The other day, the friars watched together the documentary by Ben Stein called
Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed.
And in this documentary, Ben Stein had the opportunity to interview a self-proclaimed
atheist and apparently famous scientist, Richard Dawkins, and he asked him a question.
He said, if when you die, you find yourself before God, what would you say to him?
And Dawkins responded, quoting someone else, I can't remember exactly who it was, some
other atheist, who said, well, I would ask him, why did he make himself so hard to find?
And so today's saint that we celebrate, St. John, the beloved disciple, has this intention
of revealing God to the entire world.
We see that in the beginning of the first letter of John, which we just read.
This is his entire purpose, to reveal to the world the God who he has seen with his eyes,
who he has heard speak with his ears, and who he touched with his hands.
God has made himself known, has revealed his face in the face of Christ.
This is what we see in the beginning of the first letter of John, which we just read.
This is what we proclaim to you, what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what
we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked upon and our hands have touched.
We speak of the word of life.
This life became visible.
We have seen and bear witness to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life that was
present to the Father and became visible to us.
What we have seen and heard, we proclaim and turn to you.
You see how insistent St. John is with his experiential knowledge of the word made flesh,
seeing, hearing, and touching.
And now he wants to bear witness to the world.
And why does he want to bear witness to the world?
We proclaim and turn to you so that you may share life with us.
It's our Lord.
He came to give us life so that we might have life and have it more abundantly.
That is, that refers to the life of grace in this world, sharing in God's divine life
by living in the state of grace, and then the life of glory to come.
This is the life that Christ came to give us, which fills us with that relative happiness
that we can experience in this world.
Living in the state of grace, and the fullness of happiness in the life to come.
Living in the state of glory.
This fellowship of ours is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.
Indeed, our purpose in writing you this, here he states another purpose, not only that we
might share this life, but also our purpose in writing you this is that our joy may be
complete.
So St. John wants the whole world to know about the incarnation of the Son of God, not only for
our good, but also for his own.
Do you see how true knowledge and true love of God cause one, inspire one to be, to share that
with others?
They want to share this knowledge and this love with others.
So that others, too, may have life and may have happiness.
And this increases their happiness.
Again, this is also an indication, a certain way to measure how much we know and love Christ.
By how much we desire to share that knowledge and love with others.
Do we desire that others know and love Christ?
So that others know and love Christ.
So that others know and love Christ.
So that our joy may be complete.
Or are we perhaps indifferent?
You know, just kind of leave everybody to themselves.
Whatever you believe is okay for you and what I believe is okay for me, as long as everyone's
happy.
That shows very little love and very little knowledge of Christ.
If there's very little desire to share him.
Now, one might object that, you know, that's all good and, you know, not all good.
It's not very convincing.
But the fact is that our Lord said,
He who seeks, finds.
You know, he who asks, receives.
He who knocks, the door is open for him.
Seekers find.
If we want to seek and find God in this world,
of course there are preconditions.
Humility, prayer, good works.
All of these things will help us to find God.
And again,
these may not be convincing answers
or the testimony of St. John may not be convincing
for the rationalist out there.
But the fact that it isn't convincing like a mathematical formula
does not take away from its truth value.
It still is nonetheless true.
So we pray
for the intercession of St. John today
that through his intercession,
and prayer,
that the world will become more enlightened.
We'll have a deeper knowledge
of the incarnation of the Son of God
and also a deeper love,
including in our own minds and hearts.
In the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Good night.
Thank you.