Traditional Catholic Teaching - ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

ELEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

He spoke right. St. Mark 7: 35.

Our Lord conferred a great benefit upon the man who was deaf and dumb, by opening his ears and loosing the string of his tongue; and the multitude that witnessed the miracle cried out: "He hath done all things well; He hath made both the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak."

We may ask whether these people applied their own words to themselves, and recognized what great blessings speech and hearing are to men. They rejoiced that the man who was cured could articulate and pronounce the various sounds and words clearly; but did they consider that it is not enough to have the gift of speech, but that we ought to use that gift properly? Speech is given us by God, but unhappily none of His other benefits are more frequently misused. Men are only too apt to say what is wrong, and disregard our Lord's solemn warning that we shall have to give an account of every idle word. Of all the sins of the tongue, none is commoner than lying. Not only to the deaf and dumb whom Christ healed, did He give power to speak right, but He will give it to us also, if we are faithful to Him, and this power is indispensable to our salvation. Holy Scripture contains many exhortations to truthfulness, and many warnings against lying, besides several instances of the disastrous effects of falsehood. A lie injures no one so much as the person uttering it; it may mislead others, but it most injures the liar himself, for no other sin so the soul to all that is sacred and noble, and lays the foundation of a low, mean way of thinking. How can love of God exist in the soul of a liar, who knows that his lies render him absolutely unlike the God of all truth? How can a liar be charitable towards his neighbour, when in his heart and on his lips falsehood and deceit have their abode? Even if a lie does not actually injure one's neighbour, some amount of scorn of the person deceived is always present in the heart of the liar, and thus ridicule and contempt are hidden under an outward semblance of friendship. What an abominable character! When once the habit of lying is firmly rooted in a heart, all its consequences appear one after another; and a cunning, hypocritical, deceitful disposition is formed, which is an obstacle to all better development of character. A liar, as I have said, injures himself; what is his object in telling a lie? As a rule he is trying to avoid some blame or correction, or to secure praise for what he has not done, and for some virtue that he does not possess. If his lie is believed, he escapes the censure that he dreaded, and receives the praise that he sought. But what good does he derive from it? Would it not have been better for him to accept the reproof, and amend his ways, and not to have the praise, but to be spurred on really to deserve it? Truth might have cost him something, but its fruits would have been sweeter than those of a lie.

A liar injures himself by losing the respect of his fellow men. A man must have sunk very low before he ceases to care for this respect; why, then, does he risk the loss of it by telling lies? Who can possibly feel much esteem for a liar? Christian charity may make us, out of compassion for him, conceal the poor opinion that we really have of him, but at the bottom of our hearts we all know that a liar deserves contempt. When we cease to respect a man, we cease also to trust him, for how can we confide in one whose words may be true or false, we know not which?

If we need advice, the last person to whom we shall apply is a liar, for how can we be sure that he is not telling us to do the exact opposite of what he recognizes as proper? And should the liar himself need counsel, who can give it him? Is it possible to advise a man, who may not have given us all the information requisite to enable us to form an opinion regarding his difficulties? May he not be seeking advice simply in order to ridicule it or make a bad use of it?

In the same way when a liar asks help, we often doubt whether his need is genuine, and thus his lies check the stream of Christian charity. We must acknowledge that nothing is so great a hindrance to progress in this world as lying. The world is corrupt and often laughs at simple honesty and truthfulness, but nevertheless everyone likes to have honest, straightforward people about him. Who would care to have in his house, or to associate with, persons whom he can not trust not to misrepresent all that goes on in his household, and not to rob him and his family of that good reputation that is the best foundation of temporal happiness? We all try to avoid liars, for they often do more harm than thieves, who deprive us only of our goods, whilst liars take away our honour. A liar causes confusion in houses and families, and sows distrust between those who previously had full confidence in one another. He tells one what the other is supposed to have said and done, until he has fanned a flame of discord, where harmony used to reign. Even in society a liar confidence in him. How true are the words of Holy Scripture: "The mouth that belieth, killeth the soul" (Wisd. i, ii). The liar injures himself in time and in eternity; therefore you should resolve firmly always to speak right, always to adhere to the truth and avoid lying, as if it were a serpent, ready to kill whoever touches it. If you are faithful to the truth, you will be faithful to Jesus, who is all Truth, and a heart loyal to Him is fruitful in every kind of virtue, none of which can flourish in a lying soul. The heart of the honest and upright has a claim to the everlasting kingdom of all truth and purity. Amen.

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