The Pillar and Foundation of Truth

Homily for Wednesday of the Twenty-Fourth Week in Ordinary Time

As we come to the final verses of St. Paul’s First Letter to Timothy, St. Paul concludes by using a doxology, a short hymn of praises to God, often added to the end of canticles, psalms, hymns, and, in this case, a book from the Christian Scriptures. St. Paul uses this doxology to praise Our Lord Jesus Christ.

One cannot think of St. Timothy without remembering the occasion when Jesus sent his apostles out to preach the Kingdom of God. In a show of remarkable trust and confidence, Jesus gave his apostles the power to heal and preach the message his father had imparted to him. St. Paul does much the same thing when he appoints a very young Timothy, a recent convert to Christianity, to lead the Church of Ephesus, a community that was dangerously moving away from the Gospel as preached by St. Paul. In the conclusion of his first letter to his young follower, St. Paul urges him to remind the Ephesians of the pillar and foundation of truth that they had heard from him. The confidence that St. Paul displays in this assignment tells us much about the character and strength of faith exhibited by Timothy.

The Gospel passage from the Gospel of St. Luke which we read today also contains a similar statement about the Church. At the end of his words about those who failed to accept his preaching, Jesus states: “Wisdom is vindicated by all her children." The wisdom to which he refers is the same as the pillar and foundation of truth that St. Paul mentions as he closes his letter.

I found myself wondering whether St. Paul would have the same kind of trust and confidence in our leadership skills. How strong is our faith in the wisdom and truth of the Gospels? The First Letter to Timothy is one of St. Paul’s “prison letters.” As he languishes in prison, he writes to his disciple to encourage him to stay the course in which he was originally set by his mother, his grandmother and St. Paul himself. In our Eucharist today we are fed with the body and blood of Jesus, the strength we all need to cling to the pillar and foundation of truth that we were taught years ago.