Celebrating St. George and slaying the dragon of sin

Tomorrow I plan to go to mass in honor of St. George, England's patron saint. I am, after all, an Anglican Catholic. But poor St. George is now deemed to be offensive in a multicultural world.

Gateway Pundit reports:

In 2006 Church of England officials contemplated giving Saint George the boot from his perch as Patron Saint of England because he was too offensive for modern day Muslims.

Now, British officials have cancelled an annual St. George's Day Parade in Bradford in fear that Muslims will riot.

Back in 2006, I wrote in response to Gateway's news of St George getting the boot:

This is such a sad story, more evidence of the fact that we don't really have a problem with Muslim extremism, we have a problem with the collapse and decay of Christian institutions and the whole foundation of Western Civilization. Without renewal of those foundations and a rediscovery of a robust, masculine, loving, virtuous Christian faith, our culture is toast. Onward Christian soldiers. But we must remember that our battle is not against flesh and blood and the first dragon that we must slay --with God's help--is the our own sinful nature.

I think this bears repeating, in light of what the Pope said at Yankee Stadium on Sunday about true freedom.

"Authority" … "obedience". To be frank, these are not easy words to speak nowadays. Words like these represent a "stumbling stone" for many of our contemporaries, especially in a society which rightly places a high value on personal freedom. Yet, in the light of our faith in Jesus Christ - "the way and the truth and the life" - we come to see the fullest meaning, value, and indeed beauty, of those words. The Gospel teaches us that true freedom, the freedom of the children of God, is found only in the self-surrender which is part of the mystery of love. Only by losing ourselves, the Lord tells us, do we truly find ourselves (cf. Lk 17:33). True freedom blossoms when we turn away from the burden of sin, which clouds our perceptions and weakens our resolve, and find the source of our ultimate happiness in him who is infinite love, infinite freedom, infinite life. "In his will is our peace".

Real freedom, then, is God's gracious gift, the fruit of conversion to his truth, the truth which makes us free (cf. Jn 8:32). And this freedom in truth brings in its wake a new and liberating way of seeing reality. When we put on "the mind of Christ" (cf. Phil 2:5), new horizons open before us! In the light of faith, within the communion of the Church, we also find the inspiration and strength to become a leaven of the Gospel in the world.

For my Muslim readers--when I think about St. George and spiritual warfare, I mean it in a spiritual sense, as an internal struggle. The way those of you who insist Islam is a religion of peace interpret jihad as an internal spiritual struggle. So we have something in common, if we share that interpretation, especially if we recognize there is a need for everyone of us to find God's help in overcoming the sin in our lives.