Homily for the 2025 Red Mass for the Diocese of Fort Worth

September 25, 2025
St. Mary of the Assumption Catholic Church
Fort Worth, Texas

Micah 6:1-4, 6-8
Psalm 104:1-2, 24, 35, 27-28, 29, 30
Romans 13:1-7
Luke 7:1-10

The passage from the Gospel of Luke which we have just proclaimed describes a story of the Roman centurion who sends some of the local religious leaders to Jesus to ask Him if He will come to the centurion’s home to heal his slave who is suffering and near death. When the religious leaders approach Jesus, they put their own spin on matters. They strongly recommend that Jesus do this for the centurion as they emphasize that he deserves this miracle from Jesus because, unlike a lot of the Roman military force of occupation, this centurion likes them so much that he has paid for the building of their synagogue. It is in their interest that Jesus heal the centurion’s servant.

On their way to the centurion’s home, another delegation of the centurion’s friends meets Jesus and the religious leadership and conveys a new message to Jesus from the centurion. The centurion conveys through them that he does not consider himself worthy that Jesus should enter his home so he asks the Lord not to trouble Himself but instead to simply give the word that his servant might be healed. Then follows the key point of the encounter. The centurion conveys, “For I too am a person subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes, and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”

This story from the Gospel offers a sharp distinction between two understandings of legitimate authority and its function both in the life of faith and the life of political society. The Roman centurion, motivated by compassion for his dying servant, recognizes in Jesus one who has authority and who uses His power in service to that authority in healing illnesses and forgiving sins. The centurion recognizes that Jesus has power that is accountable to God for the right ordering of human nature and the healing of sin and its effects.

The religious leadership depicted in the story, indifferent to the grave condition of the centurion’s servant, sees authority as subordinate to power and recommends that Jesus use His power to heal the sick man so as to further ingratiate themselves to the centurion whom they only see as a figure of power. We see here that when one values mere power over authority one is faced with the reality that power is limited. There is only so much power to go around and that others who hold power become viewed as a threat to be neutralized. The religious leadership depicted in the Gospel recognizes Jesus’ power and at this point seeks to co-opt Him to be part of their brand but will come to view Him as a threat to their interests and own power, a threat who they eventually come to decide should be neutralized.

Yet, rightly understood, power is a tool to be authorized and used accountably and with purpose in accord with an ordinance of reason. “Authority” comes from two Latin terms. There is “auctor” that means originator or author, the source of power. There is also “augere” that means to build up or to increase. When one mistakes authority to be subordinate to power, one either usurps the rightful place of the “author” or the “originator” through unauthorized power that dares to take the place of God as the author and source of all that is, or one abuses power as a tyrant for selfish ends without accountability to other human beings or to God. One also comes to see mercy as a form of restraint that is at odds with authority that is reduced to the imposition of mere power. The plight of our contemporary world has been forged by centuries of the modern practice of placing authority as subordinate to power, reason as subordinate to will, nature as subordinate to technology, morality as subordinate to politics, and God as subordinate to human autonomy. All of this leads to the tyranny of relativism and the usurpation of reason by insatiable appetite resulting in the nihilism and accompanying violence that afflicts our current political life.

Our hope is precisely in the words of Saint Paul from the second reading today, “Therefore, it is necessary to be subject [to authority] not only because of the wrath but also because of conscience.” Conscience is not understood here to be a harbor of private interest that exempts one from obligation to objective truth as regulated rightly by law and custom. The Holy Spirit enlightens our conscience through the ordinary means of the authentic magisterium of the Church and directly through the grace received by us through an active sacramental life of prayer. It is initiated in us at our Baptism and developed throughout our active practice of our liturgical and personal prayer. It is a well-formed conscience that draws us into communion with God and with other human beings.

As lawyers, judges, and government officials you are entrusted with authority not simply to do the bidding of the electorate’s powerful self-interest but to exercise good judgment as illuminated by the Creator for the common good of society, especially mindful of those who are most easily ignored and overlooked. To be good stewards of authority you must rely on God’s Grace and illumination so as not to abandon the gift of rightly ordered wisdom expressed in a well-formed conscience in exchange for the cunning of the crafty person who reasons and acts to usurp authority for the sake of personal power and vainglory.

This is why we are here tonight in seeking the Grace of the Holy Spirit at the start of this legal year. This is why we are in this church and at Mass and not simply considering the distinctions between authority and power in a courtroom or classroom. Real justice is a form of truth-telling, and we are here to listen to the words of Christ Who is the fullness of revelation and the truth itself. The primordial act of justice is worship, and it is here that we worship God in the way that He has revealed how He desires to be worshipped: the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is through the gift of His Son that we are able to worship God not merely as creatures rightly worshiping our Creator, but even more intimately as children worshipping God as Father and the author of our salvation.

In a few moments we will listen to the true words of the Mass first uttered prophetically by John the Baptist, “Behold the Lamb of God.” To which we are able to respond as authorized by the Church’s Liturgy with the humility of the centurion, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof but only say the Word and my soul shall be healed.”