Septuagesima Sunday 17 February 2019

 In the ancient calendar of the Church, today is known as Septuagesima Sunday, which is the day that marks the beginning of preparations for Lent for traditional Catholics.  The name Septuagesima literally means “seventieth,” a reference to the number of days before Easter. However, this is a symbolic reference, not a literal one. Next week is Sexagesima Sunday (“sixtieth”) and the following is Quinquagesima Sunday (“fiftieth”).  And of course, on Ash Wednesday we will formally enter into Lent, which in Latin is called: Quadragesima, which means “Fortieth” – referring to the 40 days of Lent.  These pre-Lenten Sundays that we begin today are to prepare us for the discipline of Lent, and they also represent a shift from the glories of the Christmas Season and the Season after the Epiphany to the more solemn and yet so very necessary penitential season of Lent.  This is a time for us to humble ourselves, examine our hearts, and confess our sins.  The prayers of this Mass beg our Lord for His mercy that we be might be delivered from our sinfulness and thereby be made worthy of the promises of Christ.  As we begin our preparations for Lent this Septuagesima Sunday, Holy Mother Church turns our minds to the mystery of human sinfulness in all of its awful brutality, encouraging us to lives of virtue through the embrace of God’s commandments.  In our epistle today St. Paul spells out the spiritual battle for our souls, likening our lives to a race we must run so that we might win the crown of incorruptibility, while our Gospel reminds us of the work we must do to attain eternal life.  And the stakes are high for doing so. Indeed, Heaven is never something any of us can ever presume upon. We are reminded of this in very sobering fashion by the last line in our Gospel today: “For many are called, but few are chosen.”  Today’s Gospel is the parable of the workers in the vineyard, in which all of those who came to work in the vineyard are given the same pay – even those who came at the very end of the day and worked only a short amount of time.  The beautiful and consoling part about this parable is that it reminds us that God’s mercy is available to us throughout our lives. Even if we repent of our sins at the very last moment of our lives, God will forgive us, and His salvation will be ours.  But those haunting last words of today’s Gospel are reminiscent of the words used in the consecration of the chalice: “qui pro vobis et pro multis effundétur in remissiónem peccatórum,” which means: “which shall be shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.”  Notice that the words of consecration do not say that our Lord’s blood will be shed for all people, only many. While we know that Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection made salvation possible for all men, not all are saved.  There is a hell, and some people go there, and this should give us pause.  To live as you will with the belief that you can blithely confess all your sins in your dying days and go straight to Heaven is really a terrible act of presumption.  God may be all-merciful, but He’s not a fool; He will not tolerate us if we are not true.  So we must never presume upon our salvation, but strive for it throughout our lives. While salvation is not something we can earn, to be saved requires our cooperation. We have to work with God’s grace and mercy.  This is what Septuagesima and Lent call to mind for us. This period leading up to Easter is a time to get serious about our spiritual lives and really strive for holiness.  Note as well the last line of today’s epistle. In speaking about the Israelites, St. Paul tells us that “with most of them God was not well pleased” – more words that should give us pause!  Again, the point here is that while Christ suffered and died to redeem us all, not all are saved. Even amongst the baptized, there are those who fail to run the race so as to win.  This is why St. Paul speaks of the effort we must put in to get to Heaven.  What this means is that we must strive to be pleasing in God’s sight, which is not merely a matter of avoiding sin and correctly observing all the Commandments. Doing these things is important, but our hearts must also be true.  There must be integrity in our love for God and for one another. Our hearts must be clean – clean of sin, clean of any presumption and pride, clean of anything that is an impediment to our union with God.  For as our Lord tells us in the Beatitudes, “blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God.”  Isn’t that beautiful? By living lives of purity, of integrity, of honor, we can prepare ourselves to actually see God! Yet the converse is also true: cursed are the unclean of heart, for they shall not see God.  This is because sin distorts and obscures our vision, both spiritually and morally. It turns our vision away from God and what would be pleasing to Him and makes us look only to ourselves and what pleases us.  Sin introduces obstacles that prevent us from loving God as we should. So we must flee from sin at all cost. We must avoid that dangerous type of thinking that allows us to believe our sins aren’t so bad, or that God isn’t really offended by our sins.  Occasionally today we hear people say, “Well, God made me this way,” or “God loves me just the way I am.” While God created all of us, He did not create any of us to be sinners. He created us to become like Him!  While God knows that we are sinners and loves us despite our sins, He certainly doesn’t want us to persist in our sins. He wants us to strive to conquer them. And He wants us to ask for His mercy whenever we do sin.  The bottom line that we must never forget is that sin damages and distorts; it blinds us. And left untended, it will kill our souls.  My brothers and sisters, as we begin preparing for the Holy Season of Lent, may we examine ourselves well, being cognizant of any presumption of God’s mercy that may lurk in our hearts.  May we be willing to run the race of this life with humility and complete trust in God’s mercy, working diligently in our Lord’s vineyard so as to receive our proper payment when we see Him face to face.  May we truly be clean of heart, so that we may be among that number who are chosen to see God for all eternity.