Excerpts from a sermon for St. Cecilia’s feast day!

Saint Cecilia: “What won her husband to the Faith, in spite of his passion, in spite (you might almost say) of his love for her, was the purity of her nature which, though a heathen, he could already discern. His eyes were not yet open to the supernatural world that rules and interpenetrates ours; he could not see the angel until he was baptized. But he could see, in his Christian bride, a new experience in his life�a blinding flash of purity. And the first duty of a Catholic wife or a Catholic husband, if they would redeem the promise they made to labor for husband’s or for wife’s conversion, is to be a model of Christian purity. The religious life, the life of virginity, is not for them; they have made their choice. But within the holy bond of matrimony, the Catholic has to hold up the highest possible standard of faithfulness�faithfulness both to the person of the other partner in marriage, and to the will of God in designing matrimony for the procreation of children. Let husband or wife be won to the Faith by the behavior of wife or husband, by considering the chasteness of that behavior with fear. The world knows that Catholics have a high standard of purity. But the world is not going to be impressed unless it is assured that Catholics keep it.

And that is not only a lesson for wives and husbands; it is a lesson for all of us. The purity which is our traditional inheritance as Catholics has a message and a charm for the world around us. Each of us, whether he likes it or not, is an advertisement of the Catholic Faith to the little circle of his neighbors, a good advertisement, or a bad advertisement. And it is such a mistake to think that we ought to try and impress our neighbors by making it clear to them that Catholics are not Puritans, are not strait-laced, are sportsmen like anybody else. The world is very ready to say that of us but it does not really respect us for it. It does not respect us for being ready to join in rather risky conversation, and enjoy rather doubtful jokes; it does not respect us for being careless about what company we keep and what places of amusement we go to. It respects us, if it sees that we shrink from the touch of anything that may defile us; if it sees that the virginity which is practised in the cloister has its complement and its fruit in the chaste conversation of Catholics who are living in the world.”