Absent and Present

Absent and Present: St. Charles Borromeo

Msgr. Ronald Knox: Sermon preached at St. Mary of the Angels, Bayswater, London.

Whatever be the rights and wrongs of all the controversies we hear about the medieval Church, this at least is clear, that in the days of the Council of Trent its organization needed reform. And reform needs more than mere legislation to decree it; it needs administration to execute it. That is St Charles's characteristic legacy to the Church: it was the influence of his example, in great measure, that molded her organization on the new model which Trent had decreed. The bishop has got to be the center of everything in his diocese, and the clergy of the diocese are to be his clergy—a family of which he is to be the father, a guild of which he is to be the master. See how fond St Charles was of synods: the whole of his comparatively short episcopate is a long record of the synods he gathered amongst his clergy. See how enthusiastic he is for the seminary idea; the bishop, henceforth, is not merely to ordain people, he is to know whom he is ordaining. And above all what was characteristic of St Charles was the institute which he left behind him— a body of secular priests, putting themselves at the disposal of the bishop as absolutely as the religious puts himself at the disposal of his superior. Yes, there is much about St Charles's life which is more exciting, and much which is more attractive, than all this; his boundless generosity to the poor, the relentless mortification that regulated his busy, competent life. But what makes him stand out among the saints more than either is his intense devotion even to the most uninspiring details of diocesan routine.