CAPG's Blog 

His zeal was ardent and fearless. In order to convert hardened sinners, he sent terror into their hearts. He tore the mask from the hypocrite. To put a stop to scandal, he raised his voice in a thunder of invective. He spared no one. The proud as well as the hypocritical he attacked with the courage of Christ Himself, whose precursor he was. When he saw the Pharisees and the Sadducees coming to him to be baptized, he exclaimed: "Brood of vipers" - that is to say, you who instill into the souls of men the poison of false doctrines and traditions - "who hath showed you to flee from the wrath to come? do ye penance." The true preachers of God's Gospels must show at times just fiery zeal for the glory of the Master: "And Elias the prophet stood up as a fire, and his words burnt like a torch." (Eccl. xLviii. 1.)

O Priest of God, is your eloquence as penetrating, is it as full of burning fire as was that of St. John? Does it go deep into the soul? Does it wound the soul unto conversion? Is it a burning torch, is it a cutting sword, is it a piercing dagger? Zeal is only another name for charity. A good father does not like to chastise his disobedient son, but love prompts him to do so. And is not the preacher a spiritual father?

True zeal, as we see it in St. John, is prudent, energetic, and yet to some extent, lenient. If St. John saw poor, humble, or ignorant people eager to become instructed he had a cheering word for them. To such he promised pardon. They will not have to retire into the desert as did the precursor himself; let them practice justice, give alms, live according to the state of life. All are called to be saints, but sanctity does not imply for all a very austere life, or the performance of heroic deeds. Sanctity consists in doing the will of God, each one according to his vocation.

A truly zealous preacher is not elated by success. He is entirely forgetful of self. An ordinary man might have been tempted to pride or vain-glory on seeing the messengers sent to him, and the unbounded admiration of the multitudes who listened to him. Not so John the Baptist. His soul was filled with humility and confusion. It entered the minds of many that he might be the Messiah; even his disciples told him: " He of whom thou gavest testimony, behold He baptizeth and all come to Him." But John reproved them. The more they praised him, the more he humbled himself. Far from wishing to pass as the Messiah, he declared that he was not worthy to loose the latchet of His shoe. His sole desire was that they overlook the precursor, and prepare for Him who is to come.

Truly that priest deserves little success, O my God, who looks for it more to glorify himself than to glorify his Master. If souls be saved, what is the praise of men to a good priest, the instrument of their salvation?

A truly zealous man is not easily tired; nothing discourages him, neither the frequency of his instruction, nor the ignorance of his hearers. For all he has an answer and a kind word.

A truly zealous man is also brave; he knows no danger, he flatters no one, and if he meets with a Herod, he will not hesitate to say: Non Licet. To show regard for the dignity or social position of a wicked man is to become, to some extent, an accomplice of his wickedness; for the more exalted a man's position, the greater the harm he does by a scandalous mode of living. John's courage in reproving Herod cost him his life; but was not martyrdom the fittest recompense of his holy preaching?

What a model is offered to evangelical preachers in the person of St. John!

Source: Meditations For The Use Of The Secular Clergy, from the French of Father Chaignon, S.J. 1907