Epistle.
1 Corinthians iv. 1-5.
Brethren:
Let a man so look upon us as the ministers of Christ, and the dispensers of the mysteries of God. Here now it is required among the dispensers, that a man be found faithful. But as to me it is a thing of the least account to be judged by you or by human judgment: but neither do I judge my own self. For I am not conscious to myself of anything, yet in this am I not justified: but he that judgeth me, is the Lord. Therefore judge not before the time; until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise from God.
Gospel.
St. Luke iii. 1-6.
Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius CÆsar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and Philip his brother tetrarch of Iturea and the country of Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilina, under the high-priests Annas and Caiphas: the word of the Lord came to John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins: as it is written in the book of the words of Isaias the prophet: A voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled: and every mountain and hill shall be brought low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways plain And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

Sermon X.
Fruits Of Penance.

Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance.
—Matthew. iii. 8.

St. John Baptist in these words, my dear brethren, teaches us, as he taught those who came to him, that penance, if it be true and genuine, must bring forth its proper fruit. Every repentance, if it be sincere, every confession, if it be really good, must be followed by a good life. If any confession is not so followed, it must needs be a delusion; though it should have been accompanied by torrents of tears, and the sins exposed as perfectly as God himself knows them.

And, moreover, the tree which brings forth the good fruit should continue to bear it; it should not only for a few days or weeks give this proof that it is what it should be, and then have him who planted it come to seek fruit on it and find none.

Yet how often do we find sinners who come to confession with what would seem to be the best dispositions very soon back just where they were before! How discouraging it is to the priest to find the fruits of a mission which seemed to be so promising reduced down almost to nothing for so many who seemed to profit by it; to spend long hours, to wear away his strength, instructing, exhorting, and absolving, and to have so little return from his labor for God and for souls!

What is the reason of all this failure of what began so well? Of course it is partly that the tree planted by the grace of God in the Sacrament of Penance was not tended afterwards. Its life was not supplied to it, as it should have been, by the frequent renewal of confession and reception of Holy Communion. But there was a difficulty further back than that; a want of something at the start, which, indeed, was the reason that the sacraments were not regularly received. What was this difficulty? It was a want of a thorough earnestness; of an understanding of the greatness of the work that was undertaken, and of a real determination to sacrifice everything in order to accomplish it.

It is a great undertaking which one commits one's self to in coming to reconcile himself with God after a sinful life. The task is not merely to examine his conscience, to tell his sins plainly and without concealment, and to feel heartily sorry for them; that is a great part of it, but by no means all. There is a great deal left, and that is to leave them for good; to quit company with them for ever. And this is not such an easy matter. When, one has lived so that his whole pleasure has been in sin, in drunkenness and debauchery, in filthy conversation, in bad actions and bad thoughts, it will perhaps seem almost like giving up life itself to part with them. The penitent sinner has not all at once become an angel; his whole nature has been warped and twisted out of place by sin, and, though the guilt of the sin has gone, the effects are there; his soul, like a limb out of joint, has much to suffer before it can get set right again.

A man must make up his mind, when he comes to serve God after serving the devil, that he has got an uphill road to travel; if he does not, he will not persevere. Labor and suffering, self-denial and mortification, he has to face these manfully. His consolation, his happiness, as well as his strength, have got to come from God. If one understands this he will seek that happiness and that strength again where he first found it—in confession and Communion. But if he does not, if he thinks that all will go right now without any more trouble, his old nature and habits will claim their dues, and he will soon be back in his sins again.

Yes, we must cut right down to the root of sin if we wish to bring forth the fruits of penance, and must make up our minds to suffer the pain that this cutting will bring. Occasions of sin must be avoided, appetites must be denied, contempt and ridicule must be faced; we must pray, we must struggle, we must resist even to blood; we must put our former life to death, that Christ may live in us. For, as St. Paul tells us: "If we be dead with him, we shall live also with him; if we suffer, we shall also reign with him." There is no other way.

Let us not shrink from this pain and this conflict; that would be the greatest mistake of all. But let us understand it, that when the trial comes, as it surely will, it may not find us unprepared.

Sermon XI.
Preparation For Christmas.

Prepare ye the way of the Lord.
—Matthew iii. 3

We are such unprofitable servants that we have much to do to prepare the way of the Lord in our hearts. If we have done all that is required of us we are, nevertheless, unprofitable servants, and unless we believe this we are spiritually blind.

The better the opinion which we have of ourselves the worse is our spiritual condition. The good opinion, than which nothing can be more false, which we have of ourselves prepares the way for a fall into sin.

The way of the Lord, the way of salvation, is found by humility, which always leads to penance.

The holy Council of Trent says that "the whole Christian life ought to be a perpetual penance." How few realize this, because they think they are what they really are not! Now, if penance be the life of the Christian in the state of grace, it must be a crying necessity for one who is in the state of sin. What food is to the starving man penance is to the soul in this unhappy state.

Penance is the preparation required of us for the coming feast of Christmas. This is the lesson of Advent. For four weeks the purple vestments, the prayers and ceremonies of the church, and the fasts on Fridays have been appealing to our eyes and ears, if not to our hearts, to prepare in this way. The wise man views the obligation which he is under to do penance as very urgent. He banishes timidity and cowardice and puts his hand to the plough with courage and confidence.

The foolish man hates to hear of penance, because his passions have got the mastery. When asked to keep the commandments and fulfil the duties of his state, he says: "I cannot." To bridle his passions and give up bad habits seem to him too hard a task.

Now, if you should consult any man who has done penance faithfully, so as to persevere in God's grace for years, he would say the foolish man's view of penance is a false one. God is more merciful and lenient than we imagine. It is the devil who dresses up penance as something repulsive.

In urging upon you to prepare for Christmas by penance my first words are: "Take courage." "Taste and see how sweet the Lord is."

St. Leo says "the cause of the reparation which we make for our sins is the mercy of God." It is our way of loving him who first loved us. How well the prophet Isaias describes this penance when he says: "The Lord says, I will lead the blind in the way in which they have not known; in the ways which they have not known I will make them walk. I will change their darkness into light, their crooked ways into ways that are straight, I will accomplish these words in them and will not abandon them. I am found," says God, "by those not seeking me, and I have appeared openly to those who have not asked for me."

We see by these words how much the grace of God assists us, and how God mercifully forgets our past sins when we do penance sincerely.

But our penance must be sincere. We must "bring forth fruit worthy of penance," says St. John the Baptist, the precursor of our Lord.

It matters not if we are "the offspring of vipers," as the holy Baptist called the multitude who approached him for penance, provided "we lay the axe to the root of the tree."

Now, the words of the prophet, instead of repelling sinners, attracted them. The publicans who were farthest from God came and asked: "Master, what shall we do?" And they received the gentle …

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… which should be our chief one at Christmas, now that the days of innocent childhood are past. We do not hate sin from our hearts; we even cling to it; at best we make compromises with it. Mortal sin, perhaps, we try to avoid, but venial faults do not trouble us; this is the best that can be said for most of what may be called good Christians. And how many there are who come outwardly to worship before the manger of Bethlehem, but with hearts entirely turned from their God, who lies there in cold and poverty for their sakes, pleading with them for his sake to give up their sinful habits! How many go on offending him at this holy time, with out repentance, almost without remorse!

Hatred of sin; yes, that is what we want if we would be happy at Christmas. And now is the time to learn to hate it. For surely the love of God comes easier to us now, if we will only try to obtain it, than at any other time, unless, perhaps, on Good Friday, when we see the sacrifice now begun accomplished. And the love of God is the hatred of sin, which is the only thing which he hates, the one cause of all his pain.

Do not let this Christmas go by, then, my dear brethren, without the joy which should come with it. Do not let this opportunity pass of acquiring that love of our dear Lord which will make you really hate and trample under foot all that offends him, and which will make you rejoice beyond measure that he has put it in your power to do so. Pray, now, at least that you may learn to love him; that you may enter into the joy of knowing not merely that he can save you, but that he has saved you from your sins.