Fr. Roger J. Landry

Visitation Mission of the Sisters of Life, Manhattan

Tuesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year II

Memorial of St. Ephrem, Deacon and Doctor of the Church

June 9, 2020

1 Kings 17:7-16, Ps 4, Mt 5:13-16

 

To listen to an audio recording of this homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/6.9.20_Homily_1.mp3

 

The following points were attempted in the homily: 

* Today we continue with three weeks of prayer about Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, which sketches out for us the way to live as Christians. Today we come to a dual vocation he announces for us: as salt and light. For me it’s very intriguing that Jesus calls his disciples “salt of the earth” and “light of the world” at the beginning of his public ministry. At this point they were “barely” his disciples. It points to something, I think, very powerful. That almost by nature we’re called to be salt and light. Human beings are supposed to exhibit the properties of salt and light. Christians, true disciples of Jesus, should live these identities and carry out these missions all the more. Let’s see how.

* In the ancient world, salt had three purposes. The first was as a preservative. There was no refrigeration in ancient Palestine and so to preserve meat or fish from corruption, they covered it with salt. This points to how Christ came into our world in order to prevent our corruption and has sent us out to help others from going bad. The second purpose was as a fire starter. There was no lighter fluid or starter wood for fires in the ancient world. What they’d do is take dung and mix it with salt and light these salted dung pellets on fire. Alone, dung wouldn’t ignite, but the salt would get the whole thing started and once the dung was lit, it could burn hot for a long time. (One of the things I’ve learned from my work at the UN is that in some poorer regions of the world, dung remains used as fuel). In a similar way, Christ has come into the world in order to light a fire on earth and longs for it to be enkindled in us so that he can send us out to light the world on fire. Christians are supposed to be a fire starter. The third function was what we still use salt for today, to give flavor. A little bit of salt can make a big difference between tasty or bland food. In a similar way, Christ came to give meaning to all experiences, no matter how bland or bitter, giving us his life to the full and instilling in us his joy. Christians, marked in this way by Christ’s mercy, are meant to bring this flavor, personality, joy and life to the environments we inhabit.

* The second part of the vocation Jesus gives us today is to be the “light of the world.” There are two fundamental purposes for light. The first is to help people to see. The second is to warm. Christ has done both for us. He has come and mercifully taught us in such a way that we may walk as children of the light and be true children of the light. So the Christian life is supposed to be luminescent, like the lights on a landing strip at an airport on a foggy night that help planes land. In the midst of many walking in valleys of darkness, Christians are called to burn with the light so that others can follow us in following Jesus the Light of the World. Similarly, light gives off warmth, and Christ has come into the world to warm us by his love, to burn away whatever in us is frigid or tepid, so that we in turn may warm others by the fire of divine love. When we approach Jesus and when others approach us, we and they should feel like someone cold approaching a lit fireplace.

* Jesus points out, however, that it’s possible for salt to lose its flavor and light to be hidden. Rather than preventing corruption, starting a fire of faith,