"In the Church, the bad are many and the good few"

Intravit autem rex ut videret discumbentes, et vidit ibi hominem non vestitum veste nuptiali. Et ait illi: "Amice, quomodo huc intrasti non habens vestem nuptialem?" At ille obmutuit. Tunc dicit rex ministris: "Ligatis manibus et pedibus ejus, mittite eum in tenebras exteriores: ibi erit fletus et stridor dentium." Multi enim sunt vocati, pauci vero electi. (From the Gospel for the Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost. Matthew xxii, 11-14: And the king went in to see the guests and he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment, and he saith to him: "Friend, how camest thou in hither, not having on a wedding garment?" But he was silent. Then the king said to the waiters: "Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." For many are called, but few are chosen.)

[I]t should not frighten you that in the Church the bad are many and the good few. [Terrere ...vos non debet quod in Ecclesia et multi mali et pauci sunt boni] For the Ark, which in the midst of the Flood was a figure of this Church, was wide below and narrow above, and at the summit measured but one cubit (Genesis vi, 16). And we are to believe that below were the four-footed animals and serpents, above the birds and men. It was wide where the beasts were, narrow where men lived: for the Holy Church is indeed wide in the number of those who are carnal minded, narrow in those who are spiritual. For where she suffers the morals and beastly ways of men, there she enlarges her bosom. But where she has the care of those whose lives are founded on spiritual things, these she leads to the higher place; but since they are few, this part is narrow. Wide indeed is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction; and many there are who go in thereat. How narrow is the gate that leadeth to life; and few there are that find it!

The Ark is made narrow at the summit, so that it is but one cubit wide: because, of those in the Church, the holier they are, the fewer they are. She reaches her highest perfection in Him Who alone among men was born Holy, and there is none to be compared with Him. He Who, in the words of the Psalmist, has become as a sparrow all alone on the housetop (Psalm ci, 8). And so the more the wicked abound, so much the more must we suffer them in patience; for on the threshing floor few are the grains carried into the barns, but high the piles of chaff that are burned with fire. ...

Then the king said to the waiters: "Bind his hands and feet, and cast him into the exterior darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Then through this dread sentence, their hands and feet are bound who now will not restrain them from evil deeds, through amendment of life. For then chastisement shall bind those whom sin now restrains from doing good. For the feet that cared not to visit the sick, the hands that gave nothing to those in need, are now through their own fault no longer free to do what is good. Those therefore who now of their own free will are bound fast in sin, shall then against their will be bound fast in torment.

Rightly is it said that he shall be cast into exterior darkness. For we call blindness of heart, interior darkness; exterior darkness, the eternal night of damnation. Each one therefore who is damned, is cast, not into interior, but into exterior darkness: for there against his will he shall be cast forth into the night of damnation who here of his own will has fallen into blindness of heart; where, we are told, there shall also be weeping and gnashing of teeth: so that there teeth shall gnash which here delighted in gluttony, there eyes shall weep which here turned hither and thither in wanton desire. For each single member shall suffer punishment for the sins for which they were used in this life.

And when this one has been cast forth, in whom manifestly the whole body of the wicked is set before us, straightaway He adds a general sentence, which says: "For many are called, but few are chosen."

Dearest brethren, we should fear with a great fear the words we have just now heard. All we here present, already called through faith, have come to the marriage of the Heavenly King. We believe and confess the mystery of His Incarnation, and we partake of the banquet of the Divine Word. But in a day to come the King of judgement will enter in among us.

That we are called, we know; that we are chosen, we do not know. And so the more each one of us knows not whether he is chosen, so much the more do we need to humble ourselves in humility. There are, we know, those who do not even begin to do good; and some who do not remain constant in the good works they begin. Another is seen to pass almost his whole life in evil-doing, but close to the end he is drawn back from wickedness through tears of earnest repentance. Another seems to lead the life of one of the elect, and yet it happens that at the end of his life he will turn aside to the wickedness of heresy. Another begins well, and ends even better; while another, from his first years, gives himself to every evil, and growing ever worse than himself is destroyed in the midst of these very evils. In the measure therefore that each one knows not what is yet to come, in that measure should he live in fear and anxiety for himself before God: for, and let us say it over and over again, and let us never forget it: many are called, but few are chosen.

Saint Gregory the Great
Homilia XXXVIII
(Habita ad populum in Basilica Beati Clementis Martyris)