A Homily for Quinquagesima Sunday
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three, but the greatest of these is charity.
—I Corinthians 13:13
In today’s epistle, Saint Paul writes about that most excellent gift of charity, which is the very bond of peace and of all virtues. Because the version of Scripture that is read publicly in our church services is that authorized in 1611 by King James I of England, the word “charity” is used throughout. You may be familiar with more modern translations in which the word “love” is used instead. The Greek word translated as “charity” or “love” is “agape.”
C.S. Lewis wrote a book called “The Four Loves,” in which he distinguished four kinds of love, pointing out that in classical languages (like Greek) there were separate words for each kind. There is, of course, romantic love; and there is the love that one has for members of one’s family (parents for children, children for parents), and there is friendship. The fourth kind of love is what was called in Greek “agape” and in Jacobean English “charity.”
Language changes over time. “Charity” now conveys a sense of handouts to the poor, often implying condescension. The bestower of charity may be assumed to feel both materially and morally superior to the recipient. Characters in literature and motion pictures express their pride and self-worth by refusing such handouts, often with the line, “I don’t want your charity.” And so modern translators of Scripture avoid using the word.
But the danger of translating “agape” with the English word “love” is that it obscures the difference between, for example, romantic love and agape-love. This passage from the first letter to the Corinthians is nowadays often read, in a modern translation, at wedding ceremonies. But that rather misses the point. We are taught that Christian marriage signifies the unity which is between Christ and his Church, and that in marriage the husband and wife are made one flesh. The love that is between the husband and wife is love of one’s own, and, in the perfection of the sacrament, love of one’s self.
But agape-love, charity, is a love that is entirely other-directed and self-denying. Charity is the love that God himself has creation, and especially for human beings, and it is the love of human beings for God. It is the love to which our Lord referred in his summary of the law: thou shalt love the Lord thy God, and love thy neighbour as thyself.” When Jesus says, “greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,” it is the word “agape” that is used. When he says, “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” it is the word “agape” that is used. When Saint Peter writes that love will cover a multitude of sins, it is the word “agape” that is used.
Charity (agape-love) is a self-denying, other-directed love. It is unlike eros, or affection, or even friendship, in that it asks nothing in return. All our doings, if they are not done out of charity, are worth nothing. Saint Paul says that even if we give all that we have to feed the poor and give our bodies to be burned, if we do not do so out of love, out of charity, then it is a worthless gesture; and if we speak lofty words, and do not do so out of love, out of charity, then it is just so much loud noise.
Charity does not come easily to human beings. Our corrupt and fallen nature prefers to be vaunted and puffed-up. We like to be recognized when we do well and rewarded when we do good. Ours is a sinful race that required a Saviour to redeem us from our fallen state.
But God so loved the world—that is with agape-love—that he gave his only begotten Son. And in order that all that was written might be fulfilled, the time came when the only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ, went up to Jerusalem, where he was delivered to the Gentiles, and mocked, and scourged, and put to death, and where, on the third day, he rose again. We now enter on our annual commemoration of those events.
Great Lent begins on Wednesday, the day that we call Ash Wednesday. It continues for six and a half weeks, forty weekdays. (Sundays are “in Lent,” but are not counted as days “of Lent.”)
The Prayer Book says that Ash Wednesday is a fast day, one of only two days so called. (The other is Good Friday.) On the two great fast days, healthy adults eat no food at all, at least until after sunset, or drastically reduce the amount of food eaten.
The Prayer Book calls the remaining days of Lent “days of fasting, on which the Church requires such a measure of abstinence as is more especially suited to extraordinary acts and exercises of devotion.” By “fasting” is meant a reduction of the amount of food eaten; by “abstinence” is meant the avoiding of certain kinds of food, traditionally flesh meat, rich sauces, sweets, and alcoholic beverages. Children learn abstinence by “giving up” something for Lent.
Nor is the idea of fasting and abstinence limited to the intake of food. Lent is not a time for partying: the big bashes that will end Tuesday night—Carnaval, Mardi Gras, Fasching—represent one last fling before the austerity of Lent.
Lent is a season of self-denial. It was once the custom that the money that was not spent on fancy foods and partying was set aside in “mite boxes,” and those boxes were brought to the Church on Easter day, so that the money could be distributed to the poor, at home or abroad.
Beyond even that, the fourth century bishop John Chrysostom urged the people of his community to practice fasting of eye and tongue, hand and body. During the forty days, Christians should be especially careful to avoid gossip and slander, to avoid hurting the people around them by word or deed. And this is linked to the reason the Prayer Book gives for fasting and abstinence, namely: to facilitate “extraordinary acts and exercises of devotion.”
During the forty days’ fast that is about to begin, we should set aside a bit more time each day than we ordinarily do for prayer and the reading of Scripture, or for meditation on those acts of perfect self-denial by which our Lord, Jesus Christ, purchased our salvation.
And the visible fruit of these extraordinary acts of devotion should be an increase in us of that most excellent gift of charity, of agape-love. And be sure that it is a gift, a gift of God the Holy Spirit. Charity is not an act of our will, or an expression of our personality; it is a gift from God, one of the three “theological virtues,” infused in us by God’s grace alone.
Often, the emphasis during Lent is on less. Less food, less frivolity. But there is one thing that we should have more of during Lent, and that is love, agape, charity.
And so it is that on this, the last Sunday before Lent, that the Church bids her children to read and hear Saint Paul’s admonition to the Corinthians about charity and to pray that God, by his Holy Spirit, will increase in all of us that most excellent gift. What better offering could we bring to the altar when Lent is over and the Easter feast begun than that same increase of charity that we pray God to give us?
Church of Our Lady of Walsingham
Corona, California
22 February 2004