 When you get to be 65, which I am you start looking back on your life and sort of counting up the graces and Holiness itself has always been an important part of the story for me I won't go into details But the study of holiness in Scripture was a powerful part of my initial conversion back in 1872 when I was a juvenile delinquent a derelict and then a convert to Christ At the time there was a theologian a Protestant a Presbyterian professor by the name of R. C. Sproul. He was still in his early 30s Working on a book that was to become his bestseller of over the hundred titles It was the holiness of God and hearing about the holiness of God Challenged me to go beyond that kind of easy believism cheap grace and To discover that the cost of the discipleship is great But nothing compared to the price that Jesus paid and so Through the study of the scriptures in my early years about 14 I came to discover this important thing called holiness I want to share with you a little bit later this evening About how that began to develop in change over the years because it was 37 years ago that I entered into the Catholic Church and It was 30 years ago almost exactly we're getting ready next month to celebrate the anniversary the 30th anniversary of Rome's sweet home Our journey to Catholicism. How many of you ever have read our book Rome's sweet home? Definitely more than holy is his name. Yeah It's sold over 40 million and it's in something like 35 languages I Might be off on those numbers now that I'm thinking about it But in any case it has been a blessing for so many people in a way that we never could have expected So that anniversary is special as well But the the thing that I'd like to focus on right now is what do we mean when we speak of holiness? Because perhaps you've seen princess bride and you remember that line. Yeah, it's worth applauding You keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means And of course the word of the movie is inconceivable But the word in my experience is holiness Because I thought I knew what holiness was I think most of us do and we look at it from different angles and we see different facets And all of them are true in one way or the other But I think what I've discovered is that practically everything I thought I knew about holiness fell short of really capturing its meaning So I'd like to begin this evening by focusing on what holiness is not What are some distinct aspects of holiness, but that are not essential. They're inseparable from it But at the same time you shouldn't confuse these things with the essence of holiness The first thing holiness is not it's not equated with signs and wonders and miracles It's wonderful to see how Signs and wonders awaken faith in people and that God uses it in the 21st century Just like you did through Jesus back in the first century and yet at the same time You come to the climax of the Sermon of the Mount in Matthew 7 and you hear an ominous warning That not all who call upon God as Lord Lord Will enter in the kingdom and he said many Will come to him in that day and say Lord did we not prophesy and cast out demons to do many mighty works And I'll say depart from me. I never knew you Wow Okay, so you can see how closely related signs wonders and miracles are to holiness and to the holy one of God and To all of those that God has called to express his holiness to others But it's not reducible to the miraculous And I say this because sometimes people leave the Catholic Church to go where they find signs and wonders Tragically, I know a former student who became a priest and then left the priesthood And maybe even considering leaving the church because he has found this spiritual renewal where all these signs and wonders occur That's awesome And I'm grateful and we share a lot of common ground with people involved in those kinds of movements But that is not the essence of holiness. In fact, it can be something that people confuse Another thing I would like to say and that is holiness is not reducible To a strict adherence to holy things holy places holy customs this sort of thing that I would speak up in terms of being a traditional Catholic I've got a number of friends who call themselves rad trads and I'm grateful for how Tradition really sustains the life of Catholics and yet I'm also aware of the fact that some of my friends are more like mad trads They're really angry and I get it. I understand but at the same time I would say I would want to be a glad trad and why because Tradition is not the same as being holy Even if it is the holy sacrifice of a mass Even if there are holy places and holy things and so this is inseparable from holiness, but it's not identical to it a Third thing that is often mistaken for holiness is this experience that people have of shock and awe Wonder and amazement fear and trembling like Moses before the burning bush Take off your shoes for the ground that you're standing on is holy or Like the Seraphim and Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 6 where you have the shaking and you have in other examples this human response to holiness and Which is beautiful and yet at the same time it is a natural response to a supernatural mystery And so we can see how closely connected they are but how you don't reduce holiness to the response of human beings a Fourth thing that I think we also have to recognize is that You have a kind of Sense of the holy people say oh, he's holy or she is holy and I would just say be careful with that You know one of my favorite saints of the last century is st. Padre Pio and yet there was famously One who succeeded him named brother Gino and everybody spoke of the aroma of holiness and roses and that sort of thing until he was exposed as a fraud and So we've got to be aware of the fact that holiness is not something that is available to our five Senses, what does holiness look like? Well, you know No, I don't The Blessed Virgin Mary. I'm sure she looked holy st. Jerome. I'm sure he didn't Especially if you had to tangle with them So what does it look like? What does it smell like? What does it sound like? What does it taste like? What does it feel like? No, it's super sensible because it is super natural natural It's not detectable to the five senses And it's also not attractive to the unholy And that's something we also have to reckon with I was just reading a saint today who was quoting Sirac three times in the book of Sirac we hear how thou those who are striving for holiness are Detested by those who are content with the world So it's not a popularity contest either I would also Suggest that we not confuse holiness with people who are great teachers or preachers Even if they're delivering orthodoxy sound doctrine in a time like ours where we need it so desperately No, because that kind of thing lends itself more to celebrity status than it does to true sanctity We want to become saints we also Look for saints, but don't confuse saints with celebrities And I feel like the poster child of that kind of confusion Because I know myself well enough to know i'm not holy and my confessor does not beg to differ And finally I would say that holiness depends upon reception of the sacraments and devotion to prayer and a lot of other activities that Basically express our personal piety But don't confuse that with holiness. It's the effect of holiness, but it can also become something that is quite distinct from it I guess there is one last thing that I'd like to share about what holiness is not because This was the thing that I thought it was for many years And I find many biblical scholars and theology professors still Confusing this and that is holiness is not the same thing as ethical rectitude Uprightness or what we would call righteousness. And once again, I want to distinguish here Not to oppose or separate, but I want to distinguish to unite By showing that yes, holiness is one thing that is inseparable from righteousness But sanctity is not the exact same thing as justice And I would propose that this is the most common confusion That when people see others who are ethical who are moral who are upright what flows from our lips Oh, he's a saint. Well, he might be a saint. She might be too But righteousness and holiness though inseparably united are clearly distinct And I think this gets us closer to what holiness means because When you look closely in sacred scripture, you discover that holiness Is the single major plot that runs from the beginning to the end throughout all the old testament until it is fulfilled in the new But holiness certainly includes righteousness, but it's not reducible to it. And where do we find that? Well in the mosaic law, for example, we have according to the rabbi 613 distinct statutes But not all statutes are created equal Jesus could ask just like the law you're asked him Which is the greatest commandment? And there was something of a consensus back in the first century Because the greatest commandment is deuteronomy 6 verse 5 that you should love the lord your gavel all of your heart mind Soul and strength But what does Jesus quickly add and the second is like unto it? You shall love your neighbor as yourself But the second one is still in second place It's like the first because it's a law of love, but it's secondary And so the two greatest commandments found in the mosaic law are commandments that require us to love not normally legislation on the one side and Love on the other are sort of like polar opposites. How can you legislate love? But if the source of law is the lord god almighty and if god is love From the beginning of creation and even before from all eternity then it only makes sense That of the 613 there are two that are much higher And both of them relate to love but the love of god, that's holiness Whereas the love of neighbor, that's righteousness And I distinguish not to separate much less to oppose but to subordinate righteousness from holiness And so holiness is also reflected in the two tables of the law when we look at the decalogue How many commandments 10, but how do we divide them? The first table consists of three commandments. The second table consists of seven And we don't distinguish to separate them out, but we recognize I am the lord your god have no other gods before me is first and foremost a commitment to god For him to be first and last and everything in between and then the second regards his holy name And what does that do? Not take the name of the lord your god in vain Which implies that you should call upon the name of the lord But just don't do it disingenuously dishonestly And so to call upon the name of the lord personally is prayer To pray in the name of the father the son of the holy spirit or just to pray in the name of the lord god The god of abraham isek and jakem He gives us his name to call us into a covenant bond a relationship And that relationship grows over time from the creator god known as elohim to the covenant lord Known as well. We typically pronounce the tetragrammaton as yaway or yaway elohim But don't think that is more intimate than abba than god the father's son in holy spirit That is the single greatest revelation of god. That is the only name that names god in terms of who he eternally is And what is the final command on the first table? remember the Sabbath day to keep it Holy the only time kadosh occurs in the ten commandments is there in the third and final command of the first table Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy doesn't mean setting your alarm on saturday in the old sunday in the new and when it goes off I remember it is the Sabbath of the old or the Sabbath of the new no remembrance is to commemorate To celebrate And it's not just private. It's not just interior you and your sons and your daughters Holiness is a family affair But not just them but your maid servants and your man servants your employees The oxen and the acid and even the sojourners who are wandering through your town and the gates All of them are to rest because all of them are called to be holy And if god alone is holy Then we should stop our work and recognize that there is one work that only god can accomplish And that is to make us holy because if you alone are holy then you alone can make us holy And since work and productivity and efficiency and wealth is not what we're made for Six days you labor but the seventh you rest And so this is how we remember this is how we commemorate this is how we Celebrate and it's not just a particular day of the week that changes from the old of the new It is a lifestyle The lord remembered his covenant. Does that imply that for a few centuries he'd forgotten? No He's commemorating. He's celebrating. He's fulfilling it Memory is the single most Important faculty in our lives in our souls in our homes and our families And yet we tend to reduce memory to sort of what I ate last night for dinner Or what I wore last sunday for mass And there is a sensible aspect of the faculty we call memory But in Hebrew and in greek the notion of memoria It's much more of a liturgical faculty within our soul It comes before the intellect. It's pre-intellectual. It comes before the will what we choose Because without memory I couldn't finish the sentence Without memory you wouldn't know why you're here Without memory I wouldn't be able to continue on with what I'm saying Because I know who I am, but I know who you are. I know why we're here But I also know That I'm not just a professor. I'm not just an author. I'm not just a speaker I'm not just a husband and a father and now a grandfather and a father-in-law I am before all other things I am created in the image and likeness of god I come from him. I'll return to him And I need to live every minute of every day in the light of who I am Not just in relationship to humans. That's righteousness But in relation to god, that's holiness And holiness is something that has been eclipsed if faced if not obliterated from our world today And so holiness is sort of you know rectitude righteousness and yet what if it's not What if it's something much more and that's the challenge For us living in a post-christian age in a post modern society Where you are a truth and my truth don't have to be the same because there is no such thing as truth There's only reality such as we define it for ourselves Is that the truth don't ask you know That's the supreme fallacy of self-exception. That's the that's what makes it so absurd But at the same time what we have to recognize Is that if holiness surpasses righteousness And holiness is the only thing for which we were made and yet holiness is humanly impossible We can't do it ourselves We can't do it apart from god But there isn't one millisecond of our existence That we ever really are truly apart from god I remember going to a concert in pittsburgh. It was ryan adams. I went with my son michael and his fiance On a humble back then before they got married and had seven kids And they had really good seats I just had a lousy seat up in the balcony And so while I was waiting in line There was a a young lady Who was to take the tickets and I was standing next to her and we started talking and she just expressed the fact that she was really depressed and i'm like why is that and she said because My dad died today and I wasn't able to be with him And uh, I I just miss him And I love him and now he's gone And I said well actually he's not god I mean god created him and god created you With him as the instrument god created him out of love god created his love for you god created your love for him And she said well i'm a secular jew i'm an atheist And I said god doesn't exist because I believe in him god doesn't not exist because you don't God is the source of your life through your father god is the source of your love for your father And so your father is still alive somewhere god knows so don't forget that love because god doesn't And her eyes went up with tears And she just gave me a hug and then she gave me her email address And we stayed in touch and she also gave me A ticket in the front row Now i'm not suggesting That we pursue holiness for the best ticket in the house But those are the fringe benefits but above all the fact is that holiness belongs to god alone You alone are holy whether people believe in him or not If they don't his holiness is not diminished Our lives are what's diminished And so in the process what we discover is the truth of holiness now What I want to do now that i've shown you what holiness is not reducible to I want to kind of focus on what we mean by kadosh That's the Hebrew word for holiness kadosh Like what Isaiah heard the seraphim singing in his vision in chapter six. Holy holy holy You know in Hebrew you don't have superlatives good better best And so three full repetition is basically saying he is the holiest of holies He is what you would call that inner sanctum in the temple the holy of holies And so the primary meaning of holiness is what God alone is what is original to god and yet at the same time there's another term kadesh Which points to the sacred the consecrated that which is sanctified by god And so this objective holiness that is gods alone Is also something that he imparts to us By consecration by sanctifying by setting apart And so this secondary sense of holiness is something that is derived from and depended upon God who alone is holy All right, that helps a little bit, but at the same time we also recognize that to be set apart by god Is objectively true, but that is true whether you're subjectively disposed to love god above all else or not So for example, we read about holiness in leviticus especially But in leviticus chapter 10 We read about the instructions that the lord god gave to moses to give to erin and his sons and no wonder in leviticus 10 verse 10 We read you are to distinguish between the holy and the common between the unclean and the clean And you are to teach the people of israel all the statutes which the lord has spoken to them So priests are appointed for the purpose of teaching us to distinguish between the holy and the common You see the holy is not opposed to the common. It's distinct from it What is holy is only opposed to what is sinful So what you do for six days might be secular But it can become holy secularity Precisely by working for the purpose of worship So that the fruit of your labor is what is offered in the liturgy as sacrifice And so your life is integrated the righteousness that is more human and horizontal Is ordered to the holiness which directs everything I do back to the lord god This comes in leviticus 10 verse 10 Now if you back up and look at the context, it's a rather ominous background Because in leviticus 10 verse 1 Nadab and Abihu the oldest sons of erin each took his sensor and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unholy fire before the lord such as he had not commanded So we don't worship god on our own terms We worship him on his terms and not because he's some persnickety ogre But because he knows better than what we know what we need to do Because he gets nothing out of our worship, but he fills us with his own life through our worship of him And so this was unholy. Well, why? Leviticus 10 verses 1 and 2 don't tell us exactly why But we do read and fire came forth from the presence of god and devoured them And they died in the presence of the lord And so erin had to go in and get his first born and second born and drag them out That's holiness as opposed to unholy Which is not the same as the common Now i'm not going to get into the clean and the unclean the holy in the common. These are two Distinct categories that are complementary. I'd recommend dr. Bergsm his amazing catholic introduction to the bible the old testament his chapter on leviticus is so illuminating But curiously what you also find in leviticus 10 Is that the lord spoke to erin saying drink no wine nor strong drink You nor your sons with you the two that are left When you go into the tent of meeting lest you die So god is not asking erin and his sons to be teetoters But when you go into the presence don't go in with wine or strong drink The only time that's commanded and why is that? Probably because that's what was so unholy about the fire that they offered when they staggered into the presence of god feeling so privileged And entitled that they hadn't really taken the love of god above the love of self So distinguishing holy from the common is the task of the priest because the priest is the one who draws into the presence of god At the same time. I think we have to recognize that if god alone is holy But he objectively sets apart certain people who are called to be priests to mediate that holiness to administer that holiness Then what we've got to do is pay close attention to the terms of the covenant To have one god and him alone and not to make false images like the golden calf Which they were doing at the bottom of the hill when moses was on the top of the summit of sinai And to call upon the name of the lord with integrity That's not only personal prayer. Where else do we find people calling upon the name of the lord? When they practice this virtue of religion by performing services, which we call professional And so I have a job And so I signed a contract. I gave them my word the university gave me its word and we've been doing this now for 33 years But kimberley ran for office as city council woman at large and when she got elected in something of a virtual landslide There were no contracts. Why because she had to call upon the name of the lord. She swore an oath of office And guess who got to hold the bible And so when we have people who have power that is not merely human, but they're entrusted with divine power not just priests but Medical officers they hold this office. And so what do we do? You swear on oath the hypochritic oath because they have the power of life and death and that's a power That is god's we can't trust it to humans. We need doctors and nurses And so what do we do? We what do we make them do call upon the name of the lord? So help me god And not just the doctors but also the nurses and the physician assistants But not just in medicine. What other profession do we speak of law? And who swears an oath who calls upon the name of the lord who performs what the second commandment requires? People who are in law witnesses always take the oath of office I they take swear the oath before they step out of the witness stand But the judge even if he was elected Or appointed he cannot take the bench until he has sworn the oath Calling upon the name of god to serve the commonwealth And likewise the attorneys might pass the bar, but they have to swear an oath So who in a courtroom administering the power of god life death freedom or incarceration Guilt or innocence right or wrong. These are divine tasks Can you really trust humans with that kind of power? No, of course you can't but you have to for the common good That's why they're public servants That's why the word in greek for public service is leiturgia from which we get liturgy and so not just in Medicine but in law it's a profession And likewise in government when you have this kind of power That is necessary for the common good for the civil order of the social You know of the social order What do you do? In the executive judicial and legislative branches of the federal government the state government You know federal state and local All of these people who are going to wield power that is quasi Divine put them under oath You know people who study law describe the oath as a relic of ancient society a fossil of religious custom But at the same time we still have this idea that if you swear an oath so help me god what you call divine assistance grace And that's the blessing that comes when you call upon the name of god with truth with integrity with humility I need your help. I'm going to be tempted to lie under oath And this is why when we take the holy name of god and tie it to our lies Lying is no longer a sin. It is what a crime And not a misdemeanor but a felony. Why because it's perjury Why is it perjury because you're under oath and we don't even know what it means, but we are under god Whether we affirm it or deny it And so to call upon the name of god with truth Versus taking his name in vain For he will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain God will put up with it because i'm offering you help. It's called the blessing. So help me god But if we refuse to avail ourselves of that assistance We're criminals. We're perjurers And so all the promises that politicians make will often fall on the ground, but at the same time God is just And the wheels of justice may grind too slowly, but they will grind to powder fine powder. That's what eternity is for And so if we're telling the truth with the help of god, but we're accused of lying god will vindicate us whenever it comes time But if we're lying through our teeth under oath and nobody Finds out god knows And so if it's the legal profession if it's the political profession if it's the medical profession And all of the branches of the military as well the power of life and death And so this is holiness in a certain way It's what we might call natural holiness secular holiness But no society could do without the professions and why because you profess your faith in god and your need for his help You get a sense of how far we've gone We don't know what we're doing in swearing oaths because what we don't know what we're undoing In trying to privatize god and relativize morality But this is who we are as catholics living in our country Who have a responsibility and an opportunity to spread holiness? Not just the holiness of the trinity through christ by the power of the spirit through the sacraments But you know what the latin word for oath is? sacramentum and so all of these natural oaths in the natural order of Society are in a certain sense like natural sacraments just like every single one of the seven sacraments is like a supernatural oath So help me god baptize me What did jesus ask the mother of james and john? He asked the brothers are you willing to be baptized with the baptism? I must undergo are you willing to drink from the cup from which i must drink we are you will But what does that have to do with baptism? I thought it was like a bath It's a pledge to death. So help me god And so the realm of holiness is not just the realm of heaven, but earth And holiness is distinct from righteousness, but holiness is the basis of justice I don't have the time to go into it besides i'd written another book a couple of years ago called It is right and just while the future of our civilization depends upon the true religion The greatest gift we can give to our country the one we love the one that is in such dire need Is to live our faith more fully and not simply put our trust in politicians who make more and more promises that we know They'll break We have to stay socially and politically involved But even more do we have to spiritually pursue that holiness Without wish without which we won't see god, but that holiness that our country's common good depends upon as well And so holiness is much more than we thought it was And yet holiness is also something that requires an act of the heart And what is the term sacrificial? Augustine points out that sacrifice is not just dead animals we offer after we've slain them sacrifice starts in the heart Through the love of god which surpasses our own love of self We love our neighbor as ourselves, but always for the love of god whereas we love god more than self And so we proceed from the interior dimension of the heart This is the single most important aspect of holiness that it is eternal and interior to the holy trinity God alone is holy God alone can make us holy, but how does he do it? By taking out the heart of stone and putting in the heart of flesh By pouring the holy spirit upon us Three times in the old testament the Hebrew Bible the term kadosh is used of the holy spirit Over 90 times in the new testament What's changed the father finally sent the son to pour out the holy spirit And so holiness was there in the old, but holiness is something different in the new You go back to genesis 50 chapters long and the term kadosh only occurs once in the second chapter After god creates in six days. He then rests on the sabbathay. He blesses the sabbathay and kodesh He sanctifies it. He declares the seventh day to be holy Because the seventh day is the sabbath and the side of the sabbath is the side of the covenant And so the covenant transforms the way we look at creation the cosmos is a temple So in genesis two after god has established the seventh day and consecrated the sabbath making it holy Then he makes god and then he makes man in his own image and likeness And when we look closely in genesis two, we'll see that the words the phrases the images Aren't just describing a garden paradise They're the terms in the images and the phrases drawn later on from The temple and the priest and the ministry So tilling and keeping the garden is only used later to describe the job description of the levites Adam isn't just the first man a husband. He's the high priest of humanity The garden of eden is not just the garden. It's described in terms of the holy of holies And when he disobeys it's not just disobedience. It's desecration So he's driven out. But what does god post at the entrance of the holy of holy? What does god post at the entrance of the garden of eden to cherubim with flaming swords? Every jewish reader would know where do I find to cherubim? Only in the holy of holies And so as adam is driven out so erin is also excluded from the presence of god entering it on a daily basis And so you find that they're driven out of the garden of eden into eden Until their son kane kills his brother abel and kane is driven. What east of eden? So this set of directions is liturgical the garden of eden eden and east of eden think of ad orientum How you are oriented by looking eastwardly and seeing people coming back And so this picture is drawn for the purpose of showing us What will later be in the tabernacle? What will later be in the temple? And that is a threefold structure the holy of holies the holy place and the outer court where gentiles are allowed I'm going to be reflecting upon this more you know later on But I want to just emphasize that the three-part structure of creation eden the garden the three-part structure of noah's ark It also had three layers the three-part structure of the tabernacle the three-part structure of solomon's temple all prepares us to imagine to enter to live in The new jerusalem The old jerusalem is where the temple was and its three-part structure was tripartite But in revelation 21, what do we read in verse 17 in the new jerusalem? I saw that there was no temple Why because terrorists had burned it down like titus and his soldiers in 70 no Because when you enter into eternity john says there is no temple for the lord god almighty is the temple And the lamb who sits upon the throne. Oh and the living water that flows from the throne of the lord god and the lamb Well, then there is a temple. Yeah, but it's not a temple. It's not a building. Well, what is it? It's the lord god the lamb and the living water Pray tell what is that threefold mystery? The lord god is the father the lamb is the son And who is the holy? What is the the living water the holy spirit that flows from the throne of the lord god and the lamb? I mean, I can barely imagine that but guess what? That's plan a That is the only thing for which we were made that is why creation exists This is why salvation occurred and this is why we're all here in finnigan field house to become saints To enter into the holy of holies And what is the holy of holies? No, not what but who the holy spirit And so in 50 chapters of genesis holy occurs once And not ever again genesis 2 verse 3 And by the time god breathed into our first father's nozzle the breath of life In genesis 2 verse 7 That means sanctifying grace original holiness not just original justice So our first father is ordered primarily to god because eve doesn't exist yet And in the next chapter when she does together they disobey But what did god say the day you eat of it you'll surely die The serpent said you won't and so they ate and they didn't die Naturally or physically but what happened truly? They committed a mortal sin. They committed spiritual suicide. They snuffed out the life of god They exhaled the holy spirit. They basically evicted him And so for us original sin is transmitting human life utterly devoid of divine life And so all of the sons of adam and the daughters of eve like us are born naturally alive but spiritually dead as a doornail Holiness does not occur anywhere else in the rest of the book of genesis No wonder it's a subtle way of gesturing towards the catastrophic consequences of the failure of our first father A brief comeback in exodus only 40 chapters kadosh occurs get this 98 times 70 times as a verb like 28 No, 18 times as a no 70 times as a noun 18 times as a verb and you know the the holy ground the holy tabernacle the holy Ark of the covenant the altar all of these things are holy and israel is called to be holy But only if you hear my voice and only if you keep my covenant Moses heard his voice, but the people only heard thunder Moses kept the covenant, but the people worshiped the golden calf And so what is holy the 12 tribes is a holy nation They're desecrated. They're defrocked and only the levites become holy hence leviticus Follows the tragedy of exodus and in leviticus the heart of it is the holiness code Be holy as the lords your god is holy. That's what god Speaks through moses to tell erin to have his sons and the levites learn Teach the 12 tribes be holy as opposed to being What? unholy idolatrous calf worshiping rebels And so leviticus is an earnest attempt on the part of moses to get erin and his sons and the levites to rehabilitate The 12 tribes and after 40 years that experiment fails And so as we continue reading through The book of the old the books of the old testament. What do we find? well They were to go into the holy land And to capture jerusalem And build the holy city and then the holy temple and then the holy of holies Could have taken 40 years at the most it could have taken 60 or 70 But in fact as rabbi berman points out It took israel almost half a millennium to get around a fulfilling god's command And they were well aware of their own tardiness The construction of the temple He says is the only event in the entire prophetic record that is explicitly dated It took place in the 400th of the 80th year after the sons of israel came out of egypt In the fourth year of solomon's reign over israel And by the time you discovered that the temple was around As isaia points out you possessed the sanctuary only a little while Before the adversaries came and destroyed it Little by little god is calling his people to holiness louder and louder the call is heard but not fulfilled As rabbi berman goes on to point out as an orthodox jewish scholar Nobody is ever called a saint in the old testament Lots of objects are called to be saints Are called holy, but israelites are called to be saints, but they never achieve it The only apparent exception is daniel 7 Where you hear about this vision That daniel has of the son of man riding on the clouds of glory Coming to the ancient of days to receive a kingdom That's everlasting and worldwide and he turns around and who does he give it to the saints of the most high Well, there you have it people are called saints in the old testament But of course not yet because the vision of the son of man is an oracle of the future Only fulfilled when the son of god the holy one of god becomes the son of man For the purpose of Giving us the holy spirit And so what we take for granted is precisely what the israelites waited centuries for more than a millennium to receive And what does it elicit from us the father sent the son to give us the holy spirit Big deal i've been here in that since i was little But what difference does it actually make well in the very beginning of luke's gospel The holy spirit shall come upon you and the power of the most high will overshadow her And what does that make her that's the language describing what the holy spirit did in relation to the holy of holies and the arc of the covenant So she is the ark of the new covenant She doesn't bear the word of god carved in stone tablets. She bears the word of god made flesh dwelling in her womb She's more of an ark than the box could ever be And so she bears the holy one of god And he lives And he is holy and righteous But he also makes his life a gift of love In a self offering the holy sacrifice of christ the holy sacrifice of the mass He rises in the power of the holy spirit He promises to give the holy spirit And 50 days after Passover is pentecost And the gift of the holy spirit empowers the blessed virgin and the apostles To take to all of the nations the truth of god's love his holy love This is the revelation of what holiness is As saint thomas equinus would say Holiness belongs to god alone because holiness is the perfection of love from all eternity That's not just what the trinity does. That's who the father the son of the holy spirit Do that's who they are And we were made in their image and likeness, but we were made ultimately To arrive there as our final destiny as our eternal home To enter into a temple not made by human hands But the temple which is the lord god the lamb and the living water To feel at home in the family of god As the extension of the holy trinity I mean, this is almost too good to be true This surpasses the highest hopes of the holiest hebrus and yet this is plan a not p or c So you can understand why people didn't get it back then and you can understand why people don't get it now Because the good news is too good to be true But what if it's the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help us god Swear these oaths the seven sacraments that are administered and in hebu by the way What does it mean to swear a covenant oath? Sheva is the hebu term to seven yourself This is more than lucky seven To seven yourself is what god did In creating the cosmos in making it a temple and in making our first father the high priest of humanity And then in making jesus the last atom the new atom So when we go through the old testament and we see nobody's ever called a saint in the old Suddenly if there was a holiness explosion when you move from genesis to exodus That explosion is multiplied exponentially when you move from the old to the new When the son of god becomes the son of man and transform death from the loss of life to the most perfect sacrifice That exceeds all of the animals that were slaughtered in the jerusalem temple and the blood that was sprinkled in the holy of Holies all of that was a foreshadowing all of that was prefiguring something that was just unimaginable That god would stoop down to us and her own lowliness As she sang he had mercy upon my lowliness This is why holiness Is not Seven steps becoming bigger and better and smarter and stronger and more popular and wealthy No, holiness is about becoming smaller And closer to god So that from the interior of our will the heart becomes the holy of holies and through prayer Through the rosary through the sacraments through the holy sacrifice of the mass in particular But I would also propose some practical takeaways for you to think about taking home And one is remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy Just as it was the circumcision in the old baptism in the new Passover in the old the Eucharist in the new the seventh day at the end of our work Whereas now the christian seventh day the christian Sabbath is the eighth day sunday the first day Because christ has christ's work has saved us even before we are born much Let's get up for work on monday Remember the Sabbath day your sons and your daughters your maid servants and your man's servants as best as you can in a non-legalistic way Make it a day of remembrance. Make it a day of commemoration. Make it a day of celebration And not just for yourselves, but for others as well. Be careful not to employ people Unnecessarily so that you're enjoying the Sabbath at the expense of people who had to show up for work again Not legalistically, but the freedom of the children of god belongs to the people at bob evans as much as the people at the table And so i want to encourage you to make the most of the lord's day When pope saint john paul the second row d is dominated on the day of the lord He basically said that the Sabbath was understood as the source of liberty The font of freedom for the children of god When they entered the promised land slaves could only work for six years They were indentured servants. They had to be set free and empowered to go forth and to build their own families So we ought to look for ways to make the seventh day holy at the beginning of the week I would also suggest Ways to celebrate like we do birthdays at anniversaries the feasts of our patron saints and of our children as well But i would also call for special devotion to the holy family To the holy family to the blessed virgin mary to saint joseph And of course to jesus the holy one of god When jesus was raised from the dead in matthew 27 We barely noticed what verses 51 and 52 tell us But after the resurrection suddenly all the tombs throughout jesusland of all of the holy ones were open and the saints were seen For a period of time until when until jesus ascension It wasn't just taking an elevator. It wasn't a solo flight He took the souls of the faithful departed that he had rescued from Sheol hades and he took that the heaven and repopulated it So the next time the only other time we hear holy holy holy Besides isaas 6 where it was a song sung only by the seraphim in revelation 4 The ascended king of kings upon his throne They're singing holy, holy, holy It's the angels and the saints the martyrs and all of the people who had died in the old testament who now stand before god We believe in the holy spirit The holy catholic church The communion of saints and all of these other catholic doctrines. That's basically reduced to talking points Oh the articles of the creed are more precious than gems diamonds emeralds and sapphires And so what we've got to do is we've got to bring these home and there were our own hearts daily prayer the rosary But i'd also suggest tithing In the old covenant it was commanded even before the mosaic law. Abraham paid a tithe to Melchizedek Have we moved from great blessings to lesser blessings from the old of the new? No great to even greater So a tithe is required more is expected Because we've experienced graces that go beyond ancient israel, but what do you tithe on the gross or the net? Well, who gets the first? Uncle sam or the lord jesus What do you want god to bless the gross or the net? Then give him 10 percent as distinct from 1.6 percent, which is the average catholic Percentage of giving the protestant is around 2.5 almost double, but not nearly enough We want our religion, but we want it cheap Well, will you get what you pay for? And so support your parish, but also support those works that you believe god has raised up and established for the purpose Of sanctifying the temporal order and turning us into saints It's a wonderful thing for our son father Jeremiah be able to transform Bread and wine into the resurrected body blood soul in the vanity of christ But that is a means to an end the real goal Is for god the father to use our priest to transform lay people and clergy alike From centers to saints That's who we are. That's what we're here for and that's the only way we're going to get home In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit