Indeed, for each individual Christian, as for the Church at large, the security of the spiritual building depends primarily on the firmness of the foundation, which is faith. The Holy Ghost will not build on a foundation that is unsound or unsafe. When, especially, He is to lead a soul to the higher degrees of divine union, He exacts from her, as the first condition, that her faith, too, be above the average, – a faith, that is, with heroism enough to fight successfully those battles which brace the soul, and so render her worthy of light and love. In every stage of the Christian life, however, it is faith that provides love with its enduring and substantialnourishment; it is faith that gives to the virtues their supernatural motives, and makes them fit to form a worthy court for their queen, charity. A soul’s development never goes beyond the measure of her faith. The capaciousness of faith, and its ever-growing plenitude, and its certified conformity with truth, these are the guarantees of the progress which will be made by a just man; whereas all such holiness as affects to be guided by a faith which is cramped or false is holiness of a very dubious kind, and one that is exposed to most fearful illusions.

It was, therefore, a good and a wholesome thing that faith should be put to the test, for it grows brighter and stronger under trial. St. Paul, in his Epistle to the Hebrews, is enthusiastic in his praise of the triumphs won by the faith of our forefathers.Could there be denied to the new Covenant those glorious combats which constituted the eternal merit and honour of the Saints who lived in the period of expectation and figures? It is by their victorious faith in the word of the promise, that all those worthy ancestors of the Christian people merited to have God Himself as their praise-giver.For us, who joyously have possession of that Messias who to them was but the object of heroic hope, our trial cannot be like theirs – the trial of expectation. This is quite true; and yet, heresy, which is the offspring of man’s pride and hell’s malice – heresy and its manifold outcomings, which are ever producing the diminution of truth in this world – will give us occasions of merit even in our possession of what they beheld and saluted only afar off. Man is ever trying to intrude his foolish ideas into the truths of divine revelation; and, as to the prince of this world, he will do all in his power to encourage these audacious attempts at corrupting the purity of the word. But Wisdom, who is never overcome, will turn all these impious efforts into an occasion of glorious victories for her children. Here we have the reason why God permitted, from the very commencement of the Church’s existence, and still permits, that sects should be continually springing up. It is in the battlefield against error that the Church brings forth the armour of God, and shows herself all brilliant with that absolute truth which is the brightness of the Word, her Spouse; it is by his personal triumph over the spirit of lying, and by spontaneous adhesion to the teachings of Christ and His Church, that the Christian shows himself to be a true child of light, and becomes himself a light to the world.

The combat is not without its dangers for the Christian who would hold, in all its integrity, the faith of his mother the Church. The tricks of the enemy, his studied and obstinate hypocrisy, the crafty skill wherewith he tries to stir up in the soul, almost without her knowing it, a score of little weaknesses of hers which more or less favour error – all this frequently ends in injuring the light, not perhaps in extinguishing it altogether, but in robbing it of some of its brilliancy. And yet, they who live on the teachings given us in our today’s Gospel are sure to come off with the victory. Let us meditate upon them with gratitude and love; for it is by such teachings that eternal Wisdom grants us what we so ardently ask of Him, when in Advent we thus beseech Him: “Come and teach us the way of prudence!” Prudence, the friend of a wise man, guardian of his treasures, and his surest defence, has no greater peril from which to keep him than shipwreck concerning the faith; if faith be lost, all is lost. No price is too great to give for that prudence of the serpent which, in a disciple of Christ, goes so admirably with the simplicity of the dove. If we are happy enough to possess prudence, we shall readily distinguish between those false teachers whom we must shun and those we must hearken to – between the falsifiers of the word and its faithful interpreters.

By their fruits shall ye know them, says our Gospel, and history confirms the words of our Redeemer. Under the sheep’s clothing, which they wear that they may deceive simple souls, the apostles of falsehood ever betray their real nature. The artful language they use, and the flatteries they utter for gain’s sake, cannot hide the hollowness of their works. They separate themselves from the flock of Christ, and flee from the light; for, as the Apostle says: “All things that are reproved, or deserve to be so, are made manifest by the light; and as to the things that are done by them in secret, it is a shame even to speak of them. Therefore, be ye not partakers with them.”

The useless or rotten fruits of darkness, and the trees of autumn, twice dead which bear such fruitson their withered branches, both of them shall be cast into the fire. If you yourselves were heretofore darkness, now that you have become light in the Lord by Baptism, or by a sincere conversion, show yourselves to be so, and produce the fruits of light, in all goodness, and justice, and truth. On this condition alone can you hope to enter into the kingdom of heaven, and call yourselves disciples of that Wisdom of the Father, who, on this seventh Sunday, asks us to give Him our love.