TKelly Homily St Bernard 230820
For our Visitors, the liturgy for this Sunday is not the missal liturgy for the twentieth Sunday of the Year. We are honouring St. Bernard, the monk who was responsible for the phenomenal growth of this monastic reform that was initiated at Citeaux, France, in 1098. Bernard entered the Community with thirty-one of his closest relatives in 1113 and was soon to establish an off-shoot of Citeaux at Clairvaux in 1115. This Abbey of Gethsemani – that is us – are in the line of the monastic reform that St. Bernard helped establish. We are all Cistercians.
It is a bit embarrassing to present this homily since my devotion to St. Bernard, the Abbot of Clairvaux, is not that profound. Part of the cause may be my natural instinct to favour the less successful and oppose the powerful. For me, Bernard was too powerful, too influential and too successful! It seems that he transformed what was meant to be a small fervent centre of monastic reform into a way of salvation for the nations, attracting great numbers of the higher clergy and a great crowd of the less spiritually gifted whose particular vocation was not necessarily the way of Citeaux. Bernard whose natural genius shone brightest in a time of struggle had a gift for inspired leadership and was responsible for having the monks involved in missionary and controversial activities. With the election his disciple and friend, Eugene, the Abbot of Tre Fontane in Rome, as pope, the life of the Cistercians and the Papacy were too closely interwoven, in my estimation.
Yet, in reality the way of Saint Bernard is simple, very much the Gospel of Jesus and seemingly distinct from the person history offers us as Bernard of Clairvaux. Bernard was obsessed with the fact that by nature human beings have an orientation toward God. We are created in the image of God, men and women only must leave behind whatever it is that separates them from the awareness of their oneness with God and discover the spiritual energy for spiritual things. This is a grace freely given that makes us truly brothers and sisters of Jesus, truly human persons. Our capacity for God; our longing to be one with God is who we are as human persons. For Bernard the monastic way was the ideal way to enter this experience.
In our liturgy, the first reading is the all-wise King Solomon proclaiming the gift of Wisdom a gift beyond all forms of material wealth as the only desire we should have. Solomon’s prayer is to have thoughts worthy of the Wisdom that is the life of God.
The reading St. Paul addressed to the Church at Philippi, presents us the same dynamic that Bernard preached to the monks. Paul shares his great personal sorrow of those who live as enemies of Christ. Their concerns are earthly things. Paul is even a bit graphic describing their plight, he says, “Their god is the belly, and their glory is in their shame, with minds set on earthly things”. This is a description worthy of Saint Bernard as he urged his monks to stand firm in the ways of discipline. We are oriented to God and we must let go of whatever separates us from experiencing God.
The Gospel text offers us this same dynamic. It is from Matthew’s Gospel and is Jesus’ teaching after presenting the Beatitudes. As called by Jesus it is the Christians’ and the monks’ vocation to give the Gospel the nuance, the taste that salt adds to a delicate dish. And we are not to hide our commitment but be the beacon of light that shows the way to the sailor or the traveller. We are to live the Gospel in its detail. And as St. Bernard who never tired of proclaiming his profound message that our lives long to be completed in the life of God.
This was the foundation of the preaching of Saint Bernard from the simple truths of Gospel. We all know the longing for God; we all will receive the gift of God as we grow in the knowledge that frees us from egoism and selfishness. Ultimately, we will be united in the one love that is the life of the Father in the Son, the life that Jesus shares with each of us; the life who is the Holy Spirit.
In truth our celebration of this Eucharist is the most appropriate way to celebrate Saint Bernard. We share the one bread and the one cup as Brothers and Sisters who experience a desire to be one in the life of God.