In the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy spirit. Amen. This is a commonplace of human experience that people And remember when we say people, we are talking collectively of individual human beings. There's no such reality as people. There's no such reality as humanity.
There are individual human beings. Period. As I say, it is a commonplace of human history that people flock to wonder making men and women. There seems to be, as far as I know, no culture or any histories we have of the so called primitive peoples where you don't have wonder working people. And there's always a strong following of it.
We've had any number of instances in The United States among Catholics and among non Catholics. So, that somehow we attracted to it. And as I say, all you have to do is to go out on on down on F Street and start looking up at the sky and look up at it. And the first thing you're gonna have is some people around you looking up there with you without saying a word. Now, what were these people looking for when they went out after Jesus Christ?
What were they looking for when they asked Christ, look, stay with us. They were looking for someone who could give them a reservoir of water up in Samariah. What were they looking for when Christ multiplied the loaves and fishes, and then left them? And the multitudes followed him. What were they following him for?
For bread, for fish. Did Christ come to change this world radically, economically or any other way? And the answer to that question, in a very real sense, is absolutely he came to change it. Because he came to change men's hearts. But you cannot point to a single instance of our blessed Lord explicitly aiming to change the political system, the economic system, the social system, the hygienic system, the reservoir system, agriculture, money.
He did not move his little finger to change one iota bit of that. And implicitly, he approved it. Implicitly, Christ approved selling your children for debt. He never said a word against slavery. He implicitly accepts slavery.
And he did not reject war. He said, I bring you the sword. I I have come Christ said to said, father against son, son against father, mother against daughter, and you know the whole series of statements. And our blessed Lord is the one who said that. This is a direct quotation.
Now, here we have an instance of of of Christ curing one leper. If he had the power to cure one leper, why didn't he go out and cure them all? And if he had the power to cure the disease of leprosy, why didn't he cure disease entirely and eliminate disease from the world? Why didn't he do it? Baruch Baum.
Why didn't he do it? If he could do it. And if he wanted to do it. If he wanted to alleviate poverty, why didn't he do it if he could? If that was the purpose he came into this life for.
Now, just yesterday, one of our parishes gave me a long quotation from Mr Denton, one of our congressmen, who's a very sensible thinker, in which he gave some insights into the subcommittee's meeting on this question of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, and the relationship to the Catholic church and the some Catholic missionaries down there. And of course, it's about this business of liberation. It's extremely revealing what's going on there. Of course, I read this last winter down in Cartagena. But this does not hit the popular press at all.
Let us come back to the to the fact that Jesus Christ came as the son of God. And he didn't come to liberate the Israel from the Romans. He didn't liberate them at all from the Romans. As a matter of fact, he was scarcely out of the tomb when Titus came and destroyed the whole city, that not a stone was left upon a stone of the temple. That's how he restored the kingdom of Israel.
And yet, plenty of people were expecting that. And when I say plenty of people, I mean the apostles. After the resurrection, if you see anyone who rejects the New Testament and the book of the Acts. Here you have the picture of the disciples after Christ's death and the empty tomb. And what is there?
What how do they feel? How do they feel? Are they triumphant? Are they full of joy? They are desolate.
All their hopes have deflated. The balloon has broken Because this man who was supposed to restore the kingdom of Israel, kick out the Romans, restore the power and the might and the autonomy of God's kingdom on Mount Zion, The kingdom of Israel, the chosen people. All a flop. They were looking for good jobs. The mother of Peter said, Lord, when you come into your kingdom, remember my sons, you know, make them members of your cabinet, make them all vice presidents.
Where did they wind up? It was a flop. And here they are walking, walking along a dusty road, dejected, despair, and they meet Christ. And for the first time they begin to see light. That our blessed Lord had come not to restore a kingdom of the world, but his kingdom.
His kingdom. And Christ said, my kingdom is not of this world. He didn't come to be a medicine man to cure disease. Of course, he did. He worked wonders.
But what what fraction, what infinitesimal fraction of the world's suffering did Christ cure? And he gave no permanent cure to it at all. Except, he gave man the power to rise above it. He gave man the power to rise above anything that can afflict him in this life. He gave man the power to put a Maximilian Kolbe in a dungeon to be starved to death, and to sing hymns of joy in doing.
That's the victory of Jesus Christ. In the name of the father, and the son, and holy spirit. Amen.