The Return...

Yes, it has been a long recess, an extended absence, a prolonged vacation... but the prodigal son has returned. I am back after approximately five months of "neglecting" my blog and its viewers. I feel that an apology is in order, because I seem to have abandoned you; however, I have returned, and I will try to prevent my incredible amounts of work from keeping me away from this blog.

I suppose that this post will be more on personal reflections than theological-biblical commentary.

Recently, something that has come to my attention is the fact that humans are incredibly, fantastically weak. I speak in generalities but mean to point specifically at myself. Amidst the piles of work and commitments to attend to (however pleasant), it becomes so entirely simple to neglect the One for whom we were created, to whom we owe our being, and by whom we have been redeemed. Our Savior, our God, literally lowered Himself from an entirely spiritual, purely existential Divine nature and became the lowest of all rational creatures. The God of the universe, the God that has no beginning and no end, the Alpha and the Omega, the One who holds everything in existence merely by His will to love us... this very same God descended to earth and became a human. From the moment of his conception, He was both God and man. In the hypostatic union, the human and Divine nature were found in one subsistence and one person, in our Lord Jesus Christ. Even before birth, John the Baptist leaped in Elizabeth's womb when Mary, only a few months pregnant with God Himself, approached to greet her. Jesus was both human and Divine from the moment of conception and was born miraculously, without causing any physical "side-effects" like normal children do at birth (If you'd like evidence of this, please comment and I will address it at that time).

After this, Jesus grew up like us, slept like us, ate, drank, cried, laughed, joked, bled, sweat, and died like us. He experienced the fullness of life as a human so as to give us an example of how to live as if in heaven while suffering on this earth. Jesus showed us how to help God's kingdom come and His will to be done, and he taught us how to pray. In his life, Jesus taught us everything we could possibly need or want. If that weren't enough, he took upon himself the weight of the entire world's sins, the sins of each person throughout history, and laid them on his own, perfect back. He took the sins of Pope John Paul II, Mother Teresa, Augustine, Francis of Assisi... he took on the sins of Jeffrey Dahmer, Charles Manson, Timothy McVeigh, Hitler, Stalin... he took on your sins and mine. Then, after the horrible agony and passion that he endured, he gave his perfect life for us, in order to make it possible for us to make it to heaven.

We are incredibly weak, and we have been showered with grace from birth, all in hopes that we will recognize God's love and love Him in return. He wants us to enter into His life-giving love; Father loving the Son without reserve, Son loving the Father equally perfectly, and the rivers of pure love that they share IS the Holy Spirit, which God pours upon us through the sacraments. What a gift!

Let us pray that we may come to recognize our weakness, His love, and our complete need for Him in all things, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Ezekiel 36: Old Testament Types of New Testament Realities

During a Theology class last quarter, we were reading from the book of Ezekiel, and I noticed something quite interesting and profound. Due to the great number of assignments that I had to complete, however, I forgot to write a commentary on it and it slipped into the recesses of my mind.

Now, I have remembered and, on this, my last day of school for this quarter and the first day of my 2 week break, I will proceed to share with you what I saw.

Ezekiel 36: 25-27 holds some very intriguing similarities to a few other things we may know today as "Sacraments" in the Catholic Church. Let me explain...

Verse 25 says, "I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you." This, in my mind, was an obvious reference to the sacrament of Baptism. In the liturgy of the Catholic Church, this "Rite of Sprinkling" can also be found. Any Catholic can attest to the fact that, during the Easter season (the 50 days after the end of Lent), at each Sunday Mass the Rite of Sprinkling is used in place of the Penitential Rite. Do not fear, this is provided for in the rubrics of the Roman Missal: "When this rite is celebrated it takes the place of the penitential rite at the beginning of Mass. The Lord have mercy is also omitted." A wonderful connection indeed is found here in Ezekiel 36 to the practices Catholics continue to carry on today in the liturgy (By the way, liturgy, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, section 1069, means "the participation of the People of God in the 'work of God').

Verse 26 contains two references, and says, "A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh." Within this verse, I saw references to both the sacrament of Penance and the sacrament of the Eucharist. Please, let me explain. The sacrament of Penance gives us a new heart because it transforms us, purifying us and giving us that new heart spoken of in this verse. Additionally, when he says, "I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh," it reminds me so much of the Eucharistic miracles (where the host changes into actual flesh) that have occurred around the world. In case you did not know, every specimen of the Eucharistic host that has been scientifically analyzed (by secular, non-Christian scientists, no less) has been found to be cardiac, or heart tissue (every Precious Blood sample has been found to be of the same blood type, as well). This is why I can see this verse referring to the Eucharist, among other theological reasons. (As a sort of disclaimer, I understand that Eucharistic miracles are not an article of faith, and no one must feel obligated to believe in them) As additional biblical support, I feel I should cite Ezekiel 36: 29-30, where it says that the Lord, "will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you," as well as making, "the increase of the field abundant," all in order to prevent famine among God's people. Bread (grain) and wine (increase of the field) are guaranteed to God's people. Just as one other side note, in Revelation 6:6, it says, "A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; but do not harm oil and wine!" In this chapter the different horsemen are being unleashed, and in this particular verse the horseman of famine is being loosed on earth. What is meant by this saying is that all other foods may may harmed, provided that wheat, (oil,) and wine are not harmed. A coincidence? I'll let you decide...

Finally, in verse 27, it says, "And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances." The sacrament of Confirmation is to be seen here in Ezekiel. It is by Confirmation that our Baptismal graces are completed. A biblical reference to this is present in of Acts 8:14-17, which says, "Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; for the Spirit had not fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit." So, seeing as the spirit is put within the people of Samaria (completing their baptismal graces), it is not unreasonable to think that they had received the sacrament of Confirmation, although it was not mentioned by that name (Keep in mind that the term "Trinity" is not mentioned, either; only the evidence of it).

I hope that all of you who read this see the beautiful connections between the Old and New Testaments. There are so many more, and I hope that you will go out and find some of your own. God bless and Mary keep you all!

Prayers...

Let all of my thoughts, O Lord, fly unto Thee, who are the Lover of my soul and the source of my life. Bless me, a wretched sinner, that I may realize my sinfulness and turn away from it. As did Mary Magdalene, may I despise and abhor my past iniquity, and never return to it. Tear from me all affection for sin; may my heart be torn in two at the thought of offending Thee, sweet Savior.

I cannot move forward without Thee, God and Father, Abba. I can see nothing apart from Thy light, Holy Spirit! Save me, Jesus! Be my refuge and my strength, my water and my bread. Depart not from me, I implore Thee.

Amen.

Reflections on God's Love; Grace

God showers down graces upon us at all moments of all days. We may not always have what we want, but we always have what He knows is best for us. At times, that could be nothing (material), but it is then that we are to turn to Him in humility and meekness, begging Him to carry us through the seemingly hopeless times.

The life we have, the breath we breathe, the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the family we have, our friends and all other people or things in our lives are gifts. That is actually what grace means: “gift.”

God created us out of nothing… try to think about that. No one can actually conceive what it is like really, because our minds can only picture darkness and interpret that as nothing. Try to imagine the absence of darkness, light, air, matter, existence; that is nothingness. Only God existed in the beginning, the ultimate and true existence. Out of this, He brought all that is; think of the trees, beasts, all people, the stars, and galaxies… the universe.

Additionally, and even more amazingly, He created the higher order of the spiritual realm, which is closer to His own nature (though infinitely far from it, seeing as He is infinite). The angels, far above humans in intellect and power, are the handiwork of the Lord of all. Our very own spirits, able to dwell in a physical body while maintaining their spiritual elements, are also of this creation, though different from the angels’ spirits. Angels are pure spirit, while we are both spirit and body. A funny fact a theologian once stated was that an angel could not handle being in a physical body, because they would essentially go insane, just as an animal would not be able to function with a human spirit within it. These are, of course, impossible scenarios, but the point that we as humans are very unique is what needs to be understood from these words.

We, who are so special, were made out of absolutely nothing. There was no matter with which to shape us in the beginning. God first created us from this nothingness, and then decided to love us totally, absolutely, completely, fully. He gave us the earth and all of its fruits, He gave us companions, He gave us humor, and on top of it all, He gave us His only-begotten Son, one in being with the Father. The Father sent the Son, with whom He is so intimately connected, in order to make it possible for us, who have fallen into sin, to have a chance the be with Him in heaven. He did all of this in order that we might have a chance to be in full and intimate union with Him, to be so enveloped in the Holy Spirit (the love “between” the Father and the Son, which is the third person of the Trinity) that we are no longer separate from God but are united with Him forever.

How can we, who are simply nothing, acted upon by the Lover of our souls, sin against Him who keeps us alive and gives us all we can possibly conceive of having? How can we sin against Him who suffered and died on the cross for us, that we may be able to love Him back?

Our free will is the mode by which we can choose to sin. Some may ask how we can do anything wrong if all we receive is grace, and it is because of the grace called, “free will.” God allows us to choose Him or to choose things contrary to Him because, if there were no choice, then there would be no love. One must choose to love another, and we must choose to love our Lord back. This is what happened in the beginning, with Adam and Eve. They had all of the grace that one could hope for but, because of the dignity accorded to all of God’s children, they were given a choice as well. They fell, just as we now fall every day.

Let us re-evaluate our lives, brothers and sisters, in order to find a way to eliminate sin from all our days. It is foolish to have pride, and here is an analogy to help us understand why:

God creates us, clothes and feeds us, places us on a road, and puts many forks in that road. At each fork, there is a “red light” and a “green light.” Of course, the green light is the path towards Him, and the red light is the path away. When we choose the green light and are proud of ourselves, it is as if we are saying, “Wow, look at me. I have chosen the right path.” The right path is obviously the better path, and it was laid out for us by the Lord. How can we be proud of ourselves for following the reasonable road? We should not think ourselves better than anyone else, because some are simply at a fork a little further back on the road. The only reason that we “got this far” is because God brought us here. Instead, let us guide others through the forks and so bring them closer to Christ.

Rejecting pride, we turn to you Lord, and we fall on our knees before You. Judge us not by what we deserve, Lord, but have mercy on us and open our hearts to the movements of Your Holy Spirit. Just as Jesus led people to holiness, even on the road to Calvary, may we, too, by carrying our cross, lead others into holiness. Amen.