The tragedy of the Church is that so many of these zealous souls in earnest love of the world became secular in spirit. Having started with the world, they moved backward and used the Church as a whipping post, and Christ to justify any position they held. They used Jesus. He did not use them. Hence, countless pamphlets on "Jesus and Homosexuals", "Jesus and Amnesty", "Jesus and Sex", "Jesus and the Rebels", "Jesus and Revolution". Their commitment to Him becomes only skin deep because they "play it safe". In the rightful fervour for social dimension, the Christ-depth was lost.

This had a bad effect on those outside the Church who were admittedly men of good will. They found themselves pulled in two directions: grace pulled them to the very door of the Church where they yearned to confess their sins and stand at the foot of Calvary in the Mass. But then they looked to the pulpit where the priest who should be proclaiming Christ is discussing the plight of cities, rock music and sexual freedom, These searching souls, as a result, turned away from the Church, saying, "We can get that gospel in the world we want to leave, and get it with better grammar and less stultifying jargon".

The very ones who were right in begging the Church to be more concerned with the secular, thus became the very ones who drove some in the world away from the Church. Christianity began to appear insipid with hardly any trace left of the Spirit that cast fire upon the earth. Insensibly, the reproaches that were directed against the psychotics in the Church who refused to budge from their ways and the neurotics who wanted to speed over the precipice, become a criticism of Christianity itself.

The world does not point a finger at our weaknesses, it points it at our failure to use our strength; namely, to approach the world problems through Christ and though His Body, the Church, and not the other way around.

THE TRANSFIGURATION: CHRIST---CHURCH---WORLD

The Transfiguration of Our Lord is a perfect example of how religion is to be related to the world. First, there is Christ in the glory of His oneness with the Father; then there is the Church, represented by three disciples on the mountain and the nine disciples down below in the world struggling and helplessness.

The background of the Transfiguration is the inability of Christ to convince His priests that He was Priest-Victim. He had just come from Caesarea Philippi where Peter confessed His Divinity but denied the Cross, for which the Lord called him "Satan". That is always the business of Satan: anti-Cross.

As Jesus prays: His Face "shone like the sun". - Matt. 17:2; Luke 9:28 - His garments appeared radiant with light. His whole being was metamorphosed. The glory of the other world budded upon His Person,as He gave a preview of His Resurrection body. Moses and Elijah appear and He speaks to them about what? Of His Death! His Victim-hood! His Exodus! His Departure which He was to accomplish in Jerusalem! Jesus had been trying for a week to convince His disciples that He was a Priest Who offered Himself. They would not grasp it.

To convince them, He turns His back on the Arch of Triumph to take the route of the seed which dies in order to live again. And why? Because He loved men unto death. He did not remain in heavenly headquarters, but went into the battlefield; He would not leave it unless He could take them with Him. The Song of Songs tell us that love is stronger than death! Aye! Now love is stronger than heaven! He will remain with His own unto the end. The Transfiguration was the preparation for the Cross. now there is Moses and Elijah instead of the two thieves. And instead of the cry, "My God! My God! Why?" there is the approval of the Heavenly Father: "This is MY Son, My Chosen; listen to Him". - Luke 9:35 -

He had taken with Him the three most...............

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Sunday, May 24, 2009

I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!

I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.

HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -