Listen, and I will tell you a mystery...

 

“We are slow to master the great truth that even now Christ is, as it were, walking among us, and by His hand, or eye, or voice, bidding us to follow Him.  We do not understand that His call is a thing that takes place now.  We think it took place in the Apostles' days, but we do not believe in it; we do not look for it in our own case.

God's presence is not discerned at the time when it is upon us, but afterwards, when we look back upon what is gone and over.  The world seems to go on as usual. There is nothing of heaven in the face of society, in the news of the day.

And yet the ever-blessed Spirit of God is there, ten times more glorious, more powerful than when He trod the earth in our flesh. 

God beholds you.  He calls you by your name.   He sees you and understands you as He made you.  He knows what is in you, all your peculiar feelings and thoughts, your dispositions and likings, your strengths and your weaknesses.  He views you in your day of rejoicing and in your day of sorrow.  He sympathizes in your hopes and your temptations.   He interests Himself in all your anxieties and remembrances, all the risings and fallings of your spirit.

He encompasses you round and bears you in His arms.  He notes your very countenance, whether smiling or in tears.  He looks tenderly upon you.  He hears your voice, the beating of your heart, and your very breathing.  You do not love yourself better than He loves you.  You cannot shrink from pain more than He dislikes your bearing it; and if He puts it on you, it is as you would put it on yourself, if you would be wise, for a greater good afterwards.

There is an inward world, which none see but those who belong to it.  There is an inward world into which they enter who come to Christ, though to men in general they seem as before. If they drank of Christ's cup it is not with them as in time past.  They came for a blessing, and they have found a work.

To their surprise, as time goes on, they find that their lot is changed.  They find that in one shape or another adversity happens to them.  If they refuse to afflict themselves, God afflicts them.

Why did you taste of His heavenly feast, but that it might work in you—why did you kneel beneath His hand, but that He might leave on you the print of His wounds?

God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another.  I have my mission— I may never know it in this life but I shall be told it in the next.

I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons.  He has not created me for naught.   I shall do good, I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments.

Therefore I will trust Him.  Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away.  If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.

He does nothing in vain.  He knows what He is about.  He may take away my friends.  He may throw me among strangers.  He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me— still He knows what He is about.

Every century is like every other, and to those who live in it seems worse than all times before it.

Let us feel what we really are— sinners attempting great things.  Let us simply obey God's will, whatever may come.  He can turn all things to our eternal good.  Easter day is preceded by the forty days of Lent, to show us that they only who sow in tears shall reap in joy.

The more we do, the more shall we trust in Christ; and that surely is no morose doctrine, that leads us to soothe our selfish restlessness, and forget our fears, in the vision of the Incarnate Son of God.

May the Lord support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen, and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done.  Then in His mercy may He give us safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at last.”

John Henry Newman

 

"It seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. 

This great masquerade of evil has played havoc with all our ethical concepts. For evil to appear disguised as light, compassion, historical necessity or even social justice is quite bewildering to anyone brought up on our traditional ethical concepts, while for the Christian who bases his life on the Word, it merely confirms the fundamental wickedness of evil.

God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings.  God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs His wonders where one would least expect them.

Mere waiting and looking on is not Christian behavior. Christians are called to compassion and to action. We pray for the big things, and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small, and yet really not so small, blessings. 

In the Incarnation the whole human race recovers the dignity of the image of God.   Thereafter, any attack, even on the least of men, is an attack on Christ, who took on the form of man, and in his own Person restored the image of God in all.  

Through our relationship with the Incarnation, we recover our true humanity, and at the same time are delivered from that perverse individualism which is the consequence of sin, and recover our solidarity with all mankind." 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer 

 

"The dawn will come. Disappointment, sorrow, and despair are born at midnight, but morning follows. Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.” 

Martin Luther King

 

"Listen, and I will tell you a mystery."

1 Cor 15:51

 Love is moving among us.  Do not let yourself be pulled away. Do not be left behind.

Lord, I trust in you.

Need little - Want Less - Love more

Weekend Reading: The Sacrament of the Moment

Those of you who have looked into it will see similarities with 'the principle of gratitude' or mindfulness.

I find this approach, which I first studied many years ago, to be a better and more sustainable approach because it has a more certain foundation in reason, by the perspective of gratitude in the three great gifts of God: repentance and forgiveness which result in thankfulness, and gratitude.

To see the hand of Providence in all that happens to us, to seek to conform ourself to the tender mercies of God, to have our hearts set on a destination that calls to us in our hearts and by our nature, is a powerful armor against the powers and principalities of the darkness of this world.

It is not a path that allows for pride, greed and anger, the three great distractions of our wicked age, to burden us down and lead us astray.  By taking up this challenge, this cross if you will, we must let go of those things that would lead us into the abyss of endless darkness and death.

This is the great blessing, the sacrament of the ordinary, that perceives the will of God for us to act in every moment, and calls us into union with it.

Come, simple souls, you who cannot understand a single spiritual term, who stand astonished at the eloquence of the learned whom you admire; come, and I will teach you a secret which will place you far beyond these clever minds. I will make perfection so easy to you that you will find it everywhere and in everything. I will unite you to God, and make you walk hand in hand with Him from the moment that you begin practising what I will teach you.

Come, not to study the map of the spiritual country, but to possess it, to walk in it at your ease without fear of losing your way. Come, not to study the theory of divine grace, nor to find out what it has accomplished in the past and still continues to accomplish; but to become simply subject to its operations. It is not necessary that you should understand what it has said to others, nor to repeat the words intended only for them and which you have overheard, but you, yourself, will receive from it what is best for you.

One grain of pure faith will give more light to a simple soul than Lucifer received in his highest intelligence. The devotion of the faithful soul to its obligations; its quiet submission to the intimate promptings of grace; its gentleness and humility towards everyone; are of more value than the most profound insight into mysteries. If one regarded only the divine action in all the pride and harshness of creatures, one would never treat them with anything but sweetness and respect.

There is not a moment in which God does not present Himself under the cover of some pain to be endured, of some consolation to be enjoyed, or of some duty to be performed. All that takes place within us, around us, or through us, contains and conceals His divine action.

The whole creation cannot fill the human heart, for it is greater than all that is not God. It is on a higher plane than the material creation, and for this reason nothing material can satisfy it. The divine will is a deep abyss of which the present moment is the entrance. If you plunge into this abyss you will find it infinitely more vast than your desires. Do not flatter anyone, nor worship your own illusions, they can neither give you anything nor receive anything from you. Receive your fullness from the will of God alone, it will not leave you empty.

To escape the distress caused by regret for the past or fear about the future, this is the rule to follow: leave the past to the infinite mercy of God, the future to His good Providence, give the present wholly to His love by being faithful to His grace.

This state of abandonment to providence is full of consolation for those who have attained it; but to do so it is necessary to pass through much anguish. The doctrine concerning pure love can only be taught by the action of God, and not by any effort of the mind. God teaches the soul by pains and obstacles, not by ideas.

With God, the more one seems to lose the more one gains. The more He strikes off of what is natural, the more He gives of what is supernatural. He is loved at first for His gifts, but when these are no longer perceptible He is at last loved for Himself.

'But,' say you, “what will become of me if ...?' This is indeed a temptation of the enemy. Why should you be so ingenious in tormenting yourself beforehand about something which perhaps will never happen? Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof. Uneasy forebodings do us much harm; why do you so readily give way to them? We make our own troubles, and what do we gain by it?

You will, without doubt, succeed, if you never lose sight of the great and consoling truth that nothing happens in this world but by the command of God, or at least, with His divine permission; and that, whatever He wills, or permits turns infallibly to the advantage of those who are submissive and resigned. Even that which most disturbs our spiritual plans changes into something better for us. Keep firmly by this great principle and the most violent tempests will not be able to trouble the depth of your soul, even though they may disturb the peacefulness by upsetting your feelings.

The high road to all perfection is pointed out in the 'Our father.' Thy will be done. Say this with your lips as best as you can; and still more perfectly in your heart. And you can be sure that, with this internal outlook nothing is wanting to you, nor ever will be. Learn by this to find peace in all what difficulties and troubles, because all will come right when God pleases, and according to our desires, if He should will it so, or allow it. Trials and temptations are such great graces that the wicked are rarely converted without them, and good people are made perfect by them.

Job blessed the name of God in his utter desolation. Instead of looking upon his condition as ruin, he called it the name of God and by blessing it he protested that the divine will under whatever name or form it might appear, even though expressed by the most terrible catastrophes, was holy. David also blessed it at all times, and in all places. It is then, by this continual recognition of the will of God as manifested and revealed in all things, that He reigns in us, that His will is done on earth as it is in Heaven, and that our souls obtain nourishment. The whole matter of that incomparable prayer prescribed by Jesus Christ is comprised and contained in abandonment to the divine will.

The proud soul cannot comprehend itself, but the simple soul, with the light of faith,can very clearly see things as they are. The perception of divine providence in all that occurs at each moment, in and around us, is true knowledge, a continuous revelation of truth, and an unceasingly renewed interaction with God.

The Holy Spirit, who arranges all the pieces on the board of life, will, by the fruitful and continual presence of His actions, say at the hour of death, 'fiat lux,' let there be light, and then will be seen the treasures which faith hides in the abyss of peace and contentment with God, and which will be found in those things that have been every moment done, or suffered for Him.

When we see how God gives Himself to us, all that is common becomes wonderful; and it is because of this that nothing seems to be so, because this way is, in itself,  extraordinary. Consequently it is unnecessary to make life full of strange and unsuitable marvels and miracles. It is, in itself, a miracle, a revelation, a constant joy even with the prevalence of annoyances and shortcomings. It is a miracle which, while rendering all common and sensible things wonderful, has nothing on the surface that is sensibly unusual and miraculous.


Jean Pierre Caussade, The Sacrament of the Moment

A Meditation For the Faithful in Their Times of Temptation, Trial and Troubles

As we know, having heard and read this many times before, the saving grace and defense for the faithful is to be found in love.  For love opens the heart to the three great gifts: repentance, forgiveness, thankfulness.

Nor will love be seen coming from the hearts of those who are fallen into wickedness: they are the fruit of hate, deceit, greed, fear, pride, possession, and aggression. And they will not only forsake love by washing their hands of it, they will eventually come to condemn it, and persecute it— and thereby condemn themselves.

For the people of God love is the touchstone of faith, the way to know if what we believe is with Him, or from something else; if we are walking with Him, or with something else; if the one who speaks is speaking for Him, or for something else; if we are keeping Him in our hearts, or something else; if we love Him, or ourselves, or something else.

Love does not speak with hate or fear or derision, but with the fullness of existence which is joy and mercy.   Love is ridiculed and trampled upon by that which is in opposition to His creation.

When you are in doubt or confusion about what is true and what is false, look for the light of love. This is the hallmark of the spirit in the world.  And if it is not there, if an act is wrapped in the hardness of pride, disguised even as an elaborate ritual observance and Pharisaical pride, then you will know what it truly is. It is a sin against the spirit.

Jesse, Love Is the Refuge for the Way

If the words of others are full of anger and wrath, turning even simple differences into sources of hatred and division, then we know that they are not from the Lord, but from the divider.   We know that in these days the fallen will speak through their followers with cleverness and well crafted arguments, so as to persuade many.  They are able to imitate wisdom and sway the minds of even the otherwise faithful with clever speeches woven from passionate hatreds.

But they will not be able to counterfeit love, because it has become alien to them.  They will have none of it in their hearts, for it is a poison to the darkness and the pride which they serve, whether they realize it fully or not. 

"I urge you, brothers and sisters, to be wary of those who cause divisions and undermine the faithful, in opposition to the teaching that you have learned.  Avoid them.  For such people do not serve our Lord, but their own appetites. And by clever words and flattery they deceive the hearts of the innocent and naive."

Romans 16:17-18

"Dividers like this speak evil about things that are different, 'the other,' or which they do not understand.  Like instinctive animals, they follow wherever their passions lead them, and so they bring about their destruction.  What sorrow awaits them.  For they follow in the footsteps of Cain, who killed his own brother.  Like Balaam, they deceive other people for money.  And like Korah, they destroy themselves with their rebellious natures.

If they eat with you in your fellowship meals of the Lord’s love, they are hidden and dangerous reefs that can shipwreck you.   They are shameless shepherds who care only for themselves. They are like clouds blowing over the land but not giving any rain.  They are like wild waves of the sea, which churn up foam with their shameful deeds.  They are orphaned stars, doomed to wander forever in blackest darkness.

People like this are detractors and complainers, living only to satisfy their desires. They are loudly boastful and arrogant, bragging loudly about themselves, and flattering others to get what they want."

Jude 1:10-13,16

"Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another.   And, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.  And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.  And be thankful."

1 Colossians 3:12-15

"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

Ephesians 6:12

"Those among the fortunate who are not, in the rigorous sense, damned, can understand poverty, because they are poor themselves, after a fashion; but they cannot understand destitution.   Capable of giving alms, perhaps, but incapable of stripping themselves bare, they will be moved, to the sound of beautiful music, at Jesus’s sufferings, but His Cross, the reality of His Cross, will horrify them.  They want it all out of gold, bathed in light, costly and of little weight; pleasant to see, hanging from a woman’s beautiful throat."

Léon Bloy

"Many people act as if they hated the cross which is our salvation.   With tears in my eyes I tell you now that they may be lost, for ever.  For their belly is the god that they worship.  They boast with pride about things of which they should be ashamed. They think only about the privileges and glories of this world. But we belong to heaven."

Phillipians 3:18-20

"And because of the increase in wickedness, the love of most will grow cold.  But those who stand, firmly to the end, will be saved."

Matthew 24:12

"When you pray, you come into His presence.  Now reflect on yourself, what your feelings are in coming.  They are these: you seem to say— I am in myself nothing but a sinner, a man of unclean lips and earthly heart.  I am not worthy to enter into His presence.  I am not worthy of the least of all His mercies.  I know He is All-holy, yet I come before Him; I place myself under His pure and piercing eyes, which look me through and through, and discern every trace and every motion of evil within me.  Why do I do so?

First of all, for this reason.  To whom should I go?  What can I do better?  Who is there in the whole world that can help me?  Who that will care for me, or pity me, or have any kind thought of me, if I cannot obtain it of Him?

I know He is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity; but I know again that He is All-merciful, and that He so sincerely desires my salvation that He has died for me.  Therefore, though I am in a great strait, I will rather fall into His hands, than into those of any creature.

This is the feeling in which we come to confess our sins, and to pray to God for pardon and grace day by day; and observe, it is the very feeling in which we must prepare to meet Him when He comes visibly.

If indeed we have habitually lived to the world, then truly it is natural we should attempt to fly from Him whom we have pierced.  Then may we well call on the mountains to fall on us, and on the hills to cover us.  But if we have lived, however imperfectly, yet habitually, in His fear, if we trust that His Spirit is in us, then we need not be ashamed before Him.

We shall then come before Him, as now we come to pray—with profound abasement, with awe, with self-renunciation, still as relying upon the Spirit which He has given us, with our faculties about us, with a collected and determined mind, and with hope."

John Henry Newman

What Do You See That Frightens You? - A Light In the Darkness

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, and will help you; I will uphold you with my firm hand of righteousness.

Isaiah 41:10

"Peace I leave you; my peace I give to you, not as the world gives do I give it to you; so do not let your heart be troubled, do not let it be afraid."

John 14:27

I am frightened by the strength of evil, and the weakness of man.

If you love the Lord, as He loves you, you cannot be afraid.

For I will be with you always, even until I have led you into my Father's house.

"God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission -- I may never know it in this life but I shall be told it in the next.

I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught.

I shall do good, I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments.

Therefore I will trust Him. Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him.

He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about.

He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me -- still He knows what He is about.

We are slow to master the great truth that even now Christ is, as it were, walking among us, and by His hand, or eye, or voice, bidding us to follow Him. We do not understand that His call is a thing that takes place now. We think it took place in the Apostles' days, but we do not believe in it; we do not look for it in our own case.

Let us feel what we really are--sinners attempting great things. Let us simply obey God's will, whatever may come. He can turn all things to our eternal good. Easter day is preceded by the forty days of Lent, to show us that they only who sow in tears shall reap in joy.

The more we do, the more shall we trust in Christ; and that surely is no morose doctrine, that leads us to soothe our selfish restlessness, and forget our fears, in the vision of the Incarnate Son of God.

May the Lord support us all the day long, till the shades lengthen, and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done.

Then in His mercy may He give us a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last.”

John Henry Newman

Caesar was swimming in blood, Rome and the whole pagan world was mad.

"But those who had had enough of transgression and madness, those who were trampled upon, those whose lives were misery and oppression, all the weighed down, all the sad, all the unfortunate, came to hear the wonderful tidings of God, who out of love for men had given Himself to be crucified and redeem their sins.

When they found a God whom they could love, they had found that which the society of the time could not give any one, -- happiness and love."

Henryk Sienkiewicz, Quo Vadis, 1905

Weekend Reading

"God beholds you individually, whoever you are. He calls you by your name. He sees you and understands you, as He made you. He knows what is in you, all your own peculiar feelings and thoughts, your dispositions and likings, your strength, your weakness.

He views you in your day of rejoicing, and your day of sorrow. He sympathises in your hopes and your temptations. He interests Himself in all your anxieties and remembrances, all the rising and failings of your spirit. He has numbered the very hairs of your head and the height of your stature.

He compasses you round and bears you in His arms; He takes you up and sets you down. He notes your very countenance, whether smiling or in tears, whether healthful or sickly. He looks tenderly upon your hands and your feet; He hears your voice, the beating of your heart, and your very breathing.

You do not love yourself better than He loves you. You cannot shrink from pain more than He dislikes your bearing it; and if He puts it on you, it is as you would put it on yourself, if you would be wise, for a greater good afterwards....

God has created you to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to you which He has not committed to another. You have your mission -- you may never know it in this life but you shall be told it in the next.

You are a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created you for naught. You shall do good, you shall do His work. You shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in your own place while not intending it if you do but keep His commandments.

Therefore I will trust Him. Whatever I am, I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him; in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him. He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me -- still He knows what He is about."

John Henry Newman, The Heart of Newman

Weekend Reading: Art and Christian Humanism

From an interview with Timothy Verdon, Art Historian and Canon of the Cathedral of Florence.

"God is infinitely beyond human comprehension – God is God, we are creatures. And yet in everything that the Judeo-Christian tradition tells us about God, it is clear that God wants to communicate with his creatures, God wants to be known by his creatures.

The whole point of the law and the prophecy in ancient Israel was that God wanted his creatures to understand him and themselves – a creature is a reflection, to some degree, of the Creator. This will of God to make himself understood – and in that process help us understand ourselves – reaches fulfilment in Christ. Christ is the Word of God where the Scriptures are many words that come from God and are filtered through the inspired authors; Christ is the very Word that all those other words try to give partial expression to.

Christ assumes a form that makes him intelligible to human beings – the Word becomes flesh. And then the Gospel of John immediately adds that he dwelt among us, and we saw his glory. What Christ did while he was on earth was to reveal the identity, the personality of the Father: all of the wonderful things that he did that reveal the father – the words he spoke, the miracles, the acts of mercy – even after Christ’s Resurrection and Ascension, they continue...

What’s the relationship of all of this with art which is my specific field? The relationship is simple. When Christ took a Body – when the Word of God took a body from the humanity of Mary – it was to be seen. Christ is now invisible except in the abstract forms of the sacraments – we see water and we know that we’re being cleansed, we see bread and wine and we know that his Body and Blood are present, but we don’t really see the body and blood. But somehow the extreme simplicity of that communication that God wanted in Christ’s Incarnation is now filtered by a symbolic system of sacraments and signs. So we don’t actually see, but the art of the Church allows us to see. It extends down through the centuries, something like that privileged experience of the people of Jesus’ own time when they saw him and intuited that there was more than just a man here. Art allows us to continue to enjoy that experience...

So the ancient desire of human beings to see God, Moses on the mountain asks God to show him his face…. In Christ people really contemplated the Face of God. Christ tells us that we see him in the poor and the needy, and so on. But the works of visual art that surround these privileged moments in which [people] come into direct contact with Christ, and which usually tell stories from the life of Christ, or of Mary or of the saints, in whom we also contemplate Christ – the works of art are part of this process.

Much of what I’ve done as an art historian is to try to remind other art historians of this whole dimension that I’m describing, which usually has not been discussed. And that’s a grave omission, because the artists and the patrons were more or less conscious of all of this. They lived within this system. So the art historians should be aware of it, because if not they are going to talk about these works in a way which is misleading. Certainly the style, the economical features – all of these things are interesting and real and an important part of the history of art, but the larger framework within which these works were meant to function was something more like what I’ve been describing.

I try to call the attention of colleagues to these things, and even more, perhaps, I try to reawaken Christians to the extraordinary eloquence and beauty of this visual heritage which today ordinary believing Christians have the equipment to understand. They may not be art historians but they have keys to understanding the works of architecture and painting and sculpture that many art historians don’t have. And those keys come from their own faith, from the simple experience of life in church, the life of the sacraments.

One could add that something that Christians tend not to reflect upon and that historians of art and of sacred music and sacred architecture similarly tend not to reflect upon, is that the great work of art that Christianity has produced since its beginning is the Liturgy.

What believing Christians have been harried by the Spirit to do right from the beginning is to seek those poetic forms of expression and those physical actions and those material objects that can be called into play to express their faith. Really Jesus himself taught us to do this. At the Last Supper, he took bread, and then he said words: “This is my Body”. Jesus, who is himself the Word made flesh, in order to communicate, takes physical things that already have their own range of meanings and says words that open that implicit range of meanings to a much more specific and explicit communication.

So Jesus himself is the first teacher of how you combine things and actions and words in order to create a composite work, which is basically a work of art. At the Last Supper, he puts on an apron, he kneels down, he washes their feet. He’s continually doing things that invite reflection and then making sure that we understand what he’s doing.

What I’m saying is that you can’t really just talk about the visual art of the Church, or the music of the Church, or the Liturgy. All of this is part of a single creative impulse that flows from the experience of Christ himself, the Word who becomes flesh. A conceptual expression of God who becomes visible and tangible. The First Letter of St John says that this is what we have seen and touched and contemplated with our own eyes; it’s a total sensory and intellectual experience. The Liturgy is that. So an artist working for the church and for its Liturgy is within this millennial creative action which, in the last analysis, is a continuation in time and space of the Creation described in Genesis."