The Tormented Minds of today are not the products of our tormented world. Rather, it is our upset minds that have upset the world. Man, by attempting to exist either apart from God or defiant of God, has made the world as delirious as his own mind is neurotic. The crisis today is so deep in its causes that all social and political attempts to deal with it are bound to be as ineffective as talcum powder in curing jaundice. It is man who has to be remade first; then society will be remade by the restored new man. The dictators that have been cast upon the shores of the twentieth and twenty-first century are not the creators of the disorder, but rather its creatures.

They are symptoms, not causes, of the universal breakdown of a moral order in the heart of humanity. The constant refusal of man to allow a supra historic Divine Power to break into his closed mind is the pride that prepares catastrophe. Most people are intuitively aware that no change other than a spiritual change will be enough: The extreme sensitiveness and ready anger of those who urge revolutions against society and morality as their remedy are proof of the insecurity of their very position. The violence of their opposition to all criticism is a sure sign of the defenselessness of their own position; even they suspect that mankind stands less in need of revolution than redemption.

Humanity cannot redeem itself by its own human reason or power; but human beings can use both reason and power in cooperation with Divine Grace. This is what a person does when he and she becomes converted. It is time now to talk of the effect such a conversion has on the soul. The soul is now open to the working of Sanctifying Grace, which elevates our nature so that we become something we were not naturally - partakers of the Divine nature Who descended to the level of our mortality to make us share His Life.

This new grace, which adds Divine to human affiliation so that we become Children of God as well as children of our parents, is not extrinsic to the soul or mere imputation of the merit of Christ. There is a reality in the soul that was not there before - a created reality that comes directly from God Himself, a reality we ourselves cannot merit in the strict sense of the term. That is why it is called a grace; it is gratis,or free.

One effect of grace is that Our Divine Lord is no longer extrinsic to us, as He is for those who think of Him as only a historical figure Who lived 2000 years ago. If Our Divine Savior had remained on earth, they would be right. He would be only an example to be copied, a voice to be heard. But once He ascended into Heaven and sent His Spirit to us, then He ceased to be a model to be copied and became a Life to be lived.

Though we are more interested here in pointing out the psychological effects of grace on the soul than its many theological effects, two of these are too important to be omitted. These are the Divine Presence in the soul after Baptism and the incorporation of the individual into the Mystical Body of Christ. "Presence of God" is a phrase very loosely used today to cover anything from the Pantheism of the Lake poets to the vague sentimentalism of the Romanticist, who likes the woods because he "feels" God there. God is, indeed, present in the universe in many various ways, as any artist can be present in various ways, for example, in his paintings, as its creator; in a museum, as a representative of culture; and in his children, as a father. God is present in the whole universe as a Cause, and in this sense He is in the flowers and the trees. But a far more intimate presence was evidenced in the Incarnation, where God appeared as man in the heart of a new humanity that was to become His new Body.

The Incarnation (in the Hypostatic Union) made God man. The union of grace and nature makes us defied. As the actions of Jesus Christ were both Divine and human, so those of a person in the state of grace are God-like, being performed by both God and man; these acts are meritorious of heaven. The presence of God in such a soul is not a mere sentimental manner of speech, but a real possession. Because we have become adopted children of God by being born of Him, we now live by the Spirit of Christ. "For you have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear; but you have received the spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry: Abba, Father" - Rom. 8:15 - The body has now become the Temple of God. "Or know you not, that your members are the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have from God; and you are not your own." - 1Cor. 6:19 -

Christ is the Head of such sanctified souls, and they stand in relation to Him as members of His Body, "And he has subjected all things under his feet, and has made the fullness of him who is filled all in all." - Eph. 1:22-23 - The relation between Christ and His Body, the Church, was said by Christ Himself to be like that of the vine and its branches: "Yet a little while: and the world sees me no more. But you see me: because I live, and you shall live. In that day you shall know, that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you." - John 14:19-20 -

"Now you are clean by reason of the world which I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine; so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches: he that abides in me, I in him, the same bears much fruit: for without me you can do nothing." - John 15:3-5 -

Jacques B. Bossuet has expressed this intimate relation of Christ with His Body, the Church, by describing the latter as the "prolongation of the Incarnation." Christ can have only one Body; therefore there cannot be many churches. Any church founded this morning or yesterday afternoon or even a hundred years ago is too remote from Pentecost to be Christ's Body. The Body and the Soul, the Church and the Holy Spirit - these must have been allied from the beginning.

The unity among the members of that Body cannot be a vague and undetermined association that any member is free to change, any more than a human body can be changeable, sometimes having one eye and one ear or no heart and seven lungs. The unity of the faithful in Christ's Body is not organizational, although an organization is necessary, and although those who admire the Church for its unity of belief and faith and liturgy attribute this to its organization.

The Church is, rather, an organism. As a human body is one because it has one soul, one visible head, and one invisible mind, so the Church, the Mystical Body of Christ, is one because it has one soul - the Holy Spirit of God - one visible Head - Peter and his successors - and one invisible Head - Christ. As Christ took upon Himself a human nature from the womb of His Mother (overshadowed by the Holy Spirit) so He took from the womb of humanity (overshadowed by the Pentecostal Spirit) His Mystical Body, the Church. Christ teaches through His Body - therefore, His teaching is infallible. He governs through His Body - therefore, the authority is Divine. He sanctifies through His Body - therefore, the sanctification accomplished in the Sacraments does not depend on the personality or character of those who administer the Sacraments.

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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 -