The same law of growth was imposed on super nature, on the Church, when our Lord told his apostles, "Preach the gospel to every creature." The Church was thus ordered to reproduce, to generate new life, to fill up the Kingdom of God, to make conquests from the outside, to increase progeny from within. For the Church that does not reproduce, that is not missionary, is weaving its own shroud. "You have not chosen me" said our Lord, "but I have chosen you; and have appointed you, that you should go, and should bring forth fruit, and your fruit should remain."
But just how is this Mystical Body of Christ to grow from a mustard seed into a great tree? Is it to grow by God pouring out his grace on human beings, while we the members remain inactive? Or is it to grow by members cooperating with the grace of God?
The law of nature suggests the answer. The human body develops from infancy to perfection, thanks principally to food and drink. But food and drink would not make the body grow unless the body already possessed a soul, which is the principle of life. Corpses do not grow, regardless of how much nourishment is poured into them. Neither does the soul alone suffice for life. The food that the living body needs comes to the body through the members of the body: the feet that walk to the table and the hands that touch it and take it into the organism. Thus the two factors combine for growth: the living soul, and the food given to the body through the help of the body itself.
The Church's soul is the Spirit of Christ, without which the Church would be an organization, not an organism. Its body is made up of all who have been baptized. But the Body and Soul alone are not enough to account for the growth of the Church. The Church, like the human body, depends for its development on the activity of its members. The fact that we share the life of Christ does not dispense us from the obligation of working with him for the increase of his Mystical Body.
Do not the branches reach out to absorb the sunlight: do not the hands and feet reach out to grasp the food? Why then should not our Lord, in like manner, make the growth of his Church dependent on its members? Mary was called to share in the Redemption, and the apostles were called to preach what Christ had preached, and Peter was called to be the rock of his Church. In fact, since the call of Abraham and the endowing of Adam with free will, it is by means of human beings that God deals with everyone.
As the diamond is polished only by the diamond, so it is by and through human natures that Christ spreads the Kingdom. The zealous souls, the apostles, the missionaries in far countries, the saintly souls in our own land, the sisters in our schools, the priests in our parishes: All Christ-loving men and women whose hearts are on fire with the love of God, are the eyes, the feet, and the hands of Christ which reach out to pagan, the dejected, the forlorn, the humanists, the sinners, the erring, to lift them into the Body where they may be quickened again into Life and Love and Truth by the vivifying power of the Spirit of Christ.
What nobler work could there be than zeal for souls? What finer way to spend oneself and be spent than in drawing souls to the love of their Lord and their God? The world holds in high repute physicians who restore health to the diseased, surgeons who amputate cancerous growth, teachers who bring history and grammar to the illiterate, social workers who rehabilitate the broken human earthenware of our streets, and scientists who extend the frontiers of our science beyond another star. All this is noble, but since there is a life beyond this one, let it be remembered that in the Book of Life they are written in letters of gold who do for souls what others have done for the body. The great Heart of Christ holds in eternal love 'spiritual' physicians, 'spiritual' teachers, 'spiritual' surgeons - those who bring to others his truth, knowledge, healing, and grace.
The responsibility to extend the Mystical Body devolves upon everyone of us. Any member who refuses the right of way to life by denying it facilities for transmission is guilty of a breach of trust. The privilege of being a cell in the Body is the privilege of a stewardship of service and of apostolate. Through loyalty to this missionary imperative each member may pay his debt of thanks for the gift of faith by endowing the future with that faith. Every living unit thus stands between past and future with obligations to both which it cannot default. What we have received we must pass on, not pocket. What has been given to us must not be confined, but cradled for growth. As guardians of the Divine Life that has come down to us since Pentecost, we must answer to God for misappropriation and impounding to our own ends. Every talent received must bear interest, and every grace received must furnish a highway along which the Gospel shall have a straight and unimpeded path for propagation.
We do not save our souls alone, but only in conjunction with others.
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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 -
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