Saying "Yes" to God - Part 1 of 3

The lives of Adam and Eve were sustained in virtuous conduct by God who granted them a share of his divine life. This share was sanctifying grace, the procession of a two-fold gift from God:  “original holiness” and a participation in the mystery of the Holy Trinity.  [CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH (CCC) 375]

The Genesis account discloses that Adam and Eve possessed the fullness of intellect and reason. Both enjoyed free will and the liberty to act rightly or wrongly. Having no experience of trial or hardship, they accepted God’s friendship and trusted his divine commands from the start—Do this, don’t do that. Throughout the age of innocence, the length of which is unknown,  the intellect and will of the first human beings mirrored the divine goodness in whose image and likeness they were created.  [cf. Gen 1:26]  

Adam, searching for a help-mate, rightly rejected all birds, beasts and fishes as unsuitable. By saying yes to intimacy with Eve, “bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” [Gen 2:23], he cooperated with God’s plan for human well-being. By saying no to the primary companionship of non-human creatures, he honored God in whose image and likeness he was created.

Eve who enjoyed good things to eat knew well what God commanded her and Adam: “You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.” [Gen 3:3]  Tempted by the serpent (devil), she touched and ate fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Obsessed by self-interest, Eve convinced Adam to make her strikingly outrageous act of apostasy against God complete. Thus the age of innocence vanished, and their idolatrous hearts convulsed with anguish and dread.

Eve rejected the God of creation and gravely wounded her relationship with Adam. The wretched Adam validated his companion’s sin by doubly failing in his duty. He neither corrected Eve nor interceded prayerfully on her behalf in God’s presence. One may speculate as to the narrative’s outcome if Adam refused to conspire with Eve, seeking instead divine pardon for her and healing for the wounded creation. In the face of this generation’s incalculable human suffering, to be sure, such speculation is feckless and irresponsible.

Saying yes to lust and greed demands a corresponding no to the primacy of truth. Both grasped for equality with God and the sham promise of undeserved self-generated immortality. They decisively rejected God who alone names what is good and what is evil. Having cooperated with the serpent’s sinister attack on the dignity of their own personhood, God expelled the two offenders from Eden.

Tragically, humanity fell with Adam and Eve into perpetual suffering and death, losing all memory of intimacy with God. Many aspects of the Genesis story always will be debated, but perhaps common agreement could be expected on this point: The human response to faith is always personal, far-reaching and involves other persons. (To be continued ... )

Wrapping a Gift

When I preach at Mass what I’m really doing is wrapping a gift. The gift is the gospel. The homily is the wrapping. I don’t make or buy the gift or keep it for myself, but I try to present the gift in a pleasing way. The wrapping is not more important than the gift.

The gospel always outshines the homilist and his own thoughts. I present the gospel to you as Christ graciously directs me. His gift is the truth. The giver and the gift are the same. The response of a longing heart to the good news of Jesus Christ is a joyous moment. The one who trimmed the gift must stand aside.

Feast of the Ascension /Circle of the Son /June 01 2014

Jesus took five steps to cross the threshold from the temporal world into the realm of eternity. These five steps are: his Passover celebration (our first Mass), his passion and death, and his resurrection and ascension into heaven.

In the larger sense, these steps complete the gospel circle of the Son. They began, of course with the Lord’s incarnation. They encompass the meaning of his whole ministry and life. Jesus’ ascension to the Father's right hand is their culmination. One thing is crystal clear:  Jesus’ ascension is not an afterthought, it’s not a gloss, it’s not a fiction employed by the early Church to smooth out difficult post-resurrection questions.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that the ascension is the happy ending to an extraordinarily dramatic gospel story. Far from being a minor experience in salvation history, the ascension of Our Lord validates the new covenant made in his name. It is the “crown jewel” in God’s plan of salvation for the human race. The new covenant in Christ's body and blood achieves its consummation in Our Lord's ascension. We may understand this more perfectly by recalling the Old Testament figure Noah.

In primordial time, God cleansed the world by sending forth a great flood which destroyed sinful humanity and all living creatures except the faithful Noah, his household and the animals housed on-board the now legendary ark. As an affirming sign to Noah and his descendants, God placed a rainbow in the clouds. He promised that flood waters would never again purge all flesh-and-blood creatures from the earth--especially human beings.

But what about death? Isn’t death the inevitable “flood” which destroys all life? And from the ages of ages, to Jesus of Nazareth God entrusted this colossally important concern of fallen human beings. The Book of Acts recounts with superb precision how Jesus has defeated death once and for all . . .

. . . HOW GOD anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. And we are witnesses to all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.

THEY PUT him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and made him manifest; not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

AND HE commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that he is the one ordained by God to be judge of the living and the dead.  [Acts 10:38-42]  

As the sign of the death of death itself, this Jesus who was resurrected from the dead was set in the clouds by God the Father as the everlasting celebration of his holy sovereignty over all things. Hence Jesus’ ascension to the father’s right hand is become the rainbow of divine mercy bridging both the temporal and spiritual realms with its splendid radiance.

To Peter and the gathered Church privileged to witness the Son's exaltation, and all who await the good news of redemption in Jesus’ name, this is the sign of the new and everlasting covenant which abolishes the power of death forever.

Absent Our Lord's ascension, his rising from the dead (no matter how spectacular) would be devoid of essential meaning. The ascension of Jesus Christ is man's assurance that the resurrection is credible. What was initiated at the moment of Mary's conception has achieved its fulfillment.

Christ's being raised to heaven is mortal man's definitive proof that a heaven awaits those who are faithful to God’s love and the path he has marked out for them. We have been purchased by the great price of Jesus’ passion and death and promised a share in his glory . We are heirs to the ultimate benefaction, Christ's resurrection from the dead!

"Free Gift of God" /Romans 6:23

There is always the temptation to talk too much in confession. If a penitent talks too much, he becomes an obstacle between God and the priest. If a confessor talks too much, he imposes himself between God and the penitent. The former is a distraction, the latter is dangerous.

Apart from serious cases, I believe that a penance should be light and easy, a few prayers that the penitent can offer before the Blessed Sacrament before going home. The confessor prescribes a penance to prompt the penitent to offer his gratitude to our Lord Jesus Christ who purchased his salvation at a great price.  [cf. 1Cor 6:20]  

A penance should be completed without undue hardship. Better that penance be performed before an altar and crucifix than behind the steering wheel of a car or worse. It is better to confess frequently while suffering profound aridity of soul than to make one hot and steamy confession in three and a half year’s time.

We go to confession with sorrowful hearts for having offended God. We earnestly expect that having been washed clean of sin that heaven’s entrance remains open to us. Then we do our penance. By his own flesh and blood the Lord has remitted the faithful follower’s undeniable and spectacular debts owed to God and his heaven. A believer must lovingly thank Jesus for this.

Jesus “the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”  [Jn 1:29]  came that we “may have life and have it abundantly”.  [Jn 10:10]  The height, depth, length and breadth of “I AM” sustains us in forgiveness as God holds creation itself in being. No one may enter into God’s holiness to an abundant, eternal and perfect union with God but through him.  [cf. Jn 14:6]  

A penitent should do something more than say his penance for the good of his own and of the supernatural order. This is usually the case. Let him as well perform the spiritual and temporal works of mercy for the good of his own and the temporal order and these as a habit of life. [1]

"Do You Believe This?" /Lent Wk 05 /Cycle A /Apr 06 2014

ON THE THIRD DAY

1.  The Mount of Olives, familiar to most Christians as the starting point for Jesus’ jubilant procession into Jerusalem, its Garden of Gethsemane, and later his ascension to the right hand of God, proves to be the dramatic setting for still another miraculous event in salvation history. Lazarus, a friend of Jesus, becomes ill at his home in Bethany, a village situated on the east slope of the Mount of Olives (about two miles distant from Jerusalem).

2.  His sisters Mary and Martha send an intimate, revealing, yet discreet message to Jesus who is some distance away:  "Lord, he whom you love is ill."  [Jn 11:3]  Their words, spare and eloquent, witness their belief in Jesus' lordship and express feelings of tenderness and worry. For his part, Jesus mysteriously chooses to linger beyond the region of Judea, thereby giving full reign to the finality of Lazarus’ death. On the third day, approaching his decisive rendezvous at the cave in which his dear friend is interred, Jesus becomes deeply emotional.

PICTURE OF HEALTH

3.  A number of years ago, late summer, I stood inside a small and complex ecosystem. I felt its cool atmosphere to be heavy and solemn. Not entirely quiet, the little grotto echoed with curious noises--the sound of sighing and varied little chirps. Intrusive voices disturbed its peace, however, which seemed to me disrespectful.

4.  The cave was a small room in the intensive care unit of a nationally known cancer center. The sighing came from a mechanical respirator, the chirping noises were beeps from a heart monitor and other equipment. These things sustained a dear friend and fellow seminarian on life-support. He was only 32 years old. His name was Jim. Only a few days earlier, he was the picture of health. A devastating leukemia cut him down within the span of one week, a brain hemorrhage the cause of death.

UNINTERRUPTED CRY

5.  I went straight to the hospital from the airport. I talked to Jim by phone from Toronto scarcely two days before, but I did not know what to expect. Lying there in his bed, he seemed to be resting. I could not grasp that he was clinically dead, that he would never open his eyes, or smile or get up again. My eyes saw what I wanted to see. What the nurses told me I did not want to hear. All I could trust was my faith in God. I asked God for more. I prayed to God saying, The victory is yours, help me to see with eyes of faith.

6.  I prayed in vigil at Jim’s bedside throughout the night. (His family chose not to stay for reasons I will never understand.) I was there in the morning when the medical staff disconnected his life support. The sighing of the respirator stopped. The rhythmic up-and-down movement of Jim’s chest ceased. The color of his complexion darkened immediately. The chirping of the monitor went on a dreadfully long time, going slower and slower until the alarm sounded in one long uninterrupted cry.

2004: Cardinal George's Ad limina address to Pope John Paul II

In his ad limina address to Pope John Paul II at the Vatican in 2004, Cardinal George spoke frankly about the United States and the Church:

…the Church in the United States is in great danger.

…anti-Catholicism has always marked American culture.

The public conversation in the United States speaks easily of individual rights; it cannot give voice to considerations of the common good.

The public conversation, like the political, legal and economic systems, is based on the generation of conflict between individuals and groups. Culturally, the right to sexual freedom is now the basis of personal freedom.

…the Church…is seen as an enemy of personal freedom and a cause of social violence.

The relation between the body of Christ which is the holy Eucharist and the body of Christ which is his Church passes through the sacrament of holy orders. A culture founded on the rejection of the sacrament of holy orders can grasp neither the Eucharist nor apostolic governance.

Americans know that we as a people can be generous, fair-minded and freedom-loving; we are slower to see that we can be arrogant, brutal and eroticized.

Is the mission of the Catholic Church to America one of fulfillment or healing? One of completion or forgiveness? The Eucharist is both, of course, and so must be the mission; but we are still struggling to find an approach to evangelizing which will open our culture and our country to the Holy Spirit and to the path of Christian discipleship. [Zenit.org JUNE 1, 2004]

Good Physician

POPE ST. Leo the Great reigned for 21 years in the mid-5th century. He wrote, “The Lord’s passion is prolonged until the end of the world.” As long as his “little ones” are impoverished, Christ hungers with them. As long as a single tear falls to the cheek of one of his “little ones”, Jesus suffers their grief and sorrows as he did his own:

COME, ALL you who pass by the way, look and see whether there is any suffering like my suffering. At this I weep, my eyes run with tears: far from me are all who could console me, far away are any who might revive me.  [Lam 1:12,16]

OUR LORD Jesus Christ suffers for you, and he suffers when you hold back from him. Perhaps there is still time for you to pause, reflect and surrender your whole heart to our crucified Lord. If you sincerely desire to console Jesus, to revive him in the midst of his suffering for you, then bring him your tears, your hunger and your distress. And let him heal you! “The Spirit is the witness, because the Spirit is the truth!”  [1Jn 5:7]   

ENTRUST YOURSELF to the Good Physician whose clinic is the Church, whose office is the Cross, whose license is the Gospel, and whose medicine of mercy is his Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.

THE LORD himself has given you life by the blood and water which flowed from his side as he hung upon the cross: “Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God.”  [1Jn 4:7]  The God of peace entrusted the Good Physician to heal the world’s many sorrows. Pray that he will bless you with his grace and love.

IS ANY human being so well off, so insulated from life, so estranged from his own heart that he can say, I’ve never cried, I’ve never known loss, I’ve never been hurt? In the name of heaven, then, why do so many Christians carry their sorrows, impoverishment and injuries alone and apart from the Church?

Icon: Virgin of Peschanskaya (Ukraine)

MANY MIRACULOUS events are attributed to the “Virgin of Peschanskaya”, an icon of the Kazan style portraying the Mother of God and the Christ child. The icon of the Theotokos (“God-bearer”) is associated with Bishop Ioasaph (Joseph) of Belgorod and Oboyanska (born Joachim Gorlenko, 1705, Ukraine). Glorified by the Russian Orthodox Church in 1911, Bishop Joseph is revered for his monastic piety and his devotion to the poor and sick of his diocese.

SHORTLY AFTER arriving in Belgorod (Russia) in 1748, Bishop Joseph had a dream in which he heard the Mother of God say, “Look what was done to my image by the servers of the Church.” Not knowing where to find the lost icon he saw in his dream, the bishop diligently inspected all of the Churches and places he visited in his diocese.

ONE DAY in 1754, the saint visited the Cathedral of the Holy Ascension in Izium (Ukraine), 100 miles southwest of Belgorod. There, stored with the charcoal used for the ritual censers, was the icon of his dream. 
TO FULFILL his spiritual promise, Bishop Joseph ordered that the newly-discovered icon be housed in a suitable case and reverently displayed to honor the Virgin of Peschanskaya. The holy hierarch died December 10 the same year.
IN 1792 the Cathedral and icon were transferred to a new location in the Peschi district of Izium. During World War I, the icon was taken to the Prussian front to protect the Russian army which had suffered disastrous defeats. The Mother of God icon is revered as the guardian of Russia in perilous times. As well, the Virgin of Peschanskaya is universally venerated as the protectress of humankind. 

COPIES OF the miraculous image are found throughout the world. The Peschanskaya icon of the Mother of God has worked many miracles: healings from incurable diseases, children brought back to life, unexpected monetary help, many monastic vocations, and the blessing of pilgrimages to the Holy Land. The feast day of the Icon is Oct 22/Nov 4. The Kazan style of iconography derives from the Our Lady of Kazan icon, said to have come from Constantinople to Kazan, Russia in the 13th century. Kazan, Tatarstan is about 500 miles due east of Moscow.

Knowing that He Knows: Lent (Wk 02, Cycle A) Sunday Mar 16 2014

SUBSTANCE OF GOD’S “ALL”

1.  The prayers of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass speak eloquently of what human beings know about God. The prayers of Mass likewise acknowledge all that we cannot comprehend about God. The height, depth, length and breadth of God’s “all” is unknown to us. The substance of God’s “all” is beyond our understanding.

2.  God is perfect existence. God is one in being and knowing. The human person is the superlative design of God who said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”.  [Gen 1:26]  God gave his human creature an immortal soul and placed him above all living things of the world. Therefore in the divine likeness, he possesses intellect and will. From infancy the human person is self-aware, conscious of his being and knowing, and knowing that he knows. An infant child sees you smiling at him. He smiles in return. He knows that he knows your smile.

BEYOND IRONY

3.  The cold and lifeless moon is not given to lovers only for its nocturnal beauty or as an inspiration for kisses and smiles. Far more important is the humbling realization that our sun, like all the stars in the cosmos, is blind to its own light. Active but not alive, it cannot comprehend its own existence. The blind planet earth receives the blind sun’s heat and light. Not one piece, part, emission or particle of either sphere knows that the other exists.

4.  Though enlightened by knowledge and experience, man's contingent being and imperfect knowing cannot function sufficiently without God in whom all life and light originate.[2]  It is beyond irony how a human being will stand in the dark to admire the moon’s anemic light and never reflect on his own existential vulnerability and the fact that everything he has is borrowed. Man's willful refusal to seek the God who sees and knows all propels him away from the divine source sustaining his own humanity.

LIKE A DYING STAR

5.  His conscious knowing that he knows diminishes. Without being able to grasp the meaning of his own personhood, he renounces the value and worth of his own and all human life. For a time, his exterior vigor conceals a growing incapacity to sustain the warmth of generative love and the radiance of meaningful relationships. He is no longer cognizant of his own priceless attributes nor does he look for them in others. Like a dying star whose vital energy has dissipated, his activity and potential remain beautiful to behold until the very instant he collapses in upon himself.

Pope John Paul II: "They Wish To Catch a Glimpse"

THE WORLD looks to the priest, because it looks to Jesus! No one can see Christ; but everyone sees the priest, and through him they wish to catch a glimpse of the Lord! Immense is the grandeur of the Lord! Immense is the grandeur and dignity of the priest!

Pope John Paul II

Rome, Italy

October 13, 1979

Blessing for a Pregnancy

EXHORTATION:

DEAR MOTHER and Father, this is a grace-filled time for you. God knows your love for each other. He affirms your desire to increase the size of your family. In the ages of ages, he has called all children by name.

COMMEND YOUR unborn child to Christ our Divine Physician. Pray for your medical doctors and staff. Ask God’s Holy Spirit for prudence and understanding to make wise decisions in the days ahead.

ASK FOR the peace of heart which only Christ can give. Ask God to pour out his Spirit upon you and refresh you. Do not be fearful. God will guard you. Pray often. Bless your unborn each day as God blesses all children. Care for your unborn child each day as God cares for all children. Love all children as you love your very own.

DEAR PARENTS, God knows that you long for the birth of your child. Even now he ministers to your baby’s needs. Look forward confidently to your child’s arrival. Do not grow impatient for the day of birth. God wants your child to be born healthy and with every good gift on the day of delivery. Nothing in the heavens or on the earth will take away God’s loving care for you.

BLESSING:

“The Lord be with you.” (R.) “And with your spirit.” 

“Bow down for the blessing.”

DEAR FAMILY, may God reveal in you the gracious miracle of his divine mercy. May he grant the assistance you humbly implore, so that through the days ahead, you will know his comforting presence.

MAY HE grant your unborn child good health, a safe birth and all that is needed for a happy childhood. May Almighty God pour out his blessings upon you and your unborn child to the praise and the glory of his exalted name.

(+) In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (R.) Amen.

(Optional: Sprinkling of Holy Water)

Michel Quoist: "Not Easy to be a Priest" (1954)

PEOPLE ASK a great deal of their priest, and they are right. But they should understand that it is not easy to be a priest. He has given himself in all the ardor of youth, yet he still remains a man, and every day the man in him tries to take back what he has surrendered. It is a continual struggle to remain completely at the service of Christ and of others.

A PRIEST needs no praise or embarrassing gifts; what he needs is that those committed to his charge should, by loving their fellows more and more, prove to him that he has not given his life in vain. And as he remains a man, he may need, once in a while, a delicate gesture of disinterested friendship . . . some Sunday night when he is alone.

[Michel Quoist, PRAYERS (Lanham, MD: Sheed & Ward 1999) 64.]

(Originally published as PRIERES by Michel Quoist (Paris: Les Editions Ouvrieres) 1954.)

Fragrant Offering: Lent (Wk 01, Cycle A) Sunday March 09 2014

NOT TWICE OVER

1.  The Tree of Knowledge was not the only great leafy treasure in the sanctuary of Eden. In the midst of the garden, stood a second and more magnificent tree, the Tree of Life.  [cf. Gen 2:9]  God told Adam and Eve their lives depended on not touching either tree. Listening to the devil, however, they feasted on the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. Satan's intent was manifest: To destroy their lives, he would persuade them to violate God’s truth.

2.  Fearing that they would molest the Tree of Life, God promptly expelled them from the garden. Eating its fruit would make Eve and Adam the human equivalent of fallen angels. God had quite enough of the rebellious Lucifer and his demons. He did not want evil immortalized twice over.  [cf. Gen 3:22]  

GOD’S MASTERY OVER TRUTH AND LIFE

3.  Though presented as a dialectic in the Genesis text, the Trees of Life and Knowledge do not imply dualities of God in whom being and knowing are one. They do however signify God’s mastery over all things. God is absolutely sovereign over life. He alone names what is true.

4.  Unquestionably, God gifted man with stewardship over the created world. His dominion encompassed the land, sea and air of earth. However, God denied his human creation supremacy over everything. Man's suzerainty terminated where divine mystery started:  

BUT OF the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.  [Gen 2:17]

HE DROVE out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.  [Gen 3:24]  

PERPETUAL STRUGGLE

5.  Adam and Eve paid a great price for hijacking the knowledge of good and evil. Their evil was responsible for the fall of God’s creation. This terrible comprehension entered society with Adam and Eve as its bewildered prophets.

6.  They were responsible for every shadow, every heartache, every tear, every disappointment they suffered. They could not wish away the world’s vulnerability and risk. They could only cope with it. Further, the divine injunction regarding the Trees was inviolable. Human beings would struggle perpetually to interpret divine truth. For his part God would never grant them power to change it or make it up.

SCRUBBY PEOPLE

7.  In the course of history, God inaugurated his plan to rescue human beings from their brutal folly. He approached a particularly pitiful clan despised by their Egyptian overlords for their flocks of sheep and goats and nomadic ways. God revealed himself to this scrubby and exhausted people "in a desert land, and in the howling waste of the wilderness; he encircled him, he cared for him, he kept him as the apple of his eye".  [Deu 32:10]  

8.  They were Hebrews, Egyptian slaves. God commanded one of them, Moses, to work signs and wonders in pharaoh's court:  “And there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.”  [Deu 34:10]

Captain of My Choice

WE HAVE only to look at a stately ship at rest in the harbor, secured to its pier or anchor by sturdy hawsers and know that its crew, confident that their vessel is secure, enjoy a unique freedom, one foot on sea, one on land. The Barque of Peter is my ship. She carries a precious cargo of souls as she sails through time and space to her final destination, the heavenly city Jerusalem. Though I am merely an ordinary seaman, I have not been pressed into this service. Rather, I signed on in freedom to serve the captain of my choice. I enjoy the leave he grants me and the freedom of being in the world but not of the world.

February 10 2004

Some Good in My Soul

WILL GOD see some good in my soul worthy of eternity--an earnest preparation for the Jerusalem of God’s glory? I pray my soul may not be cast down into darkness because it bears no light and is unrecognizable by even the least angel of heaven.

Feb 02 2004

Much Alive

No denying

it occurred,

my muttering

of a flinty word.

What causes it

to thrive?

/ and remain

very much alive

to taunt my

contrite will?

March 1977

Like an Ant

Sometimes I feel

like an ant who pauses

in his relentless toil

to take one brief opaque look

at the sky /only

to turn his head back

to the grime that

will claim him.

February 1977

Wrapping a Gift

When I offer a homily what I’m really doing is wrapping a gift. I don’t make or buy the gift. Nor do I take it for myself. With competent thoughts and words at hand, and with excellence in mind, I trim the gift in a pleasing way. Whatever I lack in perfection is surpassed by the gift. I then present the gift to you as the giver directs me. The giver is Christ. His gift is the truth. The giver and the gift are the same.