Enrolling in the School of the Lord’s Service, 14th Saturday (II), July 11, 2020

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Visitation Convent of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan
Saturday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I
Memorial of St. Benedict
July 11, 2020
Gen 49:29-32.50:15-26, Ps 105, Mt 10:24-33

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

The following points were attempted in the homily: 

• Today on this Feast of St. Benedict, the great founder of western monasticism and one of the greatest saints who ever lived, it’s key for us to grasp what he did founding the Benedictine Order, as he said in his famous Rule, as a “school of the Lord’s service.” Jesus told us in the Gospel, “No disciple is above his teacher. … It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher,” and St. Benedict sought to become like his Master and to train others to enter that same school of the Lord’s service. St. Benedict and his Benedictine sons and daughters seek to serve the Lord in their prayer, especially their common liturgical prayer that he called the “opus Dei,” the work of God. They seek to serve the Lord in their work. Prior to St. Benedict’s revolution, manual work, like working the fields, being in shops, even copying manuscripts, were considered things done by slaves. The Benedictines sought to do it as slaves of the Lord, not in a slavish way, but learning from the Master in the school of service how to do it well. They also sought to serve the Lord in their study, zealously learning from the Master in such a way that they could not only live it but pass on as of the first important what they themselves received. Ora et labora et studium: They served the Lord and learned from him in this three course classroom of prayer, work, and study. Those are the three principle courses in the life of every Christian and in all of those activities God comes first. Two of the most celebrated phrases in the famous Rule of St. Benedict that formed countless monks and nuns and lay oblates in the “school of divine service” were about the preference that needs to be given to God. Ergo nihil operi Dei praeponant, St. Benedict says in Chapter 43: “Prefer nothing to the Work of God,” by which he means their common prayer; and Christo omnimo nihil præponant, which he says at the very end (Chapter 72): “Prefer nothing whatsoever to Christ.” These were part of the opening prayer of the Mass, when we besought, “O God, who made the Abbot Saint Benedict an outstanding master in the school of divine service, grant, we pray, that, putting nothing before love of you, we may hasten with a loving heart in the way of your commands.”  The whole point of the Christian life is to put God first, above family members, friends, even our own life, which is something St. Benedict did and trained his monks to do. Once we do, we hasten to obey him with a loving heart:  in prayer we put God first, in our work we seek to offer him the sacrifice of Abel, and in our study we come on fire for him and for the truth that he has revealed in so many settings.
• Today in the Gospel, Jesus continues his instructions to the Twelve about the mission he was giving them to complete his own. It is the Master’s own school of divine service. It’s all meant to help them to go out in the person of Christ, with his words, with his authority, and even with his sufferings, and to put nothing before him. Jesus lets the apostles know that if they’ve insulted him and tried to ascribe his work to the devil, they will do the same to the Apostles and us. But he reiterates to us not to be afraid, but to speak in the light what Jesus says in the darkness, to proclaim on the housetops what he whispers. He reminds us that we have nothing to fear from those who will seek to kill our bodies but can’t harm our souls. This is what gave the apostles and the martyrs the courage to proclaim the Gospel despite all the vicissitudes they encountered, because they knew that after fighting the good fight, finishing the race, keeping the faith and being poured out like a libation, a crown of righteousness was awaiting them. They knew that God loved them all, had counted every strand of hair, and would care for them more than he cares for sparrows and lilies who never go without. The whole school of divine service was to get us to acknowledge Christ before others, literally to lead others to the knowledge of Christ.
• In the first reading, we see the calling of the Prophet Isaiah to the school of the Lord’s service. In his vocational vision, he saw the Lord surrounded by the seraphim crying out “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts! All the earth is filled with his glory!” He was filled with fear and thought he was doomed, because he was a person of “unclean lips,” someone incapable of speaking of God’s holiness because of his own impurity. But God sent the Seraphim to purify his lips with burning charcoal, to remove his wickedness and purge his sin. This is what in the Extraordinary Form a priest still prays: Munda cor meum ac labia mea, omnipotens Deus, qui labia Isaiae prophetae calculo mundasti ignito: ita me tua grata miseratione dignare mundare ut sanctum Evangelium tuum, digne valeam nuntiare. “Cleanse my heart and my lips, O almighty God, who cleansed the lips of the prophet Isaias with a burning coal, and vouchsafe, through your gracious mercy, so to purify me, that I may worthily announce your holy Gospel.” We always needs God’s grace so that we may worthily proclaim his Gospel. Once that purification rite was done, when God asked for a “volunteer” to send, Isaiah stepped forward: “Here I am. Send me!” This shows us that the school of the Lord’s service is a school of conversion, in which the Lord seeks to cleanse our minds, our hearts, our lips so that we might be able to speak of God’s holiness in the world, so that we and others may become holy as the Lord our God is holy, and so that our lives, and the world, may be filled with God’s glory. It also shows that it’s a school of freedom, in which we step forth to serve and be sent by the Lord.
• Today we come forward on this Feast of St. Benedict before the Master, who teaches us and then feeds and strengthens us for his service today through our prayer, through our work, through our study. It’s where we meet the Lord who is holy, holy, holy and seeks to sanctify us, reforming us in his image. It’s where we learn to put nothing before God and his work.

The readings for today’s Mass were: 

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