The Peace of the World vs. The Peace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Sermon by Fr. Paul Robinson, SSPX

Track 1 of the Chant II CD: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VAe5fYJzAo

• Back in the 1990s, a series of Gregorian chants CDs were produced and they became very popular. They were recordings made by Benedictine monks in Spain.
• The first of these CDs sold two million copies in the USA and two million copies in the rest of the world. When people were trying to explain why a Gregorian Chant CD could be so popular, they said that people were using it as an antidote to the stress of the modern world.
• After the first CD did so well, they produced a second CD and made the first track the monks singing the beautiful Introit of today’s Mass, which starts off with the words: “Give peace, O Lord, to those who have hoped in You”.
• The world was looking for some peace of soul and turned to Gregorian Chant. They can find it not only through Gregorian Chant, but also through the TLM.
• There is a certain point of the Mass when the Mass becomes focused on asking God for peace. This is right after the Pater Noster. In the prayer which immediately follows it, the Libera Nos, the priest says to God, “mercifully grant peace in our days, that through the assistance of Thy mercy we may be always free from sin, and secure from all disturbance.”
• Then the priest prays the Agnus Dei. As you know the last petition is “Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, grant us peace”.
• Then, the priest places his hands on the altar, and says to Our Lord, “Lord Jesus Christ, who said to Thine Apostles: Peace I leave you, My peace I give you: regard not my sins, but the faith of Thy Church; and vouchsafe to grant her that peace and unity which is agreeable to Thy will.”
• This peace that Our Lord gives is the peace that the people of the world were looking for when they were listening to Gregorian Chant in the 1990s. At the Last Supper, Our Lord explains that the peace He gives us is not like the peace that the world gives.
• For there are, in fact, two types of peace: the peace of the world and the peace of Our Lord. Because we use the same word for these two types of peace, we can easily become confused by them.
• We can meet people in the world who are living in a state of sin, or Catholics who have left the faith, or who have stopped practicing traditional Catholicism. And they say to us, “I am at peace with my decision”. And we may be tempted to think that people in the world are able to live in a state of sin and be at peace, when in fact they only have the peace of the world.
• For this reason, I think that it would be helpful for us to think about three differences between the peace that the world gives and the peace that Our Lord gives.
• The main difference between the two is that the peace of Our Lord is “tranquility in order” and the peace of the world is “numbness in disorder”. The peace of Our Lord is in the soul and is obtained by mortifying or putting to death the body. The peace of the world is in the body and is obtained by putting to death the soul.