Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/061911.shtml
“The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”
Today is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, and we are called to meditate on that mystery. We believe in 1 God in 3 Persons, where there is only One God, but God has a Son; we believe also in the Holy Spirit “which proceeds from the Father and the Son, and with the Father and Son is worshipped and glorified.”
It’s heady stuff; what the Trinity means has been a subject of study ever since the Resurrection, and will be so until the end of the world. But at its most basic, it means love. Love does not exist in a vacuum, love does not exist between one person and themselves. But God is Love, and so much so that He must exist as the Trinity.
God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are all one Being, and have always existed, none before the other. “I believe in Jesus Christ our Lord, begot and not made, one being with the Father.” We believe that even though Jesus is the Son of God, there was no time when Jesus was not. One of the hardest things to understand is that the Trinity has always existed as the Trinity, always One, always 3 Persons.
What is the Holy Spirit? My favorite description of the Holy Spirit is that the love between God the Father and Jesus the Son is so real and powerful and alive that it exists as the Holy Spirit. Because it is God, this Love is God as well.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son.” If God is Love, and the Trinity is fundamentally about Love, and the Holy Spirit is a Love so real it is God, how strongly are we loved! Everyone knows the verse John 3:16, but its familiarity blinds us sometimes to scale of love involved. God sacrificed His Son to save the world, the Son whom He loves so much that the Love between them is God.
If love could be approximated in terms of size, God does not love us with buckets of love, or mountains of love. He doesn’t love us with continents, or worlds, or galaxies of love. He loves us with more than universes of love, He loves us with God’s amount of Love, and that amount is incomprehensible.
The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity reminds us to think about who God is. We get busy worrying about our lives and the lives around us, and we forget who it is we worship. We worship God, the Trinity of Love. God does not just love the world, but each of us individually, to the point that He knows the hairs on our heads. He loves us with a God’s Love, and today we remember that and what that means.
Showing posts with label Solemnity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Solemnity. Show all posts
Friday, June 24, 2011
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/060511a.shtml
“Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven.”
The Easter season is about the triumph of grace over sin, when Jesus put even death under His feet. He did as He promised, and rose from the dead. All we believe that He can do for us, comes from the power He displayed.
The Ascension, then, is almost like a victory lap. Jesus rises from the dead, spends a little time with His disciples, and then returns to Heaven by rising into the air. He has won, and He goes to take His rightful place. But it is hard to talk about the Ascension without thinking about His return. Like the apostles, we want to know when the Kingdom will be established. And to be honest, we just want Him with us again.
A few weeks ago, a lot of people became convinced Jesus was returning to the world May 21st. Billboards were bought proclaiming the judgment day, retirement savings were spent warning unbelievers to repentance, and ultimately, nothing happened. Most Christians rightly looked at the movement with skepticism, knowing that Jesus told us “It is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has established by his own authority.” The pastor who started the “Judgment Day Movement” was absolutely a false prophet. But the attitude of his followers came so close to being so right.
Look at what Jesus exhorts us to do before his Ascension. He tells them to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth, to make disciples of all nations. Even though He is just leaving, He wants the apostles to have a sense of urgency that they must work now, and quickly. Because He is coming back, and soon, soon, soon.
This is what the followers of the false prophet knew, and knew it with a fear that drove them to action, drove them to empty themselves of money so that people could be made aware. They knew that He was coming, and some people wouldn’t be ready. It is our duty as believers to spread the truth of the Gospel as widely and quickly as possible, because when Jesus comes back, some will fail judgment. And we will wonder if it is our fault.
This is what Jesus has charged us with, our Great Commission as believers. We have been given the Truth, and Jesus Christ dwells within us. It is not just for our salvation, but for the salvation of as many as we can bring personally to Christ. Sometimes we make the mistake of identifying ourselves as the church we belong to, thinking that because we are Christian we are doing great things because our church does great things. And our support is important, but also important is: what are we personally doing?
“Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky?” We should take as our lesson from the Judgment Day people that we haven’t a moment to waste. We know Jesus has risen, we know He will come again. We don’t know when, but let us work busily for the kingdom, that we and all we meet might be saved on the last day, and all the nations of the world might be peoples of God, shouting with cries of gladness when He comes again!
“Marana tha, come Lord Jesus!”
“Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven.”
The Easter season is about the triumph of grace over sin, when Jesus put even death under His feet. He did as He promised, and rose from the dead. All we believe that He can do for us, comes from the power He displayed.
The Ascension, then, is almost like a victory lap. Jesus rises from the dead, spends a little time with His disciples, and then returns to Heaven by rising into the air. He has won, and He goes to take His rightful place. But it is hard to talk about the Ascension without thinking about His return. Like the apostles, we want to know when the Kingdom will be established. And to be honest, we just want Him with us again.
A few weeks ago, a lot of people became convinced Jesus was returning to the world May 21st. Billboards were bought proclaiming the judgment day, retirement savings were spent warning unbelievers to repentance, and ultimately, nothing happened. Most Christians rightly looked at the movement with skepticism, knowing that Jesus told us “It is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has established by his own authority.” The pastor who started the “Judgment Day Movement” was absolutely a false prophet. But the attitude of his followers came so close to being so right.
Look at what Jesus exhorts us to do before his Ascension. He tells them to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth, to make disciples of all nations. Even though He is just leaving, He wants the apostles to have a sense of urgency that they must work now, and quickly. Because He is coming back, and soon, soon, soon.
This is what the followers of the false prophet knew, and knew it with a fear that drove them to action, drove them to empty themselves of money so that people could be made aware. They knew that He was coming, and some people wouldn’t be ready. It is our duty as believers to spread the truth of the Gospel as widely and quickly as possible, because when Jesus comes back, some will fail judgment. And we will wonder if it is our fault.
This is what Jesus has charged us with, our Great Commission as believers. We have been given the Truth, and Jesus Christ dwells within us. It is not just for our salvation, but for the salvation of as many as we can bring personally to Christ. Sometimes we make the mistake of identifying ourselves as the church we belong to, thinking that because we are Christian we are doing great things because our church does great things. And our support is important, but also important is: what are we personally doing?
“Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky?” We should take as our lesson from the Judgment Day people that we haven’t a moment to waste. We know Jesus has risen, we know He will come again. We don’t know when, but let us work busily for the kingdom, that we and all we meet might be saved on the last day, and all the nations of the world might be peoples of God, shouting with cries of gladness when He comes again!
“Marana tha, come Lord Jesus!”
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin
Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/010111.shtml
“May the face of the Lord shine upon you!”
This is a blessing from the Old Testament, and is repeated twice today in the readings. I suppose it means “may the Lord focus His attention on you, and bring good things about in your cause.” But it takes on a different sense with the person of Jesus, because for Mary, the face of the Lord really did shine upon her. She held her child, and they looked into each others’ eyes and each face shone into the other.
This is what the Solemnity of Mary is about, the total role she played in the history of salvation. On this day, all the Church is required to go to Mass, to reflect on Mary and her son. The truth is, Mary brought about all that God asked of her; she gave birth to the savior, named Him Jesus, and raised Him with love and devotion. Yet even while she was a parent, she the first believer and reflected on all things concerning Jesus in her heart.
Mary had the unique position of reflecting as a follower of the teacher He would be, and one responsible for keeping Him safe. She was the mother of God. One would need to reflect a great deal in that position.
But her motherhood brought so many things to pass, chiefly that we all might be sons and daughters of God. Jesus was born to Mary under the old Jewish covenant; in His death, He made his body and blood a new covenant with God, one that would bind believers in Him for eternity. When Christ enters our hearts, we are adopted under the new covenant, and heirs to the old promise. God grants us salvation because we are His sons, and also because Mary is our mother.
Mary is the mother of Jesus, and so is the mother of the Church. As Jesus shown His face upon her so intimately, so she is a reflection of Him. All saints are a reflection of God, because God has shown His face upon them as they “reflected on him in their hearts.” But Mary is most so, because of her proximity to Jesus and her fidelity to the mission God gave to her.
It would have been easy to be scared. Easy to be terrified of living up to the motherhood of God; it might have been a large temptation to sin and therefore say “Look, see, I am not worthy of this responsibility. Someone else must do it.” But Mary did not. God looked on her with love, and asked her this thing. Mary gave her heart to God and accepted with love. Jesus was born, and Mary did not fail, but was instead raised to Queen of Heaven.
Today, eight days after Christmas, we think on the role Mary had in salvation. We reflect in our heart on her, and she did on Jesus. May God shine his face upon us too, and may we love Him enough to live up to His goodness.
“May the face of the Lord shine upon you!”
This is a blessing from the Old Testament, and is repeated twice today in the readings. I suppose it means “may the Lord focus His attention on you, and bring good things about in your cause.” But it takes on a different sense with the person of Jesus, because for Mary, the face of the Lord really did shine upon her. She held her child, and they looked into each others’ eyes and each face shone into the other.
This is what the Solemnity of Mary is about, the total role she played in the history of salvation. On this day, all the Church is required to go to Mass, to reflect on Mary and her son. The truth is, Mary brought about all that God asked of her; she gave birth to the savior, named Him Jesus, and raised Him with love and devotion. Yet even while she was a parent, she the first believer and reflected on all things concerning Jesus in her heart.
Mary had the unique position of reflecting as a follower of the teacher He would be, and one responsible for keeping Him safe. She was the mother of God. One would need to reflect a great deal in that position.
But her motherhood brought so many things to pass, chiefly that we all might be sons and daughters of God. Jesus was born to Mary under the old Jewish covenant; in His death, He made his body and blood a new covenant with God, one that would bind believers in Him for eternity. When Christ enters our hearts, we are adopted under the new covenant, and heirs to the old promise. God grants us salvation because we are His sons, and also because Mary is our mother.
Mary is the mother of Jesus, and so is the mother of the Church. As Jesus shown His face upon her so intimately, so she is a reflection of Him. All saints are a reflection of God, because God has shown His face upon them as they “reflected on him in their hearts.” But Mary is most so, because of her proximity to Jesus and her fidelity to the mission God gave to her.
It would have been easy to be scared. Easy to be terrified of living up to the motherhood of God; it might have been a large temptation to sin and therefore say “Look, see, I am not worthy of this responsibility. Someone else must do it.” But Mary did not. God looked on her with love, and asked her this thing. Mary gave her heart to God and accepted with love. Jesus was born, and Mary did not fail, but was instead raised to Queen of Heaven.
Today, eight days after Christmas, we think on the role Mary had in salvation. We reflect in our heart on her, and she did on Jesus. May God shine his face upon us too, and may we love Him enough to live up to His goodness.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Solemnity of Christ the King
Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/112110.shtml
What does it mean to be king?
In the first reading, to be king is to bear responsibility for one’s people. The tribes of Israel are bone and flesh of David, and he is responsible for them because of his kinship with him, because he has saved their lives, and because God has commanded it of him. Thus David agrees to be their king because it is his responsibility.
In the second reading, to be king is to be worthy of worship. Jesus is the image of the invisible God, and in Him were created all things in heaven and on earth. He is head of the body, the church. All the superlatives are His, and in Him all fullness is pleased to dwell. Jesus is King because he deserves to be.
But what does it mean to be King on the cross? David ruled from the throne in Jerusalem, and all Israel paid him homage, listening to his words. When Paul writes of Jesus, He is King of Heaven and all creation rightly gives Him praise. But on the cross, in this moment of all the moments of His life, Jesus is the most Kingly. At the height of His sovereignty, Jesus allows Himself to suffer and die, and feel despair.
For Jesus, to be king is to have all the power in the world and beyond it, but to accept pain. It is to have authority over countless angels, but not to relieve the suffering even of the one man who offers Him worship in His humiliation. It is so strange that we wonder why we suffer, when Christ in all his glory suffered even unto death. We who chase after Him, chase Him to the cross.
When we pray, do we pray like the first thief? Do we say, “if you are God, then do such and such?” God can, of course, do such and such, but He has showed us that in authority there is humility. Jesus would not have been worthy of being King were it not for the cross, if not for the responsibility he bore to all the world: because He came to redeem his people from bondage, to claim victory over sin. Like David, He has won us to Himself.
Can we see our King in His humility? Will we worship Him in ours? The second thief saw Jesus suffering, and He believed in God. Who can watch God die and say “Remember me when you come into your kingdom?” To believe your King can command countless angels, but refuses to, requires a faith I marvel at.
Faith is proof of what is hoped for, and evidence of things unseen. It is faith to believe in a suffering King. It is faith, to talk about God having faith, to suffer and die as King for a people that betrayed you, who lived before you walked the earth, and who are still yet to be born.
On this Solemnity, we should remember our King who is worthy to be praised, and we should pray for the faith to worship Him in our suffering, our suffering King.
What does it mean to be king?
In the first reading, to be king is to bear responsibility for one’s people. The tribes of Israel are bone and flesh of David, and he is responsible for them because of his kinship with him, because he has saved their lives, and because God has commanded it of him. Thus David agrees to be their king because it is his responsibility.
In the second reading, to be king is to be worthy of worship. Jesus is the image of the invisible God, and in Him were created all things in heaven and on earth. He is head of the body, the church. All the superlatives are His, and in Him all fullness is pleased to dwell. Jesus is King because he deserves to be.
But what does it mean to be King on the cross? David ruled from the throne in Jerusalem, and all Israel paid him homage, listening to his words. When Paul writes of Jesus, He is King of Heaven and all creation rightly gives Him praise. But on the cross, in this moment of all the moments of His life, Jesus is the most Kingly. At the height of His sovereignty, Jesus allows Himself to suffer and die, and feel despair.
For Jesus, to be king is to have all the power in the world and beyond it, but to accept pain. It is to have authority over countless angels, but not to relieve the suffering even of the one man who offers Him worship in His humiliation. It is so strange that we wonder why we suffer, when Christ in all his glory suffered even unto death. We who chase after Him, chase Him to the cross.
When we pray, do we pray like the first thief? Do we say, “if you are God, then do such and such?” God can, of course, do such and such, but He has showed us that in authority there is humility. Jesus would not have been worthy of being King were it not for the cross, if not for the responsibility he bore to all the world: because He came to redeem his people from bondage, to claim victory over sin. Like David, He has won us to Himself.
Can we see our King in His humility? Will we worship Him in ours? The second thief saw Jesus suffering, and He believed in God. Who can watch God die and say “Remember me when you come into your kingdom?” To believe your King can command countless angels, but refuses to, requires a faith I marvel at.
Faith is proof of what is hoped for, and evidence of things unseen. It is faith to believe in a suffering King. It is faith, to talk about God having faith, to suffer and die as King for a people that betrayed you, who lived before you walked the earth, and who are still yet to be born.
On this Solemnity, we should remember our King who is worthy to be praised, and we should pray for the faith to worship Him in our suffering, our suffering King.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Link to Mass Readings: http://www.usccb.org/nab/081510a.shtml
The Assumption of Mary is a belief that exists only in the oral tradition of the Church. The Church teaches that when Mary died a natural death, her body did not remain on earth but was taken up to Heaven. Mary, alone of all the followers of Jesus, did not have to wait for his second coming to be risen, but had the special honor of rising immediately upon her death. Why?
The Church is often criticized for giving too much devotion to Mary. A feast in her honor for something that is not even in Scripture seems too much. But this criticism doesn’t strike accurately at how Catholics devote themselves to Mary. Because one, she does deserve the devotion we give her, and two, all that she is points to God and His saving grace.
In the first reading, Mary is linked with the ark of the covenant from the Old Testament. This is because Mary is the ark of the New Testament. The old ark held the staff of Aarron, manna from the desert, and the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments. The ark held signs of the authority, the bread of life, and the law of the Israelites. Jesus is all of those in his person. The reason why Catholics fight so hard to defend the doctrine of Mary’s sinlessness, is because she must be perfect to hold Jesus. People died just by touching the ark in the old covenant, and that just held wood and rocks. Mary held the Messiah, and was a stainless vessel.
Mary is also described as a queen, by the crown she wears in 1st reading, and by the words of the Psalm. Her cousin Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, calls her blessed among women. In response, Mary says that “from this day all generations will call me blessed.” Clearly Scripture gives Mary as much honor as we do today. But this is only because all the honor we give to her she gives to God.
The 1st reading says “A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun.” Mary is just that, a sign of the favor of God. All generations will call her blessed, because she believed that what was spoken to her by God would be fulfilled. To her would the Christ be born. She trusted in God’s fidelity, and after his birth she followed Christ in his ministry faithfully. And because of who she was, the mother of God and perfect disciple, God assumed her body into Heaven to reign as Queen of Heaven.
She is a sign to us of God’s promise that will be fulfilled. Christ has been raised from the dead, and he will come back to raise us at his coming because he raised Mary. Those who have faith, who believe what has been spoken to us, will find our reward.
Mary said: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.” These are the lines we remember Mary by, because for all the favor bestowed upon her, she remembers that it is God’s favor and not hers. She remembers that there is an infinite gulf between God and human, and though she sits as Queen of Heaven it is Jesus who is the Authority, the Bread of Life, and the Law.
The Assumption of Mary is a belief that exists only in the oral tradition of the Church. The Church teaches that when Mary died a natural death, her body did not remain on earth but was taken up to Heaven. Mary, alone of all the followers of Jesus, did not have to wait for his second coming to be risen, but had the special honor of rising immediately upon her death. Why?
The Church is often criticized for giving too much devotion to Mary. A feast in her honor for something that is not even in Scripture seems too much. But this criticism doesn’t strike accurately at how Catholics devote themselves to Mary. Because one, she does deserve the devotion we give her, and two, all that she is points to God and His saving grace.
In the first reading, Mary is linked with the ark of the covenant from the Old Testament. This is because Mary is the ark of the New Testament. The old ark held the staff of Aarron, manna from the desert, and the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments. The ark held signs of the authority, the bread of life, and the law of the Israelites. Jesus is all of those in his person. The reason why Catholics fight so hard to defend the doctrine of Mary’s sinlessness, is because she must be perfect to hold Jesus. People died just by touching the ark in the old covenant, and that just held wood and rocks. Mary held the Messiah, and was a stainless vessel.
Mary is also described as a queen, by the crown she wears in 1st reading, and by the words of the Psalm. Her cousin Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, calls her blessed among women. In response, Mary says that “from this day all generations will call me blessed.” Clearly Scripture gives Mary as much honor as we do today. But this is only because all the honor we give to her she gives to God.
The 1st reading says “A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun.” Mary is just that, a sign of the favor of God. All generations will call her blessed, because she believed that what was spoken to her by God would be fulfilled. To her would the Christ be born. She trusted in God’s fidelity, and after his birth she followed Christ in his ministry faithfully. And because of who she was, the mother of God and perfect disciple, God assumed her body into Heaven to reign as Queen of Heaven.
She is a sign to us of God’s promise that will be fulfilled. Christ has been raised from the dead, and he will come back to raise us at his coming because he raised Mary. Those who have faith, who believe what has been spoken to us, will find our reward.
Mary said: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.” These are the lines we remember Mary by, because for all the favor bestowed upon her, she remembers that it is God’s favor and not hers. She remembers that there is an infinite gulf between God and human, and though she sits as Queen of Heaven it is Jesus who is the Authority, the Bread of Life, and the Law.
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