A Homily for Quinquagesima

Jesus said, “Behold, we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets

concerning the Son of man shall be accomplished.” And they understood none of these things.

—Saint Luke 28:31, 33

“Behold, we go up to Jerusalem!” For the next seven weeks, we are going up to Jerusalem, where all that is written by the prophets concerning Jesus was accomplished. We are going up to Jerusalem in the footsteps of Jesus and his disciples and of nearly one hundred generations of Christians. We are going up to Jerusalem in the company of nearly two billion Christian souls throughout the world.

We are going up to Jerusalem, to witness again the great acts of our redemption: the triumphal entry into the city on Palm Sunday, the cleansing of the Temple, the betrayal on Spy Wednesday, the Last Supper, the agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, the trial, the beatings, the bearing of the cross, the crucifixion, death, and burial; and the glorious resurrection early in the morning of the third day.

We are going up to Jerusalem. And, unlike the disciples, who as yet understood none of these things, we know what it is that will come to pass. We have made the journey before; we make the journey every year. The way is familiar to us.

Our journey is a journey of faith. Like the blind man on the road to Jericho, we call out with confidence: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us.” Take away our spiritual blindness, so that we can see clearly. What do we want? “Lord, that [we] may receive [our] sight.” For now we see through a glass, darkly; but we would see face to face. Our journey is a journey of hope, because it is through hope that we are heirs of the everlasting kingdom that Jesus won through his passion, death, and resurrection. Our journey must also be a journey of charity.

We are going up to Jerusalem, but ours is an interior journey. As we go up to Jerusalem, we travel away from our selves: we must keep our focus on our destination, and not on the charms of our worldly pursuits, which would draw us back from our goal. Our journey, our Lent, is a time of prayer and of fasting.

In the western Church, it is customary not only to eat less altogether, but to abstain from eating meat for the forty weekdays of Lent; it is customary to abstain from rich foods, sweets, and adult beverages, which are the stuff of merry-making. Two days, Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, are marked out as days of strict fasting; of the other Lenten weekdays, the Prayer Book says that they are “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.”

Extraordinary acts and exercises of devotion may take different forms. But it is important, as we journey up to Jerusalem, that we do a little extra. Here at Saint Mary Magdalene’s parish, we will have our weekly Lenten program of evening prayer, stations of the Cross, and discussion. At home, if we have not been in the habit of saying morning or evening prayer each day, we may try to do so during Lent. We may want to make a point of reading a few pages of Scripture each day: and of prayerfully considering what the words on those pages mean for our lives.

We are going up to Jerusalem! Let us go in charity. There is a reason why Holy Church bids us, as we begin our Lenten exercises, to take heed to what Saint Paul wrote about charity. If we go up to Jerusalem with prayer and fasting, and we do not go in charity, then our journey is for naught.

The late Bishop Cahoon, in a sermon preached on Quinquagesima Sunday a few years ago, having discussed the disciplines of fasting and abstinence, of self-examination and repentance, and of extraordinary acts of devotion, concluded as follows:

Finally, you should keep in mind that the main point of Christian discipline—Lenten or otherwise—is to increase charity, as Saint Paul points out in today's epistle. Charity means acting at all times for the good of the other person—putting his needs ahead of your own, acting as Jesus always acted. To paraphrase Saint Paul: a person who has charity puts up with everything and everybody in a kind and generous spirit; he never wants what he doesn't have already; he doesn't put himself forward or brag; he doesn't keep a list of slights; he takes no salacious interest in the wrongdoings of others.

St. Paul fleshes out what it means to be charitable. He describes what the life and the attitudes of a truly selfless person would look like. A charitable person puts up with anything and everything, because he has not made his own convenience and comfort his top priority. A charitable person does not try to call attention to himself or put himself forward. When a charitable person hears something negative about another person, he doesn't immediately conclude the worst or impute the basest possible motives to the person under discussion. He surely does not take pleasure in the real or imagined bad behavior. Instead he seeks the truth, and he actually prefers knowing the truth to wallowing in salacious rumors and suppositions.

In the epistle, Saint Paul puts all spiritual discipline into perspective. He says that no matter how much we do, no matter how good any of those disciplines may be in themselves, they are worthless if they don't make us more charitable. The ultimate point of spiritual discipline is not Bible information, or greater self-awareness, or lower cholesterol, or the better opinion of your children. Good as all of those things are in themselves, the only worthwhile point of any of them is to help us want to serve other people, and then actually go ahead and do it.

And on Quinquagesima Sunday in 387, Saint John Chrysostom, who was then a priest in Antioch, delivered a homily to the Christians of that city in which he advised them how to keep the Lenten fast. This is part of that homily:

Do you fast? Prove it by your works! Do you ask, “by what kind of works?” If you see a poor person, take pity on him! If you see an enemy, be reconciled to him! If you see a friend gaining honour, do not envy him! If you see a pretty woman, pass her by! For let not the mouth only fast, but also the eye, and the ear, and the feet, and the hands, and all the members of our bodies. Let the hands fast, by being pure from greed and avarice. Let the feet fast, by not running to unseemly spectacles.

Let the eyes fast, being taught never to fix themselves rudely upon handsome faces, or to busy themselves with strange beauties. Let the ear fast also. The fasting of the ear consists in refusing to receive gossip and accusations.

Let the mouth too fast from disgraceful speeches and railing. For what does it profit if we abstain from birds and fishes; and yet bite and devour our brethren? The slanderer eats the flesh of his brother, and bites the body of his neighbour.

But not only do I now admonish gossips and slanderers; but those besides, who hear others ill spoken of. I exhort you to stop up your ears. Say to your neighbour, "Do you have anyone to praise or highly to commend? I open my ears, to receive the fragrant oil; but if you have any evil to say, I block up the entrance to your words, for I will not admit dung and dirt.

For as he who is humane, and merciful, and forgiving, cuts away the greater mass of his sins, so he who is bitter, and cruel, and implacable, greatly increases the magnitude of his own offences. Let us then expel from our mouth all slander, knowing that if we do not abstain from it, though we might feed upon ashes, this austerity would avail us nothing. "For not that which entereth into, but that which cometh out of the mouth defileth the man." Therefore let us abstain from evil speaking, from foul language, from blasphemy; and let us not speak ill of our neighbour, nor of God!

If we make this rule for ourselves, in any wise to reduce to a correct practice these precepts during the present Lent, and to commit them to the safe custody of good habit, we shall proceed with greater ease to the rest; and by this means arriving at the summit of spiritual wisdom, we shall both reap the fruit of a favourable hope in the present life; and in the life to come we shall stand before Christ with great confidence, and enjoy those unspeakable blessings; which, God grant, we may all be found worthy of, through the grace and loving kindness of Jesus Christ our Lord, with Whom be glory to the Father and the Holy Spirit forever and ever. Amen.

Church of Saint Mary Magdalene

Orange, California

6 February 2005

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