Lent 2 (Mark 8:31-38)
“For what will it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?”
Our Heavenly Father’s Plan of salvation is a dynamic interplay of joy, sorrow and glory. The joy begins at the Christmas crib. The sorrow finds expression at the cross. The glory is the new life of the resurrection and the new way of living the Holy Spirit brings to the world at Pentecost.
As Jesus prepared for the terrible events of Holy Week and Good Friday, he instructed his apostolic leadership team in the essential facts of the Plan of Salvation. Not unpredictably, the apostles were horrified at Jesus’ teaching. They did not expect the cross to be pivotal in the Plan of Salvation. They did not want the cross to be the plan of salvation.
As with virtually everyone in their generation, and as with virtually everyone in all subsequent generations, they wanted the quick and easy path. They wanted the path of pride and power. They could not even imagine the path of sacrificial love. It made no sense to them. It makes no sense to most of us most of the time.
And so, Jesus challenges the apostles as He challenges us. What do you really want? Who do you want to become?
The Bible is a record of the path of power and its consequences. Dozens of people over centuries of time recorded their observation of human choice and human behavior. They all came to the same conclusion. Jesus expresses that conclusion in a succinct statement for all people of all time.
What does is profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?
What would you ask for in exchange for your soul? Another way of asking this question is where are your priorities in contradiction to God’s priorities for your life?
God’s priority is for you to be the beloved of the co-eternal Beloved, Jesus Christ. Jesus sets before us the three priorities of the Beloved: Love God with all of your heart, soul and mind. Love others as you love yourself. We love God through worship, the highest form of love. We love others through an attitude of compassion and in acts of service. We love ourselves by offering our particular sins to God to be transformed back into their original virtues.
Love is the defining principle by which God created our species and each and every one of us.
God did not create us to live independently of His personal presence in this world. As we choose to make God second in our lives we make God last. As we choose to ignore or subvert the Summary of the Law we begin to lose our souls. We begin to lose the meaning and purpose God gave us.
During the Middle Ages in Western Europe people pondered this aspect of human nature. They explored this aspect of human behavior in many ways. One way was the story of Dr. Faustus.
As an old man facing death, Dr. Faustus entered into a contract with the devil. He pledge his immortal soul to the devil in exchange for 30 more years of youthful vitality, intellectual superiority, unrestricted pleasure and immunity from the law of cause and effect.
In some versions of the story the demon is horrified at the proposal. In others he seduces Faustus with promises of fame fortune and pleasure. Of course, the 30 years pass quickly. Faustus cultivates the arrogance that just as the demon comes to collect his soul Faustus will repent and cheat the devil of his payment.
As the contract is fulfilled the day of payment arrives. It is then the devil restores Faustus to the law of cause and effect. The impact of 30 years of sin now hits Faustus full force. His pride turns to despair as he realizes what he has done to himself by his own choice in pursuing a life of sin without experiencing the consequences of that sin until the moment of his death.
Faustus cannot repent as his pride morphs into despair. He realizes too late the meaning of the phrase: “the devil’s bargain.”
Faustus is a cautionary tale that describes a present reality. This world of duality is the realm of choice. Every choice we make contributes to the formation of our soul and of our soul’s eternal destiny. God wants each of us to choose love as the principle by which we form our souls. As we choose love we choose the eternal nature of God and enter into eternal life here and now.
The obstacle for a soul to choose love is the original choice our species made to separate from God. That separation produces a soul that lives according to the principle of self will and pride. The apostles expressed this self will and pride as they attempted to rebuke Jesus for even considering the cross as the path to salvation.
Preeminently, the cross is the symbol of steadfast holy sacrificial unconditional love. The way of the cross is expressed in Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night of his arrest. That prayer is: Heavenly Father, if it be possible let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will but Thy will be done.
Jesus prayed that prayer from the center of Divine Love and compassion. In his humanity he did not rush to martyrdom for a cause. In his love he accepted the way of the cross to save humanity from sin and death.
There is no quick fix to sin and death. There are no short cuts in the path to reunification with God. There is only Jesus dying on the cross. There is only Jesus risen from the dead. There is only Jesus who is the original pattern for humanity.
What do you choose in place of God? Where is God not first in your priorities? Where does your pride and self will reject God’s laws through actual sin and attempts to ignore the reality of cause and effect by ignoring the consequences of those sins? Where do you live your life from the place of a demand backed by a threat?
It is never too late in this world to repent. It becomes more difficult for those who have lived a life in separation from God. The pride of separation always leads to despair. Pride says: I don’t need God. Despair says: even God cannot help me now.
During Lent, ask the Holy Spirit to show you where your priorities are not compatible with God’s perfect plan for your life. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you which particular sin you need to yield to God for God to transform back into its original virtue.
Jesus loves us with and everlasting love. He passionately desires we choose love and in choosing love that we choose life. To that end Jesus reminds us of the laws of choice, cause and effect, and consequence as he asks: “For what will it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?”
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Friday, February 24, 2012
Lent 1
Lent 1 (Mark 1:9-15)
The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news.”
The old life cannot support the new way of living.
The old life is the life we inherit from Adam and Eve. We inherit the original choice Adam made to separate from God. And, we choose to live our lives from the foundation of that choice. That foundation produces a way of living that is characterized by fear, self-will and pride, the triad of separation.
The triad of separation leads to sin, rebellion against the call to worship and rejection of the Love of God. The end result of sin is the death of the body and the eternal exile of the soul from God.
Jesus came into the world as the second Adam. He came in the fullness of time. He came following centuries of religious conflict in the midst of a culture convulsed by religious conflict. He came into a world united the military might of Rome. He came into a world united by Greek culture and language.
Jesus came at a time when the books of the Old Testament had taken their final form as we know them today. The Dead Sea scrolls prove that the Old Testament we know today is the same as the people in Jesus’ day knew over two thousand years ago.
Jesus came into a religious culture that finally, after centuries of struggle, embraced monotheism.
These things are part of what the scriptures mean when they say Jesus came in the fullness of time. Jesus also came into a world obsessed with religion and defined by religion.
Judaism had divided itself into over a dozen competing and conflicting sects. Pagan religions emerged and vanished every few years. Philosophers had developed a bewildering array of contradictory visions of the “good life”.
Over all of these things, everyone in the ancient world felt the fear and the despair of death.
People all understood the bad news confronting humanity. The Bad News is separation. The worst news is death. People argued over the causes and the possible solutions to the problem. But, they understood the nature and depth of the problem.
They blamed government, culture, economics and each other for the problem. They sought solutions in power, knowledge, superstition, mysticism and law. None of it answered the basic question. None of it offered a real practical and immediate solution.
Jesus was and is the solution.
Mark records the briefest account of Jesus’ baptism and temptation in the wilderness. The purpose for these brief accounts is to emphasize that Jesus is the Son of God and how Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved in human flesh. It is by this eternal love that Jesus overcomes the temptation of Satan in the wilderness. And, it is within the context of this eternal love that Jesus begins his three year public ministry.
The actual details of the public ministry are less important to Mark than the reality of the person. Jesus just doesn’t preach, teach and heal. Jesus is the fullness of divine love in human flesh. Jesus is the new humanity who lives from the divine center of steadfast holy unconditional sacrificial love.
The solution to separation cannot be law, knowledge, power or even religion. The solution to separation is reunification. God unites His divinity with our humanity in Jesus. That is why Jesus himself is the solution to separation. His words and deeds testify to who he is but in some ways are less important than who he is.
God recognizes the old way of being human and its terrible consequence of sin and death. God’s solution is to provide a new way of being human. There is no quick fix to the problem. There are no minor adjustments to the problem. The solution is the new life.
The new life is a gift. No one can earn it. No one has any inherent right to claim it. All we have to do is receive it. We receive it as a gift by faith that Jesus is who he claimed to be, who the apostles experienced, who God the Father declared and who the Holy Spirit bears witness to in the lives of the faithful throughout the world and across the centuries.
The old life cannot support the new way of living.
Satan met Jesus in the wilderness. Satan tempted Jesus by quoting and misquoting scripture. Jesus met Satan with the steadfast holy unconditional love of the eternal Trinity. This is the way we can meet temptation.
Our minds can always find ways to justify particular sin. We don’t need Satan to deceive us. Jesus offers to renew our minds in the clarity of divine love.
Our hearts can always find ways to justify particular sin. We don’t need Satan to interfere in order to lead us into sin. Jesus offers to transform our hearts by the outpouring of divine love from his own sacred heart.
Our wills rebel against external standards and external authority. The old life impels us to live by the motto “my will be done”. We believe that the assertion of our individual will to power produces freedom. Moses and the prophets tell and show us that the assertion of our individual will to power only leads to slavery.
The slavery of the will to power is the slavery to fear, anxiety, frustration, pride and eventually despair. Jesus offers to set us free from this slavery through the prayer his mother taught him and he now teaches us: “Heavenly Father, not my will but Thy will be done.”
Surrender to divine will produces free will. Free will is the liberation of the soul from the distortions of sin.
As we begin Lent consider where you are still in slavery to sin. Where do you use your intellect to evade the simple and direct truth of God? Where are your emotions distorted by disordered desires for short term pleasures that will only produce long term pain? Where do you bring forth to other people and even to God a demand backed by a threat?
Which particular sin is God calling to your attention through the Litany, the Liturgy and the readings? That awareness of personal sin is your invitation to invite the Holy Spirit to transform that sin back into its original virtue through the infinite power of eternal love.
No one can resist the subtle temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil apart from the new life Jesus offers. That new life is union with the infinite and eternal love of the one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit That eternal love embodied in Jesus Christ is the very power that created the universe and each of us.
It is by love, through love and with love that we are able to make the real choice to reunify with God. And, it is that unity with the Divine that can produce a new way of living here and now. Jesus reveals the new way of living in his life. Jesus is the new way of living in each choice we make to surrender sin to be transformed into virtue.
The time is fulfilled. Now is the time. Now is the moment to make that real choice to live in the Real Presence of the Divine. Now is the moment to transform our minds, hearts and wills by the principle, power and person of Divine Love: Jesus Christ.
The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe in the good news.”
The old life cannot support the new way of living.
The old life is the life we inherit from Adam and Eve. We inherit the original choice Adam made to separate from God. And, we choose to live our lives from the foundation of that choice. That foundation produces a way of living that is characterized by fear, self-will and pride, the triad of separation.
The triad of separation leads to sin, rebellion against the call to worship and rejection of the Love of God. The end result of sin is the death of the body and the eternal exile of the soul from God.
Jesus came into the world as the second Adam. He came in the fullness of time. He came following centuries of religious conflict in the midst of a culture convulsed by religious conflict. He came into a world united the military might of Rome. He came into a world united by Greek culture and language.
Jesus came at a time when the books of the Old Testament had taken their final form as we know them today. The Dead Sea scrolls prove that the Old Testament we know today is the same as the people in Jesus’ day knew over two thousand years ago.
Jesus came into a religious culture that finally, after centuries of struggle, embraced monotheism.
These things are part of what the scriptures mean when they say Jesus came in the fullness of time. Jesus also came into a world obsessed with religion and defined by religion.
Judaism had divided itself into over a dozen competing and conflicting sects. Pagan religions emerged and vanished every few years. Philosophers had developed a bewildering array of contradictory visions of the “good life”.
Over all of these things, everyone in the ancient world felt the fear and the despair of death.
People all understood the bad news confronting humanity. The Bad News is separation. The worst news is death. People argued over the causes and the possible solutions to the problem. But, they understood the nature and depth of the problem.
They blamed government, culture, economics and each other for the problem. They sought solutions in power, knowledge, superstition, mysticism and law. None of it answered the basic question. None of it offered a real practical and immediate solution.
Jesus was and is the solution.
Mark records the briefest account of Jesus’ baptism and temptation in the wilderness. The purpose for these brief accounts is to emphasize that Jesus is the Son of God and how Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved in human flesh. It is by this eternal love that Jesus overcomes the temptation of Satan in the wilderness. And, it is within the context of this eternal love that Jesus begins his three year public ministry.
The actual details of the public ministry are less important to Mark than the reality of the person. Jesus just doesn’t preach, teach and heal. Jesus is the fullness of divine love in human flesh. Jesus is the new humanity who lives from the divine center of steadfast holy unconditional sacrificial love.
The solution to separation cannot be law, knowledge, power or even religion. The solution to separation is reunification. God unites His divinity with our humanity in Jesus. That is why Jesus himself is the solution to separation. His words and deeds testify to who he is but in some ways are less important than who he is.
God recognizes the old way of being human and its terrible consequence of sin and death. God’s solution is to provide a new way of being human. There is no quick fix to the problem. There are no minor adjustments to the problem. The solution is the new life.
The new life is a gift. No one can earn it. No one has any inherent right to claim it. All we have to do is receive it. We receive it as a gift by faith that Jesus is who he claimed to be, who the apostles experienced, who God the Father declared and who the Holy Spirit bears witness to in the lives of the faithful throughout the world and across the centuries.
The old life cannot support the new way of living.
Satan met Jesus in the wilderness. Satan tempted Jesus by quoting and misquoting scripture. Jesus met Satan with the steadfast holy unconditional love of the eternal Trinity. This is the way we can meet temptation.
Our minds can always find ways to justify particular sin. We don’t need Satan to deceive us. Jesus offers to renew our minds in the clarity of divine love.
Our hearts can always find ways to justify particular sin. We don’t need Satan to interfere in order to lead us into sin. Jesus offers to transform our hearts by the outpouring of divine love from his own sacred heart.
Our wills rebel against external standards and external authority. The old life impels us to live by the motto “my will be done”. We believe that the assertion of our individual will to power produces freedom. Moses and the prophets tell and show us that the assertion of our individual will to power only leads to slavery.
The slavery of the will to power is the slavery to fear, anxiety, frustration, pride and eventually despair. Jesus offers to set us free from this slavery through the prayer his mother taught him and he now teaches us: “Heavenly Father, not my will but Thy will be done.”
Surrender to divine will produces free will. Free will is the liberation of the soul from the distortions of sin.
As we begin Lent consider where you are still in slavery to sin. Where do you use your intellect to evade the simple and direct truth of God? Where are your emotions distorted by disordered desires for short term pleasures that will only produce long term pain? Where do you bring forth to other people and even to God a demand backed by a threat?
Which particular sin is God calling to your attention through the Litany, the Liturgy and the readings? That awareness of personal sin is your invitation to invite the Holy Spirit to transform that sin back into its original virtue through the infinite power of eternal love.
No one can resist the subtle temptations of the world, the flesh and the devil apart from the new life Jesus offers. That new life is union with the infinite and eternal love of the one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit That eternal love embodied in Jesus Christ is the very power that created the universe and each of us.
It is by love, through love and with love that we are able to make the real choice to reunify with God. And, it is that unity with the Divine that can produce a new way of living here and now. Jesus reveals the new way of living in his life. Jesus is the new way of living in each choice we make to surrender sin to be transformed into virtue.
The time is fulfilled. Now is the time. Now is the moment to make that real choice to live in the Real Presence of the Divine. Now is the moment to transform our minds, hearts and wills by the principle, power and person of Divine Love: Jesus Christ.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Ash Wednesday 2012
Ash Wednesday 2012 (Matthew 6:1)
“Beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen.”
When Jesus said “beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen” he expected people to practice piety.
Piety is devotion to religious duties and practices. Until recently, piety was highly valued in most cultures. It was certainly valued in the ancient word. It has no value in our modern secular world.
When scholars produced a new modern language edition of “The Odyssey", they realized they could not make a literal translation of the title Homer used for Odysseus. Homer referred to Odysseus consistently as “pious Odysseus.” The word “pious” in the ancient world was the highest form of praise. The modern translators substituted the word “noble”.
That word misses the entire point of the ancient story. Despite the terrible things Odysseus did in war, he is nevertheless honored because of his piety, his sense of reverence that produces certain actions highly valued in faith based cultures.
Piety is a three fold attitude and action towards God, other people and ourselves. It is a virtue characterized by reverence and respect. The acts of piety are religious, charitable and personal.
When you come to church on Ash Wednesday you perform a religious act of piety. God invites us to participate in the liturgy to receive the spiritual treasure of personal transformation in God’s eternal love and holiness. It is as we take the action of coming to church with the attitude of loyalty to God that we bring forth the religious virtue of piety.
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When you bring food to the parish Food Pantry you perform a charitable act of piety. The act is infused with grace as we hold the attitude of mercy and compassion in Jesus’ name. Jesus mentions giving alms, money, to the poor and destitute as an act of piety. It is as act of piety as we remember God’s original plan for our species to be interdependent. It is an act of piety as we seek the real presence of God the Holy Spirit to cultivate divine mercy and compassion in our hearts.
Personal acts of piety are those things we choose to do and choose not to do to facilitate our own personal transformation, our sanctification. Jesus accepts us where we are and just as we are. He invites us to become more of who God created us to be. That invitation is the call to worship and the call to repentance.
During Lent, we have the opportunity to review our priorities, our attitudes and our actions. We have the invitation to yield particular sins to God the Holy Spirit for Him to transform back into their original virtues.
Fasting and prayer are two ways we can respond to this invitation to transformation. Through the self-denial of fasting we can, if we choose, learn something about sacrificial love. In combination with prayer, fasting can help us discern where we live from the place of self-indulgence and the will to power.
We are most fully alive as we live from the place of love and compassion. That is the divine pattern of human life. It is the logos, the co-eternal word of God made flesh in Jesus Christ.
God invites us to reconsider our priorities during Lent in light of the priorities He gave to us through Moses. Jesus summarizes these priorities in the framework of love. Love God with all of your heart, soul and strength. Love others as you love yourself. God invites us to review the Ten Commandments He gave to Moses and ask in prayer: where I am not in this truth?
Piety is a practice. We are being perfected in piety but we are never perfect in piety. We practice piety in the same way an artist practices art, a sportsman practices a particular sport, as a musician practices music. Through careful and intentional acts of piety we practice the new way of living Jesus gives us. We become more of who God created us to be. We become fully alive in Jesus Christ.
“Beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen.”
When Jesus said “beware of practicing your piety before men in order to be seen” he expected people to practice piety.
Piety is devotion to religious duties and practices. Until recently, piety was highly valued in most cultures. It was certainly valued in the ancient word. It has no value in our modern secular world.
When scholars produced a new modern language edition of “The Odyssey", they realized they could not make a literal translation of the title Homer used for Odysseus. Homer referred to Odysseus consistently as “pious Odysseus.” The word “pious” in the ancient world was the highest form of praise. The modern translators substituted the word “noble”.
That word misses the entire point of the ancient story. Despite the terrible things Odysseus did in war, he is nevertheless honored because of his piety, his sense of reverence that produces certain actions highly valued in faith based cultures.
Piety is a three fold attitude and action towards God, other people and ourselves. It is a virtue characterized by reverence and respect. The acts of piety are religious, charitable and personal.
When you come to church on Ash Wednesday you perform a religious act of piety. God invites us to participate in the liturgy to receive the spiritual treasure of personal transformation in God’s eternal love and holiness. It is as we take the action of coming to church with the attitude of loyalty to God that we bring forth the religious virtue of piety.
\
When you bring food to the parish Food Pantry you perform a charitable act of piety. The act is infused with grace as we hold the attitude of mercy and compassion in Jesus’ name. Jesus mentions giving alms, money, to the poor and destitute as an act of piety. It is as act of piety as we remember God’s original plan for our species to be interdependent. It is an act of piety as we seek the real presence of God the Holy Spirit to cultivate divine mercy and compassion in our hearts.
Personal acts of piety are those things we choose to do and choose not to do to facilitate our own personal transformation, our sanctification. Jesus accepts us where we are and just as we are. He invites us to become more of who God created us to be. That invitation is the call to worship and the call to repentance.
During Lent, we have the opportunity to review our priorities, our attitudes and our actions. We have the invitation to yield particular sins to God the Holy Spirit for Him to transform back into their original virtues.
Fasting and prayer are two ways we can respond to this invitation to transformation. Through the self-denial of fasting we can, if we choose, learn something about sacrificial love. In combination with prayer, fasting can help us discern where we live from the place of self-indulgence and the will to power.
We are most fully alive as we live from the place of love and compassion. That is the divine pattern of human life. It is the logos, the co-eternal word of God made flesh in Jesus Christ.
God invites us to reconsider our priorities during Lent in light of the priorities He gave to us through Moses. Jesus summarizes these priorities in the framework of love. Love God with all of your heart, soul and strength. Love others as you love yourself. God invites us to review the Ten Commandments He gave to Moses and ask in prayer: where I am not in this truth?
Piety is a practice. We are being perfected in piety but we are never perfect in piety. We practice piety in the same way an artist practices art, a sportsman practices a particular sport, as a musician practices music. Through careful and intentional acts of piety we practice the new way of living Jesus gives us. We become more of who God created us to be. We become fully alive in Jesus Christ.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Last Sunday of Epiphany 2012
Last Sunday of Epiphany (Mark 9:2-9)
“This is my Son, The Beloved. Listen to Him.”
It is a very rare occurrence in human history when God the Father speaks audibly to people.
God the Father’s audible word to Peter, James and John on the mount of Transfiguration is identical to the audible word He spoke when the last of the prophets baptized Jesus. And, it is a word very literally placed within the context and framework of the word God the Father spoke to Moses and the Prophets.
The word is Jesus. The word describes Jesus as The Beloved.
Many people in our time complain that God doesn’t speak. They say that if only God would speak clearly and unambiguously then they would believe. The record of scripture is that God does speak.
God spoke to Moses and the prophets. God spoke to the apostles and the disciple. The problem is not that God has not spoken. The problem is that when God does speak human beings refuse to listen.
Peter, James and John had both experiences. They heard God speak. And, they found it difficult to listen. In the real presence of divine glory the three apostles, the future leadership team of the Church, fell asleep. The experience of the Divine manifesting in this world was too much for them to accept.
The context of the Transfiguration is in the failure of the apostles to hear the word of God and to believe the word of God. The transfiguration takes place six days after Peter declared Jesus to be the Messiah and then immediately rejected our Heavenly Father’s Plan of Salvation in the Messiah.
Jesus took Peter, James and John to the mountain of Transfiguration to give them one more opportunity to hear the word of God and to believe the word of God.
This opportunity was unlike any other they had experienced. At the Transfiguration the one God reveals the fullness of the blessed and eternal Trinity. He recapitulates thousands of years of salvation history in the personal appearance of Moses, who represents the Law, and Elijah, who represents the prophets.
On the mountain of Transfiguration the Holy Spirit manifests as a resplendent luminescent cloud. God the Son radiates the dazzling white beauty of holiness. God the Father speaks audibly to reveal the Plan of Salvation.
The plan of salvation comes forth in the context of the Law and the prophets. But, the Plan of salvation is not limited to the Law and the prophets. The Plan of Salvation is Jesus.
Jesus is God the Father’s only begotten Son. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved of the Eternal Father. The Beloved has no beginning and has no end. There never was a time when the Son did not exist.
The Plan of Salvation is nothing more and nothing less than reunification with the infinite and eternal love of God manifesting in the particularity of human experience.
This is the Plan Moses and the Prophets proclaimed. It is not the plan most people in Jesus’ day wanted. It is not the Plan most people in our time want.
One thing the people of Jesus’ day did understand was that the Plan of Salvation is not about a distant future. It is about life here and now. Jesus’s followers and enemies expected him to produce immediate and identifiable results.
They expected Jesus to seize power in Jerusalem, raise an army, impose one rigid and inflexible religious law on Israel, then use his divine power to destroy Rome and enslave the nations. They expected Jesus to make Jerusalem the capital of a new world empire that would impose a new world order. They expected wealth and power as their reward for supporting Jesus.
They missed the reality of Jesus’ teaching that righteousness means right relationship. The missed the reality that the healing miracles express divine love. They missed the truth that Jesus is the fullness of God in human flesh.
Moses understood this. The prophets understood this. They issued the call to worship to the people and the people rejected the call. They rejected the call because they believed that the problem confronting humanity is a lack of power and a lack of law. Moses and Elijah both experienced in their own ministries how the people they served rejected God.
People reject the authentic prophetic voice for the same reason they rejected and killed Jesus. They don’t want who God is. They don’t want the steadfast, holy, unconditional, sacrificial and transforming love that is God, They, we, want the power.
The Transfiguration of Jesus just before his final journey to Jerusalem set the framework for the apostles to understand why the Plan of Salvation is the Way of the Cross.
They missed it. They fell asleep. They muttered inane references to religious practice. But, God accomplished his purpose. For they remembered.
They remembered the moment of Transfiguration so that after the resurrection they could look back and say: so that is what He meant. That is why Moses and Elijah was there. That is Jesus is both man and God. That is how the one God is three persons.
It can take a while to appreciate what God reveals to us in His word. There is an immediate and identifiable result in our individual lives as we come to Jesus by grace through faith.
The immediate and identifiable result is ours to claim. It is also ours to disdain. The result is the transformation of the way we think, feel and choose. The result is the transformation of fear into faith, of pride into hope, of self will into love.
Make no mistake. Many people want something very different from Jesus. They want Jesus to reward them with the temporary things of this world. They want the money, power, pleasure and prestige that at best is only temporary. Sadly, they want those temporal benefits to continue in the next life.
Moses and Elijah are very clear. Jesus is very clear. We become who we worship. We become how we worship.
Heaven is not only a transcendent reality it is a real presence that we can experience here and now. The Kingdom of Heaven is a relationship with Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God the Father, The Beloved of God the Father.
The Kingdom of Heaven is the transforming real presence of The Beloved in our daily lives. The Holy Spirit is speaking to us and working with us so we can become who we are called to worship and how we are called to worship.
In the call to worship, our Heavenly Father calls us to be the beloved of the co-eternal Beloved. Eternal life starts now or it never starts. The treasure of heaven is a gift God pours out to us now.
Jesus continues to pour Himself out to us in the blessed sacrament of the altar so that we can live and move and have our being free from fear, free from anxiety, free from frustration, free from the corrosive effects of sin.
On the mount of Transfiguration our Heavenly Father spoke audibly to Peter, James and John. He told them: this is my Son, The Beloved. Listen to Him.
The apostles heard the words but they did not heed the words. They did not believe until after the resurrection. They remembered the words. They wrote then down. And now we hear them. Across the centuries God the Father speaks audibly to us from the words recorded in holy scripture.
Are we listening? Do we believe? Will we act on that belief?
Jesus is God the Father’s Son. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved. Listen to him.
“This is my Son, The Beloved. Listen to Him.”
It is a very rare occurrence in human history when God the Father speaks audibly to people.
God the Father’s audible word to Peter, James and John on the mount of Transfiguration is identical to the audible word He spoke when the last of the prophets baptized Jesus. And, it is a word very literally placed within the context and framework of the word God the Father spoke to Moses and the Prophets.
The word is Jesus. The word describes Jesus as The Beloved.
Many people in our time complain that God doesn’t speak. They say that if only God would speak clearly and unambiguously then they would believe. The record of scripture is that God does speak.
God spoke to Moses and the prophets. God spoke to the apostles and the disciple. The problem is not that God has not spoken. The problem is that when God does speak human beings refuse to listen.
Peter, James and John had both experiences. They heard God speak. And, they found it difficult to listen. In the real presence of divine glory the three apostles, the future leadership team of the Church, fell asleep. The experience of the Divine manifesting in this world was too much for them to accept.
The context of the Transfiguration is in the failure of the apostles to hear the word of God and to believe the word of God. The transfiguration takes place six days after Peter declared Jesus to be the Messiah and then immediately rejected our Heavenly Father’s Plan of Salvation in the Messiah.
Jesus took Peter, James and John to the mountain of Transfiguration to give them one more opportunity to hear the word of God and to believe the word of God.
This opportunity was unlike any other they had experienced. At the Transfiguration the one God reveals the fullness of the blessed and eternal Trinity. He recapitulates thousands of years of salvation history in the personal appearance of Moses, who represents the Law, and Elijah, who represents the prophets.
On the mountain of Transfiguration the Holy Spirit manifests as a resplendent luminescent cloud. God the Son radiates the dazzling white beauty of holiness. God the Father speaks audibly to reveal the Plan of Salvation.
The plan of salvation comes forth in the context of the Law and the prophets. But, the Plan of salvation is not limited to the Law and the prophets. The Plan of Salvation is Jesus.
Jesus is God the Father’s only begotten Son. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved of the Eternal Father. The Beloved has no beginning and has no end. There never was a time when the Son did not exist.
The Plan of Salvation is nothing more and nothing less than reunification with the infinite and eternal love of God manifesting in the particularity of human experience.
This is the Plan Moses and the Prophets proclaimed. It is not the plan most people in Jesus’ day wanted. It is not the Plan most people in our time want.
One thing the people of Jesus’ day did understand was that the Plan of Salvation is not about a distant future. It is about life here and now. Jesus’s followers and enemies expected him to produce immediate and identifiable results.
They expected Jesus to seize power in Jerusalem, raise an army, impose one rigid and inflexible religious law on Israel, then use his divine power to destroy Rome and enslave the nations. They expected Jesus to make Jerusalem the capital of a new world empire that would impose a new world order. They expected wealth and power as their reward for supporting Jesus.
They missed the reality of Jesus’ teaching that righteousness means right relationship. The missed the reality that the healing miracles express divine love. They missed the truth that Jesus is the fullness of God in human flesh.
Moses understood this. The prophets understood this. They issued the call to worship to the people and the people rejected the call. They rejected the call because they believed that the problem confronting humanity is a lack of power and a lack of law. Moses and Elijah both experienced in their own ministries how the people they served rejected God.
People reject the authentic prophetic voice for the same reason they rejected and killed Jesus. They don’t want who God is. They don’t want the steadfast, holy, unconditional, sacrificial and transforming love that is God, They, we, want the power.
The Transfiguration of Jesus just before his final journey to Jerusalem set the framework for the apostles to understand why the Plan of Salvation is the Way of the Cross.
They missed it. They fell asleep. They muttered inane references to religious practice. But, God accomplished his purpose. For they remembered.
They remembered the moment of Transfiguration so that after the resurrection they could look back and say: so that is what He meant. That is why Moses and Elijah was there. That is Jesus is both man and God. That is how the one God is three persons.
It can take a while to appreciate what God reveals to us in His word. There is an immediate and identifiable result in our individual lives as we come to Jesus by grace through faith.
The immediate and identifiable result is ours to claim. It is also ours to disdain. The result is the transformation of the way we think, feel and choose. The result is the transformation of fear into faith, of pride into hope, of self will into love.
Make no mistake. Many people want something very different from Jesus. They want Jesus to reward them with the temporary things of this world. They want the money, power, pleasure and prestige that at best is only temporary. Sadly, they want those temporal benefits to continue in the next life.
Moses and Elijah are very clear. Jesus is very clear. We become who we worship. We become how we worship.
Heaven is not only a transcendent reality it is a real presence that we can experience here and now. The Kingdom of Heaven is a relationship with Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God the Father, The Beloved of God the Father.
The Kingdom of Heaven is the transforming real presence of The Beloved in our daily lives. The Holy Spirit is speaking to us and working with us so we can become who we are called to worship and how we are called to worship.
In the call to worship, our Heavenly Father calls us to be the beloved of the co-eternal Beloved. Eternal life starts now or it never starts. The treasure of heaven is a gift God pours out to us now.
Jesus continues to pour Himself out to us in the blessed sacrament of the altar so that we can live and move and have our being free from fear, free from anxiety, free from frustration, free from the corrosive effects of sin.
On the mount of Transfiguration our Heavenly Father spoke audibly to Peter, James and John. He told them: this is my Son, The Beloved. Listen to Him.
The apostles heard the words but they did not heed the words. They did not believe until after the resurrection. They remembered the words. They wrote then down. And now we hear them. Across the centuries God the Father speaks audibly to us from the words recorded in holy scripture.
Are we listening? Do we believe? Will we act on that belief?
Jesus is God the Father’s Son. Jesus is the co-eternal Beloved. Listen to him.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Epiphany 5
Epiphany 6 (Mark 1:40-45) “I do choose. Be made clean.”
Jesus could heal with a word. He could heal with a word because he is the incarnation of the co-eternal Word of God, the logos.
The Great Mystery of the One God is the Great Mystery of love. That love manifests in the eternal realm as The one Who loves (the Father), the one who is loved (the Son) and the love itself (the Holy Spirit).
The Apostle John reveals that the Beloved Son of the Father is the Word of the Father. The image is active, dynamic, creative, rational and passionate. It is not as though there was a time when God was silent and then spoke the word. There is no time in the eternal realm of the Divine. There is no before or after. There is only the eternal now.
God the Father eternally speaks the Word, God the beloved Son.
While this may or may not be interesting in and of itself, most people generally want to know what difference does it make. What difference does it make for my life? What practical help can it offer someone who is struggling to make ends meet, someone who is lonely, sad, or fully immersed in the pleasures and the pains of life?
It certainly made a big difference for the leper. No one could cure leprosy. Even the cause eluded scientists until very recently. There is a cure for leprosy now. For most of human history it meant suffering, exile and a lonely death.
Since no one knew the cause of the disease people feared it might be contagious. Lepers were seen as the living dead. They were exiled to caves outside the cities where they struggled to survive one more day before the inevitable. Death.
The Leper took a risk that day when he approached Jesus. By Law he was not permitted to come close to anyone. By law he was supposed to shout out: “unclean” if anyone came too close to him. What drew the leper to Jesus was faith. The leper had heard the stories of Jesus. He heard and he believed.
It wasn’t easy to believe without seeing. Healing leprosy was not probable. But, it was not impossible. The Leper probably remembered the story of the prophet Elisha healing the leper Naaman. Moses actually wrote into the Law a cleansing ritual for those who might be healed of the disease. The cleansing certified that the leper had indeed been healed and could return to his family.
On one occasion one of the prophets healed a leper by the power of God. On every occasion Jesus healed all who came to him. While he was on Earth Jesus spent the greater portion of his three year public ministry healing all manner of illness including leprosy. And, he healed with a word.
Jesus healed with a word because Jesus is that eternal Word God the Father eternally speaks. The Word is the expression of the very nature of God. That nature is love. God just doesn’t have love. Love is not just one of many attributes of God. God is love.
As the incarnation of God’s self-expression, Jesus reveals the meaning of divine love. That love is steadfast. It never alters due to external circumstance. Jesus never said: if you love me then I will love you. Jesus even loved those who betrayed him, falsely accused him, tortured him, and killed him.
Is your love steadfast? Or, is your love dependent on the external circumstances of your life?
Steadfast love comes only from God. We experience such love only as we reunite with God in Christ. In that unity we have the ability to make a choice to bring forth steadfast love.
The Leper was very perceptive. He believed Jesus had the ability and the power to heal. He also knew that the power is love. And, he understood that love is always a choice. So, when the leper breaks the Law governing lepers and approaches Jesus he says: ”if you choose you can make me clean.”
Jesus responds accordingly. “I do choose. Be made clean.” Love is a choice. Jesus always makes the real choice to bring forth love because Jesus is the physical embodiment of Divine Love.
The word of healing is the word of love. The specific word comes from the transcendent eternal Word made flesh in Jesus Christ.
There were many lepers in Israel who did not come to Jesus for healing. There were many sick people in the wider world of Jesus’ time that Jesus never met and never healed. Everyone in our world experiences illness. Sometimes we recover. Sometimes we don’t. Jesus loves them all.
As a particular man in a particular time and place Jesus could not meet everyone. The Holy Spirit universally and without exception invites everyone to choose life and to choose love. We, the church, are the continuation of the incarnation here and now.
Jesus wants us to continue his ministry among the people we encounter. The ministry is the outpouring of divine love and compassion. The ministry is grace.
It is only as we make the real choice to come to Jesus daily in prayer and Bible Study that we open our minds and hearts and wills to be immersed in divine love. It is only as we hear the call to worship and make a real choice to say “yes” to the call to worship that we reform our unique identities according the pattern of the Word.
Jesus is that eternal self- expression of God at work in the world today. He speaks through the Holy Spirit to all people. He speaks to us through the Bible and the sacraments. He wants us to take what we hear and experience and share it with others. He wants us to embody the Word that he speaks into our souls and become the blessing of that Word to the people in our lives.
That sharing can be as simple as a kind word for a harried clerk in a supermarket. It can be helping a child with homework and visiting an elderly person in a nursing home. It can even be giving someone the benefit of the doubt and refusing to repeat gossip. Human need is inexhaustible. Jesus gives us himself to help us meet some of those needs. It is always our choice to draw on that Love and to make that love real in another person’s life.
The infinite and eternal love that Jesus pours into our souls can become a blessing to others. Jesus in us and through us can meet some of those needs we encounter in others. That is the practical outcome of faith. It does make a difference what we believe and in whom we place our trust.
Faith is a choice. Love is a choice. The leper in his suffering and pain, in his isolation and distress, nevertheless made a choice to approach Jesus and ask for Jesus to make a choice to heal him.
We have the same choice to make. It is as we make the choice to place our faith and trust in the co-eternal Son of God that we grow in grace. It is as we grow in grace that we become open channels of grace to our family, friends, neighbors and acquaintances.
Sometimes people ask me: where is God? Where is Jesus? The answer is you. The answer is us. We are the real presence of Jesus in the world today. Our choice to live by grace through faith can release the power of the Word of God for our own transformation. In that transformation we can become the agents of Christ to our generation.
Jesus responded to the man’s need for healing by saying: “ I do choose to heal you. It is my choice and I choose to bring forth the light and life of Divine Love and Compassion. Be healed.” Jesus spoke the word and the word became the reality. The man was healed and rejoiced, giving thanks to God.
Jesus could heal with a word. He could heal with a word because he is the incarnation of the co-eternal Word of God, the logos.
The Great Mystery of the One God is the Great Mystery of love. That love manifests in the eternal realm as The one Who loves (the Father), the one who is loved (the Son) and the love itself (the Holy Spirit).
The Apostle John reveals that the Beloved Son of the Father is the Word of the Father. The image is active, dynamic, creative, rational and passionate. It is not as though there was a time when God was silent and then spoke the word. There is no time in the eternal realm of the Divine. There is no before or after. There is only the eternal now.
God the Father eternally speaks the Word, God the beloved Son.
While this may or may not be interesting in and of itself, most people generally want to know what difference does it make. What difference does it make for my life? What practical help can it offer someone who is struggling to make ends meet, someone who is lonely, sad, or fully immersed in the pleasures and the pains of life?
It certainly made a big difference for the leper. No one could cure leprosy. Even the cause eluded scientists until very recently. There is a cure for leprosy now. For most of human history it meant suffering, exile and a lonely death.
Since no one knew the cause of the disease people feared it might be contagious. Lepers were seen as the living dead. They were exiled to caves outside the cities where they struggled to survive one more day before the inevitable. Death.
The Leper took a risk that day when he approached Jesus. By Law he was not permitted to come close to anyone. By law he was supposed to shout out: “unclean” if anyone came too close to him. What drew the leper to Jesus was faith. The leper had heard the stories of Jesus. He heard and he believed.
It wasn’t easy to believe without seeing. Healing leprosy was not probable. But, it was not impossible. The Leper probably remembered the story of the prophet Elisha healing the leper Naaman. Moses actually wrote into the Law a cleansing ritual for those who might be healed of the disease. The cleansing certified that the leper had indeed been healed and could return to his family.
On one occasion one of the prophets healed a leper by the power of God. On every occasion Jesus healed all who came to him. While he was on Earth Jesus spent the greater portion of his three year public ministry healing all manner of illness including leprosy. And, he healed with a word.
Jesus healed with a word because Jesus is that eternal Word God the Father eternally speaks. The Word is the expression of the very nature of God. That nature is love. God just doesn’t have love. Love is not just one of many attributes of God. God is love.
As the incarnation of God’s self-expression, Jesus reveals the meaning of divine love. That love is steadfast. It never alters due to external circumstance. Jesus never said: if you love me then I will love you. Jesus even loved those who betrayed him, falsely accused him, tortured him, and killed him.
Is your love steadfast? Or, is your love dependent on the external circumstances of your life?
Steadfast love comes only from God. We experience such love only as we reunite with God in Christ. In that unity we have the ability to make a choice to bring forth steadfast love.
The Leper was very perceptive. He believed Jesus had the ability and the power to heal. He also knew that the power is love. And, he understood that love is always a choice. So, when the leper breaks the Law governing lepers and approaches Jesus he says: ”if you choose you can make me clean.”
Jesus responds accordingly. “I do choose. Be made clean.” Love is a choice. Jesus always makes the real choice to bring forth love because Jesus is the physical embodiment of Divine Love.
The word of healing is the word of love. The specific word comes from the transcendent eternal Word made flesh in Jesus Christ.
There were many lepers in Israel who did not come to Jesus for healing. There were many sick people in the wider world of Jesus’ time that Jesus never met and never healed. Everyone in our world experiences illness. Sometimes we recover. Sometimes we don’t. Jesus loves them all.
As a particular man in a particular time and place Jesus could not meet everyone. The Holy Spirit universally and without exception invites everyone to choose life and to choose love. We, the church, are the continuation of the incarnation here and now.
Jesus wants us to continue his ministry among the people we encounter. The ministry is the outpouring of divine love and compassion. The ministry is grace.
It is only as we make the real choice to come to Jesus daily in prayer and Bible Study that we open our minds and hearts and wills to be immersed in divine love. It is only as we hear the call to worship and make a real choice to say “yes” to the call to worship that we reform our unique identities according the pattern of the Word.
Jesus is that eternal self- expression of God at work in the world today. He speaks through the Holy Spirit to all people. He speaks to us through the Bible and the sacraments. He wants us to take what we hear and experience and share it with others. He wants us to embody the Word that he speaks into our souls and become the blessing of that Word to the people in our lives.
That sharing can be as simple as a kind word for a harried clerk in a supermarket. It can be helping a child with homework and visiting an elderly person in a nursing home. It can even be giving someone the benefit of the doubt and refusing to repeat gossip. Human need is inexhaustible. Jesus gives us himself to help us meet some of those needs. It is always our choice to draw on that Love and to make that love real in another person’s life.
The infinite and eternal love that Jesus pours into our souls can become a blessing to others. Jesus in us and through us can meet some of those needs we encounter in others. That is the practical outcome of faith. It does make a difference what we believe and in whom we place our trust.
Faith is a choice. Love is a choice. The leper in his suffering and pain, in his isolation and distress, nevertheless made a choice to approach Jesus and ask for Jesus to make a choice to heal him.
We have the same choice to make. It is as we make the choice to place our faith and trust in the co-eternal Son of God that we grow in grace. It is as we grow in grace that we become open channels of grace to our family, friends, neighbors and acquaintances.
Sometimes people ask me: where is God? Where is Jesus? The answer is you. The answer is us. We are the real presence of Jesus in the world today. Our choice to live by grace through faith can release the power of the Word of God for our own transformation. In that transformation we can become the agents of Christ to our generation.
Jesus responded to the man’s need for healing by saying: “ I do choose to heal you. It is my choice and I choose to bring forth the light and life of Divine Love and Compassion. Be healed.” Jesus spoke the word and the word became the reality. The man was healed and rejoiced, giving thanks to God.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Candelmas 2012
Candlemas 2012 “When the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses they brought him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord.” (Luke 1:22-35)
Delayed obedience is disobedience. Disobedience is death.
The Law of God revealed through Moses is the Law of Life. The Law reflects the pattern, plan and purpose of Creation and our place in Creation. Mary understood this.
Mary understood this because Mary’s mind was saturated in the scriptures of the Old Testament. Mary knew this because her heart was aflame with love for God. Mary knew this because her soul was full of grace.
The grace opens the personality to the love. The love invites the person to make a real choice.
When we hear the law of commandments, do this and do not do that, we have a tendency to resist, rewrite or rebel. God never intended the Law to solve the fundamental problem that confronts our species. God always intended the law to act as a perfect mirror to our souls.
The Law shows us the standard of holiness God designed into the Creation. The Law convicts our conscience of separation from that standard. Then, the Law prepares us to receive God’s solution to the problem. The solution is not more Law or less Law. The solution is a person, Jesus Christ.
The law is always personal. It always asks us to make a choice. We choose our priorities in the light of the law. We choose our actions and our inaction in response to or in our reaction against the Law.
Where so many people in the long history of the Old Testament had said no to God’s Law, Mary said yes. Her yes emerges from the place of grace. Her yes proceeds from the well spring of love she cultivated in her soul.
Mary chose to travel to Jerusalem to offer the appointed sacrifice at the appointed place at the appointed time. The appointed sacrifice was two pigeons. The appointed place was the altar in the Temple at Jerusalem. The appointed time was forty days from the birth.
Mary did not argue with the particularities of the Law. She did not say: why 40 days? Why not 39 or 41? Why do I have to adjust my schedule to come ancient commandment? Why does it have to be two pigeons? Why not one or three? Why pigeons? And, why does it have to be at the Temple in Jerusalem? There are more convenient places than Jerusalem.
The pattern of obedience is faith. By faith Mary joyfully accepted the Law of her Purification and her son’s Presentation as an invitation to worship. The prayer of faith is: Heavenly Father, not my will but Thy will be done.”
Faith surrenders self-will to Divine will and discovers free will. Faith sets us free from fear to rejoice in the Real Presence of the Divine. The way of faith is the way of life. The way of life is the steadfast holy unconditional and sacrificial love of Jesus Christ. We can only immerse ourselves in that divine love at the altar of sacrifice at the divinely appointed time.
The pattern of disobedience is pride. Pride says: ”I know better and I know best therefore my will be done.” Pride rejects Divine Will to assert self-will and discovers slavery to fear. Pride separates us from God, other people and the essence of our true selves. The way of pride is the way of separation. The way of separation is death.
Mary’s obedience to the Law of Moses did not merit her grace. Mary’s obedience proceeds from grace. God’s grace is the universal outpouring of his own divine nature to all people everywhere. It is that divine nature of unconditional love that brings forth both grace and Law to all people and for all people.
The Law reminds us of our separation from God. Grace interacts with Law to invite us to make a real choice to follow the way of faith. The faith releases the love that creates us, sustains us and transforms us.
The delight is in the details. It is in the particularity of the Law that we discover God present to us and for us in the details of our daily life. That is why St. Paul writes that the very unique aspects of nature reveal the reality of God for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.
We no longer have the ritual Laws of Moses to guide us in the way of faith. The Temple no longer exists. The time of sacrifice was fulfilled on the cross. The principle behind the Law and undergirding the Law is eternal. The principle is steadfast holy unconditional sacrificial love made flesh in Jesus Christ.
The invitation to grace is the call to worship. For Mary and Joseph it was the Old Covenant Law of sacrifice and Temple worship: 40 days, at the altar of sacrifice in the Temple at Jerusalem with two pigeons offered to God by a Levitical priest.
For us, it is the New Testament reality of the Incarnation. It is the Real Presence of the Divine on the seventh day at the altar of sacrifice in the offering of the holy Mystery of the Mass. It is a choice.
Moses calls to us across the millennia and says: Choose wisely. Choose life.
Mary calls to us and indeed prays for us from her place in the Church Triumphant and says: Choose Jesus.
Delayed obedience is disobedience. Disobedience is death.
The Law of God revealed through Moses is the Law of Life. The Law reflects the pattern, plan and purpose of Creation and our place in Creation. Mary understood this.
Mary understood this because Mary’s mind was saturated in the scriptures of the Old Testament. Mary knew this because her heart was aflame with love for God. Mary knew this because her soul was full of grace.
The grace opens the personality to the love. The love invites the person to make a real choice.
When we hear the law of commandments, do this and do not do that, we have a tendency to resist, rewrite or rebel. God never intended the Law to solve the fundamental problem that confronts our species. God always intended the law to act as a perfect mirror to our souls.
The Law shows us the standard of holiness God designed into the Creation. The Law convicts our conscience of separation from that standard. Then, the Law prepares us to receive God’s solution to the problem. The solution is not more Law or less Law. The solution is a person, Jesus Christ.
The law is always personal. It always asks us to make a choice. We choose our priorities in the light of the law. We choose our actions and our inaction in response to or in our reaction against the Law.
Where so many people in the long history of the Old Testament had said no to God’s Law, Mary said yes. Her yes emerges from the place of grace. Her yes proceeds from the well spring of love she cultivated in her soul.
Mary chose to travel to Jerusalem to offer the appointed sacrifice at the appointed place at the appointed time. The appointed sacrifice was two pigeons. The appointed place was the altar in the Temple at Jerusalem. The appointed time was forty days from the birth.
Mary did not argue with the particularities of the Law. She did not say: why 40 days? Why not 39 or 41? Why do I have to adjust my schedule to come ancient commandment? Why does it have to be two pigeons? Why not one or three? Why pigeons? And, why does it have to be at the Temple in Jerusalem? There are more convenient places than Jerusalem.
The pattern of obedience is faith. By faith Mary joyfully accepted the Law of her Purification and her son’s Presentation as an invitation to worship. The prayer of faith is: Heavenly Father, not my will but Thy will be done.”
Faith surrenders self-will to Divine will and discovers free will. Faith sets us free from fear to rejoice in the Real Presence of the Divine. The way of faith is the way of life. The way of life is the steadfast holy unconditional and sacrificial love of Jesus Christ. We can only immerse ourselves in that divine love at the altar of sacrifice at the divinely appointed time.
The pattern of disobedience is pride. Pride says: ”I know better and I know best therefore my will be done.” Pride rejects Divine Will to assert self-will and discovers slavery to fear. Pride separates us from God, other people and the essence of our true selves. The way of pride is the way of separation. The way of separation is death.
Mary’s obedience to the Law of Moses did not merit her grace. Mary’s obedience proceeds from grace. God’s grace is the universal outpouring of his own divine nature to all people everywhere. It is that divine nature of unconditional love that brings forth both grace and Law to all people and for all people.
The Law reminds us of our separation from God. Grace interacts with Law to invite us to make a real choice to follow the way of faith. The faith releases the love that creates us, sustains us and transforms us.
The delight is in the details. It is in the particularity of the Law that we discover God present to us and for us in the details of our daily life. That is why St. Paul writes that the very unique aspects of nature reveal the reality of God for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.
We no longer have the ritual Laws of Moses to guide us in the way of faith. The Temple no longer exists. The time of sacrifice was fulfilled on the cross. The principle behind the Law and undergirding the Law is eternal. The principle is steadfast holy unconditional sacrificial love made flesh in Jesus Christ.
The invitation to grace is the call to worship. For Mary and Joseph it was the Old Covenant Law of sacrifice and Temple worship: 40 days, at the altar of sacrifice in the Temple at Jerusalem with two pigeons offered to God by a Levitical priest.
For us, it is the New Testament reality of the Incarnation. It is the Real Presence of the Divine on the seventh day at the altar of sacrifice in the offering of the holy Mystery of the Mass. It is a choice.
Moses calls to us across the millennia and says: Choose wisely. Choose life.
Mary calls to us and indeed prays for us from her place in the Church Triumphant and says: Choose Jesus.
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