The question is often asked, if God is so good, why can he permit evil?
And of course, the answer is alluded to in today's Gospel.
The Lord permits all things because, as Scripture says, he is a jealous God.
That is, he does not like to go unnoticed by man.
And so, the Lord permits all things in order that man may in some way recognize the Creator.
For all men have in some way and in some notion a notion of God, but often our misunderstanding is clouded.
And in today's Gospel, our Lord gives the key to the unclouding of that mystery.
For when he speaks to the apostles of going out and say in the light what he speaks in the darkness
and to proclaim it from the housetops, he does not mean that he was afraid to teach them the truth.
He simply means that take from this corner of the world, Judea, these truths and speak to them to the whole world.
That is, drive out the darkness by the light of my truth.
And so, that darkness would be driven out by the light of the truth.
Because men would come to know and to realize that slavery to Beelzebub was causing them to die of fright.
But the Lord would come to reveal they had nothing to fear.
For Beelzebub can only kill the body, but it is the Lord who can kill both body and soul.
And so, in the death of the body, we have nothing to fear as long as we have died in the grace of God.
This message of the apostles would truly go to all lands.
It would truly not be restricted.
It would not be restricted to that small hamlet of the world known as Judea.
But it would be proclaimed from the housetops of the highest governments and embraced by the majority of mankind.
And indeed, today, we honor a saint who understood this message so well.
Saint Benedict would begin the monastic tradition that would spread through all of Europe.
And indeed, at the height of Christendom, Europe would be marked with over 30,000 monasteries.
And so, we would be able to see the world.
And so, we would be able to see the world.
And so, it was quite literally true that one could not travel that land without some way,
always having before their eyes a monastery and hence a witness to the Catholic faith.
Indeed, if one has ever been to Europe, there are still signs of how Catholic that culture was.
For all seems to be centered around the church.
When one drives through the mountainsides, the one building recognized in the small towns is the church in the town.
When one drives through the mountainsides, the one building recognized in the town seems to have grown up around it.
It is not like in our country in which often churches are built out of the way and on the way sides.
Or, if they have been built in a prominent way, enemies of Christ have built skyscrapers quite literally to blot them out from the sight of man.
And so, we have much to strive for, for the culture of Christ seems to be on the wane.
But we learn through the life of Saint Benedict that we have nothing to fear.
For even in death, God defends his holy ones.
For when the order was given to destroy the casino at Monte Cassino by a free Masonic general in order to obliterate that sign of Christ,
one bomb landed directly between the tombs of Saint Benedict and his sister, Saint Scholastica, but it did not detonate.
Indeed, when that bomb was being dismantled, the one doing it was explaining at the time he was dismantling it,
that there was no reason why this bomb should not be blowing up as he was dismantling it.
For everything was in working order and the plunger indeed had done its deed.
But yet, God would not have the remains, the body of his saints destroyed by such a heinous act.
And so, he preserved miraculously the bodies of Saint Benedict and Saint Scholastica to show us all that what he says is true.
That is, we need not be afraid.
That is, we need not be afraid.
That is, we need not be afraid.
That is, we need not be afraid.
That is, we need not be afraid.
That is, we need not be afraid.
fear even the death of the body for if we die with Christ then one day our body will rise also with
him and we will be reunited to that soul where we will praise God for all eternity in heaven and so
let us truly strive this day to see that the kingdom of Christ comes again and that this land
is marked by untold thousands of monasteries that witness to the presence of Jesus Christ
and the truth that what he spoke to the apostles in secret what he taught them in the classroom
by the lake of Kapanoam has gone forth to the whole world driving out the darkness that the
devil has come and most especially driving out Beelzebub that is the lord of flies and he is
referred to as the lord of flies because all of us know where flies spend the majority of their time
for his doctrine is truly the doctrine
of the Lord of Flies.
of dung and hence it is the doctrine of death and christ's doctrine is the doctrine of light
and hence the doctrine of life and so let us strive always to see that christ's doctrine
is embraced by all mankind that it is preached from the housetops by word by example and by
thought so that all that we do redoubts back to the glory of our lord and savior who has done so
much for us starting with those simple 12 teaching them in the darkness as it were of judea so that
that so that from that small hamlet they would truly go forth to the whole world and eventually
we would see that expression of christendom which saint benedict so contributed to where it was
literally not possible for a man in that land to not in some way have his mind in his heart
drawn to the higher things in this life
because of the darkness of judea
because he seemed to always have been in the presence of a monastery and hence he had that
comfort of knowing that christ was always watching over him and so we too have that comfort even if
we do not have the external reminders we must always be thoroughly convinced that christ
watches over us and he defends us both in the good times and in the bad times and if we remain
true to him he will remain true to us and we will enjoy him for all eternity
in heaven
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