The Disbelief of Saint Thomas (Incredulité de Saint Thomas) - James Tissot

“The friendship of this world is an enemy of God.” — JAS. lv. 4. 

1. The love of God and of the world. 
2. What is meant by the world. 
3. We have to be in the world; the evil and the dangers of it. 
4. How to overcome the world: Its twofold attack: adversity, pleasure. The victory won by faith.  

"1. St. Augustine tells us that there are two loves, which make two different cities or kingdoms: the love of God, spiritual and infused, which makes the city of God, the Church of the elect; the love of the world and of self, so centered as to exclude God, that makes the city of the wicked, which is the kingdom of the devil, by whom it is possessed and ruled. "Know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God ? Whosoever, therefore, will be a friend of this world becometh an enemy of God." (James iv. 4.) This is the friendship that makes men insubordinate, disobedient, and displeasing to God. "Love not the world," says St. John, "nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.” (I John ii. 15.) But let us beware of unreality and exaggeration; instead of doing good they do harm. So let us see plainly and exactly what is meant by the world and the friendship of the world.

2. By the world here is meant vain and vicious men, who love carnal, transitory, and earthly things inordinately — that is, to the exclusion of God —and these very things themselves, which such men seek and desire, grasp and cling to, that they may be enriched, praised, and exalted in this short life. Here is the evil and danger of it all.

3. We are in the world, and have to be in the world and mix with the world; where is the evil, then, in loving the things of the world ? God’s love has to be first and foremost in our hearts, and wherever and whenever things of the world seek to take this first place, there is the evil and the danger. Therefore duty to God constantly calls upon us to despise, break with, and even to hate the things and friendships of this world, inasmuch as they hinder us, or actually pervert us, from seeking and loving God. "For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but of the world." (1 John ii.16.) We must, then, thus far overcome the world that we shall not allow it or any creature friend of it so to entice us that, for the desire or love of it, we shall transgress the law of God.

As "the friendship of this world is an enemy of God," as the text tells us, we see plainly that we cannot be friends with both. God and the world have nothing in common; their ends are diametrically opposed to each other. The world bows down to wealth, influence, success; Christ blesses poverty, meekness, persecution. The world makes the most of the present and the things of life, for it knows in its heart that it passeth away. Christ bids us remember that we are pilgrims and wayfarers here, to rejoice if the world hates us, for our true home is heaven, whither we are tending. "Wonder not, brethren, if the world hate you." (1 John iii. 13.)

4. A twofold attack does the world advance against the servants of Christ. Adversity threatens that we may lose courage, and through fear be induced to sin. The world tried this for three hundred years of persecution in the early ages; it has tried it again in later times in many countries, and especially in England and in Ireland. And the glorious martyrs gave a triumphant answer, and gladly laid down their lives for the love of God. And the martyrs of more recent times vied in courage and alacrity with the martyrs of the olden days. The children of the Church had not changed with the lapse of centuries. In the same blessed choir of martyrs we behold Ignatius of Antioch and Fisher of Rochester, Cyprian and Thomas More, Lawrence and Campion the Jesuit! And the second mode of attack is an insidious one— the seductions of pleasure and prosperity, amusements and love, to entice and attract, to deceive and ensnare the hearts of the unwary and imprudent. This is the attack to which, in our days, so many, especially the young and impulsive, fall victims. Too self-willed to heed warnings, resenting interference, they are swept on with the crowds of pleasure-seekers, forgetful of God and their souls; the love of the world slowly but surely possessing itself of their heart and ruling it. He alone can withstand this attack who, with the eye of faith, looks up to God, and for His love and honor despises and rejects the blandishments of all created things. 

St. John tells us what power it is that overcomes the world - our faith: "This is the victory that overcometh the world, our faith” (1 John v. 4) - the faith that tells us Jesus Christ is our Savior and our Judge, and therefore that our lives and hearts should be all for Him. A lively, strenuous faith pleases God so much! It is above all riches and honors and the substance of this world. It is the gift of God, but we can pray for it, and pray for more and more of it. The Gospels bid us do it. "And Jesus saith, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth. And immediately crying out, with tears, he said, I do believe, Lord: help my unbelief." (Mark ix. 22, 23.) "And Jesus saith, Have the faith of God. . . . Whatsoever you ask when ye pray, believe that you shall receive; and they shall come unto you." (Mark xi. 22, 24.)

Let us pray for the love of God and the contempt of the world, with faith such as this. Then victory would be ours. May that faith be ours which, as St. Augustine says, "saves sinners, opens the eyes of the blind, cures the sick, baptizes, justifies, restores poor penitents to God’s favor, increases the merits of the just, crowns martyrs, preserves all in a sinless life, and places the elect with the angels in their eternal inheritance.” May the great and Blessed God deign to bestow this faith upon us all!"

Source: Short sermons, by Rev. Fr. Hickey 1913, Low Sunday