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These difficult times demand that we turn back to the beautiful mystery of who God is and what it means to be His cherished children. Listen in to the daily homilies from the Marian Fathers at the National Shrine of The Divine Mercy, including Fr. Chris Alar, Fr. Kaz Chwalek, and many more. May they help you to live by God’s will that you may play an active and effective role in a world whose wellbeing requires authentic Christian witness!
Indeed, Jesus truly understands human nature well, but we human beings have a hard time understanding human nature. And there's a you know, you can look at the news and maybe just pick out a variety of things that people might say, whether it's on, TV news or cable news, whatever, or the Internet. Somebody's always saying something that's kind of not smart, if you will. Kind of dumb. And so, and I'm not I don't want to say that in like a put down way.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:I'm not. But and I preface that because, someone said on cable news recently, they they went on there, this person who worked for Politico and basically said that people who believe that God given rights or or or that our our rights come from God, that, you know, believing in god given rights, this this person referred to them as Christian nationalists. Right? In other words, kind of extremists, and that has a that that's a charged word, because it's it's it's a word that's starting to be given a lot of momentum in certain areas of political speak. And just as a side, the reason why that becomes concerning is that if Christian nationalists then become associated with what?
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Extremism. And if you're an extremist, then you're a domestic terrorist. And if you're a domestic terrorist, then you can violate the Patriot Act, the Patriot Act. And if you violate that, where can you go? Jail.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Just throwing that out there. It's not my insight. I I, you know, somebody else gave that insight. I'm just kind of, wow, that's kind of amazing. But that's just out there, you know, because there was a a movie just made by Rob Reiner that kind of like, posed this whole thing of Christian nationalism and beware.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Alright. But anyway, I do want to go back to the words that were said by this person who kind of, poked at Christians who believe that rights come from God. And this is what this person said. They said and I'll just say her name. It's Heidi Przybylla.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:She works for Politico. She was on MSNBC, and she said she said the one thing that unites Christian nationalists, she says, and she says, not Christians because Christian nationalists are very different, she says, what unites Christian nationalists is that they believe that our rights as Americans and as all human beings do not come from any earthly authority. They don't come from Congress, from the Supreme Court. They come from God. Yeah.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:The people with that or the problem with that is that they are determining they are determining what God is telling them. In the past, that so called natural law, which is a pillar of Catholicism, for instance, it has been used for good in social justice campaigns. Martin Luther invoked it for civil rights, etcetera. But then she says she says, but now you have an extremist element of conservative Christians who say that this applies specifically to issues including abortion, gay marriage, and it is going much further than that as you see for instance with the ruling in Alabama this week that judges connected to the that the the judge connected to this Dominionist faction. I don't know what that is.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And talking about a lot of other issues, including surrogacy, IVF, sex education schools. There's a lot in addition. And then the person she was on the show with, Michael Steele, who's a political guy, he says, ah, there's the rub. Men get to determine what God thinks and feels about these issues. So what you have here is a misunderstanding of human nature and the natural law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Well, misunderstanding of human rights as deriving from the natural law and misunderstanding the natural law, misunderstanding what it means to be a human being. Let me because of the first the first reading speaks about the 10 Commandments, and that's part of God's law, let me just spend some time articulating the nature of law and why it's important for human beings and why understanding God as the author of all law and therefore the author of all rights or or the the author for or the, you know, the the one through through whom all rights flow from, We need to to understand that. So let me just say that there are 4 types of laws. There's the eternal law. There's the natural law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:There is the revealed law, which is what God speaks to us. And then there is human law, civil law. Okay. So what is eternal law? Eternal law is the reality that God himself has the blueprint for creation, which he does.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:God is the creator of all things, and he creates based on his wisdom, based on his intellect. Like he has the map in his divine intellect, of how things should be, about what things are, natures, that things that he create had things called natures. They are this and not that And because they are this, they behave in a certain way. They have certain goals. They are directed towards certain what we call ends.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And that's and so all of this, of what God creates based on his eternal law, creates this incredible harmony, this incredible order. And that order is just, because justice has to do more with God's order than it does with punishment. You only deal with punishment when things get out of order, correct the order, to get things back into order. But the point is that the eternal law gives to us the right order of things. Natural law comes into play because God has created us human beings with the ability to know and to choose, which gives rise to our freedom.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:We we can make free choices. And that's rooted, again, in our human nature. And because we are created in God's image in that way, we have the ability to understand something of God's eternal law. We have the ability to kind of have a sense of what His divine blueprint is about, to understand His instruction manual. And the natural law is that light within us that helps us to understand some of this eternal law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:So we can understand some basic things like do good and avoid evil. That that's the foundation for the natural law. Like that we can understand that not just ourselves, but all created things have an inclination towards the good, because that's what our good father has made us for. God has made us for goodness. That's what he's made us for.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And so we can have a sense that, yeah, this is what all creation is inclined towards. We are inclined towards the good. Indeed, we are as human beings. And so from from that first precepts, all other precepts of the natural law flows. Let me just kind of read some of what our catechism teaches us about the natural law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:It says that the natural law hinges upon the desire for God and submission to Him who is the source and judge of all that is good, as well as upon the sense that the other is one's equal, our neighbor. Its principal precepts are expressed in the 10 commandments. This law is called natural, not in reference to the nature of irrational beings, but because reason, which decrees it, properly belongs to human nature. And St. Thomas Aquinas, who is quoted in the catechism, says the natural law is nothing other than the light of understanding placed in us by God.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Through it, we know what we must do and what we must avoid. God has given us light or law at the creation. And this becomes the foundation, the fund you know, the foundation of all of all law. You know, that the 10 commandments, which again is an expression of the natural law, is basically the roadmap to happiness, the roadmap to how to love well. God is saying, don't do this.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Do this, but don't do this. Because God's law is an expression of his love. That's what it is. It is truly a map to how to be happy. If you want to be happy, do this.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And our happiness is rooted in the good of our nature. And who defines what is good for our nature? He does, Because he made our human nature. And this then gives rise to what we call the revealed law, because sin wounds us and we have a hard we have a hard time even understanding the natural law. And so God has to has to, you know, directly reveal to us what we must do and what we must not do, right?
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:He had even like the 10 Commandments are an expression of the natural law, but to get there, he basically had to tell us, you know, this is how you know, these are the basics that you are to follow. That's what the 10 commandments are. The 10 commandments are the basics for how we are to live our life, for how we are to direct our moral behavior. But we need more than just the 10 commandments. Then so Jesus comes to Earth, and he fulfills the law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:He gives more clarity on what the 10 Commandments actually point to. He develops the moral law. And then he establishes his church so that the church, through the gift of his Holy Spirit, can come to a deeper understanding of this moral law and help to direct his, you know, the church in the ways of faith and morals. And so this is why we look to the church to understand how we are to live, because God has equipped the office of the episcopacy to be able to make those determinations. It's not man making law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:It's the power of God's spirit enlightening man to understand deeply what God has revealed and therefore communicating it to us. And this is why this kind of brings us to the decision in Alabama. The decision in Alabama kind of brings together these laws, right? Because here you have this is, you know, civil law, human law, taking the principles of the natural law and coming to a conclusion about the meaning of human life, that human life begins at conception. That's a that that that that is from the, that's a natural law principle.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:It's a natural law principle. And that but then that that decision has an effect on another area called in vitro fertilization. And in vitro fertilization is not permissible because it goes against, again, God's plan for marriage and sexuality and family. It completely goes against it. It is not permitted by the church because it offends God's law.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:It goes against his instruction manuals. And this is not written in the Bible, but again, the church, as as society develops and technology develops and introduces these new procedures, the church has to interpret them in light of God's law. And she sees that there's all there's a lot of flaws, a lot of ways in which God is offended through IVF. There's a there's a list actually. One of them, you know, you well, I'll just the IVF process involves masturbation, which is an offense against God.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Right? It's a mortal sin. The fertilization of the egg outside the woman, which violates the conjugal act. Right? A child should be conceived within the context of of of of a sex between man and a woman within marriage.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:That's the ideal. Right? That's that's God's plan, part of God's plan. Right? The fact that multiple embryos are made and often destroyed, which is an abortive practice, right?
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:If a if a if a embryo is a person, which it is, then what do you do with all these embryos that that are made during this process? And so, you know, and then you can make you know, there's there's a sense. Some people will claim that it's a form of eugenics. IVS IVF can also be used to foster a perverted understanding of the family as well, because it it allows for a woman and a woman or a man and a man in a so called marriage to have kids, which again, it goes against God's plan. But we need the light of the church to help to guide us in this area.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And by the way, I want to recognize in saying this because I realize when you get into the area of IVF, you're getting into the area of infertility. And I realize that that's a very, very, very painful experience for people who are trying to have children, for couples that are trying to have children. I get that. And I'm not diminishing that at all. However, the that situation doesn't mean that we can use, means that go against God's plan for things to do it.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:The end doesn't justify the means. Having a kid having kids are great. They're awesome. But we are not allowed to violate God's law to do it. And that and I realize that leads to a painful place.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:However, you know, this is where we have to surrender to God and to his law, and that his plan for us is good, and that God is always trying to trial good out of difficult safe difficult situations and and and things that we encounter in our life. So, anyway, this this kind of, you know, brings together a lot of a lot of challenging issues, but this is at the core of our challenge in this modern day. It truly is, you know, and it kind of goes back to that original discussion that I brought up that was on TV, but this is kind of where it is. And and it's that, you know, this Michael Steele saying, the problem is men get to determine what God thinks and feels about these issues. No.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:We don't get to determine anything about God. We merely receive what God has done and what God and, you know, God has revealed to us how he thinks about these issues. We're not determining anything. It's just that it's just a matter of will we submit to the fact that there is a God and that God has created things to be in a certain way, and we have been God has equipped us through our intellect and will to be able to discern that and understand that. The question is, will we follow?
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:Will we follow? And that and that's kind of, you know, I I think that we are seeing movements in our culture, especially with, like, the the overthrow of Roe v Wade, with this Alabama decision. These are monumental decisions, but they are challenging, aren't they? They challenge us in many ways. And so anyway, the important thing that we wanna understand and we want to take away from this is law is good.
Fr. Mark Baron, MIC:And law, authentic law, is based on God's law, His eternal law and the natural law that he allows us to understand that law. But and then his pot the law he has revealed. But we just wanna really understand that all law that comes from God is rooted in his love because that's why he has created us. He has created us to be happy, and that happiness comes from conforming ourselves to his will. And, again, he gives that direction to us in his holy law.