Posted on 07/26/2025 7:33:05 PM PDT by ebb tide
Preface and Precis: This is a sermon warning against false prophets. The Gospel of this TLM Mass (Matthew 7:15-21) is, inexplicably, not to be found on any Sunday or Solemnity in the Novus Ordo Mass. This sermon also offers a supplementary context and commentary: Our Lord’s admonition against corrupt leadership “matures” into warnings against the ultimate false prophet (2 Cor 11:14), the antichrist (1 John 2:22, 4:3; 2 John 1:7). All humans are sinners, having character flaws or “cracks” in desperate need of divine repair, even as our society invariably needs “course correction” based upon divine direction (Prv 14:12, Jer 6:16-17, Rom 1:21-32). Too often, though, supinely led by tyrants and charlatans, we permit (or even encourage) our personal or political flaws to become a “new normal”—a regnant banality of evil (to use Hannah Arendt’s term), in which vice is seen as virtue, evil is seen as good, and injustice is seen as benevolence (cf. Isaiah 5:20). The wolf then devours the sheep, and the Great Deceiver laughs (Psalm 10:3-11, Prv 1:26-27). The “sacramental mortar,” divinely offered to repair our cracks, waits and waits and waits (cf. John 1:10-11).
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies . . . (2 Peter 2:1).
One of King David’s sons, Absalom, revolted against his father, leading to a great civil war, in which, finally, Absalom’s forces were defeated, and Absalom was himself killed. King David’s brilliant and loyal advisor, named Ahithophel (1 Chron 27:33, 2 Sam 16:23), had also deserted David, foolishly joining forces with Absalom. When Absalom was defeated, Ahithophel, despairing and reading the writing on the wall (cf. Dan 5:24-27), killed himself. The suicidal traitor Ahithophel is an adumbration, foreshadowing, or type, of Judas, who betrayed Our Lord and ended his life in despair (Mt 27:5; and see my article here.)
Psalm 55 is King David’s lament about being betrayed by his beloved son Absalom and his trusted counselor Ahithophel (55:12-15; cf. Psalm 41:9 and Luke 22:21). Consider also the formidable admonition of Jesus: “. . . woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born” (Mt 26:24, Mk 14:21).
In this connection, Jesus plainly warns us that “a man’s foes will be those of his own household” (Mt 10:36; cf. Prv 11:29, Hosea 8:7). We know that there are incompetent and unethical politicians and military officers, doctors and lawyers, teachers and coaches. We find consolation in the realization that, thanks be to God, the great majority of our Catholic leaders are, and have been, men and women of intelligence, integrity, and industry. Still, our justified anger and immense sorrow are the bitter fruit of unqualified and unsavory priests, bishops, and popes, about whom history all too frequently tells us (Isaiah 10:1-2, Ezekiel 34:2-10, Micah 3:1-3).
That is precisely why our Gospel this Sunday—and throughout the centuries for the Seventh Sunday After Pentecost—is an explicit warning against “false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly they are ravening wolves” (See also Acts 20:29, 1 Tim 1:3-7, Jude 1:3-5, and Rev 2:2.) If Ahithophel was a type of Judas, Judas, in turn, was a type of those Catholic leaders who have betrayed Jesus and His Church for reasons of pride, power, money (2 Peter 2:3), or lust (see Jeremiah 14:14). They are modern false prophets.
We Catholics are called to obedience (CCC #143-#144, #2087; Romans 1:5 and 16:26): we are summoned to hear and to follow the commands and counsel of our shepherds. It is no small matter, then, to challenge, to criticize, or to contravene the teaching of those entrusted with sacred offices, for we ourselves are certainly subject to error and to arrogance (See Psalm 19:12).
The customary, or ordinary, or standard attitude–the “default position”–for us is to accept with grace and gratitude the teaching of our spiritual leaders (CCC #1269; cf. #1900), much as St. Thomas Morenormally received the orders of King Henry VIII about 1530.When the King betrayed the teaching of the Church, though, Thomas More said that, although he was the king’s good servant, he was God’s first, and he disobeyed the king’s orders so that he could be faithful to Christ in the Church (See Acts 5:29).
If and when we are instructed to think or say or do things in ways that unquestionably, and even explosively, diverge[1] from historical, orthodox, regular, and traditional Catholic teaching, we must respectfully ask for clarification and explanation (see 1 John 4:1), humbly expecting such response to resolve any doubt or concerns (See Rev 2:2). This is known as the virtue of docility, a ready willingness to be taught.
Still, as one scholar teaches us, “it is not obedience that comes first, but truth and charity; and this is why obedience, rightly understood, is not blind” (Peter Kwasniewski, True Obedience in the Church, p. 7). Our Catholic faith insists that we always follow our conscience (CCC #1790, #1800), but that we must educate that conscience (#1783, #1791), not slavishly follow the carnal cravings of our guts or gonads. False prophets and failed priests are not merely historical; they are, sadly, ever present in our fallen world. Here, I am not referring to an honest mistake made in a written article or in a spoken sermon or in quiet counsel. I am referring to a deliberate pattern of deceit and deception—malevolent moral myopia—in distorting and defiling the Gospel of the Lord. (See 2 Cor 4:4.)
To follow such teaching or teachers is spiritually venomous (Gal 1:6-9, 2 Cor 11:13-15). As Pope St. Pius X warned us in 1907:
The partisans of error are to be sought not only among the Church’s open enemies; they lie hid, a thing to be deeply deplored and feared, in her very bosom and heart, and are the more mischievous, the less conspicuously they appear. We allude, Venerable Brethren, to many who belong to the Catholic laity, nay, and this is far more lamentable, to the ranks of the priesthood itself, who, feigning a love for the Church, lacking the firm protection of philosophy and theology, nay more, thoroughly imbued with the poisonous doctrines taught by the enemies of the Church, and lost to all sense of modesty, vaunt themselves as reformers of the Church; and, forming more boldly into line of attack, assail all that is most sacred in the work of Christ, not sparing even the person of the Divine Redeemer, whom, with sacrilegious daring, they reduce to a simple, mere man (Pascendi Dominici Gregis, #2).
We are not without a moral compass, lost in an ethical wilderness, in a situation of spiritual confusion (Col 2:8; Eph 4:11-14); if we have compelling reason to doubt the testimony or teaching of an ostensible shepherd, we still have this timeless counsel and consolation from the Church: we can and must inquire about such matters, basing our judgments on such strongpoints as these:
One example may help us: Suppose there is a priest who insists that homosexual practice (see CCC #2357) or, perhaps, transgender surgery (see #2333), is, or should be, fully accepted in, and accommodated by, Catholic moral teaching (cf. Jude 1:17-23).[2]In fact, let us suppose, further, that this priest wants to celebrate these notions and mentions them favorably and frequently in his homilies, even suggesting that there are multiple genders (cf. Gen 1:27) and that biblical condemnations of homosexual behaviors must be understood only in their ancient cultural context (2 Peter 3:16). This is the preaching of a wolf in a chasuble. It is wrong; it is wrong-headed; and it is not of God (1 John 3:10). But it will, sadly, be attractive to some.[3] As St. Paul taught: “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but, having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings and will turn away from the truth . . .” (2 Tim 4:3-4; cf. Gal 1:6-9, 2 Thess 2:10). Our Catholic duty and our Catholic hope are given in Acts (3:19): “Repent, therefore, and turn to[ward] God so that your sins may be wiped out” (See also the warning in Jude 1:4[4]
This is why St. Paul tells us: “what you have heard from me . . . entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim 2:2). This is why we must pray for our priests and bishops who resolutely govern, guard, and guide us (see Hebrews 13:17) with the Truth of the Faith which comes to us from the Apostles.
+ Deo Gratias. Thanks be to God. +
Jorge Bergoglio, S.J., James Martin, S.J., and Tucho Fernandez all come to mind.
Ping
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