CathInfo.com

A Translation and audio

Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Lent (Laetare)

Beloved in Christ the Lord, today, on this Fourth Sunday of Lent, we hear how the Savior, together with His Apostles, ascends the mountain, thus reminding us of our own destination. For indeed, the Lord Jesus became man and assumed our human nature for this very purpose: to lead us to heaven, so that by the help of God's grace, we might lift up our hearts and minds to heaven, and that all the sheep of God's flock might, at the end of their lives, enter the Heavenly Kingdom.

Dearly beloved, when Christ ascends the mountain, He lifts up His eyes and sees a great multitude approaching Him. He then turns to the Apostle Philip with the question: "Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat?" Let us note that the Evangelist remarks that Jesus asked His disciple this question to try his faith, for He Himself knew well what He was about to do. And behold, Philip, seeing such a vast multitude, cannot imagine what could be done in such a situation.

At that moment, the Apostle Andrew, evidently endowed with greater trust, addresses the Redeemer with a petition. He points out that he has found something—a young lad who has brought something with him. Perhaps he had already begun to share it with those who were fainting from hunger. "There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fishes; but what are these among so many?" This rhetorical question of Saint Andrew is simultaneously a cry to the Lord Jesus to work a miracle from this pittance, that this tiny amount might suffice to feed five thousand men. We can say that the Lord Jesus performs this miracle of the multiplication of bread today in response to the faith and the request of Saint Andrew the Apostle, who gives the Savior all that he has, all that he found, though it be so very little.

Dearly beloved, this Gospel scene, which Holy Mother Church sets before our eyes on this Fourth Sunday of Lent, is a most instructive lesson for us. Here we can recognize two great dangers lurking in our spiritual and Catholic lives—two traps set by Satan to lead us to doubt, to spiritual resignation, and perhaps even to thrust us into the arms of spiritual despair.
The First Trap: Egoism and Resignation

Firstly, my dear ones, our resignation, sadness, and despair in the face of life’s difficulties—in the face of the winds shaking the world and Holy Church—may stem from our egoism and self-love. This self-love tells us: "You have nothing to offer the Lord God. What you have is worthless. Why even begin?" Beloved, so often when we pray and ask God for help, we doubt whether our prayers deserve to be heard. We often prefer to do nothing rather than risk effort or admit how little we can do, how little we have, and what wretched dust and ashes we are. We often prefer to complain and murmur, leaving everything as it is, because we lack the courage and trust to offer the Savior the pittance we possess—the "dust" that we are. Like Philip, we are so consumed by temporal cares that we do not even try to think of what we could kindle in our lives to offer to God.

Yet the Savior does not demand the impossible. He calls us to offer Him what we have and who we are. Therefore, the first lesson is this: instead of complaining, grumbling, and mourning over what we lack, or lamenting our fate and the behavior of our neighbors, let us offer Christ what we have and who we are. Let us offer this pittance, which in the eyes of a proud man is nothing, but in the eyes of God can be a treasure.

    Find time throughout the day to lift your thoughts to God. (This is the definition of prayer: the lifting of the mind to God.)

    Practice short aspirations: "O my Jesus, mercy," "Holy Mother, help me," "Jesus, I love Thee," "Glory be to the Most Holy Trinity."

    Prepare for the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and give thanks after its conclusion.

    Read good Catholic books and meditate upon the Mysteries of the Holy Rosary.

    Offer charity to others: a word of advice to the doubting, a correction to the erring, or comfort to the afflicted.

    Perform your duties: help with chores, visit the sick, and pray for the living and the dead.

If we learn to offer this little bit to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, we will be amazed—just as the Apostles were amazed when twelve baskets were filled with the fragments of five barley loaves. Christ, through His grace, can make something great out of our "nothing."
The Second Trap: Doubting the Power of Grace

The second danger is the doubt in the power of God’s grace—the doubt that God desires our good. God desires the good of every person; He wants everyone to know, love, and serve Him, for He is the Supreme Good.

However, we Catholics often fall into the trap of thinking: "God cannot do anything with this. He cannot bring anything great out of such a pittance." My dear ones, we have almost entirely lost faith in the power of God’s grace, the power of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and the power of the Sacraments. We have begun to despise them.

Because our fathers and grandfathers despised the treasures entrusted to Holy Church, God allowed those treasures to be taken away. He permitted the Holy Sacrifice to be driven out of Catholic temples, no longer to be offered on altars built specifically to honor the Triune God. We no longer understand the power of the Mass that once transformed the face of the earth.

The great missionary Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre described this power which he witnessed in Africa:

    "I saw with my own eyes what the grace of the Mass can do... I saw it in those formerly pagan souls transformed by the grace of Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. These souls understood the Mystery of the Sacrifice of the Cross... pagan villages became Christian and changed not only spiritually, but also physically, socially, economically, and politically."

What happened in Africa happened a thousand years ago on Polish soil when the first Cross was raised. The Mass transformed this land. A believer living in sanctifying grace becomes a citizen of heaven even while here on earth. But we see what happens when this grace vanishes—when the Holy Sacrifice is replaced by a "protestantized," "judaized" meal. The result is a return to paganism and savagery.
Conclusion

As long as the Holy Sacrifice does not return to Catholic altars, the world will sink into deeper darkness. We have been given the knowledge of this Treasure. We must approach it with devotion and love, realizing it is the source of all grace.

If we believe and cooperate with God's grace, we can witness the re-Christianization of our now-paganizing nation. Our cities and villages can be transformed once again—not just supernaturally, but in every aspect of social and political life.

On this Fourth Sunday of Lent, let us fervently pray to believe in the power of the grace we receive through the Sacraments, especially the Sacrament of the Altar. Today, He who gave sight to the blind and fed the five thousand says to each of us, as He said to Saint Paul:

    "My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in infirmity."

Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Praised be Jesus Christ.