St. Thomas Becket & Joe Biden: The Next Four Years ~ Fr. Kirby

[Music] i'm the father the son of the holy spirit so first i want to point out the magi they of course continue on their journey so you know that they're on their way to see the christ child this sunday will celebrate the feast of the epiphany when they arrive incidentally it's from christmas day december 25th until the historical traditional day of epiphany which is january 6 which are the original 12 days of christmas if you've sung that hymn which is so long and sometimes annoying right the 12 days of christmas that's what they're talking about right of course mother church has moved epiphany so longer on january 6th that it's on the next sunday after holy family so that's why we're going to celebrate this sunday january 3rd but again the magi are moving they're on their way to see the christ child we know when they arrive the christ child is about a year and a half old so imagine the faith and the persistence the tenacity of these magi they heard of the newborn king they were going to make sure they saw him because of this time of waiting the birth of the child and the arrival of the magi mother church is very selective in terms of who we honor during this time which is why today's feast on for today's saint thomas beckett is very important why would the church allow for the honoring of this 12th century martyr during this time the reason why she does this is because his life reflects some important lessons lessons that we should take particularly to heart lessons incidentally as americans we have always treasured and pre-chief among them the principle is the freedom of religious liberty of religious expression we take that for granted as americans the vast majority of the countries today do not have religious freedom in fact in over 50 countries due to islamic extremism if you have publicly declared the divinity of jesus christ it's a capital offense you could be executed or imprisoned we do not have religious liberty remember when god came as zechariah cries out in his hymn god came in order to free us so that we might worship god without fear holy and righteous all the days of his life to free us today the church the feast of saint thomas beckett exemplifies and emphasizes the utter importance of religious freedom that a person can follow their conscience that they can worship god however he or she may understand him as catholics we have led the way in this in fact we developed a whole concept in the west of religious expression even as we realize that some will exercise that in order not to follow jesus christ or do not follow anything and yet we understand that god has given free will and there should be expression of religious freedom let's look at the life of saint thomas beckett so important for us in general that we understand the importance of religious freedom but also because we have a dark four years coming as a church and we need to get ready what can we learn about thomas beckett well first he wasn't born in the wealth his family had a small amount of wealth but thomas had to work hard and he was smart and he was industrious and that's why he won the favor of certain people and he began to just slowly move up the ranks in terms of british government getting one after the other after the other himself establishing quite a comfortable life but because of his hard work in fact the king of england trusted thomas on very sensitive foreign missions because thomas was well spoken attentive he had apparently a good sense of humor which goes a long way the pope could trust him in terms of church matters his king could trust him in church in terms of political matters well it might shock us today but in the 12th century the church was intimately connected with government in england so much so that one of the advancements had thomas become archbishop of canterbury he was still a celibate not married so he was eligible he became archbishop everybody thought he was going to play the party line favor the king remember i told you the pope could trust him once he became archbishop he realized as a point of integrity that his responsibility now was to argue for the church he was to be the thorn in the side of the king in order to make sure that the king that the church was not treated as some type of puppet and he did just that so much so that there was constant tension between the king and this new archbishop to the point that on one occasion the king cried out will anyone please rid me of this burdensome cleric someone please just get rid of this guy well certain courtiers who wanted to win favor took him at face value they found thomas beckett while he was celebrating mass the cathedral and they executed him and he died of martyr not simply a martyr of religious freedom but a martyr for our faith a martyr of the altar this is why he is so revered later in the 16th century saint thomas moore whose story is very unshockingly similar to thomas beckett's thomas more actually go and pray the shrine of thomas beckett asking him for his strength this is an example of one of our fellow believers an older brother who took the faith seriously was willing to speak and use his natural talents in order to defend the church it's important lessons for us why because we are wimps we have become so soft we are willing to compromise so much if we truly believe i pray that we do that jesus christ has given us the most powerful message ever given to humanity i pray that we will be unshakable immovable uncompromising in our defense and explanation sharing of the gospel of jesus christ and in the rights of the church of course some of us believe that some of you i know voted for someone who is now going to suffer and persecute the church for the next four years that on top of the fact that he supports the utter slaughter of the unborn what have you done what have you done to your church look at and watch as our religious sisters will be dragged through the courts as contraception will be set to be imposed upon them watch how our hospitals disappear because we will not follow government dictates watch how our support of unwed mothers disappears because of constant and irreasonable unreasonable regulations watch as mother church shrinks watch how she is treated by this government this coming administration and those of you who voted for such an administration bear the responsibility of what you have done because we are in for it folks and they're already getting ready have you seen the appointees from the most aggressive anti-catholic anti-organisms organized religion leaders in their various states and this is what we're in for to the righteous to those who believe also get ready because we're going to have a very difficult next four years we will be able to exemplify the virtues and the fortitude of saint thomas beckett who will be able to speak the truth even as they try to silence us right it's interesting whenever christians just want to share their views suddenly tolerance disappears have you noticed that the tolerance become very intolerant when it's a christian when we want to argue for natural marriage the personhood of the unborn authentic religious liberty suddenly we are the ones who are told to shut up never forget dear friends and the wise i pray you know this in spiritual wisdom the wise know that evil talks about tolerance until it's in control and then it suppresses and destroys tolerance that's what happens and get ready because if you've missed that lesson somehow in the midst of soviet communism and nazism before it and the communism in the various parts of our world just look at venezuela if you somehow miss that how have you been living under a rock if you somehow missed that don't worry you will have quite a show for the next four years in the united states of america this is where we are dear friends it has often been said that we have two religions in one institution and my goodness is that becoming so clear as some have no care about the work of the church authentic religious liberty or the authentic expression of the christian faith which by the way built the west one of these days we'll realize as the west completely implodes that the reason why it imploded is because the very principles upon which it was founded were the principles that were denied you cannot remove the founding principles of a society and think that that society will continue on that's ridiculous that's foolishness but there are some who believe that meanwhile the righteous and we will be in the minority the righteous we will suffer and it's going to be a glorious suffering because with every suffering god will just be endowing his church with more grace and it will be precisely our sufferings that will inspire other believers the lukewarm perhaps to themselves find true faith or perhaps those who have no faith to begin to ask what's different about these people why are they so vocal and they begin to ask questions to perhaps come into the faith today thomas beckett stands as a providential figure for us of what we are called to do some of you should be utterly ashamed of yourselves for what you have done the fact that there has been nothing spoken from our bishops themselves they will bear the responsibility of that on judgment day because they have allowed their mother their mother who mistreats their mother huh they have allowed mother church to be dragged through the streets mistreated and beaten and treated as a they will pair the concept to bear the consequences of that those who bear the sacred chrism on their hands is the ordained and they have remained silent they will bear consequences for that never forget the mere spiritual mystics tell us that the pavements of hell are paved with the skulls of bishops i preach the truth so those of you who are entrusted to my care you know what we believe as catholics you know what the true religion calls for and i want to make sure you know that so please god you can be saved and i want to make sure that i speak it even if every one of you denies it so when i stand before the judgment seat i might hear those glorious words well done my good and faithful servant because i did what was asked none of you is worth hell and the truth must be spoken speaking in your homes speaking in your neighborhoods speaking among your friends if you lose your friends they were never your friends or was a friendship based on falsity it is now time for us to find our voice it is once again important that we see the heroism of this martyr and find in our hearts to strengthen the grace to speak the truth and to find that fortitude in ourselves never forget how can we forget look at this century that we have just come from never forget that the only thing evil needs to succeed is for good people to remain quiet the only thing that evil needs to conquer is for holy people to remain quiet so find your voice say a few prayers and send thomas beckett and then begin to speak the truth and if you need to repent do so and as we walk through these next four years i pray that we find the strength to give a glorious witness to the power of what the church can be because our enemies they think they're going to destroy us we will be here until the lord returns but we have to suffer a little bit we have to rely more on his grace and we're going to keep saying yes and we're going to take that grace and every time they think they've knocked us down we're gonna turn back around and do even five more things more gloriously so today we pray to saint thomas beckett and ask for his intercession we pray for him to protect the church going to lose so much there's going to be such a time of darkness but we are the children of light and we're going to keep fighting so pray to this holy saint today and during this octave remind ourselves we each remind ourselves that god became a man in order to give us the grace to bring about his kingdom in order to have the grace in order to save our souls so we ask for that grace we ask for the intercession of his holy one that we might give as strong a witness as he did to speak the truth always in season and out of season you

Channel: TAN Books

Views: 122,482

Rating: 4.8542881 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: yYLEUCVUoFo

Length: 14min 7sec (847 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 05 2021