(Nineteenth Sunday of the Year (C): This homily was given on August 9, 1998 at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I. by Fr. Raymond Suriani. Read Wisdom 18: 6-9; Hebrews 11: 1-19)

"Oaths: we need to take them seriously."

I'm sure that many of us remember the 1977 movie "Oh God," where none other than George Burns (cigar and all) played the part of the Almighty. (When I saw the film I remember thinking: "If that's God, then we're all in trouble!") But anyway, at one point in the movie, John Denver's character is on trial, and the Lord (played by George) comes into the courtroom and takes the witness stand in Denver's defense. Before he testifies, however, he takes the customary oath (with one slight variation); he says, "I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--so help me, me."

Oaths. Oaths are serious business--and they should be! The New Catechism says (and here I quote): "Taking an oath . . . is to take God as witness to what one affirms. It is to invoke the divine truthfulness as a pledge of one's own truthfulness." Now here's something that many people may not realize: our Faith is based on oaths. God made a number of covenants with his people in the Old Testament; in the New Testament he made an eternal covenant with us through is Son. In every case, when God made a covenant with human beings, he swore an oath. The oath was at the heart of the covenant. And this is why people in former generations had faith in God's word: they understood the sacredness of an oath. They realized that if God swore an oath saying that he would be faithful to them, then he would be! They could bank on it! That message comes through clearly in our first reading today from Wisdom 18. This text is speaking about the night that the angel of death went through the land of Egypt killing all the first-born of the Egyptians. The author writes, "That night was known beforehand to our fathers, that, with sure knowledge of the oaths in which they put their faith, they might have courage." God had sworn oaths to Abraham and to Moses that he would protect and rescue his people. The Hebrews in slavery in Egypt remembered those promises God had made to them, and that gave them strength in the midst of their sufferings. That built up their faith. They thought to themselves: "God promised to save us. He swore that to us in an oath; therefore we will trust him."

Then, in today's second reading, we have the great list of Old Testament saints from Hebrews 11. And notice what it says about Sarah, Abraham's wife: "By faith Sarah received power to conceive though she was past the age, for she thought the One [God] who had made the promise was worthy of trust." God had sworn an oath to Abraham to make his descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. Sarah believed that God would be true to that oath, and her faith in that promise brought her a great blessing: a son named Isaac.

Fr. Ray, what does this have to do with our lives today? The answer is: Plenty. I submit to you this morning that we are now living in an age of weak faith because we don't take oaths seriously anymore. Just look at this whole fiasco involving the president. It sickens me (and it scares me) that so many people are now saying, "It doesn't matter if he's violated his oath of office. It doesn't matter if he's lied. Who cares?" And we wonder why people don't trust God when he swears an oath to us? It's because oaths don't mean anything to us anymore! "Big deal--God swears me an oath that he will always be faithful, that he will forgive me if I repent, that he will give me what I need. But how can I possibly believe him? When the president swears an oath, it doesn't mean anything; when my friends swear oaths, it doesn't mean anything--they still lie to me, they still break their promises. For heavens sake, I can't trust the people I see when they swear oaths to me, how can I possibly trust a God I don't see when he swears me an oath?" This, my brothers and sisters, is our modern problem--and it's very serious.