Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus — Sermon by Fr. Ermatinger

Translation of the Epistle for the Feast of the Holy Name of Jesus

In those days, Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said, Rulers of the people and elders, if we are on trial today about a good work done to a cripple, as to how this man has been made whole, let it known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth of Whom you crucified, Whom God has raised from the dead, even in this Name does he stand here before you, sound. This is ‘The stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone.’ Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.

Continuation of the Holy Gospel According to St. Luke

At that time, when eight days were fulfilled for the circumcision of the Child, His name was called Jesus, the name given Him by the angel before He was conceived in the womb.

The Saving Words of the Gospel

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Transcript of Sermon

On the eighth day, a male child in Israel would be circumcised and given an official name. Thomas Aquinas in Part III of his Summa Theologica asks why God-Made-Flesh would submit Himself to this ritual. And so, he looks in the Church Fathers, and finds in Bede, and Cyprian, and Augustine, some explanations, seven that he identifies. One is as proof of the truth of His Incarnation, because later Manichaeans and Gnostics would deny the corporality of the Word-Made-Flesh. Number two, to sanction the ancient rite God had instituted. Number three, to prove that He was of the seed of Abraham. Four, to deprive the Jews of this excuse to not accept him. Five, to enjoin us to obedience to God’s Law. Six, to encourage us to have recourse to whatever will help us overcome sin. And seven, that by bearing the burden of the Law, He might free us from that burden.

Elsewhere, St. Leo the Great notices phenomenon, and you’ll see this also in St. Caesarius of Arles. This practice, what they call hoodwinking. Hoodwinking is where God would do certain things in order to fool the devil about the identity of the Christ-child. You know, to protect Him. And so, this hoodwinking in this case was submission to the ritual, which the devil wouldn’t expect. And so, this was also part of that camouflage plan of the Word-Made-Flesh immersing Himself in this culture and being hidden amongst them.

St. Augustine says that by being circumcised Christ put an end to circumcision because the spiritual circumcision He would bring about for us is through the economy of grace brought about in His bloody Passion. So, He was not only circumcised, He was also given a name, but the name was not given to Him by His parents. Why? Because Joseph and Mary did not have authority to give God a name. This name was revealed to them from on high. Yeshua, Yahweh Saves, God Saves, and it has in its roots the Tetragrammaton, the original name of God in the Old Testament.

When Moses saw the burning bush, and Yahweh communicates with Him, Moses asks Him His name, and he says, I Am Who I Am. אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה‎ (eyeh asher eyeh) I am who I am, which is later morphed into Yahweh. The Jews had such an understanding of the transcendence of God that they would never dare utter His name. And so, when they would read Scripture, even today, when they would read Scripture and it comes to the word Yahweh, they wouldn’t say Yahweh, they would say Hashem, which means The Name. They would also use all sorts of other aspects of God to talk about Him, such as His power, Adonai, El Shaddai, Glory, Presence, Temple, Sanctuary, Lord of Hosts. They would call Him all of these things that were aspects of Him without saying the Name. But with the Incarnation, the Name has a Face. And it’s the face of a newborn baby.

And the Name is revealed to us, as is the face of God. And it’s been given to them from on high. Mary is told by Gabriel; Joseph is told in a dream; ‘His name will be Jesus.’ So, they didn’t have the authority to give this name. They received it and then applied it. It was a common name at the time. Joshua is another form of that, of Yeshua.

This notion of authority is important. In fact, there was a practice in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s of Catholics attempting to give their Guardian Angels a name or trying to find out the name of their Guardian Angel, which was a practice which the CDF in 1991 put the kibosh on because we’re not allowed to seek the name of our Guardian Angel. It’s hidden from us. So, on one hand, if we were to ask for it, how do we know it’s our Guardian Angel who reveals it to us? It might be a demon. So, we might be calling on a demon. On the other hand, we’re not allowed to give them names, because to give a name means to have authority over that thing. That’s why God tells Adam to name all of the animals. Why? To exert his sovereignty over creation. You can name your children, you can name your pets, but we don’t name our angels. They’re not our pets. On the contrary, it’s more like we’re their pets. Okay, we are under their authority. And so, we don’t have that authority to give them names.

But Our Lord revealed to us His Name and it’s the Name which we love. It’s the Name that should be uttered with great devotion, with faith, and never with indifference and certainly never in a disrespectful way. If you ever hear anybody misuse the Holy Name, make an immediate Act of Reparation. Lord Jesus Christ, I praise your Holy Name. Say that three times. What this will do is it will make an attempt at reparation for that grievous sin, but will also sensitize your soul to the utter holiness of His Name so that you never fall into that grievous sin.

If you need a motivation, you can read Leviticus Chapter 4, where the man who misused the Name of God was dragged out of the camp and stoned to death. So, there’s that. This is because they understood the utter holiness of His Name. And it’s not something we take lightly.

Christ told us to receive children His Name. He told us that in His Name we would suffer. In His Name, we would be persecuted. In His Name, we would be hated, and that’s all fine. The enemies of the Logos hate the Holy Name. We love it. We venerate it. We should only use it with devotion and faith.

It’s not something that can be used like a magic charm. If you remember in Acts 19, those itinerant exorcists, the Sons of Siva, attempt to do an exorcism in the Name of Jesus. But since they didn’t believe in Christ, their use of the Name was superstitious, and they all got beaten up by the demon. The demon says, Jesus, we know, Paul, we’ve heard of, but who are you? and then takes them to the cleaners and beats them up. Why? Because they use the Name as if it were a magical charm. The Holy Name is to be said with faith and devotion. We end our prayers in the Name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, not as a formality, but because in invoking the Holy Name to our prayers, the Father sees the Son, the Father hears the Son. We join ourselves to Him. Indeed, He says, ‘Where two or three are gathered in My Name, I’m present.’

So, why don’t I get what I ask for when I ask in His Name, as He tells us, ‘You’ll receive what you want if you ask in My Name.’ Well, Augustine explains this to us. He tells us, ‘mali, malum, mala.’ Sometimes we ask for a bad thing, and therefore God isn’t going to give it to us. Male, we ask in a bad way. And so, since we’re perhaps we’re disrespectful, or we expect God to jump through our hoops and we don’t have sufficient humility and we use the Name of Jesus to ask for what we want. Or mali, know we’re bad, and God’s not going to confirm us in our sin by answering our prayers as we would like, because we would never reflect on what our situation is with Him. We would think we were right with God. He also tells us that… he uses the example of a four-year-old boy who asks his dad for a sword. And he says, ‘Well, it’s not bad having a sword, but not when you’re four.’ So, it’s not a bad thing, but just not yet. Sometimes, what we are asking for Our Lord has in store for us later.

In Acts 9, we’re told to preach in the Name of Jesus. And in Acts 15, those Christians, those lovers of Jesus are called, ‘Those who have dedicated their lives to the Name of Jesus.’ What a glorious vocation that is, to dedicate one’s life to the Name of Jesus. What higher vocation is there? And to live in that reality, to understand ourselves in the context of the Holy Name. Paul tells us in Colossians to do everything we do in the Name of Jesus.

As a result of the misuse of the Holy Name, the Church recognized the importance of the Holy Name Society which makes reparation for the abuse of the Holy Name. But we also have a practice at the end of Benediction called the Divine Praises. Blessed be God. Blessed be His Holy Name. Blessed be the Holy Name of Jesus. Those are prayers in Reparation for abuse of the Holy Name. We ought to not say those mechanically. We ought to say them with great devotion, with a great sense of sorrow for any abuse of the Holy Name and asking that we never use His Name except with love and devotion.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, the Holy Ghost. Amen. 

~Fr. Ermatinger