9781644135945

The Time After Pentecost
puts before our eyes two types of men, the man of the flesh and the man of the spirit, the
child of this world and the child of God, the man living in communion with Christ and the
one separated from Him.
The man of the flesh is worldly; his outlook is very worldly. All that matters to him are
temporal things. The Gospel portrays him under the figure of the unjust steward. What
counts first with him are the means by which he can get ahead in the affairs of this world;
whether he uses the right means, those that comply with the demands of justice, matters
little to him. He belongs to the children of this world who have little interest in a life to come
and who are not greatly concerned about the commandments of God or a life modeled on
Christ’s life and the principles of the gospel. “If any man love the world, the charity of the
Father is not in him. For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the
concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world.
And the world passeth away and the concupiscence thereof; but he that doeth the will of
God abideth forever” (1 Jn 2:15–17).
“They that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh. . . . The wisdom
of the flesh is death, . . . because the wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God; for it is not subject
to the law of God. . . . And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God” (Rom 8:5 ff.). For this
reason “we are debtors, not to the flesh to live according to the flesh; for if you live according
to the flesh, you shall die” (Rom 8:12 f.; Epistle). In baptism and through the mission of the
Holy Ghost, God’s grace saved us from the slavery of the concupiscence of the flesh and made
us men according to the spirit, who mind the things that are of the spirit. “We have received
Thy mercy, O God, in the midst of Thy temple,” the Church.
In the man who lives according to the spirit, who lives in Christ and does not live according
to the flesh, the justification of the law is fulfilled. For the law of the spirit is life, and we have
been freed from the law of sin and death in Christ Jesus. If we live according to the spirit and not
according to the flesh, we mortify the deeds of the flesh by the spirit. The Spirit of God that filled
and guided Christ, lives in every one baptized in His name. It is God Himself and His Spirit,
the living flame of God, the eternal love being poured out from the Father to the Son, from the
Son to the Father. This Spirit causes us to glow with His divine life, and burning with the fire
of love for God, we come to the Father with childlike confidence. The Spirit of Christ causes
us to see life with the eyes of God and according to the values He places on things, making
us love and rejoice in whatever He desires. It urges us to renounce our attachment to earthly
goods and interests, and to regard as nothing the things of the world and whatever honors or
pleasures they may have to offer.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, those who renounce the things of this world. Blessed are the
meek, those who patiently submit themselves to all the hard and disagreeable things of life for
Christ’s sake. Blessed are they that mourn, that willingly renounce the pleasures and vanities
of this life. Blessed are the clean of heart. Blessed are they that suffer persecution for justice’s
sake, that are reviled and slandered by evil men. We should be these blessed ones of whom
Christ spoke, since we have been made free in baptism and have received the Holy Ghost in
the sacrament of confirmation. We must be men of the spirit.
“We have received Thy mercy, O God, in the midst of Thy temple”; that is, through the sacrament
of baptism. We thank the Lord for what He has done for us.
493