A Homily for the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany

+ “Domine, salva nos, perimus!” Save us Lord, we are perishing!
 
This cry of desperation and alarm by the disciples in the face of a sudden and unexpected tempest upon the sea, threatening the very lives of those in the ship, is meditated upon by the Church’s Sacred Liturgy today for good reason: many indeed are the circumstances in our lives when these words pass our lips. In the face of grave personal illness and suffering, of family crises (monastic families included), of social disorder and political opportunism (from which the Church herself is not exempt) and in the face of blatant attacks on all that we know to be True, Beautiful and Good, our distress is real. The words “Domine, salva nos, perimus!” only begin to express the danger we perceive.
 
Furthermore, the impact of these threats is compounded by the fact that, as in the Gospel of this Holy Mass, Our Lord is asleep, seemingly not in the least concerned by our peril. It is almost as if, to Him, the storm is of no account whatsoever. What, then, does the Church’s liturgical tradition teach us today through her contemplation of this incident in the Gospel?
 
Firstly, she recognises the reality of distress in the life of her children, and of the duty to address it. There is no spiritual quietism or suicidal fatalism here. The disciples do not sit back and say: “Oh well, we are perishing: it must be the Lord’s will. This is all part of God’s Providence.” No, they cry out to Him in alarm. They do all that they can to avert the danger. They do what they must—as is our duty also in situations of danger spiritually, ecclesiastically or otherwise. (I say “ecclesiastically” for we must not forget the image of the Church as a ship navigating the troubled waters of this world): they turn to the Lord with the more than fervent—perhaps even the shouted—prayer “Domine, salva nos, perimus!”
 
Through this prayer they bestir the Lord; they wake Him. Many of us can be somewhat grumpy when we are woken unexpectedly, but if we quickly realise that it was for good and serious reasons, we can leave our inconvenience aside and attend to the matter to hand. Our Lord Himself seems to have been a little grumpy; His retort “Why are you afraid, O men of little faith?” could almost seem ungracious in the circumstances. Waves crashing over a ship are not nothing. Yet His rebuke teaches us further: our fear gains ground through our lack of faith. Faith will sustain us no matter what the threat. It will enable us to endure shipwreck and sustain us still beyond—a reality that is very, very difficult for us to grasp as the ship is going down.
 
But Our Lord was awakened. He rose up and attended to the matter to hand. The seas were calmed. Shipwreck was averted. In placing this fact before us today the Church teaches us to expect and attend the Lord’s decisive intervention—an intervention that may not be as directly miraculous, perhaps, and that, if we are sufficiently faith-full, may even be worked through our own hands or in our own persons, but a decisive intervention for the good nonetheless.
 
This care of Almighty God for His People is the reality of which the Church sings at Lauds each Sunday in psalm 117:
 
“Out of my distress I called on the Lord; the Lord answered me and set me free. With the Lord on my side, I do not fear. What can man do to me? The Lord is on my side to help me; I shall look in triumph on those who hate me. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to put confidence in man. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to put confidence in princes.” (vv. 5-9)
 
And it is with this faith-filled confidence that the Church prays in the Collect of this Holy Mass for the help we need to overcome the afflictions that our sins have brought upon us—noting with the subtlety of a wise mother that often the shipwrecks we suffer are our own fault, but imploring God’s saving intervention nevertheless.
 
Time and time again St Benedict reminds his monks that “He who perseveres to the end will be saved.” (Mt 24:13) He calls us to conversion, to re-turn to the Lord, and to pray with “tears of compunction” in a manner that is “short and pure.” (Rule, ch. 20) Increasingly, in the circumstances in which we often find ourselves, the prayer “Save us Lord, we are perishing!” is to be found upon our lips. It is certainly short and most often utterly pure.
 
As we turn to the Lord at His altar in this Holy Mass, let us present this prayer to Him fervently, with the tears of compunction that His justice demands, confident that in His mercy He shall arise to rebuke that which threatens us from within and from without. +

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