This Is Perfect !

Brothers and sisters: You are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones  and members of the household of God, 
built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone.
Through him, the whole structure is held together
and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord;
in him, you also are being built together
into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

Make sure that you read the quote from Ephesians 2: 19-22 above, heck, I am going to memorize it - and yes, I know I am a Catholic and am not supposed to have a knowledge of scripture, or at least that is what some of our evangelistic Bible-thumping Protestant friends might say.  I have to say that this is the first time that I have come upon this reading even though I have read Ephesians a dozen times.  This time, this passage is really, really speaking to me!  Good grief and three sun rises to Sunday, Paul is describing the Church, not just any old Church but the Catholic Church!   Let's have some fun and take this passage apart and meditate on what it is telling us. 

Brothers and sisters: You are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones  and members of the household of God, 
built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone.

Here we are told that we no longer need to search, we have instead become fellow citizens with the saints and all other members of the household of God. We are members of a Church built on a solid foundation, sunk deep to bedrock through the ministry of the Apostles and Prophets and held together by Jesus as the capstone - the famed stone that the builders rejected! 

Through him, the whole structure is held together and grows into a temple sacred in the Lord;

Jesus holds the whole Church together and it is a structure that is Sacred in the Lord.

in him, you also are being built together
into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

Through Christ, we ourselves, are being formed into a dwelling place of God who has sanctified us.  We now worship God in His Church, in bodies that he has made for Himself a dwelling place.

We no longer need to search for truth as it has been delivered to us vis Jesus Himself through His Church.  We can trust the teachings that the Church gives to us because it is protected from error by the Holy Spirit. 

With such assurance is it possible that we as members of the Household of God can consider coming out of our shells and develop a voice whose confident tone and timbre will cause the pagan world to stop in their tracks and take notice?  Let us pray that we take the words of this reading and meditate on them and make them part of our spiritual life.  The world will never be the same once the Household of God has its say. 

Our brothers and sisters in Purgatory form part of the Household of God too.  They need our prayers to help them to leave this place.  Please say a prayer or two for them today. 

Humility and One Downsmanship

Brothers and sisters:
If there is any encouragement in Christ,
any solace in love,
any participation in the Spirit,
any compassion and mercy,
complete my joy by being of the same mind, with the same love, united in heart, thinking one thing.
Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory;
rather, humbly regard others as more important than yourselves, each looking out not for his own interests, but also for those of others.

St. Paul writing to the Philippians tells us two things.  He says it would complete his joy if we were of the same mind, same love, united in heart, and thinking one thing.  Luther and the reformers must not have read this passage when they went their own way and formed their own churches, each based on their own interpretation of the scripture.  Unlike the Catholic Church, their interpretation was a moving target which changed as frequently as the reformer changed his mind on things. They had abandoned sound reasoning and went with what felt good according to their own predilections. So these reformers traded gold for pot metal and truth for lies and they committed the sin of schism.  As they went against the call of Jesus for them to be one as He and the Father were one and against Paul's plea for unity in the present reading.  It is interesting to note that the sine of schism is not passed down to today's believers in other creeds that through no fault of their own worship God in the manner they were taught by family traditions.  They are sons and daughters of God as we Catholics are, but they are impoverished because they lack the full truth that the Catholic Church carries forward throughout the centuries untarnished by time and complete in its majestic beauty. 

We are also told by Paul to be humble and think of others as more important as than ourselves. Is he mad?  When he wrote this he had no idea of how life would be in twenty-first century America so we can discount this call to humility and make sure we make our mark in the world and get everything we are entitled to or more if possible.  

Ahh, I don't think so, Joe.   

Paul's world was very much the same as ours.  People were always pushing and shoving and clawing their way up in society and if someone got in the way, well that is just too bad.  Pauls call was for each of his Philippian converts to really claim the humility of Christ, who was the Son of God, and make this their own. Next what follows is what some say was a hymn, but it summarizes the need for humility so beautifully that I will end my poor attempt at an explanation here and allow the beauty of the scriptures sing for us! 

Have in you the same attitude

that is also in Christ Jesus,

Who, though he was in the form of God,

did not regard equality with God

something to be grasped.

Rather, he emptied himself,

taking the form of a slave,

coming in human likeness;

and found human in appearance,

he humbled himself,

becoming obedient to the point of death,

even death on a cross.

Because of this, God greatly exalted him

and bestowed on him the name

which is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus

every knee should bend,

of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue confess that

Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father.

The poor souls in Purgatory thank those that pray for them. They cannot pray for themselves, the time for making up for the temporal effects of our sins is here on earth.  Won't you please pray for the poor souls today.  Invest your time in them and they will be thankful forever. 

Change

As Moses came down from Mount Sinai

with the two tablets of the commandments in his hands,

he did not know that the skin of his face had become radiant

while he conversed with the LORD

One thing that I can say for sure is that an encounter with God will change a person in ways that may or may not be visible to those around us.  Sometimes the change can be a big one.  For example, look at Paul.  He encountered Christ and went from hating and persecuting Christians to becoming one of the greatest teachers in church history. For most of us, our encounters bring on small changes.  We encounter God while reading the Bible and perhaps we start to allow ourselves to treat other people in a more loving manner. In order for these changes to occur, we have to be open to them.  Remember, Paul was turned towards God even while he was persecuting the Church.  Had he not already been attuned to God, chances are he would have ended up as just another blind man begging on the side of the road to Damascus.

So, open your hearts to God and make the changes He leads you to make.

It is our duty to help those in need.  There is no one needier than the Poor Souls in Purgatory, please pray for them today.

One Plus One Is One

And I have given them the glory you gave me,

so that they may be one, as we are one,

Here is a stumper for you, explain the Trinity.  Is our God actually three Gods?  Those of you of ancient times might remember the Baltimore Catechism's definition of who are God actually is.  Do you remember?  Well, the answer is that The Trinity is Three Divine Persons in one Divine Being. There, we got that figured out now don't we?  Or do we?   St. Patrick used to arrive at a village and the first thing (the story goes) he would do would be to find the meanest, strongest, bad boy living there and beat the tar out of him.  This got the citizens attention and then he took out a shamrock and used it to explain the Trinity, one plant, three leaves, all united.  Is that a true story? I don't know, but it sure is a good tale.  It makes one good point, that the Trinity is united, they are one even though they are separate and distinct.   The idea of three Divine Persons in One Divine Being is hard, no, impossible to get your hands around.  It is one of those things that we may never, in all eternity understand.  

The most important thing about the Trinity, as I said is that they are united, they are one.  Jesus prayed that all of His followers be of one mind but when we came to the fifteen-hundreds, we kind of messed that up now didn't we?  I am not going to get into a finger pointing session here because there was enough blame to go around.  Luther was too prideful and the Church didn't listen as well as she should have. 

Unity in our religions is something that we need to work towards.  The Catholic Church cannot move any closer to our separated Protestant brothers and sisters by changing doctrine that has remained unchanged since the Church was founded.  She can and should to try to attract her lost children back to her. We do not do that by pointing out the error of our brothers' ways and shaking our fingers at them. To do this would make us no better than old Jack Chick and his poison tracts. We must attract them by showing them what a real Christian community is like.  This is something that we have not been too good at since Luther banged a few nails into a church door.  

How do we do this?  We make the light of Christ brighter and brighter in our church communities that they cannot fail to see that we are different and that difference is the life of Christ in us shining out. We must open doors and windows.  We must be ready to be friendly and loving to those who might not really trust us because we bear the label Catholic.   The new evangelization is not new at all. It is something that we should have been doing all along.  You don't need to become a street preacher, you need not say even a word. You may let your actions do your talking for you.  What I suggest is that we take some time and look around and find a need and fill it.  Listen for the Lord to speak to you.  He is looking for men, women, and children to build his Church.  Enthusiasm will generate enthusiasm!   Love will generate love in return.  The hardest part is to start.  

That is all for today.  I hope I have given you something to think about.  God bless and don't be afraid to leave a comment.  

Some Strong Coffee !

There is nothing like a hot cup of coffee to get you started in the morning.  The aroma gets the blood flowing even before you get the first scalding sip past your lips.  When your body feels that first sip it recognizes its old friend caffeine and brain cells all of a sudden snap on and you are finally awake and ready to take on the day.  Well the reading at Mass today from Philippians 3: 8-14 can do for our soul what coffee does for our brain. This reading becomes a shot of espresso for our soul once we read the first few sentences and use the proper Greek translation for one word. It does not change the meaning of the text but I think that it enhances it and strengthens it.  The beginning of the reading reads as follows:  "More than that, I even consider everything as a loss because the supreme good of knowing Christ Jesus  my Lord. For his sale I have accepted the loss of all things and I consider them so much rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him,,," 

The word we need to change is rubbish. The Greek word that is used here actually translates as "sewage."  The word sewage is much stronger than rubbish and I think it shows Paul considered Christ more important than anything.  Lest you think I am some sort of Greek scholar, I am not.  I gleaned this coffee bean from the homily at Mass yesterday. 

This is just food for thought. What place do we give to our relationship with Jesus in our life?  Is it the most important thing? Is it maybe in the top ten?  Or do we just think about it on Sunday morning as we sit in Church waiting for it to be over so we can tear into a jelly doughnut? 

This reading and the young deacon (man he looked young) that shared this nugget of wisdom with me has forced me to think on how much importance I place on my relationship with the Lord.  I know he is in the top ten, but if I was going to be honest I could not say that at this moment he is number one in my life.  This of course is something I will have to work on. 

I am going to challenge you today to think about the place of Christ in your life. Are the burdens of day to day life taking precedence or are we inviting Jesus into the little fiddly bits our life?  Are we letting his wisdom show us the way or are we picking and choosing? 

In this season of lent we have the luxury of time to reflect. I for one am going to examine my spiritual life and how it mates with my physical life. Where do I and Jesus connect?  Where do Jesus and I disconnect?  It's going to be a long process I am sure but in the end it will be worth while.  

God bless you today.  Catholics - here is a suggestion to get you started.  Have you been to confession lately?  Try it, taking out the garbage and receiving the forgiveness of Christ is certainly a good starting place.