If we entertain the mistaken notion that the church is merely the sum of her human members, then we run the risk of eventually trying to reject such an imperfect organism. There is a spiritual principle that many of us would do well to remember: Focus on the light, not on the darkness. If we continually seek the flaws and imperfections in the members of the body of Christ, the church, surely we shall find them. Focus on the darkness and you run the very real risk of being absorbed into the darkness, of becoming part of the darkness. Focus on the light and you will be absorbed in the light and indeed become light to the world in the one who is the "Light of the world."

So often we become discouraged because some individual through human weakness wounds the body of Christ. The person may be a priest or religious, and we take offense because of the weakness of those we look up to. We may ourselves be much worse than the one who the media criticizes due to some sin or scandal, for perhaps we have been given more by God and responded less than the poor person in the scandal spotlight this week.

The fact of the matter is that only God has a seat high enough to see everything in order to arrive at a just and valid judgment about a person's guilt or innocence and the degree thereof. It just doesn't pay to rashly judge any individual, although we must make rational judgments in the objective order. Attempting to judge individuals and subjectively impute guilt to them results in the loss of interior peace, and we begin to think that the church is less than good, less than holy; perhaps even that the body of Christ is evil.

The church is holy because of her head who is personified holiness; because of her soul: the Holy Spirit, and because of those imperfect and weak human beings who through grace become one with Christ through the action of the Holy Spirit. Indeed, the church is the "'holy People of God' and her members are called 'saints'" (#823). To the degree that we, through humility, obedience and docility, allow the Holy Spirit to form Christ within us, we become an active force to make the holiness of the church present to a world much in need of such holiness.

Indeed, united with Christ, the church is sanctified by him; through him and with him she becomes sanctifying. "All the activities of the Church are directed, as towards their end, to the sanctification of men in Christ and the glorification of God" (Vatican II, Sacrosanctum Concilium, 10). It is in the church that the "fullness of the means of salvation" (Vatican II, Unitatis redintegratio, 3, 5) has been deposited. It is in her that "by the grace of God we acquire holiness" (#824; Cf. Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 48).

Regardless of the deficiencies and sins of individual members of the church we should have a great love for, and gratitude to, this unfailingly holy body and bride of Jesus Christ. It is through Christ's body the church that we are reborn in baptism; that we are strengthened in the faith through confirmation; that we are united so intimately with Jesus, the church's head through Eucharist; that we are raised from spiritual death to life by having our sins forgiven through the sacrament of penance; that man and woman become sacramentally "one flesh" in the "Word who became flesh and dwelt among us" in the sacrament of matrimony;" that we receive a ministerial priesthood capacitated to give us five of the seven sacraments through holy orders; and it is through the church that we are strengthened in suffering, often for the final journey to eternity, in the sacrament of anointing of the sick. The indefectibly holy church bestows holy things upon God's holy people, making them holy.

As the Catechism, echoing the Second Vatican Council, teaches us, "The Church on earth is endowed already with a sanctify that is real though imperfect" (#825; Cf. Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 48, 3). We are called to make use of the many means of salvation which the church holds out to us in order to actualize our potential for that holiness that we are called to in Christ. We are all sinners, and we must acknowledge that often more than obvious fact. All of us are sinners: priests, religious, lay faithful; all of us without exception. Only Jesus and his holy mother are without sin. That being the case we should be slow to judge, quick to understand, quicker to forgive those who do fall, especially those who fall from high places.

No one knows how much pressure and pain are brought to bear by the forces of evil against the shepherds of the sheep. The church's holy ones, the saints, were the first to acknowledge that "except for the grace of God, there go I." None of us on this earth has yet arrived at our destination; we are work in process, on the way but not home yet.

No matter how weak and deficient we may feel, we should not use this weakness, however, as an excuse for sloth. We are called to holiness of life in Christ through the power of his Spirit. In fact, we must "be holy (perfected) as our Father in heaven is perfect." It is a divine mandate, not a mere suggestion! Holiness is the hidden source of the church's apostolic activity and missionary zeal (#828).

We know that God is perfectly faithful in accordance with his very nature. He has called us in the church to holiness and he has given us the full means of salvation through his holy church. It is comforting to know that one of us, "Our tainted nature's solitary boast," the Blessed Virgin Mary, is the perfect fulfillment of the church's destiny. Mary, without sin, reigns with her Son forever. She is "our life, our sweetness, and our hope" as mother of the church. We acknowledge our sinfulness, but with great and unfailing hope we look to our spiritual mother, for, as the Catechism (#829) reminds us, "... in the most Blessed Virgin the Church has already reached that perfection whereby she exists without spot or wrinkle, the faithful still strive to conquer sin and increase in holiness. And so they turn their eyes to Mary" (Cf. Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 65); in her, the church is already the "all holy."