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Brothers and Sisters in the Lord,
It is a privilege for me to join each of you at this 53rd annual Red Mass
sponsored by the John Carroll Society as part of a noble tradition in our
nation’s capital of invoking the blessing of God’s Holy Spirit on all who
are engaged in the service of the law, especially the members of the
judiciary.
Recently I received a beautiful plant rooted in a very attractive container
with gorgeous flowers mixed throughout the arrangement. Within a few short
days, however, even though I took great care of it, some of the flowers
began to fade. It was only after I removed one of the withered flowers that
I made the startling discovery that not all of the flowers were attached to
the plant and rooted in the soil, but instead simply were placed in little
plastic containers. As the flowers were not part of the plant and not rooted
in the soil, they had no source of nourishment and died.
A beautiful flower in an isolated container is much like the branch that
Jesus speaks about in today’s Gospel text from St. John, the branch that
gets cut off, detached from, isolated from the vine. Such a branch cannot
bear much fruit—certainly not for long.
Whatever image we use, the lesson is the same. We cannot be cut off from our
rootedness. We cannot become isolated from our connectedness and expect to
flourish. As a people, we have a need to be part of a living unity with
roots and a lived experience, with a history and, therefore, a future. Our
lives as individuals and as a society are diminished to the extent that we
allow ourselves to be cut off or disconnected from that which identifies and
nurtures us. Branches live and bear fruit only insofar as they are attached
to the vine.
No one person, no part of our society, no people can become isolated, cut
off from its history, from its defining experiences of life, from its
highest aspirations, from the lessons of faith and the inspiration of
religion—from the very “soil” that sustains life—and still expect to grow
and flourish. Faith convictions, moral values and defining religious
experiences of life sustain the vitality of the whole society. We never
stand alone, disconnected, uprooted, at least not for long without
withering.
A profound part of the human experience is the search for truth and
connectedness, and the development of human wisdom that includes the
recognition of God, an appreciation of religious experience in human history
and life, and the special truth that is divinely revealed religious truth.
Science linked to religiously grounded ethics, art expressive of
spirituality, technology reflective of human values, positive civil law
rooted in the natural moral order are all branches connected to the vine.
A healthy and vital society respects the wisdom of God made known to us
through the gift of creation and the blessing of revelation. We not only
need God’s guidance, but we are created in such a way that we yearn for its
light and direction. Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Fides et Ratio
reminds us: “...God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the
truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and
women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves.” (Intro.,
Fides et Ratio)
One reason we gather today in prayer for the outpouring of the gifts of the
Holy Spirit is our realization that it is the wisdom of God that fills up
what is lacking in our own limited knowledge and understanding. Connected to
the vine, we access the richness of God’s word directing our human
experience under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Cut off from the vine, we
have only ourselves.
At times our society, like many contemporary cultures heavily nurtured in a
secular vision that draws its inspiration elsewhere, can be tempted to think
that we are sufficient unto ourselves in grappling with and answering the
great human questions of every generation in every age: how shall I live;
what is the meaning and, therefore, the value of life; how should we relate
to each other; what are our obligations to one another?
The assertion by some that the secular voice alone should speak to the
ordering of society and its public policy, that it alone can speak to the
needs of the human condition, is being increasingly challenged. Looking
around, I see many young men and women who, in such increasing numbers, are
looking for spiritual values, a sense of rootedness and hope for the future.
In spite of all the options and challenges from the secular world competing
for the allegiance of human hearts, the quiet, soft and gentle voice of the
Spirit has not been stilled.
Just as we are told in the first reading today that the Spirit of God was
shared with some of the elders so, too, today we have a sense that that
Spirit continues to be shared. The resurgence of spiritual renewal in its
many forms bears testimony to the atavistic need to be connected to the vine
and rooted in the soil of our faith experience.
As Jesus assures us in today’s Gospel: “Just as a branch cannot bear fruit
on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you
remain in me.” The revelation of the mystery of God-with-us is not
incidental to that human experience. It gives light and direction to the
struggle we call the human condition. Religious faith and faith-based values
are not peripheral to the human enterprise. Our history, the history of
mankind, is told in part in terms of our search for and response to the
wisdom of God.
Religious faith has long been a cornerstone of the American experience. From
the Mayflower Compact, which begins “In the name of God, Amen,” to our
Declaration of Independence, we hear loud echoes of our faith in God. It
finds expression in our deep-seated conviction that we have unalienable
rights from “Nature and Nature’s God.”
Thomas Jefferson stated that the ideals and ideas that he set forth in the
Declaration of Independence were not original with him, but were the common
opinion of his day. In a letter dated May 8, 1825, to Henry Lee, former
governor of Virginia, Jefferson writes that the Declaration of Independence
is “intended to be an expression of the American mind and to give to that
expression the proper tone and spirit.”
George Washington, after whom this city is named, was not the first, but
perhaps was the most prominent, American political figure to highlight the
vital part religion must play in the well-being of the nation. His
often-quoted Farewell Address reminds us that we cannot expect national
prosperity without morality, and morality cannot be sustained without
religious principles.
Morality and ethical considerations cannot be divorced from their religious
antecedents. What we do and how we act, our morals and ethics, follow on
what we believe. The religious convictions of a people sustain their moral
decisions.
What is religion’s place in public life? As our Holy Father, Pope Benedict
XVI, tells us in his first encyclical letter, “Deus Caritas Est” (God Is
Love): “[f]or her part, the Church, as the social expression of Christian
faith, has a proper independence and is structured on the basis of her faith
as a community which the State must recognize. The two spheres are distinct,
yet always interrelated” (DCE 28). Politics, law and faith are mingled
because believers are also citizens. Church and state are home to the very
same people.
The place of religion and religious conviction in public life is precisely
to sustain those values that make possible a common good that is more than
just temporary political expediency. Without a value system rooted in
morality and ethical integrity, there is the very real danger that human
choices will be motivated solely by personal convenience and gain.
To speak out against racial discrimination, social injustice or threats to
the dignity of life is not to force values upon society, but rather to call
our society to its own, long-accepted, moral principles and commitment to
defend basic human rights, which is the function of law.
Not only did Thomas Jefferson subscribe to the proposition that all are
created equal, but his writings indicate that he extended the logic of that
statement. All people are obliged to a code of morality that rests on the
very human nature which is the foundation for our human dignity and
equality. Jefferson recognizes no distinction between public and private
morality. In a letter dated August 28, 1789, to James Madison, who later
became the fourth president of our country, Jefferson wrote: “I know but one
code of morality for all, whether acting singly or collectively.”
Perhaps nowhere is the relationship of values, religious faith, public
policy and the application of the law more deeply rooted in its historic
expression than here in our nation’s capital. Here is the place where our
first president, George Washington, and the first Catholic bishop in our
country, John Carroll, recognized so very early on in the life of our
country the need to respect, honor and support the understanding that the
goals of governance and the expression of faith-based morality mingle and
overlap. At the same time, each was respectful of the prerogatives of the
other, and both were mindful that all the voices needed to be heard.
In the end, the goal of public policy, and its application and
interpretation, must be not what we can do but what we ought to do; not what
we have the ability to achieve, but what in our hearts, in our conscience
and in our souls we know we must do.
As believers, our hope for a better world is rooted in our faith that God
will help us make this happen. Faith is the source of our perennial optimism
and our social activism and involvement. If we work and work hard enough,
God will be with us to bring about that world of peace, justice,
understanding, wisdom, kindness, respect and love that we call His kingdom
coming to be on earth.
Our prayer today is that our American democratic society will continue to be
a flowering plant connected to the vine with roots sunk deep into the rich
soil of our national identity, spiritual experience and faith convictions.
May our religious faith, as a foundational part of our national experience,
continue to nurture and sustain each branch of our society so that by its
very connectedness to the vine it can blossom and flourish.
Thank you.
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