Good Evil 2

EWTN Global Catholic Radio and St. Joseph Communications proudly present Life is Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Sheen. This 50-part series was recorded on phonograph records in the 1960s and the sound quality is sometimes limited, but the word of God spoken by Archbishop Sheen is timeless. And now here is Archbishop Fulton Sheen. Peace be to you. This universe of ours is a free universe. It is a universe of character making, of song making. Almighty God is placed into our hands. Think of it, the power to make ourselves saints or devils, it is up to us. There are some laws that we cannot disobey, for example the law of gravitation, certain biological laws like circulation of blood, but in a moral universe we are free either to obey the laws of God or to disobey them, just as we are perfectly free, for example, to obey the laws of health or to disobey them. What then makes a thing good? What makes a thing bad? What makes a thing good? A thing is good when it attains the purpose for which it was made. I have before me now a stopwatch. I'm talking to you without any notes that are written out, merely developing ideas that have been given to those who are interested in these ideas for many, many years. Therefore I have to have a watch before me in order to decide when I should stop. Is it a good watch? How will I know whether it is good? By asking what is the purpose of a watch. The purpose of a watch is to keep time. Does it keep time? Yes. Therefore, it is a good watch. Now let us apply that to our ultimate end. Why were we made? What is the purpose of living? The purpose of living is to be supremely happy. How do we become supremely happy? By attaining the life and truth and love which is God. Anything I do, therefore, that helps me to attain that goal or purpose is good. One side of me is an organ. It is not in the church. It is in my office, or rather in my home. As I talk to you, I am looking at the notes on that organ. Which note is good and which note is bad? Which note is right and which note is wrong? One cannot say that any particular note is right and any particular note is wrong. But what makes any note right or wrong? It's correspondence to a standard. Once I have a piece of music before me, I know what I ought to do. What note I should hit. What note I ought not to hit. So too, we have a moral standard within us which is the conscience. And what is good and bad is in relationship to that standard which is not of our own making. We do not draw our own maps and decide that the distance from Chicago to New York will be so-and-so. We do not arbitrarily set our own watches. We set them by a standard outside of us. When we buy any material, we do not decide that a yard, for example, will be 24 inches instead of 36. So a good, therefore, is that which helps us in relationship to the attainment of purpose and goals and destinies which are in accordance with right reason. What makes a thing bad? Well, here is a pencil. Is it a good pencil? Yes, it writes. That is why it was made. Is it a good can opener? It certainly is not. Suppose I use it as a can opener. What happens? First of all, I do not open the can. I do not attain the purpose for which I use the pencil. And secondly, I destroy the pencil. Now, if I, for example, decide to do certain things which I ought not to do, I do not attain the purpose that I hope to attain. For example, becoming an alcoholic does not make me happy, and furthermore, I destroy myself just as I destroy the pencil in using it to open the can. When I disobey God, I do not make myself very happy on the inside, and I certainly destroy any piece of soul that I ought to have. Evil, you see, is not positive. Evil is either an excess or a defect of what is good. An excess or a defect. Food is good. Too little of it is bad. Too much of it is bad. Drink is good. Too little of it is bad. Too much of it is bad. Sleep is good. When, however, sleep interferes with duty, it is not good. Evil is very much like darkness. It is the absence of light. It has no purpose inside of itself, or rather it has no substance of its own, that is a better way to put it. All badness is spoiled goodness. A bad apple is a good apple that became rotten. Because evil has no capital of its own, it is a parasite on goodness. Looking back then upon our reason and will in this universe, we can see, as we said before, that this universe is a veil of soul-making. We were made to be good. We were made to attain the truth. But, oh, how weak we are. Look at the limitations of our reason, and then look at the limitations of our will. First of all, our reason. How poor it is. Even those that had very good reasons admitted that, in the end, they had captured but just a little of what was true. Isaac Newton, the great scientist, said that he felt as if he was standing on the seashore of infinite truth, and the vast waters of knowledge stretched endlessly before him. Socrates, one of the wisest of the Greeks, said, there is only one thing that I know, and that is that I know nothing. Thomas Aquinas, who was the greatest mind that ever lived, said at the end of his life that all that he had written seemed to him as so much straw in comparison to a dim vision that he received of heaven. Then to quite apart from these learned men, look at the weak reason of people today, their confusion of mind, their failure even to recognize any such thing as truth or goodness. They will read one book on Monday, and they will say, oh, I'm a materialist. Then they'll read another book on Tuesday, and they're communist. Then they read another book later on in the week, and they reject both of those systems. They're laying down tracks one day, tearing them up the next. They're planting seed one week, tearing the seed up the next. They're never, never working toward one goal. It's no wonder there are so many psychotics and neurotics in our world. They're just rehashing a lot of old errors and giving them new labels. Calling some of the old errors very novel. That's only because they do not know what is ancient. Not only is our reason weak, but also our will. Even when we know what is right, how hard it is sometimes to do it. We are besieged by temptations. We often feel very much like gay thieves. It's said that he often wondered why he was one man, because he felt there was enough evil in him and goodness to make both a rogue and a gentleman. St. Augustine said, and we may have occasion to quote this again, Whatever I am, I am not what I ought to be. Looking back, therefore, on what we are, we have to admit that our reason is weak, our will is feeble, our mind is dark, our will is lame. We need help. We need more truth for our mind. We need more love and goodness for our will. Where are we going to get it? Would God give it to us? Oh, certainly God could give it to us, not because we are worthy, because rather it seems that it would be in keeping with his goodness. To tell us something and to give us added power, and furthermore, we are teachable, we have minds. God could certainly give us new truths. Our nature is constantly receiving invisible forces. We would not have flowers and trees if there were no sun communicating light that we do not see. It is only that by which we see. So God might send either a visible or an invisible force to illumine us. And then also he could strengthen our will. And that certainly we need, we cannot lift ourselves by the lobes of our ears. Our aspirations are too weak. Look at the resolutions we take on New Year's and break. We need power, and that power has got to come from the outside. An electric light bulb is useless unless power is supplied from without. We have a stomach, but we need food from the outside. We have ears, but we need sound from the outside. Very well then, God might indeed illumine our reason, but how would we know it? Suppose there was such a thing as revelation. Could we tell? Certainly there are many who make claims to be messengers from God. Reason has to set up certain standards, even before there is any revelation. We just simply cannot allow some man to come upon the stage of history and say, Listen to me, I am from God, or I had a revelation. I once received a telegram from someone, and the telegram read, Report to Port 53, New York Harbor, to receive illumination from the Holy Spirit. Well, I'm very sure that individual who sent it, whoever he was, believed that he had a revelation, but we cannot accept the revelation of any individual who claims merely that he has one. We cannot accept, for example, someone who says, I've got a book here. An angel wrote it for me. This world of ours would be filled with crackpots. If Skygag came to this country from Mars, we would say, Show me your passport. How do I know you are from Mars? So too, if anyone is coming from God with a revelation for our reason and a strength for our will, reason is going to impose certain tests, and these tests are three. And they are tests that can be verified by reason and by history. First, whoever comes should be preannounced. Two, he should work miracles in attestation of the fact that he is a messenger. Third, nothing that he ever teaches or reveals to us should be contrary to human reason, though it may be above it. Those are three tests. That's a standard. That's a measuring rod. First, we say, anyone who comes should be preannounced. After all, brides preannounce their wedding. Automobile manufacturers tell us when a new model would appear, and if God is going to send someone to this earth, certainly the least that God can do is to let us know, I'm sending someone. That will do away with this idea of any individual suddenly appearing upon the stage of history and saying, I am God or I have a message from God. A preannouncement test will therefore be the test of prophecy. And secondly, there will be another test, namely miracles. He who comes ought to be able to do marvels, signs, to authenticate his message. Not so much, you see, in order to do things that would excite our wonder, make us say, Oh! But rather, miracles that would prove that God was with him. And then thirdly, certainly anyone who comes to this earth must never in his teaching contradict human reason. We may indeed have, oh, mysteries revealed to us that are above our reason. But they can never be contrary. For example, if anyone comes and teaches immorality, or that the soul is not immortal, well, we would know such a person could not come from God because statements of this kind are contrary to reason. Looking back, then, we have three measuring rods, or tests, designed by reason applicable to history. Now, line up all the claimants that come from God according to their words. March them out. Line them up. Stand there, one by one. Let us say to them, We are going to judge you. Buddha? Confucius? Laocene? Mohammed? Marx? Brahmins? Which doctors? Hindu philosophers? University professors? Eddie? Heidegger? Eddie, will you please? And the founder of the latest cult in New York or Los Angeles? Stand there. We want to ask you questions. First, and we're just going to use one test in this lesson. Were you ever preannounced? Any one of you? Answer. Buddha? Did anyone ever know that you were coming to this earth? Confucius? Was the prince of your birth prophesied? Socrates? Did anyone foretell that you would die of hemlock juice? Mohammed? Was there ever an ancient tradition that you would be born among a certain people? Were there ever descriptions to how you would die? Did any one of your mothers know that you were coming? Is there a single one of you that can point to an historical record in which it was foretold where you would live, where you would die, how you would die, what would be your character, the manner of your teaching, the kind of enemies that you would provoke and evoke by the dignity of teaching? Answer me. Is there no one that can step out? Up to this moment, you see, we have not regarded Christ as any different from any other messenger from God. Now one steps out of the ranks. What is your name? My name is Jesus Christ. Were you ever preannounced? Are there any historical records long before your coming describing the details of your existence? Are there documents attesting to the work that you would do and the purpose of your coming? He is the only one that can answer, yes. So we say to the others, step back. You may be interesting, but you do not satisfy my first test. You were not preannounced. And that's the least that God could do. You have only your own word. But we are interested in the person of Christ. He says he was preannounced. In that case, we will have to study the documents. That will be the subject of the next lesson. God love you. This has been Life is Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Sheen. For more information about this series, contact St. Joseph Communications at 1-800-526-2151. And outside the U.S., call 818-331-3549. And please join us again next time for Life is Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Sheen on EWTN Global Catholic Radio.