But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments will be called the greatest in the kingdom
of heaven.
My friends, today we have the feast day of St. Alphonsus Liguori, 18th century doctor
of the church.
As we see in today's readings, today's first prayer, in different ages, God raises up special
men and women to counteract the evils of their times.
There was a new Pharisaism.
In the 18th century, called Jansenism, it was a very rigorous theory and it infected
the whole church and caused people to despair and lose sight of the truth of what had happened.
And we see in today's first reading how they had been redeemed by the precious blood of
Jesus Christ.
And God's mercy is the greatest.
The greatest of his works.
It wasn't so with the Jansenists.
They were very rigorous, like the old Pharisees, laid heavy burdens on people and caused much
despair among the people, especially the simple people.
We see these in today's times, different people, saying this, that, and the other thing.
And not giving us the truth.
And this is why we must always listen to the church and why God raises up great men like
Saint Alphonsus.
To counteract the Jansenist philosophy, Saint Alphonsus gave us his moral theology, a guide
to all confessors.
And he preached missions, simple missions, calling people to repentance.
And he gave us missions, simple missions, calling people to repentance.
And he gave us the health of his life.
gave guides to the various confessors in the confessional so that they would free the people
from their burdens and not cause confusion. To those who denied the Blessed Virgin Mary,
St. Alphonsus Liguori wrote a magnificent book called The Glories of Mary, quoting various
saints and scriptural references on Our Lady. One of the aspects of St. Alphonsus' writings is
a multitudinous amount of quotes from the various saints and stories. So he's very readable and very
popular. And The Glories of Mary inspired people to come back to Our Lady when other people had,
as Protestants had done,
said, we don't have to go to Mary, we can go to Jesus. But as one of our priests said,
will Jesus have anything to do with us if we don't love his mother? So it's just very simple.
We go to Mary, St. Alphonsus, and St. Lui before him to go to Jesus.
To help people prepare for death, he wrote a beautiful book called The Preparation for Death.
So all these,
very popular books, were wonderful ways in which the people of his day could
re-inspire themselves with the teachings of the church. Because, as we know,
there are many false teachings out there. And there are many people who say you can do this
and you can do that, when in reality, nothing really has changed. We've been freed from sin
by Jesus Christ. And we've been freed from sin by Jesus Christ. And we've been freed from sin by Jesus Christ.
And as we see in today's psalm, it's most important for us to obey his statutes and his law.
Psalm 118, which is today's psalm, as listed here, 119, is the longest psalm in the book.
And it tells us all about keeping the word of God.
Lord, teach me your statutes. Teach me your word. How shall a young man be faultless in his way?
By keeping your words, keeping your commandments. Within my heart, I treasure your promise
that I may not sin against you. Today's world, people think they're going to be free
if they do what they want. Little do they know, the more they do what they want and not what God
wants, the more they will become a slave of sin. Jesus tells us that those who commit sin are slaves.
of sin. And we have a new slavery today. The devil's tricked us, telling us to be good to
ourselves and be free and so on. And we do this and we follow the world. We eat, drink, and be
merry. And we find out that we're chained to sin. We're slave to our addictions, money, sex, drugs,
alcohol.
We're not happy. We can only be happy by keeping God's commandments. This is what we see in today's
psalm. In the way of your decrees, I rejoice as much in all riches. With my lips, I declare
all the ordinances of your mouth. These are the commandments of God. And Jesus says,
if you love me, you will keep my commandments. And if we teach others to love God and keep his
commandments,
then we too, like St. Alphonsus, will shine like the stars. And if we keep the commandments of God,
then we will also be, as we see in today's scripture, today's gospel, the salt of the earth,
the light of the world. And we will be a light to all those around us. And we'll be the salt,
the ingredient, to make everything flavorful in life. So let us thank God for
giving us this most wonderful saint, St. Alphonsus Liguori. And let us read what this great saint
has written. Get his books, ponder over them, and you will rejoice that God has raised up such a
great saint in these times, these modern times. And we have so many people telling us untruths.
We need the truth.
And only the church teaches us the absolute truth. The gates of hell shall not prevail
against the Catholic church. Behold, I am with you all day, as Jesus said, and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against us. So let us thank God for raising up St. Alphonsus. And let us also
thank God for sending us his mother in 1917 at Fatima, to teach us also to keep God's commandments,
and not offend God, who is too much offended by sin. May the Lord bless you.
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