The Monks Of Norcia:

September 26, 2012


Last Sunday, Fr. Basil delivered a homily which focused on the relationship between faith and charity, and reminded us about the Year of Faith.  Read it below!

Faith as the Guide of Charity
by Fr. Basil Nixen, O.S.B.
Monastery of San Benedetto, Norcia, Italy

                Our Lord Jesus Christ, in today’s Gospel, reminds us of the central importance of charity.  A Pharisee asks which commandment is the most important and Jesus responds saying:  You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depends the whole law and the prophets. (Mt 22:37-40). Then, St. Paul affirms the importance of this virtue, exhorting the Ephesians to support one another in charity (Eph 4:2).  In the First Letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul expresses himself in an even stronger way:  And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity (1 Cor 13:13).
 
                In our contemporary culture (just as in the past), we often hear about “love”.  The concept of love has inspired many books and movies, and especially popular songs.  We are surrounded by a culture inundated by “love”.  We are constantly looking for love, but unfortunately, this search usually ends in frustration.  Paradoxically, authentic love isn’t found in the culture which is obsessed with it.  Instead, we’re more likely to be disappointed, since we’re looking in the wrong place for it. St. Augustine says: “Seek what ye seek; but it is not there where ye seek” (Confessions, 4, 12)
 
                Pope Benedict XVI recently said that “charity without faith would be a sentiment constantly at the mercy of doubt” (Apostolic Letter in the form of a Motu Proprio, Porta Fidei, 14).  With these words, the Pope affirms the absolute need of love to be guided by faith.  Faith allows us to know the revealed truth of God, and therefore it is the necessary virtue which makes charity both genuine and profound, and guides it towards its highest goal, which is union with God in eternal life.  In fact, Holy Scripture speaks of the “door of faith” (Acts 14:26).  Faith is truly the door through which we can enter more faithfully and authentically; this consists in knowledge of the only true God and the one who the Father sent, Jesus Christ (cf. Jn 17:3).
 
                Therefore, faith is the beginning of charity.  Faith protects charity and renders it fruitful.  But since we live in a period of history in which faith is threatened by many errors and much ignorance, the Holy Father has proclaimed an entire year dedicated to faith.  This Year of Faith will begin in a few weeks (on October 11, 2012) and will end with the feast of Christ the King the following year, November 24, 2013.  This will be an occasion for the entire Church to more profoundly learn the contents of the faith which is expressed in the Creed that we recite every Sunday.  The beginning of this Year of Faith coincides with the 50^th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II and the 20^th anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  In other words, this will be an opportune time to learn more deeply the Catechism and to delve more deeply into the Council, which—the Holy Father affirms—“can be and can become increasingly powerful for the ever necessary renewal of the Church” “if we interpret and implement it guided by a right hermeneutic” (Apostolic Letter in the form of a Motu Proprio, Porta Fidei, 5).
 
                The Holy Father, in his Apostolic Letter named Porta Fidei with which he indicated the Year of Faith, underlines that faith is strengthened every time we put it into practice.  He offers us the wonderful insight from St. Augustine that the faithful “strengthen themselves by believing” (Apostolic Letter in the form of a Motu Proprio, Porta Fidei, 7).  This means, my dear brothers and sisters, that we must exercise faith in order to grow it.  We must frequently make acts of faith, like that of St. Martha:  She said to him: “Yea, Lord, I have believed that you are Christ, the Son of the living God, who has come into this world” (Jn 11:27).
 
                Every prayer is an act of faith, thus we must pray more to increase our faith.  Each time we recite the Creed, we make an act of faith.  So, the ancient Christians were used to memorizing the Creed.  The Holy Father reminds us of the words of St. Augustine regarding the Creed:

the symbol of the holy mystery that you have all received together and that today you have recited one by one, are the words on which the faith of Mother Church is firmly built above the stable foundation that is Christ the Lord. You have received it and recited it, but in your minds and hearts you must keep it ever present, you must repeat it in your beds, recall it in the public squares and not forget it during meals: even when your body is asleep, you must watch over it with your hearts (Apostolic Letter in the form of a Motu Proprio, Porta Fidei, 9).

                Today, let us try to take seriously these words of the Pope and of St. Augustine.  How great is the treasure of our faith!  Let’s all pray for the grace to “walk worthy of the vocation in which we are called” (cf. Eph 4:1), so that we may hear the Lord say at the end of our life: “your faith has saved you!” (Lk 17:19; 18:42; 7:50; Mk 10:52).

(Translated from the original Italian by B. Gonzalez.) (The Monks Of Norcia:here)