The church in which I was raised was an interesting piece of architecture that dated from the modernist period following the Second Vatican Council. You entered the church at the front, so everyone could see your messed-up hair or untucked shirt when you passed through the doors. The sacristy was at the back, so the altar party could easily process to the altar.
The roof sloped from over the sacristy to the front, over the altar, at a rather steep angle. There was a skylight over the baptismal font. There were abstract Stations of the Cross about which I could make neither head nor tail. There was little symmetry in the internal arrangement, and pews surrounded the altar on most sides.
It turns out that the innovative design of this church may have been its downfall, though. After a major hurricane in 2017, the church experienced so much damage that it couldn’t reopen again. Maybe it was the innovative roof or experimental design, or perhaps just shabby craftsmanship, but sadly, this past fall, the building was demolished. Sometimes innovative designs just don’t work. Maybe they’re too innovative for their own good.
But take this building, for instance. There’s nothing innovative about it. It’s a feat of bold retrospection, idealizing a period in Church history that we like to imagine was purer and better than any other time. News flash: it wasn’t. But no matter how flimsy that romanticized argument of the medieval period is, this building isn’t flimsy. Sure, the windows and the roof have been known to leak. Water seeps through the porous stone when it rains, and brittle stone falls off the walls, which is why I wouldn’t recommend using Wissahickon schist for stone in the future. But this building has a good structure. It’s solid. They just don’t build them like this anymore, we say. This building has strong bones. It’s not puffed up by innovation; it’s meant to last.
That, I think, is St. Paul’s understanding of ministry, at least if we draw a connection between his theology of the Body of Christ and the mission of the Church. “Knowledge” puffs up, but love builds up. Our translation puts scare quotes around knowledge. Too often, we moderns simply think we know more than we do. And as Paul bluntly tells us, if someone thinks they really know something, they don’t know anything at all.
It’s excellent advice that Paul gives us. Be builders, he exhorts, not people who are puffed up by big talk. It’s less about what you “know” (scare quotes again) and more about how you love. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Talk all you want about your “knowledge,” but it means absolutely nothing without love and charity. And love and charity are delectable.
The somewhat enigmatic passage from Paul’s 1 Letter to the Corinthians is not so much about food sacrificed to idols; it’s about how to flourish in a community built up by love, rather than one that’s merely a puffed-up bubble of conceit. For Paul, it means nothing if some of the Corinthians can in good conscience participate in feasts containing meat that has been involved in pagan sacrifices. Their consciences might be clear because they know that idol worship has no validity to it. Who cares if I eat that meat, they say? I don’t believe in that pagan nonsense.
But not everyone is as assured as those puffed up with “knowledge.” For some, who have not quite realized the invalidity of idol worship, watching others chow down on meat used in idol worship is harmful to their faith. Oddly enough, something that might not be an inherently sinful action could be sinful if it affects another brother or sister in Christ. Sin is profoundly contextual in some instances.
For those of us puffed up with Darwin’s notion of survival of the fittest, Paul’s words are simply ludicrous. After all, we “know” so much more than Paul because we have “evolved.” And those of us who have “evolved” will survive; the rest will die out. For those of us steeped in a culture of individualism, we imagine that our innovative minds and sophisticated “knowledge” give us license to do whatever we want, assuming we avoid blatant sinning. But often we sin when we try to demonstrate the correctness or sophistication of our “knowledge” and thereby wound the novice in the faith, who still needs milk and is not yet ready for solid food.
Undoubtedly, our age is one of much puffed-up “knowledge” and very little checking of the tongue or staying of the arm. Sometimes our puffed-up knowledge is better kept inside than let out, though, especially if it’s not grounded in charity. Love builds, but knowledge can easily tear down. And that Christ-like love, the builder of all good things, requires patience, sensitivity, grace, compassion, and above all, wisdom. St. Paul is right. We’re called to be builders, not destroyers.
Something can be torn down in the blink of an eye but take decades to rebuild. An insensitive remark can do long-term, irreparable damage, but a small gesture of love can move another soul in an instant. A bold stance taken for a supposedly right and just reason can go deeply wrong when others are destroyed in its wake. Sometimes even the zealous proponent of “truth” is the only one standing after the rest of the building surrounds him in smoking embers.
And for those steeped in this “age of anxiety,” to borrow from W.H. Auden, the temptation is, oddly enough, not to build with patient love but to build with haste. Many lust after innovation as the newfound idol that will solve all the problems of malaise and decline. Many long to stand out with novelty in a sea of apathy, wrangling whatever gimmicks are available to cheerlead others into faith. Provocation and careless banter are wielded to command attention. And rarely does such innovation and provocation pause to assess the souls that have been lost to their crassness. Only infrequently, it seems, are charity’s quietness and gentleness recognized as the best ways of all.
Yes, as St. Paul reminds us, we’re called to be builders, not puffed-up innovators. If we’re truly following Christ, then we won’t accept a tired narrative of Church decline or easy solutions to anxious problems. Instead, we might be less loud-mouthed and quieter because love is the way and charity costs nothing. Indeed, such love will help us gain our souls.
If the Church wants to be stronger, then every joist and timber in her structure is essential, and every part of her frame will need to find its source of gravity in love. And worshipping in this marvelous and solid building today is such an inspiration. If any place is a witness to the power of Christ’s redeeming and reconciling love, it’s this parish. Harmony has spoken more powerfully (if more quietly) than division. What is old has spoken with a clarifying newness and with astounding openness. A relatively small number of people can build a sturdy house, especially if that house is built on love. And even if the exterior stone is fragile, the house will stand forever if the bones are good.
We know that it doesn’t take long to tear something down, and we also well know that it takes a long time to rebuild. But God has more time than we can ever imagine.[1] God’s way is to take the long road of patience and perseverance. Love and charity would have it no other way. God can turn a few scraps into a marvelous feast. God can take fissures in an aging frame and weld them together to last a lifetime. God can do anything with very little. God doesn’t need puffed-up things; God just needs our cooperation in love.
And here’s the most amazing and countercultural thing of all. This building up to which we’re called and which is the sole purpose of the Church doesn’t require an advanced degree or expertise or an IQ of 140. It doesn’t require money or power or prestige or fame. It’s not puffed-up or fancy or innovative. This building up, which is our truest calling, requires only one thing. Love. And if we brave the risk of throwing all our knowledge to the wind, this love is the pearl of great price and the only thing worth having.
Sermon by Father Kyle Babin
The Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
January 28, 2024
[1] This idea is influenced by Stanley Hauerwas, especially in Matthew: A Theological Commentary (Ada, MI: Brazos Press, 2015).