In our society people who hold, or practice a religious faith are being treated like second class citizens. Society seems to applaud immoral behaviour and people of faith are being scorned and marginalized. The legal system increasingly restricts our lived out practice of our beliefs; I am starting to feel like an alien in my own country.
I am writing about my faith. In the hope that I will shed light on the issue and with God’s grace, redress the situation.
The first on the seven deadly sins is pride. Pride is excessive belief in one's own abilities, that interferes with the individual's recognition of the grace of God. It has been called the sin from which all others arise.
We all know how proud we feel when we are praised, or some project we take part in succeeds. It is the simplest of sins. Murder, theft or inappropriate sexual habits may be easy to see to label and condemn, but pride is the one that condemns us all. Pride strikes to the heart and we do not see it.
Jesus was anti pride and pro humility, in fact he was humility incarnate.
Paul writes of his attitude although He existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, and being made in the likeness of men.…
Our Lord washed the feet of his disciples, is washes our feet.
Repeatedly the Gospels record Jesus encouraging us to be humble. In Luke 14:1,7-14 we are encouraged not to take the place of honour, but to take the lowest positions.
If we are to convert the world, fix our society you and I must be humble. Trusting God and his will, not our ability. We must encourage others by our good example. I pray that I can put aside my vanity and pride and be more humble.
I pray that our leaders can put aside their arrogance and be more Christ like. Realising that your cannot resolve a violent situation with ever more violence. We must encourage justice, as without justice there is no peace.
John the Baptist is the only saint in the calendar (apart from St Joseph) who has two feasts to himself. One, in August, celebrates his death, and one, in June, celebrates his birth. And this is as it should be, for as Christ himself said, John was the greatest of the sons of men.
The greatest, but also the most tragic. A prophet from before his birth, leaping in the womb to announce the coming of the incarnate God, his task was to proclaim the fulfilment of all prophecies – and thus his own obsolescence. And he did it: with unequalled courage he spread the news that he, the greatest of all men, was the least in the kingdom of heaven. His disciples, and the devil, would have preferred him to fight, to build his sect, to defeat this upstart whom he himself had baptised, to seize his place in history. But he did not – and so, rightly, he has his place, and he has glory in heaven.
We envy the great and the talented, and sometimes we think that they themselves are beyond envy. But when they come across someone with greater gifts, as one day most of them will, they will see for the first time what it means to feel like us. Let us pray that they, like John the Baptist, may pass that test.
Pope Francis In a recent phone call to an Italian teenager shows a significant change in the Papacy, a return to Biblical roots and humility and a closeness to God.
The Pope’s famous phone call to an Italian teenager is more significant than we first thought “He said to me, do you think the Apostles would have used the polite form with Christ? “Would they have called him your excellency? They were friends, just as you and I are now, and with friends I’m accustomed to using ‘tu’.
The writers of the Gospels record that when Jesus’ followers ask him, how should we pray Jesus replies “Our Father….”
Scholars write the English translation of abba (Greek: Αββα, Aramaic: אבא) are best captured by father, dad, daddy, in English
You and I ought to follow the Gospels and the Pope, in not making God distant. We ought to be humble and familiar. We need to reflect Christ in the world and not man’s image of Christ, not my image of Christ. We ought to allow God’s Spirit to fill us, to study the scripture and live the gospels. Each day we should examine out performance, apologise for our failings and ask for the grace to be more like Christ.
And we should pray
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Everybody who dies in the faith of Christ is accepted into the presence of Christ in heaven. Virtually since it’s inception the church has named dead individuals as people who have gone to glory. Examples of grace, love, piety and holiness good examples who we should follow and to whom offer up prayers of supplication, asking them to intercede on our behalves.
I have often felt that canonising a pope, a bit wrong, unnecessary. Until recently I have not seen what good a pope can do. I am so impressed with Pope Francis, it has changed my mind and now I look at the individuals rather than the incumbent of an office. Clearly some popes will appear more saintly than others.
I have been horrified by Pope Innocent III, who was far from innocent and can be named alongside Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, Papa Doc and Hitler.
St Pius X (1835 - 1914) was death and entry into glory is celebrated today was truly a saintly individual and a pope.
He was born in the village of Riese, near Venice, one of ten children of a very poor family. He was ordained to the priesthood at the age of 23. He was successively bishop of Mantua and of Venice, and was elected Pope, against his wishes, in 1903. In his time as Pope, he sought to “restore all things in Christ.” He insisted on the separation of Church and State, and banned the formation of political associations that claimed exclusive religious sanction for their political programme, whether of the Left or of the Right. He revised the code of Canon Law, founded an institute for scriptural studies, and initiated the revision of the Latin translation of the Bible (the Vulgate) and the reform of the liturgy.
He lived in great poverty even when he was Pope, and preached sermons every Sunday in the courtyards of the Vatican, to any who would listen. In his simplicity and goodness of heart, he performed miracles even when he was alive, and the clamour for his canonization started immediately after his death, on 20th August 1914, broken-hearted at the outbreak of the First World War.
I pray that I can be more like Pius. If we all were more like him we would change society and draw the world to Christ.
When I hear about the dreadful deaths in Egypt and the horrendous war in Syria, I cannot help but feel ever so grateful to live in leafy rural Britain. I am well fed, warm, dry and at no risk of violence. I may live in what some might call a post Christian society, but that is just the point. Christian Society. People may have lax morals, but the ethos of Love they neighbour is embedded in British society. Sadly this tolerance and respect does not seem to exist in Egypt. The behaviour of brother toward brother is awful. It reminds me of the shameful crusades. God must cry. I do not know where this violence will end, but I pray that Egypt can discover love, forgiveness and the tolerance that comes from New Testament values. South Africa and Northern Ireland found peace, but we must remember there is no peace without justice. As individuals we must try to radiate these values to the world.
The doctrine of The Assumption teaches that at the end of her life, Mary, the mother of Christ, was taken body and soul into heaven. The church celebrates this feast today 15th August.
Personally, I have always found this teaching, this doctrine, hard to swallow. The empiricist in me questions the metaphysical nature of the Assumption. The theologian in me believes that because the scriptures do not explicitly state that Mary the mother of our divine Lord died and was buried it does not mean she did not die, it just means the writers of scripture did not think that Mary’s post resurrection life was not important, or central to the purposes of the documents they were writing. In their eyes the inclusion of details about her life was not necessary to spread the Good News. Is there a record of Joseph’s death, or Mary Magdalene's?
However, I have no problem accepting, the existence of God, the virgin birth and the resurrection. I have no problem believing that Mary had to be special to be graced as The Mother of our Divine Lord. I glory in the communion of saints. I have no issue with asking Mary or any of the saints in glory to intercede for us. Yes I can petition God directly, but equally I can ask the saints in glory for assistance too.
Why then do I have an issue? Perhaps I have no good reason, perhaps I have picked up others prejudice growing up in a protestant environment. Maybe I just do not understand why in 1950 the then pope thought it necessary to make the doctrine of the Assumption a central tenant of the faith. Maybe my issue is that I see with the eyes and perspective of a man, and a little man at that.
God is God and he and his doings are beyond my understanding. I can only hope to see and understand a little of the Divine, I am small, discrete and limited. God is infinite. Regards the Assumption perhaps I need to go on a little faith.
I do know that hundreds of thousands of souls have found their interface with the Divine through Mary and Marian devotions, asking Mary the Mother of God to intercede with Christ on their behalves. They have received much consolation and comfort and I have no doubt found their way to Christ by this route.
I am arrogant, assuming I know best, that I am the font of knowledge, when the reverse is true, I know a little, a very little. Perhaps I need to trust God and the leaders of his Church on earth. I need to grow in humility and so pray:
Hail Mary, Full of Grace, The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now, and at the hour of death. Amen.
"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might." —Deuteronomy 6:4-5
I am plagued with this commandment. I hear it all the time, it is engraved on my heart, repeatedly it comes back to me in the day. With every sin it comes back to me. Whenever I engage in vain thoughts or actions. There it is in my head.
Love God with ALL your heart
But I am constantly distracted.
I can see an attractive young woman, be reminded of an old girlfriend, build castles in the sky, dream of winning the lottery, be distracted in work, TV or other entertainment, even when writing the blog.
I fail, I fall. All I can do is strike my breast, apologise, say sorry and with God’s grace do better.
Unless I can turn my face from sex, drugs and rock and roll and truly Love God with ALL my heart I will not be a truly effective evangelist. You and I are called to be just that, to go out to all nations. We must go out into the world and draw people back to Christ. To do that we must love, or at least try to love God with all our heart.
Every day, Every hour every moment, not just on Sunday morning when the Minister and community are watching us.
With God’s grace I will put aside my impure and unfaithful thoughts and focus on Christ.
Practising the Examen every day, two or three times a day helps. About the Examen
