Memorial - St. Philip Neri

Memorial

St. Philip Neri, you brought countless people to God through your gift of understanding exactly what they needed. You recognized that each person is an individual with a unique dignity, deserving of an approach specific to his own situation, personality, and spiritual state. By your prayers and intercessions, obtain for us the Grace to show the Love of God to each soul we should encounter in that way which will most touch his or her heart, and so bring all of God's children home to the eternal glory in which you now rest, through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

St. Philip Neri, pray for us.

Longhorns in the Sky

Well, longhorn skulls, anyway.

What Christianity Isn't

I want to address something that I've noticed quite a bit recently. It's something I've come across in many different places in my life. Unfortunately, it is the sort of thing that might make some people feel uncomfortable. Therefore, I just want to say that this isn't directed towards anyone in particular. No one person is the inspiration for this. I've seen this amongst friends, family, acquaintances, and all throughout the blogosphere and other Internet forums.

What I am talking about is, essentially, a false form of Christianity. It is, as the title suggests, what Christianity isn't.

Christianity isn't going to Mass. It's not believing all the right things. It's not standing up for the rights of the unborn, or opposing homosexual marriage, or believing that the Ten Commandments ought to be allowed in public space. It's not living morally - abstaining from sex outside of marriage, being polite, staying sober, and so forth. It's not praying frequently, fervently, or with dedication. Christianity isn't feeding the hungry, helping the poor, and in other ways helping the less fortunate. It isn't reading spiritual books. It isn't standing up against those who are hijacking the Christianity for their own causes, or being the lone voice in the wilderness in opposition to some un-Christian practice or idea. Christianity isn't hating sin or cultivating virtue. It isn't standing up for legitimate "modern innovations" in the Church, nor is it defending the "traditional Church." It isn't opposing heresy, preaching truth, admonishing sinners, or imitating saints.

If you think that Christianity is any of those things, you are worshipping an idol. Your idol may be orthodoxy. It may be Ignatian spirituality. It may be sexual purity. You may worship tradition, the prayer, or even the Mass. In fact, you may have a polytheism in which you worship virtue, prayer, morality, orthodoxy, the corporal works of mercy, and all of the other things that are associated with Christianity. The fact is, Christianity is none of these things. We don't worship the Mass - we go to the Mass to worship God. And God, as St. John tells us, is Love (1 John 4:10).

Christianity is Love. It is nothing else. It is singularly, completely, and unreservedly Love. Indeed, all of the things listed above are a part of Love. One who loves his child will admonish her when she does wrong. One who loves God will believe all the right things. One who loves the unborn will defend their lives against the abortion mill that is western civilization. Yet none of these things, apart from Love, has any place in Christianity. Apart from Love, they are simply idols for us to worship instead of God.

Indeed, many people do worship these things. It is very common to worship virtue. The ancient Greeks were quite good at it. Today, many Christians worship these things. Purity apart from Love is not directed toward God, and yet time after time Christians will practice purity, even look to it as a great virtue, while failing to have Love in their lives.

It's a great thing to defend the faith; the Scriptures command us to be ready to (see 1 Peter 3:15). It's a great thing to oppose some terrible sin that our government is committing. It's absolutely necessary to admonish the sinner (such as pro-abortion politicians), but any of this done apart from Love falls far short of being Christian. Apart from Love, it is simply ideology.

Love is what separates orthodoxy from ideology. Love is what separates purity from prudishness. Love is what separates prayer from babbling, virtue from habit, saints from good citizens, righteous anger from sin. Love is what separates Heaven from Hell.

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy
gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all
mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains,
but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up
my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and
kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not
insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at
wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all
things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for
prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for
knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but
when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke
like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a
man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to
face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully
known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of
these is love." (1Co 13:1-13)

Love makes Christians Christians. Unfortunately, as I go through life, I see so little of it.

I have to be clear, here. I am a sinner. We are all sinners. I am not talking about sin. Not everybody is Saint Thérèse. I and most other people will certainly fall short of Love in our lives. We will on occasion practice a virtue without Love. We will abstain from sin for selfish reasons. We will do each and every thing on my list apart from Love sometimes. That's not what I am talking about.

What I am talking about is a general attitude that I see wherein these things are so often taken to be all that there is to Christianity. Love is seen as being Christian, but simply as another item on the list rather than the only thing that makes one Christian. In reality, all of those other things are supposed to be subordinate to love. They are supposed to be part of Love - things that we do to Love. They are supposed to be means, rather than ends. Our only end is to be God - Who is Love.

So I encourage you - as humbly as I can - to examine yourself. Examine your motives. Examine why you do all the things you do. If you pray, why do you? If you live a moral sexuality, what is causing you to? How often do you do things - good, Holy, virtuous, pious things - without Love? I can only promise to do the same examination myself, and I will. I think that it's something our world is in such need of right now. If every Christian who is fighting abortion, defending the faith, or trying to restore Christ to our world in every other way would simply stop for a moment and start to Love first and do these things second, our world would turn around in a matter of weeks.

Salvation and the Theological Virtues

One of the big differences between Protestantism and Catholicism, theologically speaking, is the emphasis on the theological virtues: faith, hope, and love. In Catholic theology, all three of these are required for salvation. If a person is lacking any one of them, he or she will not inherit the kingdom of Heaven, as St. Paul would say. The virtues are called theological because they pertain to God, as opposed to something else. The theological virtue of Faith, for example, is faith in God. The theological virtue of Hope is hope in God, as opposed to hope in something else. Hope in some other thing would be called the natural virtue of hope, for it is hope in something natural.. In Protestantism, faith is regarded as necessary - and faith alone.

This difference naturally leads to quite a bit of confusion on the part of Protestants when coming across the Catholic teaching. "Hope and love," they might ask? "The Bible says we're saved by faith, not hope and love." The biggest question, however, is not one that is particular to Protestants, but one that might be on the mind of anyone considering the idea. Namely, why faith, hope, and love? Why does a person need these three particular things for salvation?

To understand this actually isn't all that difficult if one has a Catholic understanding of God Himself. I oughtn't generalize, as there are certainly many Protestants who have this understanding of God as well, but it's much easier to explain the Catholic viewpoint when contrasting it with another view, one not uncommon in Protestantism. This understanding is what I call the "bouncer" God. In this non-Catholic thinking, God is essentially like a bouncer who guards the entrance into the club of Heaven. Unfortunately, thanks to our sins, nobody is good enough to enter except for Jesus Christ. However, anyone who is with Jesus is allowed to enter by virtue of being associated with Him.

As opposed to this, the Catholic understanding of God is familial. God is understood as not only wanting to be like, but as wanting to be the true and literal Father of us all. He wishes only to adopt us as His children and bring us into His home to receive the true inheritance that we have as His children, but He won't force us to. In life, He offers this invitation. We can either choose Him and enter our home - Heaven - to receive our inheritance, or we can choose other things that we would rather have. When we choose something besides God, this is sin. Of course, there is a true justice to this all. The idea of punishment due sin is not lost, because sin is also understood as real, true moral choices; it does deserve punishment. For those adopted as children of God, He forgives as Father. For those remaining children of the devil, He condemns as judge.

In the Catholic understanding, then, salvation is not simply a matter of escaping hell. Rather, it is a matter of choosing Heaven - or more properly, of choosing God. To penetrate more deeply into this question, then, let us consider what is required to choose anything.

If I were to hold a ball out to you, what would be required for you to choose it? First, and most obviously, you would need to believe that the ball was existed, and beyond that, that it was in fact really being offered. Second, you would need to want the ball. I could offer you the ball all day long, but if you did not want it, you would not choose it. Now, believing that it is available to you and desiring it, you would be required finally to do something to claim the ball. You would need to reach out and take it, or perhaps speak up and tell me that you did in fact want it.

Our example here is of a ball, but it may as well have been anything else in existence. To choose anything at all, then, three things are required: one must believe both that the thing exists and that it can be chosen, one must want the thing, and one must make some action to claim it. These three things are referred to in Catholic theology as faith, hope, and love.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines the theological virtue of Faith as "the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself" (1814). This is very similar to a description that the book of Hebrews gives for faith: "Without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him" (11:6). This is exactly the conclusion that we arrived at above in regards to choosing things.; one must believe both that a thing exists and that the thing is available to be chosen. Faith requires that one believe in God and in what He says, namely, that He rewards those who seek Him - He can be chosen.

The definition of Hope that the Catechism provides is also consistent with what we have discovered about choosing things. "Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ's promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit" (1817). If faith is the virtue by which we believe in God and His rewards, then Hope is that virtue by which we desire God.

Finally we come to Love. The Catechism says, "Charity [Love] is the theological virtue by which we love God above all things for his own sake, and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God" (1822). This requires a bit more unpacking. In Catholic Theology, it is understood that when a person is made just before God, God's Love is poured into his heart (see Romans 5:5). When one is just before God, and thus in the state of salvation, the Holy Spirit is present in his or her soul (no Christian would disagree with this idea,so far as I know). The Holy Spirit is that which internally causes us to Love God, and so by accepting the Holy Spirit into his heart, one Loves God. In the understanding of choosing things that we established, one must, upon believing in and desiring a thing, make an act of claim on that thing. One must "reach out and grab" the thing, as it were. The same is true of God. In the case of God, it is Love by which one "grabs" God, because it is by accepting Love into one's heart that one accepts the Holy Spirit. This idea could be embellished upon greatly by analyzing St. John's exhortations that "God is Love" from his first epistle.

In the Catholic understanding, God, through the merits of Jesus Christ, offers us Himself. Our life is a prolonged opportunity to choose, either to choose Him or to choose something else. He will not force Himself upon us, and so if we choose something else, He will respect that choice rather than dragging us into His presence anyways. It is by Faith that we believe in God and that we believe He is choosable. It is by Hope that we desire God, and it is by Love that we actually make our claim on Him (for lack of a better term). It makes sense, then, that no person can be saved if lacking any one of these three virtues. Without Faith, of course, one would not even recognize anything to choose. If one did not have Hope, then one would not want God, and clearly no choice is made in which a person does not want the item chosen. Finally, without Love, a person has not made any claim that He in fact does want God. If you believe I am offering you a ball and want it, it will do you no good if you do not actually do anything and simply stand in place believing and wanting it.

And so we come back to the Protestant belief that faith alone is required for salvation. Part of this is simply a matter of terminology. Most Protestants who believe that faith alone is required define faith differently from Catholics. To them, Faith includes in it the idea of Hope, and generally a sense of Love as well, although in many cases this sense of Love may be rather incomplete. This topic itself could fill up and entire post, or book for that matter, and will not be expounded upon further. It will suffice for now to read the words of Saint Paul from 1 Corinthians:

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy
gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all
mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains,
but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up
my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing... So now faith,
hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love." (13:1-3;
13)

Thus we see that Faith, apart from Love, profits nothing. Even dying for Christ will "gain nothing" apart from Love. Love is far more important than most people realize, or at least than most people act as though they realize, and is the greatest of these three crucial theological virtues.

Upcoming Later Today...

...will be two related posts, the first theological, and the second, practical.

• Salvation and the Theological Virtues
• What Christianity Isn't

St. Thérèse on Love

"One evening, not knowing in what words to tell Our Lord how much I loved him, and how much I wished that He was served and honouredeverywhere, I thought sorrowfully that from the depths of hell there does not go up to Him one single act of love. Then, from my inmost heart, I cried out that I would gladly be cast into that place of torment and blasphemy so that He might be eternally loved even there. This could not be for His Glory, since He only wishes our happiness, but love sometimes feels the need of saying foolish things. If I spoke in this way, it was not that I did not long to go to Heaven, but that for me Heaven was nothing else than to Love, and in my ardour I felt that nothing could separate me from the Divine Being Who held me captive."

Memorial - St. Rita of Cascia

Optional Memorial

St. Rita of Cascia is one of the most varied of all the saints. Both wife and mother, and later a nun, she went through the trials of women in all walks of life. There is little that a woman can experience that St. Rita did not, including an abusive 18 year marriage and a terrible illness. Through all of the trials, sufferings, and rare joys in her life, Rita maintained her faith and trust in God. She is a wonderful example for any and all women, regardless of their calling, place on the journey, or situation.

St. Rita of Cascia, you suffered every ailment imaginable, from the abuse of a husband to the death of your children to the pains of bodily illness. Pray for us so that we, too, may live our lives with the faith, trust, and love that you gave to God, regardless of what circumstances we happen to be in or what troubles we may be experiencing. By the Heavenly glory that you have gained in Christ, show us now how to live our lives for God so as to attain to this same glory, through Jesus Christ Our Lord, Amen.

Great Deal

One of the great travesties of our day is the loss of sacred musis in and around churches. It used to be that one of the great roles of music in society was to lift the heart of man up to God. We simply don't have that any more.

Of course, we do have a great deal of Christian music out there. I don't mean to disparage modern Christian music. I like a lot of Christian pop, rock, etc. Much of it is very good, and it certainly provides an alternative to the generally sin-filled offerings provided by mainstream music.

That being said, it isn't quite the same as what I refer to when I say "sacred music." It makes perfect sense to imagine a large group of people sining a modern praise song in honor of God, but it would just seem wrong to play the same thing during a visit to the Holy Sepulchre, or even during a wedding ceremony.

There is something that just tells us that the truly sacred moments in our lives call for music that transcends the norm - for something beyond, something sacred, something very special. It may not be easy to define this, exactly, but we know it when we hear it. This is the sort of music that used to be produced often. It's the kind of music that used to be performed during Mass and other sacred ceremonies.

I must admit, I'm no great expert on this sort of thing. In fact, I know virtually nothing about it. I have, however, wanted to get into it somewhat, and to incorporate it a bit into my life. Unfortunately, I really had no idea where to start. Fortunately, EMI Classics has very recently (within the past 2 months) released a fantastic compilation of some of the best of this sort of music over the past 1000 years. This is a 6 CD set with 100 sacred works, from Gregorian chant to some of the rare sacred music that is being produced today. And even better, it's only $20.

If you're interested, take a look!

Memorial - St. Christobal Magallanes and Companions, Martyrs

Optional Memorial

St. Christobal Magallanes, you were martyred because the government of your day chose to abuse the power which it had received from God, turning on Him from whom their authority came and on all those who lived in His Name. Today, the governments we are subject to are growing closer to following in a similar, unjust path, while some are already persecuting the Church of our Blessed Lord. Pray for us that we may enact positive and peaceful change in our governments, and that if called to make the same sacrifice that you made for your faith, we will do so willingly and joyfully.

St. Christobal Magallanes, pray for us.

Pirates of the Caribbean and the Fall of Western Civilization

This coming weekend, the keenly expected third installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean films will be released in theatres. It won't be the typical summer release, but rather one of those "special" events where people dress up in costumes and go to the theatres at midnight so that they can see the highly anticipated release as soon as is humanly possible. Even beyond that, the theatres will no doubt be packed this weekend with all manner of swashbucklers and salty dogs. In short, most of western civilization will be going to see this film.

It would do them much good, however, to revisit the first film before doing so. This is not simply for the sake of refreshing their memories of the adventures of the buccaneers, but more importantly because the first film contains a message that most of western civilization is in dire need of hearing, and more importantly, of assimilating.

The first film, The Curse of the Black Pearl, tells the story of a crew of pirates trying to escape the curse of an eternity existing in between death and life as immortal half-men, unable to experience anything other than their own miserable, half-human existence. They can go through neither pain nor pleasure, a state which leaves them to a numb, meaningless, empty existence far worse than even any suffering might provide. The cause of all of this is a curse which came upon them after taking forbidden treasure, and their sole purpose is now one of trying to steal back all of the treasure so that the curse can be reversed.

Watching the film, one can't help but feel a bit bad for these fellows. They are in a simply pathetic state of affairs. What used to be men, they now simply go through the motions of men, even fighting amongst each other with no possible outcome to be gained, as they cannot be injured. These men have been without any meaning to their existence for so long that they don't even realize just how self-destructive and stupid their behaviors are. Fighting amongst selves causes enough delay in reaching a goal; in their case, the delay may be forever, if they choose to fight that long. Any member of the audience at once realizes just how stupid these cursed men are behaving.

Unfortunately, our society has been caught in an existence without meaning for so long that we, too, are essentially incapable of recognizing just how self-destructive and stupid our behaviors are. The reality is that western civilization is caught in the very same situation that these forsaken pirates were. Just like the pirates, we have sold our souls for various treasures. Sometimes it is money, but, as Captain Jack points out in the film, "not all that glitters is gold." One of our treasures is wealth. Another is fame. Sex is one of our treasures, as is science, and even progress in general. As a society, we have thrown aside what makes us human for the treasure - and in many cases, the unknown treasure. When it comes to progress, for example, we do not need to know the ultimate prize, simply that it is in some way moving forward.

This is perhaps best exemplified in the case of abortion and contraception. Here, we take the very life out of us and destroy it, all for the sake of our treasure. Modern science makes this parallel frightfully complete. Biology identifies life as that which fulfills 7 characteristics, one of which is the ability to produce new organisms. Contraception and abortion are designed to hinder and negate this ability, rendering us as not quite alive, but clearly not dead, either. In fact in western Europe, where we see this problem most prominently, the population is decreasing at a rate faster than it was during the black plague and the birth rate is in such that humanity is well on its way to virtual extinction on the continent. Without children to prepare for the future and a new generation to leave a legacy and bestow our accomplishments on, lives are reduced to an utter meaninglessness of going through the motions.

And these pirates teach us something else about the sins that plague our society, as well. Their first sin was a sin against themselves. They weren't so much hurting anyone; any claimants to the treasure had long since died. The only thing truly wrong with the treasure was that it was forbidden. That's the reality of all sin, in one sense: God said "no." There may be more too it than that (and there most often is), but even if there weren't, all that matters is that god said "no."

Yet even such a "harmless" sin leads the pirates into greater sins, sins against other people. The emptiness which they find in themselves after the first sin leads to a need, a need to fulfill what can only be fulfilled by more sin, and greater sin. Now they must steal, murder, and kidnap to fill the hole inside of them.

This is the reality of sin. Nobody sins to commit evil. Every sin is an effort - a misguided effort - to get some good. The pirates didn't go after this treasure to make their existence a constant, meaningless process of going through the motions: they wanted easy money. The person who has sex outside of marriage is trying to find love, even if without realizing it. The young man who gets high on drugs isn't looking to destroy his body, he's trying to find happiness in a fallen world. The woman who has 3 abortions isn't trying to snuff out 3 innocent lives, she is trying to protect her career.

And yet all sin leads to this emptiness, an emptiness created by trying to fill a need with self. We already have ourselves - adding more of oneself cannot fulfill. Selfish acts - and all sin is, ultimately, selfish - simply try to fill that hole inside of us with self, leading us to feel more empty than before; discovering the powerlessness to fulfill oneself is a very gnawing experience. And so the sinner, not knowing what to do, tries to take from others in the hope that they can provide what is lacking in themselves. Yet taking from others is simply another act of selfishness, another attempt to fill the hole with self. It is a numbing cycle in which the western world is trapped.

Ultimately, there are two possible endings to this cycle, both illustrated in the Curse of the Black Pearl. When the curse is finally - and unexpectedly - lifted, Captain Barbossa, the leader of the cursed pirates, has just been shot. Because of the lifting of the curse, he is finally able to feel. He is finally able to experience life - and yet all he can experience is death. His initial reaction is one of joy. He has gone for so long without feeling, that though all he is able to experience is the pangs of death, he rejoices in it. This is, ironically, what he was seeking: feeling and meaning, at any cost. Like today's western world, Captain Barbossa delved into sin after sin in his drive for meaning. Ultimately, the meaning that he found was death, and it came unexpectedly. He always expected to be in control of his mortality - to hang onto his invincibility until he was ready to surrender it. Yet death came, unexpectedly, and ironically, as the utter and perfect fulfillment of all of his desires. He sought meaning through sin, and he found the only meaning sin holds: death.

His crew, on the other hand, meets a different end: mercy. They, too, find themselves subject to death unexpectedly as the curse is lifted while in battle with superior British forces. However, death does not come to these men. They are granted mercy by the soldiers. The commanding officer did not need to grant these pirates mercy - and they had certainly committed crimes far exceeding the warrant of death - but he did. All they had to do was accept it. Their choice was to go on fighting to the death, or drop their weapons and accept the fate of capture.

Yet this is a deeper choice than it would seem, and one which ultimately our civilization will have to make. The pirates had gone for a great time without any meaning in their lives, without any feeling. Finally, they had found it, and they were left with a choice: life as prisoners, or death. They chose the former. This no doubt meant much suffering for them, especially in light of the allusion from earlier in the film that freedom is the greatest and most valued privilege of pirates. They would seem to heartily agree with the famous statement of Patrick Henry, "give me liberty or give me death!" But these pirates had something greater than that: meaning. They had sought meaning for so long, as their single goal, and though they had sought it in every corrupt, wrong, and evil way, by the grace of mercy, they had an opportunity to experience it. Even surrendering themselves to the British, the pirates could experience meaning. They could taste the sweet bite of an apple, or experience the warm Caribbean breeze on their faces and an infinity of other things which anybody else would take for granted. They must suffer for this, but ultimately, it was life, and it was meaning, and they chose it.

And so, this is where the western world stands. Indulging in an endless cycle of a search for meaning, a cycle leading deeper and deeper into sin and meaninglessness, one of two things will happen. Either death will come, quickly and unexpectedly, or mercy will. If mercy comes, it will be on the condition of suffering. There is much penance to be done for the sins our civilization has committed, and redemption will not come without suffering and hard work. And yet, if mercy is offered, and if it is accepted, we will have the chance to experience something beautiful, something incredible, and something well worth any suffering: meaning. If we are willing to lay down our weapons of vice and selfishness, we will find such infinite meaning that we had forgotten existed that the sacrifices required for it would seem radically insignificant. Let us pray for this; let us pray.

College in 3 1/2 Minutes

The Limitations of Knowledge

"To be learned and able to discuss the Trinity will get you nowhere if you do not have humility, and therefore displease the Trinity. Lofty words neither save you more make you a Saint; only a virtuous life makes you dear to god. It is better to experience contrition than to be able to define it.

To be well versed in Scripture and all the sayings of philosophers will not profit you if you are without God's Love and His Grace. All things are vanity. Nothing matters except to Love God and to serve Him only. The height of wisdom is to set your goal on Heaven by despising the world." - The Imitation of Christ, 1

The Ascension, the Body, and the Beatific Vision

Today is the official date of the Feast of the Ascension. In some parts of the United States and in some other countries, the celebration has been moved to the 7th Sunday of Easter. However, here in my home archdiocese of Boston, it is still celebrated today. This is the day that, in a certain sense - as Fr. Ventura said at the evening Mass tonight - sums up the reason we're Catholic: to go to Heaven. Jesus ascended into Heaven, and we hope to get there.

GK Chesterton made a similar statement once when he was asked why he was Catholic. Of course, his questioner was expecting some sort of theological reasoning, perhaps a historical reference, or even an emotional appeal to aesthetics or some such thing. However, in classic Chestertonian fashion, the author responded simply, "to get my sins forgiven."

So here we have to answers to the question of why we are Catholic. One is provided by today's celebration, and might be called the more positive of the two: we hope for Heaven! The second might be understood to be more negative, focusing on that which we hope to escape rather than that which we hope to gain. However, in the classic beauty of the Catholic faith, the reality is that the two answers are not really all that different at all, much less opposed as being two different ways of looking at something. In fact, in a certain sense they are very really the same answer precisely.

St. Augustine touched on this point in one of his sermons on the Ascension. He wrote,

"While in heaven [Christ] is also with us; and we while on earth are with him. He is here with us by his divinity, his power and his love. We cannot be in heaven, as he is on earth, by divinity, but in him, we can be there by love."

The last statement really stuck out at me when I read it. We can be in Heaven - even now - by Love. This is really an astonishing statement. I'm sitting in a chair right now as I write this, and as much as I might try to love God, I certainly don't feel like I'm in Heaven. I'm in an orange basement, so far as my eyes tell me, and it seem quite far from Heaven, as you might imagine.

To explain this point further, Augustine speaks more specifically of Christ's incarnation, quoting John 3:13:

"He did not leave heaven when he came down to us; nor did he withdraw from us when he went up again into heaven. The fact that he was in heaven even while he was on earth is borne out by his own statement: No one has ever ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven."

This statement is very though provoking. It could be the subject of a great deal of meditation. However, the reality is that its not that profound a statement, theologically speaking. It simply states a very basic theological statement, one which any student would learn in his first year of theology: Christ experienced the beatific vision from the first moment of His existence.

Now, the beatific vision is the very essence of Heaven. To be in Heaven, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, consists in"nothing else than the vision of the Divine Essence" (ST, I-II, 3, 8). Heaven is - in all that it is - the state of knowing God. Christ states the same in John's Gospel: "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God..." (17:3)

So Christ was literally in Heaven while on earth, and St. Augustine says that we can be too, through Love. If you've noticed, however, I have been capitalizing "Love" most of the time in this post. This is because it's not our love that Augustine is speaking about, but the Love of God, and this brings us back to Fr. Ventura and GK Chesterton. We are forgiven our sins, per Chesterton's answer, thanks to the Love of God, and we are brought into Heaven, per Fr. Ventura's homily, by His Love as well. John expressed this in his first epistle, writing that what matters is "not that we loved God, but that He loved us..." (4:10).

It gets deeper than this, though. Love doesn't cause our forgiveness and beatification to Heaven simply as a final cause, but also as a efficient cause. In other words, Love isn't simply that which inspires God to forgive us and show us the vision of Himself, but it is also the means by which He does this. In our justification, God's Love is "poured into our hearts" (Rom. 5:5). It is this very Love which wipes away sin. Sin and Love are incompatible, because sin is the contradiction of Love. By pouring His own Love into our hearts, God eradicates sin. At the same time, it is through Love that we know God - that is, see Him. With Love in our souls (which is what "hearts" refers to in Scripture[excluding passages referring to the organ]), we see God. On the other hand, "Anyone who loves," St. John writes, "...knows God." (1 John 4:7).

To know God is to Love, but to Love not with our own, human Love, but with the Love that God has placed in us. Further, to know God is, according to Christ, the essence of eternal life. Love is that which at once - simultaneously - forgives sin and infuses the vision of God into our souls. Just as Christ was in Heaven while on earth, we too can be in Heaven, even while on earth. In fact, anyone who is in a state of Grace (does not have unforgiven mortal sin) is in Heaven, quite literally.

This makes more sense when we recall that Heaven belongs to the soul, not the body. Our bodies will be glorified and brought into Heaven, but even then, it is not by them which we experience Heaven (at least not directly; Heaven will involve the body, but not as a fundamental quality. See ST, I-II, 3,3 and ST, Sup., 92, 2 regarding this point). Heaven consists in the soul's vision of God.

The practical implications of this are tremendous. So long as we are in Grace, we are in Heaven, even here on earth. Christ experienced Heaven, even as He hung on the cross, and we can experience Heaven even as we bear some terrible pain or sadness. This explains the ability of the saints and the apostles, as recorded in Scripture, to profess tremendous joy even in their sufferings. By this, they were able to rejoice in their sufferings, as St. Paul said (Rom. 5:3). The pain can be overwhelming, but the soul is still in Heaven.

This also has implications for our consciences. Our bodies are afflicted with sin, even when our souls are striving for God. We will become angry without intention, our eyes will be drawn to look upon an illicit image, evil thoughts will pass through our minds. This does not matter. Our body will do these things even while our souls rejoice - in a certain very real sense unbeknownst to us - in the vision of God. Sin enters when we consent to these things, by allowing them in the door of our souls as it were. Make no mistake, to consent to or willingly engage in bodily wrong is sinful. It is also true that gradually, through living virtuously, God's Grace will heal our bodies so that these things will happen less and less, and if you are blessed in a special way, never at all. This must be what we strive for, but we must also not be discouraged if it does not happen this way. Some of the saints, for example Augustine, struggled with their bodies until their death.

And so as we go through life, it is easy to expect that we will have a lot of "cleaning up" to do in Purgatory. For many of us this will be the case. However, it is also possible that our souls may be much cleaner than we imagine. This is important to understand for the sake of perseverance, as it can be a great encouragement. Nevertheless, there is great danger in thinking of it in any way more than this. We all have many sins which indeed are in our souls, which indeed we do consent to and even engage in purposefully, and we needn't any excuses.

Rather, what we need to do is recognize just what it means to be in the state of Grace and strive to stay there. We need to recognize the reality that our souls are in Heaven even now, and live for that. "Is this song fit for a soul in Heaven?" "Is this movie something that is good to see when I can be seeing God?" "Should I spend time experiencing this when God is there for me to experience?"

And this is where all of this should bring us: to prayer. Our souls are filled with God's Love - they can see God - but because of our emphasis on the body, we don't recognize this. God is there, waiting to be experienced, and we don't even realize it. In prayer, we reach beyond the bodily senses of sight, taste, smell, touch, and sound, and reach the senses of our souls, the senses that have direct access to God Himself. We have this power, and we simply don't even realize it because we have never used it. Imagine if you had been fed intravenously your entire life and never had anything put into your mouth so that you didn't even realize there was such a thing as taste for never having used it before. This is the state we are in in regards to our souls.

In prayer, gradually and slowly, we are able to peel off the layers of flesh until we recognize these senses, the senses of our souls. I am not referring to verbal prayer, but mental prayer, to meditation. "Blessed is the man who... meditates night and day," David tells us in the first Psalm. Mary herself, the one creature living in the greatest communion with God, led a life of meditation, as Luke tells us when he says that Mary treasured sayings about Jesus and pondered them in her heart (2:19).

Our souls do not yet see God fully. As we grow in prayer and holiness, we will see God more and more as He is. If it is difficult to pray now, to take the time to do it, or to avoid sin, it will become easier. It can be frustrating when we struggle so much with these things, but we needn't feel this way. As we see God more and more, the choices between sin and God, or between one thing and the prayer by which we know God, will become easier. After all, the more we grow the more we will see Heaven - see God - and the choice between anything and this is really a very simple one when we see the choice we're making.

"For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known." (1 Cor. 13:12). St. Paul wrote these words immediately before writing that Love is the most important thing. I want to end on this point. Love is truly the most important thing in the world. To Love is literally to know God! All of our actions, be they of Love, are actions of prayer and actions of Heavenly contemplation. God is Love! When we Love, we are knowing God. If we Love, we are experiencing God, even if we can't quite see it yet. St. Thérèse understood this, and so she Loved. And she Loved some more. And she Loved and she Loved and she Loved. As John wrote, "We love because he first loved us." (1 John 4:19). He gave us His Love so that we can give it to others. By doing this - by Loving - we are entering more and more into the realm of God. Each simple, Loving action is nothing less than another step further into Heaven itself.

Take a plunge.

Heaven in Her Eyes

It's so hard to look towards Heaven when we don't know exactly what it is we are looking forward to. It's no surprise that we sin, that we choose lesser things, when we don't even know what is being offered us. "Heaven..." It seems so abstract, so esoteric, so meaningless, really, as merely a word.

This is the face of St. Thérèse of Liseux. It is the face of a person who is filled with the Love of God and nothing else. Look at her. Look her in the eyes. There, you will see your every longing, your every desire, all that you have ever wanted, and in some mysterious way, so much more.

It is the face of someone who is looking to God and desiring nothing but Him, and who can almost see Him already. It is the face of a person who knows how much she is loved by God, and who lives every moment simply to receive that love so that she can share it with others. St. Thérèse understood how she was loved by God, and as a result you can see God - see Heaven - in her eyes.

This is the very meaning of life: to have what is in her eyes in our souls. No matter what we are going through, what mistakes we have made, or what longings and desires we might have, this is waiting for us. This is true joy, the unending joy that cannot be weakened or taken away. It's there for the taking... all we have to do is receive.

Strive for it. Ask for it. Cast away everything else you have, and it will be yours. Oh, how can we desire sex, alcohol, material things - even human love! - rather than that which is in Thérèse's eyes? All that those things can possibly give, and so, so much more, is right there. This is Heaven. This is what we are offered. Go and live every moment looking toward this prize... towards Love....

Carrying Our Crosses

"Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me," Jesus said," cannot be my disciple." There is a great deal of meaning behind these words, and many Christians do try to pay attention to them. Our lives will contain many burdens we must bear, sufferings we must go through, and personal difficulties we must struggle through. We are called to bear these things as Jesus bore His cross: with humility, patience, love, and even thanksgiving to God our Father. I think we understand this. We don't always like it or do it, but we at least understand it.

However, the problem is that we typically acknowledge this and move on, or we make some half-hearted resolution to do better and then go back to our old ways. What we really need to do is actually carry our crosses, and suffer with Jesus. But this is what we've been trying to do - how can we do it?

There are many answers. The one I want to focus on here is to realize just what it means to carry our cross - and what it tells us. After all, we know we have to carry our crosses, but what does that actually mean? Why do we have to carry our crosses; what difference does it make? We all have some vague idea of it, to be sure. We know that we are sharing in Jesus' suffering when we carry our cross. We know that we are offering a sacrifice of praise to God... but does this mean anything personally to us?

I'm going to say something rather shocking here: Jesus couldn't save us alone, and He didn't. He needed human help. This is an incredibly shocking, if not scandalous, thing to say - but it's the reality, and in fact we are all familiar with this fact even if we don't realize it.

We all know Simon of Cyrene, even if not by name. He's the person that the Roman soldiers forced to help Jesus carry His cross. Matthew, Mark, and here Luke, recorded it: "And as they led him away, they seized one Simon of Cyrene, who was coming in from the country, and laid on him the cross, to carry it behind Jesus." (23:26) This shows us that Jesus allowed another person to help Him, and this itself is rather significant. Jesus wants us to be able to play a part... He did what we couldn't do, but He also didn't hoard it all to Himself so as that we can't do anything to help.

I have heard it explained rather beautifully by Rosalind Moss, a writer for This Rock magazine and a Jewish convert. Imagine, she says, a mother baking cookies in the kitchen when her little daughter walks into the kitchen behind her and asks to help. Now the mother doesn't need the child's help; she has the ingrediants, the tools, the bowls and cookie sheets, the oven, and the ability to put it all together to make cookies. In fact, the child could never make the cookies on her own. She couldn't even reach the counter! Is the mother going to not allow the poor child to help? Of course not... she loves her child, and she wants the child to feel a part of it and to help if she likes. Jesus is infinitely more loving than this mother, and so He would do no less for us. After all, if, Rosalind says, you could go back to Calvary and hold up Jesus' arms a little bit as He hung on the cross to take some of that burden off of Him, wouldn't you?

We can see that Jesus allows us to suffer with Him, then. This in itself is absolutely fantastic - to share in God's very own work and suffering. Words cannot convey how wonderful this is! If we only consider this, how can we not carry our crosses, realizing what an oppurtunity we are passing up!

But I said more than this. I said that Jesus couldn't save us on His own - without Simon. Why does it matter that someone else helped Him? Why does it matter that Jesus allowed Him to help, even if it is an astounding participation? Let's ask, then, why did they make Simon carry the cross? The answer must be because Jesus was incapable of doing so. This is the way it was depicted in The Passion of the Christ, and it makes a lot of sense. The Romans weren't nice guys, especially when it came to executions. They were ruthless. They didn't just want to be nice to Jesus here. The only reason they ever would have done this is if Jesus was actually incapable of carrying the cross on His own any further.

There's an incredibly important distinction here. Jesus, in His Divinity, certainly needed no help. God doesn't need help with anything. But in His humanity, Jesus did need help. His human body was spent. It couldn't go any further. He needed the addition of Simon's humanity, as it were, to finish the job.

But to say that Jesus - the God-man - needed Simon is different. He was, after all, God and man, so why could He not simply have miraculously lifted His body up and kept it going? The answer is, no, He couldn't, not if He wanted to save us. Jesus became man primarily to be a human representative - a sinless human representative - to God the Father on our behalf. Some human being needed to offer God a perfect sacrifice, but because all human beings were sinful, none could. Christ couldn't offer this simply as God, because then it would be God offering God a sacrifice; there would be no benefit to humanity, because no human would have made the sacrifice. If Christ had performed some miraculous act to offer the sacrifice, then it would have essentially subsumed His humanity, and the sacrifice wouldn't have been an authentically human act. his role as human Mediator would have been destroyed, and the sacrifice would have been no good for us.

So without Simon's help, Christ couldn't have made it up to Calvary to be put on the cross. What's more, up until the point of actually being put on that cross, the sacrifice couldn't necessarily be said to have been offered, even had Jesus died on the way. His sacrifice was a spotless sacrifice, a sinless one of Christ being obedient unto death (cf. Phill. 2:8). Up until being nailed to that cross, Christ hadn't done that yet. He had gone far, but not all the way. He hadn't actually been obedient to death, because He hadn't put Himself in the position definitely to be killed yet. For example, He could have escaped, or tried to. He certainly could have sinned on the cross, too, by rejecting His death even as He underwent it, but there is something a bit different about this. This would be a different way He could have sinned, but there was still the fact that He had not yet actually gone all the way to death, not volunatarilly. Allowing Himself to be nailed to that cross was truly a consummation of sorts to His acceptance of death.

Simon made up what was lacking in Christ's sufferings, then. In fact, this is exactly the choice of words Paul used in Colossians when he explained his sufferings: "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church." (1:24) This is a wonderfully deep statement, in light of what we have been discussing, and it leads directly to the point of all of this. Note that Paul said that it was in his "flesh" that he made up what was lacking, just as Simon had made up in his flesh. Simon provided what was lacking in Christ's bruised and battered humanity. St. Paul said that he was doing the same.

Let's consider one more thing. Simon was one of the most common names amongst Jews at the time of Christ. Cyrene was an important gentile port city, from which the entire world could be reached. Simon of Cyrene, represents, essentially, the everyman. He is the common Jew, and the gentile from anywhere in the world. The place he took is the place that any person could take. When St. Paul bore his own sufferings well, he took the place of Simon. Paul carried his cross, and in carrying his cross, he was not carrying his alone, but that of Christ. He was adding to Christ's afflictions what was lacking, just as Simon did. And when we bear our crosses, we do the same.

And this is the reality of our crosses. Our crosses are not simply difficulties to suffer through out of praise, but to take part in the true sacrifice of Christ. They are sufferings by which we take part in the ultimate praise, the only praise ever complete enough for God, the praise of Christ's offering on the cross. When we bear our crosses, we bear His, and when we bear His, we become a true part of His sacrifice, His sacrifice of praise, His eucharistion (Greek: thanksgiving). We hold up His arms that little bit - out of love. To be His disciple, we must take up our crosses, for apart from that, His cross would lay on the ground with Him just inside the walls of Jerusalem.

This also means something very important, so much more important than anything else. It means that Jesus didn't just die for us but He died for you - personally. Every step He took on the way of the cross was for you and you personally. In the grand mystery of the Incarnation, His steps were at once for all mankind and exclusively for you. He died because He loves you - not because He loved mankind, not because He loved everyone or because He loved me or us, but because He loved YOU.

Thinking of this, our crosses must seem like toothpicks.

Are You Semi-Pelagian?

A shocking question, I know. It has the force to harrow one to the bones just considering it!

But seriously, it is an important question. I came to thinking about it last evening at the vigil for Virginia Tech, when we sang "Amazing Grace." It's a beautiful song, really, in terms of the melody and such, and I must admit I have been known to sing it on my way home from school on occasion. The words are pretty nice, too - the message that is intended is fantastic.

But it's semi-Pelagian, or at least could be understood that way.

Pelagianism is a form of theological belief (considered a heresy by the Catholic Church and virtually every other Christian group in existence) which is named after a man named Pelagius who lived in the latter part of the 4th century. Pelagius taught that man could be saved completely by his own actions. According to Pelagius, a person could live a virtuous enough life, staying away from sins and doing enough good works - to earn the right to enter Heaven as, more or less, a payment from God. Man didn't need any Grace. This is the heresy that Augustine fought so strongly against, occupying a rather large portion of his time in fact. It's also the heresy that is probably most likely to strike horror into the heart of any good Protestant.

Semi-Pelagianism is a belief that developed in the middle of the 5th century in what would later become southern France. It held that Grace was necessary, but that man could make the first step toward God, Who would then respond with the Grace necessary for salvation. It rejects the idea that a person can somehow make his or her way to Heaven apart from God's help, but still holds out the idea that a person can at least start to approach God apart from being called. In semi-Pelagianism, the fallen person asks God to save him or her, and then God does it. This idea was rejected in 529 at the Second Council of Orange, which condemned, among other things, the idea that "the beginning of faith and the very desire of faith... proceeds from our own nature and not from a gift of Grace..."

The orthodox Christian position, the one held by all but a few pockets of Christians, is that Grace comes before anything. Grace is what enables a person to realize his or her need for God, to believe in God, to ask God for salvation, and to do anything else at all. There's some disagreement over whether or not the individual must consent to this Grace (Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Evangelicalism, Methodism, Lutheranism, Anglicanism, most Baptists, most Pentacostalism) or whether God simply chooses those who will accept it without the cooperation of the individual (Presbyterianism, most Southern Baptists, other Calvanists), but the fact that God has to reach out to man and not the other way around is all but universally accepted.

The potential problem in "Amazing Grace" is the verse, "How precious did that grace appear, The hour I first believ’d!" This could easily be read to mean that Grace came with the first moment of belief, as if the belief of the speaker prompted the Grace, rather than the orthodox Christian position that the belief was preceded by Grace. This interpretation is strengthend by the fact that the verses immediately preceding speak about some of the benefits of Grace, such as the relief of fear, intimating that the these treasured effects had been gained by merit of the belief.

In any case, I didn't write this for the sake of criticizing this song. I wrote it for the sake of leading us to examine ourselves. Semi-Pelagianism is one of those interesting things in Christianity that nobody believes, but a great number live as if they do. The idea that we go to God for what we need, rather than God calling us to come to Him, is one that at times permeates our lives. This is especially true because of the emphasis that Christianity puts on faith.

We are saved by faith, we must have faith, we must follow God with faith. With this mindset, albeit one based on the truth, it is very easy to fall into the same error as the author of "Amazing Grace" seems to have. We realize that our faith is important - we must have it, and we must exercise it, but beyond that, we must realize that when we exercise our faith or cling to our faith or even simply have faith, we are simply replying "yes" to God's promptings.

This should cause us to rely even more on God. Our faith is not a sort of buzzer by which we can call upon God, hoping He says 'yes.' If anything, our faith is the gift that gave us when we said yes to His buzzer. Saint Paul teaches us that our faith is the gift of Grace, saying, " by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God." (Eph. 2:8) The "it" he is referring to is the faith - the faith is not of our own doing, but is the gift of God. We can't even believe apart from God. We utterly rely on Him for everything. Of course, we have to respond, which is gets to what St. Paul talks about in the passage Stephanie brought up, as he says that we must "work out our own salvation." (Phil. 2:12) We have to actually respond with a "yes" when God gives us the Grace to pray, to ask Him for something, to do something good, or even simply to believe.

Yet it is in these moments that we should realize that we couldn't even be doing this apart from Him. When we pray, it is because He loves us enough to enable us to pray to Him. When we goto church, it is because He has given us the Grace to do that, and we should thank Him. When we believe, at each moment that we do, we should thank God and praise Him to High Heaven for the gift of belief, the gift that He gave all of His own Love - all the while realizing that the very praises we are saying are there only as another gift from Him.

He gives us everything. All that we give to God we are simply giving back what He provided in the first place. This is how indebted we are to our God and our Saviour. And this knowledge should lead us to recognize something even more profund. Every moment of faith, and every act of faith, and every good deed, and every prayer, and every second spent inside church, feeding the poor, or placing a few cents into a charity tin at the drive through - each of these moments is another yes to God, another yes just as important as that first moment we came to Christ in the first place. At that time, we said "yes" to His Grace, and at each and every other moment - with every breath we take believing in Jesus Christ - we are saying "yes" to His Grace.

And so how can we fail to pray? How can we not worship God? How can we not keep Him in mind at all moments? For when we do not do these things, we are failing to say "yes." Even if our choices are not at the level of a conscious "no" to the Lord, we are nevertheless passing up an oppurtunity to say "yes." We are passing up an oppurtunity to receive the gift of God, the gift that He offers so freely and at such great cost to Himself. Let us not then be idle in our faith, nor in our works, nor prayers nor our Love, for with each moment passing, our Heavenly, Loving God, Our God Who Loves us more than anyone could and desires the greatest happiness for us, who has given His only Son over to death simply so that we could say "yes" to what we should have been saying "yes" to in the first place, calls to us. Our Divine Spouse awaits, calling - let us go to Him without reserve.

What Easter Means to Us

The tomb is empty, and Jesus Christ is risen. Today, we celebrate how 2,000 years ago, after tremendous suffering and a horrible death, a man rose from the dead and made it possible for all of us to go with Him. You all know the story. We’ve probably all heard it so many times that it may not have the effect it ought to on us anymore. Most of us have been hearing the story of Jesus’ Resurrection since before we were old enough to remember. Some of us may have heard it only a few times, but the fact is that it is the center of our faith and so, in a way, we think of it all throughout the year. Dare I say, we take it for granted all throughout the year.

But this is the story – the historical, real as World War II or the American Revolution or Columbus’ landing in America story – of a man dying one of the most thorough deaths a person can, being taken down from a cross, lifted all about, wrapped up, carried to a tomb, being put inside, and then three days later rising to be no less alive than any one of us is here today. This is something we should be amazed by, not something we should hear passively as though it were an old war story we’re hearing grandpa tell for the hundredth time or that little book we’ve been made to read to our children at bedtime for so many times we’ve lost count.

Unfortunately, that’s how we react. We don’t mean to. I think I could fairly vouch for everyone here that we all wish we didn’t react this way. We wish the story could astound us, confuse us, and shock us like it did those first disciples long ago. When Mary Magdalene went to the tomb on Easter morning, she was shocked to find Jesus’ body gone. What does she say? Does she assume Christ had risen from the dead? No, even after His having spoken of it so many times, the disciples still didn’t get it. Mary’s first thought was that the body had been taken. Moved. Perhaps stolen. Thomas, upon seeing Christ standing in front of him, still couldn’t believe it. This event was so shocking that many of the Jews of the time simply refused to believe it – they couldn’t bring themselves to – and never joined the Christian Church. Saul of Tarsus refused to believe until he was spoken to by Christ in a mystical vision.

If we want to be like these first Christians, we need to follow Christ’s words and be like children. “Unless… you become like children,” He said, “you shall never enter the kingdom of Heaven.” To children, the story of Christ is not new. To children, the story of Christ is as vibrant and real in their minds as the visit to the grocery store to buy things for Easter dinner. To children, the Resurrection of Christ is filled with wonder and awe.

But those of us who are grown have an advantage – and it is an advantage though it doesn’t seem to be. Our advantage is that we understand that people don’t rise from the dead. We understand, now more than ever in this culture of death, war, and violence, that death is final. We know that when our friends, children, and siblings go to Iraq, they might die – and we know what that means. We have been through the suffering of losing a parent or a loved one, and we know the finality of that. We see in the paper each and every day the death that fills the world – and we know that it is something that one does not return from.

But Christ did. He rose from the dead. The finality of death meant nothing to Him. This is what we celebrate today – a man rising from the dead. This is what our faith is about. This event, an event so real it could have been on the front page of the Jerusalem Times if such a thing existed in His day. Christ was like every other poor soul who got themselves in perhaps over their head and ended up dead for it – except He rose. So how can we become like children? How can we become like those first disciples? Well, for one thing we can think of the pains in our own lives. We can imagine the time when a loved on passed on – go ahead, do it - or when a friend was killed. Remember the finality of it - and then imagine they rose from the grave. Imagine they came back. This was the experience that the disciples had. Their friend – their teacher – risen again, come back from the tomb, from the end.

And so I’d like to ask you to think for a moment about what Easter means to us now, here, today. What else can we learn from the first disciples about us today? What does the Resurrection of Christ mean for us? It means death has no hold over us. It means we can escape our sins and go to Heaven – we know that. It’s another thing we take terribly for granted. But that’s the end of the journey. What about right now, in the midst of the journey itself? What does it mean for us as we prepare for that end, realizing that it could come at any moment?

Like Peter, it means that we can return God, or even to a friend or to family, no matter how much we’ve hurt them or how harshly we abandoned them. Like it did Peter, Easter gives us the chance to forget the past altogether and to simply turn to God and say, “I’m sorry.” It gives us the chance to tell Him we love Him, and for us to realize that He accepts us back, even if we have abandoned and denied Him at the most crucial hour. And, what’s more, Peter didn’t just do this - no he rushed. When he was told that Christ had risen, he immediately got up and ran to the tomb to see for himself. When Christ appeared to the disciples as they fished in his boat, Peter didn’t take the few minutes it would have to row the boat ashore. He lept from it, into the water, and swam to meet Jesus as fast as he could. He wanted so desperately to return to God, and on Easter he could. We can too, and we shouldn’t take our time any more than Peter did, but jump out of the boat, get ourselves wet, abandon a catch we had been struggling to make all day, and do anything else we need to simply to get to Jesus as fast as we can.

Like Thomas, it means we have the chance to literally touch God and to see His reality, and that He is ours. In this special time of Grace, He is there in a special way for us that we may see Him as we consider His wounds, and we may realize just what it is He means to us. Easter Sunday wasn’t the first time Thomas doubted; it seemed to be a bit of a personality trait of his. With Thomas, we can see all that Jesus has gone through and that now despite our abandoning Him, He wants us to come with Him still, and we can fall on our knees and say, “My Lord and My God.”

With John, we can see the Glory of God in some terrible suffering we have had to see a friend or loved one go through. As John stood helpless at the foot of the cross and watched Christ suffer agony upon agony, we too may be helpless to stop the suffering of someone we care about. As John finally saw the glory of God in that suffering, as he finally saw all that that suffering was for and all that that suffering really meant, we too can, on this Easter, see in Christ’s Resurrection the glory of God in the suffering of someone – or perhaps ourselves – and the ultimate joy that is born of that suffering.

With Mary, we can learn to trust God regardless of what He does, or asks of us, to know that His ways and the difficult times He allows us to go through are for our own good if we will embrace Him. Jesus’ poor mother had to stand by and watch as her son was abused, mocked, tortured, and killed – all for having done nothing wrong. No human being could possibly go through more suffering than this poor Woman. Yet she trusted God, knowing He would deliver her son – and herself – from it all, and on Easter morning, He finally did. With Mary, we can learn to trust God and go through with things His way, rather than our own, surrendering our own understandings and even our own desires and opinions to for the sake of what He asks. We can recognize that even if we think there is a better way, even if perhaps we see what God asks as being a bit unfair or a bit harsh, in the end His way is the way of true compassion. His way is the way of love. His way is the way that leads to the Resurrection, and to the unsurpassed joy of Easter morning. With Mary, we can put aside our own confusions, opinions, and understandings, trust in and follow after God, and wait for that Easter morning in our lives when it all suddenly makes sense.

And finally like Christ Himself, we can recognize that the mockery and hatred, the stripes on our backs, and the spittle in our faces that are given us unjustly by those who do not understand needn’t bother us. Christ did not deserve death. He did not deserve to be beaten. He did not deserve to be spit upon or to be mocked or to be reviled. In fact, He deserved the highest glory and honor a person could receive. But He accepted all these things willingly, lovingly. He didn’t hate those who did Him injustice, but loved and prayed for them. He didn’t let them bother Him, and He didn’t compromise for them. He did what God asked of Him, trusting in Him completely, and caring only what God asked of Him. He turned to God in His difficult times and in His easy times, and He didn’t make exceptions. As the ungodly did Him harm, He never forgot the Godly friends He did have, even when they abandoned Him. He realized that John and His Mother were there with Him even in His own suffering, and in the midst of all the mockery, hatred, and violence, He turned to them to love them. He turned to John as a friend, and to Mary as His Mother.

And in the end, none of that mockery mattered. None of the pain Christ endured mattered. Mary’s confusion was erased, and Easter morning answered any of the questions she may have had about why things were as they were. The suffering John went through didn’t matter either in the end, except perhaps to make the ultimate outcome more joyful. Thomas’ doubts were answered, and he found a faith like he had never had before. And Peter – poor Peter. His sins were forgiven, as terrible as they were, and Christ accepted Him back lovingly. On this day, on Easter Sunday, none of these sins, doubts, fears, confusions or sufferings mattered. All that mattered was Christ, a man, risen from the dead, making it possible for us to rise with Him. Let us see that Christ is risen for us today, and that all of this is a reality for us even now – if we only ask for it. Alleluia, Christ is risen. Truly, He is Risen.

Why did Jesus rename Simon?

The apostle Peter is one of the most well known individuals from the Bible. In fact, he is mentioned in the New Testament more than any other person except for Christ Himself. Peter is a favorite of many because of his personality; he is a man whom modern readers have a very easy time relating to. This is because Peter's personality is timeless. It is not bound by the culture and age in which he lived. He was a working man, a fisherman. He was a passionate man, a trait which sometimes got him into trouble. He was also quick to speak his mind, seldom holding back or taking the time to think. Peter was the man who promised Christ he would follow Him wherever He went, yet he was also the man who denied Him three times. Every Christian can relate to this immediately, and every Christian takes comfort in Christ's forgiveness of the fisherman for even so great a sin. Yes, Peter was all of these things and more, expressing qualities in which perhaps any human in any age could easily identify with. Yet for all of this, for being so many things to so many people, Peter was not the one thing that is most central to his own identity; He was not born with the name Peter.

The man whom gave the first sermon in the history of Christianity was born Simon, son of Jonah. He grew up with his brother Andrew, who also would be an apostle, and together they fished the Sea of Galilee as their trade. However, it was when Christ, the God-man, came to make them fishers of men that Simon first learned that he was to be called by another name:

"Jesus looked at him and said, "You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas" (which, when translated, is Rock.)" (John 1:42)

The word Cephas is Aramaic, the language of Jesus and the apostles, and it means rock. Yet Simon continued to be called by his birthname as he followed Christ, learning from the Saviour's wisdom. It was not until he had spoken that earth-shaking truth revealed to him by the Father, the truth that his rabbi was indeed the Christ, the Son of the living God, that Simon would be given that most famous of names, as His Lord said to him, "I say to you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:18)

This name Peter, so common in our age, most certainly resounded as none other ever had in the newly renamed apostle's ear, for it had so different a meaning for he as it does now to us. He did not hear, as we read, the word 'Peter,' but instead the Aramaic word Kepha, the word we say in English as 'rock.' The New Testament manuscripts were written in Greek, andin fact the name "Peter" is nothing more than the Anglicanized Greek word for rock, 'Petros.' Whenever we see the word 'Peter' in our English Bible, if we turn to the same passage in the original Greek it says, 'Petros' - Rock. The significance of this is made more clear by the knowledge that Christ's declaration is the first recorded usage in all of history of the name Peter. To Christ, and to Peter, and to the apostles, he was not Peter in the way we know him. No, he was simply Rock.

The modern equivalent is to be found in the entertainment industry. Former WWF wrestler and current actor The Rock helps us to understand just what this name meant to those who lived with Peter. If one were to speak to this man, one would say something such as, "Hello, Rock, how are you doing?" When fans of his discuss his latest film, they might say, "Rock was particularly good in that last scene!" This is how Peter was spoken of throughout all of the Christian world in his days as an apostle. When news came to Anitoch that he was on his way to visit, the people said "Rock is coming here soon." When it was time to eat dinner at the house where Peter was staying, the children were instructed to "go and tell Rock that it is time to eat." And when the Holy Spirit inspired Scripture through the apostle Matthew, the Lord and giver of life said, "you are Rock, and on this Rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it."

Yet when they wrote, Matthew and the other Gospel writers chose to write 'Petros' instead of 'Kepha.' It very interesting that they did this, because 'Kepha' was Simon's new name, not Petros. Consider English translations of the French Masterpiece Les Miserables. Characters' names are kept in the original language even though all the other words, words such as 'go' and 'run' and 'eat' and 'he' and 'cat' are translated into English. Jean is still called Jean in the English translation, while 'pomme' is translated into 'apple' and 'vous' is translated into 'you.' Even though the French name Jean is equivalent to the English name John, translators keep names in their original language because names are not like other words. A name is just a way of referring to people. A name, in a certain sense, is just a particular sound by which we identify ourselves. Should a man from France named Jean travel to the US and be called John, he may be confused or offended because, though it is equivalent, John would not be his name - Jean would be.

Therefore it is indeed interesting that the Gospel writers, writers inspired by God Himself, used the Greek word for 'rock,' Petros, instead of the apostle's actual name, Kepha. Throughout the rest of the Scriptures, there are many examples of the New Testament writers preserving the names of Old Testament personalities in their original languages instead of writing their Greek equivalent. For instance, the name "Moses" means 'drawn from'; it was given Him by Pharoah's daughter because she drew him from the river. Just as translating 'Rock' into Greek yields Petros, translating 'drawn from' would result in Anaspaoek. Yet when Matthew and the other Gospel authors described the transfiguration, they did not write, "and standing there with Him were Anaspaoek and Elijah." No, they wrote "Moses and Elijah." Similarly, in his language, Abraham's name meant "father of nations," yet the Gospel writers referred to him as Abraham, not Paterekethnos. They do this because these words were the people's names. Names are not meant, like nouns verbs and adjectives, to be translated for each language in whic they are used; they are meant to be universal identifiers, identifiers that are in fact so deeply connected to the people they identify that they actually become part of their identities.

Yet in the Gospels, the authors do not call Peter by His name. Instead, they call him by what his name means. They do not call him by his identifier, but by his identity. These gospels were written by the power of the Holy Spirit to convey the truth of Christ to all future generations. Every word was carefully chosen by God to teach His people everything that He wished to. In doing this, Peter's name was ignored. That name by which every Christian living in the apostolic age knew him was not selected. Instead, the word which conveys a particular meaning was recorded. It would be as though a historian chose to write 'President' in the place of 'George Bush,' emphasizing the office and identity over the person. As they recorded Holy Writ, the "word settled forever in the Heavens" (Psalm 199:89), the inspired scribes said Petros. It is a part of the eternal word of the Creator, that same Word by which He created the Heavens and the Earth. As they wrote for all God's people for all time, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and even God Himself didn't care about telling us what Peter's name was. They cared about telling us that he was Rock.

Mary's Role in Heaven

Joh 2:1 On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.
Joh 2:2 Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.
Joh 2:3 When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, "They have no wine."
Joh 2:4 And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come."
Joh 2:5 His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."
Joh 2:6 Now there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons.
Joh 2:7 Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water." And they filled them up to the brim.
Joh 2:8 And he said to them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast." So they took it.
Joh 2:9 When the master of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom
Joh 2:10 and said to him, "Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now."
Joh 2:11 This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him.


There are several very key points here. First, note how it starts off:

Joh 2:1 On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there.
Joh 2:2 Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples.

John introduces this scene by putting the emphasis on Mary. He says, this is what's going on, and this is who is there. Then he says, "Jesus was also invited..." This doesn't mean Jesus isn't important, but John begins by making sure we are paying attention to Mary. The reader is naturally inclined to be focused on Jesus, and the fact is that Jesus is prominent in this passage as well, so the reader would simply take no notice of Mary while reading this passage. However, John wants to make sure there is attention on her by immediately putting her in the forefront in the beginning before the narrative starts focusing on Christ. This way the reader will not pass her over, whereas if it began by saying "On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and Jesus was there. His mother was there also," Mary would fall into the background too quickly and the reader wouldn't pay any attention to her.

Next we see that Mary intercedes for the wedding guests so that Jesus will grant them something, which ends up being wine. So at a bare minimum this passage is showing us Mary in an intercessory role.

But there's something far, far more interesting about this passage. If we go back to John chapter 1, we see a summary of Christ calling the apostles. He is starting to build His kingdom. The last line of John chapter 1 says:

Joh 1:51 And he said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."

Immediately after John records Jesus saying "you will see heaven opened," he writes "On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there."

So John tells us that the kingdom of Heaven will be opened, then he says "on the third day there was a wedding." Again and again and again Heaven is described by Jesus as being a wedding. John, who wrote this very passage, uses the image in Revelation where he describes Heaven as the "marriage supper of the lamb." On top of this, Heaven was opened to all believers on the third day after the crucifixion.

So if we read through John chapter 1 into John 2, we see Jesus building the kingdom, then we are told we will see Heaven opened up, then we are told that there was a wedding on the third day. This happens to be the only wedding in the entire New Testament, a New Testament filled with the use of weddings to represent Heaven. What we are seeing in the wedding at Cana is Heaven. What we see in John 1-2 is a description of Christ building His kingdom, then of Heaven being opened on the third day in which Jesus brings desciples to Heaven.

There's more. John starts his gospel by paralleling Genesis 1:1, when he says, "In the beginning..." He then describes the creation, saying, "all things were made through him..." He then mentions the Mosaic Covenant, saying "For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ."(17) He then mentions Isaiah and John the Baptist, two of the prophets, quoting John saying, "He said, "I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, 'Make straight the way of the Lord,' as the prophet Isaiah said."(23) John the prophet is leading the way to Christ. Then Jesus comes, and we are told "Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (29) Then John mentions the coming of the Holy Spirit in verse 32. Then we see Jesus gather desciples.

Then So really, if we read John 1-2, we see John summarize:

1) The Creation
2) The Law
3) The Prophets
4) The coming of Christ (the Nativity)
5) The descent of the Holy Spirit (Pentecost)
6) The The Building of Jesus' Kingdom

John is paralleling his account to the entire history of the world. Then when this is done, he says we will see Heaven opened and then describes a wedding on the third day.

The wedding is, again, the only description of an actual wedding n the New Testament, even though the enitre New Testament, including John himself, use weddings again and again and again to describe Heaven. He presents this right after saying Heaven will be seen opened, and he places it on the third day, which is when Heaven was opened up. The wedding at Cana is a description of Heaven.

And in that description, John calls our attention to Mary, and Mary intercedes and Christ as a result performs a miralce involving wine, which connects directly to the concept of the Eucharist. Then the master of the feast rewards the bridegroom because the wine the bridegroom has provided is the good wine, the best wine, wine that is better than the previous wines. This is a description of the Father rewarding the Son for His good blood. This miracle, we are told, manifested Christ's glory.

After this, John introduces a new scene, this time keeping Christ in the forefront by introducing it, " After this he went down to Capernaum, with his mother..." (12) This further makes the point that John's introduction of Mary first, almost in away describing the main character of a story and describing Christ the way one would describe a lesser character, is not just a fluke (nothing in Scripture could be anyways), but is significant.

Of course if you try to take John 1-2 as a literal timetable of the history of the world, it won't work, because He's already shown up in John 1 before Moses and Isaiah and so forth. The point is that John is drawing a parallel, not giving a summary. Protestant commentators have also noticed this parallel, in fact many of them. Same thing with the wedding. The analogy is not perfect, but Jesus' parables aren't either. Parables and anaolgies are things which are similar to other things; by their very nature, they are also dissimilar, or else they would be the things they represent, which they are not. The sorts of things I am describing here are what are called polyvalent symbolism, something studied in the Scriptures by Catholics and Protestants alike, in which one symbol has multiple meanings.

(By the way, this doesn't really have to do with the post but it is so related I will put it up anyways. We see that after this description, John turns attention to the Passover feast. Then he makes another reference to "three days" and says that also at the Passover feast He did signs which led people to believe, just as His sign at the wedding was described as leading people to believe. This seems to be a comparison between the Heavenly goings-on and the Mass.)

Is Mortal Sin a Sort of "Lightbulb" Salvation?

In having a dialogue about mortal sin here, the objection was raised that this is a sort of "lightbulb" salvation, where one moment it is on, the next it's off. One moment you are saved, the next you are not. This sort of salvation was said to be unbiblical. There are two problems with this, the first being that Catholic theology doesn't look at it this way. From our perspective, with our human minds, the linear "first you're saved, then you're not, then you are again" is actually correct and biblical, but Catholic theology does not limit God and force Him into our human understanding of time. In reality, how this would work is much more complicated than we could understand. So the short answer is, it's not a sort of lighbulb salvation.

However, the fact is that salvation as an on again off again thing is quite Scriptural. I posted this example over there, and I thought it would be beneficial for you to see here. If you want to see the entire dialogue, read the comments over at the other site. Here you go!

Again, I would not call it lightbulb salvation, but if you want to, I have Scripture for that.

Mat 10:32 So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven,
Mat 10:33 but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.

Mat 16:25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

Ok, that premise is clear. A little later in Matthew:

Mat 26:33 Peter answered him, "Though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away."
Mat 26:34 Jesus said to him, "Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times."
Mat 26:35 Peter said to him, "Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!" And all the disciples said the same.

Now we have another premise that strengthens the first: Christ equates denying Him with falling away. Not only this, but the parallel is drawn in that Peter denied Christ to save his life, whereas Christ says if one did that he would lose his life. When Peter denied Christ to save his life, he did not physically die, so earthly life could not be what Christ was talking about, though very few, probably mostly modernists and demythologizers, would have tried to say that it was anyways. So we have a few premises:

1) Whoever denies Christ, Christ will deny Him before the Father
2) Peter denied Christ

Conclusion - Christ denied Peter before the Father

or

1) Whoeve would save his life over Christ will lose it
2) Peter saved his life over Christ

Conclusion - Peter lost his life

There are plenty of other ways to put this, and it is even more obvious without having to use my syllogisms because there is a lot more evidence, even in this post, then I have put into the syllogisms. In Luke, Jesus says to Peter:

Luk 22:31 "Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat,
Luk 22:32 but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers."

So Peter was going to turn back, and as we know he did. Here is what we know:

A) Whoever denies Christ will be denied before the Father
B) This is the same as falling away
C) Whoever saves his life over Christ will lose it
D) Peter denied Christ and saved his life over Christ

Conclusion - Peter lost his life and fell away, and would be denied before the Father.

If he had died that moment, he would be in according to the Bible.However, Christ says that he would turn back. Turn back from what? From his denial. He did, in John 21, where Christ asks Peter if he loves Him three times. If Peter had died after this, we can be pretty confident that he would have gone to heaven.So here we have a clear, unambiguous case of 'light-bulb' salvation.