Are we losing by believing we’re winning?
Almost every Sunday, I have the undeserved good fortune to receive a homily by one of the best Catholic preachers alive today, Monsignor Eugene Morris. Monsignor Morris’s homilies stick with me throughout the week. I am truly gifted.
Last Sunday, the Last Sunday after Pentecost, Monsignor’s homily opened my eyes both spiritually and politically.
“We must admit defeat in order to claim victory,” he said.
(Listen to Msgr. Morris’s amazing homily below.)
We went on to explain, in the manner of St. John Chrysostom, that the crucifixion of Jesus Christ was absolute defeat for His ministry. The Apostles certainly saw it as a defeat—all but John fled and hid. They knew His three-year ministry was over and they would be reviled. As mostly ignorant fishermen and the like, they would return to their lowly labor and hope to avoid the wrath of the pharisees.
But “on third day He rose again in fulfillment of the scriptures.”
Only by admitting defeat were they were able to turn the cross into a symbol of His ultimate victory.
The Apostles could have denied His defeat. They could have claimed He simply slipped out of town. They could have carried their narrative beyond Jerusalem where few if anyone could refute them.
Had the Apostles refused to admit defeat, Christ’s resurrection would have been known only to John and the Marys. The Apostles might have gained worldly success through their false narrative. They could have maintained the hoax that Jesus narrowly escaped crucifixion and remains in hiding, providing wisdom to a select few who continue to spread the word for Him. In short, they could have become false prophets.
But they admitted defeat, thereby sharing in the glory of His victory.
It’s time for us on the right to apply this lesson to elections: we have been defeated. Not fairly nor justly defeated—the prosecution, judgment, and execution of Christ was anything but fair or just. Just defeated. Our enemies changed the rules while we were perfecting the old ones. To continue my analogy from last week, we were like a baseball team that built a team around who could bat just as MLB was introducing the designated hitter rule.
And we lost.
We lost in 2020, and we lost in 2022. (Yes, the House. Whoop-tee-friggin-doo.)
We can continue saying, “No, but we actually won,” or we can admit defeat and, thereby, achieve ultimate victory. If we learn anything from the life of Christ, we must admit that denying defeat will separate us forever from final victory. If we pretend that we already got what we wanted, we will forfeit our claim to ultimate prize.
Joe Biden is the president of the United States because he was elected by a majority of the electors of each state. Whether or not those electors were properly chosen is a matter for the various states to address. If you living a state that sent the wrong electors, you must admit defeat on this point, just as the robbery victim must have the humility to admit he was robbed. No humility, no justice. No defeat, no victory.
I don’t know what this victory will look like, but I am very confident Monsignor is right: we will never see victory until we admit defeat. We can’t get to the victory of the Resurrection without suffering the defeat of the cross.
I have written many times that America was never great but for the goodness of her people. I believe, therefore, that the secret to this victory begins with Monsignor’s ending exhortation: vow not to save the world, but to save your soul. Be good. Live your life as a good Christian and worry not what the world does or thinks.
We lost. We are lost politically. But we who are blessed to have the indelible seal of the cross stamped on our souls are found again in the glory of Christ’s victory over death. The demons—the damned—refuse to admit their defeat, and they tempt us to deny our defeats. Even the demons know perfectly well how the story of salvation ends, they won’t accept it. The deny it. It’s why they will never glory in the victory of Christ.
Let’s not succumb to diabolical urges to deny defeat (and here I’m writing mostly to myself.) Defeat is the only way to victory. And victory is guaranteed for those do what Christ commands.
The road to the White House runs through the nave of the Church, up the hill to Calvary, and onto the cold slab of an unmarked—but well guarded—tomb. Only by dying can we be restored.
We lost, praise Jesus. We are free at last, and for that we give thanks to God alone.
Now, I urge you to listen to the entirety of Monsignor’s excellent homily.
Homily by Monsignor Eugene Morris—Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost, November 20, 2022 given at the Oratory of Ss. Gregory & Augustine in St. Louis.
Surrender is the triumph over failure.