Preview: "Knowledge of God's Will" on the Son Rise Morning Show

Matt Swaim and I will discuss another of Newman's Parochial and Plain Sermons, "Knowledge of God's Will" (which has the full title of "Knowledge of God's Will without Obedience" in Volume I) on Monday, April 6 on the Son Rise Morning Show at the usual time.

We had several great sermons to choose from for our Monday of Holy Week installment in our series of meditations from The Tears of Christ. Sermons such as "The Incarnate Son, a Sufferer and a Sacrifice" (Palm Sunday and Monday), "The Mental Sufferings of Our Lord in His Passion" (Spy Tuesday and Wednesday), "The Crucifixion" (for Good Friday), and "Moses, a Type of Christ" (Holy Saturday). It was hard to choose. I highly recommend these sermons for devotional reading during Holy Week too.

Reading these meditations certainly highlights how deeply and devotedly St. John Henry Newman read the Holy Bible. He bases this sermon on the verse "If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." John 13:17. (Or, in the Revised Standard Version translation, "If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.") These are the words Jesus spoke to the Apostles after He had washed their feet, reminding them of how He had served them and given them an example of how they were to serve.

Most of us won't be attending a Holy Thursday Mass because of the pandemic and when we watch that Mass celebrated on EWTN or our parish church's YouTube or Facebook page, we won't see the ceremony of the Washing of the Feet. As Cardinal Sarah has proclaimed for this Holy Week 2020 only: "The washing of feet, which is already optional, is to be omitted."

Newman offers us, however, a vivid word picture of that event at the Last Supper, alluding briefly to some of "The Mental Sufferings of Our Lord in His Passion" that night :

We read a passage in the Gospels, for instance, a parable perhaps, or the account of a miracle; or we read a chapter in the Prophets, or a Psalm. Who is not struck with the beauty of what he reads? I do not wish to speak of those who read the Bible only now and then, and who will in consequence generally find its sacred pages dull and uninteresting; but of those who study it. Who of such persons does not see the beauty of it? for instance, take the passage which introduces the text. Christ had been washing His disciples' feet. He did so at a season of great mental suffering; it was just before He was seized by His enemies to be put to death. The traitor, His familiar friend, was in the room. All of His disciples, even the most devoted of them, loved Him much less than they thought they did. In a little while they were all to forsake Him and flee. This He foresaw; yet He calmly washed their feet, and then He told them that He did so by way of an example; that they should be full of lowly services one to the other, as He to them; that he among them was in fact the highest who put himself the lowest. This He had said before; and His disciples must have recollected it. Perhaps they might wonder in their secret hearts why He repeated the lesson; they might say to themselves, "We have heard this before." They might be surprised that His significant action, His washing their feet, issued in nothing else than a precept already delivered, the command to be humble. At the same time they would not be able to deny, or rather they would deeply feel, the beauty of His action. Nay, as loving Him (after all) above all things, and reverencing Him as their Lord and Teacher, they would feel an admiration and awe of Him; but their minds would not rest sufficiently on the practical direction of the instruction vouchsafed to them. They knew the truth, and they admired it; they did not observe what it was they lacked. Such may be considered their frame of mind; and hence the force of the text, delivered primarily against Judas Iscariot, who knew and sinned deliberately against the truth; secondarily referring to all the Apostles, and St. Peter chiefly, who promised to be faithful, but failed under the trial; lastly, to us all,—all of us here assembled, who hear the word of life continually, know it, admire it, do all but obey it.

The image I chose, from the works of Master of the House Book, illustrates Judas as the traitor and the Apostles discussing what Jesus is doing by washing their feet. St. Peter reaches out his hands for Jesus to wash them too while Judas glowers at both of them. 

Newman's insight into what Jesus knew about His followers is breathtaking: even those who hadn't betrayed Him or wouldn't deny Him would abandon Him because they "loved Him much less than they thought they did". And then Newman applies that lesson to us:

Is it not so? is not Scripture altogether pleasant except in its strictness? do not we try to persuade ourselves, that to feel religiously, to confess our love of religion, and to be able to talk of religion, will stand in the place of careful obedience, of that self-denial which is the very substance of true practical religion? Alas! that religion which is so delightful as a vision, should be so distasteful as a reality. Yet so it is, whether we are aware of the fact or not.

So if we know the Holy Bible, if we know the teachings, moral, spiritual, doctrinal, and liturgical of Jesus and His Church--we have to be aware that knowing is not doing.

In several paragraphs not included in The Tears of Christ, Newman does what he does so often in these sermons: he presents types or examples of different decrees of knowledge and reaction to the Teachings of Christ.  He mentions the multitude of men who ignore religious matters entirely and then looks at those who do know what God has taught and who think they've accepted it, but

They overlook or explain away its precepts. They in no sense obey because it commands. They do right when they would have done right had it not commanded; however, they speak well of it, and think they understand it. Sometimes, if I may continue the description, they adopt it into a certain refined elegance of sentiments and manners, and then the irreligion is all that is graceful, fastidious, and luxurious. They love religious poetry and eloquent preaching. They desire to have their feelings roused and soothed, and to secure a variety and relief in that eternal subject which is unchangeable. They tire of its simplicity, and perhaps seek to keep up their interest in it by means of religious narratives, fictitious or embellished, or of news from foreign countries, or of the history of the prospects or successes of the Gospel; thus perverting what is in itself good and innocent. This is their state of mind at best; for more commonly they think it enough merely to show some slight regard for the subject of religion; to attend its services on the Lord's day, and then only once, and coldly to express an approbation of it. But of course every description of such persons can be but general; for the shades of character are so varied and blended in individuals, as to make it impossible to give an accurate picture, and often very estimable persons and truly good Christians are partly infected with this bad and earthly spirit. 

Newman has great insight into how we can fool ourselves, be what he calls "double-minded", and he much more hope for the Christian who readily admits that it's a struggle to obey God's will because he is honest and ready to repent:

"It is so very difficult to serve God, it is so much against my own mind, such an effort, such a strain upon my strength to bear Christ's yoke, I must give it over, or I must delay it at least. Can nothing be taken instead? I acknowledge His law to be most holy and true, and the accounts I read about good men are most delightful. I wish I were like them with all my heart; and for a little while I feel in a mind to set about imitating them. I have begun several times, I have had seasons of repentance, and set rules to myself; but for some reason or other, I fell back after a while, and was even worse than before. I know, but I cannot do. O wretched man that I am!"

Now to such an one I say, You are in a much more promising state than if you were contented with yourself, and thought that knowledge was every thing, which is the grievous blindness which I have hitherto been speaking of; that is, you are in a better state, if you do not feel too much comfort or confidence in your confession. . . . You are, I admit, in a better state than if you were satisfied with yourself, but you are not in a safe state.

Because that's just the beginning of repentance and obedience and Jesus shows the way (from The Tears of Christ):

But if you are really pierced to the heart that you do not do what you know you should do, if you would love God if you could, then the Gospel speaks to you words of peace and hope. It is a very different thing indolently to say, "I would I were a different man," and to close with God's offer to make you different, when it is put before you. Here is the test between earnestness and insincerity. You say you wish to be a different man; Christ takes you at your word, so to speak; He offers to make you different. He says, "I will take away from you the heart of stone, the love of this world and its pleasures, if you will submit to My discipline." Here a man draws back. No; he cannot bear to lose the love of the world, to part with his present desires and tastes; he cannot consent to be changed.

Newman does not leave a person who is inspired to repent and be obedient in such a state, having drawn back from the words of Christ. More on Newman's exhortation to such a man or woman on Monday.