I saw a very silly car commercial recently while
I was watching basketball playoffs. It was for
a Jeep, Jeep Wrangler or a Jeep Cherokee, something
like that. Of course, you have to picture the
usual scene, right? A Jeep going up impossibly
steep paths through the snow on a mountain, racing
through a desert. making its way through the
woods or on the beach and the water spraying
everywhere. The usual type of crazy, impractical
ways in which you can use up your $6 a gallon
gas. And as if most of us are ever going to drive
in those situations with that kind of vehicle.
And the narrator says, do you want to follow
a well -marked path? Or, big pause, be born free.
Rebellion against the path, so to say. Make your
own way. You know, spiritually, that's usually
delusional. St. Paul warned his flock of savage
wolves, which will come in among you, not sparing
the flock, also from among yourselves. Men will
rise up speaking perverse things to draw away
the disciples after themselves. Now perhaps you
think that commercial is a bit, I'm making things
a little too dramatic. But it's an approach and
it's a mindset of how we are deeply influenced.
The kind of rebellion that's being offered to
us in these expensive vehicles. by our media
and our culture now, is marketed. It's not a
rebellion. It's something to make money by others.
The morals, the mores, the ideas, the ethics
are all marketed to us. Here is the serpent's
temptation in the garden of paradise over and
over again from Genesis. For God knows in the
day you eat of the fruit from the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, your eyes will be
open and you will be like gods, knowing good
and evil. Recreate yourself. Be your own god.
Know good and evil, but the problem is you can't
tell the difference sometimes. You're lost between
the two. Christ prayed, and this is eternal life,
that they may know thee, the only true God, and
Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. Our identity,
therefore, to use a modern word, as humans, like
truly human, is not in our feelings, not in this
media -presented If we could acquire this, then
we'll have something really wonderful. Not in
some kind of inner rebellion against our own
human nature, which is definitely being marketed
to us. Our true identity is found and eventually
formed by being in Christ. This is eternal life
that they may know thee. the only true God, and
Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. This is not
an ideology. Because faith is not something mental
that we think about. I have strong faith. I've
really grasped it in my mind. It's there and
it's not going to be shaken. That's just in the
mind. Faith is living out those words to know
the Father. and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent,
and to know ourself. We can say that Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, became what we are in order to
make us what he is. He became what we are to
make us share in what he is. And if I believe
that, and I act in faithfulness, I carry forward
my life in action, not just in some kind of intellectual
ascent to an idea. If I believe that with my
heart and my soul, with action, that Jesus Christ
is indeed the Son of God, as we say in the creed
of one essence with the Father. Hearing our nature
too. Today is the Sunday of the Holy Fathers.
The creed that we recite, those words come from
that day. if we truly believe that, it means
that I look at the world, I look at myself, I
see my neighbor, through the lens of Christ's
compassion, through the lens of Christ's humility,
through the lens of Christ's love for us, the
love of the cross that he expressed on the cross.
Then I respond as Christ would. I'd walk that
extra mile, as Jesus said, to do it, the person
that asks. Walk that extra mile. I'd give my
coat, because I don't need two, to the person
that needs one. I'd see the poor person as the
least of these, my brethren. Everything that
I would do would be not just an act of... Different
ethics, New Testament ethics, but a sharing in
the light of light of God's kingdom. And being
called by Christ's name, which some people are
ashamed of these days, to be called Christian,
is an honor beyond all created honor. Bestowing
not just human worth on us, but divine worth
on a vessel of clay. Last week, We read about
Jesus Christ taking dirt and spit. It reminds
us what we're made of, dust from the earth, but
God's breath poured into that. This is the ultimate
meaning of our existence, to be known by God
as like him. The ultimate goal of our time on
this world. And believing this, that Jesus is
light of light, true God of true God, and that
we are joined to him, that we are united to him
who sits on the throne next to the Father, believing
that changes everything in our life, everything
we do. And at that point, we see that if it doesn't
involve Christ, we're wasting our time. If you're
going to love God, then love him. Truly love
him with all your heart, your mind, your strength.
Why? Not because Jesus said so only, but because
human nature is such that if you don't love God
with all your heart, your mind, your soul, and
your strength, and he exists before us, then
you're going to be loving something else with
all that energy, and it will disappoint you.
And it will be idolatry because it isn't the
one true God. You may say, or some may say, well,
what's wrong with that? I have other things that
I need to love. What's wrong is that we are human
and only truly and fully human in Christ when
we identify ourselves with Christ and not the
jargon of this world, especially about human
nature. Brothers and sisters, there's an attack
on our human nature, if you haven't noticed.
We should be extremely vigilant. We are children
of the gospel, children of the scripture. Get
back to that. To contradict that TV commercial
about the Jeep Cherokee, we are not born free.
We are born yoked to death. By sin. And afflicted
by sin. Our path to freedom is Christ. One saint
said, I can't remember what he said. The path
is with the cross. Because no one enters the
kingdom of heaven in comfort. He's the way, the
truth, and the life, as he said. Not as an idea.
No, we stand before that reality. The way is
a reality. We go a certain direction. The truth
is something we grasp. It's not just a thought.
The life is something we live. And we stand before
those things. for Christ who is our life, light
of light, true God of one essence with the Father.
And we let him draw out of us sin and doubt.
We let him draw out of us fear and uncertainty
and weakness and anxiety. And we let him, as
he says, share his glory with us to be one. Even
as he and the Father is one, we become one with
Christ. You can't do that part -time. And you
can't do that without a well -worn path. This
is what the church is giving us today on the
commemoration of the Holy Fathers, of the First
Ecumenical Council, as the church at the beginning
stood between the day of the ascension of Christ
and the coming of the Holy Spirit. We also await
that feast day, and we await the coming of God
in glory. Amen.