The last chapter of the Book of the Prophet Hosea, the first reading for Mass today, is one of my favorite passages in the Bible. Hosea, under God’s direction, marries a harlot named Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim. God had said to Hosea, “Go again, love a woman who is beloved of a paramour and is an adulteress; even as the Lord loves the people of Israel, though they turn to other gods” (Hosea 3:1). Hosea is to do what God does: love an unfaithful wife. Each of us sins, and so we are an unfaithful wife to God, but that does not extinguish God’s love for us. God hates our sin and calls us back to Himself; when we turn back to Him through God’s unrelenting tenacity, “in that day, says the Lord, you will call me, ‘My husband’ ” (Hosea 2:16).
The final chapter of this amazing book of the Bible goes like this:
Thus says the LORD: return, O Israel, to the LORD, your God; you have collapsed through your guilt. Take with you words, and return to the LORD; say to him, “Forgive all iniquity, and receive what is good, that we may render as offerings the bullocks from our stalls. Assyria will not save us, nor shall we have horses to mount; we shall say no more, ‘Our god,’ to the work of our hands; for in you the orphan finds compassion.” I will heal their defection, says the LORD, I will love them freely; for my wrath is turned away from them. I will be like the dew for Israel: he shall blossom like the lily; he shall strike root like the Lebanon cedar, and put forth his shoots. His splendor shall be like the olive tree and his fragrance like the Lebanon cedar. Again they shall dwell in his shade and raise grain; they shall blossom like the vine, and his fame shall be like the wine of Lebanon. Ephraim! What more has he to do with idols? I have humbled him, but I will prosper him. “I am like a verdant cypress tree”– because of me you bear fruit! Let him who is wise understand these things; let him who is prudent know them. Straight are the paths of the LORD, in them the just walk, but sinners stumble in them (Hosea 14:2-10).
And so the words of the prophet come to an end. If we understand what he is saying here, according to him, we will have wisdom. What is that wisdom? It is primarily this: “I am like a verdant cypress tree—because of me you bear fruit!” The RSVCE states it as such: “I am like an evergreen cypress, from me comes your fruit.” God is merciful and forgiving, and He will forgive and heal us if we are humble and turn to Him. We will be destroyed if we persist in our disobedience and separation from Him. Turning to Him and giving ourselves entirely into His hands, we will become like a lily, an olive tree, a Lebanon cedar, a blossoming vine, and the wine of Lebanon, God is like a tree who is always green, and from Him comes our fruit.
God makes us fruitful. We bear fruit through God’s power and grace. This is true on at least two levels. On the one hand, God is the one who provides children, and on the other hand, He is also the one who gives us the grace to do anything good that we do. Bearing babies is one way we bear fruit, and the other way we bear fruit is through all the good that we do. Both are fruit, and they were symbolized by the two trees in the Garden of Eden: the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The tree of life symbolizes the heart which loves, trusts and obeys God; therefore, it is the tree which always does the good, and so it is united to God, the source of all life. The tree of knowledge of good and evil, according to my theory, is our power and ability to conceive children.
What we need to learn is, and where wisdom is found is in this passage here: God provides. He makes us fruitful. He is the source of life and children, and He is the source of goodness and every good action. In the Blessed Virgin Mary, these two forms of providing fruit are fulfilled. God makes Mary filled with His life and a plenitude of virtue and trust in Him; that trust in God within her heart is rewarded with the most exalted reality: God gave Mary His own Son to conceive, bear, and raise as her own Son. God provides life and virtue, and He provides His very own Son to be Mary’s Son.
What that means for you and me is that, on the one hand, we need to realize that anything good that we have ever, are doing, or will ever do is because God has given us the grace to do so. On the other hand, we need to realize that children are a gift from Him, and they are not to be shunned as a burden or sought after regardless of the means (i.e. in vitro fertilization) as if we had a right to them. We are to welcome and thank God for our gifts, both our virtues and our children.
God is Father. One of the primary roles of a father is to provide for his children. Unless we become like children, we cannot enter the kingdom of God because children are totally dependant upon their parents. God wants us to be totally dependant upon Him and upon His provision for us. This does not mean that He wants us to be childish or big babies. Parents don’t want their children to be helpless, hopeless, childish brats. We need to be strong and mature, all the while knowing that our strength and life and love come from Him. He wants us to trust Him, to cling to Him, to rely on Him for everything, to call Him “Father,” or “Abba” or “Dad.”
The danger of being “rich” in any way whether it is regarding money or fame, intelligence or abilities, beauty or health, family or friends, the danger of riches is that we tend to forget that we need God and that every good that we have is His gift. We are like the fickle, self-absorbed friend who only calls when he needs something; we tend to only remember Him when we are in trouble and we need something from God. No one likes to be treated like a sugar daddy or a slot machine or a fast food restaurant or a spa or an amusement park or an ATM machine or a witch doctor. God doesn’t let Himself be used like that for He isn’t an object for our use. He is a person (three to be exact), and He wants to be in the most intimate relationship with us; He is meant to be our husband, and so He is jealous for our love. He is the very best of husbands, and only in giving ourselves totally to Him are we truly happy and satisfied. Nothing else quenches the infinite longings of our soul because that is how He fashioned us. As Saint Augustine said, “You have made us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.”
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.26.2008
Jesus of Nazareth
I plan to work my way through Jesus of Nazareth by Pope Benedict XVI, formerly Joseph Ratzinger, published by Doubleday in 2007. Tonight I want to start by focusing on the last sentences of his introduction on page eight:
“The disciple who walks with Jesus is thus caught up with him into communion with God. And that is what redemption means: this stepping beyond the limits of human nature, which had been there as a possibility and an expectation in man, God’s image and likeness, since the moment of creation.”
Putting what the Pope says in my own words, I would say: Jesus is the Way by which we are united to God and have a relationship with Him. This union and friendship with God is what redemption is, for heaven itself is nothing other than being with God. Jesus enables us to go beyond the merely natural and be transported into the supernatural reality for which God created us. Being made in God’s image and likeness bespeaks the reality that God made us to be in relationship with Him.
What I find most interesting in this quote from our Holy Father is that he connects our communion with God to our being created in the image and likeness of God. That makes sense. It relates to what I say which is that being created in the image and likeness of God means that we are created to be God’s spouse and to have the deepest union with Him. Our two statements are not mutually exclusive; my statement is more specific and strongly stated.
The first chapter of the book is a reflection on the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. John is shocked that Jesus wants to be baptized by him, but Jesus replies to John saying, “Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness” (Matthew 3:15). The Pope reflects on Jesus’ words on page seventeen of his book:
“The key to interpreting Jesus’ answer is how we understand the word righteousness: The whole of righteousness must be fulfilled. In Jesus’ world, righteousness is man’s answer to the Torah, acceptance of the whole of God’s will, the bearing of the “yoke of God’s kingdom,” as one formulation had it. There is no provision for John’s baptism in the Torah, but this reply of Jesus is his way of acknowledging it as an expression of an unrestricted Yes to God’s will, as an obedient acceptance of his yoke.”
One is baptized then, in Jesus’ understanding, as an expression of an unrestricted Yes to the whole of God’s will and an obedient fulfillment of God’s commands. Pope Benedict says that the Eastern Church sees Jesus’ response here to John’s bewilderment as an anticipation of Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane: “My Father…not as I will, but as thou wilt.” Jesus is wholly given over to the will of His Heavenly Father, even unto death.
Today, when one is baptized, he enters into the death of Jesus, and he is given the very heart of Jesus which led Him to His faithful-unto-death self-offering. With Jesus’ heart within us, we are able to take on the impossible task of following and loving God and obeying His commands. We too are given the courage and spirit of sacrifice to say together with Jesus: “Not as I will, but as thou wilt.” The Eucharist is an extension and celebration of our baptism, and as such, the Eucharist is the new heart we need to be wholly given over to the will of God. Jesus frees us from our slavery to our own wills and makes it possible for us to follow and please God perfectly.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“The disciple who walks with Jesus is thus caught up with him into communion with God. And that is what redemption means: this stepping beyond the limits of human nature, which had been there as a possibility and an expectation in man, God’s image and likeness, since the moment of creation.”
Putting what the Pope says in my own words, I would say: Jesus is the Way by which we are united to God and have a relationship with Him. This union and friendship with God is what redemption is, for heaven itself is nothing other than being with God. Jesus enables us to go beyond the merely natural and be transported into the supernatural reality for which God created us. Being made in God’s image and likeness bespeaks the reality that God made us to be in relationship with Him.
What I find most interesting in this quote from our Holy Father is that he connects our communion with God to our being created in the image and likeness of God. That makes sense. It relates to what I say which is that being created in the image and likeness of God means that we are created to be God’s spouse and to have the deepest union with Him. Our two statements are not mutually exclusive; my statement is more specific and strongly stated.
The first chapter of the book is a reflection on the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. John is shocked that Jesus wants to be baptized by him, but Jesus replies to John saying, “Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness” (Matthew 3:15). The Pope reflects on Jesus’ words on page seventeen of his book:
“The key to interpreting Jesus’ answer is how we understand the word righteousness: The whole of righteousness must be fulfilled. In Jesus’ world, righteousness is man’s answer to the Torah, acceptance of the whole of God’s will, the bearing of the “yoke of God’s kingdom,” as one formulation had it. There is no provision for John’s baptism in the Torah, but this reply of Jesus is his way of acknowledging it as an expression of an unrestricted Yes to God’s will, as an obedient acceptance of his yoke.”
One is baptized then, in Jesus’ understanding, as an expression of an unrestricted Yes to the whole of God’s will and an obedient fulfillment of God’s commands. Pope Benedict says that the Eastern Church sees Jesus’ response here to John’s bewilderment as an anticipation of Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane: “My Father…not as I will, but as thou wilt.” Jesus is wholly given over to the will of His Heavenly Father, even unto death.
Today, when one is baptized, he enters into the death of Jesus, and he is given the very heart of Jesus which led Him to His faithful-unto-death self-offering. With Jesus’ heart within us, we are able to take on the impossible task of following and loving God and obeying His commands. We too are given the courage and spirit of sacrifice to say together with Jesus: “Not as I will, but as thou wilt.” The Eucharist is an extension and celebration of our baptism, and as such, the Eucharist is the new heart we need to be wholly given over to the will of God. Jesus frees us from our slavery to our own wills and makes it possible for us to follow and please God perfectly.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.25.2008
"Those Who Trust in You Cannot Be Put to Shame"
Tuesday’s first reading comes from the book of Daniel 3: 25, 34-43. Azariah (named Abednego by the Babylonian in charge of him) and two others from the tribe of Judah would not fall down and worship the false god King Nebuchadnezzar set up. For their punishment, they were thrown into the fiery furnace. While in the fiery furnace, Azariah stood up and prayed aloud:
“For your name’s sake, O Lord, do not deliver us up forever, or make void your covenant. Do not take away your mercy from us, for the sake of Abraham, your beloved, Isaac your servant, and Israel your holy one, to whom you promised to multiply their offspring like the stars of heaven, or the sand on the shore of the sea. For we are reduced, O Lord, beyond any other nation, brought low everywhere in the world this day because of our sins. We have in our day no prince, prophet, or leader, no burnt offering, sacrifice, oblation, or incense, no place to offer first fruits, to find favor with you. But with contrite heart and humble spirit let us be received; as though it were burnt offerings of rams and bullocks, or thousands of fat lambs, so let our sacrifice be in your presence today as we follow you unreservedly; for those who trust in you cannot be put to shame. And now we follow you with our whole heart, we fear you and we pray to you. Do not let us be put to shame, but deal with us in your kindness and great mercy. Deliver us by your wonders, and bring glory to your name, O Lord.”
Surely this is an extremely heartfelt and urgent prayer showing forth the beauty of the heart that trusts in God. Let’s examine this prayer a bit. The beginning asks for God’s mercy as He remembers His covenants with the patriarchs, and then it moves to acknowledging his sins and the sins of God’s people. In their present state, both he and God’s people have nothing of sacrifices to offer God, nor have they a leader to draw them closer to Him.
The heart of the prayer is in the center: even though we have sinned and have nothing for leadership or in the way of sacrifices, we do have humble, contrite hearts which, entirely trusting in God, follow Him without reserve. Azariah prays to God that He might accept his sacrifice of following God with his whole heart in place of burnt offerings and sacrifices which were usually offered. He ends his prayer seeking God’s kindness and great mercy to deliver them from their ever-present and all-consuming ordeal.
The story ends with God delivering the three young men from the fiery furnace. Once again, the centrality and immense importance of the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God above all things is shown forth clearly. We have God’s life in our souls when our heart completely trusts God and follows Him in all things; it is the tree of life, and there is no other. God desires us to have such a heart beating within the walls of our rib cage, and His plan is to give us that heart, Jesus’ heart pierced on the cross and resurrected to new life, in the Holy Eucharist. That is what the Eucharist is, and, as such, it is our tree of life which enables us to love, trust and obey God in all things and at all times, so that we too may offer ourselves as living sacrifices upon the Calvary of our life.
On another, related note, the gospel today, Matthew 18: 21-35, is powerful. It is hitting home with me in new and more powerful ways; on my retreat, it was one of the main themes that was running through my mind. God has been and is so merciful to me on countless occasions, and how little am I merciful to those indebted to me. May I have God’s mercy in my heart to those in my debt.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“For your name’s sake, O Lord, do not deliver us up forever, or make void your covenant. Do not take away your mercy from us, for the sake of Abraham, your beloved, Isaac your servant, and Israel your holy one, to whom you promised to multiply their offspring like the stars of heaven, or the sand on the shore of the sea. For we are reduced, O Lord, beyond any other nation, brought low everywhere in the world this day because of our sins. We have in our day no prince, prophet, or leader, no burnt offering, sacrifice, oblation, or incense, no place to offer first fruits, to find favor with you. But with contrite heart and humble spirit let us be received; as though it were burnt offerings of rams and bullocks, or thousands of fat lambs, so let our sacrifice be in your presence today as we follow you unreservedly; for those who trust in you cannot be put to shame. And now we follow you with our whole heart, we fear you and we pray to you. Do not let us be put to shame, but deal with us in your kindness and great mercy. Deliver us by your wonders, and bring glory to your name, O Lord.”
Surely this is an extremely heartfelt and urgent prayer showing forth the beauty of the heart that trusts in God. Let’s examine this prayer a bit. The beginning asks for God’s mercy as He remembers His covenants with the patriarchs, and then it moves to acknowledging his sins and the sins of God’s people. In their present state, both he and God’s people have nothing of sacrifices to offer God, nor have they a leader to draw them closer to Him.
The heart of the prayer is in the center: even though we have sinned and have nothing for leadership or in the way of sacrifices, we do have humble, contrite hearts which, entirely trusting in God, follow Him without reserve. Azariah prays to God that He might accept his sacrifice of following God with his whole heart in place of burnt offerings and sacrifices which were usually offered. He ends his prayer seeking God’s kindness and great mercy to deliver them from their ever-present and all-consuming ordeal.
The story ends with God delivering the three young men from the fiery furnace. Once again, the centrality and immense importance of the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God above all things is shown forth clearly. We have God’s life in our souls when our heart completely trusts God and follows Him in all things; it is the tree of life, and there is no other. God desires us to have such a heart beating within the walls of our rib cage, and His plan is to give us that heart, Jesus’ heart pierced on the cross and resurrected to new life, in the Holy Eucharist. That is what the Eucharist is, and, as such, it is our tree of life which enables us to love, trust and obey God in all things and at all times, so that we too may offer ourselves as living sacrifices upon the Calvary of our life.
On another, related note, the gospel today, Matthew 18: 21-35, is powerful. It is hitting home with me in new and more powerful ways; on my retreat, it was one of the main themes that was running through my mind. God has been and is so merciful to me on countless occasions, and how little am I merciful to those indebted to me. May I have God’s mercy in my heart to those in my debt.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
The Four Rivers are the Tree of Life and the Heart
The woman at the well was the gospel yesterday. One further point that I have not developed much in this blog but which is very important in what I am saying is that there is a very strong connection between the living waters and the heart and that connection goes way back to the very beginning of the creation of man. Let’s look back at this original connection that occurs in the creation account:
“And out of the ground the LORD God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which flows around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one which flows around the whole land of Cush. And the name of the third river is Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to till it and keep it” (Genesis 2: 9-15).
The very first mention of the tree of life in the Bible is immediately followed by this passage about the singular river which breaks into four different rivers. Rivers work in the exact opposite manner: many rivers become one great or mighty river. Here in Genesis, however, one river becomes many rivers. This description of an unnatural river is the symbolic representation and clue about what the tree of life is. The tree of life is mentioned, and it is followed by its symbolic description so that we may better know what the tree of life is.
As I have said in previous posts, the Garden of Eden is not so much a place as the man and the woman; Eden means delight, and we are God’s garden of delight. He created us for Himself and to bear much fruit. He made us to be His children, His temple, and His bride. From Him comes our life and our fruit. This life was lost through sin, but Jesus comes to restore our relationship with God and so that we may have life and have it abundantly.
The two trees of the garden singled out are two abilities God has given us; the tree of life is the heart and its ability to love, trust and obey God. God then symbolizes the heart with the one river which flows into four rivers because our one heart is divided into four chambers which are connected to the four sections of “rivers” bringing differently equipped blood all around our bodies. Oxygenated blood is pumped out of our heart to our entire body and is taken back to our heart to be pumped to the lungs which oxygenate it and send it back to the heart afresh to be pumped out all over again. Four chambers are needed to accomplish this life-giving and life-sustaining task.
Earlier this winter my children and I were playing in our front yard and digging a tunnel in our six-foot high mountain of snow from the driveway. Toward the end when I was getting worn out, I lay back on the snow looking up at the two large, leafless Elm trees which dominate the front, and I noticed that, from the ground up, there is a resemblance between trees and the circulatory system. Physically, they look somewhat similar, in my opinion, and how fluid moves in both the circulatory system and a tree is also very similar. In the circulatory system, the life-giving oxygenated blood is transported throughout the body through its “rivers,” but it only provides that life and oxygen at the very end of the line in the capillary system; likewise, the “blood” within a tree is circulated with in by its “rivers,” but the exchange of life and oxygen only takes place at the very end of the line in the leaves. Leaves and the capillary system themselves look very much alike, and in them both take place the exchange of life.
So why is the heart called the tree of life? Well, looking at the human body and focusing on the circulatory system, we look much like trees, and the circulatory system and trees operate in a number of similar ways. We are like trees. Throughout the Old Testament, in fact, we are compared to trees many times, and even in the New Testament there are connections and symbolisms between humans and trees.
The tree of life is the four rivers of water, and those four rivers of water symbolize the heart. Here we have the connection between the heart and living/flowing waters. The most important reason why the heart is the tree of life is that the only way we have spiritual life is by loving, trusting and obeying God, and these good actions are matters of the heart. With a good heart doing what it was made to do, we will have abundant life. Just as the heart is the center of the circulatory system, so our heart is the center of our spiritual life and our relationship with God and others. In the end, we will be judged on how much we loved.
The exchange of life happens in the smallest parts of an organism: the exchange of life in a tree is in the leaves, the exchange of life in our bodies is in the capillary system, the exchange of life in our spiritual lives is in living our ordinary life well. Being faithful and trusting in the small and little ways of our ordinary life is where God meets us and forges us into saints. Relationships consist and are built up with a myriad of little events and ordinary occurrences that further cement and strengthen the connection and union of people; our relationship with God is no different. When we fulfill our deepest desires with the only One capable of doing so, our whole life changes and becomes His. To this person Jesus says, “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’ ” (John 7: 37-38). Our thirst for happiness and meaning is fulfilled and quenched only in Jesus, and being thus quenched with the life of God, our heart itself becomes a life-giving font of water and joy. We become other Christs who spread the truth and life who is Jesus.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“And out of the ground the LORD God made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food, the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A river flowed out of Eden to water the garden, and there it divided and became four rivers. The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which flows around the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is good; bdellium and onyx stone are there. The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one which flows around the whole land of Cush. And the name of the third river is Tigris, which flows east of Assyria. And the fourth river is the Euphrates. The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to till it and keep it” (Genesis 2: 9-15).
The very first mention of the tree of life in the Bible is immediately followed by this passage about the singular river which breaks into four different rivers. Rivers work in the exact opposite manner: many rivers become one great or mighty river. Here in Genesis, however, one river becomes many rivers. This description of an unnatural river is the symbolic representation and clue about what the tree of life is. The tree of life is mentioned, and it is followed by its symbolic description so that we may better know what the tree of life is.
As I have said in previous posts, the Garden of Eden is not so much a place as the man and the woman; Eden means delight, and we are God’s garden of delight. He created us for Himself and to bear much fruit. He made us to be His children, His temple, and His bride. From Him comes our life and our fruit. This life was lost through sin, but Jesus comes to restore our relationship with God and so that we may have life and have it abundantly.
The two trees of the garden singled out are two abilities God has given us; the tree of life is the heart and its ability to love, trust and obey God. God then symbolizes the heart with the one river which flows into four rivers because our one heart is divided into four chambers which are connected to the four sections of “rivers” bringing differently equipped blood all around our bodies. Oxygenated blood is pumped out of our heart to our entire body and is taken back to our heart to be pumped to the lungs which oxygenate it and send it back to the heart afresh to be pumped out all over again. Four chambers are needed to accomplish this life-giving and life-sustaining task.
Earlier this winter my children and I were playing in our front yard and digging a tunnel in our six-foot high mountain of snow from the driveway. Toward the end when I was getting worn out, I lay back on the snow looking up at the two large, leafless Elm trees which dominate the front, and I noticed that, from the ground up, there is a resemblance between trees and the circulatory system. Physically, they look somewhat similar, in my opinion, and how fluid moves in both the circulatory system and a tree is also very similar. In the circulatory system, the life-giving oxygenated blood is transported throughout the body through its “rivers,” but it only provides that life and oxygen at the very end of the line in the capillary system; likewise, the “blood” within a tree is circulated with in by its “rivers,” but the exchange of life and oxygen only takes place at the very end of the line in the leaves. Leaves and the capillary system themselves look very much alike, and in them both take place the exchange of life.
So why is the heart called the tree of life? Well, looking at the human body and focusing on the circulatory system, we look much like trees, and the circulatory system and trees operate in a number of similar ways. We are like trees. Throughout the Old Testament, in fact, we are compared to trees many times, and even in the New Testament there are connections and symbolisms between humans and trees.
The tree of life is the four rivers of water, and those four rivers of water symbolize the heart. Here we have the connection between the heart and living/flowing waters. The most important reason why the heart is the tree of life is that the only way we have spiritual life is by loving, trusting and obeying God, and these good actions are matters of the heart. With a good heart doing what it was made to do, we will have abundant life. Just as the heart is the center of the circulatory system, so our heart is the center of our spiritual life and our relationship with God and others. In the end, we will be judged on how much we loved.
The exchange of life happens in the smallest parts of an organism: the exchange of life in a tree is in the leaves, the exchange of life in our bodies is in the capillary system, the exchange of life in our spiritual lives is in living our ordinary life well. Being faithful and trusting in the small and little ways of our ordinary life is where God meets us and forges us into saints. Relationships consist and are built up with a myriad of little events and ordinary occurrences that further cement and strengthen the connection and union of people; our relationship with God is no different. When we fulfill our deepest desires with the only One capable of doing so, our whole life changes and becomes His. To this person Jesus says, “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’ ” (John 7: 37-38). Our thirst for happiness and meaning is fulfilled and quenched only in Jesus, and being thus quenched with the life of God, our heart itself becomes a life-giving font of water and joy. We become other Christs who spread the truth and life who is Jesus.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.24.2008
Our Daily Bread: the Source of Holiness
A few days ago I reflected on Jesus’ encounter with and words to the Samaritan woman at the well; toward the end of that event, Jesus tells the apostles that his food is to do the will of him who sent him and to finish his work. Today, the third Sunday of Lent, the gospel is the entire passage of the Samaritan woman at the well.
I have been pondering this passage more where Jesus tells his apostles what His food is, and that made me think of the Our Father prayer He teaches them. In that prayer, I think the only prayer He teaches as recorded in Scripture, He says, “Give us each day our daily bread” (Luke 11:3). In the singular prayer we have from Jesus, He does not teach us to pray for tomorrow’s bread. We only pray for the bread for today. There is no retirement account for this bread. The same was true for the manna in the wilderness; it vanished after a day, so no matter how much one gathered in a day, it would not be there for tomorrow. Each day they gathered it in a new. The one exception to that was on the Sabbath; they did not gather on that day. They would gather a double portion on Friday which would last them through Saturday.
In a similar manner, we can not store up our prayers seeking the bread of today for tomorrow. Each and every day we must pray for that bread. What is this daily bread? Certainly, Jesus wants us to rely upon Him for all our physical needs and to thank Him for all of our overflowing blessings. The more significant and life-changing bread that we pray for each day is God’s life in us; to have life and live it abundantly, we need to have a deep communion with God wherein we put on the mind of Christ and conform our wills to His. He dwells in us and we dwell in Him. For this sharing of our lives together with our Merciful Father, we need to pray each day as Jesus showed us.
Thinking about this word “daily,” I looked to see where else this word is used in the New Testament and checked it in the Greek to make sure it is the same word (καθʼ ἡμέραν). One of the places it is also used is two chapters earlier in Luke where Jesus says: “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels” Luke 9:23-26.
Jesus tells us to take up our cross daily. We are to pray each day for our daily bread, and we are to take up our cross daily. Is there a connection between these two, our daily bread and our daily cross? I think there is. For you and me to be willing to lose our life, to lose the world, to take up our cross, we have to be filled with God’s life. Unless we are fully alive and entirely given over into the hands of our Savior, we aren’t going to be able to give up everything. The only motivation strong enough to do such a seemingly crazy thing is that God has won over our hearts and we trust Him fully with all that we have and with all that we will need in the future. To take up our daily cross, we must have our daily bread.
Another instance of the use of “daily” is found in the other writings of Saint Luke. In the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles when the Church is just getting off the ground, Luke uses the word “daily” (καθʼ ἡμέραν) twice in a short passage: “And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2: 46-47).
With glad, generous hearts, the disciples gathered daily for their bread, and daily the number of disciples increased. Earlier, I mentioned the connection between daily bread and being able to carry one’s daily cross. Here, the daily bread is what is the impetus and source for growth in the Church. Daily bread can simply be God’s grace that He showers down upon us for strength for the day, but it is most completely the Holy Eucharist itself. Jesus Himself, the True Bread from Heaven, is the perfect daily bread. When we gladly and generously give ourselves to Him when we receive Him in the Holy Eucharist, then we are able to carry our daily cross and then we will be fruitful personally; partly because our holiness is attractive and partly because God provides the fruit, our faithful and worthy reception of the Eucharist brings others into the Church as well.
The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life (Lumen Gentium #11): it is our daily bread which gives us strength to carry our daily cross and which bears much fruit, especially with the expansion and growth of the Church. As the second Eucharistic Prayer states right before the epiclesis, “Lord, you are holy indeed, the fountain of all holiness.” The fountain of grace God has established is the Eucharist; as it says in today’s gospel, it is the gift of God and the source of living water. All that we need for life and sanity, for hope and trust, for generosity and self-sacrifice, is found in the Eucharist: the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ. The Eucharist is the very Love Exploding Heart of Christ which poured itself out completely for you and me, and with that heart within us, we have life and we can carry our cross and we will bear much fruit.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
I have been pondering this passage more where Jesus tells his apostles what His food is, and that made me think of the Our Father prayer He teaches them. In that prayer, I think the only prayer He teaches as recorded in Scripture, He says, “Give us each day our daily bread” (Luke 11:3). In the singular prayer we have from Jesus, He does not teach us to pray for tomorrow’s bread. We only pray for the bread for today. There is no retirement account for this bread. The same was true for the manna in the wilderness; it vanished after a day, so no matter how much one gathered in a day, it would not be there for tomorrow. Each day they gathered it in a new. The one exception to that was on the Sabbath; they did not gather on that day. They would gather a double portion on Friday which would last them through Saturday.
In a similar manner, we can not store up our prayers seeking the bread of today for tomorrow. Each and every day we must pray for that bread. What is this daily bread? Certainly, Jesus wants us to rely upon Him for all our physical needs and to thank Him for all of our overflowing blessings. The more significant and life-changing bread that we pray for each day is God’s life in us; to have life and live it abundantly, we need to have a deep communion with God wherein we put on the mind of Christ and conform our wills to His. He dwells in us and we dwell in Him. For this sharing of our lives together with our Merciful Father, we need to pray each day as Jesus showed us.
Thinking about this word “daily,” I looked to see where else this word is used in the New Testament and checked it in the Greek to make sure it is the same word (καθʼ ἡμέραν). One of the places it is also used is two chapters earlier in Luke where Jesus says: “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels” Luke 9:23-26.
Jesus tells us to take up our cross daily. We are to pray each day for our daily bread, and we are to take up our cross daily. Is there a connection between these two, our daily bread and our daily cross? I think there is. For you and me to be willing to lose our life, to lose the world, to take up our cross, we have to be filled with God’s life. Unless we are fully alive and entirely given over into the hands of our Savior, we aren’t going to be able to give up everything. The only motivation strong enough to do such a seemingly crazy thing is that God has won over our hearts and we trust Him fully with all that we have and with all that we will need in the future. To take up our daily cross, we must have our daily bread.
Another instance of the use of “daily” is found in the other writings of Saint Luke. In the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles when the Church is just getting off the ground, Luke uses the word “daily” (καθʼ ἡμέραν) twice in a short passage: “And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (Acts 2: 46-47).
With glad, generous hearts, the disciples gathered daily for their bread, and daily the number of disciples increased. Earlier, I mentioned the connection between daily bread and being able to carry one’s daily cross. Here, the daily bread is what is the impetus and source for growth in the Church. Daily bread can simply be God’s grace that He showers down upon us for strength for the day, but it is most completely the Holy Eucharist itself. Jesus Himself, the True Bread from Heaven, is the perfect daily bread. When we gladly and generously give ourselves to Him when we receive Him in the Holy Eucharist, then we are able to carry our daily cross and then we will be fruitful personally; partly because our holiness is attractive and partly because God provides the fruit, our faithful and worthy reception of the Eucharist brings others into the Church as well.
The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life (Lumen Gentium #11): it is our daily bread which gives us strength to carry our daily cross and which bears much fruit, especially with the expansion and growth of the Church. As the second Eucharistic Prayer states right before the epiclesis, “Lord, you are holy indeed, the fountain of all holiness.” The fountain of grace God has established is the Eucharist; as it says in today’s gospel, it is the gift of God and the source of living water. All that we need for life and sanity, for hope and trust, for generosity and self-sacrifice, is found in the Eucharist: the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ. The Eucharist is the very Love Exploding Heart of Christ which poured itself out completely for you and me, and with that heart within us, we have life and we can carry our cross and we will bear much fruit.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.21.2008
We are "The One and Only Bride of Christ"
Today in my Magnificat the meditation of the day is from Saint Peter Damian, a doctor of the Catholic Church who died in 1072. What he says has some application to what I am saying; I will quote some of it. This selection comes from pages 111-112 of A Word in Season, Readings for the Liturgy of the Hours, volume V.
“The Church of Christ is united by a bond of mutual love so strong that not only is it a single entity subsisting in many members, but in each member it is also mysteriously present in its plenitude. So it is that the entire universal Church is rightly said to be the one and only bride of Christ, and each person, through the mystery of the sacrament, is believed to be the Church in its fullness. One in all and entire in each, holy Church is single in the plurality of its members thanks to the unity of faith, and manifold in each of them thanks to the bond of charity and the diversity of charisms, for they all come from One.”
What I understand Saint Peter Damian to be saying is that the Church is one Body with many members, as Saint Paul says, and the Church is also present in Her fullness in each of Her members. The part that I don’t remember hearing before is that the Church is present in each of Her members; I had thought something like that, but I don’t remember ever reading it. If you and I, as members of the Church, bear within ourselves the plenitude of the Church, could what is said of the Church, in some sense, be said of us?
Since the “entire universal Church is rightly said to be the one and only bride of Christ,” could it not also be said that each of us participates in that one spousal relationship with Him? The highest level of prayer and the spiritual life is called mystical marriage or mystical union with God; in prayer, the endpoint is to become the spouse of Christ, and this we already know, especially from the works of Saint John of the Cross and Saint Theresa of Avila. The Catholic Church also teaches that all are called to be holiness, that there is a universal call to holiness. There is no holiness without a deep communion with God in prayer, so in some sense, it could be said that there is a universal call to contemplation and to its fulfillment: mystical marriage.
One of the pillars of my theory is that God made us to be His spouse. When, in the very first chapter of the Bible in Genesis 1:26, we were made in the image and likeness of God, since every other living creature was made according to its own likeness and kind for reproduction and we were not made according to our own likeness and kind but in the likeness of God, that passage is saying that we were created to be the spouse of God. It is in our mystical union with Him that we bear much good fruit. We see this best lived out in the Blessed Virgin Mary who was so closely united to God and trusted in Him above all else, that she bore the best possible fruit, the very Son of God, and she did so virginally as a pure gift from God Himself.
How great a dignity we have; we are indeed temples of the Holy Spirit; God lives and dwells within us; when we foster that relationship with God and give ourselves to Him more and more each day, our mind, heart and will more closely conform to His; the more we become like Him, the more able we are to receive Him and His life; having removed all attachments to sin and created realities from our souls and desiring to please only Him, we approach the deepest spiritual union with God; it is in this that we become the bride of Christ as an individual, participating in the life and reality of the singular bride of Christ, the Catholic Church.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“The Church of Christ is united by a bond of mutual love so strong that not only is it a single entity subsisting in many members, but in each member it is also mysteriously present in its plenitude. So it is that the entire universal Church is rightly said to be the one and only bride of Christ, and each person, through the mystery of the sacrament, is believed to be the Church in its fullness. One in all and entire in each, holy Church is single in the plurality of its members thanks to the unity of faith, and manifold in each of them thanks to the bond of charity and the diversity of charisms, for they all come from One.”
What I understand Saint Peter Damian to be saying is that the Church is one Body with many members, as Saint Paul says, and the Church is also present in Her fullness in each of Her members. The part that I don’t remember hearing before is that the Church is present in each of Her members; I had thought something like that, but I don’t remember ever reading it. If you and I, as members of the Church, bear within ourselves the plenitude of the Church, could what is said of the Church, in some sense, be said of us?
Since the “entire universal Church is rightly said to be the one and only bride of Christ,” could it not also be said that each of us participates in that one spousal relationship with Him? The highest level of prayer and the spiritual life is called mystical marriage or mystical union with God; in prayer, the endpoint is to become the spouse of Christ, and this we already know, especially from the works of Saint John of the Cross and Saint Theresa of Avila. The Catholic Church also teaches that all are called to be holiness, that there is a universal call to holiness. There is no holiness without a deep communion with God in prayer, so in some sense, it could be said that there is a universal call to contemplation and to its fulfillment: mystical marriage.
One of the pillars of my theory is that God made us to be His spouse. When, in the very first chapter of the Bible in Genesis 1:26, we were made in the image and likeness of God, since every other living creature was made according to its own likeness and kind for reproduction and we were not made according to our own likeness and kind but in the likeness of God, that passage is saying that we were created to be the spouse of God. It is in our mystical union with Him that we bear much good fruit. We see this best lived out in the Blessed Virgin Mary who was so closely united to God and trusted in Him above all else, that she bore the best possible fruit, the very Son of God, and she did so virginally as a pure gift from God Himself.
How great a dignity we have; we are indeed temples of the Holy Spirit; God lives and dwells within us; when we foster that relationship with God and give ourselves to Him more and more each day, our mind, heart and will more closely conform to His; the more we become like Him, the more able we are to receive Him and His life; having removed all attachments to sin and created realities from our souls and desiring to please only Him, we approach the deepest spiritual union with God; it is in this that we become the bride of Christ as an individual, participating in the life and reality of the singular bride of Christ, the Catholic Church.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.20.2008
Eat the Tree of Life
The first reading from Jeremiah 17:5-10 is one of those perfect readings that harmonizes so well with my theory. I will quote it here in full:
“Thus says the LORD: Cursed is the man who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the LORD. He is like a barren bush in the desert that enjoys no change of season, but stands in a lava waste, a salt and empty earth. Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose hope is the LORD. He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: it fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; in the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit. More tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it? I, the LORD, alone probe the mind and test the heart, to reward everyone according to his ways, according to the merit of his deeds.”
The first line of this passage is exactly, according to my theory, what the man and the woman did in the garden. They trusted in themselves and the strength of their flesh as their heart turned away from God and trusted in the serpent. My theory, which I have mentioned multiple times on this site, is that God made man to be His spouse. He created the first man and woman and gave them a test of faith.
He told them to be fruitful and multiply and then told them to remain virgins, to not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This doesn’t seem to make sense. God told them to forgo the highest of the natural goods to obtain the highest of the supernatural goods; He wanted them to give up (sexual) marriage to a human being to obtain marriage to Himself; He asked them to give up the good and holy image of union with God (marital intimacy) to obtain the very thing itself: complete union with God forever in heaven in never ending bliss. Desiring to fulfill God’s command to be fruitful and multiply, they took matters into their own hands, trusted in themselves and their reproductive powers, distrusted God’s singular prohibition, and had marital relations.
They immediately realize they are naked and hide from God; their punishments revolve around bearing children and planting bad seed; the very first thing the man does after the punishments is re-name his wife. Now that she has conceived from the very first sin, she is no longer just woman, she is a mother. She has become a new reality, and so the man names her Eve, mother of all the living. The child she wanted and now conceived is Cain; when he is born, she names him “gotten,” i.e. Cain.
Back to Jeremiah, those who trust in man receive barrenness and death, and that is what the man and woman received: Cain the murderer. On the other hand, he who trusts and hopes in the Lord is fully alive. He is a tree planted next to the stream whose leaves stay alive in any condition and still bears fruit. It doesn’t matter how little rain falls, the tree is close to the stream, and so it receives all the water it needs. The tree flourishes and bears fruit because it trusts in God.
The tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. The heart that trusts God has its roots deeply inside God, the source of all life. The trusting, obedient heart is the conduit for receiving God’s life, for being in communion with Him; therefore, since it is the means by which we stay connected to God, the heart is the tree of life: a heart united to God is united to Life.
The passage continues: “More tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it?” The heart is the location of the battle which determines where we will spend eternity. When a heart doesn’t trust, nothing, other than a miracle of God’s grace, can help it trust. All our actions, all our deeds, flow from the abundance within our hearts. If our heart is full of disobedience and suspicion toward God, we will do all sorts of evil deeds; if our heart trusts Him and longs to please Him in all we do, then of course we will most always do what is good. The passage concludes: “I, the LORD, alone probe the mind and test the heart, to reward everyone according to his ways, according to the merit of his deeds.” Our deeds matter and decide our eternity because they reveal what is in our heart. In the end, all that matters is that we love, trust and obey God—that we eat of the tree of life.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“Thus says the LORD: Cursed is the man who trusts in human beings, who seeks his strength in flesh, whose heart turns away from the LORD. He is like a barren bush in the desert that enjoys no change of season, but stands in a lava waste, a salt and empty earth. Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose hope is the LORD. He is like a tree planted beside the waters that stretches out its roots to the stream: it fears not the heat when it comes, its leaves stay green; in the year of drought it shows no distress, but still bears fruit. More tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it? I, the LORD, alone probe the mind and test the heart, to reward everyone according to his ways, according to the merit of his deeds.”
The first line of this passage is exactly, according to my theory, what the man and the woman did in the garden. They trusted in themselves and the strength of their flesh as their heart turned away from God and trusted in the serpent. My theory, which I have mentioned multiple times on this site, is that God made man to be His spouse. He created the first man and woman and gave them a test of faith.
He told them to be fruitful and multiply and then told them to remain virgins, to not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. This doesn’t seem to make sense. God told them to forgo the highest of the natural goods to obtain the highest of the supernatural goods; He wanted them to give up (sexual) marriage to a human being to obtain marriage to Himself; He asked them to give up the good and holy image of union with God (marital intimacy) to obtain the very thing itself: complete union with God forever in heaven in never ending bliss. Desiring to fulfill God’s command to be fruitful and multiply, they took matters into their own hands, trusted in themselves and their reproductive powers, distrusted God’s singular prohibition, and had marital relations.
They immediately realize they are naked and hide from God; their punishments revolve around bearing children and planting bad seed; the very first thing the man does after the punishments is re-name his wife. Now that she has conceived from the very first sin, she is no longer just woman, she is a mother. She has become a new reality, and so the man names her Eve, mother of all the living. The child she wanted and now conceived is Cain; when he is born, she names him “gotten,” i.e. Cain.
Back to Jeremiah, those who trust in man receive barrenness and death, and that is what the man and woman received: Cain the murderer. On the other hand, he who trusts and hopes in the Lord is fully alive. He is a tree planted next to the stream whose leaves stay alive in any condition and still bears fruit. It doesn’t matter how little rain falls, the tree is close to the stream, and so it receives all the water it needs. The tree flourishes and bears fruit because it trusts in God.
The tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. The heart that trusts God has its roots deeply inside God, the source of all life. The trusting, obedient heart is the conduit for receiving God’s life, for being in communion with Him; therefore, since it is the means by which we stay connected to God, the heart is the tree of life: a heart united to God is united to Life.
The passage continues: “More tortuous than all else is the human heart, beyond remedy; who can understand it?” The heart is the location of the battle which determines where we will spend eternity. When a heart doesn’t trust, nothing, other than a miracle of God’s grace, can help it trust. All our actions, all our deeds, flow from the abundance within our hearts. If our heart is full of disobedience and suspicion toward God, we will do all sorts of evil deeds; if our heart trusts Him and longs to please Him in all we do, then of course we will most always do what is good. The passage concludes: “I, the LORD, alone probe the mind and test the heart, to reward everyone according to his ways, according to the merit of his deeds.” Our deeds matter and decide our eternity because they reveal what is in our heart. In the end, all that matters is that we love, trust and obey God—that we eat of the tree of life.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
Each of Us is the Woman at the Well
I have been meditating on John 4 the past several days. At the beginning of this chapter, Jesus is passing through Samaria on His way to Galilee when He stops to rest at the city’s well about noon. A woman comes there to get some water, and Jesus, being thirsty, asks her for a drink. She is stupefied by the fact that a Jewish man is talking with her, and He replies, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water” (John 4:10).
Wells in the Old Testament were the places that the patriarchs often met the woman they would marry, so there is a marital undertone throughout this passage by the well of Jacob. The Samaritans were some of the most hated people to the Jews since they were the unfaithful remnant of the ten northern tribes of Israel after they had been mostly wiped out by Assyria in 722 B.C. and partially repopulated with foreigners. Samaria, for the most part, was what was left of Israel while the Jews remained strong down south in Judea. The Jews and Samaritans simply didn’t talk to one another if they could help it.
So here was Jesus, a Jew, talking to a Samaritan and a woman at that. She could not believe it. Jesus tells her that if she knew that she was speaking to God, and if she knew the good gifts God wants to give, she would ask Him to give her living water. She asks Him how He is going to get the water, and He responds, “…whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14). Jesus doesn’t answer her question, but He further clarifies the water He is talking about: the living water that He gives becomes in the one who receives it a spring of water which leads to eternal life.
The conversation moves toward the woman’s husband; she currently has no husband. She has had five, and the one she is with now, she has not married. This has a double meaning since the Samaritans had had five rulers, or husbands, too. Both the woman and the Samaritans were looking for ultimate, lasting happiness in their husbands, but they had not found it. Now Jesus, True Husband of Souls, meets her at the place of meeting a spouse, and offers to give her His life which we call grace and which is symbolized by living water.
His disciples come back from going to buy food and are amazed that Jesus is talking to this woman. The woman left her water jar to go and tell other Samaritans that she had found the Christ. “Meanwhile the disciples besought him, saying, ‘Rabbi, eat.’ But he said to them, ‘I have food to eat of which you do not know.’ So the disciples said to one another, ‘Has any one brought him food?’ Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work’ ” (John 4:31-34).
This is the passage I want to look at most closely. When Jesus says to His disciples, “I have food to eat of which you do not know,” He is making a linguistic reference back to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life. Jesus has food to eat of which they do not know, and in a similar manner, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was not to be eaten: in both instances, there is food and not knowing or not eating. Jesus refers to the tree of life when He says, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work.” The tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God; in other words, it is to do the will of God and accomplish the task given by Him.
The Samaritan woman at the well, unfaithful and sinful, symbolizes every one of us. Even though we are unworthy, Jesus is thirsty and seeks us out. He thirsts for our love, and asks us for a drink; He asks us: “Will you marry me?” On our own, we have nothing to give Him, but we can ask Him, and He will pour out His life into our hearts, making them springs of living water. In the middle of each day as we go about our mundane tasks, Jesus asks us if we will satisfy His thirst. We do so when we give our entire self to Him in love and trust and do what He commands, even and especially in the little ways.
Jesus seeks to be our husband and to give us the gift of God, which is God’s very life. To receive this most awesome gift, we have to ask for it just as the Samaritan woman did. Jesus is eager to give His life to us if we ask Him for it; He does not force His life upon us. When we receive His life in our souls, it becomes a spring of living water and leads us to eternal life.
A while later, Jesus went back to Jerusalem for the feast of Tabernacles and said the same thing that He had said to the woman at the well. “On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and proclaimed, ‘If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’ ’ ” (John 7: 37-38). When we love, trust, and obey God, our heart becomes a tree of life which flows with living water and bears fruit ever month of the year.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
Wells in the Old Testament were the places that the patriarchs often met the woman they would marry, so there is a marital undertone throughout this passage by the well of Jacob. The Samaritans were some of the most hated people to the Jews since they were the unfaithful remnant of the ten northern tribes of Israel after they had been mostly wiped out by Assyria in 722 B.C. and partially repopulated with foreigners. Samaria, for the most part, was what was left of Israel while the Jews remained strong down south in Judea. The Jews and Samaritans simply didn’t talk to one another if they could help it.
So here was Jesus, a Jew, talking to a Samaritan and a woman at that. She could not believe it. Jesus tells her that if she knew that she was speaking to God, and if she knew the good gifts God wants to give, she would ask Him to give her living water. She asks Him how He is going to get the water, and He responds, “…whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14). Jesus doesn’t answer her question, but He further clarifies the water He is talking about: the living water that He gives becomes in the one who receives it a spring of water which leads to eternal life.
The conversation moves toward the woman’s husband; she currently has no husband. She has had five, and the one she is with now, she has not married. This has a double meaning since the Samaritans had had five rulers, or husbands, too. Both the woman and the Samaritans were looking for ultimate, lasting happiness in their husbands, but they had not found it. Now Jesus, True Husband of Souls, meets her at the place of meeting a spouse, and offers to give her His life which we call grace and which is symbolized by living water.
His disciples come back from going to buy food and are amazed that Jesus is talking to this woman. The woman left her water jar to go and tell other Samaritans that she had found the Christ. “Meanwhile the disciples besought him, saying, ‘Rabbi, eat.’ But he said to them, ‘I have food to eat of which you do not know.’ So the disciples said to one another, ‘Has any one brought him food?’ Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work’ ” (John 4:31-34).
This is the passage I want to look at most closely. When Jesus says to His disciples, “I have food to eat of which you do not know,” He is making a linguistic reference back to the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life. Jesus has food to eat of which they do not know, and in a similar manner, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was not to be eaten: in both instances, there is food and not knowing or not eating. Jesus refers to the tree of life when He says, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me, and to accomplish his work.” The tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God; in other words, it is to do the will of God and accomplish the task given by Him.
The Samaritan woman at the well, unfaithful and sinful, symbolizes every one of us. Even though we are unworthy, Jesus is thirsty and seeks us out. He thirsts for our love, and asks us for a drink; He asks us: “Will you marry me?” On our own, we have nothing to give Him, but we can ask Him, and He will pour out His life into our hearts, making them springs of living water. In the middle of each day as we go about our mundane tasks, Jesus asks us if we will satisfy His thirst. We do so when we give our entire self to Him in love and trust and do what He commands, even and especially in the little ways.
Jesus seeks to be our husband and to give us the gift of God, which is God’s very life. To receive this most awesome gift, we have to ask for it just as the Samaritan woman did. Jesus is eager to give His life to us if we ask Him for it; He does not force His life upon us. When we receive His life in our souls, it becomes a spring of living water and leads us to eternal life.
A while later, Jesus went back to Jerusalem for the feast of Tabernacles and said the same thing that He had said to the woman at the well. “On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and proclaimed, ‘If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water’ ’ ” (John 7: 37-38). When we love, trust, and obey God, our heart becomes a tree of life which flows with living water and bears fruit ever month of the year.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.18.2008
Ratzinger: the Cross and Eucharist=the Tree of Life
This weekend I went on my yearly silent retreat with Opus Dei, and that is why I haven’t written anything these past several days. While on the retreat, I read a short book that consists of four homilies during lent that Pope Benedict XVI gave back before he was pope or even the prefect for the Doctrine of the Faith. He gave the lectures during lent in 1981, right before he was the prefect (at least I don’t think he was just yet). Ratzinger didn’t publish them for five years; the edition I read was from 1995 and is titled: ‘In the Beginning…’ A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall.
One of the overriding themes of these homilies is that the belief that God created the world is extremely important to properly understanding not only ourselves, but reality and the Faith itself. I am not going to summarize the reasons for this, at least not tonight. I assume this point in everything I write, and it was encouraging to know that, hopefully, I can do a small part to lead others to re-examine the creation account. In the beginning of the preface of the book, Ratzinger laments how “…the creation account is noticeably and nearly completely absent from catechesis, preaching, and even theology.” That was true when he preached these homilies in 1981. “Since then, from the perspective of my new work [as prefect], the critical state of the creation theme in the present-day kerygma has become so much more evident that I now feel pressed to bring out the old manuscripts again and prepare them for printing.” That is why he published them five years later and created the book I read this weekend.
I want to quote at length his conclusion to his forth homily:
“Thus Christ is the new Adam, with whom humankind begins anew….The cross, the place of obedience, is the true tree of life. Christ is the antitype of the serpent, as is indicated in John 3:14. From this tree there comes not the word of temptation but that of redeeming love, the word of obedience, which an obedient God himself used, thus offering us his obedience as a context for freedom. The cross is the tree of life, now become approachable….Therefore the Eucharist, as the presence of the cross, is the abiding tree of life, which is ever in our midst and ever invites us to take the fruit of true life….To receive it, to eat of the tree of life, thus means to receive the crucified Lord and consequently to accept the parameters of his life, his obedience, his ‘yes,’ the standard of our creatureliness. It means to accept the love of God, which is our truth—that dependence on God which is no more an imposition from without than is the Son’s sonship. It is precisely this dependence that is freedom, because it is truth and love.”
Of course, I love this quote; I do because it resonates so well with much of what I have been saying. For someone who only desires to write within the context of Catholicism, in the strict sense of the word, having the Pope say some of the very same things is sweet music to my ears. I am glad that I found this quote this weekend; I plan to work my way through the Pope’s most recent book, Jesus of Nazareth, so I can see what else he says that may resonate with what I am saying. Isn’t his next book coming out soon, too?
At the same time, what I am saying is only in part what the Pope is saying. I say that the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God is the tree of life, and that that is the way it was from the beginning with the man and the woman in the garden. Their hearts trusted in Satan and his wisdom, and so they brought death into the world for themselves and all their descendants. The problem with us then, is that we have hard hearts, hearts that trust in themselves, rely upon their own power, turn away from God, are disobedient and in love with self and the good things of this world. We need hearts of flesh that love, trust and obey God in all things, at all times, and against all difficulties even unto death. We receive that loving and self-sacrificing heart of flesh at Baptism when we are united to Christ in His death and resurrections; being united to Jesus, we receive His very heart which was crucified and pierced; every Eucharist is a celebration of our Baptism wherein we receive that Heart of Christ, crucified and risen. With such a heart, we are able to fully and truly love, trust and obey God. That is the awesome gift we receive at every Eucharist, but it is up to us to open the present and use it. Nothing less than sanctity awaits us when we take the heart of Jesus given to us and make it our own.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
One of the overriding themes of these homilies is that the belief that God created the world is extremely important to properly understanding not only ourselves, but reality and the Faith itself. I am not going to summarize the reasons for this, at least not tonight. I assume this point in everything I write, and it was encouraging to know that, hopefully, I can do a small part to lead others to re-examine the creation account. In the beginning of the preface of the book, Ratzinger laments how “…the creation account is noticeably and nearly completely absent from catechesis, preaching, and even theology.” That was true when he preached these homilies in 1981. “Since then, from the perspective of my new work [as prefect], the critical state of the creation theme in the present-day kerygma has become so much more evident that I now feel pressed to bring out the old manuscripts again and prepare them for printing.” That is why he published them five years later and created the book I read this weekend.
I want to quote at length his conclusion to his forth homily:
“Thus Christ is the new Adam, with whom humankind begins anew….The cross, the place of obedience, is the true tree of life. Christ is the antitype of the serpent, as is indicated in John 3:14. From this tree there comes not the word of temptation but that of redeeming love, the word of obedience, which an obedient God himself used, thus offering us his obedience as a context for freedom. The cross is the tree of life, now become approachable….Therefore the Eucharist, as the presence of the cross, is the abiding tree of life, which is ever in our midst and ever invites us to take the fruit of true life….To receive it, to eat of the tree of life, thus means to receive the crucified Lord and consequently to accept the parameters of his life, his obedience, his ‘yes,’ the standard of our creatureliness. It means to accept the love of God, which is our truth—that dependence on God which is no more an imposition from without than is the Son’s sonship. It is precisely this dependence that is freedom, because it is truth and love.”
Of course, I love this quote; I do because it resonates so well with much of what I have been saying. For someone who only desires to write within the context of Catholicism, in the strict sense of the word, having the Pope say some of the very same things is sweet music to my ears. I am glad that I found this quote this weekend; I plan to work my way through the Pope’s most recent book, Jesus of Nazareth, so I can see what else he says that may resonate with what I am saying. Isn’t his next book coming out soon, too?
At the same time, what I am saying is only in part what the Pope is saying. I say that the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God is the tree of life, and that that is the way it was from the beginning with the man and the woman in the garden. Their hearts trusted in Satan and his wisdom, and so they brought death into the world for themselves and all their descendants. The problem with us then, is that we have hard hearts, hearts that trust in themselves, rely upon their own power, turn away from God, are disobedient and in love with self and the good things of this world. We need hearts of flesh that love, trust and obey God in all things, at all times, and against all difficulties even unto death. We receive that loving and self-sacrificing heart of flesh at Baptism when we are united to Christ in His death and resurrections; being united to Jesus, we receive His very heart which was crucified and pierced; every Eucharist is a celebration of our Baptism wherein we receive that Heart of Christ, crucified and risen. With such a heart, we are able to fully and truly love, trust and obey God. That is the awesome gift we receive at every Eucharist, but it is up to us to open the present and use it. Nothing less than sanctity awaits us when we take the heart of Jesus given to us and make it our own.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.14.2008
My First Poem: Offered Back
(Other poems)
Offered Back
Love began the flame within the fragile cells.
Love, too, completed the Love began, in nourishing womb.
Husband and wife, united, made into the perfect body of one,
An image of the Perfect Triune Body of One
Presented with the new creation--the new born babe.
In this Love, I AM embraces this chalice
Freshly fashioned, radiating being.
The molded golden handle bulb--its heart
Living to be held...by Him.
The reflecting receiving concave belly--its mind, its soul
Living to be filled...with HIm.
Like an eagle fledgling floundering in cliff-hung nest
Pushed out to fly, to live
Tumbling, follows not its guardinas in flight
Looking away, follows the pull
Insatiably darkly driven insensible.
Thirsting chalice, numb, leaves home, prostitutes itself
Corrupt hands unable to hold, to draw near
Dry tasteless drink unable to fill, to satisfy and sustain
Clang! Happening hard upon frozen stone, violated and broken.
Shattering into its world the Shepherd finds this chalice,
Holding it close to the Loving Pierced Heart,
Reality penetrating eyes know its every construction.
Deep, dirty, disjointed dings destroy the dance
Gouges and scrapes scathingly show sustaining
Deathly emptiness, stark cold lonely nakedness
Once poured over, twice poured over, thrice poured over
Washed in pure water, cleansed by the bath.
Grime regrasps its gauche grip, holding to fester
Particles hiding, hibernating in the caves.
Mercy Infinite, Love Exploding, hands of light drudge deep
Polishing till perfection, holy and without blemish.
Rest is given, new wine poured in.
Both united--Him holding its heart with Pierrced Palms
Living within each other--it holding the Bleeding Wine
Chalice breathing Blood, Blood breathing Life.
This lost chalice is now His chalice.
Through Him, With Him, In Him, offered back to I AM.
I began this poem while in pain on my bed as a freshman at the Franciscan University of Steubenville after a serious ankle sprain playing basketball. I worked on it for some time and turned it in for my poetry class. The next year, I took it out again and worked on it some more. I revised it and published it in the university's literary magazine, which, for that year, was entitled "Offered Back" after this poem.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
Offered Back
Love began the flame within the fragile cells.
Love, too, completed the Love began, in nourishing womb.
Husband and wife, united, made into the perfect body of one,
An image of the Perfect Triune Body of One
Presented with the new creation--the new born babe.
In this Love, I AM embraces this chalice
Freshly fashioned, radiating being.
The molded golden handle bulb--its heart
Living to be held...by Him.
The reflecting receiving concave belly--its mind, its soul
Living to be filled...with HIm.
Like an eagle fledgling floundering in cliff-hung nest
Pushed out to fly, to live
Tumbling, follows not its guardinas in flight
Looking away, follows the pull
Insatiably darkly driven insensible.
Thirsting chalice, numb, leaves home, prostitutes itself
Corrupt hands unable to hold, to draw near
Dry tasteless drink unable to fill, to satisfy and sustain
Clang! Happening hard upon frozen stone, violated and broken.
Shattering into its world the Shepherd finds this chalice,
Holding it close to the Loving Pierced Heart,
Reality penetrating eyes know its every construction.
Deep, dirty, disjointed dings destroy the dance
Gouges and scrapes scathingly show sustaining
Deathly emptiness, stark cold lonely nakedness
Once poured over, twice poured over, thrice poured over
Washed in pure water, cleansed by the bath.
Grime regrasps its gauche grip, holding to fester
Particles hiding, hibernating in the caves.
Mercy Infinite, Love Exploding, hands of light drudge deep
Polishing till perfection, holy and without blemish.
Rest is given, new wine poured in.
Both united--Him holding its heart with Pierrced Palms
Living within each other--it holding the Bleeding Wine
Chalice breathing Blood, Blood breathing Life.
This lost chalice is now His chalice.
Through Him, With Him, In Him, offered back to I AM.
I began this poem while in pain on my bed as a freshman at the Franciscan University of Steubenville after a serious ankle sprain playing basketball. I worked on it for some time and turned it in for my poetry class. The next year, I took it out again and worked on it some more. I revised it and published it in the university's literary magazine, which, for that year, was entitled "Offered Back" after this poem.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.13.2008
Will You Marry Me? Poem
Interestingly, one of the main ways people find their way to my blog is by looking for a “Will You Marry Me?” poem on a search engine, usually google. I suppose that is because I have posted a few poems and my blog has as part of its name: will you marry me. I feel bad that these people usually don’t find what they are looking for when they visit here. On the eve of Valentine’s Day, it seems more people than usual are looking for such a poem as they prepare to pop the question. I’ve wanted to provide some sort of engagement poem here for some time, and with tomorrow’s celebration, it seems a good time to compose such a poem; I write it from a man’s point of view.
Keeper of My Heart, Keeper of My Life, Will You Be My...
My heart has found a home in your care
Your gentle and firm hands receive it well
And make it better and more true to tell
You inspire it with your vibrant flair.
With the keeping of my heart I want to say
That I want to be your protector and your sure stay
I want to lay down my life for love of you
Pouring myself out each day as the sun’s radiant hue.
You make my heart sing and give me life
With my heart in your hands, Will you be my wife?
I want to be yours till the day I die
Will you be mine, too, may I be your guy?
I am down on my knees and humbly beseech
That you be the keeper of my life
And my only cherished peach
Will you be mine, will you be my wife?
Let’s journey together on our way home
Let’s make a home together open to God’s gifts
That at the end of our journey we may not roam
But be taken to heaven where there are no rifts.
Will you be my wife and the center of my life
Except for God who is always number one
His name is Jesus, God’s only Son
Together we journey to Him through all life’s strife.
Well, you can’t say I didn’t try. It’s a first draft done in about twenty minutes. Feel free to use it and/or modify it to your needs. It is generic and a bit sappy, I fear. If it is too good, she may think you didn’t write it, right? This is just bad enough for her to think that you wrote it; of course, you wouldn’t want to deceive her, so you would have to modify it to take any credit for it. Or, you could just blame it on me; I mean give me the credit. Happy Valentine’s Day!
For a Bible passage that reflects some of what is in my poem, read this from Proverbs 31:
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
Keeper of My Heart, Keeper of My Life, Will You Be My...
My heart has found a home in your care
Your gentle and firm hands receive it well
And make it better and more true to tell
You inspire it with your vibrant flair.
With the keeping of my heart I want to say
That I want to be your protector and your sure stay
I want to lay down my life for love of you
Pouring myself out each day as the sun’s radiant hue.
You make my heart sing and give me life
With my heart in your hands, Will you be my wife?
I want to be yours till the day I die
Will you be mine, too, may I be your guy?
I am down on my knees and humbly beseech
That you be the keeper of my life
And my only cherished peach
Will you be mine, will you be my wife?
Let’s journey together on our way home
Let’s make a home together open to God’s gifts
That at the end of our journey we may not roam
But be taken to heaven where there are no rifts.
Will you be my wife and the center of my life
Except for God who is always number one
His name is Jesus, God’s only Son
Together we journey to Him through all life’s strife.
Well, you can’t say I didn’t try. It’s a first draft done in about twenty minutes. Feel free to use it and/or modify it to your needs. It is generic and a bit sappy, I fear. If it is too good, she may think you didn’t write it, right? This is just bad enough for her to think that you wrote it; of course, you wouldn’t want to deceive her, so you would have to modify it to take any credit for it. Or, you could just blame it on me; I mean give me the credit. Happy Valentine’s Day!
For a Bible passage that reflects some of what is in my poem, read this from Proverbs 31:
When one finds a worthy wife,
her value is far beyond pearls.
Her husband, entrusting his heart to her,
has an unfailing prize.
She brings him good, and not evil,
all the days of her life.
She obtains wool and flax
and works with loving hands.
She puts her hands to the distaff,
and her fingers ply the spindle.
She reaches out her hands to the poor,
and extends her arms to the needy.
Charm is deceptive and beauty fleeting;
the woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.
Give her a reward for her labors,
and let her works praise her at the city gates.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.12.2008
God's Word Makes Our Heart Flow with Living Water
The first reading today in the Mass was a short one and came from Isaiah 55: 10-11. Here it is:
“Thus says the LORD: Just as from the heavens the rain and snow come down and do not return there till they have watered the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, giving seed to the one who sows and bread to the one who eats, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.”
Although this is such a short passage, the context surrounding this little one is packed with awesome passages that resonate very well with my theory. I’ll have to unpack these chapters more on another occasion; for now, I will begin to explore this passage and two short sentences right before this one.
The two other passages I want to highlight are 54:5 where it says, “For your Maker is your husband,” and 55:1 which states, “Ho, every one who thirsts, come to the waters.” I bring up these two because these two themes, the husband and water, are the two themes of today’s reading. Rain and snow come from heaven and water the earth making it fertile; in the same way God’s word comes from heaven and waters the earth, making it fruitful. Water makes the earth fruitful. God’s word makes the earth fruitful.
How is a woman made fruitful? It is her husband who pours out his “water” so that she can bear fruit. In that sense, the husband makes the wife fruitful through water. God is our husband, but He is not so in a sexual sense. God pours out His Word to us in order that it accomplishes what He desires—our fruitfulness. How are we fruitful? We are fruitful when our tree of life is alive. How is our tree of life alive? It is alive when we have a heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. When we love, trust and obey God, we bear good fruit for Him, and He is our Husband.
How do we receive God’s Word in an effective manner? We do so by opening wide our hearts to Him to do whatever He asks of us. The responsorial psalm today says, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; and those who are crushed in spirit he saves” (Psalm 34:19). Those who are humble, those whose hearts turn from their sin and turn back to God, those who are grieved that they hurt God who loves them so much, those who want to share in the sufferings of Christ and be a self-sacrificing lover, these are the ones who have a heart open to God to receive His Word and bear much fruit. Yes, these are the ones; he is the one who believes in Jesus, and “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38). When we open our hearts to God, He fills our hearts with His water so that out of our very own hearts, rivers of living water flow.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“Thus says the LORD: Just as from the heavens the rain and snow come down and do not return there till they have watered the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, giving seed to the one who sows and bread to the one who eats, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I sent it.”
Although this is such a short passage, the context surrounding this little one is packed with awesome passages that resonate very well with my theory. I’ll have to unpack these chapters more on another occasion; for now, I will begin to explore this passage and two short sentences right before this one.
The two other passages I want to highlight are 54:5 where it says, “For your Maker is your husband,” and 55:1 which states, “Ho, every one who thirsts, come to the waters.” I bring up these two because these two themes, the husband and water, are the two themes of today’s reading. Rain and snow come from heaven and water the earth making it fertile; in the same way God’s word comes from heaven and waters the earth, making it fruitful. Water makes the earth fruitful. God’s word makes the earth fruitful.
How is a woman made fruitful? It is her husband who pours out his “water” so that she can bear fruit. In that sense, the husband makes the wife fruitful through water. God is our husband, but He is not so in a sexual sense. God pours out His Word to us in order that it accomplishes what He desires—our fruitfulness. How are we fruitful? We are fruitful when our tree of life is alive. How is our tree of life alive? It is alive when we have a heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. When we love, trust and obey God, we bear good fruit for Him, and He is our Husband.
How do we receive God’s Word in an effective manner? We do so by opening wide our hearts to Him to do whatever He asks of us. The responsorial psalm today says, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; and those who are crushed in spirit he saves” (Psalm 34:19). Those who are humble, those whose hearts turn from their sin and turn back to God, those who are grieved that they hurt God who loves them so much, those who want to share in the sufferings of Christ and be a self-sacrificing lover, these are the ones who have a heart open to God to receive His Word and bear much fruit. Yes, these are the ones; he is the one who believes in Jesus, and “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7:38). When we open our hearts to God, He fills our hearts with His water so that out of our very own hearts, rivers of living water flow.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.10.2008
The Temptation of Christ was the Temptation of Adam
Tonight is the three month anniversary of my blog’s launch; technically, I started it late at night on the ninth, but I did not really put anything in my first post other than that I was going to start writing. I started writing on the tenth. This is my 83rd post in these past 90 days or so, and it has been much fun for me. One of the main reasons I had not written before was that I was simply too busy with life; that hasn’t changed. In order to write, I just get less sleep. Most of my writing takes place late at night; I try to finish before midnight, but it is usually sometime after when I can actually hit the hay. Since I love it, even though I wish I were doing a much better job of it, it is not difficult to keep going. Thanks to all the people who keep me and my writing in your prayers.
What better readings could there be today for this first Sunday in Lent for my three month anniversary! The first reading talks about the tree of life, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the Fall itself. I will reprint the whole thing here. I usually use the RSCVE Bible, but of course the Mass readings are using the NAB; it will be interesting to compare the two. It comes from Genesis 2:7-9 & 3:1-7:
The LORD God formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being. Then the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and placed there the man whom he had formed. Out of the ground the LORD God made various trees grow that were delightful to look at and good for food, with the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the LORD God had made. The serpent asked the woman, “Did God really tell you not to eat from any of the trees in the garden?” The woman answered the serpent: “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; it is only about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, ‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is evil.” The woman saw that the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
One thing I like about this translation is that the various trees God plants in the garden are delightful to look at and good for food. The word Eden means delight, and the trees planted there are delightful. That makes sense. Part of my theory is that the Garden of Eden is not so much a place as it is the man and woman themselves; the garden refers to them and to their bodies. The trees refer to all of their abilities and powers as humans. God created us good, and how we are created is beautiful. Our bodies are beautiful, and our abilities are beautiful; in an unfallen state, we were perfectly harmonious and in order; we would not die or get sick; our will and intellect and body worked together toward one good common goal; all was well, and all was beautiful. We are still created good and beautiful, yet we are disordered and tend toward the evil; it is a battle to choose the good. It is a battle not to be selfish and not to forget about God. It is a battle not say, My will be done.
The two most important delightful trees, which are in the middle of the garden, are the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. My theory is that the tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is our ability to have marital relations and conceive children. Since God had put us on earth but made us for heaven, and since He gave the man and the woman to each other as spouses but made us to be married to Him forever in heaven, He told the man and the woman not to have relations.
He asked them to forgo the greatest of this world’s blessings as a sacrificial test and trial of faith in order be given a child by God directly, virginally, and so also be given the greatest supernatural blessing: complete beatitude and union with God Himself forever in Heaven. We are first and foremost created for heaven, which is to be married to God forever; we are not made for earth or earthly marriage, ultimately; earth and earthly marriage are the pathway we take to prepare us for heaven, where there is no earthly marriage. God still requires this same sort of test for all those who live the priestly or religious life; it is the test of celibacy. And it still takes great trust and love of God to pass this test, but the fruit of a well-passed test is bountiful.
The responsorial psalm is the great penitential psalm David wrote after he acknowledged his sin with Bathsheba; there are a number of parallels between his sin and the Fall, as I see it. Perhaps the most important element of this psalm is David’s request to God to create a clean heart in him. David asks God for a clean heart. Repentance is a matter of the heart. Turning back to God is a matter of the heart. Being faithful and loving God is also a matter of the heart. Life comes through union with God, and in that respect, the faithful heart is the source or conduit of life. The heart is the tree of life.
I will include all of the second reading today from Paul’s Letter to the Romans 5:12-19:
“Brothers and sisters: Through one man sin entered the world, and through sin, death, and thus death came to all men, inasmuch as all sinned—for up to the time of the law, sin was in the world, though sin is not accounted when there is no law. But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin after the pattern of the trespass of Adam, who is the type of the one who was to come. But the gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one, the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one man Jesus Christ overflow for the many. And the gift is not like the result of the one who sinned. For after one sin there was the judgment that brought condemnation; but the gift, after many transgressions, brought acquittal. For if, by the transgression of the one, death came to reign through that one, how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of justification come to reign in life through the one Jesus Christ. In conclusion, just as through one transgression condemnation came upon all, so, through one righteous act, acquittal and life came to all. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so, through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous.”
I think Paul’s argument here is relatively simple. He is saying that through one man, Adam, sin and death entered the world. He was disobedient, sinned, and brought death upon his family, the human race. The implication is that all his children and their children, the sons of Adam or the sons of man, are born dead to God, born without sanctifying grace. In Adam, all sinned, all were condemned, and all died. The one man brought disobedience and death upon everyone. Adam is a type, as in typology or image, of Christ, yet Christ undoes what Adam destroyed. The one man, Jesus Christ, was obedient, and so He brings grace, acquittal, justification, righteousness and life to the many. The one man, the Son of Man, enables us, sinners, to have life again and have our relationship with God renewed.
How is original sin passed on? It passes on through human generation; each child born is born in the state of original sin. This is no personal sin on the part of the baby; it is a state of being not born with sanctifying grace in our souls. Without sanctifying grace, which is the very life of God, we are born dead to God. We need to be born again. That is the state of things Adam left us in by his one act of disobedience.
How do we go from being sons of men to being sons of God? How do we become children of God and born alive to Him? We need to be born again, born from above, born of God in the sacrament of Baptism. Baptism is being really, spiritually united to Jesus, specifically His passion, death and resurrection so that we can die, be set free from our old master, sin, and be born again to be married to our new spouse, Jesus (see Romans 7:1ff). As Adam gives birth to spiritually dead babies through natural generation, so Jesus gives birth to children alive in God through His death and resurrection, which we truly share in through the sacrament of Baptism.
One of my main points here is that both Adam and Jesus beget children; the first through disobedience because of the fear of death and trying to save his own life, begets dead children, and the other through obedience and going through the worst possible death, makes the dead into a new creation and alive to God. Each of these singular men, through their one act, beget children: the first begets children who are dead, and the second begets those dead children to new life in Him.
Lastly, we have the gospel which today comes from Matthew 4:1-11, and it depicts the temptation of Christ by Satan after Jesus fasted for forty days in the desert. Jesus was hungry; I think we can assume that He was most hungry; physically, I do not know how much longer one could possibly fast and still live. It would be difficult to be hungrier than Jesus was when Satan approached Jesus and told Him to turn stones into bread. Then Satan told Jesus to throw Himself down from the temple because, as the Bible says, God gives His angels to watch us to keep us from getting hurt. Lastly, Satan tempts Jesus by saying that he would give Jesus all the kingdoms of the world if Jesus would simply lay flat on the ground and worship him.
As the New Adam, I would assume that Jesus’ temptation would have some similarities to the temptation Adam underwent. My theory is that God commanded Adam not to have relations with his wife. Barrenness was death for the Jews, and wanting to be like God who creates, the man and the woman, fearing the death of not having children, disobeyed God to obey God’s other command to be fruitful and multiply. Abraham and Sarah, after God promised them a son, waited twenty-five years, from the time he was 75 until he was 100, before God actually sent that promised son, Isaac. They were hungry for a son; they were so hungry that Abraham had a son through Sarah’s maid in an attempt to fulfill God’s promise.
How long did the man and the woman wait to have a child? It could have been a very long time. It could have been very short, or it could have been decades or even centuries. We don’t know. I speculate that it was a long time and that they were extremely hungry for a child, to be creative like God and fulfill God’s command to be fruitful. And Satan hit them were they were most weak. Jesus was hungry for bread, so Satan proposes that He make bread from stones. The man and the woman were hungry for a baby, so Satan proposes that they eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to have one. And they do, and they name him “gotten,” which is Cain.
When you purposely throw yourself down from a great height to test God and make Him protect you against your own stupidity, you of course sin, and obviously you will get critically hurt. You will probably die. This is similar to what Adam did. Adam was created without sin and unaffected by death and sickness; he had a great dignity and was the very first human created. He took all that dignity, all that height, and threw it down by his sin. He disobeyed God’s singular prohibition; that is as smart as jumping off a cliff, and it has the same consequence—death. He, the father of the human family, becomes the father of death by his stupid sin. One other thing, Adam was made as a temple of God, and by his sin he threw himself down from such a dignity as temple of God; he was made from dirt, but he was made to be God's temple; he forsook being God's temple and choose to be dirt.
Lastly, Jesus was offered all the kingdoms of the world if He prostrated Himself before Satan. This, too, has parallels to what Adam did, according to my theory. If the Fall was having relations with his wife, the woman, then they both would have been prostrate on the ground, as it were. They did it through the wisdom of the serpent, and by trusting in him, they were choosing to worship him instead of God. That, then, covers the falling prostrate and worshipping Satan. What about the having the kingdoms of the world? What are kingdoms made up of? People. If there are no people, there certainly are no kingdoms. There wouldn’t even be a state, city, town, village or hamlet. Adam, hungry for a child, could have also been promised as part of his temptation to be the father of all the people of the earth. By his trust of and obedience to the wisdom of the serpent, if my theory is correct, Adam did become the father of all the earth and in that manner possess all the kingdoms of the earth. Everyone on the earth is a son of Adam, a son of man. So the Son of Man came to undo what Adam had done, making the sons of men into sons of God.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.rom
What better readings could there be today for this first Sunday in Lent for my three month anniversary! The first reading talks about the tree of life, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the Fall itself. I will reprint the whole thing here. I usually use the RSCVE Bible, but of course the Mass readings are using the NAB; it will be interesting to compare the two. It comes from Genesis 2:7-9 & 3:1-7:
The LORD God formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being. Then the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and placed there the man whom he had formed. Out of the ground the LORD God made various trees grow that were delightful to look at and good for food, with the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the LORD God had made. The serpent asked the woman, “Did God really tell you not to eat from any of the trees in the garden?” The woman answered the serpent: “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; it is only about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, ‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is evil.” The woman saw that the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.
One thing I like about this translation is that the various trees God plants in the garden are delightful to look at and good for food. The word Eden means delight, and the trees planted there are delightful. That makes sense. Part of my theory is that the Garden of Eden is not so much a place as it is the man and woman themselves; the garden refers to them and to their bodies. The trees refer to all of their abilities and powers as humans. God created us good, and how we are created is beautiful. Our bodies are beautiful, and our abilities are beautiful; in an unfallen state, we were perfectly harmonious and in order; we would not die or get sick; our will and intellect and body worked together toward one good common goal; all was well, and all was beautiful. We are still created good and beautiful, yet we are disordered and tend toward the evil; it is a battle to choose the good. It is a battle not to be selfish and not to forget about God. It is a battle not say, My will be done.
The two most important delightful trees, which are in the middle of the garden, are the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. My theory is that the tree of life is the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is our ability to have marital relations and conceive children. Since God had put us on earth but made us for heaven, and since He gave the man and the woman to each other as spouses but made us to be married to Him forever in heaven, He told the man and the woman not to have relations.
He asked them to forgo the greatest of this world’s blessings as a sacrificial test and trial of faith in order be given a child by God directly, virginally, and so also be given the greatest supernatural blessing: complete beatitude and union with God Himself forever in Heaven. We are first and foremost created for heaven, which is to be married to God forever; we are not made for earth or earthly marriage, ultimately; earth and earthly marriage are the pathway we take to prepare us for heaven, where there is no earthly marriage. God still requires this same sort of test for all those who live the priestly or religious life; it is the test of celibacy. And it still takes great trust and love of God to pass this test, but the fruit of a well-passed test is bountiful.
The responsorial psalm is the great penitential psalm David wrote after he acknowledged his sin with Bathsheba; there are a number of parallels between his sin and the Fall, as I see it. Perhaps the most important element of this psalm is David’s request to God to create a clean heart in him. David asks God for a clean heart. Repentance is a matter of the heart. Turning back to God is a matter of the heart. Being faithful and loving God is also a matter of the heart. Life comes through union with God, and in that respect, the faithful heart is the source or conduit of life. The heart is the tree of life.
I will include all of the second reading today from Paul’s Letter to the Romans 5:12-19:
“Brothers and sisters: Through one man sin entered the world, and through sin, death, and thus death came to all men, inasmuch as all sinned—for up to the time of the law, sin was in the world, though sin is not accounted when there is no law. But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin after the pattern of the trespass of Adam, who is the type of the one who was to come. But the gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one, the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one man Jesus Christ overflow for the many. And the gift is not like the result of the one who sinned. For after one sin there was the judgment that brought condemnation; but the gift, after many transgressions, brought acquittal. For if, by the transgression of the one, death came to reign through that one, how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of justification come to reign in life through the one Jesus Christ. In conclusion, just as through one transgression condemnation came upon all, so, through one righteous act, acquittal and life came to all. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so, through the obedience of the one, the many will be made righteous.”
I think Paul’s argument here is relatively simple. He is saying that through one man, Adam, sin and death entered the world. He was disobedient, sinned, and brought death upon his family, the human race. The implication is that all his children and their children, the sons of Adam or the sons of man, are born dead to God, born without sanctifying grace. In Adam, all sinned, all were condemned, and all died. The one man brought disobedience and death upon everyone. Adam is a type, as in typology or image, of Christ, yet Christ undoes what Adam destroyed. The one man, Jesus Christ, was obedient, and so He brings grace, acquittal, justification, righteousness and life to the many. The one man, the Son of Man, enables us, sinners, to have life again and have our relationship with God renewed.
How is original sin passed on? It passes on through human generation; each child born is born in the state of original sin. This is no personal sin on the part of the baby; it is a state of being not born with sanctifying grace in our souls. Without sanctifying grace, which is the very life of God, we are born dead to God. We need to be born again. That is the state of things Adam left us in by his one act of disobedience.
How do we go from being sons of men to being sons of God? How do we become children of God and born alive to Him? We need to be born again, born from above, born of God in the sacrament of Baptism. Baptism is being really, spiritually united to Jesus, specifically His passion, death and resurrection so that we can die, be set free from our old master, sin, and be born again to be married to our new spouse, Jesus (see Romans 7:1ff). As Adam gives birth to spiritually dead babies through natural generation, so Jesus gives birth to children alive in God through His death and resurrection, which we truly share in through the sacrament of Baptism.
One of my main points here is that both Adam and Jesus beget children; the first through disobedience because of the fear of death and trying to save his own life, begets dead children, and the other through obedience and going through the worst possible death, makes the dead into a new creation and alive to God. Each of these singular men, through their one act, beget children: the first begets children who are dead, and the second begets those dead children to new life in Him.
Lastly, we have the gospel which today comes from Matthew 4:1-11, and it depicts the temptation of Christ by Satan after Jesus fasted for forty days in the desert. Jesus was hungry; I think we can assume that He was most hungry; physically, I do not know how much longer one could possibly fast and still live. It would be difficult to be hungrier than Jesus was when Satan approached Jesus and told Him to turn stones into bread. Then Satan told Jesus to throw Himself down from the temple because, as the Bible says, God gives His angels to watch us to keep us from getting hurt. Lastly, Satan tempts Jesus by saying that he would give Jesus all the kingdoms of the world if Jesus would simply lay flat on the ground and worship him.
As the New Adam, I would assume that Jesus’ temptation would have some similarities to the temptation Adam underwent. My theory is that God commanded Adam not to have relations with his wife. Barrenness was death for the Jews, and wanting to be like God who creates, the man and the woman, fearing the death of not having children, disobeyed God to obey God’s other command to be fruitful and multiply. Abraham and Sarah, after God promised them a son, waited twenty-five years, from the time he was 75 until he was 100, before God actually sent that promised son, Isaac. They were hungry for a son; they were so hungry that Abraham had a son through Sarah’s maid in an attempt to fulfill God’s promise.
How long did the man and the woman wait to have a child? It could have been a very long time. It could have been very short, or it could have been decades or even centuries. We don’t know. I speculate that it was a long time and that they were extremely hungry for a child, to be creative like God and fulfill God’s command to be fruitful. And Satan hit them were they were most weak. Jesus was hungry for bread, so Satan proposes that He make bread from stones. The man and the woman were hungry for a baby, so Satan proposes that they eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to have one. And they do, and they name him “gotten,” which is Cain.
When you purposely throw yourself down from a great height to test God and make Him protect you against your own stupidity, you of course sin, and obviously you will get critically hurt. You will probably die. This is similar to what Adam did. Adam was created without sin and unaffected by death and sickness; he had a great dignity and was the very first human created. He took all that dignity, all that height, and threw it down by his sin. He disobeyed God’s singular prohibition; that is as smart as jumping off a cliff, and it has the same consequence—death. He, the father of the human family, becomes the father of death by his stupid sin. One other thing, Adam was made as a temple of God, and by his sin he threw himself down from such a dignity as temple of God; he was made from dirt, but he was made to be God's temple; he forsook being God's temple and choose to be dirt.
Lastly, Jesus was offered all the kingdoms of the world if He prostrated Himself before Satan. This, too, has parallels to what Adam did, according to my theory. If the Fall was having relations with his wife, the woman, then they both would have been prostrate on the ground, as it were. They did it through the wisdom of the serpent, and by trusting in him, they were choosing to worship him instead of God. That, then, covers the falling prostrate and worshipping Satan. What about the having the kingdoms of the world? What are kingdoms made up of? People. If there are no people, there certainly are no kingdoms. There wouldn’t even be a state, city, town, village or hamlet. Adam, hungry for a child, could have also been promised as part of his temptation to be the father of all the people of the earth. By his trust of and obedience to the wisdom of the serpent, if my theory is correct, Adam did become the father of all the earth and in that manner possess all the kingdoms of the earth. Everyone on the earth is a son of Adam, a son of man. So the Son of Man came to undo what Adam had done, making the sons of men into sons of God.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.rom
2.09.2008
"You Will be a Watered Garden"
On Friday there were some good scripture passages on which to comment. The first came from the responsorial psalm, Psalm 51: “For you are not pleased with sacrifices; should I offer a burnt offering, you would not accept it. My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit; a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.” God wants our hearts, and when we turn to Him, humble and seeking His help, He loves to come to our aid.
God is not pleased in animal sacrifices in themselves; the Israelites were worshipping fertility gods symbolized by bulls (calves) and goats, so God had them sacrifice their very gods. Killing and eating one’s gods does not make for happy gods. They had to sacrifice lambs because, insofar as they sinned, they were worshipping themselves. Thus, animal sacrifices were a good penitential act showing God that one wasn’t going to worship those false gods, but it didn’t mean that one couldn’t find some other false gods to worship. Animal sacrifice didn’t guarantee that one was loving and obeying the one true God. We show God we love Him when, humbly, we give Him our heart and our whole selves.
The second scripture passage was from Matthew 9:14-15: “The disciples of John approached Jesus and said, ‘Why do we and the Pharisees fast much, but your disciples do not fast?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast’.” Here, Jesus refers to Himself as the bridegroom. He is our husband. Part of my theory is that right from the beginning, God made us to be His spouse; when man and woman are made in the image and likeness of God in the very first chapter of Genesis, He is making us to be His bride. We were stolen by Satan in the garden, so God comes to earth to win back His wayward bride. The Catholic life is the life of a bride of Christ who receives His body and blood in the Eucharist to bear fruit for God.
Today, Saturday, also had some readings which resonate with my theory. The first reading is from Isaiah 58: 9-14: “Thus says the LORD: If you remove from your midst oppression, false accusation and malicious speech; if you bestow your bread on the hungry and satisfy the afflicted; then light shall rise for you in the darkness, and the gloom shall become for you like midday; then the LORD will guide you always and give you plenty even on the parched land. He will renew your strength, and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails. The ancient ruins shall be rebuilt for your sake, and the foundations from ages past you shall raise up; ‘Repairer of the breach,’ they shall call you, ‘Restorer of ruined homesteads.’ If you hold back your foot on the Sabbath from following your own pursuits on my holy day; if you call the Sabbath a delight, and the LORD’s holy day honorable; if you honor it by not following your ways, seeking your own interests, or speaking with malice then you shall delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will nourish you with the heritage of Jacob, your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
This passage consists of two parallel parts. They are both structured saying, if you do this good deed, then something good will happen to you. The good that will happen in the first half is that God will give plenty, renew your strength, and you will be like a watered garden and an ever flowing spring of water. The second half says that you will delight in the Lord and be nourished. The two rewards seem to be arranged in a chiasm that looks like this:
A God will give you strength and plenty
B You will be a watered garden and an ever flowing spring
B’ You will delight in the Lord
A’ You will be nourished by the Lord
What is most significant is what is in the middle. The two parallel middle parts are 1) being an ever flowing spring of water and 2) taking delight in God. They are the same thing, if my theory is correct. I say that the tree of life in Genesis two and three is both the river broken into four sections and the heart, the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. Remember that Eden means delight, so here we have a garden and Eden. When our heart loves, trusts and obeys God, it delights in Him; when it delights in God, our hearts become the four-sectioned river or spring which always produces water and good fruit and the fulfillment of what Jesus said: “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7: 38). When our hearts are turned toward God, then He gives us strength, nourishment and plenty.
The responsorial psalm is Psalm 86, and the refrain is from verse 11: “Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth.” In order for our hearts to be obedient to God, we need to know what pleases Him. We ask Him to teach us His ways so that we know how to please the One who loves us.
In the gospel, Jesus calls Levi, the tax collector, to follow Him and then goes to a great banquet at his house. The scribes and Pharisees were upset that Jesus ate with tax collectors and sinners, but Jesus responded: “Those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do. I have not come to call the righteous to repentance but sinners” (Luke 5:32). Of course, we are all sinners, but only those who realize they are a sinner, only those who are contrite and humble of heart as we saw in Psalm 51, only these please God. So, we have come full circle tonight.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
God is not pleased in animal sacrifices in themselves; the Israelites were worshipping fertility gods symbolized by bulls (calves) and goats, so God had them sacrifice their very gods. Killing and eating one’s gods does not make for happy gods. They had to sacrifice lambs because, insofar as they sinned, they were worshipping themselves. Thus, animal sacrifices were a good penitential act showing God that one wasn’t going to worship those false gods, but it didn’t mean that one couldn’t find some other false gods to worship. Animal sacrifice didn’t guarantee that one was loving and obeying the one true God. We show God we love Him when, humbly, we give Him our heart and our whole selves.
The second scripture passage was from Matthew 9:14-15: “The disciples of John approached Jesus and said, ‘Why do we and the Pharisees fast much, but your disciples do not fast?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast’.” Here, Jesus refers to Himself as the bridegroom. He is our husband. Part of my theory is that right from the beginning, God made us to be His spouse; when man and woman are made in the image and likeness of God in the very first chapter of Genesis, He is making us to be His bride. We were stolen by Satan in the garden, so God comes to earth to win back His wayward bride. The Catholic life is the life of a bride of Christ who receives His body and blood in the Eucharist to bear fruit for God.
Today, Saturday, also had some readings which resonate with my theory. The first reading is from Isaiah 58: 9-14: “Thus says the LORD: If you remove from your midst oppression, false accusation and malicious speech; if you bestow your bread on the hungry and satisfy the afflicted; then light shall rise for you in the darkness, and the gloom shall become for you like midday; then the LORD will guide you always and give you plenty even on the parched land. He will renew your strength, and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails. The ancient ruins shall be rebuilt for your sake, and the foundations from ages past you shall raise up; ‘Repairer of the breach,’ they shall call you, ‘Restorer of ruined homesteads.’ If you hold back your foot on the Sabbath from following your own pursuits on my holy day; if you call the Sabbath a delight, and the LORD’s holy day honorable; if you honor it by not following your ways, seeking your own interests, or speaking with malice then you shall delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will nourish you with the heritage of Jacob, your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
This passage consists of two parallel parts. They are both structured saying, if you do this good deed, then something good will happen to you. The good that will happen in the first half is that God will give plenty, renew your strength, and you will be like a watered garden and an ever flowing spring of water. The second half says that you will delight in the Lord and be nourished. The two rewards seem to be arranged in a chiasm that looks like this:
A God will give you strength and plenty
B You will be a watered garden and an ever flowing spring
B’ You will delight in the Lord
A’ You will be nourished by the Lord
What is most significant is what is in the middle. The two parallel middle parts are 1) being an ever flowing spring of water and 2) taking delight in God. They are the same thing, if my theory is correct. I say that the tree of life in Genesis two and three is both the river broken into four sections and the heart, the heart that loves, trusts and obeys God. Remember that Eden means delight, so here we have a garden and Eden. When our heart loves, trusts and obeys God, it delights in Him; when it delights in God, our hearts become the four-sectioned river or spring which always produces water and good fruit and the fulfillment of what Jesus said: “Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7: 38). When our hearts are turned toward God, then He gives us strength, nourishment and plenty.
The responsorial psalm is Psalm 86, and the refrain is from verse 11: “Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth.” In order for our hearts to be obedient to God, we need to know what pleases Him. We ask Him to teach us His ways so that we know how to please the One who loves us.
In the gospel, Jesus calls Levi, the tax collector, to follow Him and then goes to a great banquet at his house. The scribes and Pharisees were upset that Jesus ate with tax collectors and sinners, but Jesus responded: “Those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do. I have not come to call the righteous to repentance but sinners” (Luke 5:32). Of course, we are all sinners, but only those who realize they are a sinner, only those who are contrite and humble of heart as we saw in Psalm 51, only these please God. So, we have come full circle tonight.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.07.2008
Total Surrender
The readings for Mass on this second day of Lent are worth examining. The first reading comes from the end section of the book of Deuteronomy; the reading is 30:15-20:
“Moses said to the people: ‘Today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and doom. If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin on you today, loving him, and walking in his ways, and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees, you will live and grow numerous, and the LORD, your God, will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy. If, however, you turn away your hearts and will not listen, but are led astray and adore and serve other gods, I tell you now that you will certainly perish; you will not have a long life on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and occupy. I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him. For that will mean life for you, a long life for you to live on the land that the LORD swore he would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’.”
Moses tells us that we have a choice between life and death; if we obey and turn our hearts toward God, we will have life and blessing; if we disobey and turn our hearts away from God, we will have death and the curse. We will have life if we love God and heed His commands; an obedient, trusting and loving heart will be blessed and have life. Again, my theory that the tree of life is the heart finds resonance in this passage from Deuteronomy. When our heart turns toward God, clings to Him, loves Him, and obeys Him, we have life. God is the source of life, and when our heart is attune to Him, our heart receives His life. The heart is the vehicle through which God gives us His life.
The theme of the heart continues in the responsorial psalm; today’s psalm is Psalm 1:
“Blessed the man who follows not the counsel of the wicked nor walks in the way of sinners, nor sits in the company of the insolent, but delights in the law of the LORD and meditates on his law day and night. He is like a tree planted near running water, that yields its fruit in due season, and whose leaves never fade. Whatever he does, prospers. Not so the wicked, not so; they are like chaff which the wind drives away. For the LORD watches over the way of the just, but the way of the wicked vanishes.”
The one who despises God’s law disobeys God’s law and is a wicked, insolent sinner; he is like chaff which vanishes in the wind. The one who delights in God’s law and constantly thinks about it is blessed, and he is like a tree planted close to a river. His leaves do not fall off, and in season, he bears fruit. Delight comes from the heart, and we meditate and think about reality in our heart; Mary pondered all that happened to her in her heart. Therefore, when our heart loves what God loves, we are a fruitful tree. When we love, trust and obey God, our heart is a tree of life.
The gospel for today takes a slightly different, yet related, route. It comes from Luke 9:22-25, but I will only quote the second half of it:
“If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. What profit is there for one to gain the whole world yet lose or forfeit himself?”
Immediately before Jesus said this, He was telling His disciples about His crucifixion. When Jesus says we must take up our cross and follow Him, the place He is leading us is to our own crucifixion. When we are following Him with our cross on our back, we are not out for a joy ride and a relaxing, pampered destination. We are on the way to our very own complete self-offering on our very own Calvary. Jesus died not so that we don’t have to, but rather, He died so that we would have the heart to do what He did. Jesus’ mission is to give us a new heart, His very own heart, so that we too can be a self-sacrificing lover.
When someone tries to save his life, it signifies that he does not trust in God. When one gains the whole world, he is trying to control his life and not need God. This saving of our life and this gaining the world is another way of saying that one has abandoned God. If we seek life and try to save our life, death is our keep. The reason for this is that life comes through trust in God. Life does not come through ourselves or our abilities. The heart that trusts God is willing to face death, embrace his cross, and follow Jesus to Calvary. The heart that trusts God will lose his life, lose the world, lose himself, and become a pleasing sacrifice to God. In no other way is there life. The trusting heart is the tree of life.
There is no difficulty trusting if everything is easy and everything is just as I would have it. There is no trust when all is well and I have whatever my heart desires. There is no trust when I am doing exactly as I would like to do. There is no trust when it is “My will be done.” Trust enters the picture when it is “Thy will be done.” Trust enters the arena when it is “Not my will be done.” Trust enters our hearts when all we have to hold onto is God, when we are racked with pain and suffering, deprivation and discomfort, and shattered plans and empty hands. When life is easy, we are dead for we cling only to ourselves. When life is a whirlwind and a hurricane, we are fully alive for only then do we cling to God, He who is life and existence Himself.
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta said on page 111 in the book, Jesus, The Word to Be Spoken words that I think resonate, in part, with what I have been saying:
“Total surrender to God must come in small details as it comes in big details. It’s nothing but that single word, ‘Yes, I accept whatever you give, and I give whatever you take.’ And this is just a simple way for us to be holy. We must not create difficulties in our own minds. To be holy doesn’t mean to do extraordinary things, to understand big things, but it is a simple acceptance, because I have given myself to God, because I belong to Him—my total surrender. He could put me here. He could put me there. He can use me. He cannot use me. It doesn’t matter because I belong so totally to him that he can do just what he wants to do with me.”
“Lent is a time when we relive the passion of Christ. Let it not be just a time when our feelings are roused, but let it be a change that comes through cooperation with God’s grace in real sacrifices of self. Sacrifice, to be real, must cost; it must hurt; it must empty us of self. Let us go through the passion of Christ day by day.”
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“Moses said to the people: ‘Today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and doom. If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin on you today, loving him, and walking in his ways, and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees, you will live and grow numerous, and the LORD, your God, will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy. If, however, you turn away your hearts and will not listen, but are led astray and adore and serve other gods, I tell you now that you will certainly perish; you will not have a long life on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and occupy. I call heaven and earth today to witness against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the LORD, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him. For that will mean life for you, a long life for you to live on the land that the LORD swore he would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’.”
Moses tells us that we have a choice between life and death; if we obey and turn our hearts toward God, we will have life and blessing; if we disobey and turn our hearts away from God, we will have death and the curse. We will have life if we love God and heed His commands; an obedient, trusting and loving heart will be blessed and have life. Again, my theory that the tree of life is the heart finds resonance in this passage from Deuteronomy. When our heart turns toward God, clings to Him, loves Him, and obeys Him, we have life. God is the source of life, and when our heart is attune to Him, our heart receives His life. The heart is the vehicle through which God gives us His life.
The theme of the heart continues in the responsorial psalm; today’s psalm is Psalm 1:
“Blessed the man who follows not the counsel of the wicked nor walks in the way of sinners, nor sits in the company of the insolent, but delights in the law of the LORD and meditates on his law day and night. He is like a tree planted near running water, that yields its fruit in due season, and whose leaves never fade. Whatever he does, prospers. Not so the wicked, not so; they are like chaff which the wind drives away. For the LORD watches over the way of the just, but the way of the wicked vanishes.”
The one who despises God’s law disobeys God’s law and is a wicked, insolent sinner; he is like chaff which vanishes in the wind. The one who delights in God’s law and constantly thinks about it is blessed, and he is like a tree planted close to a river. His leaves do not fall off, and in season, he bears fruit. Delight comes from the heart, and we meditate and think about reality in our heart; Mary pondered all that happened to her in her heart. Therefore, when our heart loves what God loves, we are a fruitful tree. When we love, trust and obey God, our heart is a tree of life.
The gospel for today takes a slightly different, yet related, route. It comes from Luke 9:22-25, but I will only quote the second half of it:
“If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. What profit is there for one to gain the whole world yet lose or forfeit himself?”
Immediately before Jesus said this, He was telling His disciples about His crucifixion. When Jesus says we must take up our cross and follow Him, the place He is leading us is to our own crucifixion. When we are following Him with our cross on our back, we are not out for a joy ride and a relaxing, pampered destination. We are on the way to our very own complete self-offering on our very own Calvary. Jesus died not so that we don’t have to, but rather, He died so that we would have the heart to do what He did. Jesus’ mission is to give us a new heart, His very own heart, so that we too can be a self-sacrificing lover.
When someone tries to save his life, it signifies that he does not trust in God. When one gains the whole world, he is trying to control his life and not need God. This saving of our life and this gaining the world is another way of saying that one has abandoned God. If we seek life and try to save our life, death is our keep. The reason for this is that life comes through trust in God. Life does not come through ourselves or our abilities. The heart that trusts God is willing to face death, embrace his cross, and follow Jesus to Calvary. The heart that trusts God will lose his life, lose the world, lose himself, and become a pleasing sacrifice to God. In no other way is there life. The trusting heart is the tree of life.
There is no difficulty trusting if everything is easy and everything is just as I would have it. There is no trust when all is well and I have whatever my heart desires. There is no trust when I am doing exactly as I would like to do. There is no trust when it is “My will be done.” Trust enters the picture when it is “Thy will be done.” Trust enters the arena when it is “Not my will be done.” Trust enters our hearts when all we have to hold onto is God, when we are racked with pain and suffering, deprivation and discomfort, and shattered plans and empty hands. When life is easy, we are dead for we cling only to ourselves. When life is a whirlwind and a hurricane, we are fully alive for only then do we cling to God, He who is life and existence Himself.
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta said on page 111 in the book, Jesus, The Word to Be Spoken words that I think resonate, in part, with what I have been saying:
“Total surrender to God must come in small details as it comes in big details. It’s nothing but that single word, ‘Yes, I accept whatever you give, and I give whatever you take.’ And this is just a simple way for us to be holy. We must not create difficulties in our own minds. To be holy doesn’t mean to do extraordinary things, to understand big things, but it is a simple acceptance, because I have given myself to God, because I belong to Him—my total surrender. He could put me here. He could put me there. He can use me. He cannot use me. It doesn’t matter because I belong so totally to him that he can do just what he wants to do with me.”
“Lent is a time when we relive the passion of Christ. Let it not be just a time when our feelings are roused, but let it be a change that comes through cooperation with God’s grace in real sacrifices of self. Sacrifice, to be real, must cost; it must hurt; it must empty us of self. Let us go through the passion of Christ day by day.”
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.06.2008
Lenten Plan Resurrects Our Tree of Life
Lent begins today. The first reading for Ash Wednesday comes from Joel and begins with verse 12. I have included part of the verse prior to 12:
“For the day of the LORD is great and very terrible; who can endure it? ‘Yet even now,’ says the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.’ Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and repents of evil” (Joel 2: 11-13).
It was common in the ancient world to rip one’s clothes when confronted with a great sorrow. God is not so much interested in how we look on the outside; He cares what is in our hearts. When our hearts are attached to sin and to the good things of this world, its receptacles are filled up and have no room for God. We need to free our hearts from all its attachments and pray as it says in today’s psalm: “A clean heart create for me, O God” (Psalm 51:10). God tells us that we need to rend our hearts; that is a powerful image; it is a painful route to take, but it brings us new life.
The key to our living the faith is turning our heart back to God. The repentant heart is the key. We express that repentance by our fasting, sorrow for our sin, and our almsgiving, and they are meant to be painful as we rend our hearts. We also rend our hearts by the confession of our sins and by our prayer and charitable deeds. These penitential activities help to turn our dead hearts of stone into hearts of flesh which seek to please God. They resurrect our dead, fruitless trees of life into fruitful, abundant, overflowing trees of life which bear good fruit each month and out of which flow rivers of living water.
There are three main parts to a plan for Lent, a program for our increased daily conversion of heart: 1) we need to cut out the ways we sin; 2) we should give us something good as a sacrifice to God; 3) we should increase something better we already do or start something new.
An example for a Lenten plan could look something like this: first, I am going to be committed to avoid that near occasion of sin which I am too comfortable with right now; second, I am going to give up alcohol; third, I am going to say a decade of the rosary each day and do the stations of the cross on Fridays. Another example: first, I am not going to gossip; second, I will give up coffee and chocolate; third, I will get to daily Mass and read the daily Mass readings for the next day the night before. Of course, the options are endless, but it is important to stop sinning, have a sacrifice of something good and put something better in its place. All these items help our hearts to draw closer to God and attach to the only worthy and life-giving attachment.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
“For the day of the LORD is great and very terrible; who can endure it? ‘Yet even now,’ says the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.’ Return to the LORD, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and repents of evil” (Joel 2: 11-13).
It was common in the ancient world to rip one’s clothes when confronted with a great sorrow. God is not so much interested in how we look on the outside; He cares what is in our hearts. When our hearts are attached to sin and to the good things of this world, its receptacles are filled up and have no room for God. We need to free our hearts from all its attachments and pray as it says in today’s psalm: “A clean heart create for me, O God” (Psalm 51:10). God tells us that we need to rend our hearts; that is a powerful image; it is a painful route to take, but it brings us new life.
The key to our living the faith is turning our heart back to God. The repentant heart is the key. We express that repentance by our fasting, sorrow for our sin, and our almsgiving, and they are meant to be painful as we rend our hearts. We also rend our hearts by the confession of our sins and by our prayer and charitable deeds. These penitential activities help to turn our dead hearts of stone into hearts of flesh which seek to please God. They resurrect our dead, fruitless trees of life into fruitful, abundant, overflowing trees of life which bear good fruit each month and out of which flow rivers of living water.
There are three main parts to a plan for Lent, a program for our increased daily conversion of heart: 1) we need to cut out the ways we sin; 2) we should give us something good as a sacrifice to God; 3) we should increase something better we already do or start something new.
An example for a Lenten plan could look something like this: first, I am going to be committed to avoid that near occasion of sin which I am too comfortable with right now; second, I am going to give up alcohol; third, I am going to say a decade of the rosary each day and do the stations of the cross on Fridays. Another example: first, I am not going to gossip; second, I will give up coffee and chocolate; third, I will get to daily Mass and read the daily Mass readings for the next day the night before. Of course, the options are endless, but it is important to stop sinning, have a sacrifice of something good and put something better in its place. All these items help our hearts to draw closer to God and attach to the only worthy and life-giving attachment.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.04.2008
"Live as Though You are Not Married"
I started my read through Saint Augustine’s “Of Holy Virginity” back in January, and this tonight is the fourth and final post on this work. In its concluding paragraphs, there are many wonderful quotes. Saint Augustine spends his remaining paragraphs encouraging virgins to be faithful to God and their virginity through their love of God and their humility and meekness of heart. In Sunday’s gospel reading today from Saint Matthew 5:5 it says: “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the land.”
In paragraph 52, Saint Augustine says that virginity is guarded by love, and love’s home is humility: “Therefore there is none that guardeth the virginal good, save God Himself Who gave it: and God is Charity (1 John 4:8). The Guardian therefore of virginity is Charity: but the place of this Guardian is humility.” We all, therefore, need to learn from Jesus who said, “I am meek and lowly of heart.” With a humble heart, we can draw close to Jesus and learn from Him, Saint Augustine says, and in a holy humility, Jesus finds rest for His head.
In the next paragraph, 53, Saint Augustine continues to state the absolute necessity for humility and for not justifying oneself: “Let such among your number [of virgins] as persevere, afford to you an example: but let such as fall increase your fear. Love the one that ye may imitate it; mourn over the other, that ye be not puffed up. Do not ye establish your own righteousness; submit yourselves unto God Who justifies you. Pardon the sins of others, pray for your own: future sins shun by watching, past sins blot out by confessing.” We are to give ourselves to God and realize, if we stay free from certain sins, it is due to His grace and help. Therefore, we can love much because we have been forgiven much (either by confessing our sins or by being preserved from falling into the in the first place). We can also be merciful to those who do fall into sin and so pardon them.
Virgins, Saint Augustine says in paragraph 55, have given up marriage to a human person so that they can be married more fully to God. If this is true, then they should put all the energies one normally puts into loving one’s earthly spouse into loving their Divine Spouse: “If, therefore, ye despise marriages of sons of men, from which to beget sons of men, love ye with your whole heart Him, Who is fair of form above the sons of men; ye have leisure; your heart is free from marriage bonds. Gaze on the Beauty of your Lover: think of Him equal to the Father, made subject also to His Mother: ruling even in the heavens, and serving upon the earth: creating all things, created among all things. That very thing, which in Him the proud mock at, gaze on, how fair it is: with inward eyes gaze on the wounds of Him hanging, the scars of Him rising again, the blood of Him dying, the price of him that believes, the gain of Him that redeems. Consider of how great value these are, weigh them in the scales of Charity; and whatever of love ye had to expend upon your marriages, pay back to Him.” Since Jesus is a virgin’s primary and immediate Spouse, Saint Augustine says, virgins should love Him passionately, with all that they have and are.
In the second to last paragraph, 56, Saint Augustine repeats what he said in the previous paragraph and adds that it would be unlawful for a virgin not to wholly love Jesus: “If therefore ye should owe great love to husbands, Him, for Whose sake ye would not have husbands, how greatly ought ye to love? Let Him be fixed in your whole heart, Who for you was fixed on the Cross: let Him possess in your soul all that, whatever it be, that ye would not have occupied by marriage. It is not lawful for you to love little Him, for Whose sake ye have not loved even what were lawful. So loving Him Who is meek and lowly of heart, I have no fear for you of pride.”
Surely what Saint Augustine says of virgins is true: they are specially married to the Divine Spouse and are bound to love Him with their complete and entire self. Since all members of the Church are called to holiness and thus to deep prayer and intimacy with Jesus, all of us are also called to marry God. That is why He made us. A virgin has the opportunity for a special intimacy with Him, and he lives, to a certain extent, the life of heaven here on earth. Yet all people are called into a most intimate relationship with God. Marriage is a symbol of God’s relationship with humanity; in living in a committed and self-sacrificing marriage, one learns how to love and be loved and draws closer to God.
Our goal on this earth is heaven, where there is no marriage. There is no marriage among human persons there because we are all married to God in heaven. For those called to the vocation of marriage, it is the way God has called us to become holy and to love Him. Marriage is a God-given calling which sanctifies those who live it well and generously, as does any vocation. Earthly marriage will eventually pass away at the end of time, and it passes away for all of us who are married when our spouse dies. Earthly marriage, as our vocation, is the path to our heavenly, divine marriage with God. Human marriage is not the end point; it is our path to grow in our relationship with Jesus.
I think that is why Paul says a rather difficult sentence in his first letter to the Corinthians: “I mean, brethren, the appointed time has grown very short; from now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods, and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the form of this world is passing away” (1 Corinthians 7:29). Paul is not saying that we should think little of marriage. He is saying that it is not the ultimate reality; the ultimate reality is our life in heaven and our marriage to the Divine Spouse. In a similar manner, sex, which the culture of death worships, is not the ultimate reality as good as it is; union with God is the ultimate reality. "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O God."
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
In paragraph 52, Saint Augustine says that virginity is guarded by love, and love’s home is humility: “Therefore there is none that guardeth the virginal good, save God Himself Who gave it: and God is Charity (1 John 4:8). The Guardian therefore of virginity is Charity: but the place of this Guardian is humility.” We all, therefore, need to learn from Jesus who said, “I am meek and lowly of heart.” With a humble heart, we can draw close to Jesus and learn from Him, Saint Augustine says, and in a holy humility, Jesus finds rest for His head.
In the next paragraph, 53, Saint Augustine continues to state the absolute necessity for humility and for not justifying oneself: “Let such among your number [of virgins] as persevere, afford to you an example: but let such as fall increase your fear. Love the one that ye may imitate it; mourn over the other, that ye be not puffed up. Do not ye establish your own righteousness; submit yourselves unto God Who justifies you. Pardon the sins of others, pray for your own: future sins shun by watching, past sins blot out by confessing.” We are to give ourselves to God and realize, if we stay free from certain sins, it is due to His grace and help. Therefore, we can love much because we have been forgiven much (either by confessing our sins or by being preserved from falling into the in the first place). We can also be merciful to those who do fall into sin and so pardon them.
Virgins, Saint Augustine says in paragraph 55, have given up marriage to a human person so that they can be married more fully to God. If this is true, then they should put all the energies one normally puts into loving one’s earthly spouse into loving their Divine Spouse: “If, therefore, ye despise marriages of sons of men, from which to beget sons of men, love ye with your whole heart Him, Who is fair of form above the sons of men; ye have leisure; your heart is free from marriage bonds. Gaze on the Beauty of your Lover: think of Him equal to the Father, made subject also to His Mother: ruling even in the heavens, and serving upon the earth: creating all things, created among all things. That very thing, which in Him the proud mock at, gaze on, how fair it is: with inward eyes gaze on the wounds of Him hanging, the scars of Him rising again, the blood of Him dying, the price of him that believes, the gain of Him that redeems. Consider of how great value these are, weigh them in the scales of Charity; and whatever of love ye had to expend upon your marriages, pay back to Him.” Since Jesus is a virgin’s primary and immediate Spouse, Saint Augustine says, virgins should love Him passionately, with all that they have and are.
In the second to last paragraph, 56, Saint Augustine repeats what he said in the previous paragraph and adds that it would be unlawful for a virgin not to wholly love Jesus: “If therefore ye should owe great love to husbands, Him, for Whose sake ye would not have husbands, how greatly ought ye to love? Let Him be fixed in your whole heart, Who for you was fixed on the Cross: let Him possess in your soul all that, whatever it be, that ye would not have occupied by marriage. It is not lawful for you to love little Him, for Whose sake ye have not loved even what were lawful. So loving Him Who is meek and lowly of heart, I have no fear for you of pride.”
Surely what Saint Augustine says of virgins is true: they are specially married to the Divine Spouse and are bound to love Him with their complete and entire self. Since all members of the Church are called to holiness and thus to deep prayer and intimacy with Jesus, all of us are also called to marry God. That is why He made us. A virgin has the opportunity for a special intimacy with Him, and he lives, to a certain extent, the life of heaven here on earth. Yet all people are called into a most intimate relationship with God. Marriage is a symbol of God’s relationship with humanity; in living in a committed and self-sacrificing marriage, one learns how to love and be loved and draws closer to God.
Our goal on this earth is heaven, where there is no marriage. There is no marriage among human persons there because we are all married to God in heaven. For those called to the vocation of marriage, it is the way God has called us to become holy and to love Him. Marriage is a God-given calling which sanctifies those who live it well and generously, as does any vocation. Earthly marriage will eventually pass away at the end of time, and it passes away for all of us who are married when our spouse dies. Earthly marriage, as our vocation, is the path to our heavenly, divine marriage with God. Human marriage is not the end point; it is our path to grow in our relationship with Jesus.
I think that is why Paul says a rather difficult sentence in his first letter to the Corinthians: “I mean, brethren, the appointed time has grown very short; from now on, let those who have wives live as though they had none, and those who mourn as though they were not mourning, and those who rejoice as though they were not rejoicing, and those who buy as though they had no goods, and those who deal with the world as though they had no dealings with it. For the form of this world is passing away” (1 Corinthians 7:29). Paul is not saying that we should think little of marriage. He is saying that it is not the ultimate reality; the ultimate reality is our life in heaven and our marriage to the Divine Spouse. In a similar manner, sex, which the culture of death worships, is not the ultimate reality as good as it is; union with God is the ultimate reality. "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O God."
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
2.03.2008
The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple
It is late at night, so it is Sunday now; however, it still feels like today, Saturday, and not tomorrow, Sunday, because I am still awake. All day I’ve wanted to write about the feast of Saturday: the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple. For a good while, I’ve suspected there is some connection of my theory with the need to present one’s children in the temple and redeem them. Why does one need to present and redeem one’s newly-born child?
The first instance of this mentioned in the Bible comes from Exodus 13:11-16, right after the Passover and the Exodus, which states: “And when the LORD brings you into the land of the Canaanites, as he swore to you and your fathers, and shall give it to you, you shall set apart to the LORD all that first opens the womb. All the firstlings of your cattle that are males shall be the LORD’s. Every firstling of an ass you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. Every first-born of man among your sons you shall redeem. And when in time to come your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ you shall say to him, ‘By strength of hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt, from the house of bondage. For when Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the LORD slew all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both the first-born of man and the first-born of cattle. Therefore I sacrifice to the LORD all the males that first open the womb; but all the first-born of my sons I redeem.’ It shall be as a mark on your hand or frontlets between your eyes; for by a strong hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt.”
All first-born male cattle are sacrificed to God; a first-born ass can be redeemed with the sacrifice of a lamb instead or it can be sacrificed itself; all first-born sons need to be redeemed. It does not say how our sons are to be redeemed here; we will find that out in a later passage. God passed over all Israel’s first born in Egypt as He set them free, so now they need to sacrifice or redeem all the first-born.
A woman needs to be purified after she gives birth; she needs to wait forty days for having a boy and eighty days for having a girl. The presentation of a baby in the temple is also about the woman being purified after birth. Here we find out with what a child is redeemed. “And when the days of her purifying are completed, whether for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the door of the tent of meeting a lamb a year old for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering, and he shall offer it before the LORD, and make atonement for her; then she shall be clean from the flow of her blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, either male or female. And if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for her, and she shall be clean” (Leviticus 12: 6-8).
A baby was to be redeemed with the sacrifice of a lamb as a burnt offering. A young pigeon or a turtledove was also sacrificed for a sin offering. The poor do not need to sacrifice a lamb; rather, they are allowed to bring a pair of turtledoves or pigeons for both of these sacrifices—the burnt offering and the sin offering.
We also find out that man’s redemption price is five shekels of silver. “Everything that opens the womb of all flesh, whether man or beast, which they offer to the LORD, shall be yours; nevertheless the first-born of man you shall redeem, and the firstling of unclean beasts you shall redeem. And their redemption price (at a month old you shall redeem them) you shall fix at five shekels in silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs” (Numbers 18: 15-16).
So here is what I am thinking right now about all of this:
My theory is: The man and the woman in the Garden of Eden sought after a child of their own, they wanted to be creative like God and make a man, and so they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which is they had relations, and they conceived and had Cain. Since they had children in a manner contrary to God’s command, the children they bore were children of men, not children of God, so they were born without God’s life in them, which we call sanctifying grace, and their passions were disordered, which we call original sin.
Abraham is given a similar test as the man and the woman, and after ten years of waiting for his promised son, Abraham sins and has relations with Hagar, his wife’s servant. Twenty-five years later, they finally give birth to their own son, Isaac. Since they never really passed the test, God tested Abraham again and told him to sacrifice Isaac. As Abraham is about to sacrifice Isaac, God stops him, and Isaac is passed over for the ram caught by the horns of its head in a thorn bush.
Because of Abraham and Isaac’s faithfulness, God swears by Himself to make his descendants a blessing to all nations. It was because of this covenant God makes here that about five hundred years later the Israelites are redeemed and set free from Egypt. The first and foundational Passover was Isaac, and the second was the Passover of all the first-born from Egypt. Because of God’s redeeming work of freeing Israel from Egypt, for all their descendants afterward they need to present and redeem all children shortly after they are born.
Due to the fear of death, the fear of not having children, sin entered the world. The second reading for the Presentation is from Hebrews 2: 14-18. “Since the children share in blood and flesh, Jesus likewise shared in them, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the Devil, and free those who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life” (2: 14-15). It was the fear of death that led humanity into slavery; it is Jesus’ death which destroys this fear and power of death.
Jesus destroys the power of death by dying on the cross; we participate in His death by our baptism since by baptism we die with Christ and are raised up with Him in His resurrection. In the Old Covenant, children had to be redeemed shortly after birth; in the New Covenant, children are redeemed shortly after birth in baptism. Now instead of redeeming our children with the sacrifice of a lamb or a pigeon or turtledove, our kids are redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb. This turns our sons of men into children of God, and the original problem from the beginning is fixed. The specific antidote to the Fall is found first of all in Jesus’ crucifixion, death and resurrection and secondly in our participation in those saving deeds most notably through baptism and Holy Eucharist.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
The first instance of this mentioned in the Bible comes from Exodus 13:11-16, right after the Passover and the Exodus, which states: “And when the LORD brings you into the land of the Canaanites, as he swore to you and your fathers, and shall give it to you, you shall set apart to the LORD all that first opens the womb. All the firstlings of your cattle that are males shall be the LORD’s. Every firstling of an ass you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. Every first-born of man among your sons you shall redeem. And when in time to come your son asks you, ‘What does this mean?’ you shall say to him, ‘By strength of hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt, from the house of bondage. For when Pharaoh stubbornly refused to let us go, the LORD slew all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both the first-born of man and the first-born of cattle. Therefore I sacrifice to the LORD all the males that first open the womb; but all the first-born of my sons I redeem.’ It shall be as a mark on your hand or frontlets between your eyes; for by a strong hand the LORD brought us out of Egypt.”
All first-born male cattle are sacrificed to God; a first-born ass can be redeemed with the sacrifice of a lamb instead or it can be sacrificed itself; all first-born sons need to be redeemed. It does not say how our sons are to be redeemed here; we will find that out in a later passage. God passed over all Israel’s first born in Egypt as He set them free, so now they need to sacrifice or redeem all the first-born.
A woman needs to be purified after she gives birth; she needs to wait forty days for having a boy and eighty days for having a girl. The presentation of a baby in the temple is also about the woman being purified after birth. Here we find out with what a child is redeemed. “And when the days of her purifying are completed, whether for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the door of the tent of meeting a lamb a year old for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering, and he shall offer it before the LORD, and make atonement for her; then she shall be clean from the flow of her blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, either male or female. And if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for her, and she shall be clean” (Leviticus 12: 6-8).
A baby was to be redeemed with the sacrifice of a lamb as a burnt offering. A young pigeon or a turtledove was also sacrificed for a sin offering. The poor do not need to sacrifice a lamb; rather, they are allowed to bring a pair of turtledoves or pigeons for both of these sacrifices—the burnt offering and the sin offering.
We also find out that man’s redemption price is five shekels of silver. “Everything that opens the womb of all flesh, whether man or beast, which they offer to the LORD, shall be yours; nevertheless the first-born of man you shall redeem, and the firstling of unclean beasts you shall redeem. And their redemption price (at a month old you shall redeem them) you shall fix at five shekels in silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, which is twenty gerahs” (Numbers 18: 15-16).
So here is what I am thinking right now about all of this:
My theory is: The man and the woman in the Garden of Eden sought after a child of their own, they wanted to be creative like God and make a man, and so they ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which is they had relations, and they conceived and had Cain. Since they had children in a manner contrary to God’s command, the children they bore were children of men, not children of God, so they were born without God’s life in them, which we call sanctifying grace, and their passions were disordered, which we call original sin.
Abraham is given a similar test as the man and the woman, and after ten years of waiting for his promised son, Abraham sins and has relations with Hagar, his wife’s servant. Twenty-five years later, they finally give birth to their own son, Isaac. Since they never really passed the test, God tested Abraham again and told him to sacrifice Isaac. As Abraham is about to sacrifice Isaac, God stops him, and Isaac is passed over for the ram caught by the horns of its head in a thorn bush.
Because of Abraham and Isaac’s faithfulness, God swears by Himself to make his descendants a blessing to all nations. It was because of this covenant God makes here that about five hundred years later the Israelites are redeemed and set free from Egypt. The first and foundational Passover was Isaac, and the second was the Passover of all the first-born from Egypt. Because of God’s redeeming work of freeing Israel from Egypt, for all their descendants afterward they need to present and redeem all children shortly after they are born.
Due to the fear of death, the fear of not having children, sin entered the world. The second reading for the Presentation is from Hebrews 2: 14-18. “Since the children share in blood and flesh, Jesus likewise shared in them, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the Devil, and free those who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life” (2: 14-15). It was the fear of death that led humanity into slavery; it is Jesus’ death which destroys this fear and power of death.
Jesus destroys the power of death by dying on the cross; we participate in His death by our baptism since by baptism we die with Christ and are raised up with Him in His resurrection. In the Old Covenant, children had to be redeemed shortly after birth; in the New Covenant, children are redeemed shortly after birth in baptism. Now instead of redeeming our children with the sacrifice of a lamb or a pigeon or turtledove, our kids are redeemed by the Blood of the Lamb. This turns our sons of men into children of God, and the original problem from the beginning is fixed. The specific antidote to the Fall is found first of all in Jesus’ crucifixion, death and resurrection and secondly in our participation in those saving deeds most notably through baptism and Holy Eucharist.
Thanks for reading and your prayers.
Copyright 2007.
All rights reserved.
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