A Hard Master

On the Feast of the Transfiguration we contemplate the event on Mt. Tabor when Peter, James and John witnessed the glorified appearance of the Lord Jesus. In the words of St. Matthew:

Six days afterwards Jesus took Peter and James and his brother John with him, and led them up on to a high mountain where they were alone. And he was transfigured in their presence, his face shining like the sun, and his garments becoming white as snow; and all at once they had sight of Moses and Elias conversing with him. Then Peter said aloud to Jesus, Lord, it is well that we should be here; if it pleases thee, let us make three arbours in this place, one for thee, one for Moses and one for Elias. Even before he had finished speaking, a shining cloud overshadowed them. And now, there was a voice which said to them out of the cloud, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; to him, then, listen. The disciples, when they heard it, fell on their faces, overcome with fear; but Jesus came near and roused them with his touch; Arise, he said, do not be afraid. And they lifted up their eyes, and saw no man there but Jesus only.

When Peter, James and John experienced Jesus’ transfiguration, they encountered, not an alternate science fiction universe, but a reality beyond that which they could see with human eyes. They beheld Jesus as the angels behold Him, as the Ultimate Reality. In 2002 John Paul II suggested that a new set of mysteries, the Luminous Mysteries, be added to the traditional Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries of the Holy Rosary. The new Mysteries have been embraced by Catholics, and one of them, the fourth, is the contemplation of the Mystery of Jesus’ Transfiguration. This means that everyone who prays the Rosary now contemplates the Transfiguration of Jesus on a weekly basis. When I pray the Mystery of the Transfiguration, I ask for this gift: that I might be granted a glimpse of reality – to see thing the way they really are, specifically that I might see God as He is, that I might see myself as He sees me, and that I might see others as He sees them.

After all, how tough can that be?

Well, let’s start with seeing God the way He really is. The very first sin, the sin of Adam and Eve, was eating the apple, right? Not exactly. The sin was disobedience, and that sin took root when our First Parents became confused about Who God really is. Satan hissed to Eve that God was a cosmic party-pooper, a tyrant who was trying to keep her from experiencing life to the fullest because that possibility threatened His monopoly on all the fun. She bought it. This lie of the Evil One worked in the Garden, and it’s been working for him ever since. Satan has pretty much sold the world on a version of God called “The Hard Master.” You know, the Guy from the parables Jesus told:

“For it is just like a man about to go on a journey, who called his own slaves and entrusted his possessions to them. To one he gave five talents, to another, two, and to another, one, each according to his own ability; and he went on his journey. Immediately the one who had received the five talents went and traded with them, and gained five more talents. In the same manner the one who had received the two talents gained two more. But he who received the one talent went away, and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money. Now after a long time the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them. The one who had received the five talents came up and brought five more talents, saying, ‘Master, you entrusted five talents to me. See, I have gained five more talents.’ “His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ “Also the one who had received the two talents came up and said, ‘Master, you entrusted two talents to me. See, I have gained two more talents.’ “His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ “And the one also who had received the one talent came up and said, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow and gathering where you scattered no seed. ‘And I was afraid, and went away and hid your talent in the ground. See, you have what is yours.’ But his master answered and said to him, ‘You wicked, lazy slave, you knew that I reap where I did not sow and gather where I scattered no seed. ‘Then you ought to have put my money in the bank, and on my arrival I would have received my money back with interest. ‘Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to the one who has the ten talents.’

Also known as “the Lousy Landowner”:

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. When he had agreed with the laborers for a denarius for the day, he sent them into his vineyard. And he went out about the third hour and saw others standing idle in the market place; and to those he said, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right I will give you.’ And so they went. Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did the same thing. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others standing around; and he said to them, ‘Why have you been standing here idle all day long?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You go into the vineyard too.’ When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last group to the first.’ When those hired about the eleventh hour came, each one received a denarius. When those hired first came, they thought that they would receive more; but each of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they grumbled at the landowner, saying, ‘These last men have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden and the scorching heat of the day.‘ But he answered and said to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for a denarius? ‘Take what is yours and go, but I wish to give to this last man the same as to you. ‘Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with what is my own? Or is your eye envious because I am generous?’ So the last shall be first, and the first last.

As well as “the Mean Old Man”:

Now his older son was in the field, and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. And he summoned one of the servants and began inquiring what these things could be. And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has received him back safe and sound.’ But he became angry and was not willing to go in; and his father came out and began pleading with him. But he answered and said to his father, ‘Look! For so many years I have been serving you and I have never neglected a command of yours; and yet you have never given me a young goat, so that I might celebrate with my friends; but when this son of yours came, who has devoured your wealth with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him.’ And he said to him, ‘Son, you have always been with me, and all that is mine is yours. But we had to celebrate and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live, and was lost and has been found.’

Jesus came to bring us exceedingly great good news: The First Person of the Trinity is not a celestial slave-driver, nor a capitalist pig, nor a cosmic grump. He’s your Papa! When Jesus taught His followers to pray, He instructed us to address God as our Father, and to ask that His Kingdom might come. Why? Because nothing could be better than that. He told us to ask our Daddy to give us our daily bread, because “what father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” Jesus’ disciples were commanded to ask for forgiveness, with the understanding that we were passing that forgiveness on as children of our Loving Father, Who isn’t asking us to do anything that He hasn’t already done for us, on a completely unfathomable scale. We Christians must then ask our Papa to deliver us from evil, from the evil one who’s busy trying to lure us away from Him.

St. Paul took up the refrain: “…because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!” And Blessed JP2 expounded upon that:

In us, human beings, the divine sonship comes from Christ and is brought about by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit comes to teach us that we are children and at the same time to make this divine sonship effective in us. The Son is He who with all His being says to God: “Abba! Father!”. Here we are touching on the culminating point of the mystery of our Christian life. In fact, the name “Christian” indicates a new way of being, to be in the likeness of the Son of God. As sons in the Son, we share in salvation, which is not only the deliverance from evil, but is first of all the fullness of good: of the supreme good of the sonship of God.

The Father loves us beyond all telling, so impossibly much that He had to communicate this not in words, but in His Living Word made flesh, His Son, Who came to convince us that we too could become sons of the Most High. That contradicted the popular narrative – wasn’t God a slave-driver? True, the Old Testament prophets had on occasion referred to God as a Father, but they had also referred to Him as a fowl (Deut 32:11, Ruth 2:12, Ps 91:4)– you couldn’t take that rhetoric too seriously! Fallen man crucified the Beloved Son for having the temerity to teach this divine sonship, particularly His own unique Sonship. Hear the scorn in the voices of those demanding that Jesus be put to death. Pilate inquires as to what crime Jesus has committed, and they answer, “He has made Himself the Son of God!” (Jn 19:7) Likewise as He hangs upon the Cross, this charge is thrown in His face, “Let God rescue him now, if He delights in him; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God‘” (Mt 27:43).

If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is – they told each other. Crucify Him.

Mary believed. Had the Archangel Gabriel proposed the Incarnation to me, I would surely have blurted out the Aramaic equivalent of “Hold on just a gall-durn minute there – how is all of this going to play out??? Is there a downside to this??? Can I get this in writing?? Can’t I just have my attorneys get in touch with your attorneys??” God, however, in His infinite omniscience bypassed me entirely and went to Mary. When presented with the Almighty’s jaw-dropping proposal, she explained that she, as a woman committed to remaining a virgin even after marriage, couldn’t see how she was going to bear a child, but the thought of turning God down never occurred to her. Mary adhered to the traditional understanding of God as her Creator and Lord; she was, she declared, His handmaiden. Yet she had internalized Isaiah’s cry to the Lord: “You, O LORD, are our Father!” A maidservant may obey her master even while second-guessing him. But before she became the chaste spouse of the Holy Spirit, before she became the Mother of God, Mary was the child of the Father. Mary loved and trusted God as her Father, and what He proposed she accepted as a matter of course, the same way you responded to your dad when he said, “Get in the car; we’ve driving over to Krispy Kreme.” Mary simply TRUSTED her Dad. He would never ask her to do anything that would not be a blessing; she was convinced of that. That conviction got her through the three days when Jesus went missing as an adolescent – the Father of Lights would never leave her lost in darkness. That conviction supported her through the three days before the Resurrection – the Father of Mercies had His plan, and His plan was GOOD; it could not be otherwise.

Something that we often forget is that faith, in and of itself, is useless. The object of your faith is what matters – in whom have you believed? Mary believed in her Dad. He didn’t fail her. He is incapable of failing us.

Which can seem like kind of a far stretch of faith when your husband divorces you, your son is on drugs, your doctor says the tests don’t look good, and your employer is proposing layoffs, when good men die young and the folks who betrayed them live to party another day, when tornadoes and floods wipe out the innocent while the survivors scheme to profit from the disaster. It undoubtedly seemed like a far stretch of faith to believe that anything good could come of the murder of the Lamb of God, His Beloved Son. Yet God surprised us. He didn’t, however, surprise Mary. She knew – you can trust your Dad.

This is the first Reality we need to learn to embrace – the reality of our Heavenly Father.

 

On the Feast of the Transfiguration

Deo omnis gloria!

Photo credits: Devastation after tsunami in Rikuzentakata, Iwate, Japan, by Mitsukuni Sato/Wikimedia

Christmas in July

Around this time of year many people’s thoughts turn to Christmas, if only to breathe a sigh of relief that five months still remain between them and figuring out what to get for Aunt Martha. Stores have “Christmas in July” sales to drum up business, and at this time of year my daughter, when she was younger, would always beg to be allowed to play Christmas carols. It’s been 7 months since the Big Day, and in the summer heat many hearts look back, remembering the joy that accompanies the celebration of the “miracle of Christmas.”

As we all know, the “miracle of Christmas” is supposedly the birth of the God-man. Close, but no cigar. The “miracle of Christmas” actually took place 9 months prior, at the Annunciation, for when Mary gave her “yes” to God, the Incarnation began. The so-called “miracle of Christmas” is the Incarnation.

Catholics dwell on the Incarnation (literally, the “enfleshment”) all year round. But why? With every recitation of the Nicene Creed we recall the moment when “for us men and for our salvation He came down from Heaven, and by the power of the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became Man.” In the Apostles’ Creed we do mention His birth, but only for the purpose of highlighting the fact that His mother was a virgin. That Jesus was born was no great surprise – He grew inside the womb of His mother for 9 months; birth is the expected outcome. It was His Incarnation that deserved to make headlines. As an Evangelical I was steeped in the life of Christ, His sacrifice on the Cross, His triumph o’er the grave and His soon-coming again (heavy emphasis on that last part). The Incarnation was a theological concept that I was familiar with, but it really didn’t play any kind of role in my daily Christian scheme of things. Yes, the second Person of the Trinity became a Man – how else could He have offered up His Life on the Cross to save me? End of story.

As a Catholic, I now realize that the answer to the question of the Incarnation is not just “Jesus became a Man so He could die on the Cross to save me.” Not by a long shot. The Incarnation is the beginning of the story of my redemption, the middle of the story, and the ongoing, never-ending story to which I as an Evangelical never gave a second thought. The theology of the Incarnation is the underpinning of all things Christian.

Take the story of the Good Samaritan, for example, a story exceedingly familiar to Evangelicals. We preached on it and taught it to our children. I could have recited it in my sleep. A man was travelling and got mugged. As he lay by the side of the road expiring, a priest came along. The priest knew, of course, that it was important for him to help his fellow man. He also knew that by touching the poor wretch that he would be rendered ritually unclean. He passed by. A Levite also came along and neglected to render assistance for the same reason. A non-Jew, a heretic, that is to say, a Samaritan, then came along and did what the priest and the Levite should have done, putting the man on his donkey and transporting him to safety at a nearby inn. He even paid for the man’s care, promising to recompense the innkeeper for any expenditures he incurred. The story teaches us that our “neighbor” is anyone in need. End of story.

But one day, as a Catholic, I was confronted with St. Augustine’s take on this story, beginning with the words, “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho; Adam himself is meant.”

Whoa – that’s a different way of looking at it!

Yet from an Incarnational point of view, that’s a very appropriate way of looking at it. For here we find the rationale for the Catholic emphasis on the Incarnation as it relates to Jesus’ odd statement:

Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner.

As an Evangelical, that was something of a stumper for me. What did Jesus mean by that? Obviously, Jesus didn’t mean that He saw the Father being born in a manger, preaching the Gospel to men, eating with tax collectors and sinners, healing blind Bartimaeus…. Yet, what did He mean? And did it have any implications for the way I lived my life?

St. Augustine got it. He approached the story of the Good Samaritan not from my Evangelical “go out and help your neighbor – Jesus said so” understanding of the parable, but from the Incarnational “here’s why you are helping your neighbor” point of view – because “Adam himself is meant.”

According to St. Augustine, an alternate reading of the parable begins with God, Who comes upon fallen man lying by the side of the road. He binds man’s wounds, takes him to the Inn (which symbolizes the Church) and instructs those who work there to take care of this man, promising to compensate them for their expenditures when He returns. And it is in light of that Incarnational reading that we understand why we love our neighbor – because God loved us first, and as His body we do what He is doing.

And how could we not? For as Augustine explains in another context:

All men are one man in Christ, and the unity of Christians constitutes but one man. Let us rejoice and give thanks. Not only are we to become Christians, but we are to become Christ. My brothers, do you understand the grace of God that is given us? Wonder, rejoice, for we are Christ! If He is the Head, and we are the members, then together He and we are the whole man.

Jesus became Man so that man might become a part of His body. As a part of His body, you love as He loves, and lovingly do the works that He does, even as He does the works that His Father does. Jesus’ eyes are always seeking the lost, and His ears listening for their cries that His feet might hasten to where they have fallen, His hands raising them from the dirt and His arms embracing them, His shoulders bearing them until they grow strong enough to walk on their own. Got that? That’s you and me – His eyes, His ears, His feet, His hands, His arms, His shoulders. As St. Paul told the Corinthians, “You are not your own!” There is simply no other way to be a member of the Body. The judgment stories that Jesus tells emphasize this fact: there will be people who flaunt their faith (“Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord!'”) and even their miracles (“Did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?”) Yet Jesus fails to recognize those who are clearly not members of His body, doing what He is doing. Waving in His face His supposed “Lordship” in their lives and the miracles they have worked in His Name but independent of Him is to no avail – “I don’t know who you are!” is His answer to them.

So my Evangelical understanding that I had to love God above all things and my neighbor as myself was correct – as far as it went. But lacking an Incarnational insight into the situation, I did not understand that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us so that I, a creature of flesh, could be made a member of His body, and as a member I can do nothing of myself; I can only do what He is doing.
Through me, Jesus would tenderly raise the dying man from the side of the road and carry him to the Inn where he could be brought back to life. That the Second Person of the Trinity was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became Man is far from being the mere flashpoint of the ongoing, never-ending story of my life as a partaker of the divine nature. The Incarnation means more than I ever could have guessed, for it is the key that unlocks the mystery of all those “works” that we Protestants avoided like the plague, the works upon which the Church insists, the works on which the churches in the book of Revelation are judged (Rev 2:2, 2:9, 2:13, 2:19, 3:1, 3:8, 3:15), the works which distinguish the sheep from the goats (Mt 25:33), the works by which a man is justified (James 2:24).

To paraphrase St. Augustine, what could be a better sign of how much God loves us than the Son of God deigning to share our nature? At Christmas we celebrate just one small (but glorious!) glimpse into what the Father is doing through the Incarnation of His beloved Son. And it is something to CELEBRATE, in December or even in July.

 

On the memorial of St. James the Greater

Deo omnis gloria!

Like Jesus

The Ascension was never my favorite Bible story, containing as it did all the elements of a monumental tragedy – at least as far as I was concerned. The poor, shell-shocked disciples of Christ, barely recovered from the horror of the Crucifixion, just beginning to exult in the reality that even death could not defeat their Lord, gullibly follow Jesus up the Mount of Olives, and He leaves them! How could He?? I know, I know – He mumbled something about having to leave so that He could send the “Comforter.” Paraclete, Schmaraclete! was my well-reasoned response. I want JESUS! The story was a triumph for Him – He got to go Home! I was stuck here….

No, I was not a big fan of the Ascension. It might have helped if I had known that the Ascension was actually all about: ME.

Question: Who is the light of the world? Little-known fact: I AM.

Hang on a minute – Jesus proclaimed in John 8:12 that HE was the Light of the World.

Absolutely correct. It is, however, also absolutely correct for me to insist that I am the light of the world, because Jesus said I was, in His Sermon on the Mount.

In fact, if you read the New Testament carefully, you’ll notice that an incredible number of “parallel” claims are made along those same lines. Jesus would explain to his disciples that He was something specific like the Light of the World, and later in Scripture we would be told that WE were (or were to become) that very same thing. A few examples:

• Jesus is the only begotten Son of God. Jn 3:16
  

“For you are all sons of God
through faith in Christ Jesus.” Gal 3:26

• Jesus has been appointed “the heir of all things.” Heb 1:2
  

“Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ…” Rom 8:16

• Jesus is “the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.” Col 1:15
  

“For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers.” Rom 8:29

• Jesus is “the radiance of [the Father’s] glory and the exact representation of His nature….” Heb 1:3
  

“For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature” 2 Pet 1:4

• Jesus is “the apostle and high priest whom we confess.” Heb 3:1
  

“But you are ‘a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own….” 1 Pet 2:9

• Jesus is the “one mediator between God and men” 1 Tim 2:5
  

“I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— for kings and all those in authority….” 1 Tim 2:1

• Jesus was “crucified in weakness, yet He lives by God’s power.” 2 Cor 13:4
  

“Likewise, we are weak in Him, yet by God’s power we will live with Him
to serve you.” 2 Cor 13:4

• Jesus is seated “at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.” Heb 1:3
  

“And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms
in Christ Jesus….” Eph 2:6

We are called to be what Jesus is, to imitate Him in all things (except in His divine Essence – we will not become God, but we are commanded to become god-ly.) Jesus was very God of very God, but He did not spend His earthly existence sitting around marveling at this fact. Jesus “went about doing good.” This means, obviously, that we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us. One small problem… We are unable to do anything of ourselves!

“Apart from Me you can do nothing.” Jn 15:5

Make that one BIG problem – Jesus just ascended to the Father, and He didn’t take us with Him! And so much is expected of us, as the “parallel” statements make abundantly clear!

• Jesus was sent: “I am not here on my own, but He who sent me is true. Jn 7:28
  

“As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world.” Jn 17:18

• Jesus became “a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth….” Rom 15:8
  

“Your attitude should be the same
as that of Christ Jesus, Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant….” Phil 2:5

• Jesus said, “The Father who dwells in me is doing His works.” Jn 14:9
  

“For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Eph 2:10

• Jesus was “a Man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs.” Acts 2:22
  

“…he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works than these
he will do.” (Jn 14:12)

• The Father gave Jesus “authority over all people” Jn 17:3, to “reign forever and ever” Rev 11:5
  

“… if we endure, we will also reign with Him.” 2 Tim 2:12

• Jesus is “the one whom God appointed as the judge of the living and the dead.” Acts 10:42
  

“Do you not know that the saints will judge the world?… Do you not know that we will judge angels?” I Cor 6:2-3

• Jesus “gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.” Eph 5:2
  

“… offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God” Rom 12:1

• Jesus is “the Holy One of God.” Mk 1:24
  

“like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves
also in all your behavior” 1 Pet 1:15

• Jesus said, “I love the Father” Jn 14:31 , and “As the Father loves me, so I also love you” Jn 15: 12
  

“Love one another, even as I have loved you.” Jn 13:34

The Ascension looked to me like a recipe for disaster! So much is expected of us, yet we are simultaneously informed that without the One Who just ascended, we can do nothing! Not only does He leave us, but He insists that He MUST leave us, so that we can receive “the Comforter.”

It’s all starting to fall into place…. We aren’t the only ones who can do nothing of ourselves – Jesus said the very same thing about Himself:

…the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner. For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself is doing….

There’s a plenty good reason that we can do nothing of ourselves. Even the second Person of the Trinity could do nothing of Himself! That’s why He makes it clear to us that the Father loves Him, and He loves the Father. The Bible tells us that God is Love – God the Father is Love, God the Son is Love, God the Holy Spirit is Love. You and I are not, obviously, but we have to be in order to enter into this progressive endowment of responsibilities and the resulting ability to fulfill those responsibilities. Love is what makes it possible for us to participate in the life of God. And therefore, the Comforter was sent to fill us, the Comforter Who is the Love between the Father and the Son, so real that He is actually a Person of the Holy Trinity. If we are expected to live the life of Christ in this world, we must be filled with the same Love He is filled with, and with the power of this divine Love. Thus, of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace. We are made partakers of the divine nature. Each Christian becomes a part of this divine bucket brigade, as God’s love pours out from the Father, to the Son, to us and through us to our neighbor.

Note the divine progression of Love flowing from the Father, to the Son, to the disciples, to the world. As Jesus receives from the Father, so He also gives to us, but not so that we can sit around marveling at how privileged we are. As Jesus went about doing good, so must we. As He gives to us, we are to offer to others: love, forgiveness, prayers, assistance, forbearance, mercy. We who have received from Jesus what He received from the Father are now commissioned to react as Jesus reacted to those gifts: by laying down our lives and taking up the work the Father has prepared for us. When Scripture defines who the Christian is, and what his mission is now that he has been born again, it simply points us back to Jesus’ nature and mission, because that says it all. We were loved so much that God gave His only begotten Son to save us, so that we could lay down our lives and save others (and yes, it is legitimate to say that we play a limited, supporting role in the salvation of others, as St. Paul said, “I have become all things to all men, so that I may by all means save some.”) Jesus left us so that we might experience His life more fully, or as St. Paul put it “that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.” St. Maximus the Confessor probably expressed it best: we are called to nothing less than total participation in Christ. We, the members of the body of Christ, are literally co-workers with God (1 Cor 3:9) and partakers of the divine nature (2 Pet 1:4). As members of His actual body, how could we not be? Pope Pius XII expressed the concept in these words:

“As He hung upon the Cross, Christ Jesus not only appeased the justice of the Eternal Father which had been violated, but He also won for us, His brethren, an ineffable flow of graces. It was possible for Him of Himself to impart these graces to mankind directly; but He willed to do so only through a visible Church made up of men, so that through her all might cooperate with Him in dispensing the graces of Redemption. As the Word of God willed to make use of our nature, when in excruciating agony He would redeem mankind, so in the same way throughout the centuries He makes use of the Church that the work begun might endure.”

“…so in the same way throughout the centuries He makes use of the Church that the work begun might endure” – this is the Catholic understanding of the mystery of the Incarnation, that Jesus became Man so that men might become members of Jesus’ very body. Jesus did the will of His Father, and now intercedes for us that we might do exactly the same thing, following in His footsteps, by exactly the same Power that He relied on, the Holy Spirit Who is Love. The Ascension is a textbook illustration of the way God demands something impossible of us only to show us our need, and then steps in to do what needs to be done through us. Over the next 10 days we will see this in the story of Pentecost, as the apostles pray with the Blessed Virgin for 9 days before receiving the power necessary,the Holy Spirit, to fulfill the Great Commission Jesus gave them at His Ascension.

The Ascension was a key event in the divine plan. Our Elder Brother has been glorified, and is now praying for us as we, filled with the Holy Spirit, do the works that God has prepared for us to do. This is the reason we were created. We will be just like Him one day, to the glory of God the Father.

Practice starts now.

 

On the feast of the Ascension of the Lord

Deo omnis gloria!