— St Augustine
I'm praying for you!
:)
Friday, November 28, 2014
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Somebody on Tumblr wrote, "the catholic church encourages 7 year olds to drink blood every week but gay marriage is wrong."
This was my reply:
The Catholic Church encourages everyone over the age of reason to consume Christ in the Eucharist as often as possible, and “gay marriage” is a literal impossibility. I was about to say those are completely unrelated, but the Eucharist is the source and summit of Christian life, so come along, children, and I shall explain Catholic teaching to you as best I can.
Firstly - the Eucharist. Catholics believe that in Mass, we transcend time and space and stand at the foot of the cross on Calvary. And everyone who has ever received or will ever receive the Eucharist is there - completely united to each other and Christ each and every time we participate in the Sacrament. When we receive the Eucharist, we receive the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ. We unite ourselves to HIm. The Church is the body, Christ is the head, and we are all united in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is possible because Christ died for our sins and rose again so that we might be eternally united to Him in perfect joy. Pretty cool, right? In receiving His body, we become His body. Although we believe we are consuming human flesh and blood, it is not cannibalism for many reasons, but I’ll paraphrase the arguments made by thecatholicthing.org:
1) The Eucharist is life - We do not eat dead human flesh. We are receiving the living Christ in the Eucharist.
2)It’s the whole body and blood, not a part. Christ cannot be divided, and we receive Him in His entirety each time we receive the Eucharist. We are inviting Christ into our body and soul, not just a part of His body.
3) It’s His glorified body. We’re not receiving His earthly body or a resurrected corpse. We’re receiving His eternal body which is permanently united to His spirit, so that we truly receive all of Him each time we receive the Eucharist, including His soul and His divinity.
4) The Eucharist is not diminished by us consuming Him. Each one of us receives all of Christ every single time, and there is not “less” of Christ after we receive Him.
5) Really, the Eucharist consumes us. Instead of Christ becoming part of us when we eat and drink Him, we become part of Him - we join the Mystical Body of Christ.
6) It’s nonviolent. Christ sacrificed Himself for us, and His sacrifice and death makes our salvation, and therefore the Eucharist, possible, but we do not destroy, kill, or injure Christ when we receive the Eucharist.
In summary, the Eucharist unites us to Christ and to each other, as one body, and provides us with sustaining grace which allows us to live our lives in love of Christ and others and to accept an eternal home in heaven where we will be united to Christ and the entire Church in eternal, infinite joy (if we choose this place).
Now, on to marriage. Christ is the bridegroom to His bride, the Church. This is made evident throughout scripture, and the Eucharist is a beautiful representation of this reality. In the Eucharist, we (the Bride) receive Christ (the bridegroom) and in so doing, are joined to Him and incorporated into Him. We become one body with Christ, just as a husband and wife become one flesh. We are not many brides of Christ, although nuns and sisters individually share in the bridal nature of the Christ in a unique way, but we are all one bride, the Bride of Christ. Marriage is both an earthly representation of this relationship - Christ and His Church eternally bonded in mutual love, and an earthly representation of the love of God present in the Trinity. God is three persons - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father begets the Son, the Son in turn loves the Father and submits to His perfect, loving Will, and their love is so profound that it is a third person - the Holy Spirit. In marriage, a husband and wife are joined into one flesh - still two separate persons as the Father and Son are separate persons, but mysteriously and wondrously joined into one flesh and one being by the love of Christ (they enter into marriage of their own free will, but it is Christ who joins them together). Their love is so intimate and so intense that new life flows out of it, just as the love of the Father and the Son flows out from them in the form of the Holy Spirit. The family then becomes an earthly image of the Trinity and a miniature representation of the Church.
Men and women have complementary anatomy and complementary “genius,” which is how we refer to the intellectual and spiritual gifts specific to each sex. The female genius, femininity, does not consist of wearing dresses or liking pink or playing with dolls, just as the male genius does not consist of playing sports or rough-housing or wearing too much plaid. It consists in gifts of graces, virtues, and understanding which are granted to men and women in different amounts and ways by the Holy Spirit. A lot of people much wiser than I have written a lot on this subject, and this is kind of a tangent, so I’ll let you do that research and reading on your own, but the main point is that men and women are different but completely equal in dignity and that our bodies, minds, and souls are made to complement each other, so that a husband and wife can help each other on the path to heaven.
Marriage was instituted by God when He joined Adam and Eve (whether they were really two specific historical figures is a separate debate), but it was elevated to a sacrament - an outward sign instituted by Christ to give us grace - by Christ. He said, “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to His wife, and the two become one.” In marriage, a man and wife are made one, and this sacrament has several purposes:
1) Help each other grow in perfection - as I’ve mentioned, men and women complement each other mentally and spiritually, and the unique bond of marriage helps them to help each other reach heaven. To love is to will the ultimate good of the beloved, and the ultimate good is to attain perfect eternal joy with God in heaven, so if husband and wife truly love each other, then they are devoting their lives to each other’s salvation.
2) Unity - In marriage, the two become one. The married couple becomes an image of Christ and His Church and their love for each other radiates outward and teaches others how to love.
3) New life - as we’ve discussed, the family becomes an image of the Trinity when sex produces new life. The Church teaches that the family (NOT the individual) is the basic unit of society, and the marriage bond gives couples the grace, love, and support to bring new life into the world, sustain that life, and to prepare new souls for heaven. The family branching out and joining with other families becomes a miniature image of the unified nature of the Church.
Since Christ has instituted and defined marriage as a permanent (until death) union of a man and woman, the Church cannot change this definition. Marriage isn’t a social institution or something we made up. It is a glorious sacrament given to us by God, and even if we wanted to, even if everyone in the Church agreed that it should be defined differently, we couldn’t redefine it. In the book In Soft Garments, Monsignor Ronald Knox writes, “The Church does not forbid divorce. Almighty God forbids divorce, and all the Church does is shake her head and say there’s nothing she can do about it. The Church can no more prevent a divorced man who remarries from committing adultery than she can a man who falls off a precipice from breaking his neck.” (I’m quoting from memory, so a few words might not be exactly the same). Just as the Church cannot redefine marriage in a way that would allow for dissolution or divorce (an annulment declares that a marriage was invalid in the first place, not that it was valid and is now ended), She cannot redefine marriage to be a union between two members of the same sex. The Church does not define truth - She relates truth revealed to Her by God, and she cannot change it. “Gay marriage,” therefore, is not just wrong. It’s impossible. Whatever union two members of the same sex may enter into, it is simply not marriage.
It should be noted, however, that the Catholic Church teaches radical love of every single human being, including (and due to recent awareness of the issue, even especially) people who experience same-sex attraction. (SSA) The Catholic Church uses this term to describe people who might self-identify as gay or homosexual because we believe that your desires and temptations do not define you. We do not believe that you are a bad or inherently sinful person if you experience same-sex attraction or that you need to be “cured” of your homosexuality. Impulses, desires, and thoughts are often completely outside of our control, we all experience temptations, and recognizing your own personal temptations is much healthier psychologically and spiritually than trying to ignore them or pretend they don’t exist. The Church also believes in the ability of the grace of God working in our hearts to resist any temptation, no matter how strong, and she calls each and every person to avoid sin and to strive for holiness and love in everything we do. So persons who are tempted towards homosexual acts are urged to resist that temptation, because sex is a gift from God intended to be utilized only within the bonds of marriage between a husband and wife. In a similar way, all people are urged to resist the temptation to engage in sexual acts, regardless of sexual orientation, outside of the marriage bond. And we all sin. We all fail to live up to our full potential and we fail to love God and others. You are not a bad person if you sin. You are not permanently barred from grace, salvation, or the Church. Any sin, absolutely any, can be forgiven. The Church teaches that Christ loves each of us infinitely and is always reaching out to each and every one of us, inviting us to repent of our sins and to turn and follow Him, no matter how far we have fallen. And we are called as members of His Church and Body to love everyone and to extend that love and compassion to them as Christ extends it to us and to invite everyone to be united to Christ and the Church. Abigail Van Buren (source a little iffy) said, “The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.” We’re not out to make a bunch of difficult rules or to condemn people. We’re trying to love people so much that they end up perfectly united to Christ and the whole Church and perfectly recognizing their potential as sons and daughters of God.
So yes, we encourage 7-year-olds to drink blood, and we deny the validity of gay marriage, because we are inviting everyone to something so much better than this world has ever imagined. Sex is a great gift from God, and it is one that helps us to grow closer to each other and to Him within the bonds of marriage, so that someday, we might reach the wedding feast of the Lamb, the eternal joy of heaven where the entire Church will be forever united to our creator, our redeemer, and our beloved, who loves us more than anyone else in existence, who has a glorious will for each and every one of us, and who desires nothing more than to give us eternal, perfect joy with Him.
May the peace of Christ be with each of you that reads this, and if you have any questions about Church teaching, feel free to message me :)
The Catholic Church encourages everyone over the age of reason to consume Christ in the Eucharist as often as possible, and “gay marriage” is a literal impossibility. I was about to say those are completely unrelated, but the Eucharist is the source and summit of Christian life, so come along, children, and I shall explain Catholic teaching to you as best I can.
Firstly - the Eucharist. Catholics believe that in Mass, we transcend time and space and stand at the foot of the cross on Calvary. And everyone who has ever received or will ever receive the Eucharist is there - completely united to each other and Christ each and every time we participate in the Sacrament. When we receive the Eucharist, we receive the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ. We unite ourselves to HIm. The Church is the body, Christ is the head, and we are all united in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is possible because Christ died for our sins and rose again so that we might be eternally united to Him in perfect joy. Pretty cool, right? In receiving His body, we become His body. Although we believe we are consuming human flesh and blood, it is not cannibalism for many reasons, but I’ll paraphrase the arguments made by thecatholicthing.org:
1) The Eucharist is life - We do not eat dead human flesh. We are receiving the living Christ in the Eucharist.
2)It’s the whole body and blood, not a part. Christ cannot be divided, and we receive Him in His entirety each time we receive the Eucharist. We are inviting Christ into our body and soul, not just a part of His body.
3) It’s His glorified body. We’re not receiving His earthly body or a resurrected corpse. We’re receiving His eternal body which is permanently united to His spirit, so that we truly receive all of Him each time we receive the Eucharist, including His soul and His divinity.
4) The Eucharist is not diminished by us consuming Him. Each one of us receives all of Christ every single time, and there is not “less” of Christ after we receive Him.
5) Really, the Eucharist consumes us. Instead of Christ becoming part of us when we eat and drink Him, we become part of Him - we join the Mystical Body of Christ.
6) It’s nonviolent. Christ sacrificed Himself for us, and His sacrifice and death makes our salvation, and therefore the Eucharist, possible, but we do not destroy, kill, or injure Christ when we receive the Eucharist.
In summary, the Eucharist unites us to Christ and to each other, as one body, and provides us with sustaining grace which allows us to live our lives in love of Christ and others and to accept an eternal home in heaven where we will be united to Christ and the entire Church in eternal, infinite joy (if we choose this place).
Now, on to marriage. Christ is the bridegroom to His bride, the Church. This is made evident throughout scripture, and the Eucharist is a beautiful representation of this reality. In the Eucharist, we (the Bride) receive Christ (the bridegroom) and in so doing, are joined to Him and incorporated into Him. We become one body with Christ, just as a husband and wife become one flesh. We are not many brides of Christ, although nuns and sisters individually share in the bridal nature of the Christ in a unique way, but we are all one bride, the Bride of Christ. Marriage is both an earthly representation of this relationship - Christ and His Church eternally bonded in mutual love, and an earthly representation of the love of God present in the Trinity. God is three persons - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father begets the Son, the Son in turn loves the Father and submits to His perfect, loving Will, and their love is so profound that it is a third person - the Holy Spirit. In marriage, a husband and wife are joined into one flesh - still two separate persons as the Father and Son are separate persons, but mysteriously and wondrously joined into one flesh and one being by the love of Christ (they enter into marriage of their own free will, but it is Christ who joins them together). Their love is so intimate and so intense that new life flows out of it, just as the love of the Father and the Son flows out from them in the form of the Holy Spirit. The family then becomes an earthly image of the Trinity and a miniature representation of the Church.
Men and women have complementary anatomy and complementary “genius,” which is how we refer to the intellectual and spiritual gifts specific to each sex. The female genius, femininity, does not consist of wearing dresses or liking pink or playing with dolls, just as the male genius does not consist of playing sports or rough-housing or wearing too much plaid. It consists in gifts of graces, virtues, and understanding which are granted to men and women in different amounts and ways by the Holy Spirit. A lot of people much wiser than I have written a lot on this subject, and this is kind of a tangent, so I’ll let you do that research and reading on your own, but the main point is that men and women are different but completely equal in dignity and that our bodies, minds, and souls are made to complement each other, so that a husband and wife can help each other on the path to heaven.
Marriage was instituted by God when He joined Adam and Eve (whether they were really two specific historical figures is a separate debate), but it was elevated to a sacrament - an outward sign instituted by Christ to give us grace - by Christ. He said, “A man leaves his father and mother and is joined to His wife, and the two become one.” In marriage, a man and wife are made one, and this sacrament has several purposes:
1) Help each other grow in perfection - as I’ve mentioned, men and women complement each other mentally and spiritually, and the unique bond of marriage helps them to help each other reach heaven. To love is to will the ultimate good of the beloved, and the ultimate good is to attain perfect eternal joy with God in heaven, so if husband and wife truly love each other, then they are devoting their lives to each other’s salvation.
2) Unity - In marriage, the two become one. The married couple becomes an image of Christ and His Church and their love for each other radiates outward and teaches others how to love.
3) New life - as we’ve discussed, the family becomes an image of the Trinity when sex produces new life. The Church teaches that the family (NOT the individual) is the basic unit of society, and the marriage bond gives couples the grace, love, and support to bring new life into the world, sustain that life, and to prepare new souls for heaven. The family branching out and joining with other families becomes a miniature image of the unified nature of the Church.
Since Christ has instituted and defined marriage as a permanent (until death) union of a man and woman, the Church cannot change this definition. Marriage isn’t a social institution or something we made up. It is a glorious sacrament given to us by God, and even if we wanted to, even if everyone in the Church agreed that it should be defined differently, we couldn’t redefine it. In the book In Soft Garments, Monsignor Ronald Knox writes, “The Church does not forbid divorce. Almighty God forbids divorce, and all the Church does is shake her head and say there’s nothing she can do about it. The Church can no more prevent a divorced man who remarries from committing adultery than she can a man who falls off a precipice from breaking his neck.” (I’m quoting from memory, so a few words might not be exactly the same). Just as the Church cannot redefine marriage in a way that would allow for dissolution or divorce (an annulment declares that a marriage was invalid in the first place, not that it was valid and is now ended), She cannot redefine marriage to be a union between two members of the same sex. The Church does not define truth - She relates truth revealed to Her by God, and she cannot change it. “Gay marriage,” therefore, is not just wrong. It’s impossible. Whatever union two members of the same sex may enter into, it is simply not marriage.
It should be noted, however, that the Catholic Church teaches radical love of every single human being, including (and due to recent awareness of the issue, even especially) people who experience same-sex attraction. (SSA) The Catholic Church uses this term to describe people who might self-identify as gay or homosexual because we believe that your desires and temptations do not define you. We do not believe that you are a bad or inherently sinful person if you experience same-sex attraction or that you need to be “cured” of your homosexuality. Impulses, desires, and thoughts are often completely outside of our control, we all experience temptations, and recognizing your own personal temptations is much healthier psychologically and spiritually than trying to ignore them or pretend they don’t exist. The Church also believes in the ability of the grace of God working in our hearts to resist any temptation, no matter how strong, and she calls each and every person to avoid sin and to strive for holiness and love in everything we do. So persons who are tempted towards homosexual acts are urged to resist that temptation, because sex is a gift from God intended to be utilized only within the bonds of marriage between a husband and wife. In a similar way, all people are urged to resist the temptation to engage in sexual acts, regardless of sexual orientation, outside of the marriage bond. And we all sin. We all fail to live up to our full potential and we fail to love God and others. You are not a bad person if you sin. You are not permanently barred from grace, salvation, or the Church. Any sin, absolutely any, can be forgiven. The Church teaches that Christ loves each of us infinitely and is always reaching out to each and every one of us, inviting us to repent of our sins and to turn and follow Him, no matter how far we have fallen. And we are called as members of His Church and Body to love everyone and to extend that love and compassion to them as Christ extends it to us and to invite everyone to be united to Christ and the Church. Abigail Van Buren (source a little iffy) said, “The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.” We’re not out to make a bunch of difficult rules or to condemn people. We’re trying to love people so much that they end up perfectly united to Christ and the whole Church and perfectly recognizing their potential as sons and daughters of God.
So yes, we encourage 7-year-olds to drink blood, and we deny the validity of gay marriage, because we are inviting everyone to something so much better than this world has ever imagined. Sex is a great gift from God, and it is one that helps us to grow closer to each other and to Him within the bonds of marriage, so that someday, we might reach the wedding feast of the Lamb, the eternal joy of heaven where the entire Church will be forever united to our creator, our redeemer, and our beloved, who loves us more than anyone else in existence, who has a glorious will for each and every one of us, and who desires nothing more than to give us eternal, perfect joy with Him.
May the peace of Christ be with each of you that reads this, and if you have any questions about Church teaching, feel free to message me :)
I'm praying for you!
:)
Friday, November 21, 2014
“Don’t worry about tomorrow because the very same Heavenly Father who takes care of you today will have the same thought tomorrow and always… What does a child in the arms of such a Father have to fear? Be as children, who hardly ever think about their future as they have someone to think for them. They are sufficiently strong just by being with their father." - St. Padre Pio
I'm praying for you!
:)
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Monday, November 17, 2014
"Look at the face of the other…
Discover that he has a soul, a history and a life, that he is a person and that God loves this person."
Discover that he has a soul, a history and a life, that he is a person and that God loves this person."
- Pope Benedict XVI
Part of what I've been trying to do this semester, especially because I'm riding the bus every day, is to never act like a person is invisible. That doesn't mean I talk to everyone I pass, but I try to notice everyone around me and smile or say hello when it seems appropriate. I've ended up having some conversations with homeless people or other random strangers at bus stops and other places. I told my sister-in-law that riding the bus was awful (because of the schedule and route) and she said, "Because of all the homeless people?" But that's definitely not it. We definitely need to start seeing people as human beings. After all, they are loved by God and as Fr. Baker pointed out, we might just see that person again in heaven. In fact, we hopefully will.
I'm praying for you!
:)
Sunday, November 16, 2014
You probably thought I forgot about this blog.
But I did not.
And I am back.
Today, Fr. Baker said that the "talents" in the Gospel are not the things God has given us or even the spiritual gifts or talents He has given us. Rather, the greatest gifts he has given each of us are other people - family, friends, co-workers, and even the strangers we pass on the street. Because human beings are the only things in this world that are immortal.
So thanks for being one of my talents. I thank God for you.
I'm praying for you!
:)
But I did not.
And I am back.
Today, Fr. Baker said that the "talents" in the Gospel are not the things God has given us or even the spiritual gifts or talents He has given us. Rather, the greatest gifts he has given each of us are other people - family, friends, co-workers, and even the strangers we pass on the street. Because human beings are the only things in this world that are immortal.
So thanks for being one of my talents. I thank God for you.
I'm praying for you!
:)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)