A Homily for the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

+ “Man does not live on bread alone but the very word of God” (Deuteronomy 8:3, Matthew 4:4). Nothing that comes from man has the power to save. Even the manna given in the wilderness did not prevent the Israelites’ death (cf. John 6:49) – for they were a perverse generation who would not stop murmuring. God took them into the wilderness to test their hearts, leading them to the land of milk and honey. Yet they fled before the reports of giants in Canaan, not allowing God to carry the burden of the day for them (cf. Numbers 13:17-14:12).

​How is it that even now, in the face of the greatest of treasures that God has given us, we still find many faltering in their resolve to trust Him – or worse claiming that God has ordained things should be as they are, and that we must accept it? If God has truly ordained that we should be under such an attack it is to test and purify us, to see that we rely on Him in continuing the battle for the sake of His Name, and for our salvation. Never does He will the wanton destruction of what is good and righteous. Never will He leave us empty handed when we truly seek the Word of God – and not simply as a nice philosophy or a comfort, but as a staunch supernatural discipline directing us unto eternal life: unto God.

Look at how Christ looks on the crowd who come to listen to Him in the wilderness. He knows they have been there three days and have nothing more to eat. He knows they have exhausted their nourishment and cannot get home without some bodily sustenance. Unlike the other miracle wherein Our Lord multiplies the loaves, the crowd is not here seeking free food, but to listen to the one Word Who can give life. It is not for nothing that He has compassion on them; rather he pays the labourers their wages (cf. Luke 10:7).

It matters not what giants, what immense and overwhelming powers may face us, we must ever continue battling on to bring the justice of God to the world (cf. Matthew 6:33). God wants to give us great graces yet cannot whenever we are cowed down by purely human considerations, or refuse to stand up and tell a legitimate superior he has outstepped his competence or is even abusing those he has been given charge to bring to God. Nobody can arbitrarily command another to separate himself from God, from his God-given vocation or the means to live that vocation.

Here then we must find the context in which Our Lord instructs us to take no thought for tomorrow (Matthew 6:34). It is not to say that all preparation should be ignored, and nothing is to be done that helps develop one character and capacities to act in a manner becoming one’s vocation. Rather it is to put aside all petty concerns, those material things which are of no real consequence, and put all our effort into that which is necessary to elevate those around us from mundane things to those of eternity. It is the command to hasten to do now what will profit oneself for eternity (Rule of St Benedict, Prologue). Even if it seems imprudent at a human level, for loss of income or property or some other passing material good, fulfilling the Divine Law is that which must be done.

Similarly, St Basil would teach that according to Our Lord’s teaching we are not to concern ourselves with what we will eat, but rather we should concern ourselves to assure that our neighbour can eat (cf. Shorter rule for monks, 127). Yet it is not on bread alone that man lives. We should ever prepare ourselves to give any of the works of mercy as circumstance demand; and in our own age and culture the spiritual works of mercy have a precedence of necessity as well as dignity. It can only be the case that without knowing the reality of sin and human weakness man cannot know mercy.

In her the riches of her tradition the Church proclaims the saving reality that by Christ the power of sin has been broken. Now we can die to sin such that death may have no hold on us. Living in this reality can only be accomplished by living from the Church – from the Sacred Liturgy, ordinarily the unique mediator of grace. But it is not only the objective grace conferred through the sacraments which is to be received through the sacred rites. It is the lived reality in which and by which we are formed, as it has formed countless saints before us.

Yet we live in a world where certain despots wish to take this away from the Church; where they want to live the principle of revolution – that which once was must be bad for only the new up-to-date material is good. How far removed is this from all that is contained in Revelation. The Scriptures, including the Gospel, never tire of recapitulating the events of the wilderness years and of the giving of the Law through Moses. Substantially, likewise, does the sacred liturgy as it has been passed on from Our Lord through the Apostles and to all generations. It cannot fail to be so.
How deeply then are we invited to drink from the riches of the Tradition (cf. Psalm 109: 7) which ever flows from Our Lord, through the Church, and allows us to remain strong against the giants who come at us from the world! A tradition which has conquered no end of powers, errors and ideologies through the power and might of God infused into it. Yet the tradition also provides us with the richest of milk and honey for the journey to the promised land. +