Sermons to the People 224.1–230.1

Let us address those who have been baptized today and been reborn in Christ Jesus, and you in them, and them in you. See, you have been made members of Christ. If you think of what you have been made, all your bones will say: “Lord, who is like you?” For that condescension of God cannot be worthily thought of, and all human speech and sense fail: that grace has come to you freely, with no merits going before. That is why it is called grace, because it is given gratis. What grace? That you may be members of Christ, children of God, brothers of the Only-begotten. If he is the Only-begotten, how are you brothers, unless because he is the Only-begotten by nature and you have been made brothers by grace? Since you have been made members of Christ, then, I warn you: I fear for you, not so much from pagans, not so much from Jews, not so much from heretics, as from bad Catholics. Choose for yourselves among the people of God those whom you will imitate. For if you want to imitate the crowd, you will not be among the few who walk the narrow way. Abstain from sexual immorality, from robbery, from frauds, from perjuries, from unlawful things, from quarrels; let drunkenness be driven from you; fear adultery as you fear death: not the death that releases the soul from the body, but that in which the soul will burn forever with the body.

My brothers, my sons, my daughters, my sisters, I know that the devil plays his part and does not cease to speak in the hearts of those whom he holds bound in his chains: I know that in the hearts of those who commit sexual immorality, of adulterers who are not content with their own wives, the devil says: The sins of the flesh are not great. Against this whispering of the devil we must hold the incarnation of Christ. This is how the enemy deceives Christians through the allurements of the flesh: he makes light for them what is heavy, gentle what is harsh, sweet what is bitter. But what use is it that Satan makes light what Christ shows to be heavy? Is the devil doing something new in saying to faithful Christians: What you are doing is nothing serious? You sin in your flesh: do you sin in the spirit? The sin of the flesh is easily wiped out; pardon is easily given by God? What great thing is he doing? He is plying his trade, what he said in paradise: “Eat, and you will be like gods; you will not die at all.” God had said: “On the day you eat, you will surely die.” The enemy came and said: “You will not die, but your eyes will be opened, and you will be like gods.” God's command was set aside, and the devil's persuasion was heeded. Then God's command was found true and the devil's deception false. Did it profit, I ask you, that the woman said, “The serpent deceived me”? Did the excuse avail? If the excuse availed, why did condemnation follow?

Therefore I say to you, my brothers, my sons: you who have wives, know no other; and you who do not have them and want to marry, keep yourselves intact for them, as you want to find them intact. You who have vowed continence to God, do not look back. See, I tell you; see, I cry out to you; I free myself of responsibility: God has made me a dispenser, not a collector. And yet, as far as we can, where an opportunity is given, where it is allowed, where we know, we rebuke, we reprove, we anathematize, we excommunicate: and yet we do not correct. Why? Because “neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the growth.” Now, as I speak, as I warn, what is needed but that God hear me for you and do something in you, that is, in your hearts? I speak briefly, and I commend it to you, and I frighten the faithful, and I build you up. You are members of Christ: listen not to me but to the Apostle: “Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot?” But someone or other says: She whom I have is not a harlot; she is my concubine. O holy bishop, you have made my concubine a harlot! Did I say it? The Apostle cries out, and I have incurred the charge. I want you to be healthy: why do you rage against me like a madman? You who say this, do you have a wife? I have, you say. Very well: like it or not, she who sleeps with you besides your wife, I have already said, is a harlot. See, go and tell her that the bishop has insulted you. You have your lawful wife, and another sleeps with you: whoever she is, I have already said, she is a harlot. But your wife keeps faith with you, and knows no one but you alone, and does not intend to know another. Since she is chaste, then, why do you commit sexual immorality? If she has you as her one, why do you have two? But you say: My slave woman is my concubine; am I going to another man's wife? Am I going to a public prostitute? Or am I not allowed to do what I want in my own house? I tell you: it is not allowed. Those who do this go to Gehenna; they will burn in everlasting fire.

Let me at least be allowed to speak here and say this. Let those who are such correct themselves while they live, lest afterwards they want to and cannot: because death comes suddenly, and then there is no one to be corrected, but one to be sent into the fire. And when that last hour will come is not known, and still one says, I will correct myself. When will you correct yourself, when will you change? Tomorrow, you say. See how often you say, Cras, cras, “tomorrow, tomorrow”: you have become a crow. See, I tell you: when you make the crow's cry, ruin meets you. For that crow whose cry you imitate went out of the ark and did not return. But you, brother, return to the Church, which that ark then signified. But listen to me, you who are baptized; listen to me, you who have been reborn through the blood of Christ: I beg you by the name that has been invoked over you, by that altar to which you have come, by the sacraments you have received, by the future judgment of the living and the dead; I beg you, I bind you by the name of Christ, not to imitate those whom you know to be such; but let the sacrament of him remain in you who would not come down from the wood, but willed to rise from the tomb.

The Son of God, born of the Father without time, commends to us the height of divine grace toward us. For what was he before he was in a man? Suppose you have asked this and said it. For let us suppose, my brothers: before Christ was born of the Virgin Mary, did he exist or not? Suppose we are asking about what I do not doubt. To these thoughts the Lord himself answered, when it was said to him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and you have seen Abraham?” For he answered and said: “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I am.” So he existed, but he was not yet man. Lest anyone say, He was an angel, the holy Gospel has told you what Christ was. And you ask what he was? “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.” See what he was: “In the beginning was the Word.” The Word was not made in the beginning, but the Word was. But of this world what does Scripture say? “In the beginning God made heaven and earth.” Do you ask through what he made it? In the beginning was the Word, through which heaven and earth were to be made. The Word was not made, but was. It remains now to ask what kind of Word: for our words too are called words. Our words, indeed, are conceived by thought and brought forth by the voice; and yet, when thought and uttered, they pass. But that Word, what? “And the Word was with God.” Say where he was, say what he was. I have already said it. The holy Gospel has told you: “In the beginning was the Word.” Say where he was, say what he was: “And the Word was with God.” But I asked what kind of Word. Do you want to hear what he was? “And the Word was God.” O Word! What kind of Word? Who can explain the Word? “And the Word was God.” But perhaps made by God? Far from it. Hear what the holy Gospel says: “All things were made through him.” What does “all things” mean? Whatever was made by God was made through him. And how was he made, who made all things? Did he make himself? Finally, if he made himself, he who made himself already existed. If, then, he existed so as to make himself, he never did not exist.

How is such a Word in a virgin? “All things were made through him.” What does “all things” mean? Whatever was made by God was made through him. Do not, brother, separate the Holy Spirit from this so great work. From what great work? Not a small work; the angels are a great work: the angels worship the flesh of Christ seated at the right hand of the Father. Such a work, then, the Holy Spirit above all wrought. In this work he was named when the son to come was announced through the angel to the holy Virgin. Since she had resolved on virginity, and her husband was not the taker but the guardian of her chastity, or rather not the guardian, because God guarded it, but the witness of her virginal chastity, lest she be thought pregnant by adultery: when the angel announced it to her, she said, “How shall this be, since I do not know a man?” If she had intended to know one, she would not have wondered. That wonder was the testimony of her resolve. “How shall this be, since I do not know a man?” How shall it be? And the angel to her: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you.” See how what you ask will come about. “And the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and therefore the holy one that will be born of you will be called the Son of God.” He spoke well in saying, “will overshadow you,” so that your virginity might not feel the heat of lust. And when she was pregnant, it was said of her: “Mary was found to have in her womb by the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit, then, wrought the flesh of Christ. The only-begotten Son of God himself also wrought his own flesh. How do we prove it? Because Scripture says of this: “Wisdom has built herself a house.”

Notice, then. So great a God, God with God, the Word of God through whom all things were made: how is he enclosed in a womb? So that the Word might be there, did he first desert heaven? And on what would the angels live, if the Word deserted heaven? But so that man might eat the bread of angels, the Lord of angels became man. Let human thought still wander through its own fogs; let it fail, seek, speak, so as to find how the Word of God, through whom all things were made, in the womb of a virgin did not desert the angels and did not desert the Father. How could he be enclosed in that womb? He could be there; he could not be enclosed. How, someone says, could one so great be in so small a place? Then the womb held what the world does not hold. Nor was he diminished in order to be in the womb. He was in the womb, and he was so great. How great was he? Say how great he was, say what he was: “And the Word was with God.” Say what he was: “And the Word was God.” And I know it, I who speak with you, and I do not comprehend it either: but thought makes us stretch, stretching widens us, widening makes us capacious. And even when made capacious we shall not be able to comprehend the whole; but I deal with you by means of my own word. See what I am saying, what I am about to say: hear this, understand this word of mine, that is, a human word. If you cannot comprehend even this, see how far you are from that Word. We certainly marvel how Christ took flesh, was born of a virgin, and did not withdraw from the Father. See, I who speak with you, before I came to you, thought beforehand what I would say to you. When I thought what I would say to you, there was already a word in my heart. For I would not say it to you unless I had thought it first. I found you a Latin speaker; a Latin word must be brought out to you. But if you were Greek, I should have to speak to you in Greek and bring out a Greek word to you: what is in my heart altogether precedes these languages. I seek a sound for it, I seek a vehicle, as it were; I seek how it may reach you, while it does not withdraw from me. See, you have heard what is in my heart, and now it is in yours too. It is in mine and it is in yours: you have begun to have it, and I have not lost it. As my word took on a sound through which it might be heard, so the Word of God took on flesh through which he might be seen. As far as I could, I have spoken. And what have I said? Since who has spoken? A man wanted to speak of God. He is so great, he is such, that we can neither speak of him nor ought we to keep silent about him.

I give you thanks, Lord, because what I say, or wanted to say, you know: yet I have fed my fellow servants from the crumbs of your table; you too feed and nourish inwardly those whom you have regenerated. See, what was this multitude? Darkness; but now light in the Lord. For to such the Apostle says: “You were once darkness, but now light in the Lord.” O you who have been baptized, you were once darkness, but now light in the Lord. If light, then surely day: for God called the light day. You were darkness; he made you light, he made you day: of you we have sung, “This is the day which the Lord has made; let us exult and rejoice in it.” Flee darkness. Drunkenness belongs to darkness. Do not go away sober and come back drunk; and after midday we shall see you. The Holy Spirit has begun to dwell in you: let him not move out; do not shut him out of your hearts. He is a good guest: he found you empty, he fills you; he found you hungry, he feeds you; finally he found you thirsty, he makes you drunk. Let him make you drunk: for the Apostle says, “Do not get drunk with wine, in which is all debauchery.” And as if wanting to teach us with what we ought to be made drunk, he says: “But be filled with the Holy Spirit, speaking to yourselves in hymns and psalms and spiritual songs, singing in your hearts to the Lord.” Whoever rejoices in the Lord and sings the Lord's praises with great exultation, is he not like a drunken man? I approve this drunkenness: “Since with you, God, is the fountain of life, and you will give them to drink from the torrent of your pleasure.” Whence? Because “with you, God, is the fountain of life, and in your light we shall see light.” The Spirit of God is both drink and light. If you found a fountain in darkness, you would light a lamp to reach it. Do not light a lamp to reach the fountain of light: it shines for you itself and leads you to itself. When you come to drink, approach and be enlightened. “Approach him and be enlightened”; do not draw back, lest you be darkened. Lord God, call, and let them approach you; make them firm, lest they draw back. Make your children new, old men from little ones, but not dead men from old men. For in this wisdom one may grow old; one may not die.

You have heard the Lord Christ proclaimed: that “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” For he is the Lord Christ who, if he had not humbled himself but had willed always to remain so, man would have perished. We acknowledge the Word, God with God; we acknowledge the only-begotten Son equal to the Father; we acknowledge light from light, day from day. He is the day that made the day: not made by the day, but begotten. If, then, he is day from day, not made but begotten, what is “the day which the Lord has made”? Why day? Because it is light. “And God called the light day.” Let us seek what day the Lord has made, so that we may exult and rejoice in it. In the first founding of the world we read that “darkness was over the abyss, and the Spirit of God was borne over the water. And God said, Let there be light; and there was light. And God divided the light from the darkness; and he called the light day and the darkness night.” See the day which the Lord made. But is it the one in which we ought to exult and rejoice? There is another day which the Lord has made, which we ought rather to recognize, and in which we should rejoice and exult. For it was said to the faithful who believe in Christ: “You are the light of the world.” If light, then certainly day, since he called the light day. So here too, yesterday, the Spirit of God was borne over the water, and darkness was over the abyss, when these infants were still carrying their sins. When, then, their sins were forgiven them through the Spirit of God, God then said, “Let there be light; and there was light.” See the day which the Lord has made; let us exult and rejoice in it. Let us address this day in the Apostle's words: O day which the Lord has made, “you were once darkness, but now light in the Lord.” “You were once darkness,” he says. Were you, or not? Recall your deeds, if you were not. Look back at your consciences, which you have renounced. Since, then, you were once darkness, but now light, not in yourselves but in the Lord, walk as children of light. Let these few words be enough for you, since we must labor later too, and today we must discourse to the infants on the sacraments of the altar.

I remember my promise. For I had promised you who have been baptized a sermon in which I would explain the sacrament of the Lord's table, which you see now too, and of which you became partakers last night. You ought to know what you have received, what you are going to receive, what you ought to receive every day. That bread which you see on the altar, sanctified by the word of God, is the body of Christ. That cup, or rather what the cup holds, sanctified by the word of God, is the blood of Christ. Through these the Lord Christ willed to commend his body and his blood, which he poured out for us for the forgiveness of sins. If you have received well, you are what you have received. For the Apostle says: “One bread, one body, we being many.” So he explained the sacrament of the Lord's table: “One bread, one body, we being many.” In this bread it is commended to you how you ought to love unity. For was that bread made of one grain? Were there not many grains of wheat? But before they came to be bread they were separate: they were joined through water, after a certain grinding. For unless wheat is ground and moistened with water, it does not come to this form which is called bread. So you too before were as it were ground by the humiliation of fasting and the sacrament of exorcism. Baptism and water came; you were as it were moistened, so as to come to the form of bread. But it is not yet bread without fire. What, then, does the fire signify? That is the chrism. For the oil of our fire is the sacrament of the Holy Spirit. Notice it in the Acts of the Apostles when it is read. That book is just beginning to be read: today began the book called the Acts of the Apostles. Whoever wants to make progress has the means. When you come together in the church, put away idle tales; attend to the Scriptures. We are your books. Pay attention, then, and see that the Holy Spirit is to come at Pentecost. And he will come thus: he shows himself in tongues of fire. For he breathes in love, by which we burn toward God and despise the world, and our hay is burned up, and the heart is purified like gold. So the Holy Spirit comes, fire after water; and you are made bread, which is the body of Christ. And so unity is in a way signified. You have the sacraments in their order. First, after the prayer, you are admonished to have your heart on high. This befits the members of Christ. For if you have been made members of Christ, where is your head? Members have a head. If the head had not gone before, the members would not follow. Where has your head gone? What did you give back in the Creed? “On the third day he rose from the dead, he ascended into heaven, he sits at the right hand of the Father.” So our head is in heaven. Therefore, when it is said, “Lift up your heart,” you answer, “We have it to the Lord.” And lest you attribute this very having your heart on high to the Lord to your own strength, your merits, your labors, since to have the heart on high is God's gift, the bishop or presbyter who offers therefore continues, when the people have answered, “We have our heart on high to the Lord,” and says: “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God,” for having our heart on high. Let us give thanks, because unless he had given it, we would have our heart on the earth. And you bear witness by saying, “It is right and just,” that we give thanks to him who has made us have our heart on high to our head. Then, after the sanctification of God's sacrifice, since he willed us ourselves to be his sacrifice, which was shown where that sacrifice of God was first laid down, and we are it, that is, the sign of the thing that we are: see, when the sanctification has been completed, we say the Lord's Prayer, which you have received and given back. After it is said, “Peace be with you”; and Christians kiss one another with a holy kiss. It is a sign of peace: as the lips show, so let it be in the conscience. That is, as your lips approach your brother's lips, so let your heart not withdraw from his heart. Great sacraments, then, very great. Do you want to know how they are commended? The Apostle says: “Whoever eats the body of Christ or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.” What is it to receive unworthily? To receive mockingly, to receive contemptuously. Let it not seem cheap to you because you see it. What you see passes; but the invisible thing signified does not pass, but remains. See, it is received, eaten, consumed: is the body of Christ consumed? Is the Church of Christ consumed? Are the members of Christ consumed? Far from it! Here they are cleansed; there they are crowned. What is signified, then, will remain eternally, though it seems to pass. Receive it, then, in such a way that you think about yourselves, that you have unity in your heart, that you always fix your heart on high. Let your hope not be on earth but in heaven; let your faith be firm in God, acceptable to God. For what you do not see here now, and believe, you will see there, where you will rejoice without end.

After the toil of last night, since though the spirit is willing the flesh is weak, I ought not to keep you long with a sermon; and yet I owe you a sermon. These days, on which after the passion of our Lord we sing Alleluia to God, we keep as festal in joy until Pentecost, when the promised Holy Spirit was sent from heaven. Of these days, the seven or eight now being kept are assigned to the sacraments of the infants. Those who a little before were called competentes are now called infants. They were called competentes because they were knocking at their mother's womb, seeking to be born; they are called infants because they have just been born to Christ, who had first been born to the world. [Faith] has been renewed in them, which ought to be firmly established in you; and you who are already faithful, give them examples, not by which they may perish, but by which they may make progress. For those newly born are watching how you, born long ago, live. Those who are born according to Adam also do this: first they are little ones; afterwards, when they begin to perceive the ways of their elders, they observe what to imitate. And since where the elder leads the younger follows, it is to be desired that the elder go by a good way, lest by following both elder and younger perish. So, brothers, you who by the age of your regeneration are already in a sense parents, I address you and exhort you to live in such a way that you may rejoice with those who imitate you, not perish with them. A newly born one watches some drunkard among the faithful; I fear he may say to himself: Why is that man one of the faithful, and drinks so much? He watches some moneylender, a grudging giver, a ruthless exactor, and says to himself: I will do so too. He is answered: You are now one of the faithful; do not do it; you are baptized, you are reborn, your hope has been changed, let your morals be changed. And he: Why are this man and that man faithful? I will not mention other things; for who could list them all? Therefore, my brothers, when you who are already faithful live badly, you will render God an evil account both of yourselves and of them.

Now I address them, that they may be grain on the threshing floor, not following the chaff, which will be carried about by the wind, to perish with it, but remaining by the weight of love, so that they may reach the kingdom of immortality. You, then, brothers, you sons, you new shoots of mother Church, I beg you by what you have received to look to him who has called you, who has loved you, who sought you when you were lost, who enlightened you when you were found, so that you do not follow the ways of the lost, in whom the name of the faithful goes astray: for the question is not what they are called but whether they agree with their name. If he has been born, where is the new life? If he is faithful, where is the faith? I hear the name; let me recognize the thing too. Choose for yourselves those whom you will imitate: those who fear God, who enter the church of God with fear, who listen to the word of God diligently, retain it in memory, ruminate on it in thought, and fulfill it in deeds; choose these to imitate. Let your heart not say: And where shall we find such people? Be such, and you will find such. Every like thing clings to its like: if you live as one lost, no one will join himself to you but one lost. Begin to live well, and you will see how many companions surround you, how great a brotherhood you will rejoice in. Finally, do you find no one to imitate? Be one whom another may imitate.

We owe the infants today, at the altar of God, a sermon on the sacrament of the altar. We have dealt with them on the sacrament of the Creed, what they ought to believe; we have dealt with the sacrament of the Lord's Prayer, how they ought to ask; and with the sacrament of the font and of baptism. All these they have both heard discussed and received as handed over to them; but of the sacrament of the holy altar, which they saw today, they have heard nothing yet; today a sermon on this matter is owed them. That is why this sermon ought to be short, both because of our toil and for their edification.

Because he suffered for us, he commended to us in this sacrament his body and blood, which he also made us ourselves. For we too have been made his body, and by his mercy we are what we receive. Remember: you too did not exist, and you were created. You were carried to the Lord's threshing floor; by the labors of the oxen, that is, of those who proclaim the gospel, you were threshed. When as catechumens you were held back, you were kept in the barn. You gave in your names; you began to be ground by fasts and exorcisms. Afterwards you came to the water, and you were moistened, and you were made one; when the fervor of the Holy Spirit came, you were baked, and you were made the Lord's bread. See what you have received. As, then, you see that what has been made is one, so be one, by loving one another, by holding one faith, one hope, undivided love. Heretics, when they receive this, receive a testimony against themselves: because they seek division, while this bread points to unity. So too the wine was in many clusters, and now it is in one. It is one in the sweetness of the cup, after the pressing of the winepress. And you, after those fasts, after the labors, after humility and contrition, have now come in the name of Christ, as it were to the Lord's cup: and there you are on the table, and there you are in the cup. You are with us. For we receive this together, we drink together: because we live together.

For every day has been made by the Lord; yet not without reason is it written of one in particular, “This is the day which the Lord has made.” We read that when God was founding heaven and earth he said, “Let there be light; and there was light. And God called the light day, and the darkness night.” But there is another day, certain for us and especially to be commended, of which the Apostle says: “Let us walk honorably as in the day.” This common daily day is completed by the sun's rising and setting. There is another day, in which the word of God shines in the hearts of the faithful and drives away darkness, not of the eyes but of evil morals. Let us recognize this, then, and rejoice in it. Let us hear the Apostle saying: “For we are children of light and children of the day; we are not of the night or of darkness. Let us walk honorably as in the day: not in revelry and drunkenness, not in debauchery and impurity, not in strife and jealousy; but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh in its desires.” If you do this, you sing with your whole heart, “This is the day which the Lord has made.” For what you sing, you are, if you live well. How many get drunk during these days? How many during these days, not content with getting drunk, also quarrel shamefully and cruelly? Such people do not sing, “This is the day which the Lord has made.” The Lord answers them: You are darkness; I did not make you. If you want to be the day which the Lord has made, live well; and you will have the light of truth, which will never set in your hearts.