{"id":115540,"date":"2016-08-10T11:21:40","date_gmt":"2016-08-10T15:21:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aleteia.org\/?post_type=post&p=115540"},"modified":"2016-08-10T11:21:40","modified_gmt":"2016-08-10T15:21:40","slug":"the-meaning-of-st-lawrence-today-we-have-to-do-more-than-believe-we-have-to-practice-what-we-believe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/deaconsbench\/2016\/08\/the-meaning-of-st-lawrence-today-we-have-to-do-more-than-believe-we-have-to-practice-what-we-believe\/","title":{"rendered":"The meaning of St. Lawrence today: ‘We have to do more than believe; we have to practice what we believe’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

My Salesian friend Father Mike Mendl delivered a really good\u00a0homily today on St. Lawrence. Here\u2019s part of it:<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Lawrence made a link between what the Church does inside its places of worship and what it does outside; or, in the ideas contained in the collect, between \u201clove\u201d and \u201cpractice\u201d; his \u201cfaithful service\u201d led to his \u201cglorious martyrdom.\u201d<\/p>\n

My brothers and sisters, we\u2019re aware of how the Church is being persecuted in our time\u2014Christians taxed, robbed, exiled, beaten, burned, beheaded \u2014in the Middle East.\u00a0 The new leader of Boko Haram in Nigeria announced his intention of killing all the Christians he can.\u00a0 Priests who denounced drug lords in Mexico or the Mafia in Sicily get killed.\u00a0North Korean Christians risk death or labor camps.\u00a0 This kind of list could go on a lot.<\/p>\n

And here our bishops are reminding us that we face a regular barrage of harassment and constant legal threats, which is why Bishop Jenky has us praying at every Mass for the freedom of the Church.\u00a0 Our practice outside these walls is under a relentless secular, atheistic assault:\u00a0 our universities, hospitals, nursing homes, places of business, and personal consciences.\u00a0 Popular entertainment, the mass media, and academia jump to label us as homophobes, women-haters, and opponents of science\u2014because we uphold natural law against the depravities of the sexual revolution and uphold the dignity of the tiniest human beings:\u00a0 no experimenting on people, no treating human beings as lab experiments nor as marketplace commodities.<\/p>\n

One of the issues in this fall\u2019s elections is religious freedom.\u00a0 One party\u2019s official platform has a whole paragraph on that, including a sturdy defense of the rights of conscience.\u00a0 The other party says it will defend the rights of religious minorities in the Middle East, but here at home, \u201cWe support a progressive vision of religious freedom that respects pluralism and rejects the misuses of religion to discriminate.\u201d\u00a0 That\u2019s in the paragraph on LBGT rights, which outweigh our religious beliefs or our freedom to act on our beliefs or, at times, even to voice our beliefs.\u00a0 That position has also prevented the passage of legislation that would guarantee the rights of doctors, nurses, and hospitals to refuse to be involved with abortion or sterilization.<\/p>\n

As St. Lawrence gave his life because his faith required a public stand, we have to do more than believe; we have to practice what we believe.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read it all.<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My Salesian friend Father Mike Mendl delivered a really good\u00a0homily today on St. Lawrence. Here\u2019s part of it: Lawrence made a link between what the Church does inside its places of worship and what it does outside; or, in the ideas contained in the collect, between \u201clove\u201d and \u201cpractice\u201d; his \u201cfaithful service\u201d led to his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":132,"featured_media":115541,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nThe meaning of St. Lawrence today: 'We have to do more than believe; we have to practice what we believe'<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"My Salesian friend Father Mike Mendl delivered a really good\u00a0homily today on St. Lawrence. 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