The Sunday Sermon Archive

Dear Friends in Christ,

Jesus warns us that we must strive to do better than following the minimal "letter of the Law." If we cannot do any better than that, then we cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven. He teaches us that the physical commandment also includes words, ideas, and intentions. As an example, He shows us the Fifth Commandment: "Thou shalt not kill."

Taking the physical life of our neighbor will bar us from Heaven, but so will evil or hateful words that may leave the body of our neighbor intact but would wound or destroy his reputation or spiritual life. In addition to avoiding physical harm, we must guard against evil thoughts and desires. We must avoid evil deeds, evil words, and evil thoughts.

The root or beginning of the sin of murder must be immediately sought out and removed if we are to be successful in keeping God's Law against murder. This root is spiritual. If we can tame the thought or desire of anger, we will not have to contend with angry words or actions.

The faithful followers of Jesus Christ learn to take control of the motions of their hearts or souls. It is impossible to control our words or actions without first mastering our thoughts and desires. Here is the most challenging part of the problem. If we can do this much, the rest will be relatively easy. In examining our hearts, we often wonder: "Did I deliberately or willfully entertain evil thoughts or desires?" How can we tell?

We must first understand that the devil, the world, and our fallen nature constantly present evil thoughts or desires to us. These are temptations. Temptations are not sins. We sin when we take unlawful pleasure in these thoughts or willingly entertain them. We must do what we can to dismiss them as soon as we understand that they are wrong, evil, or sinful.

Continuing with the Fifth Commandment of God, we must resist — dismiss — all temptations to unlawful anger. There is a just anger. We should be angry with sin or evil. Be angry and sin not. In all cases, Scripture teaches that we should not allow the sun to set upon our anger. (Ephesians 4:26)

The perception of some evil or wrong brings about anger. Very often, this evil is directed at us. In this, we perceive a "justifiable anger" or retaliatory anger. "You hurt me, so now I will hurt you." This has a way of quickly spiraling out of control.

We cannot avoid the injury inflicted upon us, but we can avoid making it worse. We can even transform this injury, or the intended injury, into a spiritual good. We may do this by first understanding that we deserve this because of our sins. We must cultivate a true spirit of humility. It is not my neighbor who has done this to me, but God. God has actively or permissively willed that I should suffer this harm — whatever it may be. If we can come to terms with and accept this, we are well on our way. With our anger weakened, we then direct it against ourselves rather than away from ourselves.

Our enemy (neighbor) is only an instrument of God to humble us, correct us, give us a necessary cross so that we can follow Jesus on this earth and into Heaven. For this, we should love him, forgive him, and even pray for him. The temptation to anger, hatred, and murder has been nipped in the bud. We can now forgive him as we hope to be forgiven by God.

This does not mean that the sins of our neighbors should go uncorrected. We should — motivated by love rather than anger or hatred — admonish the sinner and make peace with him. We should strive to amend whatever injury we may have intentionally or unintentionally caused him. If our neighbor refuses to be reconciled, we must at least do what we can and pray for him. We can then pray with Jesus as He hung upon the Cross: "Father, forgive him because he does not know what he is doing."

This instruction that Jesus gives us concerning the Fifth Commandment can be applied to all the Commandments. The cure and preventive measures are remarkably similar. If we control our thoughts, we will have control over our words and actions as well. If we replace negative or evil thoughts with positive or good ones, we will begin to perceive that our words and actions align with our thoughts. Our tongue and body do not have to be fought against if we take this fight into our hearts and minds and engage in the battle there.

This is the path to perfection. Jesus would have everyone enter on this path. "Be ye perfect because your Father in Heaven is perfect." (Matthew 5:48) Nothing stained can enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. (Apocalypse 21:27) We may never be perfect in this world, but that does not excuse us from reaching and striving for this goal, and most importantly, humbly working and desiring unity with God in Heaven. God will accept the loving desire for the deed. He will fill up all that is lacking in us if we earnestly love and strive to reach Him.

May the Immaculate Heart of Mary inspire, guide, and protect us.

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