Sunday, May 12, 2013
Blog # 301 Evil
Blog # 301 Evil
Philosophers, theologians, Social Welfare professionals, victims of criminal violence, pacifists, widows and widowers, men and women of deep faith in God and those without faith in God have worked and wondered in search of what has been referred to as 'The Problem of Evil'. I am among those who wondered.
I think I came closest than ever to a solution to the problem of evil on the day I denied there was a problem of evil. It is not that I have me eyes closed to evil in the world. The recent tragedy of innocent school children killed in Newtown,Connecticut, and then just a few weeks later the slaughter of people at the finish line of the Boston Marathon prompted me to write this blog. I had the honor, privilege, burden, challenge, or whatever you want to call it, of personally spending a good part of a day visiting the death camp at Auschwitz, Poland years ago. Many days there are stories in the local newspaper of shootings stabbings violence and hatred even among members of one's own family. I do not deny evil in the world. I do not think that evil is good and not evil. I just want to say I see it differently than most people seem to do. I do not defend evil or think it is good. Evil is bad. It is evil. Calling or naming it a problem is what I call into question.
Ordinarily when we think of anything as a problem we incline to think of it in relation to a solution. Once we arrive at a solution the problem is solved and the case is closed. In the case of the 'problem' of evil we should not be surprised there have been several well thought out and sincere solutions proposed. Some have been satisfied to solve the 'problem' in identifying someone to blame for it. It is the result of sin in the world. Eliminate sin and we would eliminate evil. Partly true.
If we were to consider pain and suffering as evil, as many do, then blaming it on sin, we do not have the solution to the problem of good and innocent people suffering and in pain. If we were to say evil is beyond God's control, we would have a solution that would be in contradiction to our identification of God as unlimited, totally good, all-powerful, and all loving. In seeing this as true, some would feel no need to go further in their search for a solution to the 'problem' than to deny the reality of a personal unique unlimited good powerful and loving God. For them, in the stage to which we have come in our natural evolution as human beings, evil remains an inevitable given. The solution is to recognize this and to avoid it as well as you can.
In these and other solutions sincerely offered to solve the 'problem' of evil I see a fundamental danger and an obstacle of arriving at the truth we are seeking. It is the danger of identifying the task in which we are engaged as seeking a solution to a problem. Ironically, the danger comes from having a solution. We work to solve a problem until we arrive at a solution that we confidently feel is the truth. The situation is complicated by the fact that others working toward a solution to the same problem confidently and sincerely arrive at a different solution. If our solutions are different, someone is correct or closer to being correct than another. That is another problem. But if I am sufficiently confident in my solution and someone else's solution does not evidently harm me, it tends not to be my concern. I remain apart from them.
I would like to try to illustrate how this works out when we apply it to what I consider one of the greatest evils of all. The problem is the division of the Church. I have to point out and admit that as far as I can tell I am in a definitely very very small minority of people among those I know personally and through the media, government leaders, church members, people all around me who otherwise are very much like me in our everyday experience of life who see this as a problem to be solved. It is not that others confront me and try to change my convictions. I think they are just not aware of what I am concerned about as a concern of theirs. They just don't think of it. If I did not experience it as real I don't think I could imagine how we could claim to live by the Gospel message of salvation and not be seriously concerned about our division.
We can shed significant light on the 'problem' by focusing it in the form of a question: What does it mean to be 'saved'? Identifying this as a problem we seek a solution as our response. Each Sunday here in the United States millions of good people gather in large and small Christian gatherings to worship a single God in the name of a single Savior, but divided in the solutions they give to the problem of our division in direct contradiction to the prayer of Jesus that all who would come to believe in Him would be united in the love and obedience He lived in His relationship with His Father Whom He had identified as the sole Creator of us all. (Jn 17: 11, 20 - 23, 26).
In considering evil as a problem and seeking to solve it with a solution, we have in the ocurrence of different solutions the situation of something being correct or incorrect and and therefore division among the searchers of truth which in itself is one. In response to this I have continued to refrain from using the title Problem of Evil and subsituting the title Question of Evil.
Solutions for me imply conclusions, the end of a process. Questions lead to answers but also for me leave room for other questions from other people who have different answers than ours to what we thought were the same questions until we asked questions of one another and discovered our questions were not the same. Then through further questions we can grow in our knowledge of the truth that unites.
The process is ongoing rather than conclusive. Sincere questions are invitations to unity rather than intrusions and sources of division.
There are a few more things to consider with regard to the question of evil so we will include them in a different blog.
Saturday, May 4, 2013
Blog # 300 Further thoughts on the Eucharist
Blog # 300 Further thoughts on the Eucharist
In His unique historical experience of unconditional trust and total love for the Father, Jesus freely laid down His human life on the Cross in obedience to the Father's plan for Him. Limited in time and space by the reality of its genuine physical nature, His death occurred in a specific place at a specific time. In the reality of its nature as death, it occurred once and for all. His blood shed, His body given, would live again in the glory of His Resurrection , but never die again in the physical limits of Calvary almost two thousand years ago..
What then of the event of the Last Supper the evening before the event of Calvary? And what of what happens when the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is offered day after day on our altars in Catholic churches throughout the world? "This my body, given". "This is my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenent, poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins." These words could literally be applied to the body and blood of Jesus as He hung on the Cross and died in the experience that fulfilled the promise made to Adam and brought salvation to the whole world. But what of their meaning and power when applied to the bread and wine of the Last Supper and of the Mass?
Is our Catholic faith and theology correct in proclaiming these words can and should also be applied literally to what happened at the Last Supper and to the daily offering of the Sacrifice of the Mass? The majority of our fellow non-Catholic Christians throughout the world have come to answer that question "No, the Catholic Church is wrong in this regard. The words in question produce a symbolic reminder of what actually happened once and for all two thousand years ago."
I am thoroughly convinced of the truth of our Eucharistic faith. Yet I recognize a problem someone might have in reconciling it with what we see and touch in our sense knowledge of the the Mass. It helps to realize that by its nature faith is not to be proven but to be believed. There will always be an elemant of mystery whenever we deal with truths that are beyond our competence to understand fully, from the notion of creation itself down through the divinity of Jesus, the authenticity of the Bible, to what happened at the Last Supper and what happens each time the Mass is validly offered.
In admiration and appreciation of the teaching method of Jesus in His use of parables to clarify and proclaim His message, I tried to come up with something that would help me understand the truths we believe and proclaim with regard to the relationship of Calvary, the Last Supper and the Mass. I will share it with you here.
Before Mass started a couple of weeks ago, with just a few people there early, I handed out five dollars. Then in the homily of the Mass I told the people what I had done and asked them to imagine, that is, to create an image in their minds of what I did. Several 'saw' me give a five dollar bill to a single person. Others who voluntered to reveal what they had imagined 'saw' me give five single dollar bills to five different individuals. What I actually did was give a one dollar bill to a single person and in four cellophane sandwich bags I gave out four additional dollars in four different modes. One had a roll of fifty pennies and ten dimes. Another had four quarters. Another had twenty nickles and a fouth had one quarter five pennies two dimes and ten nickles. Each had something in common with them all. All of them were money!
Applying this to the problem someone might have in reconciling the Biblical narratives of the Crucifixion and the Last Supper with with one another and with the Church's tradition and faith regarding the identity of what goes on in the celebration of the Sacrifice of the Mass, we are dealing with a reality and truth that is beyond our human competence to understand completely. We seek to understand what we believe rather than to prove it. This was similar to the experience of the people at Mass a couple of weeks ago who did not and could not in the limited experience available to them know for sure what and why I had done what I did unless they believed me or an other reliable witness who testified to it. And this was true for them in a question of what was not in itself beyond their capacity to comprehend, the simple all-human gift of five dollars. How absolutely certain it would be in regard to the questiion of the mystery of the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist !
We can see a parallel to this in the case of the witness of St Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians in his significant and familiar testimony to the Eucharistic action and words of Jesus at the Last Supper ( 1 Cor 11:23 - 27). "I received from the Lord what I handed on to you, namely, that the Lord Jesus on the night in which He was betrayed took bread, and after He had given thanks, broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you, Do this in remembrance of me". In the same way, after the supper , He took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."
It is very significant that Paul did not say remember me by doing this but do this to remember me. The action is prior to the memory of it in time power importance and meaning.
In the parable of the money, applied to various coins and paper, we see all of it as money existing in different modes. Applied to Calvary the Last Supper and the Mass , we see all three events as real in themselves and all three identified and impowered by the same redeeming infinite love of Calvary expressed in three different modes. We gain some understanding of this in the light of our faith in the identity of Jesus and the Eternal Word as one single person with the astonishing effect of granting the suffering and death of Jesus supernatural unlimited divine power with regard to the bread and wine similar as to what was given in the other miracles of Jesus such as raising the dead and curing the deaf and the blind by the simple act of declaring it when this would be the Father's will.
One more application of the parable. There is such a thing as counterfeit money. Genuine authentic money is backed up by the authority of the government that has the right and power to authenticate or guarantee its value. The authenticity of our faith in the meaning and value of Calvary the Last Supper and the Mass and their common identification in the total love of Jesus in obedience to the Father is primarily found in the Bible and the official teaching of the Church, but it is supported as well in history and tradition, in the lives of holy people who have lived by it and loved God in its light, in the parts and effects of it we can experience ourselves that give us joy,peace, comfort in our sorrows, support in temptation and in our weaknesses, in our personal praise and thanks to Jesus that inspires us ever more prefectly to love and appreciate His goodness and power, and in all the other natural and supernatural gifts we receive each day that tell us we are loved by God uniquely one by one and as a community of belivers in the same love the Father has for Jesus. ( Jn 17: 23,26).
In His unique historical experience of unconditional trust and total love for the Father, Jesus freely laid down His human life on the Cross in obedience to the Father's plan for Him. Limited in time and space by the reality of its genuine physical nature, His death occurred in a specific place at a specific time. In the reality of its nature as death, it occurred once and for all. His blood shed, His body given, would live again in the glory of His Resurrection , but never die again in the physical limits of Calvary almost two thousand years ago..
What then of the event of the Last Supper the evening before the event of Calvary? And what of what happens when the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is offered day after day on our altars in Catholic churches throughout the world? "This my body, given". "This is my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenent, poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins." These words could literally be applied to the body and blood of Jesus as He hung on the Cross and died in the experience that fulfilled the promise made to Adam and brought salvation to the whole world. But what of their meaning and power when applied to the bread and wine of the Last Supper and of the Mass?
Is our Catholic faith and theology correct in proclaiming these words can and should also be applied literally to what happened at the Last Supper and to the daily offering of the Sacrifice of the Mass? The majority of our fellow non-Catholic Christians throughout the world have come to answer that question "No, the Catholic Church is wrong in this regard. The words in question produce a symbolic reminder of what actually happened once and for all two thousand years ago."
I am thoroughly convinced of the truth of our Eucharistic faith. Yet I recognize a problem someone might have in reconciling it with what we see and touch in our sense knowledge of the the Mass. It helps to realize that by its nature faith is not to be proven but to be believed. There will always be an elemant of mystery whenever we deal with truths that are beyond our competence to understand fully, from the notion of creation itself down through the divinity of Jesus, the authenticity of the Bible, to what happened at the Last Supper and what happens each time the Mass is validly offered.
In admiration and appreciation of the teaching method of Jesus in His use of parables to clarify and proclaim His message, I tried to come up with something that would help me understand the truths we believe and proclaim with regard to the relationship of Calvary, the Last Supper and the Mass. I will share it with you here.
Before Mass started a couple of weeks ago, with just a few people there early, I handed out five dollars. Then in the homily of the Mass I told the people what I had done and asked them to imagine, that is, to create an image in their minds of what I did. Several 'saw' me give a five dollar bill to a single person. Others who voluntered to reveal what they had imagined 'saw' me give five single dollar bills to five different individuals. What I actually did was give a one dollar bill to a single person and in four cellophane sandwich bags I gave out four additional dollars in four different modes. One had a roll of fifty pennies and ten dimes. Another had four quarters. Another had twenty nickles and a fouth had one quarter five pennies two dimes and ten nickles. Each had something in common with them all. All of them were money!
Applying this to the problem someone might have in reconciling the Biblical narratives of the Crucifixion and the Last Supper with with one another and with the Church's tradition and faith regarding the identity of what goes on in the celebration of the Sacrifice of the Mass, we are dealing with a reality and truth that is beyond our human competence to understand completely. We seek to understand what we believe rather than to prove it. This was similar to the experience of the people at Mass a couple of weeks ago who did not and could not in the limited experience available to them know for sure what and why I had done what I did unless they believed me or an other reliable witness who testified to it. And this was true for them in a question of what was not in itself beyond their capacity to comprehend, the simple all-human gift of five dollars. How absolutely certain it would be in regard to the questiion of the mystery of the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist !
We can see a parallel to this in the case of the witness of St Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians in his significant and familiar testimony to the Eucharistic action and words of Jesus at the Last Supper ( 1 Cor 11:23 - 27). "I received from the Lord what I handed on to you, namely, that the Lord Jesus on the night in which He was betrayed took bread, and after He had given thanks, broke it and said, "This is my body, which is for you, Do this in remembrance of me". In the same way, after the supper , He took the cup, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me."
It is very significant that Paul did not say remember me by doing this but do this to remember me. The action is prior to the memory of it in time power importance and meaning.
In the parable of the money, applied to various coins and paper, we see all of it as money existing in different modes. Applied to Calvary the Last Supper and the Mass , we see all three events as real in themselves and all three identified and impowered by the same redeeming infinite love of Calvary expressed in three different modes. We gain some understanding of this in the light of our faith in the identity of Jesus and the Eternal Word as one single person with the astonishing effect of granting the suffering and death of Jesus supernatural unlimited divine power with regard to the bread and wine similar as to what was given in the other miracles of Jesus such as raising the dead and curing the deaf and the blind by the simple act of declaring it when this would be the Father's will.
One more application of the parable. There is such a thing as counterfeit money. Genuine authentic money is backed up by the authority of the government that has the right and power to authenticate or guarantee its value. The authenticity of our faith in the meaning and value of Calvary the Last Supper and the Mass and their common identification in the total love of Jesus in obedience to the Father is primarily found in the Bible and the official teaching of the Church, but it is supported as well in history and tradition, in the lives of holy people who have lived by it and loved God in its light, in the parts and effects of it we can experience ourselves that give us joy,peace, comfort in our sorrows, support in temptation and in our weaknesses, in our personal praise and thanks to Jesus that inspires us ever more prefectly to love and appreciate His goodness and power, and in all the other natural and supernatural gifts we receive each day that tell us we are loved by God uniquely one by one and as a community of belivers in the same love the Father has for Jesus. ( Jn 17: 23,26).
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
Blog # 299 From Jerusalem to Augusta and back
Blog # 299 From Jerusalem to Augusta and back...
Blog # 298 focused upon the event of the original Good Friday experience of Jesus in Jerusalem. It was identified as an act of perfect obedient love and, as directed to the Father, labeled Worship.
In the light of our belief in the mystery of the Incarnation, in Jesus and the Word of God we have the same person. And in further light coming from the Incarnation, we have, in the normal experiences of Jesus as one of us, truly human experiences such as hunger fatigue lonelines generosity death temptation and the other normal limitations other than sin we all know in our day by day human lives. On the other hand when the Father's plan for Jesus called for thoughts actions or words beyond the scope and capacity of His biological human nature, Jesus, in obedience to the Father, was personally capable of experiencing these realities as divine as well as human or in other words as experiences of God on earth in Him and therefore infinite, beyond and independent of the limitations Jesus knew and we know as mere human creatures.
In that paragraph, reminding us of the clearly revealed identy in a single person of the Eternal Word and Jesus, and the consequences of this identity, seen in the perfectly human (limited) and divine (unlimited) experiences in the life of Jesus, it seems to me we have a fundamental and most important theological truth that does not normally seem to be part of the conscious awareness of folks in a typical congregation assembled before the altar at a time the Sacrifice of the Mass is being offered. In the light of such a lack of awareness it seems to me we could hardly understand, let alone be aware of what was going on at the Last Supper the evening before Jesus died, and, in the light of this, at the Eucharistic table around which we might be asembled as Mass is being offered.
First we must be aware of and appreciate what was going on at Calvary. The physical suffering and death of Jesus on Calvary, necessarily limited by its nature, occurred in its historical mode once and for all, never to be repeated in that mode. On the calendar, the twenty four hours of the day Jesus died on Calvary will never come again. So it is with the blood He shed and with all of the pain and suffering that goes with being crucified. It began that morning, continued for a time until His heart stopped beating and He died. He had given all He possessed. He had no more to give. Such is the way it is with death. It was this way for Jesus in the plan the Father had for Him. He had said "Yes" to it in the garden of Gethsemane the evening before. It would never happen again this way.
What next? In the Biblical narrative of it, the mystery of creation sin and salvation started with our Creator's promise to send a redeemer bearing the gift of forgiveness of sin. It continud on in Moses, Abraham, and a long line of Prophets who handed on the story of the promise and kept the hope for it alive in God's Chosen People. Then came Jesus, identified in the minds of people living around him in the town of Nazareth as the son of Joseph, a local carpenter. While still a young man Jesus made the claim for himself to be the fulfillment of the promise made to Adam. For a period of about three years He engaged in a ministry of preaching, shedding light on the meaning of the promise and upon His own divine identity as God's Beloved Son.
Finally on the evening before He died, while officially celebrating the Feast of Passover commemorating the release of God's Chosen People from the slavery of Egypt, Jesus did the most important and astonishing thing He ever did. It was His greatest miracle. It was the act that fulfilled the promise of Genesis and won salvation for all people who would hear of it and believe in it. He took bread and said it was His body given. He took wine and said it was His blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant, poured out for the forgiveness of sins.
The same words Jesus proclaimed over the bread and over the wine at the Last Supper could truly have been said of the body and blood of Jesus on Calvary as He hung and died on the Cross the day before. The same words applied to both instances express an identical truth about the bread and the wine and His body and blood but in different modes. The key to understanding this lies in the words given and poured out. Given and poured out on Calvary in one historical mode. Given and poured out at the Last Supper in another mode unique to that occasion.
Three men died on Calvary that first Good Friday. One of them died a broken and despairing man. A second of the men we know as Saint Dismas, the Good Thief. The third man, Jesus, was God, the Eternal Word, come among us as Jesus precisely for this moment, to die, to show us what it means to love most perfectly in the unconditional trust and total self-giving of Jesus in His death on the Cross. This was the fulfillment of the promise made to Adam on behalf of all people. Jesus' death was His greatest love and His greatest glory (Jn 17: 5,6), an act of worship that won for Him the victory over sin and death in the experience of His predicted Resurrection three days later and the title of Redeemer of All Mankind.
The Title of this blog is 'From Jerusalem to Augusta and back... Those three dots indicate there is more. We have been in Jerusalem for the death of Jesus and the Last Supper. We have to come back to Augusta before we finish. We have identified the Last Supper with Calvary. It remains to identify the Sacrifice of the Mass that we experience here in Augusta at St. Mary on the Hill with the other two.
The infinite love of Jesus the Word of God was experienced and proclaimed as a unique experience, once and for all, in the naturally limited physical nature of the suffering of Jesus on the Cross (as one of us He had only so much to give and gave it all), and naturally limited as well by time and place in its historical mode ( in a certain hour on the hill of Calary). The experience of the Last Supper was also a once in a lifetime unique experience, never to be repeated in its historical mode. What made it so was the unique physical presence of Jesus at the table . The words spoken by Jesus over the bread and the wine at the Last Supper were spoken in the sound of His personal voice in the sight of His physical presence. The combination of these precise details would never occur again.
As the Last Supper was the experience of Calvary in a different mode so the experience of the Mass is the experience of the Last Supper in still a different mode. We refer to it as a Sacramental mode. In every experience in the Sacramental mode we have three elements, a reality that is signified in some tangible way, and a response by the person receiving the Sacrament. In reference to the Sacrifice of the Mass Calvary is the basic reality signified in the here and now by the the love and Sacramental presence of Jesus in the bread given and in the wine poured out and received by a believer in the Sacrament of Holy Communion.
This has been a long blog with a rich content that merits reflection upon it. I hope to share a few further insights that will be helpful in another blog 'tomorrow'....
Blog # 298 focused upon the event of the original Good Friday experience of Jesus in Jerusalem. It was identified as an act of perfect obedient love and, as directed to the Father, labeled Worship.
In the light of our belief in the mystery of the Incarnation, in Jesus and the Word of God we have the same person. And in further light coming from the Incarnation, we have, in the normal experiences of Jesus as one of us, truly human experiences such as hunger fatigue lonelines generosity death temptation and the other normal limitations other than sin we all know in our day by day human lives. On the other hand when the Father's plan for Jesus called for thoughts actions or words beyond the scope and capacity of His biological human nature, Jesus, in obedience to the Father, was personally capable of experiencing these realities as divine as well as human or in other words as experiences of God on earth in Him and therefore infinite, beyond and independent of the limitations Jesus knew and we know as mere human creatures.
In that paragraph, reminding us of the clearly revealed identy in a single person of the Eternal Word and Jesus, and the consequences of this identity, seen in the perfectly human (limited) and divine (unlimited) experiences in the life of Jesus, it seems to me we have a fundamental and most important theological truth that does not normally seem to be part of the conscious awareness of folks in a typical congregation assembled before the altar at a time the Sacrifice of the Mass is being offered. In the light of such a lack of awareness it seems to me we could hardly understand, let alone be aware of what was going on at the Last Supper the evening before Jesus died, and, in the light of this, at the Eucharistic table around which we might be asembled as Mass is being offered.
First we must be aware of and appreciate what was going on at Calvary. The physical suffering and death of Jesus on Calvary, necessarily limited by its nature, occurred in its historical mode once and for all, never to be repeated in that mode. On the calendar, the twenty four hours of the day Jesus died on Calvary will never come again. So it is with the blood He shed and with all of the pain and suffering that goes with being crucified. It began that morning, continued for a time until His heart stopped beating and He died. He had given all He possessed. He had no more to give. Such is the way it is with death. It was this way for Jesus in the plan the Father had for Him. He had said "Yes" to it in the garden of Gethsemane the evening before. It would never happen again this way.
What next? In the Biblical narrative of it, the mystery of creation sin and salvation started with our Creator's promise to send a redeemer bearing the gift of forgiveness of sin. It continud on in Moses, Abraham, and a long line of Prophets who handed on the story of the promise and kept the hope for it alive in God's Chosen People. Then came Jesus, identified in the minds of people living around him in the town of Nazareth as the son of Joseph, a local carpenter. While still a young man Jesus made the claim for himself to be the fulfillment of the promise made to Adam. For a period of about three years He engaged in a ministry of preaching, shedding light on the meaning of the promise and upon His own divine identity as God's Beloved Son.
Finally on the evening before He died, while officially celebrating the Feast of Passover commemorating the release of God's Chosen People from the slavery of Egypt, Jesus did the most important and astonishing thing He ever did. It was His greatest miracle. It was the act that fulfilled the promise of Genesis and won salvation for all people who would hear of it and believe in it. He took bread and said it was His body given. He took wine and said it was His blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant, poured out for the forgiveness of sins.
The same words Jesus proclaimed over the bread and over the wine at the Last Supper could truly have been said of the body and blood of Jesus on Calvary as He hung and died on the Cross the day before. The same words applied to both instances express an identical truth about the bread and the wine and His body and blood but in different modes. The key to understanding this lies in the words given and poured out. Given and poured out on Calvary in one historical mode. Given and poured out at the Last Supper in another mode unique to that occasion.
Three men died on Calvary that first Good Friday. One of them died a broken and despairing man. A second of the men we know as Saint Dismas, the Good Thief. The third man, Jesus, was God, the Eternal Word, come among us as Jesus precisely for this moment, to die, to show us what it means to love most perfectly in the unconditional trust and total self-giving of Jesus in His death on the Cross. This was the fulfillment of the promise made to Adam on behalf of all people. Jesus' death was His greatest love and His greatest glory (Jn 17: 5,6), an act of worship that won for Him the victory over sin and death in the experience of His predicted Resurrection three days later and the title of Redeemer of All Mankind.
The Title of this blog is 'From Jerusalem to Augusta and back... Those three dots indicate there is more. We have been in Jerusalem for the death of Jesus and the Last Supper. We have to come back to Augusta before we finish. We have identified the Last Supper with Calvary. It remains to identify the Sacrifice of the Mass that we experience here in Augusta at St. Mary on the Hill with the other two.
The infinite love of Jesus the Word of God was experienced and proclaimed as a unique experience, once and for all, in the naturally limited physical nature of the suffering of Jesus on the Cross (as one of us He had only so much to give and gave it all), and naturally limited as well by time and place in its historical mode ( in a certain hour on the hill of Calary). The experience of the Last Supper was also a once in a lifetime unique experience, never to be repeated in its historical mode. What made it so was the unique physical presence of Jesus at the table . The words spoken by Jesus over the bread and the wine at the Last Supper were spoken in the sound of His personal voice in the sight of His physical presence. The combination of these precise details would never occur again.
As the Last Supper was the experience of Calvary in a different mode so the experience of the Mass is the experience of the Last Supper in still a different mode. We refer to it as a Sacramental mode. In every experience in the Sacramental mode we have three elements, a reality that is signified in some tangible way, and a response by the person receiving the Sacrament. In reference to the Sacrifice of the Mass Calvary is the basic reality signified in the here and now by the the love and Sacramental presence of Jesus in the bread given and in the wine poured out and received by a believer in the Sacrament of Holy Communion.
This has been a long blog with a rich content that merits reflection upon it. I hope to share a few further insights that will be helpful in another blog 'tomorrow'....
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Blog # 298 Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord.
Blog #298 Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord
Years ago when I was an altar boy the title of our liturgical celebration the Sunday before Eater as far as I can remember was always simply Palm Sunday. In the recently published official edition of the Mass texts it is given a more complete title which identifies it further by reference to the Passion of the Lord. I was happy about this and chose the expanded title as the title of Blog # 298.
I did this in order to give myself an opportunity of sharing with you some important insights into the theological identity of the passion and death of Jesus that I feel may be unfamiliar to many. As I have come to understand, experience, and apply them, they have clarified for me more clearly than ever the theological nature of the events of Calvary, the 'last Supper' and the Mass, the relationship between these three, and the relationship all three have to the Sacrament of Baptism.
It seems to me for many people the primary and almost total goal of the sufferings and crucifixion of Jesus was to atone for sin. I remember from years ago in one of our theology classes in the seminary the question being asked whether death would have occurred in our human experience of life if sin had not occurred. It was a speculative question since sin did occur and continues to occur all over the world. No one could be sure of the answer to our speculative question if God would not have revealed it to us, but the experience of reflecting upon the question helped us identify and appreciate more fully the actual historical 'work' or goal of the Crucifixion and death of Jesus on behalf of all people throughout the world and down through history until the end of time. "There is no salvation in anyone else, for there is no other name in the whole world given to men by which we are to be saved." ( Acts 4:12).
My speculative answer to the speculative question back then in our theology class and carried on through the years was : Yes, death, or an experience equivalent to death, that God would provide,would have existed and would have been offered to every human person God would create even if sin had not occurred. Of course this experience would have been without the negative elements of the experience of death as we know it that can be ours with sin in the picture, such as the feelings of guilt, fear, the mystery and challenge of suffering, shame, etc. I found a clue to the solution of the question in seeing death as the unique opportunity it is of experiencing the perfect love of giving all that we have on earth in the instant we cross the border between life and death, not that we be conscious at that moment but that now in good health and full feedom we choose it according to God's plan for us and never negate that choice for the rest of our lives.
I will give just a few familiar texts here that have served as a background and basis for my further insight into the theological identity and goal of the Crucifixion.
"Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that all who believe may have eternal life in him." (Jn 3: 14, f). "When you lift up the Son of Man, you will come to realize that I AM and that I do nothing by myself...The One who sent me is with me. He has not deserted me since I always do what pleases him." ( Jn 8: 28 f). " Now has judgment come upon this world, now will this world's prince be driven out, and once I am lifted up from earth - will draw all men to myself." ( This statement indicated the sort of death he had to die.) (Jn 12: 32 f).
As part of the long discourse given by Jesus at the Last Supper, John has this: " I shall not go on speaking to you longer; the Prince of this world is at hand. He has no hold on me, but the world must know that I LOVE the Father and do as the Father has commanded me. Come,then! Let us be on our way." (Jn 14: 31). And He led the Apostles to Gethsemani and His arrest by the secular Roman Government.
Until fairly recently I used to refer to the experience of Jesus on the Cross as an example of perfect loving obedience, doing the will of the Father to the extreme of laying down His life. I saw that view as correct in recognizing the Crucifixion as both obedience and love , but now see it as incorrect in identifying the Crucifixion in its essence as obedience rather than as love, in other words with the emphasis on obedience rather than on love and in this way altering the nature of the experience. (Jn 14: 31).
The major consequential difference between these two ways of identifying the Crucifizion and death of Jesus may not be perfectly clear at first to all. Everything that Jesus thought, desired, spoke, or accomplished was done in obedience to the Father's will. All of these examples of obedience could be and were multiplied morning, noon, and night, day by day every moment of the life of Jesus on earth.
Everywhere, and always. The Crucifixion was also an act in
obedience to the Father's will.
But of its very nature it cannot be placed among and as equivalent to all the other acts of obedience Jesus performed. In other words, the Crucifixion was not just one act of obedience among many. To lay down one's life , the act of dying, is unique, once and for all, total. There is no competitor when it comes to other possible experiences. Jesus actually died on the Cross. The Eternal Word, equal to the Father and the Spirit, by force of the mystery of the Incarnation had become one of us,and given the name Jesus, was capable now of death as we are so capable.
He gave His life into the hands of His Father in the greatest love that has or ever will have touched the earth.
All the experiences of Jesus were done as an expression of His love for the Father. Obedience unites us one way or another to the authority giving the command we obey. Our personal motivation in choosing to be obedient at any one time could be fear, as for example I might choose to do my work in a factory in obedience to the boss for fear of losing my job. Or an elephant might do his series of tricks at a circus for the sake of the reward given him immediately afterward. The motivation may also be love but in the case of obedient love the object of our obedience, the what of a command, is not something external to us but within. If we were to receive a command to obey, the comand determines what we are to think say or do. If we were to receive a command to love, love determines the nature and extent of our obedience. In other words I can experience obedience without love but not genuine love without the will to obey.
The distinct unique love we have for God is referred to as worship. Worship is held for God alone because God, as the sole Creator of all that exists, deserves or is worthy of such love. The experience and proclamation of Jesus on the Cross, His unconditional trust and total love is clearly recognized as an act of worship.
Down through the ages from the first beginning of the story of creation, from Cain and Abel, the children of Adam and Eve, through Moses, and Abraham, in the selection and setting aside of the tribe of Levi as priests, the experience of sacrifice was designated and commanded by God as the official experience and sign the Chosen People received to experience and signify their unconditional trust and total love for their Creator.
The experience and proclamation of Jesus on the Cross fulfilled all of the conditions given in our theological definition of sacrifice: An offering to God alone by an official representative of the people with a change or destruction of what is offered in order to recognize, experience, signify and proclaim our unconditional trust, total love, and complete dependance upon our Creator.
The suffering and death of Jesus was an act of worship. All that went before was in preparation, by God's design, for this. As Jesus said explicitly of the law and the Prophets, He did not come to destroy them but to fulfill them. They led the way to Him. There never could be any greater love than His, that of the eternal Word, equal to the Father and the Spirit from all eternity now living among us as one of us without ceasing to be the Word, yet as one of us destined to die, giving willingly in faith all that He possessed on earth in obedience to the Father, in death. "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets. I have come not to abolish them, but to fulfill them.." (Mat 5: 17). "There is no greater love than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends." ( Jn 15:13).
The 'work' or goal of Good Friday was the Crucifixion, death, love, worship, fulfillment of a covenant. What has this to do with the Last Supper and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?
Check out Blog # 299.
7
Years ago when I was an altar boy the title of our liturgical celebration the Sunday before Eater as far as I can remember was always simply Palm Sunday. In the recently published official edition of the Mass texts it is given a more complete title which identifies it further by reference to the Passion of the Lord. I was happy about this and chose the expanded title as the title of Blog # 298.
I did this in order to give myself an opportunity of sharing with you some important insights into the theological identity of the passion and death of Jesus that I feel may be unfamiliar to many. As I have come to understand, experience, and apply them, they have clarified for me more clearly than ever the theological nature of the events of Calvary, the 'last Supper' and the Mass, the relationship between these three, and the relationship all three have to the Sacrament of Baptism.
It seems to me for many people the primary and almost total goal of the sufferings and crucifixion of Jesus was to atone for sin. I remember from years ago in one of our theology classes in the seminary the question being asked whether death would have occurred in our human experience of life if sin had not occurred. It was a speculative question since sin did occur and continues to occur all over the world. No one could be sure of the answer to our speculative question if God would not have revealed it to us, but the experience of reflecting upon the question helped us identify and appreciate more fully the actual historical 'work' or goal of the Crucifixion and death of Jesus on behalf of all people throughout the world and down through history until the end of time. "There is no salvation in anyone else, for there is no other name in the whole world given to men by which we are to be saved." ( Acts 4:12).
My speculative answer to the speculative question back then in our theology class and carried on through the years was : Yes, death, or an experience equivalent to death, that God would provide,would have existed and would have been offered to every human person God would create even if sin had not occurred. Of course this experience would have been without the negative elements of the experience of death as we know it that can be ours with sin in the picture, such as the feelings of guilt, fear, the mystery and challenge of suffering, shame, etc. I found a clue to the solution of the question in seeing death as the unique opportunity it is of experiencing the perfect love of giving all that we have on earth in the instant we cross the border between life and death, not that we be conscious at that moment but that now in good health and full feedom we choose it according to God's plan for us and never negate that choice for the rest of our lives.
I will give just a few familiar texts here that have served as a background and basis for my further insight into the theological identity and goal of the Crucifixion.
"Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that all who believe may have eternal life in him." (Jn 3: 14, f). "When you lift up the Son of Man, you will come to realize that I AM and that I do nothing by myself...The One who sent me is with me. He has not deserted me since I always do what pleases him." ( Jn 8: 28 f). " Now has judgment come upon this world, now will this world's prince be driven out, and once I am lifted up from earth - will draw all men to myself." ( This statement indicated the sort of death he had to die.) (Jn 12: 32 f).
As part of the long discourse given by Jesus at the Last Supper, John has this: " I shall not go on speaking to you longer; the Prince of this world is at hand. He has no hold on me, but the world must know that I LOVE the Father and do as the Father has commanded me. Come,then! Let us be on our way." (Jn 14: 31). And He led the Apostles to Gethsemani and His arrest by the secular Roman Government.
Until fairly recently I used to refer to the experience of Jesus on the Cross as an example of perfect loving obedience, doing the will of the Father to the extreme of laying down His life. I saw that view as correct in recognizing the Crucifixion as both obedience and love , but now see it as incorrect in identifying the Crucifixion in its essence as obedience rather than as love, in other words with the emphasis on obedience rather than on love and in this way altering the nature of the experience. (Jn 14: 31).
The major consequential difference between these two ways of identifying the Crucifizion and death of Jesus may not be perfectly clear at first to all. Everything that Jesus thought, desired, spoke, or accomplished was done in obedience to the Father's will. All of these examples of obedience could be and were multiplied morning, noon, and night, day by day every moment of the life of Jesus on earth.
Everywhere, and always. The Crucifixion was also an act in
obedience to the Father's will.
But of its very nature it cannot be placed among and as equivalent to all the other acts of obedience Jesus performed. In other words, the Crucifixion was not just one act of obedience among many. To lay down one's life , the act of dying, is unique, once and for all, total. There is no competitor when it comes to other possible experiences. Jesus actually died on the Cross. The Eternal Word, equal to the Father and the Spirit, by force of the mystery of the Incarnation had become one of us,and given the name Jesus, was capable now of death as we are so capable.
He gave His life into the hands of His Father in the greatest love that has or ever will have touched the earth.
All the experiences of Jesus were done as an expression of His love for the Father. Obedience unites us one way or another to the authority giving the command we obey. Our personal motivation in choosing to be obedient at any one time could be fear, as for example I might choose to do my work in a factory in obedience to the boss for fear of losing my job. Or an elephant might do his series of tricks at a circus for the sake of the reward given him immediately afterward. The motivation may also be love but in the case of obedient love the object of our obedience, the what of a command, is not something external to us but within. If we were to receive a command to obey, the comand determines what we are to think say or do. If we were to receive a command to love, love determines the nature and extent of our obedience. In other words I can experience obedience without love but not genuine love without the will to obey.
The distinct unique love we have for God is referred to as worship. Worship is held for God alone because God, as the sole Creator of all that exists, deserves or is worthy of such love. The experience and proclamation of Jesus on the Cross, His unconditional trust and total love is clearly recognized as an act of worship.
Down through the ages from the first beginning of the story of creation, from Cain and Abel, the children of Adam and Eve, through Moses, and Abraham, in the selection and setting aside of the tribe of Levi as priests, the experience of sacrifice was designated and commanded by God as the official experience and sign the Chosen People received to experience and signify their unconditional trust and total love for their Creator.
The experience and proclamation of Jesus on the Cross fulfilled all of the conditions given in our theological definition of sacrifice: An offering to God alone by an official representative of the people with a change or destruction of what is offered in order to recognize, experience, signify and proclaim our unconditional trust, total love, and complete dependance upon our Creator.
The suffering and death of Jesus was an act of worship. All that went before was in preparation, by God's design, for this. As Jesus said explicitly of the law and the Prophets, He did not come to destroy them but to fulfill them. They led the way to Him. There never could be any greater love than His, that of the eternal Word, equal to the Father and the Spirit from all eternity now living among us as one of us without ceasing to be the Word, yet as one of us destined to die, giving willingly in faith all that He possessed on earth in obedience to the Father, in death. "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets. I have come not to abolish them, but to fulfill them.." (Mat 5: 17). "There is no greater love than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends." ( Jn 15:13).
The 'work' or goal of Good Friday was the Crucifixion, death, love, worship, fulfillment of a covenant. What has this to do with the Last Supper and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass?
Check out Blog # 299.
7
Friday, March 22, 2013
Blog # 295 LENT - 2
Blog # 295 LENT - 2
Yesterday's Blog was long. Today's is short, just a few thoughts to help us get ready for the celebration of HOLY WEEK.
Let's try, as individual believers, and as a community of believers, to make the experience of Holy Week this year a very special one.
Try to put aside some time each day individually and as a family to reflect and pray about the events in the life of Jesus we will be celebrating. These events give shape to our religious experience as believing Christians.
As the sun, which shines for each of us as if there were no others, so Jesus came and lived and died for each of us as if there were no others. His life and love for each of us should be that close and personal.
We carry the palms, hear the story of His sufferings again, share the love of Calvary in the Eucharistic meal on Thursday, touch the wood of the Cross on Friday, experience the sorrow of the open and empty tabernacle during the hours Jesus lay in the tomb after the Crucifixion, and are blessed with the new Easter water which calls us back to our original Baptismal commitment of discipleship, faithfulness, and generous love.
Be blessed by it ! Let it be for you!
Yesterday's Blog was long. Today's is short, just a few thoughts to help us get ready for the celebration of HOLY WEEK.
Let's try, as individual believers, and as a community of believers, to make the experience of Holy Week this year a very special one.
Try to put aside some time each day individually and as a family to reflect and pray about the events in the life of Jesus we will be celebrating. These events give shape to our religious experience as believing Christians.
As the sun, which shines for each of us as if there were no others, so Jesus came and lived and died for each of us as if there were no others. His life and love for each of us should be that close and personal.
We carry the palms, hear the story of His sufferings again, share the love of Calvary in the Eucharistic meal on Thursday, touch the wood of the Cross on Friday, experience the sorrow of the open and empty tabernacle during the hours Jesus lay in the tomb after the Crucifixion, and are blessed with the new Easter water which calls us back to our original Baptismal commitment of discipleship, faithfulness, and generous love.
Be blessed by it ! Let it be for you!
Thursday, March 21, 2013
Blog # 294 Lent -1
Blog # 294 Lent - 1
'Today' on our liturgical calendar is labeled 'Thursday, Lent - week five'. We are far along on our journey to Holy Week and Easter 2013. It would be appropriate to ask how our observance of Lent is going. A text that I have found useful for some extended reflection is Philippians 3: 10. "I wish to know Christ and the power flowing from His Resurrection; likewise to know how to share in His sufferings by being formed into the pattern of His death. Thus do I hope that I may arrive at resurrection." I have coupled it with the opening prayer for the first Sunday of Lent: "Father, through our observance of Lent, help us to understand the meaning of Your Son's death and Resurrection, and teach us to reflect it in our lives."
"...through our observance of Lent...", whatever it is we decided that is different and special for us during the weeks in preparation for the official renewal of our Baptismal commitment this Easter, whether it be to spend more time in prayer, spiritual reading, rest, less time with TV, giving up smoking, getting enough exercise, or whatever it is, this we offer to You to make something happen for us believers, joined in faith with Your Son, Whom You love.
"... help us..." we know it would turn out better if You would do it all, without us, or maybe when we are asleep, but we also know that is not Your plan, so we ask Your help. Gifted as we are with faith and freedom we know it is our responsibility to discover and to live out Your will for us in Jesus, Your Son, each day.
"...help us understand..." If You had called us, Father, to be Your slaves or servants rather than Your children, it might have been more appropriate to have prayed to "know and carry out Your will" so You would not be angry with us or punish us for our failures and disobedience. But we know by faith You did not create us because You needed something to be done here on earth, and then. later on, if we qualify, more singers in Your choir in Heaven. No, it was rather that You created us because You loved us, even before we came to be. And so You wanted us to be as much like You as we could , so we could love You each in our own limited yet real and beautiful way.
So we know You wanted us to understand as far as we could what You were doing when in the beginning You created all that exists, and all that You are doing now in keeping it all, including ourselves, in existance, which measns in Your love. In praying for understanding we are praying to be more like You, Yes, Father, that is what You want for us. That is what we want. "Father, help us to understand..."
"...the meaning of Your Son's death..." What we are really asking for, dear Father, is faith. ANYONE who happened to be there on Calvary when Jesus died would have known WHAT happened. ANYONE would have known that He had been rejected and condemned for something or other, that He was in pain, and that He died. But ONLY A BELIEVER would have known WHY.
In asking for understanding we are asking why. We are asking for faith. We want to understand why it was Jesus referred to His death as His 'glory' rather than His glory being His miracles, prayer experiences, preaching, or any other thing that He did, all of which was according to Your will for Him.
Help us, Father, understand the several times in John's Gospel light is shined on the meaning of Calvary. In Jn 3:14: "Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that all who believe may have eternal life in Him". Jn 12: 32 f: "...and once I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all people to myself. (This statement indicated the sort of death He had to die.)" Jn 12: 23f: "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be GLORIFIED.. I solemnly assure you, unless the grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat. But if it dies, it produces much fruit." Jn 15: 13: "There is no greater LOVE than THIS: to lay down one's life for one's friends."
"...and Resurrection..." Help us. Father, to understand the meaning of the Resurrection. A danger is we think we know quite well what it means, but I wonder. If a person really knew, could he or she ever sin again? If we really knew would any of us ever be afraid of death or live in a way that was not preparing for and already participating by faith in our own calling forth by Your love into Eternal Life? Father, help us understand...
"...and teach us to reflect our understanding of the meaning of the death and Resurrection of Jesus in our lives..." This is Philippians again (3: 10). "I wish to know Christ and the power flowing from His Resurrection, likewise to know how to share in His sufferings BY BEING FORMED INTO THE PATTERN OF HIS DEATH. THUS do I hope that I may arrive at resurrection from the dead.
We are not asking here to suffer, but to love with a total love, no matter what!
Lent, 2013. What an opportunity! What a gift !
'Today' on our liturgical calendar is labeled 'Thursday, Lent - week five'. We are far along on our journey to Holy Week and Easter 2013. It would be appropriate to ask how our observance of Lent is going. A text that I have found useful for some extended reflection is Philippians 3: 10. "I wish to know Christ and the power flowing from His Resurrection; likewise to know how to share in His sufferings by being formed into the pattern of His death. Thus do I hope that I may arrive at resurrection." I have coupled it with the opening prayer for the first Sunday of Lent: "Father, through our observance of Lent, help us to understand the meaning of Your Son's death and Resurrection, and teach us to reflect it in our lives."
"...through our observance of Lent...", whatever it is we decided that is different and special for us during the weeks in preparation for the official renewal of our Baptismal commitment this Easter, whether it be to spend more time in prayer, spiritual reading, rest, less time with TV, giving up smoking, getting enough exercise, or whatever it is, this we offer to You to make something happen for us believers, joined in faith with Your Son, Whom You love.
"... help us..." we know it would turn out better if You would do it all, without us, or maybe when we are asleep, but we also know that is not Your plan, so we ask Your help. Gifted as we are with faith and freedom we know it is our responsibility to discover and to live out Your will for us in Jesus, Your Son, each day.
"...help us understand..." If You had called us, Father, to be Your slaves or servants rather than Your children, it might have been more appropriate to have prayed to "know and carry out Your will" so You would not be angry with us or punish us for our failures and disobedience. But we know by faith You did not create us because You needed something to be done here on earth, and then. later on, if we qualify, more singers in Your choir in Heaven. No, it was rather that You created us because You loved us, even before we came to be. And so You wanted us to be as much like You as we could , so we could love You each in our own limited yet real and beautiful way.
So we know You wanted us to understand as far as we could what You were doing when in the beginning You created all that exists, and all that You are doing now in keeping it all, including ourselves, in existance, which measns in Your love. In praying for understanding we are praying to be more like You, Yes, Father, that is what You want for us. That is what we want. "Father, help us to understand..."
"...the meaning of Your Son's death..." What we are really asking for, dear Father, is faith. ANYONE who happened to be there on Calvary when Jesus died would have known WHAT happened. ANYONE would have known that He had been rejected and condemned for something or other, that He was in pain, and that He died. But ONLY A BELIEVER would have known WHY.
In asking for understanding we are asking why. We are asking for faith. We want to understand why it was Jesus referred to His death as His 'glory' rather than His glory being His miracles, prayer experiences, preaching, or any other thing that He did, all of which was according to Your will for Him.
Help us, Father, understand the several times in John's Gospel light is shined on the meaning of Calvary. In Jn 3:14: "Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that all who believe may have eternal life in Him". Jn 12: 32 f: "...and once I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all people to myself. (This statement indicated the sort of death He had to die.)" Jn 12: 23f: "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be GLORIFIED.. I solemnly assure you, unless the grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat. But if it dies, it produces much fruit." Jn 15: 13: "There is no greater LOVE than THIS: to lay down one's life for one's friends."
"...and Resurrection..." Help us. Father, to understand the meaning of the Resurrection. A danger is we think we know quite well what it means, but I wonder. If a person really knew, could he or she ever sin again? If we really knew would any of us ever be afraid of death or live in a way that was not preparing for and already participating by faith in our own calling forth by Your love into Eternal Life? Father, help us understand...
"...and teach us to reflect our understanding of the meaning of the death and Resurrection of Jesus in our lives..." This is Philippians again (3: 10). "I wish to know Christ and the power flowing from His Resurrection, likewise to know how to share in His sufferings BY BEING FORMED INTO THE PATTERN OF HIS DEATH. THUS do I hope that I may arrive at resurrection from the dead.
We are not asking here to suffer, but to love with a total love, no matter what!
Lent, 2013. What an opportunity! What a gift !
Monday, March 11, 2013
Blog # 293 ...be HOLY
Blog # 293 ...be HOLY
During the past couple of days I have been reflecting upon what it means for us to be holy. In my concordance I found hundreds of references using the word holy. I did not have enough time to read them all. One in particular from Leviticus 11: 44 attracted my attention: "I the Lord, am your God and you shall make yourselves and keep yourselves holy because I am holy." My reflection had begun with a desire on my part to review and further clarify the meaning in our Catholic faith of what we know in theology as the gift of Sanctifying Grace, the supernatural gift that makes us holy.
The immediate reference in Leviticus is to the command of God for His people not to be contaminated by eating food that would be designated by God as "unclean". Through their obedience they would be uniting themselves with God's desire, an experience that fits very easily into the definition of love.
In Luke 6: 36 Jesus tells His disciples they are to "be merciful just as your Father is merciful". Then we have Jesus praying to the Father in John's Gospel ( 17: 20-23,26): " I pray that all may be one, as we are one...I living in them, you living in me...that their unity may be complete. So shall the world know that you
loved them as you loved me...To them I have revealed your name..so that your love for me may be in them, and I may live in them !". And in John 14:23 Jesus says: "Anyone who loves me will be true to my word, and my Father will love him; we will come to him and make our dwelling place with Him.: In our Catholic theology these and similar texts apply to the gift of Sanctifying Grace, a share in God's divine life in a limited and human way, making us holy and, given by God in the Sacrament of Baptism, lost or distorted by the betrayal of sin.
At the entrance of all our Catholic churches is a font of blessed water. It is intended to be a reminder of our Baptism to all of us coming into the church. Dipping our hand into the water and making the sign of the Cross is an invitation to renew our faith in the meaning and effect of our Baptism. Born in a deeply faithful family, my Baptism occurred when I was just three weeks old. Two of my cousins came with their families from the Bronx and from Brooklyn to be my Godparents.
As in the experience of my natural birth three weeks before, so now in the experience of my second birth 'from above', I had nothing to do with it but to be there. I could not buy it. It could not be earned. It was a gift, by nature something that could only be received. I was to receive the gift of new life, born from above, God's love within me, a gift that only God could offer. All I had to do was grow up and believe in it, to make God's love my own, to be holy, compassionate, merciful, loved as the Father loves Jesus, called and appointed to do God's will in union with Jesus for the rest of my life on earth and into eternity!
Though the sounds of in meant nothing to me that first day of my new-born life in Jesus, the priest said in Latin as he poured the water over my head: "Charles Matthew, I Baptize you in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." If he did it correctly he did not say "Amen", as we usually do whenever the Divine Persons come together in prayer. I have always interpreted this official omission of the Amen in the Baptismal rite as a deliberate choice on the part of the Church to offer the person being Baptized an invitation and opportunity of consciously and freely living out the new identity he or she receives through the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism as a member of the Church, a branch on the Vine, enlivened and made holy with the presence of our living God within us.
Amen means yes. At my present age, and starting at about the age of four or five I probably have responded to that call., unwittingly perhaps at times but yet really, a minimum of sixty thousand times!
Praying the Amen! of our Baptism could be compared to signing a contract with a manufacturing Company of a pro ball team, making a commitment to do a certain thing for the Company or the team, to keep myself up on the development of the business or to keep myself in the physical shape that will permit me to play the game the best I can. In response to my commitment, the Company or the team grant me identified benefits. The Baptismal Yes-prayer has power. In times of temptation, Help me. Lord. Amen! In times of joy, Thank You Lord, Amen! In times of sorrow, Be with me, Lord. Amen! In the morning, Amen! At the end of the day: Amen! At the final conscious act of my life and the instant of my death : I come to do Your will, O Lord. Amen!.
During the past couple of days I have been reflecting upon what it means for us to be holy. In my concordance I found hundreds of references using the word holy. I did not have enough time to read them all. One in particular from Leviticus 11: 44 attracted my attention: "I the Lord, am your God and you shall make yourselves and keep yourselves holy because I am holy." My reflection had begun with a desire on my part to review and further clarify the meaning in our Catholic faith of what we know in theology as the gift of Sanctifying Grace, the supernatural gift that makes us holy.
The immediate reference in Leviticus is to the command of God for His people not to be contaminated by eating food that would be designated by God as "unclean". Through their obedience they would be uniting themselves with God's desire, an experience that fits very easily into the definition of love.
In Luke 6: 36 Jesus tells His disciples they are to "be merciful just as your Father is merciful". Then we have Jesus praying to the Father in John's Gospel ( 17: 20-23,26): " I pray that all may be one, as we are one...I living in them, you living in me...that their unity may be complete. So shall the world know that you
loved them as you loved me...To them I have revealed your name..so that your love for me may be in them, and I may live in them !". And in John 14:23 Jesus says: "Anyone who loves me will be true to my word, and my Father will love him; we will come to him and make our dwelling place with Him.: In our Catholic theology these and similar texts apply to the gift of Sanctifying Grace, a share in God's divine life in a limited and human way, making us holy and, given by God in the Sacrament of Baptism, lost or distorted by the betrayal of sin.
At the entrance of all our Catholic churches is a font of blessed water. It is intended to be a reminder of our Baptism to all of us coming into the church. Dipping our hand into the water and making the sign of the Cross is an invitation to renew our faith in the meaning and effect of our Baptism. Born in a deeply faithful family, my Baptism occurred when I was just three weeks old. Two of my cousins came with their families from the Bronx and from Brooklyn to be my Godparents.
As in the experience of my natural birth three weeks before, so now in the experience of my second birth 'from above', I had nothing to do with it but to be there. I could not buy it. It could not be earned. It was a gift, by nature something that could only be received. I was to receive the gift of new life, born from above, God's love within me, a gift that only God could offer. All I had to do was grow up and believe in it, to make God's love my own, to be holy, compassionate, merciful, loved as the Father loves Jesus, called and appointed to do God's will in union with Jesus for the rest of my life on earth and into eternity!
Though the sounds of in meant nothing to me that first day of my new-born life in Jesus, the priest said in Latin as he poured the water over my head: "Charles Matthew, I Baptize you in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." If he did it correctly he did not say "Amen", as we usually do whenever the Divine Persons come together in prayer. I have always interpreted this official omission of the Amen in the Baptismal rite as a deliberate choice on the part of the Church to offer the person being Baptized an invitation and opportunity of consciously and freely living out the new identity he or she receives through the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism as a member of the Church, a branch on the Vine, enlivened and made holy with the presence of our living God within us.
Amen means yes. At my present age, and starting at about the age of four or five I probably have responded to that call., unwittingly perhaps at times but yet really, a minimum of sixty thousand times!
Praying the Amen! of our Baptism could be compared to signing a contract with a manufacturing Company of a pro ball team, making a commitment to do a certain thing for the Company or the team, to keep myself up on the development of the business or to keep myself in the physical shape that will permit me to play the game the best I can. In response to my commitment, the Company or the team grant me identified benefits. The Baptismal Yes-prayer has power. In times of temptation, Help me. Lord. Amen! In times of joy, Thank You Lord, Amen! In times of sorrow, Be with me, Lord. Amen! In the morning, Amen! At the end of the day: Amen! At the final conscious act of my life and the instant of my death : I come to do Your will, O Lord. Amen!.
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