(The following homily was given by Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde during the Respect Life Mass at St. Mary Church in Alexandria, Virginia on January 8.)
The scene projected before us in today's Gospel account is both encouraging and instructive: John the Baptist pointing across the Jordan in the direction of Jesus as he proclaims: “He must increase; I must decrease.” His words encourage us, for they urge us to live our identity more fully, the identity which St. John the Apostle in his First Letter makes clear: “"[W]e belong to God.” Indeed, from baptism on, we do belong to God, having been born again by water and the Holy Spirit — “begotten by God,” St. John would say. John the Baptist's words are also instructive, for they remind us that each day we must, with God's grace, allow the presence of Christ to be deepened in us as we are formed in His image. This is why we prayed a short time ago: “God our Father, through your Son you made us a new creation"with His help, may we become more like Him” (Opening Prayer).
So then, each day must find us allowing Christ to increase in us while our sin-prone and selfish self must decrease. The more that the presence of Christ increases, the more will we be like Him in all we think, speak and do. And if we are like Him, if we belong to Him, then we will unfailingly and unceasingly proclaim the Gospel of Life in all its fullness. As Pope John Paul II reminds us, “The Gospel of God's love for man, the Gospel of the dignity of the person and the Gospel of life are a single and indivisible Gospel” (Evangelium Vitae, No. 2). Like God, we will love, for St. John repeats over and over in his First Letter that God is love.
And what is love? Love is the unconditional giving for the good of the other person, not for our good, but for the good of another. Love is more than feeling; it is more than an emotion. Love is a decision — a decision that a husband and wife make to each other every day; a decision that a child makes to his or her parents every day; a decision that friends and strangers make to each other every day. Of the relationships listed above, one is very special. The love between a Christian husband and a wife is so powerful and so profound that the Church raised it to the level of a sacrament. The tangible result of this love is children. Each of us is the tangible sign of the love between our mother and father.
The more Christ increases in us, the more will we uphold the sacredness of human life from its first moment of conception all the way to its last moment at natural death. Because we belong to God and Christ's Presence is deepening within us, we will do all we can to protect and to defend human life by prayer and penance, by education and witness, by persuasion and by our conscientious choices in the voting booth. Later this month, when we participate in the March for Life in Washington, we shall be witnessing unambiguously and proudly that we stand for life from its very beginning at conception and therefore we oppose any and all attacks on human life like abortion, partial-birth abortion and embryonic stem-cell research. At the March for Life and also every time we pray before an abortion facility, as we will do today following this monthly Respect Life Mass, we are repeating what Pope John Paul II wrote so beautifully in his encyclical Evangelium Vitae, whose 10th anniversary of publication will occur on March 25. “With humility and gratitude we know that we are the people of life and for life, and this is how we present ourselves to everyone” (No. 78).
Yes, if we allow Christ to increase in us, then we will uphold His teachings about the sacredness of life and the holiness of marriage. Within this context, we understand why artificial birth control contradicts God's purpose for marriage and, in the end, hurts the couple and leads them away from God and from each other at their deepest level of intimacy and union. Within this context, we understand why chastity is so essential before marriage and within marriage.
With Christ's life increasing within us, let us proclaim the truth about chastity and about marriage in God's plan. We must promote chastity among our young people and among those not so young.
I find it instructive that couples who marry and have only one sexual partner do not contract the various sexually transmitted diseases that are prevalent in our society. They save themselves for each other in marriage. They statistically have more successful marriages. Those marriages where the couple practices a natural form of spacing children have a much higher rate of success than those who do not. Birth control hurts women; it hurts the relationship of the couple and, therefore, it hurts the marriage.
In this diocese, there are 29 couples trained to teach natural family planning through the Couple to Couple League. They teach several hundred of our engaged and married couples each year. Over the next two months, there are 14 classes starting throughout the diocese — one beginning tonight at St. Louis's Parish in Alexandria. If you are married or engaged to be married and are unfamiliar with this wonderful gift of fertility called Natural Family Planning, I encourage you to take a course in it or the Home Study Course. If you have a relative or friend who is unfamiliar with this Natural Family Planning, encourage them to take a course.
Yes, John the Baptist's words ring deeply within our hearts: “He must increase; I must decrease.” As we come to the end of the Christmas season and soon begin Ordinary Time, let us once again ask the Infant Jesus to deepen His life within us each day, so that, formed in His likeness and belonging to God, we will proclaim the Gospel of Life more by our witness than by our words and truly be His people, today, tomorrow and always!
