Quinquagesima Sunday
For two weeks now, Holy Mother Church has been preparing us to enter the holy season of Lent. Today, standing at the threshold, like a good Mother, She gives us a final lesson. She has sternly warned us of the seriousness of life, of the small number of the elect, of the dangers of not preparing our soul by a life of self-denial, lest the seed of the Word fall on rocky ground and bear no fruit.
Today, along with the admonition to keep our eyes fixed on Calvary, she teaches us that Lent is less about what we are going to do than about how much love we put into it. This is the whole point behind St Paul’s hymn to charity (1 Cor 13) that the Roman liturgy places here on this Sunday as if to say: Be generous with God during Lent; practice some serious penance (less food, less drink, more discipline, less internet…), but keep in mind that penances and prayers have as their ultimate objective to help us grow in true charity. If we deprive ourselves of food or drink, we should give that food or its equivalent to those in need. If we give more time to work, it should be work that will profit someone other than ourselves. If we enter Lent and go through it in this frame of mind, then when holy Pascha arrives, we will have taken full advantage of this most holy of seasons.
Let’s consider briefly some of the qualities St Paul attributes to true charity. Let’s note first that he begins this hymn to the greatest of the theological virtues by pointing to the ineffectiveness of some common ascetical practices when they are done without love. He mentions speaking in tongues, prophesying, extensive knowledge based on the highest level of faith – even that of moving mountains – distributing all one’s goods to the poor and finally, even handing over one’s body to torture for Christ. All this, says the apostle, is useless without charity, true love of God and neighbour. This should give us pause. When hearing of someone who did any of these extraordinary things, many of us would say, ‘this person is a saint’. But St Paul says, well, not necessarily. It is charity alone which fully unites us with God, assures us of His grace, and gives value to everything else we do.
St Paul then goes on to enumerate a number of attitudes that true charity has or does not have. First of all, it is patient and kind. True love knows how to wait. We remind young couples of this when they are madly in love but cannot yet get married. True love knows how to wait. The true spouse is ready to wait even a lifetime for the one she loves. Such is the quality of love that it will have the object of its love no matter how long the wait or how great the cost. We also remind religious souls of this. In religious life, too, there are times of impatience: to enter, to take your vows, to receive the veil, to build a proper monastery and stop living in makeshift quarters. All this demands a lot of patience. But when you love, you are ready to wait a very long time. In many respects, patience is the most important virtue in any kind of life in common.
The apostle continues: charity is not envious of others. If you love someone, you are happy for them, even if they receive much more and much quicker and with seemingly less merit than you. Incidentally, envy is the one capital sin that gives no satisfaction whatsoever. The glutton, the sloth, the lustful or avaricious person, even the always angry person, finds some satisfaction in their wayward living. The envious finds none. She is always looking at what others have and wants it, and this eats her up and refuses to allow her to enjoy what she does have. All vices are destructive of interior peace, but none more than envy.
He goes on: True charity is not puffed up; it is not proud and ambitious, seeking its own interests. Earlier in the epistle, we were told that while knowledge puffs up, charity builds up. This amazing expression captures the difference between true and fictitious goods. Fictitious ones, such as much learning or being in a prominent professional or social position, puff up. The image is one of a balloon that can be quite impressive when filled with air, but there really is no substance to it, and this is because the person who has many things but does not love is empty. There is nothing in this life that can satisfywithout true love. Charity builds up because it has substance. This is why the Song of Songs says: Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it: if a man should give all the substance of his house for love, he shall despise it as nothing (Sol 8:7). Love alone explains perseverance in the midst of the most dire of circumstances. How many families owe their stability to the unwavering love of a maternal heart who, day in and day out, is the mainstay of a family put to the sore test of want, loss or simply the failure of one of its members to carry his/her weight! How many religious communities are still in existence today because of the love in the heart of some – perhaps even just one – of its members, who keeps her little lamp lit, zealously guarding its flame lest it be extinguished by the gusts of contrary winds!
Charity does not seek her own interests but those of others. At the end of his rule St Benedict tries to summarise the most important elements of community life in the famous chapter about the good zeal that monks must have, and one of those pithy statements that in just a few words encapsulates a truly religious life he tells his monks: ‘Let none follow what seems good for himself, but rather what is good for another’ (Rule of St Benedict, ch. 72). Oh, the admirable lesson, sufficient in itself to resolve all conflicts and difficulties in every religious community as in every household. If only every monk and every nun and every husband and every wife and every brother and every sister would take this one statement to heart and live it, all of our communities and families, in spite of whatever hardships they have to bear, would be transformed into a paradise on earth. That charity which bears all things and endures all things would reign as queen, and would bring with her, her inseparable handmaids whose names are peace and joy. May this Lent find us all progressing in this queen of all virtues. If it does, we will truly ‘look forward to holy Easter with the joy of spiritual longing’ (Rule of St Benedict, ch. 49).
