Why I Believe, or, How I Know that God Exists

(Originally posted September 11, 2007)

I believe in Truth, in Reason, and in Love. I believe that there is truth, not only physical truth, but transcendent moral truth -– right and wrong, good and evil -– and that this morality is not relative, otherwise, it would not be truth. In a world without God, any evil thing is possible. But in a world with God, love and salvation and freedom are possible; life is possible.

Indeed, Christ has already saved the world in a very tangible way. He has redeemed the world. Without Christian love and forgiveness and reconciliation, the world would have destroyed itself long ago. One wrong would lead to retaliation, which would lead only to retaliation for that act, in never-ending cycles of wars of vengeance, on both a personal and national level. We only need to look at some non-Christian cultures in the world today to see that they differ from Christian values and morality.

Yet, although I believe, I am also a sinner. My sins are great and many, and I am greatly in need of a savior to pay my debts, to ransom me. Maybe others believe that they can live well without Christ, and that they can have eternal life without Him. Maybe they don’t need Him. But I do need Him. I do need, not only His forgiveness, but His grace –- the power to do things that I could never do or accomplish on my own, things like love and forgiveness and perseverance and peace of heart and hope.

If it were just me, I’d probably want to nuke the entire Muslim world as payback for the bastards that do things like fly planes into buildings and set off car bombs and suicide bombs, killing thousands of innocent people. But Christ commands me to love my enemies, and He gives me the grace to do the impossible -- to let go of hate, to let go of the thirst for vengeance. He gives me the grace to do things like love and forgive such people.

Yes, forgive. I forgive those who did this evil thing. He gives me the grace to be able, when we hopefully have peace, to live together with them as children of God. Left to myself, I would not want to accomplish any of these things, and I could not do any of these things myself. It is only because God does exist, that such things are possible. We do not have peace now, and because peace requires both sides to set aside their arms, it may still be necessary to implement the tragic tools of war, but we should do so, not out of hate and vengeance, but only in order to gain that peace.

So, pray for true peace. Pray for our enemy, that God grant them grace and wisdom to choose peace. Pray for us, that, as we must necessarily destroy that enemy to obtain the peace, that God grant us grace and strength to not hate those He commands us to love, that we kill not for vengeance, but to end the violence and the capacity and will of the enemy to make war on us, until the day we again may live in peace with these children of God.

Eternal and Merciful God, at times of tragedy our intellects seek understanding, our hearts seek healing, and our souls turn to You: our source of hope and solace. Heal our troubled nation as our nation turns its eyes to You and comfort those whose lives are changed forever: those who have perished, those who have lost family, friends or loved ones, and those who now live in the aftermath of these acts of terror. May God bless our national leadership, may God bless our servicemen and women, and may God bless America. Amen

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, let thy protection be upon all those who are in the service of our country; guard them from all harm and danger of body and soul; sustain and comfort those at home, especially in their hours of loneliness, anxiety, and sorrow; prepare the dying for death and the living for your service; give success to our arms on land and sea and in the air; and grant unto us and all nations a speedy, just and lasting peace. Amen.

The Good Life of Gift-of-Self in Love to Others, but Loving God First

If something is holding you back from God and a more holy life, you must let it go even if you get some good benefit from it. This is a hard lesson to learn, as we discussed in considering the Gospel reading for last Sunday's Mass. We must let these things go and detach ourselves from an undue attachment to worldly things and concerns, especially if those things involve sinful activities, but even if they are non-sinful, yet are not on the path that we are called to follow. No matter how essential you may think the fruits of this activity or practice are, if they are preventing you from a closer relationship with the Lord, you must cut it off, amputate that hand diseased by sin, chop off that well-intentioned foot that keeps taking you in the wrong direction and down the wrong path.

This brings us to the Gospel reading for Wednesday, which involves a similar lesson:

As Jesus and His disciples travelled along they met a man on the road who said to Him, "I will follow you wherever you go." Jesus answered, "Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head."

Another to whom He said, "Follow me," replied, "Let me go and bury my father first." But He answered, "Leave the dead to bury their dead; your duty is to go and spread the news of the kingdom of God."

Another said, "I will follow you, sir, but first let me go and say goodbye to my people at home." Jesus said to him, "Once the hand is laid on the plough, no one who looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." (Luke 9:57-62)

We've been speaking a lot about the New Evangelization, and will speak of it a lot more as we begin and live the Year of Faith, and a large part of the New Evangelization is finding more effective ways to spread and explain the Good News of Jesus Christ. Now, this aspect of the New Evangelization promises to be rather tricky, requiring us find ways to get around the pre-built defenses that many people of today have against the Christian faith. It is not as if we are in a society where people have never heard of Jesus before, they have -- practically everyone has heard of His name, and of course those Catholics and non-Catholic Christians who have fallen away from the faith have certainly heard of Him, but they have built up a "wall of separation" against Him due largely to the fact that what they have heard and learned about Christianity is false and wrong. So we need to find ways to speak to former believers and non-believers in ways that they will listen to us and thus get to know the truth about Jesus and the Faith. And it is in the light of such truth that they will be set free of their pre-conceived opposition and objections to the Good News. And the people of this world are in great need of some good news right now.

In learning how to best speak to non-believers, one of the best resources is to talk to converts, to read their conversion stories and discover exactly what it is that finally clicked, that drew them in to want to have a relationship with Jesus Christ. Perhaps the most famous of these conversion stories is St. Augustine's Confessions, and because of his experiences in decadent Roman society, what with the modern world increasingly becoming like Rome, he is a person that the modern person can relate to very much. But then again, Augustine did live 1600 years ago, so maybe there are some more recent models we can turn to?

An excellent resource for learning about conversion of non-believers to believers is Jennifer Fulwiler, who writes at Conversion Diary. She was a long-time atheist who believed that God and Christianity were rather irrational and absurd, but who, after embarking upon a search for truth like Augustine, later entered the Catholic Church with her husband at the Easter Vigil in 2007. Jennifer and her husband are celebrating their ninth wedding anniversary, which is made all the more joyous with the news that they are expecting baby number six. She recounts how, before their conversion, they thought that they had the good life, a life of comfort and freedom, but in all that comfort, something was missing, they felt a sense of emptiness which they tried to fill with even more worldly things.

Now, a few years later, they have five children ranging from 8-years-old to 15-months, with a sixth on the way, and Jennifer reflects on her current life:

We’re so busy and tired, I’m not sure if we’ll even do anything to celebrate. Between homeschooling, dance class, soccer, scouts, general chaos management and me feeling astoundingly exhausted and vaguely sick all the time, I think that what we’d both like for our ninth anniversary is the opportunity to get 12 straight hours of sleep (that is the traditional nine-year gift, right?).

This is not the easiest phase of life I’ve ever been in.

But she then goes on, after remembering their past life, to remark that all of this living and doing for other people is the real good life. Following her profound conversion, Jennifer understands that

the way to be happy isn’t to amass nice stuff or go on awesome vacations or even to think about yourself much at all. The way to be happy is to love. And real love always involves self-sacrifice; in fact, love and self-sacrifice are basically the same thing.

Yes, life is hard when all of your time is filled with doing things for and with other people. It can be loud and chaotic and messy and more work than you've ever had to do in your life.

But life is harder still when all of your time is empty and alone, and you struggle to find something to do to fill that abyss in your life, even though you might have various material possessions that promise you comfort, but never really fulfill that promise. Our temporal existence can be excruciating without something, or more specifically, someone, to help us live it. To have what some might think is the ultimate freedom, the radical autonomy to be without any duty or obligation to others, is actually a taste of Hell.

To be with others who have need of you, need of your love, need of your self-giving, is the more authentic freedom, paradoxical as it may seem, because it is more true to our nature as human persons — we are made to love and be loved in truth, and it is in such truth that we are set free. We are free to be who we are made to be, social creatures made for fruitful loving communion with others in one being.

The further paradox, though -- and to return us to our original point -- is that to fully love the other, to better love our spouse or our children, we must in a sense, put them second, not first. That is, we must love God first, before we love them. Our first priority is to follow Jesus, even before burying our dead father, even before saying goodbye to the family at home. (Luke 9:57-62)

The way to be happy, the way to the good life, is to love. But if we feel that we should or must love our spouse first and foremost, even before loving God, we end up giving them an impoverished love. Rather, we must love God first before we love others, we must put our love of God before our love for our spouse or children or friends or any other worldly thing. But in so doing, we do not love our family members less, but more. In following Jesus before first burying our dead father, we do not leave his corpse there to rot in the roadside, we do not abandon our beloved family members. Quite the contrary. In loving God before loving them, we love them even more.

To love our spouse or children or parents or others more perfectly, we must love them through the Lord. In loving God before we love them, God takes our love, purifies it, multiplies it by His own, and gives it to the other in an even greater and fuller measure than we could on our own. In love, God is not a competitor, He is a multiplier.

A Hard Lesson to Learn

Suppose there is a guy -- or let's suppose that it is you -- who engages in a certain activity, a certain practice. And this practice provides him with a measure of comfort and a degree of happiness. Life appears to be much better for him, much easier for him, because of this practice. Conversely, were he to stop this practice, and thereby lose out on those resulting benefits, he believes that life would be much harder. Thus, for fear of losing those benefits of comfort and happiness, he continues the practice.

Now let us suppose that the activity or practice that he engages in is morally wrong. Perhaps this wrongful activity or practice is economic or sexual or perhaps it involves perpetuating a lie about this or that. In any event, despite gaining certain advantages and benefits from engaging in it, it is wrong, it is sinful. Or maybe the practice is not sinful at all, but it is not the right path for him in life, it is not the life that God intends for him and the practice is keeping him from that right path.

What to do? What to do? With respect to the former case, he knows that what he is doing is wrong, but he fears losing the things that he gains from it. The benefits he gets are not themselves wrong -- some comfort in life, some economic or emotional security, and the peace of mind that goes with having these things -- but the means to those good ends are bad. He is otherwise a good and decent fellow, and he sincerely does want to be good and do good, but he also believes that he needs these goods things and were they to be taken away, so he believes, he would despair, he would be lost. Augustine was at a similar point in his life -- knowing what was right, wanting to do right, but enjoying the benefits of the wrong he was doing -- when he famously exclaimed, "God grant me chastity . . . but not yet."

Likewise, with respect to the latter case, where the practice is not sinful, just wrong in the sense that it is not what God intends for him, he continues the practice because of the benefits that he enjoys. He really has not put much thought into whether it is the right path in life, into what he might be called to, what his particular vocation is at that point, he only knows that the activity provides him with some comfort, happiness, and security, all of which he would not want to lose.

The Gospel reading for today has Jesus counseling,

"If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut if off. It is better for you to enter into life crippled than with two feet to be thrown into Gehenna. And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into Gehenna, where 'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched." (Mk 9:43-48)

It is a hard lesson to learn, and harder to implement. But we need to let go of that wrongful practice, we need to detach ourselves from those sinful deeds, and those non-sinful deeds that are keeping us from our proper path, no matter how much we might enjoy them or even depend upon them.

And if we do not let go of that practice or activity voluntarily ourselves, perhaps God in His providence and mercy might intervene and take it away Himself. Although we might be alarmed at the loss, to have what we think is a necessity snatched away from us, we should be thankful to God for doing us the favor. He did what we knew should be done but did not have the will to do ourselves.

It may not be easy at first, it may cause our anxiety level to skyrocket. But rather than bemoan the loss of the bad, whether we let go voluntarily, or He takes it away involuntarily, we should seek the grace of understanding the lesson of the pruning of the branches, the lesson of the lilies of the field, the beatitude of being poor in spirit, of putting our lives in His hands and trusting that He will replace those ill-gotten gains with something better. We need to trust that after closing the bad door, He will open a good door for us; new opportunities will present themselves, opportunities for obtaining good by doing good, rather than by doing wrong. What we thought was our misfortune may instead be our salvation.

Hanukkah and the Light of ChristThe Rededication of the Temple and the Festival of Lights

Hanukkah begins this evening, December 20, 2011, at sundown (remembering that the Jewish day begins at sundown).

The Jewish Feast of Dedication (Hanukkah) was instituted in the year 165 B.C. It is celebrated annually as a memorial of the rededication of the Temple with a new altar and purification of the sanctuary. Three years earlier, Antiochus Epiphanes had caused a pagan altar to be set up at the altar of burnt offerings in the Temple and sacrifices to be offered to his idol, called "Zeus Olympius."

The Maccabean revolt followed, led by Judas Maccabeus (Yehuda HaMakabi, "Judah the Hammer"). After many battles, the Holy City of Jerusalem and the Temple were recovered.

1 Maccabees 4:36-59

Judas Maccabeus and his brothers said, "Now that our enemies have been crushed, let us go up to purify the sanctuary and rededicate it." So the whole army assembled, and went up to Mount Zion. They found the sanctuary desolate, the altar desecrated, the gates burnt, weeds growing in the courts as in a forest or on some mountain, and the priests' chambers demolished.

Then they tore their clothes and made great lamentation; they sprinkled their heads with ashes and fell with their faces to the ground. And when the signal was given with trumpets, they cried out to Heaven.

Judas appointed men to attack those in the citadel, while he purified the sanctuary. He chose blameless priests, devoted to the law; these purified the sanctuary and carried away the stones of the Abomination to an unclean place.

They deliberated what ought to be done with the altar of holocausts that had been desecrated. The happy thought came to them to tear it down, lest it be a lasting shame to them that the Gentiles had defiled it; so they tore down the altar. They stored the stones in a suitable place on the temple hill, until a prophet should come and decide what to do with them.

Then they took uncut stones, according to the law, and built a new altar like the former one. They also repaired the sanctuary and the interior of the temple and purified the courts. They made new sacred vessels and brought the lampstand, the altar of incense, and the table into the temple. Then they burned incense on the altar and lighted the lamps on the lampstand, and these illuminated the temple. They also put loaves on the table and hung up curtains. Thus they finished all the work they had undertaken.

Early in the morning on the twenty-fifth day of the ninth month, that is, the month of Chislev, in the year one hundred and forty-eight, they arose and offered sacrifice according to the law on the new altar of holocausts that they had made. On the anniversary of the day on which the Gentiles had defiled it, on that very day it was reconsecrated with songs, harps, flutes, and cymbals. All the people prostrated themselves and adored and praised Heaven, who had given them success.

For eight days they celebrated the dedication of the altar and joyfully offered holocausts and sacrifices of deliverance and praise. They ornamented the facade of the temple with gold crowns and shields; they repaired the gates and the priests' chambers and furnished them with doors. There was great joy among the people now that the disgrace of the Gentiles was removed.

Then Judas and his brothers and the entire congregation of Israel decreed that the days of the dedication of the altar should be observed with joy and gladness on the anniversary every year for eight days, from the twenty-fifth day of the month Chislev. (see also 2 Macc 1:18-2:19; 10:1-8)

Hanukkah, from the Hebrew word for "dedication" or "consecration", is also known as the Festival of Lights due to a miracle that allowed the Eternal Light of the Temple to burn for eight days, even though there was only enough oil to last one day.

This miracle is recounted in the Talmud (Shabbat 2),

The rabbis taught: On the twenty-fifth day of Kislev, Hanukkah commences and lasts eight days, on which lamenting (in commemoration of the dead) and fasting are prohibited. When the Hellenists entered the sanctuary, they defiled all the oil that was found there. When the government of the House of Asmoneans prevailed and conquered them, oil was sought (to feed the holy lamp in the sanctuary) and only one vial was found with the seal of the high priest intact. The vial contained sufficient oil for one day only, but a miracle occurred, and it fed the holy lamp eight days in succession. These eight days were the following year established as days of good cheer, on which psalms of praise and acknowledgment (of God's wonders) were to be recited.

The Eternal Light of the Temple represented God's everlasting presence, just as the sanctuary lamp placed before the tabernacle containing the Blessed Sacrament in Catholic churches is always kept lit to indicate and honor the constant presence of Christ. In the synagogue, a perpetual lamp signifies the Lord's presence in the Torah, the Word of God. (Similarly, the candles at liturgical services, candles for the Advent wreath, votive candles, candles during Sabbath prayers, etc., are lit to signify the presence of God, as He was present in the burning bush, during those ceremonies.)

Although a Jewish holiday -- one celebrated by Jesus -- Hanukkah can also be a time for Christians to remember that it is God Himself who is a Light that is everlasting and can never be extinguished. These days of rededication and the manifestation of God's eternal light remind us that evil will be defeated and, even if the evil has defiled the good, in the meantime, God cannot be defeated. His light is everlasting. More than light from oil, which runs out, His is the Eternal Light which cannot be extinguished. Thus, this is a time of hope.

It is fitting, then, that we observe this celebration of the Light as we await in Advent the birth and revelation to the world of the Light Incarnate -- God from God, Light from Light.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing came to be. What came to be through Him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

.

Holy Days of Opportunity

One of the precepts of the Church under canon law is to attend and participate in the Sacred Liturgy on Sundays and specified Holy Days of Obligation. The word "obligation" is unfortunate; it makes it sound as if Mass is a cumbersome duty or hassle or burden. But it is not really a hassle, it is not merely one of the "rules" that we must obey. Or, at least, it should not be. If it is, it’s not God’s fault.

It’s not a burden, and really need not be seen as an “obligation,” because it should rightly be seen an an opportunity. It should not be thought of as having to go to Mass, but as getting to go to Mass. An opportunity to be with God and love Him.

If we love God, and if we want to be with Him in heaven, then we should want to be with Him for a little bit while we are still sojourning down here on earth. If we purposely do not go to Mass on Sundays and Holy Days, we are saying that we do not want to be with God, we do not want to spend a measly one-hour in His presence, and that would be what we call "a sin." A serious sin that is necessarily mortal* since to not want to spend time with God is to not want to spend time with Life itself.

To purposely fail to go to Mass on these days would be contrary to the First Commandment (we would be putting our own earthly gods, including ourselves, before Him) and, in the case of Sunday Mass, it would be contrary to the Third Commandment (by failing to keep holy the Lord’s Day). And if we refuse to go to Mass, not because we do not love God, but because we cannot stand the other people at Mass (what they sing, how they act, how boring they are), then that is contrary to the commandment to love one another as Jesus loves us, and it would be a rupture of the communion of the Church. In any case, it would be a rejection of the Blessed Sacrament and Jesus’ request that we participate in the Eucharist in memory of Him.

Now, it is true that we don’t need to go to Mass to pray to God. We can pray to God at home. We can form a spiritual communion with Jesus at home. But one thing that we cannot do at home is to establish full communion with Him, communion in the entirety of our being. Prayer away from Mass accomplishes only a partial communion with Him, a spiritual communion. But we are more than spiritual beings, we have bodies as well. Only do body and spirit together make up the entire person.

And we can obtain full communion with Jesus, spirit and body, only at Mass in the Eucharist, the actual Body and Blood of Christ. Only at Mass can we be one with Him fully, and in a profoundly intimate way, our soul one with His, our body one with His. Holy Communion is the only true communion, everything else falls short.

Mass on Sundays and Holy Days and every other day of the year (technically Mass is not celebrated on Good Friday or Holy Saturday) are not “obligations,” they are unique opportunities for Communion with the Lord.

Moreover, ours is not an individual faith, but a communal faith. Our relationship with Christ is not a limited one-on-one relationship. Rather, we are one with Him, and He is one with everyone else, such that we are meant to be one in communion with all the other faithful in heaven, on earth, and in purgatory. When we pray at Mass, we celebrate one liturgy, we pray as one, with the entirety of the Church, both across geography and across time. (That is also why, as Catholics, even when we are alone, we often pray these standardized prayers, rather than always being extemporaneous. As good as individualized prayer is, the standardized prayers are the prayers of the Church, so when we pray them, we pray not alone, but with all the faithful.)

When we do our own thing, staying at home because we think that we do not “need” Mass to have a relationship with God, we rupture that communion with the Church, which is the Body of Christ.

If the liturgy is poorly done, or if the music is bad, or the homily is boring, or the other people are dressed inappropriately, or the priest/deacon/ministers are too liberal or too conservative or too this or too that, or you stayed out too late the night before, or you’ve done some things that you shouldn’t have done and thus are in a state of sin, or you don’t understand some of the teachings of the Church, or you think you know better and oppose the Church, or whatever million other excuses you can come up with, even when you are fully justified in your dissatisfaction, none of that is God’s fault. None of that is on Jesus. Maybe it is on other people, maybe it is on us. Maybe it is on YOU. Maybe it is on me.

But it’s not God’s fault. So don’t take it out on Him. He is the remedy to all these problems. He is the priceless pearl. The Eucharist is “the source and summit” of our faith. The Blessed Sacrament is Emmanuel, God with us. No matter how lousy everything else is, do not let that keep you from Him. If you must, go to a different parish, but do not go to a different “god.” Do not stay away altogether.

(By the way, if you do physically attend Mass (as it is good that you do so), but you spend most of the time angry or disgusted or resentful or grumbling, etc. about how lousy all these things are, then it is pretty close to not coming to Mass at all. "Coming" to Mass means coming with a proper disposition, especially if receiving Holy Communion, which means a warm and loving heart -- if not enthusiastically loving one another (which includes loving other people you don't like (it's easy to love people you like, but Jesus calls us to love everyone)), then leaving that anger, disgust, resentment, etc. at home, or at least in the car.)

Even if it is not proper for you to receive Holy Communion because you’ve done something you shouldn’t, but like it and intend to keep on doing it, so that you’re not ready to go to Confession yet, then don’t go up for Communion, but do still go to Mass! Jesus Christ is there!

If you have been away for a while, for whatever reason you left and/or have stayed away, do not be afraid to admit that you are starving. Come home. The father will slaughter the fatted calf and all of heaven will rejoice and celebrate.

Mass is not an “obligation,” if by obligation one means a burden or bother or hassle. Rather, it is an opportunity. It is the ability to receive the “medicine of immortality,” i.e. the Eucharist. It is hope, the hope by which we are already saved.
_____________________

*There are some exceptions to this – if the Sunday obligation cannot be met due to illness, caring for someone sick, no Mass to attend, etc., then one is not under penalty of mortal sin because it is not intentional. (CCC 1857 For a sin to be mortal, three conditions must together be met: “Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.”)
.

The Holy Trinity – One God in Three Persons

-- Updated below --

Revelation informs us that the Lord God is a Holy Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Here, we see the necessity for revealed truth, for although the existence of God can be discerned by observation and reason, that He is a Trinity could not be known purely by these methods. But having been revealed to us, reason allows us to now have a greater understanding that God is a loving communion of three distinct persons in one undivided nature, substance, and essence – each possesses the fullness of the other and each has always existed.

The Trinity is a mystery - one that we should always respect in trying to understand it, so that our imperfect attempts at explanation do not inadvertently lead us to stray into error. Nevertheless, since ours is a faith that seeks understanding, we should not simply come to a halt when confronted with a mystery, but should instead proceed ahead to seek understanding, but with caution.

Although a mystery, we can begin to grasp some understanding of the Trinity by understanding that God is Truth and God is Love.

God told Moses that He is the "I am." What does this reveal about God? It means that God simply "Is." That is, He is Truth in person, the Ultimate Reality who is complete in Himself and, therefore, He is One.

But the One who Is is also Love and love is by its very nature relational – it requires an “other.” That is, love is not self-oriented, but must extend outward -- an "other" is required for love to exist, one who loves and one who is loved. Love does not exist in a vacuum.

Accordingly, God is not a one-dimensional being who exists in solitude, but, rather, being Truth and Love, and complete in Himself, He exists as one person (Father) who loves and is loved by a second person (Son), and this everlasting Love proceeding from and to each of them is not merely a sentiment, but is a person as well, namely, the Holy Spirit.

This Love of God is complete, total, and perfect love in its truest and fullest sense -- a “spousal” type of love that is unitive and fruitful/procreative, encompassing both the unconditional, gratuitous, and sacrificial love of agape (caritas), and the joyous wanting love of a purified and ennobled eros.

The perfect love of God (to which we also are called) involves not merely a relation of persons, but a communion of persons -- three are one. This love is also fruitful, that is, it is creative. Love is dynamic, not static, stagnant or sterile, and it bears fruit, seeking to spread outward and grow and generate new love and life. Accordingly, this loving communion of three persons in one divine being, although complete in Himself, chose to share His love even more and create mankind -- the God of Truth and Love is, by His nature, the Creator.

There is only one source of true love, and that is God. Saint John makes this clear when he declares that "God is love" (1 Jn 4:8,16). He was not simply saying that God loves us, but that the very being of God is love. Here we find ourselves before the most dazzling revelation of the source of love, the mystery of the Trinity: in God, one and triune, there is an everlasting exchange of love between the persons of the Father and the Son, and this love is not an energy or a sentiment, but it is a person; it is the Holy Spirit.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Message for World Youth Day 2007

Thanks to the Holy Spirit, who helps us understand Jesus' words and guides us to the whole truth (cf. Jn 14: 26; 16: 13), believers can experience, so to speak, the intimacy of God himself, discovering that He is not infinite solitude but communion of light and love, life given and received in an eternal dialogue between the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit - Lover, Loved and Love, to echo St Augustine.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus, 11 June 2006

By understanding the Trinity, we understand not only who and what God is, but we also gain an understanding of who we are as human persons because man, male and female, is made in the image and likeness of God, that is, we are each made in the image and likeness of the Trinity. To be made in the image of the Triune God means to be made in the image of truth and love. We are made to love and be loved in truth.

As demonstrated by the fullness of love in the Trinity, and as revealed by the spousal meaning of the human body, male and female, this love we are made for is not merely relational, but is a love which is unitive and procreative, a love which draws the individual toward a communion of persons and bears the fruits of not only new biological life, but also eternal life, as well as more and new love, and generosity, kindness, gentleness, patience, goodness, faithfulness, chastity, modesty, self-control, joy, and peace.

____________________

See also --
Immaculate Mary, the Virgin Mother
St. Joseph and the Fullness of Love in the Theology of the Body
Our Father in Heaven
____________________

UPDATED:

Homily of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI
Pastoral Visit to the Diocese of San Marino-Montefeltro
Holy Trinity Sunday, June 19, 2011

Today we celebrate the feast of the Holy Trinity: God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. When one thinks of the Trinity, what comes to mind is the mystery of the God who is Three in One, one God in three Persons. But today's liturgy draws our attention to the reality of love that is contained in this first and greatest mystery of our faith. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one, because God is love: the Father gives everything to the Son, the Son receives everything from the Father with gratitude, and the Holy Spirit is like the fruit of this mutual love between the Father and Son.

The texts of today’s Holy Mass speak of this love; they do not dwell so much on the three divine Persons - there is only one sentence in the Second reading which refers to them - but on the love which constitutes their essence.

The first passage that we heard from the Book of Exodus, and on which I focused in a recent Wednesday catechesis, is surprising because the revelation of God’s love takes place after the people had committed a serious sin. The covenant of Mount Sinai has just been sealed, and already the people are lacking in faithfulness to God. As Moses is kept away, the people ask Aaron to make a god who is visible, accessible, manageable, made to man’s measure. Aaron agrees and makes a golden calf.

Coming down from Mount Sinai, Moses sees what has happened and breaks the tablets of the covenant, the two stones on which the "Ten Commandments" were written, the concrete content of the covenant with God. All seems lost, all friendship broken. Yet, despite having committed the gravest of sins, God, through the intercession of Moses, decides to forgive His people and calls Moses to ascend the mountain once more to receive His law, the Ten Commandments.

Moses then asks God to reveal Himself, to show him His face. But God does not reveal His face, rather He reveals the fullness of His goodness with these words: "The LORD, the LORD, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity" (Ex 34.8). This self-definition of God manifests His merciful love, a love that conquers sin, covers it, eliminates it. There can be no clearer revelation. We have a God who renounces the destruction of the sinner and wants to show His love in an even more profound and surprising way right in front of the sinner in order to always offer the possibility of conversion and forgiveness.

The Gospel completes this revelation, because it indicates the extent to which God has shown His mercy. The evangelist John refers to this statement of Jesus: "God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life" (3:16).

In the world there is evil, there is selfishness, there is wickedness, and so God might come to judge the world, to destroy evil, to punish those who work in darkness. Instead He shows He loves the world, He loves man, despite his sinfulness, and sends what is His most precious possession: His only begotten Son. He not only sends Him, but He makes a gift to the world.

Jesus is the Son of God who is born for us, who lived for us, who healed the sick, forgave sins, welcomed everyone. Responding to the love that comes from the Father, the Son gave His life for us: on the cross the merciful love of God comes to a climax. And it is on the cross that the Son of God obtains for us the possibility of sharing in eternal life, which is communicated to us with the gift of the Holy Spirit.

So, in the mystery of the cross, there are three Divine Persons: the Father, who gave his only begotten Son for the salvation of the world, the Son, who carries out the will of the Father to the very end and the Holy Spirit - poured out by Jesus at the moment of his death - who comes to render us participants in divine life, to transform our lives, so that our lives are animated by divine love.

Dear brothers and sisters! Faith in the Triune God has also characterized this church of San Marino-Montefeltro, in the course of its ancient and glorious history. . . . You are rightly proud of and grateful for what the Holy Spirit has worked through the ages in your church. But you also know that the best way to appreciate a legacy is to cultivate and enrich it. In fact, you are called to develop this precious deposit in one of the most decisive moments in history.

Today, your mission is having to deal with profound and rapid cultural, social, economic and political transformations that have determined new reference points and changed attitudes, customs and sensibilities. Even here, in fact, as elsewhere, there are difficulties and obstacles, mainly due to hedonistic models, which cloud the mind and threaten to undo all morality. The temptation has crept in to believe that the wealth of man is not the faith, but his personal and social power, his intelligence, his culture and his ability to manipulate scientific, technological and social realities. Thus, in these lands, the Christian faith and values have begun to be replaced ​​with a presumed wealth, which in the end reveals itself inconsistent and incapable of containing the great promise of truth, goodness, of beauty and justice, which for centuries your ancestors identified with the experience of faith. Moreover the many families in crisis must not be forgotten, compounded by a widespread psychological and spiritual fragility of spouses, as well as the fatigue experienced by many educators in their attempts to ensure continuity in the formation of young people, conditioned by various uncertainties, first among all their role in society and employment opportunities.

Dear friends! I know well the commitment of every member of this Church, especially in promoting Christian life in its various aspects. I urge all the faithful to be like leaven in the world, showing both in Montefeltro and San Marino that you are present, proactive and consistent Christians. . . . I invoke God's blessing on your journey of today and tomorrow and I recommend all to "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit" (2 Cor 13:11). Amen!

.

Why God Became Man

In our Lord Jesus Christ, God became man -- Jesus is fully God, yet fully man.

Why did God become man?

In his book, The Belief of Catholics, Msgr. Ronald Knox writes, "God became Man in order that, dying, he might atone for our sins, and win us the graces normally necessary to the attainment of salvation."

This is one hundred percent, absolutely fundamental, true Church doctrine. To be sure, the name Jesus (Joshua or Yeshua in Hebrew) means "God saves."

That being said, if Adam and Eve had never sinned, if all of mankind was still totally innocent, even frolicking fancy free in the Garden (with no shame), would God still have become man?

Certainly He would not do so for salvation purposes, there would be no need to, but could there be another reason that God became man?

Despite the "what if" and highly speculative nature of the question, there are good reasons for thinking that He would have. Salvation is not the only reason for Emmanuel, God with us. It seems that He because man also because He loves us and wanted to join us to Him more fully.

Pope Benedict speaks of the Annunciation as a marriage proposal. There is something in that -- that Jesus wanted to "marry" humanity. God wanted to establish, not merely a parental relationship with us, but a spousal relationship as well, the fullness of love in a communion of persons that is both unitive and fruitful. In love, He wanted to join fully with humanity, not merely spiritually, which is only partially, but in the fullness of our being, spirit and body, two become one, wholly apart from the issue of salvation. (See also CCC 456 et seq.)

We have need of a savior, of course, because of mankind rejecting God. Early on, Adam and Eve, not satisfied with being mere creatures, ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge because they wanted to be like gods themselves. It was this Original Sin that ushered in death -- real death, not merely death of the physical body, but eternal death -- because the very nature of sin is to separate us from God, who is Life itself. Consequently, because He loves us, God sent us His only Son, Jesus Christ, who is the salvation of the world.

The irony of Adam and Eve sinning by wanting to be like gods (which ultimately is the root of every sin that we commit) is that it didn't have to be that way. It did not have to be a sin. The irony is that God Himself wants us to be like gods! (CCC 460)

As St. Athanasius wrote, "The Son of God became man so that we might become God." (De Incarnatione Verbi Dei 54, 3: PG 25, 192B) Likewise, St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, "The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that He, made man, might make men gods." (Opusc. 57, 1-4)

The problem is that we (mankind) wanted and want to be gods on our own terms. We want to be gods by our own will, by our own doing. We want our divinity to be self-actualized, without the involvement of He who is already God.

God does want us to be "gods," but He wants us to be gods on His terms, He wants us to be gods by His doing. Not because He is a "jealous God" who can't bear to have competition, but because He is Truth. He is the One and only God, thus, only He can make us like "gods."

For us to be gods on our own, by our own doing (or for us to be our own saviors, to attain salvation all by our own merits) would not be consistent with truth, it would be a lie, it would be contrary to the very idea of God. No, to be true, man can become gods only by the action of the God who is Truth.

We can become gods only by God joining us to Himself, by Him taking us unto Himself in the entirety of our being -- our soul joined to His Spirit, our body joined to His Body -- so that we are in Him and He is in us to such a degree that we truly are a loving communion of persons, no longer separate and apart, but two become one, not merely in a symbolic or poetic sense, but in a very real, authentic and true sense.

"Be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect," Jesus said. Only God is perfect, but by joining fully in communion with Him, in allowing ourselves to be truly sanctified by the Spirit of Sanctification, we can be made perfect as commanded by Jesus. The Lord does not demand the impossible of us, He makes the "impossible" possible. He makes us imperfect humans perfect, He -- and only He -- makes us like gods.
.

The Efficacy of Prayer and the Mystery of the Eternal Nature of God

If you pray for a sick person, does that move God to heal him or her, or is that something that He would have done anyway? Does prayer have any real effect on God and what He does, or is it merely an academic exercise? I mean, what's the point?

The juxtaposition of the eternal nature of God, causality, and free will (since the eternal nature of God knowing what we will do before we do it implicates the question of free will) does indeed appear to present a theological quandary. In the area of prayers of petition and intercession, we run smack dab into the mystery of eternity and the interaction between eternity and the temporality in which we humans exist.
(a) On the one hand, being eternal, existing outside of and beyond linear time, God knows what will happen "before" it happens because, for Him, it has already happened. Moreover, being perfect, God does not make mistakes. And to "change one's mind" is to say, to some extent, that one was wrong before.
(b) On the other hand, Jesus clearly and expressly said, "ask and you shall receive" and "to pray always without becoming weary." (Mt. 7:7-8, Lk 18:1-7) And the prayer He commended to us, the "Our Father," contains many requests that God do this or that. There are multiple occasions too in the Old Testament where the Lord says that He is acting because He has heard the cries and prayers of His people. Moreover, we have the authority of Christ's holy Church, as guided by the Holy Spirit, which has taught from the earliest days that we should offer our prayers to God, including prayers of petition and intercession. (See CCC 2629-36) All of this does suggest that prayer has an effect on God, that He does do things in response to prayer that He might not have done if the prayer were not made.

So, these are complex questions, with seemingly contradictory answers. But, at the risk of confusing the issue further, and leaving aside the question of the effect of prayer on the person who prays, rather than on the person prayed for, here are three possible affirmative responses to these questions, and a couple of other points.

(1) (a) Prayer is not at all an academic exercise, but the question of whether prayer affects the actions of the eternal God does appear to be an academic question. God may do X only because we have prayed for Him to do X. However, being eternal, God already knows what happens before it happens. So, He knew not only what He was going to do, He already knew that we would pray for X before we asked for it. Conversely, if we did not pray for X, then God might not do X, but He knows that too before we fail to pray it. Either way, God already knowing what we are going to do before we do it doesn't mean that our prayers do not have an effect on what He might or might not do.

Prayer does have a real effect on God, even if it might appear, because of the mystery of eternity, that it does not.

That is, it might appear that our prayer does not have any real effect on what God is going to do in the sense that, being timeless, God already knows what He is going to do (from the human temporal perspective) and, indeed, has already done (from God’s out-of-time perspective). It might appear that prayer does not lead to God to do something, like save someone's life, if He was not going to already do it.

However, God not only knows what He is going to do before you pray for it, He also knows that you are going to make that prayer (or not). So when God chooses to act or not, He does so with the foreknowledge of your prayer or lack thereof. Being eternal and transcendent of time, so that everything that has ever happened and ever will happen in the human timeline is in God’s present, all of time being a singularity, the fact that He already knows and has already done it does not mean that what we have prayed for did not play a factor in whether it was done or not.

But let us set aside this mystery of eternity interacting with temporality, which mostly results in tying ourselves up in knots and, therefore confuses the issue.

(b) Instead, let us consider that it is clear that there are conditions precedent to some of God’s actions. You must do something, namely ask and/or accept, before He will do those actions. A prime example of this is the gift of grace. The gift of grace from God is not an action. It is a transaction. God does not unilaterally confer grace upon someone. That would be an imposition contrary to love. Rather, for grace to be conferred, (1) you must ask God for it and, once offered, (2) you must accept the gift. If you don’t ask and you don’t accept, you will not get it (that said, Jesus has already indicated that He stands ready to give it if we ask, so our asking, like any prayer, is really in response to His initiative).

It is not a case of God merely doing what He would have done anyway. Without your doing that condition precedent of asking or accepting, He would not have done it, even if He does know what the ultimate outcome is before it happens. God already knew that Mary would say “yes,” but that does not mean that her “yes” was not required, and was not freely given, before the Holy Spirit would come upon her.

The same might hold true for prayers of petition and intercession, as in the case of a person who is sick and suffering. The prior request for, and assent to, the grace of healing might be necessary, inasmuch as God does not impose Himself upon us against our will.

That said, whether God has in fact intervened in a given situation and altered what would have happened if He had not intervened is ultimately a matter of faith. It cannot be submitted to the scientific method. God cannot be put under the microscope. Either one believes that a healing was miraculous or he doesn’t. “All I know is that I was blind, and now I see.”

(2) Although God, and God alone, provides us salvation (in Christ), and although He is all-powerful, dependent upon none, He has chosen to need the assistance of humanity to accomplish the work of salvation. God has chosen not to do it all by Himself -- He wants our help. He wants us to participate in saving others by, among other things, praying for them, which has the transcendent effect of joining all the faithful together as one in communion with God.

Indeed, in the Sacrament of Confirmation, where Jesus asks us to join in the mission of the Church to be a witness for Him, we see that God has very much chosen to need the help and participation of humanity in saving others. God doesn't need our help, but He wants our help. He has chosen to depend upon us, including in the work of salvation. He has chosen to make this a group effort. Or, if you will, a family effort. The Almighty does not need our help, but He asks for it anyway. And if we do not provide that help, it isn't going to be done.

We see this in the very fact that He depended upon Mary for His very life, and depended upon her and Joseph to raise Jesus. The Jesus who saves by the Cross and Resurrection is always the Baby Jesus as well. The Baby Jesus who requires us to help Him.

If Mary didn't help God; if Mary didn't say "yes" and carry Jesus in her womb, and raise Him and teach Him and feed Him and clothe Him and shelter Him, the salvation of the world would have never come. God chose to need her. God chooses to need us.

Prayer for other people helps Him. Not because He needs our help, but because He wants our help. He wants that help, He wants us to love one another and care about the welfare of one another. Jesus wants us to pray for others -- the key part of "ask and you shall receive" is not the "receive" part, but the "ask" part. In the parables about the woman who keeps bothering the judge until he rules in her favor (Lk 18:1-7) and the man who pesters his reluctant friend in the middle of the night to give him some bread (Lk 11:5-8), Jesus tells us to be persistent in prayer. If we do not do things like pray, that help for others might not get done. That God already knows what we will do and what He will do does not detract from that. We need to help Him help them. We need to pray.

(3) Prayer also has a very real effect because God made us as social beings, He made us to exist, not in isolation, not in individualistic solitude, but in communion -- in communion not only with Him, but if each of us is one with Him, we are necessarily one with each other.

Even if God does not intervene to physically heal the person, our prayers are made use of. He does, in fact, do something that He would not have done had the prayers not been made. Implicit in prayer is love, inasmuch as prayer is communication with God, i.e. communion with Him, an exchange of love with Him. In His compassion, God is already with the sick and suffering. Such that when we pray for them in loving communion with God, that love is further communicated through Him to the sick person.

If we pray for the sick, if we give our love for that person to God, then He will convey that love of ours -- and the implicit power of healing in love -- to the sick person. However, if we do not pray for the sick, then God cannot convey such love to him or her since it has not been given to Him.

(4) Notwithstanding the widespread assertion that God listens to and answers every prayer (even if He sometimes says "no"), actually, on occasion, God purposely does not answer our prayers. In the case of one making a good faith prayer, He will listen, but He might not respond, at least not right away. We have only to look at not a few of the great saints who have experienced the "dark night of the soul" to understand this. Sometimes, God will withdraw. You may call out, "God? Are you there?" And receive nothing but silence in return. It does not mean that God has abandoned you. Sometimes, He will withdraw so that you might go looking for Him.

(5) One other point about prayer needs to be noted. God also sometimes will not even listen, sometimes He pays no attention to what we ask of Him. God is under no obligation to listen to or answer a "prayer" that borders on being blasphemous by being improper and inappropriate. Consider what happened when Herod effectively prayed that Jesus perform tricks for him --

"When Herod saw Jesus, he was greatly pleased, because for a long time he had been wanting to see Him. From what he had heard about Him, he hoped to see Him perform some miracle. He plied Him with many questions, but Jesus gave him no answer." -- Luke 23:8-9

Jesus, that is, God, gave Herod the attention he deserved -- none. If we similarly impiously make demands upon Him, if we effectively take His name in vain and put Him to the test, insisting that He prove His love for us, He is under no obligation to listen.

(6) Finally, and most importantly, we need to remember that God is Love. God loves us. That's what He does. And He wants only what is good for us. Always, and in all things. And He does not abandon us. In that same lesson where Jesus says, "ask and you shall receive," He also says,

"Which one of you would hand his son a stone when he asks for a loaf of bread, or a snake when he asks for a fish? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him." (Mt. 7:7-11)

God loves us. And when we say, "Thy will be done," as we should in all prayer, we should know that His will is always to love us in truth. Thus, even if it were the case that our prayers to Him had no effect on His actions, even if He were to do whatever it is that He is going to do regardless, He nevertheless wants what is good for us and He does what is good for us. He will not abandon us, He will not leave us alone in misery.

In His mercy (from the Latin miserere, meaning "to alleviate misery"), and His compassion (from the Latin "com," meaning "with," and passio, meaning "to suffer"), God suffers with us, as we most graphically see with Jesus taking on humanity and suffering on the Cross. And by the transformative power of His love, our misery is turned into hope, and then ultimately into joy in eternal life, where "He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain." (Rev. 21:4) God loves us, so even if He were to ignore our faithful prayers (which He does not), still we should not lose hope -- He Himself provides the hope. And such faithful prayer would not be in vain or otherwise pointless, loving communion with God in prayer is never in vain.

__________________________

See also, Effects of prayer, Catholic Encyclopedia
C.S. Lewis, "The Efficacy of Prayer" (1959), reprinted in The World's Last Night
St. Augustine, Sermon 30 (LXXX. Ben.) (Augustine here asks "What is the use of prayer at all, if our Father knows already what things we have need of? . . . Why weary ourselves in asking, and seeking, and knocking, to instruct Him who knows already?" His conclusion is that we should indeed ask, we should pray, but his explanation is rather hard to follow.)
St. Alphonsus Ligouri, Necessity and Power of Prayer (Alphonsus says that, not only is God moved by prayer, but that without prayer, we cannot obtain the help (grace) necessary for salvation. "Hence it is that the generality of theologians, following St. Basil, St. Chrysostom, Clement of Alexandria, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, teach that prayer is necessary to adults, not only because of the obligation of the precept (as they say), but because it is necessary as a means of salvation. That is to say, in the ordinary course of Providence, it is impossible that a Christian should be saved without recommending himself to God, and asking for the graces necessary to salvation.")
.

Love and Truth – the Nature and Attributes of God

Adult Confirmation Class One
May 4, 2011

A. Knowledge of the Nature of God

The unavoidable question of life is whether or not God exists. To arrive at a correct answer to that mystifying question, one must, of course, have a proper conception of whom or what God is. It is quite easy to reject any belief in God if all you know is a caricature of Him, rather than the reality. The problem is that, while the mere existence of God is knowable by reason, reason is necessarily limited by what is already known or by what can be imagined. However, reason can be enlightened by revelation -- someone simply revealing truth to us -- helping us to know who and what it is that we seek, that is, helping us to have that proper conception of God, at least to the extent that we can comprehend, conceding that the full extent of the nature of God is beyond our limited human comprehension, which we call "mystery."

Of course, to accept such revelation as reliable, one must necessarily have faith. That said, faith and reason are not incompatible. Faith helps reason to discover itself. As Pope Benedict has pointed out, the search for truth in any endeavor never starts from zero, but always presupposes a trust in knowledge, ideas, and data which we cannot always control by ourselves. Faith implies reason and perfects it, and reason, illuminated by faith, finds the strength to rise to knowledge of the transcendent, God and other spiritual realities. Human reason loses nothing when it is open to the contents of revealed faith.

Also, when one simply "takes it on faith" that God exists, then it all starts making sense. As St. Augustine discovered, belief leads to understanding, which in turn
leads to greater belief. Once we simply flip the switch of faith, the light comes on, and we can see, thereby confirming that we were right to trust. Thus, in
answering the question of God, it is good to consult revelation as a starting point from which our reason can determine whether this is a truth to which we should
give our assent. It is only by Divine Revelation (the Bible and Sacred Tradition, as authoritatively interpreted and understood by the Magisterium, which is guided by the Holy Spirit) that we can have a greater and proper understanding of the mystery of the nature of God.

B. Divine Revelation – God Reveals to Mankind What and Who He is

(1) The Fullness of Being – Truth itself – “I am” – God is
Ex. 3:13-15 – Moses said to God, "When I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' if they ask me, 'What is His name?' what am I to tell them?" God replied, "I am who am." Then He added, "This is what you shall tell the Israelites: I AM sent me to you." God spoke further to Moses, "Thus shall you say to the Israelites: The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. "This is my name forever; this is my title for all generations.”

(2) The Word – Logos – Creative Reason
John 1:1-4 – In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing came to be. What came to be through Him was life, and this life was the light of the human race.

(3) Deus Caritas Est – God is Love
1 Jn. 4:7-9 – Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love. In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him.

(4) Creator – source of all that exists
Gen. 1:1-3 – In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless wasteland, and darkness covered the abyss, while a mighty wind swept over the waters. Then God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.

(5) Beginning and end of all, making all things new
Rev. 21:5-6 – The one who sat on the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new." Then He said, "Write these words down, for they are trustworthy and true." He said to me, "They are accomplished. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.”

As set out above, Divine Revelation informs us that:
(1) God told Moses that He is the "I am." What does this reveal about God? It means that God, as the "I am," is the Ultimate Reality, complete in Himself and, therefore, One. He is Being itself and is therefore Truth itself. Indeed, if something lacks truth, it lacks reality and existence. This Truth is the first principle, from which all else follows. Referring to Himself as the "I am," shows that God is a transcendent conscious reality that has a name, an identity, that is, He is not merely philosophical truth, not merely a cosmic force, but a personal being. He is not merely a what, but a who.
(2) God, that is to say, Jesus Christ, is also the Word, that is, Logos (Creative Reason), and as such, is again Truth itself from which everything that exists proceeds. And yet again, He is (5) the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and end of all things. In Him, all things are made new.
(3) However, Revelation informs us that God is not merely Truth, He is also Love. And this is demonstrated again and again in salvation history, in our creation and in our salvation. And it is in and by the power of that Love, that He is (4) the Creator and ultimate source of all that is.

C. The Nature of God

From Revelation, reason allows us to discern the nature of God --

(1) One and Complete in Himself – noncontingent, dependent upon nothing, in need of nothing beyond Himself

(2) Only Necessary Being – the creator, source and sustainer of all that exists

(a) God created the universe ex nihilo (out of nothing)
(b) Divine Providence – God continues to sustain and interact with His creation
(c) God is Life itself – we are not the accidental products of an impersonal universe, rather, we are each created by the thought of God as an act of love, and we have life because He has breathed His Spirit into us.

(3) God has a Name – He is not merely a what, but is a who, that is, God is a conscious, intelligent, and personal being; He is not a mere cosmic force.

(4) Transcendent Spirit

(a) noncorporeal, nonmaterial
(b) God exists in and beyond space (the physical universe) and time

(5) God is Truth – God "is"

(a) His name reveals Him to be Being itself, existence itself – Ultimate Reality
(b) The Word – Logos, a Greek term meaning “reason” (from which we get “logic”)
(c) As truth, God embodies justice and order

(6) God is Total Perfect Love in Person

(a) The Love of God is total and perfect love in its truest and fullest sense, a “spousal” type of love that is unitive and fruitful/procreative, encompassing both the unconditional, gratuitous, and sacrificial love of agape (caritas), and the joyous wanting love of a purified and ennobled eros.
(b) The Love of God is unitive - love is by its very nature relational, and total perfect love in its truest and fullest sense involves not merely a relation of persons, but a communion of persons, whereby many become one.
(c) The Love of God is fruitful (procreative) – love in its fullest sense is naturally fruitful, it is not stagnant or sterile, but instead seeks to spread outward and grow and generate new love and life.
(d) Divine Mercy – God is ever merciful

D. The Perfections of God

Assisted by Revelation, reason also informs us of certain perfections of God --

(1) Holy and All Good
(2) Omnipotent (almighty, all powerful)
(3) Omniscient (all knowing)
(4) Transcendent and Infinite

This One Truth who is also Love is eternal and transcendent, not bounded by time or space. He is pure, infinite, unbounded spirit. The only “limit” to the all-powerful God is that He cannot be contrary to Himself – He is not and cannot be or act contrary to truth or love because He is Truth and Love. Thus, He cannot be unreasonable or irrational or unjust or the source or cause of evil.
(5) Omnipresent - God transcends and is not bounded by the physical universe, such that He can and does exist in all places
(6) Eternal – God transcends and is not bounded by temporality

God exists beyond and outside of space - the physical universe - and because time is a measurement of changes in space, He exists both in and outside of time. He is simultaneously the beginning and the end. For God, time is not linear, as for humans, but is both a singularity and a totality. All moments are for Him in the present. "Eternity" does not mean "forever," but instead means being above and beyond time. Thus, God is not some ancient being who is more than 20 billion years old, but is instead always "new." For Him, all things exist simultaneously, and each moment exists in perpetuity -- thus, for example, Jesus was not merely crucified 2,000 years ago (as it appears from a human perspective), but rather, being eternal, He is hanging on the Cross even now and yet, He is simultaneously also rising from the dead, and leading us into the New Jerusalem.

E. The Holy Trinity – one God in three persons

Most importantly, Revelation informs us that the Lord God is a Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Here we see the necessity for revealed truth, for this could not be known purely by observation and reason. But having been revealed to us, reason allows us to now have a greater understanding that God is a loving communion of three distinct persons in one undivided nature, substance, and essence – each possesses the fullness of the other and each has always existed.

The Trinity is a mystery - one that we should always respect in trying to understand it, so that our imperfect attempts at explanation do not inadvertently lead us to stray into error. Nevertheless, since ours is a faith that seeks understanding, we should not simply come to a halt when confronted with a mystery, but should instead proceed ahead to seek understanding, but with caution.

Although a mystery, we can begin to grasp some understanding of the Trinity by understanding that God is Truth and Love. Because God is Truth and Complete, He is One. But He is also Love and love is by its very nature relational – it requires an “other.” That is, love is not self-oriented, but must extend outward -- an "other" is required for love to exist, one who loves and one who is loved. Love does not exist in a vacuum.

Accordingly, God is not a one-dimensional being who exists in solitude, but, rather, being Truth and Love, and complete in Himself, He exists as one person (Father) who loves and is loved by a second person (Son), and this everlasting love proceeding from and to each of them is not merely a sentiment, but is a person as well, namely, the Holy Spirit.

Such complete and perfect love, love in its truest and fullest sense, is both unitive and fruitful. It involves not merely a relation of persons, but a communion of persons -- three are one. This love is also fruitful, that is, it is creative. Love is dynamic, not static, and it bears fruit. Thus, this loving communion of three persons in one divine being, although complete in Himself, chose to share His love even more and create mankind.

There is only one source of true love, and that is God. Saint John makes this clear when he declares that "God is love" (1 Jn 4:8,16). He was not simply saying that God loves us, but that the very being of God is love. Here we find ourselves before the most dazzling revelation of the source of love, the mystery of the Trinity: in God, one and triune, there is an everlasting exchange of love between the persons of the Father and the Son, and this love is not an energy or a sentiment, but it is a person; it is the Holy Spirit.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Message for World Youth Day 2007

Thanks to the Holy Spirit, who helps us understand Jesus' words and guides us to the whole truth (cf. Jn 14: 26; 16: 13), believers can experience, so to speak, the intimacy of God himself, discovering that He is not infinite solitude but communion of light and love, life given and received in an eternal dialogue between the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit - Lover, Loved and Love, to echo St Augustine.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus, 11 June 2006

Hanukkah and the Light of ChristThe Rededication of the Temple and the Festival of Lights

Hanukkah begins this evening, December 1, 2010, at sundown (remembering that the Jewish day begins at sundown).

The Jewish Feast of Dedication (Hanukkah) was instituted in the year 165 B.C. It is celebrated annually as a memorial of the rededication of the Temple with a new altar and purification of the sanctuary. Three years earlier, Antiochus Epiphanes had caused a pagan altar to be set up at the altar of burnt offerings in the Temple and sacrifices to be offered to his idol, called "Zeus Olympius."

The Maccabean revolt followed, led by Judas Maccabeus (Yehuda HaMakabi, "Judah the Hammer"). After many battles, the Holy City of Jerusalem and the Temple were recovered.

1 Maccabees 4:36-59

Judas Maccabeus and his brothers said, "Now that our enemies have been crushed, let us go up to purify the sanctuary and rededicate it." So the whole army assembled, and went up to Mount Zion. They found the sanctuary desolate, the altar desecrated, the gates burnt, weeds growing in the courts as in a forest or on some mountain, and the priests' chambers demolished.

Then they tore their clothes and made great lamentation; they sprinkled their heads with ashes and fell with their faces to the ground. And when the signal was given with trumpets, they cried out to Heaven.

Judas appointed men to attack those in the citadel, while he purified the sanctuary. He chose blameless priests, devoted to the law; these purified the sanctuary and carried away the stones of the Abomination to an unclean place.

They deliberated what ought to be done with the altar of holocausts that had been desecrated. The happy thought came to them to tear it down, lest it be a lasting shame to them that the Gentiles had defiled it; so they tore down the altar. They stored the stones in a suitable place on the temple hill, until a prophet should come and decide what to do with them.

Then they took uncut stones, according to the law, and built a new altar like the former one. They also repaired the sanctuary and the interior of the temple and purified the courts. They made new sacred vessels and brought the lampstand, the altar of incense, and the table into the temple. Then they burned incense on the altar and lighted the lamps on the lampstand, and these illuminated the temple. They also put loaves on the table and hung up curtains. Thus they finished all the work they had undertaken.

Early in the morning on the twenty-fifth day of the ninth month, that is, the month of Chislev, in the year one hundred and forty-eight, they arose and offered sacrifice according to the law on the new altar of holocausts that they had made. On the anniversary of the day on which the Gentiles had defiled it, on that very day it was reconsecrated with songs, harps, flutes, and cymbals. All the people prostrated themselves and adored and praised Heaven, who had given them success.

For eight days they celebrated the dedication of the altar and joyfully offered holocausts and sacrifices of deliverance and praise. They ornamented the facade of the temple with gold crowns and shields; they repaired the gates and the priests' chambers and furnished them with doors. There was great joy among the people now that the disgrace of the Gentiles was removed.

Then Judas and his brothers and the entire congregation of Israel decreed that the days of the dedication of the altar should be observed with joy and gladness on the anniversary every year for eight days, from the twenty-fifth day of the month Chislev. (see also 2 Macc 1:18-2:19; 10:1-8)

Hanukkah, from the Hebrew word for "dedication" or "consecration", is also known as the Festival of Lights due to a miracle that allowed the Eternal Light of the Temple to burn for eight days, even though there was only enough oil to last one day.

This miracle is recounted in the Talmud (Shabbat 2),

The rabbis taught: On the twenty-fifth day of Kislev, Hanukkah commences and lasts eight days, on which lamenting (in commemoration of the dead) and fasting are prohibited. When the Hellenists entered the sanctuary, they defiled all the oil that was found there. When the government of the House of Asmoneans prevailed and conquered them, oil was sought (to feed the holy lamp in the sanctuary) and only one vial was found with the seal of the high priest intact. The vial contained sufficient oil for one day only, but a miracle occurred, and it fed the holy lamp eight days in succession. These eight days were the following year established as days of good cheer, on which psalms of praise and acknowledgment (of God's wonders) were to be recited.

The Eternal Light of the Temple represented God's everlasting presence, just as the sanctuary lamp placed before the tabernacle containing the Blessed Sacrament in Catholic churches is kept lit to indicate and honor the presence of Christ. In the synagogue, a perpetual lamp signifies the Lord's presence in the Torah, the Word of God.

Although a Jewish holiday -- one celebrated by Jesus -- Hanukkah can also be a time for Christians to remember that it is God Himself who is a Light that is everlasting and can never be extinguished. These days of rededication and the manifestation of God's eternal light remind us that evil will be defeated and, even if the evil has defiled the good, in the meantime, God cannot be defeated. His light is everlasting. More than light from oil, which runs out, His is the Eternal Light which cannot be extinguished. Thus, this is a time of hope.

It is fitting, then, that we observe this celebration of the Light as we await in Advent the birth and revelation to the world of the Light Incarnate -- God from God, Light from Light.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

.

"Why didn’t the Father come to save us Himself?"

When he was much younger, Msgr. Charles Pope, asked, "Why didn’t the Father come to save us himself?"

Many years ago, when I was just a teenager I remember being puzzled by the oft quoted John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son . . .” Now everyone used this verse to demonstrate how much God loved us. But I got stuck thinking, “What kind of a Father is this that he sends his Son to suffer horribly and die!?” My own Father wouldn’t send me in harm’s way, he’d go and face the threat and protect me. But God the Father sent his Son to do the hard and dirty work, to get slaughtered and die. Why? Why didn’t the Father come to save us himself?

As I asked this question no one had a real answer. Even the priests looked at me like they didn’t understand my question. As the years went by I eventually connected the dots and found the answer. But recently I was reminded of my question as some one asked me, “Why didn’t the Father come to save us himself?”

The answer really comes down to one word, a word we’re not so good at understanding in these modern times. The word is “obedience.” The simple answer is that the Father cannot obey the Father, only the Son can do that. For it is not just the suffering of Christ per se that saves us, it is his obedience that saves us. . . .

And why such terrible suffering? Here too some get stuck on thinking that God is blood thristy. We need not conclude this any more that we would conclude such a thing of a surgeon. The surgeon clearly makes use of radical proceedures, slicing open the body, sawing through bones, cutting out flesh and the like. But strong medicine is needed when the situation is grave. Rather than looking at the crucifixion and saying, God has a problem (i.e. he is blood-thirsty) we ought to see how desperate our problem is. Sin is a very serious condition and we should not make light of it. In order to resolve our problem, God had to resort to this. . . .

"Why didn’t the Father come to save us himself?"

It seems to me that the premise of the question (or maybe a related question) is:
Why is there a Son?

(And how are they, or why do we call them, “Father” and “Son”?)

Of course, God is Love, and love is relationship, love requires an other, hence the Trinity, where the Father loves the Son, and the Son loves the Father, and the love that proceeds from the Father and the Son is a Person as well, a loving communion of three persons in one divine nature. And, of course, this understanding, the knowledge that God is a Trinity, would never have come about if Jesus had not Himself revealed the existence of this Son-Father relationship.

Whether we called them Father and Son, or Person 1 and Person 2, someone needed to do it, if anyone was going to come to save us. If the Father had come, we might as well ask, why didn’t the Son come? And the answer for many might end up being that He is a lazy good-for-nothing just lying around heaven not doing much of anything.

Given that God is Love, God is relationship, and the whole purpose of this Creation Project of God’s is relationship, reason suggests that it had to be the Son because it had to be an act of love. Love is an act of self-giving, it is service, it is obedience, doing what those you love want or need doing.

"And why such terrible suffering?"

Because God is not only Love, God is Truth. And the truth is that sin exists. Sin exists and it has evil effects, sin causes horrific suffering. The effect of sin is made manifest in Christ’s flesh. God takes that horror, caused by man, upon Himself. Had God instead simply waved His divine hand, that would have been a lie. To simply pretend that the sin did not happen, that sin does not have horrific consequences, would have been wholly contrary to truth. And it would have been contrary to that aspect of truth which is justice.

The sin happened, the window was broken. You can forgive throwing the ball through the window, but you cannot simply act as if there is not a gaping hole in the glass. To pretend like the window is not still broken, even after forgiveness, is to allow the rain and snow to come in. The truth is that the window is broken, the scales of justice must be balanced, justice requires a return to the status quo — an unbroken window. Thus, truth is, and justice demands, that someone needs to suffer all the trouble to fix it.

Jesus volunteered for the job. Jesus takes the reality of sin, the truth of evil and the horrific consequences of sin, upon Himself so that we do not have to take it upon ourselves. As Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger said immediately before he was elected Pope, in Jesus on the Cross, love and truth coincide.

Christ's mercy is not a grace that comes cheap, nor does it imply the trivialization of evil. Christ carries the full weight of evil and all its destructive force in His Body and in His Soul. He burns and transforms evil in suffering, in the fire of His suffering love. The day of vindication and the year of favour converge in the Paschal Mystery, in the dead and Risen Christ. This is the vengeance of God: He Himself suffers for us, in the person of His Son.

The truth is that suffering caused by sin exists. If Jesus doesn’t take this terrible suffering upon Himself, we have to, as a matter of truth and justice, take it upon ourselves.
.

Our Father in Heaven

The Anchoress today raises the issue of "gender-inclusive" language when referring to God.

In a former parish, there was a sister-liturgist who–eager to promote “sensitivity”–decided that the Gloria should be sung with the refrain “Glory to God in the Highest, and peace to God’s people on earth;” she was content to brutalize the ear, change a liturgical prayer that is not supposed to be changed, and disorient the people just a tad, in order that no one should be subjected to that troubling male pronoun, “His.”

I always thought it was a nonsensical point; why go to the trouble of training the people to avoid the “His” in that sung prayer, when it proceed to refer to God as “Heavenly King, Almighty God and Father,” and to Jesus as “only Son of the Father.” And of course, I got into a civil debate with her about it.

“You don’t understand,” she said kindly (because she was a very kind sister) “it’s important that we begin to think of God as having no gender at all, containing aspects of both mother and father, but not limited to our understanding as 'Father.' . . . There are a lot of people in the world who have had bad fathers, they have bad memories, a lot of people find referring to God as Father to be distancing and hurtful. They cannot relate.” . . .

Well of course God is neither male nor female, He simply IS. Even Joseph Ratzinger, called an ultra-harsh misogynist by those who knew nothing of him, has said so many times in his writings and addresses, that God, being Complete, has both paternal and maternal qualities, before and after he became Pope Benedict XVI.

However, notwithstanding this truth about the nature of God, Jesus did invite us to call God in heaven "Father," did He not?

Was Jesus wrong? Or just being insensitive or ignorant? Did He not know that a lot of people find referring to God as “Father” to be distancing and hurtful?

Besides, there is also the whole relationship between God and Israel being described in spousal terms in the Bible, with Israel being the Bride. And that same spousal relationship has described Christ and the Church since the beginning. I suppose in this day and age of same-sex "marriage," it would no longer be absurd to stop referring to God as a "He," but then we have that pesky problem of the Word of God using "He" to refer to "Him."

And the fact is that not only do a lot of people today have biological fathers who are bad and abusive, but they also have biological mothers who are mean or distant or abusive. (I won't say that my own mother is bad, she's not, but we do not have the greatest and most perfect of relationships. There are occasional tensions, as most people have with their own earthly mothers. But Jesus also said that we could call His own mother our "mother," which does not cause me to think less of Mary, but thankful that I could look to her for maternal love.) And there are plenty of brothers and sisters and neighbors and strangers and even enemies who we have bad memories of. Indeed, the world is full of jerks.

So transferring references about God to something other than "Father" or "He" really doesn't solve the problem. Whichever alternative pronoun we use has bad associations with it as well. And transferring references to some out-of-this-world concept that is totally foreign to our common understanding only ends up creating a distant and unrelatable God. That is even worse!

The spousal meaning of the body of man, male and female, being made in the likeness and image of God, reveals how we are social creatures who are made for relationship, not only any relationship, but that very special and intimate relationship which, through love, is capable of communion, a relationship which is not only unitive, but fruitful. And we are made for such relationships, not only amongst ourselves, but between mankind and God.

In that relationship with God, mankind is the "female." We are the bride, the mother. This is again revealed in the human body, which is fruitful, that is, it produces children. But we do not produce children by our own self-made fertility, we make them with the Creator of all things. We did not make ourselves, God made us. If mankind is the female, then God necessarily must accomplish the role of the "male," the bridegroom, the father. He is rightly, then, called "He." (We see this quite plainly when the Virgin Mary conceives by the power of the Holy Spirit, who thus is not to be thought of as some neutral or androgynous being, an "It", but as a "He.")

God is not really exclusively "male" or "female," of course, He is neither, and He is both. As the "I Am," He is not limited or incomplete in this way, as are humans made to be. But it is crucial that we think of Him in understandable terms of relationship -- the spousal relationship that He Himself has chosen as the model throughout all of Salvation History -- if we are to ever come close to knowing Him and being able, then, to love Him and allow Him to love us.
.

Harming God through Acts of Desecration

With news of another act of desecration of the Eucharist, comes the issue of whether God is "hurt" by such things. Our good friend Jan over at Runs with Angels asks:

What hurts Jesus? What hurts God? Is Jesus not 'beyond' being hurt, since He's already suffered the ultimate hurt? Or is the Passion in continuous motion and all these new sins and hurts keep piling on?

For that matter, it must not 'feel' too good to be chewed like cud every day. On a side note - my First Communion Nun told us to NEVER chew the Host, just leave it until it melts.

Here we confront the mystery of God become man.

On the one hand, God, being all-powerful, cannot be hurt or injured in anyway. We humans especially do not have that power over Him. All of mankind could be Hitlers and it wouldn't harm Him one bit. As such, there is no need for God to ever get "angry" or retaliate against people. References in scripture about God acting in that way are feeble human attempts to use understandable human attributes to understand a God who is beyond our comprehension and understanding.

The Commandments are not so that we won't hurt God, they are so we won't hurt ourselves. WE are the ones injured by sin, not God. And, being Love, He does not want to see us hurt ourselves. The Commandments, even the first three, are for our benefit, not His. Our service to Him is for our benefit, not His. He is complete in Himself, He has need of nothing -- He certainly doesn't "need" us to be His heavenly butlers or constantly bowing up and down at Him. He is not an egoist who needs our validation or our love. He wants our love, but He doesn't need it.

On the other hand, God became man. Fully human in all ways except sin. Jesus was and can be hurt, physically, mentally, and emotionally. "Jesus wept" at the death of Lazarus, He got frustrated repeatedly and busted up the marketplace, He knew hunger and thirst, and, of course, in His Passion, He knew excruciating physical pain, literally ("excruciating" being from the Latin for "from the cross"). Even today, Jesus bears the marks of His crucifixion in His Body. And, God being eternal, that is, transcending temporality, being outside of time, not only do all moments in human history exist simultaneously for Him, but each individual moment exists in perpetuity. Jesus did not suffer on the Cross 2000 years ago -- from His perspective, He is being scourged now, He is being nailed to the Cross now, He is hanging there now and will to the end of time. And each of our sins is another tear into His flesh. As fully human, He did not use His divinity as some sort of painkiller. So, yes, God can indeed feel pain, He can be hurt and injured. He can and does have "compassion" -- He suffers with us.

Regarding the Eucharist, He did not merely give us His Blood, He purposely gave us His Body and said, "eat" it. He knowingly took bread for this purpose, and to eat bread means to chew it up before swallowing. If He didn't want people to chew, He would have stopped at the wine become Blood. But even if chewing were inappropriate because it could somehow hurt Him, is it really any less painful to be swimming around in a pool of stomach acid after the Host is swallowed? Is using teeth any different in any significant way than using enzymes in saliva, which effectively break down, i.e. chemically chew, the Host?

As for desecration, or inadvertently dropping the Host and not being able to get each and every minute particle off the floor with a damp purificator (or spilling the Precious Blood in parishes that are foolish enough to confer it in a carpeted area (shaking his head), not to mention the minute dust particles of the Host that remain on the palm of the person who receives in the hand (all the more reason to receive Holy Communion by mouth)(after distribution, ministers of Holy Communion purify their fingers of these tiny dust particles by rinsing them in a small lavabo bowl of water)), Jesus the God-Man can indeed be hurt, but God is also incapable of being hurt. And it is fully within His power to have the Hosts "revert" back to their prior state if He were to so choose. He can avoid any contemporary injury in that respect. (It should be noted that the Real Presence already does not remain forever or even very far in the digestive process (microscopic Jesus isn't bouncing around your intestines). Rather, the Real Presence no longer remains when the "accidents" (the appearance of bread and wine) are so broken down that they are no longer compatible with the species of "bread" and "wine," whether in the stomach or if the Host is placed in a glass of water or the Precious Blood is diluted.)

Does He actually "revert back" in cases of desecration, etc.? I don't know, but He could if He were to choose to do so. I think we can safely say that God knows how to protect and take care of Himself. Rather, the injury He does suffer by the abuse of desecration of the Eucharist is by His willful act of compassion on the Cross. The desecration is all part and parcel of the Passion, which covered not only the sins that had accrued up to that point in history, but all of the future sins.

The biggest injury from desecration of the Host is to the person who engages in it. HE is the one who is harmed. It does not harm God in heaven one iota. Desecrators are not more powerful than God, they cannot shoot arrows of pain up into heaven to hurt Him. Rather, they are the ones who are injured, they are the ones who are harmed. They are the ones who will end up in the cold and dark abyss of Hell, not Him.

____________________

See also --
This post on a 2008 case of desecration of the Host
The Blessed Sacrament -- the Real Presence of the Body and Blood of Christ, Part One, and Part Two
The tabernacle as dwelling place of the Lord
What's really real in the Eucharist
Reality vs. Appearance and Seeing with God's Eyes
The Drug of Immortality and Life in Abundance
.