Sometimes my life is like an open book. Last week, the book was The Spirit and Genius of St. Philip Neri, a series of three lectures given by Father Frederick William Faber in the mid-1800s.
I must confess that it was a somewhat difficult read, but it was the book chosen by my book club. Some years ago, four of us decided to form a book club and to read predominantly about the lives of saints or sometimes read the writings of saints.
We were drawn to St. Philip Neri because he is described so often as the joyful saint. St. Philip lived for 80 years, spanning the 16th century. He had a keen sense of humor and loved children, animals and the poor. He seemed commonplace, but his holiness was magnetic.
He spent the bulk of his life in Rome but had a huge impact on Catholics in England. He lived with an outward simplicity and detachment but not with an outward austerity. He was devoted to Christ, especially in the Eucharist, and to Mary. He was so greatly loved that his followers feared to disappoint or offend him.
Father Faber’s book made two points that I grasped and held on to and which seemed significant. The first was that most saints illuminate a particular aspect or virtue of Our Savior. St. Philip Neri had the rare quality among saints of being a whole and entire copy of Our Lord. No particular virtue, grace or miraculous gift stood above the rest.
Father Faber says, “In his measure and degree there is a supernatural harmony and equality in his graces, which again casts our thoughts, whether we will or not, upon Him who deigned to be the pattern of all holiness, and who was Himself the eternal and the Holy One.”
In the history of the Church and in the saints whom God has given Her through the centuries, there was only one other like St. Philip in this regard, and that was St. Francis in the Middle Ages.
The second point that Father Faber makes is that St. Philip was rooted in his times, “modern times,” as Father Faber calls them. St. Philip was a kind of incarnation of Our Lord for his times.
Father Faber notes that the Church in Her essentials never changes. However, because Her mission is to interfere with the world by molding and transforming it, She presents herself to us under very different appearances.
He writes: “To enthrone a past age in our affections above the one that God has given us in His Church is, implicitly at least, to adopt the formula of heresy and schism. To do so explicitly is incompatible with an orthodox belief, as well as with a true Catholic obedience.”
St. Philip was an exemplar of drawing others to Christ in the times he was given. He did this by understanding the realities that the people of his day faced and by gently calling them to the timeless vision of their dignity and their redemption in Christ.
So, what does all this have to do with us? As a society, we seem to be enjoying an abundance of license and an absence of joy. St. Philip’s life encourages us to engage with our times “by putting on Christ,” as St. Paul says.
St. Philip encouraged his followers to live in large towns to maximize both their opportunity to engage others and their power to transform by an authentic witness. As we face challenges such as the upcoming ballot issues, we ought to do the same. We should be open to the appearances of the Church that God is presenting to us in the evangelization work and structural recombination that are a part of Real Presence Real Future.
These are new opportunities to interfere with the world. Like St. Philip, we should be attentive to the many and varied needs of the poor and marginalized. We can draw strength from the Eucharist and from our relationship with our mother Mary, a cause of our joy. In that way we can give grace to others, demand more of ourselves, witness, console and draw others to Jesus.
St. Philip Neri, pray for us!
