Preaching is not the act of giving a talk, seminar, sermon; it is the art of making a preacher. The preacher then becomes the talk and sermon.

It is from the heart's overflow that the mouth speaks. - Luke 6:45 -

The preacher without the Spirit of Christ is like Gehazi whom Elisha sent to revive a dead man. Although Gehazi brought with him the prophet's staff, no miracle happened, for the virtue of the staff was negated by the hands that held it. - 2Kings 4:25-38 - One may hold the Sacred Scripture/Holy Bible of the Lord in the pulpit, as Gehazi held the staff in his hand, but no souls are saved. The absence of an inner spiritual life makes sermonizing dull, stale, flat and unprofitable.

It is possible for the bishops, priests and clergy to experience a hardening as a result of his intimate contact with the spiritual, rather than an increase in spirituality. Sacristans are privileged to work or serve close to the Eucharistic Lord but that does not prevent some sacristans from being perfunctory in their genuflections. Jewelers become used to jewels. Husbands grow bored with beautiful wives if there is no "stirring up of the first zeal." Contact with the Divine is a privilege that can similarly turn into indifference unless each day one tries to get a step closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. Trafficking with the Word of God one day after another without prayer and preparation does not leave a bishop, priest, clergy the same; it leave him worse. Failure to climb means to slide backward. The only defense against acedia, against the tragic loss of divine reality, is a daily renewal of faith in Christ. The bishop, priest who has not kept near the fires of the tabernacle can strike no sparks from the pulpit.

The bishop and priest at ordination was told to preach. The office is to be taken so seriously as to make every bishop and priest cry out with Saint Paul:

It would go hard indeed with me if I did not preach the Gospel. - 1Cor. 9:16 -

The best preacher or counselors are not the worldly wise with tape recorders or those who know all the psychological tricks of interviewing and presenting, those more concerned with congenial surroundings than with the presence of the Spirit. The best guides of souls are saintly bishops and priests who have suffered in union with the Lord Jesus Christ. Through such does the Holy Spirit pour His seven gifts. Those who live close to Christ impart Christ. As Saint Augustine said, "What I live by, I impart." Suffering brings wisdom, but books bring only natural understanding. The bishop and priest who has been crucified and has endured His passion with patience will always be found to be the merciful bishop and priest. If there is a long line outside one confessional on Saturday and only one or two penitents outside another, it is time for a bishop and priest to ask himself some questions. Holiness draws penitents to holy bishops and priests. The attraction of such bishops and priests is the attraction of Christ Himself.

If only I am lifted up from the earth, I will attract all men to Myself. - John 12:32 -

No bishops and priests sees problems so sympathetically as the bishop and priest who is standing on the watchtower of Calvary. Like the sun, it cannot be seen, and yet it illumines all else.

How many souls say of that great army of saintly bishops and priests: "He showed me my heart" or "He showed me the loveliness of Christ" or "It was like talking to Our Lord." It is not possible for a bishop and priest, at one and the same time, to be clever and to show that Our Lord is mighty to save. With noble iteration, no less than thirty-three-times does Saint Paul use the expression "in Christ." To him it is the secret of "encouragement, loving sympathy, common fellowship in the Spirit. - Phil. 2:1 - The bishop and priest imbued with this concept because he has "crucified nature with its passions and all its impulses" - Gal. 5:24 - always directs others in the shadow of the Cross and the light of the Spirit.

Bishop and priestly counseling is basically the application of the Redemption to the individual. It is not just preaching to one person instead of preaching to a crowd, for in counseling the individual presents his problem as does a patient to a doctor. The bishop and priest establishes the facts, as the doctor does; then he presents his diagnosis and treatment, always mindful of the words of Our Lord:

Only the Spirit gives life; the flesh is of no avail; and the words that I have been speaking to you are Spirit and Life. - John 6:64 -

The Spirit is particularly important when the bishop and priest is dealing with a problem of behavior rather than a intellectual problem. In almost nine cases out of ten, those who have once had the faith but now reject it or claim that it does not make sense are driven not by reasoning but by the way they are living. Catholics usually fall away not from any difficulty with the Creed, but from some difficulty with the Commandments. When this happens, the bishop's and priest's task is to arouse the conscience through the Spirit. There is not much reference to the conscience alone in Sacred Scripture, but there is abundant testimony that the conscience is aroused by the Holy Spirit. Saint Paul tells us that it was his conscience that was illumined by the Holy Spirit, making him ready to be doomed in order to save his brethren.

I am telling you the truth in Christ's name, with the full assurance of a conscience enlightened by the Holy Spirit. - Rom. 9:1 -

It is the work of conscience to witness to our fulfillment of our duty toward God, but it is the work of the Spirit to witness God's acceptance of our faith in Christ and our obedience to Him. Thanks to the Spirit, the testimony of conscience and the declaring of Christ in our life become identical. Conscience alone in a person may be likened to a room that is very poorly lighted and in which the Commandments are printed on the wall in small characters. When the Holy Spirit illumines the conscience , a brilliant light is shed upon those characters. The Holy Spirit restores consciences, so that they accept the guidance of the law of Christ. The Holy Spirit also shows the conscience the relationship between sin and its purging by the Blood of Christ, so that there is no more a consciousness of sin. - Heb. 9:14, 10: 2-22 -

It is never enough for a bishop and priest to tell his people that they must follow their conscience; he must constantly seek the illumination of their conscience by the Spirit.

The end at which our warning aims is charity, based on purity of heart, on a good conscience, and a sincere faith. - 1Tim. 1:5 -

One never understands the enormity of sin except through the Spirit, a truth that Our Lord explained to His apostles and priests the night of the Last Supper. Sin is best treated and overcome, not solely in relation to the breaking of a commandment, but in terms of the breaking of our bonds with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Sin disrupts our ties with the Heavenly Father because it alienates us as sons. Such is the message of the parable of the prodigal son. - Luke 15:11-32 - Sin also reenacts Calvary.

Would they crucify the Son of God a second time, hold Him up to mockery a second time, for their own ends? - Heb. 6:6 -

A personal equation must be established between the soul and the Crucifix. Sins of pride are understood through the crown of thorns; sins of lust, through the torn flesh; sins of avarice, through the poverty of nakedness; and sins of alcoholism, through thirst. Moreover, sin must be seen as resisting the Spirit of Love - Acts 7:51 - as stifling the Spirit of Love - 1Thess. 5:19 - and as distressing the Spirit of Love. - Eph. 4:30 -

Conscience is always enlightened when sin is seen as hurting someone we love. No sin can touch one of God's stars or silence one of His words, but it can cruelly wound His Heart. Once the penitent understands this truth, he can see why he has such emptiness and desolation in his soul: he has hurt one he loves.

Many who approach a bishop or priest still try to conceal their conscience. They offer spurious reasons to explain their actions. The bishop, priest, clergy who remains on a purely psychological level cannot always see through such deceits, and, in consequence, he cannot help the one who has come to him. It takes a spiritual X ray to penetrate such a mind.

Who else can know a man's thoughts, except the man's own spirit that is within him? So no one else can know God's thoughts, but the Spirit of God. And what we have received is no spirit of worldly wisdom; it is the Spirit that comes from God, to make us understand God's gifts to us; gifts which we make known, not in such words as human wisdom teaches, but in the words taught us by the Spirit, matching what is spiritual with what is spiritual. Mere man with his natural gifts cannot take in thoughts of God's Spirit; they seem mere folly to him, and he cannot grasp them, because they demand a scrutiny which is spiritual. Whereas the man who has spiritual gifts can scrutinize everything, without being subject, himself to any other man's scrutiny. Who has entered into the mind of the Lord, so as to be able to instruct him? And Christ's mind is ours. - 1Cor. 2:11-16 -

Thousands or millions would flock to the Church, frustrated souls and the young would seek the bishop and priest out, hearts unnumbered would seek comfort in the confessional did the bishops, priests, clergy but realize the extraordinary powers of direction, counseling and guidance that come from living in the Spirit of Christ.

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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 -