At Work While Resting

My Father is at work until now, so I am at work. (John 5:17)

One of the great ironies of history: the Pharisees turned doing nothing into an intolerable burden. No job could have been more demanding than properly resting on the sabbath. The toil of the week might have been fraught with worries, but on the sabbath you had to be especially careful.

One of the great ironies of my own personal life: Nothing relaxes me, nothing soothes me or gives me rest, like a nice long run. Perhaps you non-runners will dismiss this as sheer insanity. But everyone can relate somehow. We find genuine rest not in supine couch-slouching but in some activity that harmonizes with a rhythm we have inside. Could be gardening, clubbing the little white ball around the dale, bridge or pinochle, kicking the soccer ball, downing beers in the Martinsville speedway infield, reading a book…In other words, in order to rest, we do something that requires attention and effort.

The Son of God became man to do the work He sees His Father doing. What does Christ see His Father doing? Only He Himself can answer that question completely. But, at the very least, He sees His Father doing what we see His Father doing—which is everything that gets done, except sins.

Make the sun rise, sustain the earth in existence, move us to do any good that we do, keep the possibility of heaven out there for another day—all in a day’s work for the heavenly Father. And He does it all day, day in and day out, 24/7, 365 or 366 days a year, for the entire length of the history of the universe.

Ought we to say, “Lord, we love You and we appreciate it. But You are working too hard. We are wearing You out. Take a day off and relax.”

No. The Lord has no trouble sustaining His unimaginably enormous workload. Being the Creator and sustainer of all things does not exhaust Him. It is, in fact, His pleasure. To work every good work that is worked provides God with a perpetual sabbath. He could do infinitely more work effortlessly.

The same thing goes for the Son made man. Did it exhaust Christ to teach the truth to the human race? Did He get tired of healing the sick and feeding the multitudes? Did it wear Him out to take all our sins on His back, carry them to Golgatha, and incinerate them on the altar of the cross?

No. Even descending into hell did not tire the Lord Jesus. He woke up refreshed, talked to Mary Magdalen, walked all the way to Emmaus, and He was still fresh as a daisy when He came to the upper room at supper time.

We must, however, obey the commandment and keep the sabbath rest. The Pharisees were right in this respect: Resting on the sabbath distinguishes the people of God. The pagans slave themselves and squander their vitality with fruitless agitations. But Israel heeds the law of Moses, which recounts the serene holiness of the Lord’s day.

So, how do we keep it? How can we act and rest at the same time, to the glory of God, Who moves the heavens without breaking a sweat? There is only one way: By believing in the Son Whom He has sent. Faith in Christ is the most fruitful work and the sweetest rest.

God Asks Permission His Way

I am ashamed to admit that I am just now getting around to reading all the homilies and speeches our Holy Father gave when he was in the Israel in May.

When he was preaching in the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth, the Pope made a remarkable observation.

He was recounting what happened at that spot, when the Archangel Gabriel awaited the Blessed Virgin’s response:

The narrative of the Annunciation illustrates God’s extraordinary courtesy. He does not impose himself, he does not simply pre-determine the part that Mary will play in his plan for our salvation: he first seeks her consent.

In the original Creation there was clearly no question of God seeking the consent of his creatures, but in this new Creation he does so.

Of course it is a beautiful thing to see the Archangel waiting on Our Lady’s free response–to see the Lord waiting on it, all creation waiting on it.

Pope meditating during Vespers in Nazareth

What struck me here the most, though, is the way the Pope blithely contrasts this with the way God created us in the first place.

In the original Creation there was clearly no question of God seeking the consent of his creatures.

Of course there wasn’t. He created us out of nothing. You can’t ask nothing permission to create it, because there is nothing to ask.

You can only seek the permission of a free person who already exists. Existing is a given–literally. God gave us ourselves.

Then, He asks us to give ourselves back. Freely giving ourselves back is the one and only way for us to deal with having ourselves in the first place.

It is pointless and absurd to fuss about existing, because it never was, and never could have been, a matter for advice and consent.

But offering oneself back to God as an oblation of love–now that is something to fuss about…

My brother Ben

Speaking of which, a friend asked me to mention that The Bethlehem Monastery of Colettine Poor Clare nuns in Barhamsville, VA is having a “Come and See” day on November 14 for women 18-35.

…P.S. Just in case you were looking for White in the Grey Lady recently, Ben White has moved on from the NYT and is now contributing to a daily briefing on politico.com called “Morning Money.”

Turning Your Back to the Sun

Among the pagan people who surrounded the ancient Israelites, it was customary to build temples on high places so that, at dawn, the priests could face east and worship the sun.

The Temple in Jerusalem was built in such a way that in order to worship God at daybreak, the priests had to turn their backs to the rising sun in order to face the Holy of Holies.

The Creator has made a beautiful earth for us to live on. The least we can do is take care of it.

Without Christ, however, this planet would be nothing but a rock hurtling us toward doom.

Happy Earth Day! Praised be Jesus Christ now and forever!

Two Categories

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth (first verse of the Holy Bible).

The most fundamental fact is: There are two categories.

These two categories include absolutely everything.

In the one category is God. In the other category is everything that God has made.

Our Quasi-Omnipotent Lady

 

 

 

          “Who is this that comes forth like the dawn, as beautiful as the moon, as resplendent as the sun, as awe-inspiring as bannered troops?”   Song of Songs 6:10

Today we rejoice in the birth of the Mother of God.  She was conceived immaculate in her mother Ann’s womb, and nine months later, she was born.

When she came of age to bear a child, the Archangel come to propose God’s plan to her, and she gave her consent.  With her Son, she walked down the path of humility and suffering.  After our salvation was won, God exalted her, like her Son, to the highest heaven.

Obviously, the Blessed Virgin Mary is not God; she is not divine.  God made her.  He did not, on the other hand, make Himself.  He made the humanity which He took to Himself, but God the Son always was and always will be.  Christ is a divine Person, not a creature.  We cannot worship the Blessed Mother the way we worship God.  Only God is God.  Our goal is to give glory to God, just like the Blessed Virgin does.  No one worships God better than our Lady worships Him; she worships God in Christ perfectly.

From God’s point-of-view, our Lady is splendidly beautiful, but of course she is infinitely less than He is Himself.  He keeps her in existence at every instant.  If He did not, she would disappear without a trace.

From our point-of-view, though, the Blessed Virgin might as well be God.  Our Lady is in charge of all the angels; they serve and adore her.  All the graces God gives to us come through her.  She is our life, our sweetness, and our hope.  She is the everlasting Garden of Eden.

Let’s not fret and fuss about falling into “Mariolatry.”  Damn the torpedoes, when it comes to Protestants trying to criticize us on this.  We cannot venerate and love our Lady too much.  Why get technical about the difference between worshipping God and throwing ourselves at our Lady’s feet?  The experts who make sure that the prayers we use are orthodox can worry about things like that.

          Here’s a weak analogy:  An expert land surveyor might be able to tell the difference in height between Mt. Everest and K-2, just by looking.  I am sure, though, that if I laid eyes on Mt. Everest and then Mt. McKinley, I couldn’t tell the difference in height.  In both cases, I would say, “Wow, that is an awesome mountain.”  When I think of God, I say to myself, “Awesome.”  When I think of our Lady, I say to myself, “Awesome.”

          From where I am standing, the Blessed Virgin Mary is infinitely powerful.  She is immeasurably more powerful, holier, more excellent and glorious than me.  I rely on her for my life’s breath.  If by “infinite” I mean simply that I cannot measure what I am talking about, I have to confess that our Lady is infinitely wonderful.  I beg her to take care of me.

The Consecration of a Priest

The office of Apostle has been handed down by the laying on of hands since the Lord Jesus originally consecrated His chosen Twelve.  A man becomes a priest when a bishop lays his hands on him and says the prayer of consecration.  What does it mean when this happens?

A priest is consecrated by the grace of Christ the High Priest.  Christ is a priest by virtue of His holy humanity, because it is only by being human that He has a relationship with the eternal Father that includes being a part of creation.  A priest offers sacrifice in order to reach across the great divide between heaven and earth.  Of course, this sacrifice of the incarnate High Priest Jesus Christ is the infinite offering of the Son to the Father in the Holy Spirit (the Uncreated divine love).  But Christ’s offering is only a priestly sacrifice because it is made by a creature (albeit the unique creature who is Personally also the Creator).  In other words, only creatures need priests; only creatures can be priests.  The priest’s office is to connect creation with the Creator.  (I learned all this from Bl. Columba Marmion’s book on the priesthood.)

So Christ the God-man is a priest.  He stands at the center of creation and gives it beautiful order; He makes it fitting and good:  He offers His gift to God to express the gratitude, submission, adoration, and glorification that the creature owes the Creator, and His gift is the infinite divine love, offered from a pure and upright human heart.

The priest makes the relationship between creature and Creator visible by standing at the altar and offering sacrifice to God in the sight of the people.  Then he gives what is sacred to the people.  Christ did this perfectly by offering the Holy Sacrifice of His Body and Blood, and giving Holy Communion.  The Holy Priesthood in the Church is the continuation of this until the end of time.

So the ultimate goal of the consecration of a priest is the Holy Mass.  The pattern that is to be unfolded according to the wisdom of God for His glory and the well-being of creation is for everyone to come to the altar of God to assist the priest in the Holy Sacrifice.  The Holy Mass, with the priest standing at the altar in the place of Christ and the people gathered around him in praise and worship of the Triune Majesty, is the image of creation perfectly fulfilled and consummated.  Everything that God has made possesses an inherent movement towards this consummation which is expressed in the Holy Mass.  May it please God:  When history is over, what we see under a veil at Mass will be fulfilled in heaven; we will be filled with peace and joy by glorifying God forever through Christ our High Priest.

To attain this goal the Church must preach the Gospel, and the priest first and foremost must preach, as the Prayer of Consecration says:  With the same loving care you gave companions to your Son’s apostles to help in teaching the faith: they preached the gospel to the whole world.  Preaching is clearly necessary for two reasons: 

1.  In order for people to come to Holy Mass regularly, they need to know that there is one God, Who is the loving Father that Christ has taught us about, that the Lord Jesus is God made man, that He instituted the holy sacrifice and all the sacraments.  People need to be taught all the things they need to know in order 1) to get in the habit of coming to Mass and 2) to hope for the heaven that the Mass promises.

2.  Even if people regularly come to Mass, they may not be participating in the Holy Sacrifice in such a way as will get them to heaven.  The gathering of the people around the holy altar with the priest has to be pure and true, which means that the souls of everyone present have to be cleansed and purified.  The only way for this to happen is by virtue of the Blood of Christ, which cleanses souls through the sacraments of Baptism and Penance.  Baptized sinners have to confess their sins and turn to God, and they are much more likely to do so if the priest preaches the truth and exhorts his people to penance and the practice of virtue.

So here we have the story of my life:  the Lord has chosen and consecrated me to say Mass at the appointed times (in Upper Marlboro, Md., for the time being) and to baptize, hear Confessions, and administer all the sacred things.  I have to be tireless and generous in doing this, as the Lord Jesus Himself was.  (Though I need to take care of myself and the dignity of the priesthood, too.)  Also, I have to preach:  preach to the people in the parish who do not come to Mass, and preach to the people who do. 

It is easier to see how I am supposed to preach to the people who do come to Mass, since they listen to what I say when it comes time for the homily.  In a way, I guess, I am preaching to everyone when I do this, since the doors are open, everyone knows that our building is a Catholic church, and the Mass times are clearly posted.  Obviously, I have to stick to the teaching of the Church in my homilies.

I preach to everyone in the parish boundaries by being at my post, wearing my cassock and clerical clothes, coming out of the house and doing the things that a priest would reasonably be expected to do.  I think I can hope to make my way to heaven by dutifully doing these things for the rest of my life at whatever assignment I have.

 In the hopes, however, that some of the people who do not come to church might read what I write here, I am undertaking to publish some occasional essays on the internet.  Even if no one ever reads these, my attempts to write out the things that I think about will certainly do me some good.  And it will get me out of the house to my favorite watering hole.  Here you have the first installment of my little blog.  The good Lord knows how many more are to come.  May He be glorified in every word and work; may we all come home to Him when everything is said and done!