Their travels take Page and Griffiths on a train to St. Louis and then along I-55 as they make their way by automobile back to Chicago. Through a series of mishaps, Griffiths causes their rented car to catch fire. While Page is able to get a room at a flea bag motel, Griffiths has to spend the night sleeping outside in the burned-out rental car. As the snow falls and just before falling asleep in the car, Griffiths tells his deceased wife:

Well, my dear Marie, once again you’re right as rain. I am without a doubt the biggest pain in the butt that ever came down the pike. I meet someone whose company I really enjoy. And, what do I do? I go overboard. I smother the poor soul. I cause him more trouble than he has a right to. God, I have a big mouth. When am I going to ever wake up?"

How often after stating what's on your mind have people told you, "Mind your own business." Or, "Don’t rock the boat." What about: "Don’t poke a stick at a snake" or "Better to let sleeping dogs lie." Then there’s the statement, "Your mouth is a potent weapon. If you’re not careful, you’re going to bludgeon yourself with it."

Today’s readings from the book of the prophet Jeremiah and the gospel of Matthew remind all of us of our obligation to state the truth. The trouble is, however, that stating the truth requires "fearing" the Lord. This doesn’t mean being afraid of the Lord. No, it means recognizing God’s absolute Truth and then making decisions upon it no matter what people may think or do.

And yet, each day presents numerous challenges to this obligation. We may find ourselves worrying more about what others may think or do if, like Del Griffiths, we are "the real article" and "what people see is what they get." It’s easier to prefabricate our words and actions around their responses so as to avoid embarrassing confrontations as well as the emotional pain and physical suffering that is sure to ensue.

But, today’s scriptures remind us to fear the Lord and to use God’s absolute Truth as our standard of judgment. We do so not by worrying about what others may think about or do to us but by worrying about what God thinks about us and will do to us. Why? Because, one day, God’s absolute Truth will be the standard by which our lives will be judged. In the timelessness of God’s eternity, being afraid of what anyone else may think about us or do to us is absolutely meaningless. "Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul," Jesus said to the Twelve. "Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father. But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father."

In an interview I recently read, the United States Attorney General, John Aschroft, echoed this scriptural teaching. When asked about the way people have attacked him for his decisions as Attorney General, Aschroft responded:

First of all, I want to do what is right, and I would rather have the comfort of doing what is right than the comfort of people around me praising me when I really didn’t believe what I was doing was right. That’s another way of saying that ultimately, and this has to do with my faith, I’d rather enjoy the verdict of eternity than the verdict of public opinion, and I want to do what I believe is right and what I believe is right in God’s sight as compared to just pleasing someone for the moment…this is why I think we need external standards, and for some people the external standard is a standard of faith….You want to do things that you believe are right in God’s sight, and then you don’t have to measure your success by how many people you make sad or how many people you make glad….You want to try to figure out a way to act so that you can ask yourself as you look in the mirror, "Are you the person you think you were created to be?"

The scriptural challenge, then, is not to give in to those people and things we are afraid of.

Parents, for example, who are struggling sometimes against the powerful riptide of popular culture to raise their children to be moral and virtuous parents must not be afraid of the tantrums, pouting, and general snottiness their children will serve up in response. Spouses especially, and friends, too, must state their honest concerns to one another and not be afraid that doing so will destroy the relationship. If it is a relationship with God's love at its core, it won't! And, for Catholics especially, none of us should be afraid to assert our moral and religious values. It is in the moment when we make decisions based upon fear of the Lord that we overcome being afraid of what others may say and do.

Stating God's absolute Truth is how we witness our faith.

During the past couple of decades, however, our culture has increasingly seduced many of us into feeling comfortable in not stating what we know God's absolute Truth to be. We’ve learned to sidestep confrontations about moral and religious virtue by using politically correct language (or, "PC"). For example, we use the phrase "popular culture" to connote "withitness" and "relevance." But, much of what is subsumed by this PC label actually denotes paying admission to public displays of indecent and immoral behaviors that would be reviling to any person possessing civil and moral sensibilities.  We also label some television shows "Adult Content" so that parents can see to it that their children don't watch these shows. The truth is that these shows display behavior, language, and situations contrary to our faith which, arguably for some, should watched neither by children or adults nor televised in the first place. Surfing the web, we label some websites "Adult Websites" which is the PC way of stating that people can see and fantasize about practically every sexual proclivity. Voyeurism and pornography are contrary to our faith. Both not only demean God’s gift of human sexuality but also its proper expression in a sacramental marriage. Then too, we say that a politician "prevaricates" which is PC for stating that the politician is a liar and, of course, lying is contrary to our faith.  We also say that couples "live together" before marriage. That's the "PC" way to avoid stating that fornication is contrary to our faith and, if the couple's wish is for God to be a part of their marriage, a couple living together must separate until they are united in a sacramental marriage.

But, many people are afraid to state these truths, to challenge people to change how they live, and to demand that something be done. Afraid of the ridicule and suffering they will have to endure for challenging people to use God’s absolute Truth as a standard for judging what will be allowed entrance into homes, to influence the texture and fabric of marriage and family life, or to shape our cultural values, these people remain indifferent, invoke "PC," or stand by silent in the belief that they are helpless. Or, worse yet, they are afraid of being labeled "conservative," a "right wing wacko," or not "inclusive" and then attacked for their countercultural religious beliefs and moral values. 

Although the applications may be different in this generation than in previous generations, every generation has to deal with being afraid of those who, Jesus says, "can kill the body but cannot lay a finger on the soul." Thanks be to God there are "regular people"---just like you and me---"the real thing" who have tried to state God's absolute Truth and tolerated the ridicule, pain, and suffering that comes when one fears the Lord rather than being afraid of others. We Catholics call these people "Saints."

Just yesterday, for example, the Church celebrated the English martyrs Thomas More and John Fisher.  Thomas was a husband and a father while John was a bishop; yet, both were executed for refusing to accept Henry VIII as the supreme head of the Church of England. The King would have given both Thomas More and John Fisher anything they wanted if only they would forsake the dictates of conscience. But, fearing the Lord more than they were afraid of their earthly sovereign, both remained steadfast to their religious convictions, informed as they were by the standard of God's absolute Truth.

Tomorrow, the Church will celebrate the birth of St. John the Baptist who proclaimed the coming of God’s kingdom rather than cowering before the King and being afraid of his earthly power. For this, the Baptist had his head served up on a silver platter. On Friday, the Church will remember St. Irenaeus who---though many of us may never have even heard of him---continues to influence how we think about God's divine nature. It may not be a big deal to us, but it was to the religious and civil authorities who persecuted and murdered Irenaeus for his teaching. Then, on Saturday, we will celebrate Peter and Paul, the two apostles savagely martyred by the tyrannical Roman Emperor, Nero. Except for St. Peter---who was crucified upside down on the slope of the Vatican Hill---each of the saints whose memory we celebrate this week were beheaded. The charge against them? They stated God’s absolute Truth to a world that did not want to hear it.

In our own generation, many people don’t want to hear God’s absolute Truth. Many also deny that the existence of absolute Truth. But, fortunately, God continues to send people who take to heart the words that motivated Jeremiah: "The Lord is with me."

I believe one such person is Pope John Paul II. When elected Pope in 1978, the Pope’s first words were "Do not be afraid….Jesus Christ be praised!" Throughout his pontificate, the Pope has steadfastly applied the standard of God’s absolute Truth to the important issues confronting us, including the denigration of human life, the dissolution of the family, and the increase in divorce as well as the moral questions posed by genetic research, social justice, education, human sexuality, and the Internet. For this, Pope John Paul II has been roundly criticized. In the past two months alone, I’ve read articles and op-ed pieces in the New York Times, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Philadelphia Enquirer labeling the Pope as "too old and frail," a "prisoner of the Vatican" who is "out of touch," "conservative," "patriarchal," "anti-woman," and "anti-homosexual." The solution offered? The Pope should leave the world’s stage and retire in silence to monastery somewhere in rural Poland. And, it was Catholics who wrote these articles!

Once again, thanks be to God, there are Catholics like William J. Bennett whose application of Catholic educational philosophy to the crisis in public education has made him the prime target of those who’d like to take the education of children out of the hands of their parents and put it into the hands of faceless bureaucrats who want to keep religious morality out of schools. There’s also Dr. Mary Ann Glendon of Harvard University whose medical and legal training has enabled her to defend the Church’s teachings about the intricate issues relating to human life, the natural compatibility of the sexes, and the truth about AIDS. Just this past week, Governor Frank Keating of Oklahoma has emerged. The nation's bishops have selected him to tackle the issue of evil’s incursions into the priesthood and episcopacy and to hold the hierarchy accountable for being honest about and for dealing directly with the twin evils of pedophilia and illicit and immoral sexual activity on the part of the clergy "from the lowliest priest to the mightiest bishop," Keating said about his responsibility. Lastly, there’s Associate Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. His defense of natural law theory and the Church’s defense of the unborn has brought him ridicule from those aligned against God's absolute Truth.

"Do not be afraid…Cast out into the deep," Jesus told the Twelve. In the ensuing generations, Thomas More, John Fisher, John the Baptist, Irenaeus, Peter, and Paul did not fail to state God's absolute Truth. And, in our own generation, Pope John Paul II, William J. Bennett, Mary Ann Glendon, Frank Keating, and Antonin Scalia are not failing to state God's absolute Truth. These heroes fear the Lord and are more concerned about what God thinks about them than what anyone else might think about them. And, for this, while they have blessed our lives, they have personally suffered.

"Be not afraid, I go before you always," Jesus told the Twelve, "Come follow me and I will give you rest." As Christians and as Catholics, we must not be afraid. Like those faithful disciples who have preceded us and those now in our midst, we must believe with all of our heart that, if we assert God’s absolute Truth and stand for it, all will be well...even if we have to bear suffering.