and said to his disciples, if anyone wishes to rank first, he must remain the last of all and the servant of all. Then Jesus took a little child, stood the boy in their midst, and putting his arms around him, said to his disciples, whoever welcomes a child such as this for my sake welcomes me. And whoever welcomes me welcomes not only me, but him who sent me.
And this is the gospel of the lord. Praise be to Lord. Before going any further, I want to the word the Greek word here for embracing, it's a very strong word. It's it's very uncommon in the New Testament, but it means to put your arms around. It's a good it's a good classical Greek word.
It me to embrace is really not strong enough in English. It means to grasp, to hold them tight, to grapple with them. And that's the the the word used in both instances in Saint Mark where it says, our lord well, you know the translations are the embrace, put his arms around, and all of that. But it means he hugged them. Now this morning, I want to speak to you about children.
And first thing, I wanna go back to our lord. Now we have at least two texts. Both are in Saint Mark, chapters nine, and the next chapter 10. We read chapter nine this morning. But I wanna put them together so that you'll get the picture of what our blessed lord thought of little children.
Notice they're little children. They're not teenagers. I don't know what he thought about them. So Jesus taking a little child placed him in the midst of the disciples and putting his arms around him, hugging him. We wouldn't dare do it today.
You know? Jesus said to his disciples, whosoever receives one of these children in my name notice, not just receiving them for your sale self or for your benefit or for society. Oh, no. Who receives the child in my name receives me. How often do peep mothers and fathers see Jesus in their children?
Now the other text is from Saint Mark chapter 10 verse three thirteen. People were I love this one. People were bringing children to Jesus that he might touch them. That's very significant. They wanted him to lay his hands on them.
Today, we wanna push them away. We're scared of being sued or worse. They wanted Jesus to touch their babies, but the disciples said no. They rebuked him. Now when Jesus saw what they were doing, he was indignant.
Now that word doesn't occur much with our blessed lord, but he was indignant and said to the disciples, let the children come to me. Don't try to stop them for the kingdom of god belongs to such as these. And then he took them into his arms, the same Greek word, and blessed them, placing his hands on them. Now notice all this physical stuff. It's so important to touch people.
I never will well, point is that it's I don't have to tell you that. Think of what we how much we make today of body language. And yet on the other hand, the way things are going in The USA is we don't dare touch people. Now the second authority I wanna quote goes back to 1925 to doctor William Kirby, who I might you might call the foundation of Catholic charities in The United States. He became a Monsignor.
I knew him fairly well. He was a great friend of Mary Merrick and missus Nobloc, and they are eternally associated with the Christ Child Society. Now doctor Kirby gave a talk on children at one of the Christ Child Society's luncheons, and I just happened to have a copy of it in those dear old files. Now I'm what I'm giving going to read to you is not a verbatim. It's sort of a summary of his talk, four pages.
Kirby said, this is 1925 when you didn't even use the word abortion. Notice the words that we didn't even use are in a bar, in a saloon, we're using from the pulpit today. Think of that. Anyway, this is 1925, and and doctor Kirby's talking to the Christ Child Society, one of the downtown hotels. As I say, this is not verbatim.
It's they're mostly his words, but it's my brief summary. Every child that a man and woman procreate is a special creation of god. Do we think about that? Every kid that enters a woman's womb is a creation of god. Notice it's something absolutely new.
Parents share the new existence with god whose unique act no. It's unique. It's one and only. It's singular. Of infusing the soul into the product of human intercourse brings into existence a new individual of the human race.
And if it's not that, then I ask, what is it? And if it ain't from the beginning of conception, when does it become a human being? Tell me for sure. So that it's a product of human intercourse bringing into existence a new individual of the human race, a human baby, a human person. And this from the very first moment of conception, god has begun a distinct and wonderful work, but hasn't been achieved.
It's only be has begun. Every child doctor Kirby concludes, every child is a plan of god begun. Begun. Not finished, but begun. A dear enduring care of Jesus Christ.
The hope of humanity, a heavy responsibility. These are his act exact words, but not in their order. The child calls to the parents, to the parents first, and to the mother the first of the two. It calls upon the parents. It calls upon the world.
That child calls upon the state not to kill it, but to preserve its rights. It calls upon for the its society for guidance. And what for? Very simple. Very To bring that new human being that has come into existence by a unique creative act of god to what?
The peace of Christ in this life and to salvation in the next. They're noble words. Noble words. 1925, when you didn't have to talk about abortion at all. It wasn't even mentioned except to say it was a great crime that you didn't even mention.
Now I wanna bring up not at all a summary of all the things that can keep babies and little children from Christ. I wanna, this morning, bring to your attention just two things, and you know what the first one's going to be. The first thing is the direct killing of that unique being in the mother's womb. Now notice, the essence of the crime here is not killing them. It's not death.
There's no immorality in dying. People are dying right and left. The immorality is where you of set intent, direct. That's what the word direct of set intent. You deprive this newborn you I mean, this new being, this new human being in existence of a natural we had that for two Sundays, the natural law.
You deprive it of an inalienable right. That's what the that's what the declaration of independence has to say. You deprive that of an inalienable right, which it has by nature. That's the essence of the crime, not the deprivation of the life. Plenty of babies die.
Plenty of human beings die. Everybody die. Death is absolutely commonplace. There's no immorality in dying. The immorality is that the deprivation of set intent of a human being's right, inalienable right to life.
But there's something else that you never hear mentioned. There's another right that that child is being deprived of. It's a living child. If it's not living, you have no problem. Baptism.
Baptism. Now our lord said that baptism was a necessary means to salvation, and there's no chance of that that being, whatever it is in the mother's womb, there's no chance of it being baptized while it's still living when it comes out in tiny pieces. Now the church has never said, what happens to unbaptized people? Now it's not just the baptism of water I'm talking about. It's the baptism of desire, the baptism of martyrdom.
But a baby in the womb can't have those two things, can't have any desire, it's like not likely to be a martyr. The church has never said, but the church has never said that they're damned either. So I don't know what happens to them, but I know this, that by a direct act of another human being, that baby is deprived of what should be its gate to eternal salvation. Deprived of it for eternity. How about that?
Isn't that a pretty serious consideration? And if there's any doubt about it, can you act in a doubt? Of course, the answer is absolutely no. Not sufficient for that. But remember, as far as the Catholic church is concerned, as far as the tradition of Western culture is concerned, there is absolutely no question.
It's indisputable that it's absolutely a crime and against the natural law. But what I wanna do today is really to bring out a second point that was news to me. I got it from the late one of the latest editions of the London Economist. And in that regard, I wanna express public thanks for some friends who keep me supplied with it. Couldn't live without it, and I couldn't afford to buy it either.
In the August the seventeenth issue of the economist now I'm repeating. This isn't from a from some Catholic publication. This is not from a church or Oregon. This is from the London economist. They had an article about divorce.
I repeat, this is from The Economist. And it has to had to do with what they say. This was news to me. I don't know if it's gonna be news to you or not. That in The United States Of America, today, there is a very strong campaign being being put into motion.
It hasn't reached any kind of a summit, but it's being put into motion by pro family groups, now listen, of conservative Republicans and centrist Democrats, and it's an effort that put a halt to Divorces USA. Now what brought this about is what it says you've heard of it, the no fault divorce. It started with in California about ten years ago, and now it is spread to all states. I'm I'm using the London the Economist. I'm not familiar with this.
But it The Economist says it's in all 50 states of The USA, including the District Of Columbia, whereby spouses do not have to prove that the opposite is adulterous or a thief or cruel or has abandoned them. They don't have to prove anything. All the spouses have to do is to declare that they don't wanna live together anymore. It's it's almost a self-service divorce. It saves a lot of money.
It saves time. It saves embarrassment. It saves anguish. As some people say, it's the civil way of breaking up a marriage. Now what this campaign, this pro life group made up of conservative Republicans and centrist Democrats, according to the what they want is to put a halt to this no fault business.
They wanna they want to establish an interval of time so that people will I'm talking about couples with children. That's a very important point. What their what their their thrust is to try to slow down the procedure and the process of getting a divorce with couples who have children. Because according to this article, these good these are good people in both parties, and and notice '92 is coming up. And the the economist says that this issue of trying to put the brakes on no fault divorce is going to be a big issue in '92, ranking with abortion, if you please.
This is all news to me. Maybe it's maybe it's old stuff to you, but it's not to me. Have to read the London Economist to know what's going on over here. Now what is the basic now I'm not saying they're right or wrong. What is the basic reasons for this?
It's the same reasons I can remember in my earliest age, way, way back when the church took a stand against divorce. It's the same stuff. What It's absolutely a disaster in many instances for there are exceptions. Of course, there are. But these people are talking in general.
And notice this is the economist talk. And they're supposed to be quoting the pro lifers from the republicans, the democrat party, who are aiming to slow down the terrific speed of these this no fault divorce business. That it leaves children confused. It leaves them without a role model in many instances. It leaves them angry.
I could verify that. I sure can verify that. And it leads them to be poor students, to drop out of school, and to, I'm quoting, to much destruct self destructive conduct. Self destructive conduct. I just saw a just the other night, bit of it.
Didn't see it all. It was a something from a Landon show about a young man who was the victim of divorce. And the self destructive, self suicidal conduct. Now you'll say, you can believe this or not, and this is not coming from a priest or a rabbi. It's not coming from a from a church or a religious magazine.
It's coming as a report from a campaign that is now being instituted and pushed ahead by a pro life by a pro life group made up of conservative Republicans Democrats that this no fault in church is out of hand and that children are suffering desperately, desperately. Now they said you'll hear more about it that this thing is just beginning. And then it also adds now the figures here you pick take your pick. But the figures vary widely. But that women divorced who who are in a divorce situation suffer from a 30 to a 70% decrease in their economic level.
Now those two figures are given. The 70 is terribly high, and the 30 may be low. I don't know which one's right. Take your pick. But the point is they suffer a major injury.
By and large, we're talking about these are statistics. You know what you can do to a statistics? This is very serious. This is very serious. But what interests me is that here in 1991, here we have an article coming from England about The United States about divorce, pointing out its evils as if that was a new discovery.
The Catholic church has been saying it all along, leaving aside a lot of but from a plain common sense point of view, it's destructive of the family. It's harmful to the children, and it's therefore if if that is true, what are you going to say about a society that rests upon it when you have almost not quite, but almost a two to one ratio of divorces and marriages. Now this article points out that it's in the tradition of The United States to be to lean towards divorces. Good and then they trace it all the way. A book has just been published by the Oxford University Press on it, divorce in The United States.
Now the point I'm making is this is coming from a purely secular source. This is coming to give you a report on people who have a purely secular point of view. If they're right, what will you say about this if it's put on a supernatural level? If it's true that that new product of conception in the mother's womb is destined to have the peace of Christ in this life and eternal salvation in the next, what will you say about things which hinder it, which obstruct it, which contradict Christ's words? Let the little children come to me and forbid them not, either by taking away their very lives, closing the gate, or depriving them of the means of growing through this life to appear before god for eternity when he will recognize them as his own.
In the name of the father and the son and holy spirit, amen.