Caput X
The Shared Sufferings of the Faithful
The afflictions of the Church in the present age are not new, for the Fathers endured the same persecutions, and those who succeed them in faith must likewise share in their sufferings.
This should not, however, seem like a recent development, as we've already noted — that Mother Church, or her leaders, or the household of faith suffers such great things in our time not only from pagans but also from her own children. For among those Fathers we just mentioned — men who shone with wisdom, virtue, and signs — persecution raged just as fiercely. For whoever succeeds those Fathers in faith and rank must necessarily, like a people purchased to reflect the image of their mother, follow their Fathers by enduring the same sufferings.
The Apostle's Model of Pastoral Charity
Paul's words to the Thessalonians are cited to show that a teacher must first attend to his own soul and then shepherd those entrusted to him with a father's tender care.
That each teacher should be anxious first for himself and then for those entrusted to his care is shown by the words of the Apostle, who says of the Thessalonians: You are witnesses, and God also, how holily and justly we lived among you — understand that — and you know how we dealt with each one of you as a father deals with his own children, encouraging you, comforting you, and urging you to walk in a way worthy of God (1 Thess.✦1 2:10, 12). He had written a little earlier: We were gentle among you, and as a nurse cherishes her own children, so being deeply devoted to you, we were eager to share with you not only the Gospel but also our very lives (ibid.✦2 , 7–8).
The Reluctance of the Humble Speaker
The speaker confesses a certain hesitation in offering such admonitions, aware that they may strike uncomfortably close to home.
But it's not without a certain hesitation that we bring forth words of this kind — words that, once spoken, seem to strike close to home.
Bearing the Yoke of Christ
Those who find the call to imitation harsh are those who refuse Christ's yoke, whereas the truly humble, like Peter corrected by Paul, welcome reproof without indignation.
But if anything in the examples mentioned above, or in any statement at all, seems harsh to imitate or sounds too sharp, it taunts only those who refuse to bear the yoke of Christ.✦ For we are confident about you, because you don't want to imitate Nabal — of whom, as it is written, no one could say a word — but rather the apostle Peter, who, though he was the leader of the apostles, and had learned from blessed Paul, his fellow disciple, that he was publicly called blameworthy, was not indignant; on the contrary, he would have praised that same Paul nonetheless for the wisdom Paul had publicly given him.✦✦
The Scrutiny Due to Those in Authority
Just as the Old Law required priests to be without bodily defect, so too must spiritual leaders be carefully examined, for a priest who preaches without the sound of truth faces death.
Let us say also this: that it is altogether out of step with the crooked morals of certain people, and that it makes those who are careful about themselves more cautious. For I know that not even bodily blemishes in priests were to be overlooked by the law, but that everything was to be examined and required, lest a priest have any defect — a priest for whom death is also threatened if he has walked without bells, which is the sound of preaching.✦✦
Moses and the Courage to Accept Counsel
Even Moses did not despise Jethro's counsel, and anyone who presumes to call the speaker arrogant should remember that the greatest leaders accepted correction from others.
But whoever that person is who has perhaps called me a presumptuous person among those who will come after, he should remember that Moses did not despise the counsel of Jethro — who is also said to have been harassed on account of those who provoked his spirit.✦✦
The Burden of the Superior Who Rebukes
A superior who fails to rebuke the faults of those under him provokes God even more than the wicked do, for the righteous who remain silent about evil share in the guilt of those they oversee.
This vexation, of course, any superior will incur far more of, if he does not rebuke the faults of those under him. Hence it is said to Ezekiel: Son of man, do not be one who provokes to anger (Ezek.✦ II, 8). For just as the wicked provoke God by doing whatever evil they please, so also do the good — those placed over the wicked — provoke Him by keeping silent about the good.
The Prophet's Duty and the Sin of Silence
A prophet who disobeys God by remaining silent provokes the Almighty just as the wicked do, for the good who fail to rebuke evil grant sinners license to persist and grow in their corruption.
For unless the prophet, when he was sent to speak the words that needed to be spoken, obeyed the almighty Lord, he would have provoked the Almighty just as the people were provoked by their wicked deeds — so too would the prophet have provoked him by his own silence. So it is the wicked who are guilty of doing wrong, and the good who are guilty of keeping silent about what is right. In this matter, then, the good along with the wicked provoke God at the same time, because when they do not rebuke wicked deeds, they grant the wicked license to keep on progressing in evil through their very silence.
Ignorance and the Careless Soul
Many fail to recognize their own faults or minimize them precisely because they are rarely corrected, and so, lying in their corruptions, they remain careless through ignorance.
For many people are so unaware that they either do not recognize the evil they commit, or they consider their own faults to be less serious the less severely rebuke corrects them. Therefore, if these people do not listen to what is right, lying as they are in their own corruptions, they are careless through ignorance.
Read the original Latin
Non autem, ut jam diximus, recens videatur, quod mater Ecclesia, vel rectores ejus, aut familia non solum a paganis, sed etiam a suis filiis tanta nostro tempore patitur. Quandoquidem apud praedictos Patres, qui sapientia et virtutibus signisque fulgebant, tantopere persecutio grassata sit. Nam quisquis eis Patribus in fide et gradu succedit, necesse est ut quasi plebs ad speciem matris empta Patres suos eadem patiendo sequatur. Quod autem quisque doctor sibi primum, tum subditis spiritaliter sollicitus sit, verbis Apostoli monstratur, qui de Thessalonicensibus ait: Vos testes estis, et Deus, quoniam sancte et juste fuimus, subaudi, apud vos, et scitis qualiter unumquemque vestrum tanquam pater filios suos deprecantes vos et consolantes testificati, ut digne ambuletis Deo (I Thess. II, 10, 12). Qui paulo ante praemiserat: Facti sumus parvuli in medio vestrum, et tanquam si nutrix foveat filios suos, ita desiderantes vos cupide volebamus tradere vobis non solum Evangelium, sed etiam animas nostras (Ibid. , 7, 8). Verum non sine quadam verecundia hujusmodi verba proferimus, quae prolata tangere videntur.
Sed si quid aut in relatis superius exemplis, aut in qualibet sententia durum ad imitandum vel mordaciter sonare videtur, illos tantummodo suggillat, qui ferre jugum Christi recusant. De nobis enim confidimus, quia non vultis imitari Nabal, cui, ut scriptum est, nemo valebat loqui, sed apostolum Petrum, qui cum esset princeps apostolorum, et a beato Paulo condiscipulo suo se reprehensibilem nominari publice didicisset, non indignaretur, sed eumdem Paulum nihilominus de sibi data publice sapientia laudasset. Dicamus igitur et hoc quod intortis moribus quorumdam minime concordat, et quod illos, qui sibi solliciti sunt, cautiores reddat. Scio enim nec corporis quidem maculas in sacerdotibus per legem praetermitti, sed perscrutari et requiri omnia, ne aliquod vitium sacerdos habeat, cui et mors comminatur si absque tintinnabulis, quod est sonus praedicationis, incesserit. Sed quisquis ille est, qui me tanquam praesumptorem forte succedentium nominaverit, reminiscendum ei est quod Moyses concilium Jethro non despexerit, qui etiam vexatus dicitur propter eos qui exacerbabant spiritum ejus. Quam scilicet vexationem multa magis quilibet praelatus incurret, si culpas delinquentium non redarguit, Hinc ad Ezechiel dicitur: Fili hominis, noli exasperans esse (Ezech. II, 8). Sicut enim mali Deum exacerbant mala quaelibet agendo, sic et boni qui malis praelati sunt, bona reticendo.
Nisi enim propheta, cum ad loquenda verba mittebatur, obediret, omnipotentem Dominum, sicut populus de perverso opere, sic de suo silentio exasperasset. Malis itaque culpa est perversa agere, bonis recta reticere. In hoc ergo cum malis etiam boni Deum simul exasperant, quia cum perversa non increpant, eis per suum silentium proficiendi licentiam praestant. Nam plerique sic imprudentes sunt, ut vel malum non cognoscant, quod committunt, vel tanto minores culpas suas aestiment, quanto minor eas invectio castigat. Isti igitur si recta non audiunt, in suis pravitatibus jacentes, per ignorantiam securi sunt.
Scripture echoes
- ↩1Thess.2.10-1Thess.2.12 — You are witnesses, and God also, how devoutly and righteously and blamelessly we conducted ourselves among you who believe. 1Thess.2.11 — just as you know how, as a father with his own children, we were encouraging each one of you and comforting you 1Thess.2.12 — so that you would walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.
- ↩1Thess.2.7-1Thess.2.8 — but we became infants among you, as when a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children 1Thess.2.8 — So being affectionately desirous of you, we were willing to share with you not only the gospel of God, but also our own souls, because you have become beloved to us.
- ↩Matt.11.29-Matt.11.30;Acts.15.10 — Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Matt.11.30 — For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Acts.15.10 — Now then, why are you testing God by placing a yoke on the necks of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear?
- ↩1Sam.25.17 — Now therefore, consider and see what you will do, for evil is determined against our master and against all his house; and he is a son of worthlessness, one cannot speak to him.
- ↩Gal.2.11 — But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned.
- ↩Lev.21.17-Lev.21.21 — Speak to Aaron saying: Any man among your descendants throughout their generations who has a blemish shall not come near to offer the bread of his God. Lev.21.18 — For no man who has a blemish may approach — a man who is blind, or lame, or has a mutilated face or a limb too long, Lev.21.19 — or a man in whom there is a broken foot or a broken hand Lev.21.20 — or a hunchback, or a dwarf, or a blemish in his eye, or scabs, or crushed testicles Lev.21.21 — No man of the offspring of Aaron the priest who has a blemish shall come near to offer the offerings by fire to the LORD. He has a blemish; he shall not come near to offer the bread of his God.
- ↩Exod.28.33-Exod.28.35 — And you shall make on its hem pomegranates of blue and purple and scarlet yarn, around its hem, and gold bells in between them all around. Exod.28.34 — a gold bell and a pomegranate, a gold bell and a pomegranate, on the hem of the robe all around Exod.28.35 — And it shall be on Aaron when he serves, and his sound shall be heard when he goes into the holy place before the LORD, and when he comes out, and he shall not die.
- ↩Exod.18.13-Exod.18.27 — The next day, Moses sat to judge the people, and the people stood around Moses from morning until evening. Exod.18.14 — When Moses' father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, "What is this thing that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, with all the people standing around you from morning until evening?" Exod.18.15 — Moses said to his father-in-law, "The people come to me to inquire of God. Exod.18.16 — For when they have a matter, it comes to me, and I judge between one person and another, and I make known the statutes of God and his instructions." Avoid gendered idiom where it is not necessary for clarity. Exod.18.17 — Moses' father-in-law said to him, "What you are doing is not good." Exod.18.18 — You will surely wear yourself out, both you and this people who are with you, for the task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone. Exod.18.19 — Now listen to my counsel, and may God be with you. You represent the people before God, and you bring the matters to God. Exod.18.20 — And you shall warn them about the statutes and the instructions, and you shall make known to them the way they are to walk in it, and the work that they are to do. Exod.18.21 — And you shall look from among all the people for able men who fear God, men of truth who hate dishonest gain; and you shall set them over the people as leaders of thousands, leaders of hundreds, leaders of fifties, and leaders of tens. Exod.18.22 — And let them judge the people at all times, and it shall be that every great matter they shall bring to you, and every small matter they shall judge themselves, and let it be lightened from upon you, and let them bear with you. Exod.18.23 — If you do this thing, and God commands you, you will be able to endure, and all this people will also go to their place in peace. Exod.18.24 — Moses listened to his father-in-law's advice and did everything he said. Exod.18.25 — And Moses chose able men from all Israel and made them heads over the people, chiefs of thousands, chiefs of hundreds, chiefs of fifties, and chiefs of tens. Exod.18.26 — They judged the people at all times; the difficult case they brought to Moses, and every small matter they judged themselves. Exod.18.27 — Then Moses sent his father-in-law away, and he went to his own land.
- ↩Num.11.10-Num.11.15 — Moses heard the people weeping throughout their families, each one at the entrance of his tent. And the anger of the LORD burned greatly, and the matter was evil in Moses' eyes. Num.11.11 — And Moses said to the LORD, 'Why have you treated your servant so badly? And why have I not found favor in your eyes, that you have put the burden of all this people on me?' Num.11.12 — Have I conceived all this people, or have I given birth to them, that you should say to me, 'Carry them in your arms, as a nurse carries the nursing child, to the land that you swore to their fathers'? Num.11.13 — Where am I to get meat to give to all this people? For they weep before me, saying, 'Give us meat, that we may eat.' Num.11.14 — I am not able to carry this whole people by myself, for it is too heavy for me. Num.11.15 — And if this is how you are going to treat me, please kill me at once, if I have found favor in your eyes, so that I do not have to see my misery.
- ↩Ezek.2.8 — But you, son of man, hear what I am speaking to you. Do not be rebellious like a rebellious house. Open your mouth and eat what I am giving you.
Notes
- 1 ↩The parenthetical 'subaudi, apud vos' is an editorial insertion by the author indicating a word to be understood; rendered here as 'understand that' to preserve the sense.
- 2 ↩The Latin 'parvuli' (little ones/children) is rendered as 'gentle' following the sense of tender, childlike care in Pauline usage. 'Animas nostras' rendered as 'our very lives' to capture the force of self-giving.
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