What Are You Looking For? Part 1: The Nicene Creed

Holy

Holy

            We use the word holy a lot.  Sometimes we use it appropriately, sometimes not.  Used properly, the meaning is very rich, and something I think we may have forgotten in our modern lives.  According to the Encarta Dictionary, the word holy means several things.  It means consecrated, saintly, sacred and awe-inspiring.  According to the Nicene Creed, the church is holy, consecrated, saintly, sacred and awe-inspiring.  Most of us can look at the body of Christ today and…we don’t see it.  Sure, there are church buildings out there that have been and are consecrated, that are sacred.  Some are even awe-inspiring.  But the congregations that meet there, maybe not so much. 

            That’s because the Church, the body of Christ, is made up of sinners.  I know no surprise there.  But in spite of that, the church is still holy.  It is holy because Jesus is holy, and we are his body.  We are united to him.  He is the bridegroom and we are his bride.  We are “sanctified by him; through him and with him she becomes sanctifying.” (CCC 824) 

We, the Church, are holy, but we are also becoming holy.  The holiness of the Church as a whole is an unfailing holiness, but the people who are the Church are still working on it.  We are, all of us, the very ones Christ established the Church to rescue.  That’s the whole purpose of the Church: those who were rescued from drowning reaching out to others who are drowning and together learning how to swim.  In other words, we’re all sinners.  We all have concupiscence (man’s disordered inclination to sin).  It’s something we will all struggle to overcome for our entire lives.

There have been some who have done better than others.  In my lifetime, there have been two such people who have impacted the world with their holiness to such a degree that the Catholic Church has declared them Blessed, which is one step away from being named a Saint.  (Note the capital “S”.  All Christians are saints, lower case “s”.)  These two are Blessed Mother Theresa of Calcutta and Blessed Pope John Paul II.  To anyone who lived in the late 20th century, the impact of these two on the world is undeniable.  For both, what they did stemmed from who they were, and Who they served.  And they are models of modern holiness.  What was it that thrust them upon the world stage to such a degree that they became household names across the world?  What did they know that most of us don’t?  For both of them, the rock of all they did was Jesus.  And all they did was for love of him.   St. Therese of Lisieux, in her Autobiography of a Saint, (tr Ronald Knox; London: Harvill, 1958) describes it perfectly: “If the Church was a body composed of different members, it couldn’t lack the noblest of all; it must have a Heart, and a Heart BURNING WITH LOVE.  And I realized that this love alone was the true motive force which enabled the other members of the church to act; if it ceased to function, the apostles would forget to preach the gospel, the Martyrs would refuse to shed their blood.  LOVE IN FACT, IS THE VOCATION WHICH INCLUDES ALL OTHERS; IT’S A UNIVERSE OF ITS OWN, COMPRISING ALL TIME AND SPACE-IT’S ETERNAL!”

That’s what Blessed Mother Theresa and Blessed John Paul II knew.  That’s what motivated them.  That’s what needs to motivate us.  If we let that love, that burning love, be “the true motive force” then the Church as an entity, won’t just be consecrated, saintly, sacred and awe-inspiring.  Her buildings won’t just be consecrated, saintly, sacred and awe-inspiring, but her people within the buildings, the people who make up the entity of the Church, will live like they are consecrated, saintly, and sacred.  And that will be awe-inspiring.  And it will change the world.