Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/110912.cfm

Do you not know that you are the temple of God,
and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?
If anyone destroys God's temple,
God will destroy that person;
for the temple of God, which you are, is holy.

Twice a week I meet with Veterans at the VA Hospital who have set out on the road to recovery from "substance abuse." Substances include alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, heroin and God knows what all. Perhaps gasoline and model airplane glue. It's all pretty much the same. 
I have a whole set of topics to discuss with them and periodically I raise the question, "Is anything sacred?" 
Few of my Veterans are Catholic though most have some religious background. The question is not easily answered, or even discussed, since Christians in general cannot agree that anything is sacred. 
Catholics have the widest variety of sacred objects, from the Blessed Sacrament and the Blessed Virgin Mary, to our churches, altars, chalices and their accessories, to the Sacred Heart badges, plastic medals and cheap string rosaries my former soldiers wear around the neck. Protestants will generally agree their churches and cemeteries are holy, and their ministers deserve deferential, even reverential treatment.

But some of the Veterans have argued nothing is sacred; not buildings, or cemeteries or people or objects. One fellow was really coming hard at me with that assertion when I asked him, "What about the American flag? Why can't I burn it or rip it up and use it for old rags?" 
With that he backed down, "Your point is taken." he said. 
Chalk that up for one of the two or three arguments I've ever won in my life. 

I maintain that the human being has an instinct for the Holy. But, like so many of our instincts, it can be suppressed by violence. 
I'll go further and say that violence of any kind -- physical, emotional, verbal, sexual, economic, political, intellectual or religious -- can quash our willingness to see the Holy. Even mechanical violence, like a bulldozer in a forest, crushes our sense of the holy. 
Healing from violence involves the rediscovery of reverence, piety, and our instinct for the holy. That's why I bring it up to this jaded group of Veterans. 

The Church has a long history of trying to protect the Holy. Sometimes our efforts were misguided. For centuries we condemned those doctors who purchased (under cover of darkness) the bodies of executed criminals in the pursuit of science. We could not suppose that the end (knowledge) might justify the means (autopsies.) Some modern philosophers like Carl Sagan and Daniel J. Boorstin resent the Church for this resistance to progress, while others point to the Church's sponsorship of research and learning. I suppose the jury is still out on that issue. 

As we celebrate today the Basilica of Saint John Lateran we remember our ancient reverence for a building; and we hear Jesus' teaching about his human body: 
"Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up."
The Jews said,

"This temple has been under construction for forty-six years,and you will raise it up in three days?"But he was speaking about the temple of his Body.Therefore, when he was raised from the dead,his disciples remembered that he had said this,and they came to believe the Scriptureand the word Jesus had spoken.

We have also heard Saint Paul's words from 1 Corinthians:

Do you not know that you are the temple of God,and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?If anyone destroys God's temple,God will destroy that person;for the temple of God, which you are, is holy.

The Second Vatican Council especially asserted the holiness of the individual person: her body, intellect, freedom, spirit, grace and mystery. We insist upon the sacredness of the born and unborn person, the aged and the young, the able and disabled. We are beginning to see that no person is truly disabled for every person gives glory to God in one way or another; and every person deserves reverence and respect because of the divinity God has planted in our human flesh. 

That holiness is manifest in the Risen Body of Christ and in the Assumed Body of Mary. It even appears in the ancient stones of Rome and the Basilica of Saint John Lateran.