Editor’s note: The following homily was preached on the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost (EF), August 7, 2022, at the Church of the Holy Innocents, New York City.
Only twice in the entire New Testament do we hear of Our Lord weeping, not in the Passion narratives as one might suspect, but in the pericope just proclaimed [Lk 19:41-44] and at the death of Lazarus [Jn 11:35].
Let’s situate today’s episode geographically. Jesus is on the Mount of Olives, overlooking the Holy City, the sight of which makes Him weep. This incident caused chapels and churches to be erected on the supposed spot over the centuries, the latest being constructed between 1953 and 1954. Not only is the church called “Dominus Flevit” (The Lord wept), but it is fashioned in the shape of a teardrop – to symbolize Christ’s tears. If you have ever been in that church, you will recall that the apse is a window, allowing you to see Jerusalem just as did Our Lord two millennia ago.
Now we are poised to consider the context for today’s Gospel. Back at Luke 13:34, we hear Jesus exclaim: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!” Can you not hear the pathos in that verse as Jesus compares Himself to a mother hen desirous of protecting her chicks from danger? Fast forward six chapters to the present text. Obviously, the Lord’s pleading and preaching did not bring about the conversion needed in the general populace, which brings Him to tears.
Remember that the mission of the biblical prophets involved both “forth-telling” and “fore-telling.” The “forth-telling” dimension has the prophet warn the people – even cajole them – into “teshuvah,” what the New Testament calls “metanoia” – that change of mind and heart signaling conversion. Donning the prophetic mantle, Jesus utters a last-minute appeal for the people to reform their ways: “Would that even today you knew the things that make for peace!” Notice how He links peace to personal conversion. Centuries later, Dante would declare: “In His will is our peace.” In other words, the human person and whole societies can only experience peace when their wills are made to conform to God’s holy will.
Ironically, even the name “Jerusalem” itself means, precisely, “City of Peace.” The unwillingness to undergo “teshuvah” will shatter even any semblance of peace, so that Our Lord can only go on to predict the most dire punishment imaginable – the destruction of the City – a prophecy fulfilled to the letter by the Romans in A.D. 70. And so, Jesus “wept.”
Let’s take a look at the other passage where we hear about Jesus weeping. In your mind’s eye, go to the events of John 11: Jesus is informed by messenger, “Lord, he whom you love is ill,” that is, Lazarus – one of that family famed for its hospitality to Our Lord; instead of rushing to Bethany to heal him, Jesus delays. Enigmatically, He essentially says, “Lazarus is sick, so let’s wait!” In fact, He waits two days, so that upon His arrival in Bethany, He learns that Lazarus has been in the tomb for four days – in other words, he is deader than a door-nail.
The two sisters, however, unbeknownst to each other, still harbor hope that Christ can do what needs to be done. In fact, Martha utters an amazing profession of faith, a stunning echo of Peter’s profession we hear in Matthew 16: “I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, he who is coming into the world.”
The scene changes, however, once Jesus arrives at the tomb, where the “mourners” have gathered. Don’t forget, many “mourners” in those days were paid to wail! Jesus was so turned off by the would-be mourners for Jairus’ daughter that He threw them out of the house! At any rate, these mourners exhibit cynicism about the whole affair. Cynicism, of course, is just another word for a lack of faith. Jesus becomes “troubled in spirit,” the Evangelist tells us, and then He weeps.
The common interpretation is that Jesus weeps over the death of His dear friend. However, that makes no sense, for He has already decided to raise Lazarus from the dead. No, Our Lord’s weeping at the tomb of Lazarus is not from sorrow or empathy. Rather, He weeps due to the lack of faith among the “mourners” (the same reason for which He wept over Jerusalem).
Board your time-machine and travel with me to the second of October in 1873. St. John Henry Newman has been invited to preach at the opening of the first seminary in England since the Reformation. One would expect the venerable cleric to lead the assembly in choruses of joy. On the contrary, Newman delivers one of the most chilling sermons of his long homiletic career as he ignores most of the congregation to address the seminarians directly and prognosticates on what those young men will face as priests. The title of the sermon should give a clue: “The Coming Age of Infidelity.” By “infidelity” Newman means a lack of faith. Here is his “warm-up” pitch:
I think that the trials which lie before us are such as would appal and make dizzy even such courageous hearts as St. Athanasius, St. Gregory I, or St. Gregory VII. And they would confess that dark as the prospect of their own day was to them severally, ours has a darkness different in kind from any that has been before it.
He explains:
The special peril of the time before us is the spread of that plague of infidelity, that the Apostles and our Lord Himself have predicted as the worst calamity of the last times of the Church. And at least a shadow, a typical image of the last times is coming over the world. I do not mean to presume to say that this is the last time, but that it has had the evil prerogative of being like that more terrible season, when it is said that the elect themselves will be in danger of falling away. This applies to all Christians in the world, but it concerns me at this moment, speaking to you, my dear Brethren, who are being educated for our own priesthood, to see how it is likely to be fulfilled in this country.
And the novelty of this age to come?
. . . the elementary proposition of this new philosophy which is now so threatening is this—that in all things we must go by reason, in nothing by faith, that things are known and are to be received so far as they can be proved.
Anticipating objections to his thesis, Newman continues:
. . . you will say that their theories have been in the world and are no new thing. No. Individuals have put them forth, but they have not been current and popular ideas. Christianity has never yet had experience of a world simply irreligious.
. . . consider what the Roman and Greek world was when Christianity appeared. It was full of superstition, not of infidelity. There was much unbelief in all as regards their mythology, and in every educated man, as to eternal punishment. But there was no casting off the idea of religion, and of unseen powers who governed the world. When they spoke of Fate, even here they considered that there was a great moral governance of the world carried on by fated laws. Their first principles were the same as ours. Even among the sceptics of Athens, St. Paul could appeal to the Unknown God.
And then with a rhetorical flourish that must have made dizzy the heads of those future priests, he declares: “My Brethren, you are coming into a world, if present appearances do not deceive, such as priests never came into before. . . .”
I suspect priests present must have made a mental note: “Don’t invite Newman to preach at your silver or golden jubilee!”
But I ask you: What would Newman say today? Far more importantly: What would be the reaction of our Blessed Lord?
First, within what should be the sacred precincts of Holy Church:
– Settled doctrine is held up for “review” or even ridicule at the highest levels of the Church. Jesus weeps.
– Fake Catholic politicians, at odds with the most basic teachings of Christ and His Church, receive Holy Communion, eating and drinking unto their own condemnation, while clerics sit on their hands. Jesus weeps.
– Two-thirds of Catholics either deny or are ignorant of the fundamental and paramount doctrine of the Holy Eucharist. Jesus weeps.
– The “hermeneutic of continuity” practiced by Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI is systematically dismantled in favor of a “hermeneutic of rupture.” Jesus weeps.
– Faithful celebrations of the Sacred Liturgy are victims of an ecclesial “cancel culture,” while blasphemous renderings go unchallenged. Jesus weeps.
– Vocations to the Sacred Priesthood have been reduced to a trickle in most dioceses and female vocations are nearly non-existent. Jesus weeps.
– Catholics contracept at the same rate as pagans. Jesus weeps.
Venturing into the world-at-large, we find:
– Militant atheism seeks to destroy the last remnants of a Christian culture. Jesus weeps.
– The culture of death rages over attempts to safeguard unborn and vulnerable human life. Jesus weeps.
– The dictatorship of relativism turns all reality on its heels with its aggressive and maniacal promotion of notions and programs that make a mockery of sexuality, marriage and family, basic concepts of right and wrong, through an individualism and subjectivity gone wild. Jesus weeps.
– Children are the pawns of a godless school system, grooming them to be victims of gender theory, sexploitation, and critical race theory. Jesus weeps.
Were I to go on (and I could), I fear all too many of you might succumb to despair. If Cardinal Newman castigated “the infidelity of the future,” he also saw the antidote being fidelity. And so, he proclaims:
Any child, well instructed in the catechism, is, without intending it, a real missioner. And why? Because the world is full of doubtings and uncertainty, and of inconsistent doctrine—a clear consistent idea of revealed truth, on the contrary, cannot be found outside of the Catholic Church. Consistency, completeness, is a persuasive argument for a system being true. Certainly if it be inconsistent, it is not truth.
Make no mistake, my friends, refusal live in truth has consequences: Jerusalem fell; Rome fell; and indeed, the secularized West – including the United States – can fall because God will not be mocked, as St. Paul reminded the Galatians (6:7). So, resolve to live the truth in that corner of the Lord’s vineyard where He has planted you, ensuring that you never cause Him to weep. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches us that good is diffusive of itself, so that the good that you do has ripple effects. Every major movement – for good or ill – has started out small, with an idea, and often no more than one or two adherents.
So, do not be intimidated into silence and inaction. And, oh yes, meditate daily on Newman’s exhilarating insight: “God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission.” No cause for divine weeping, then. On the contrary, such a commitment will gladden the Heart of our Savior.
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