Sermon XXII. Fraternal Charity. (For The Festival Of St. John The Evangelist.)

I Epistle St. John ii. 10. "He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is no scandal in him."

We celebrate to-day the Feast of St. John the Evangelist, the Apostle who is distinguished in Holy Scripture as the disciple whom Jesus loved, and who is represented as leaning on the bosom of the Lord at the Last Supper. Now, we may ask what is the reason the Lord showed this marked preference and especial affection for St. John above the other Apostles? It must have been because St. John was more like the Lord than any of the others, for God must always love us in proportion as we approach His divine image and likeness. The more we put on Christ—that is, the more we are clothed with the thoughts, ideas, feelings, and dispositions of Christ, the more is Christ attracted to us in love.

Now, what was the characteristic virtue of this great Apostle, which rendered him so like to Christ and so dear to Him? It was his tender and overflowing love to his neighbor—that is, to all his fellow-men. He is pre-eminently the Apostle of fraternal charity, or of the love of one's neighbor.

Nothing, then, will please St. John better today than to speak of the excellence of this virtue, which was the continual subject of his discourse.

What, dear brethren, is the end and object for which we live in this world? Undoubtedly it is to acquire the love of God. This divine love will render us for ever blessed, and we shall be blessed just in the proportion we have acquired it. The greatest saints are those who have loved God best; the least in heaven are those who have loved Him least; but all must love God in some degree, or there is no place in heaven for them.

Now, I assert that the easiest, shortest, and most efficient road to the love of God is the love of our neighbor, or of our fellow-man, who is designated by the word neighbor. I assert it on the authority of St. John himself, who has laid it down in the clearest manner. We read in the breviary of to-day this beautiful narrative of St. Jerome:

"The blessed John the Evangelist, whilst he was living at Ephesus, in his extreme old age, was scarcely able to be brought to the church by the hands of his disciples, and could not weave together many words into a sentence. He did nothing at the different assemblies but repeat the same words, 'My little children, love one another.' At last the disciples and brethren who were present, getting tired of always hearing the same thing, said: Master, why do you always repeat this? He replied in a sentiment worthy of St. John: 'Because it is the precept of the Lord, and if this alone be observed it is sufficient.'"

How beautiful is this! "Little children, love one another," and, "This alone is sufficient." We must love one another with the sincerity, the artlessness, of little children. There must be no hypocrisy about our love; it must be genuine, and flow from the right fountain. And what is this fountain? It is the love of God. Our love of our fellow-men must proceed from the love of God. We must love him for the sake of God, and because God wishes us to love him, and because he represents God to us.

There is a love which is not on account of God, but, on the contrary, opposed to God, and which destroys the love of God in us. A parent, for example, is distractedly fond of a child because the child is beautiful, or talented, or amiable, and this child is consequently indulged and spoiled; is educated for show and vanity, or, to sum it all up, exclusively for this short-lived world and its object. Such love as this does not lead to God, but turns the soul away from Him. With passionate eagerness it fixes it on the present, as its last end and chief good, and quenches its thirst for God, who is the only last end and chief good for which it was created.

We must love our neighbor, because we see in him an immortal soul, created to the image and likeness of God, and destined to participate at last in the glory and happiness of God. We must love our neighbor, because he has been bought by the blood of Jesus Christ, his God, who was willing to lay down His life for him, after thirty years of toil and hardship, suffering the agony of the cross.

Now, dear brethren, let me explain this a little more practically. You see a person who is in some respects repugnant to you. His manners and ways of acting are not pleasant to you; indeed, some of his actions are very disagreeable. Well, then, if you are actuated in loving your neighbor by the love of God, you will not allow your mind to dwell on these things so far as to conceive a dislike or hatred, but, on the contrary, you will rise above such thoughts, by considering his relation to God. You will see God in him, and this will keep your mind sweet, gentle, and kind towards him.

This is what our Lord says: "You have heard what has been said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy; but I say unto you, Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you, that you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven; who maketh His sun to rise upon the good and the bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust. For if you love those that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans the same? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more? Do not also the heathen the same? Be ye perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." [Footnote 118]

There, Christians, is the doctrine of our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ. If it is not yours also, is it proper to call you by His name, Christians? Should you not rather be called, according to His way of naming, heathens and publicans?

But how many objections are raised against this plain and heavenly doctrine? How much repugnance and fighting against it! You see a poor man in the street, or in his miserable shanty. He is ragged and dirty, for rags and dirt are often necessary accompaniments of poverty. Do you see in him Jesus Christ? No; only an object of disgust. Instead of relieving him, you begin to reason. Why does he not go to work? He is idle and shiftless. If he is relieved, he will be just the same. Instead of helping him, let him be forced by stress of poverty and starvation to find work. And after all, the poor man has done his best, and at least should not have to bear undeserved reproach, as well as his poverty.

My dear brethren, how is it possible that we should have this right love of our neighbor, which is supernatural, unless we love him for God's sake; unless we hunger and thirst to please God and acquire His justice, and unless we pray constantly to God to grant us this wonderful effect of His goodness?

Let us understand, then, that, if we will acquire the love of God, we must pray for the love of our neighbor, and then act it out in all sincerity whenever an opportunity offers itself to us. St. John tells us in his epistle: "How can we love God whom we have not seen, when we love not our neighbor whom we have seen?" This text deserves an explanation. You desire to love God more; you feel that this love is of more value to you than anything else; this prompts you to fall upon your knees and beg earnestly for it. You say My God, give me Thy love; give me a great decree of this love. Then comes the natural thought What shall I do to acquire this treasure? How shall I conduct myself and order my life, so as constantly to preserve and increase it? If God would only show Himself to me, and I could behold His beauty, and experience His goodness, then I should know how to love Him. Why does He not reveal Himself?

But all is dark, all is silent. God is hidden: we cannot form a picture of Him in our minds. We have never seen God at any time, and we shall not see Him as long as we remain in the flesh.

But God and our Lord Jesus Christ walk the streets every day. We meet them whenever we go abroad. How is that? It is in the person of every one we meet, particularly of the poor, the miserable, and the despised. The promise is absolute: "Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of these, ye did it unto Me." Love one of these poor men, entertain a sentiment of compassion for him, and you have made a genuine act of love of God. Entertain an habitual love for him, and respect him for the sake of the One he represents, and you will form the habit of God's love in your soul.

When St. Martin cut his cloak in two, and gave half of it to a poor man he met on the roadside, our Lord appeared to him the same night with the half cloak upon his shoulders, and said: "Martin the catechumen (St. Martin was at that time under instruction for his baptism) has clothed Me in this garment."

In the account of the last judgment, everything is described as being settled on this one principle. "Then the King shall say to them that shall be on the right hand: Come, ye blessed of My Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave Me to drink: I was a stranger, and ye took Me in: naked, and ye clothed Me: sick, and ye visited Me. I was in prison, and ye came to Me. Then shall the just answer: Lord, when did we see Thee hungry, and fed Thee; thirsty, and gave Thee drink? and when did we see Thee a stranger, and took Thee in? or naked, and covered Thee? or when did we ever see Thee sick or in prison, and visit Thee? And the King answering, shall say to them: Amen, I say to you, as long as ye did it unto the least of these, my brethren, ye did it unto Me." [Footnote 119]

This is what the saints understood and fully realized. St. Catharine of Sienna found an old woman sick of the leprosy. She was so disgusting and loathsome an object that everybody had deserted her, and she was perishing of neglect and starvation. The saint gladly took charge of her, cleansed her sores, prepared her food, and lavished upon her every possible attention. The mother of the saint was not so charitable. She heard of her daughter's proceedings, and became very angry. In her fear of the infection, she forbade her to attend the sick woman any longer. But St. Catharine pleaded our Lord's case so strongly that her mother was obliged to yield. Then the old woman, overcome by her miseries, took a dislike to her, and repaid her kindness by a constant torrent of the foulest abuse. St. Catharine, in spite of all this, never relaxed her kindness a moment. As a further trial, she caught the infection, and her hands were all covered with the loathsome disorder. But nothing deterred her from her purpose until she had the satisfaction of receiving the last breath of this poor creature, who died in sentiments of the deepest contrition. Then the saint finished her work by burying her with her own hands, and, as she cast the earth into the grave, those hands became instantly freed from all traces of disease, and became white and more beautiful than ever before.

If we love for God's sake, we shall love all, and no one will be excluded from our love. Love will flow from our hearts, like the water from a perpetual, inexhaustible fountain, which makes all the soil it waters fertile, producing rich fruits and beautiful flowers, These fruits and flowers of divine charity are well enumerated by St. Paul: "Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely: is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeketh not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinketh no evil: rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth: beareth all things; believeth all things; hopeth all things; endureth all things." [Footnote 120]

Dear brethren, let us reflect on this virtue of fraternal charity, and resolve to increase in it. Let us be more pleasant and kinder in our way of speaking. Let us look more kindly upon others, and their ways of acting. Let us endeavor to maintain towards all such a manner of speaking and acting as we suppose our Lord Jesus Christ to have had, and, altogether, be more amiable than we have ever been before. Indeed, let us set no bounds within our own hearts to our love of our fellow-men.

Every action of love, no matter how small, will increase the love of God in our hearts. Everyone will be another stroke of the oar which drives forward the little boat of our soul toward the kingdom of heaven. Every one will be an increase of merit and of eternal reward.