First: How HAPPINESS/PARADISE came to be lost:
Each one of us have as our life goal to attain true HAPPINESS. Our lives are one long search for happiness. The main reason we all search for happiness is that our very being was created for happiness. Adam and Eve were created for happiness. They did not have to look for it; they had it as a gift as soon as they were created. They were created sinless and happy. Before Eve was created, Adam was happy in the garden; but still felt a great need for a mate. He found no suitable partner in the animal world. God said: "It is not good for a man to be alone; I will make him a help-mate." Notice God did not say: "I will make him a sex mate" although that is included in the word "mate". No, God sent Adam a "help" and a "mate." She was to complete his already great happiness in the Garden. Adam was happy because he had life, all the beauty of the garden, the animals...but most of all, Adam had God to talk to face to face and walk with Him at the evening time when the gentle "breeze" was blowing. That in Genesis was an image of the Holy Spirit who is Present when we walk and talk to God. Adam had it all..and now God was giving him the desires of his heart - a beautiful woman who would become the "mother of all the living." Adam and Eve's bodies were so perfect that they lived to be over 900 years. They were actually designed to live forever. Death was NEVER in God's plan for us. So, here we have two people in perfect happiness. What happened? The same that happened to the fallen angels who had it all, too. They were perfectly happy. But being thinkers, these angels thought "what would it be like to be without God...to be independent of God...to not have to be grateful to God...therefore, to be God for themselves: to be "like God, knowing good and evil." Funny, but that temptation they tempted themselves with was the very same they tempted Eve with: "God knows well that you will not die but be like Him knowing good and evil." This temptation meant for Eve to decide for herself what is good and bad. The devil actually tempted her to be "pro-choice" - to see "evil" and call it "good." That is what the devil does today to all humankind: "You do not have to do what God says in the 10 Commandments; just do what you feel comes naturally and easily." Therefore, today you have "pro-choice" where women [new Eves] can choose what is good or evil for themselves independent of God's will or law...especially the 5th and 6th Commandments. These two Commandments are changed to: "Thou shalt kill whomever you wish as long as that person is in the womb." And the second is like unto the first: "Thou shalt sleep with whomever you wish be they married to someone else or single as long as it is as consenting adults."
Well, Adam and Eve found themselves outside of the Garden of Happiness and scheduled to die after committing the Original Sin. God did NOT punish them with death. God hates death. Why would He give it to anyone - especially to His children who are created in His own image and likeness? He is eternal; so He wanted us to never die.
Death came naturally after the sin of Adam and Eve because their sin freely chosen in disobedience to God caused their souls to die from Grace - the LIFE of God in them. They let their souls die from the LIFE God had put there. That death was their own choice; they became "pro-choice" and had chosen "death" not life just as women who abort today. They choose death for their babies by abortion. Was it God's will that these babies die - absolutely not. He gave a 5th Commandment so they would not die.
But Adam and Even began to die immediately after they sinned because their souls they caused to die are so closely united to their bodies that to kill the soul is to kill the body. And finally because of Adam and Eve's Sin, their bodies 900 years later died when their souls separated from their bodies. Their souls had to leave because souls - the principle of life - cannot abide in a dead body. An immortal soul cannot live in a corpse.
The souls eases out of that body because it cannot stand to be in a corrupting body. A living soul and a dead body are so opposite that it is impossible for a soul to live thus in a dead body. We see so often stories of zombies or vampires: these are imaginations of souls living in dead bodies. This can't happen because Jesus said: "God is a God of the living, not of the dead."
Well, then, did Adam and Eve's hope for true happiness die right there when they said yes to the devil? Actually, they only said "yes" because they were lied to...told that they could even be more happy apart from God. That lie was the sam lie that Lucifer told himself. And he believed himself...but he was DEAD wrong. If Satan was correct in his assesment when he told Eve: "God surely knows you will not die..", then if he were telling the truth [which is impossible for him to do since he is the "father of lies"], then that would make God out to be a liar. Why? Because God had said to eat of the tree of good and evil would cause death: "you will surely die", God had said to them. You cannot have it both ways. Either Satan was telling the truth or God was telling the truth. Whom would you believe?..a snake or God? Well, today millions are believing the snake. That is why 60,000,000 babies have been killed in the womb since 1973 and why 1 out every 2 marriages ends in divorce. God is Love: Wherever their is Love and Unity, there is God." Lucifer now Satan, is by his own irrevocable choice separated from God. "Satan is the god of separation; and wherever there is division and disunity, there is Satan." Therefore, all denominationalism is from Satan. Satan knows there is one true Church of Jesus Christ: the Holy Catholic Church which Jesus founded on the rock of Peter. But Satan floods the world with many churches so that people cannot recognize the "ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC CHURCH of Jesus Christ. Also, these churches do not claim to be the one true church of Jesus; but the Mormon church claims to be. They claim to have restored the priesthood of Jesus Christ which was never actually lost since the laying of hands upon the apostles. The Mormons also have a new New Testament: the Book of Mormon so that it will water down the two books written by the Holy Spirit: the Old and the New Testaments. But if Satan can introduce a third Testament, then he has won a significant advantage because the Book of Mormon is not inspired by the Holy Spirit. Also, the Koran is claimed by Muslims to be the Word of God but it says that Jesus did not die on the cross but only had a substitute die in His place. Therefore there is no need for the Resurrection of Jesus nor to believe in the cross as part of out redemption. Please let me state: the Mormon and Muslims are holy people who love God/Allah; but their scriptures are not inspired by the Holy Spirit because the Holy Spirit cannot inspire something diametrically opposed to what He inspired in His Old and New Testaments. The Holy Spirit cannot inspire opposite doctrines. Also, after St. John wrote God's Book of Revelation, there were no more scriptual revelation of God. There would be prophetic words through the saints over the next 2000 years but there would never be another Holy Scriptural work aftr St. John's Book of Revelation. How we as Christians can bring UNITY to the world is first of all love our Mormon and Muslims brothers and sisters...our Prostestant brothers and sisters and withness to them in love the truth but showing them how we are truly recognized: "See how they love one another."
Adam and Eve when expelled from the Garden of Happiness and Grace, they were given HOPE in that they were promised that a Messiah would come, atone for their sins and bring them back to Paradise - complete HAPPINESS.
Well, not we have seen how Paradise was lost. All of the above is a summary of UNHAPPINESS got here to this earth. So, now with darkened wills and misdirection as how to find happiness, here below are the four levels of happines that we mortals seek and a few examples of each:
Level One Happiness: Living for Physical Pleasure:
This envolves excessive compulsions without regard to any morality. In the Old Testament, King David had 1000 wives and 300 concubines. Was he happy or satisfied? He was not because he wanted Bathsheba, another man's wife. 1300 women were not enough for him because the nature of level one happiness is that it is never satisfied and only wants more and more. In this sense, Hugh Hefner will never be truly happy. Actually, sex with 1300 women will not satisfiy because the soul has a transcental nature to it. It wants more and more because all the women in the world will not satisfy what the transcendental soul really wants: The Beatific Vision of God. The more and more of physical pleasure is examplified by the PlayBoy Mansion that had to bring in animals for sexual pleasure because human copulation became boring. All physical pleasure, once it is over, cannot be remembered. Thoughts about it are vague and not real like the experience. That is why there are nymphomaniacs. They want to live in a constant state of orgasmic experience. They cannot get enought and will not ever be able to because it is their soul that is seeking for happiness not their body. The movie Alfie has a son: "What's all about Alfie"? Good question! Level One happiness is centered on "me being happy" - self centered not at all other centered. Leve One hapines is a total "ego trip"!
Level Two Happiness: Finding Satisfaction in Success:
This happiness envolves feeling good about having achieved something great. But it has a lot of delusions to it. How many business men who have climbed the corporate ladder and worked themselves to the bone for 40 years for a Company that just forgest about them when they retire. What was it all for? So many men have lost their marriages, children for spending too much time for the Corporate Ladder while their own home ladde crumbles into ruin. Raymond Burr who was a good man told in an interview that his divorce came from spending too much time on the set instead of in the arms of his wife. He bitterly regretted it. Yet, Gary Grant - after his daughter was born in his later years - stayed home completely. He gave up his career in films totally to be home with his little girl. He stayed close to her daily until he died when she was at the age of 19. He got it together: gave up making 40 more films to stay and be the Best Dad ever. He was as charming off screen as on screen. He did not make the mistake of putting career happiness before family happiness. Who else lived a completely Level Two existence? Most notable were these two: Napoleon and Htiler. They thought they had to be better than anyone ever was. Their happiness was in dominating others and controlling the lives of others...even by taking the lives of others. This is a corporate ladder called "emperorism". Did both of them become happy? Neither did. Both ended up in the prison they fashioned for themselves. In doing their thing to find happiness, millions died. People on Level Two identify themselves with their work title: Emperor" When that title is taken away, they consider themselves a nobody. There were really somebody before they became emperor. They were children of God - made in His image and likeness. Becoming emperor is like making tattoos all over your body. The body does not need anything to make it beutiful. It is beautiful. So, too, men do not have to become emperors or CEO's to be somebody. They were somebody the moment they were conceived. So, Level Two happiness is like Level One: totally self centered to make oneself feel good: a total "ego trip" - just a little more sophistocated. That will not satitisfy the human heart to find happiness in God and in loving others for God.
But some success is God-given not man-given: The life of Thomas More, chancellor of England. He even said as to his office: "Better me than Cromwell". So Sir Thomas More wanted to be Chancellor to bring good to that office instead of letting Cromwell corrupt it. But notice, St. Thomas More did not seek that office. The King appointed him to it. But St. Thomas More gave it up in a New England moment when that office came between him and God.
Level Three Happiness: Living the Eight Beatitudes:
Jesus said "Happy are those who..." - the word "Beatitude" comes from the Latin word: "Beatus" - "Happy". Mother Teresa lived the Eight Beatitudes perfectly. Was she happy? If you look at the US stamp that bears her image, you will see a woman completely happy. But actually, she was completely happy because of Level Four. But understand that Level Three is completely other centered. Still, it alone will not make us completely happy because even doing charity to others is limited. It cannot fill the soul completely; but it comes very close. Our souls need something completely transcendent to be completely happy.
Level Four Happiness: Living a Total Surrender to God Unconditional Love. This life is totally transcendent and based on Trusting in God's Unconditional Providential Love for us and for others we love. Who comes to mind here is St. Francis of Assisi. He has inspired millions that came after him to trust in God completely. Yes, he did find joy and happiness in living the Eight Beatitudes given to us by Jesus, Himself. Francis' love for the poor has caused Franciscan Orders to care for the poor much like Mother Teresa has done. But St. Francis and Blessed Mother Teresa went so much father then the Beatitudes. They let themselves go by totally surrendering themselves go into the Arms of God. They were mystics: had extraodinary intimacy with God in this world. Mystical Prayer is the Unitive Way, the Seventh Mansion of St. Teresa of Avila. Here we have the mystical reflections of the souls union with God as prefigured in the Song of Songs: the mystical union of the soul and God in a spiritual marriage. God always used the marriage covenant to show His intimate love for Israel. He does that with us as well. St. John of the Cross also taught us that the Song of Songs was a model of God's love for us. Isaiah said of God's love for us: "I will espouse you to me..forever...As a young man marries a virgin, so your Maker will marry you. And as a young man delights in his bride, so shall the Lord delight in you."
Marriage, therefore, is the very model and sign of how God loves us. Also, in all literature: pagan and Christian, we see a pursuite of happiness in a true in-love-relationship that leads to "they lived happily ever after". Notice the elements of this human dream: "living happily" and for "ever after". These two elements are what all marriages hope for. Even if the formula says: "for better or worse until death do we part", there is a hope in the human soul that wants this relationship to continue even into heaven. Not that it will be sexual but that it will be soulfully close forever. Indeed this is possible. It is said by theologians that "Cana is forever." This can be very true in the sense that spouses are close in heaven and see one another in love who got each other to heaven. Gratitude and love will be forever in their case. But marriages that are selfish or adulterous cannot hope to have such a relationship in heaven - unless of course there is complete repentance and forgiveness so that the couple is restored to its original luster and even possibly deeper. I know a woman who not only forgave her adulterous husband but converted him to Christ. He died a saint. You can be sure this couple will be close in heaven.
So, is a happy marriage of a true love the answer to our quest for happiness. Romance novels say so. But in everything on earth even a good and holy marriage, there will be the cross. Even St. Joseph and Mary had their cross to carry: Mary being pregnant just before they got married; the flight into Egypt to avoid Herod; losing Jesus for 3 days; Joseph dying before Jesus starts His public life; Mary under the cross. Yes, even when Adam and Eve sinned, God did not take away the gift of holy marriage from them. That He would not do. As to all of us, Jesus says,"Set out into the deep!" - in our marriages and in our spiritual jouney to Him and His Father in the Holy Spirit.
There are four kinds of marriage:
1) Nuptual human love between one man and one woman called the sacrament of Matrimony. This is the vocation from God for most the people on the earth. But even in the perfect marriage, there will be a cross. Also, the spouse cannot fill completely the needs of the other spouse because when God made us, lest a special place in our heart that ony He can fill. No person can fill that space in our heart. But marriage can bring the most loving caresses and love we will ever receive from anyone human person on this earth in our short lives. The love given and received in marriage is really a manisfestation of the Divine love for us.
2) Virginal love of nuns to Jesus; this is a spiritual spousal love here which Jesus says are the five wise virgins who will go into the Marriage Feast of the Lamb with Jesus on the Last day. Nuns get married to Jesus to find happiness and to give Jesus happiness.
3) Priests are married to Jesus and His Church. They are bonded to Jesus in their priesthood and love for His Bride: the Church.
4) Every soul who is married to Jesus as His Bride the Church - laymen/women/religious - because all who are in Christ are His Bride the Church. On earth, this marriage can attain the intimacy of infused contemplation and even ecstasy. St. Teresa of Avila attained this union with Jesus, this intimacy that words cannot express.
IN all these Holy Marriages in the Spirit, our last total end is to be with Jesus and the Father in the Holy Spirit is the very reason we were created: Only in God is our perfect happiness. Therefore, this Level Four Happiness is True Happiness we all seek. We were made for this happiness. In heaven, we will have the Beatific [Happy] Vision of God, face to face. Let us begin to have it here and now..but total surrender of our lives to God. Amen.
Father "with You we shall always be!" In Your arms we shall always be." Help us to trust You now to help us to arrive safely in Your arms to live happily ever after. In Your arms is what You have destined us for.
Help us to be happy here by doing all for You, in You and with You. Keep us from pursuing any false happpiness that endangers our souls. Give us true happiness here and in heaven with You. In Jesus Name we pray through the Holy Spirit. Amen. Amen. Amen.
Love, Pio
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Pio's Proverb 102: Woodpecker Family
It's morning. I was just coming back from my morning prayer walk by the sea [Lake St.Clare] when I heard a jack-hammer sound high up on a wooden light pole. I looked hard and could just make out a mother and father woodpecker next to their summer home's hole they had built [pecked out] a few years back. How interesting that they did not go to a new location; no, this was there home by the sea, and they liked it just that way. It was hard to see them at first because their color blends in with this ancient light post. But I could see one move; the other remained so still facing the hole. Then I thought they had 5 sparrows watching them peck away; but these were not sparrows. They were baby woodpeckers who when able to fly, do not fly away but remain as a Woodpecker Family. They were small but very energetic in their flying around. Then what was the father woodpecker's pecking like a jack hammer all about? The pole resonated the pecking much better than a tree would because it was like a sounding board much like a guitar helps the strings to sing out in wood-sounds that delight us all. This father woodpecker was instructing his youngin's how to peck! It was too early for him to be calling all of them to dinner. They were watching him like little students.
You know: every day nature teaches us about life: Here is a lesson in family life. Mom and Dad woodpecker are not divorced. They have not gone after new lovers. They are not out of the home working on successful woodpecker careers. No. These are stay-at-home Mom and Dad woodpeckers. If you look at the enthusiam of the youngin's; if you look at the joy of the Mom and Dad woodpecker who stay so close to their beautiful little ones who can fly away but do not because they too have a sense of family life. No. These little woodpeckers are home-schooled. All of this is to each you and me what true happiness is: love of each other at home.
Love, Pio
You know: every day nature teaches us about life: Here is a lesson in family life. Mom and Dad woodpecker are not divorced. They have not gone after new lovers. They are not out of the home working on successful woodpecker careers. No. These are stay-at-home Mom and Dad woodpeckers. If you look at the enthusiam of the youngin's; if you look at the joy of the Mom and Dad woodpecker who stay so close to their beautiful little ones who can fly away but do not because they too have a sense of family life. No. These little woodpeckers are home-schooled. All of this is to each you and me what true happiness is: love of each other at home.
Love, Pio
Monday, August 29, 2011
Pio's Proverb 101: "Search for a Permanent Reality": Life of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J., Ph.D: Geologist, Priest, Philosopher and Mystic: his quotes to remember.
How five-year-old Pierre Teihard had a striking realization of life's frailty and the difficulty of finding any abiding reality which launched him on a life-time "search for permanent reality" was his following memory told in his own words:
"A memory? My very first! I was five or six. My mother had snipped a few of my curls. I picked one up and held it close to the fire. The hair was burnt up in a fraction of a second. A terrifble grief assailed me; I had learnt that I was perishable....What used to grieve me when I was a child? This insecurity of things. And what used I to love? My genie of iron! With a plow hitch I believed myself, at seven years, rich with a treasure incorrputible, everlasting. And then it turned out that what I possessed was just a bit of iron that rusted. At this discovery I threw myself on the lawn and shed the bitterest tears of my existence "
This was an intense child with an intense unusual powers of observation. He had leaned from his father an avidinterest in natural science. Even at this early age of looking for permanence in rocks and minerals, his choice to get his eventual doctorate as a Geologist had its roots in his love for things in the "biosphere" - a word he coined in complement to his notion of beings in the "noosphere" - as knowing subjects.
So, Pierre had turned from "iron" as permanent reality to "stones" such as amethyst, citrine, and chalcedony in his youthful search for "Permanent Reality". But there was a "metaphysical reality" - a spiritual reality - that was mirrored for him in his own mother. She lived a life in the Spirit. Her piety had an intrinsic influence on his soul and mind. He says of his mother:
"A spark had to fall upon me, to make the fire blaze out. And, without a doubt, it was through my mother that it came to me, sprung from the stream of Christian mysticism, to light up and kindle my childish soul. It was through that spark that 'My Universe,' still but half-peronalized, was to become amorised, and so achieve its full centration." (The Heart of Matter, p.4)
At 12 years of age, Pierre entered Notre Dame de Mongre and was a quiet and diligent student for 5 years. He learned here to "exchange his security in stones for a Christian piety largely influenced by Thomas a kempis' Imitation of Christ." [As a side note: while I was in the seminary for 8 years, Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ was next to the bible itself in inspiration because this work had Jesus talking to you about different things in the spiritual life. It was what all wanted: a personal relationship with Jesus where He talked to you everyday.] At graduation time, he wrote his parents that he wished to become a Jesuit.
As a Jesuit, Pierre dedicated himself to scientific investigation of the earth and to the cultivation of a life of prayer as did his mother show to him by her good example. Like St. Monica influenced her son St. Augustine, Fr. Pierre's mother influenced him in his quest for sanctity. But for him, a man must become fully human before he can become spiritual. Grace builds on nature. He became an ascetic pious Jesuit. He became interested in Philosophy as well. So Fr. Pierre had four eyes to see reality: his geological eyes; his theological eyes; his philosophical eyes; and his spiritual eyes that bended this earth with the divine: the biosphere with the noosphere. Thus he followed science as a legitimate way to God as he was directed by his novice master, Fr. Paul Trossard.
Teilhard in his work discovered the fossil tooth in one of his diggings that caused his name to become known to the scientific community. Teilhard's enthusiam [comes from the Greek "en-theos" - "to be caught up into God"] for the scientific study of prehistoric human life now crystallized as a possiible direction after his ordination in August of 1911.
In reading Henri Bergson's newly published "Creative Evolution," Teihard encountered a thinker who dissolved the Aristotelian dualism of matter and spirit in favor of a movment though time of an evolving universe. Teihard also found the word "evolution" in Bergson. He connected the very sound of the word, as he says, "with the extraordinary density and intensity with which the English landscape then appeared to me especially at sunset. - the woods seemed to be laden with all the fossil life that I was exploring, from one quarry to another, in the soil of the World". From Bergson, then, Teilhard received the vision of on-going evolution. For Bergson, evolution was continually explanding, a "Tide of Life" undirected by an ultmate purpose. Teihard would eventually disagree with Bergson with respecf to the direction of the universe. Later he put forward his own interpretation of the evolutionary process based on the intervening years of field work.
From 1912 and 1915, Teihard continued his studies in paleontology. He developed experise in the geology of the Eocene Period that earned him a doctorate in 1922.
Through Marguerite Teillhard Chombon, his cousin, Teilhard "entered a social milieu in which he could exchange ideas and receive critical comment from several perspectives. In these surroundings, Teilhard developed his thought until the outbreak of World War I in 1914.
When the war broke out, Teilhard enlisted as a priest-soldier and became a stretcher bearer with the North African Zouaves in January of 1915. He learned the vulnerability and fraility of human beings. His search for "permanent reality" became more and more a joining the Earth to the Spiritual World.
From the Front, Teilhard wrote these words:
"I'd call it 'Nostalgia for the Front'. The reasons, I believe, come down to this: the front cannot but attract us because it is, in one way, the extreme boundary between what one is already aware of, and what is still in process of formation. Not only does one see there things that you experience nowhere else, but one also see emerge from within one an underlying stream of clarity, energy, and freedom that is to be found hardly anywhere else in ordinary life - and the new form that the soul then takes on is that of the indiviual living in the quasi-collective life of all man, fulfilling a function far higher than that of the indiviual, and becoming fully conscious of this new state. It goes without saying that at the front you no longer look on this in the same way as you do in the rear; if you did the sights you see and the life you lead would be more than you could bear. This exaltation is accompanied by a certain pain. Nevertheless it is indeed an exaltation. And that's why one likes the front in spite of everything, and misses it."
(To be continued...)
"A memory? My very first! I was five or six. My mother had snipped a few of my curls. I picked one up and held it close to the fire. The hair was burnt up in a fraction of a second. A terrifble grief assailed me; I had learnt that I was perishable....What used to grieve me when I was a child? This insecurity of things. And what used I to love? My genie of iron! With a plow hitch I believed myself, at seven years, rich with a treasure incorrputible, everlasting. And then it turned out that what I possessed was just a bit of iron that rusted. At this discovery I threw myself on the lawn and shed the bitterest tears of my existence "
This was an intense child with an intense unusual powers of observation. He had leaned from his father an avidinterest in natural science. Even at this early age of looking for permanence in rocks and minerals, his choice to get his eventual doctorate as a Geologist had its roots in his love for things in the "biosphere" - a word he coined in complement to his notion of beings in the "noosphere" - as knowing subjects.
So, Pierre had turned from "iron" as permanent reality to "stones" such as amethyst, citrine, and chalcedony in his youthful search for "Permanent Reality". But there was a "metaphysical reality" - a spiritual reality - that was mirrored for him in his own mother. She lived a life in the Spirit. Her piety had an intrinsic influence on his soul and mind. He says of his mother:
"A spark had to fall upon me, to make the fire blaze out. And, without a doubt, it was through my mother that it came to me, sprung from the stream of Christian mysticism, to light up and kindle my childish soul. It was through that spark that 'My Universe,' still but half-peronalized, was to become amorised, and so achieve its full centration." (The Heart of Matter, p.4)
At 12 years of age, Pierre entered Notre Dame de Mongre and was a quiet and diligent student for 5 years. He learned here to "exchange his security in stones for a Christian piety largely influenced by Thomas a kempis' Imitation of Christ." [As a side note: while I was in the seminary for 8 years, Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ was next to the bible itself in inspiration because this work had Jesus talking to you about different things in the spiritual life. It was what all wanted: a personal relationship with Jesus where He talked to you everyday.] At graduation time, he wrote his parents that he wished to become a Jesuit.
As a Jesuit, Pierre dedicated himself to scientific investigation of the earth and to the cultivation of a life of prayer as did his mother show to him by her good example. Like St. Monica influenced her son St. Augustine, Fr. Pierre's mother influenced him in his quest for sanctity. But for him, a man must become fully human before he can become spiritual. Grace builds on nature. He became an ascetic pious Jesuit. He became interested in Philosophy as well. So Fr. Pierre had four eyes to see reality: his geological eyes; his theological eyes; his philosophical eyes; and his spiritual eyes that bended this earth with the divine: the biosphere with the noosphere. Thus he followed science as a legitimate way to God as he was directed by his novice master, Fr. Paul Trossard.
Teilhard in his work discovered the fossil tooth in one of his diggings that caused his name to become known to the scientific community. Teilhard's enthusiam [comes from the Greek "en-theos" - "to be caught up into God"] for the scientific study of prehistoric human life now crystallized as a possiible direction after his ordination in August of 1911.
In reading Henri Bergson's newly published "Creative Evolution," Teihard encountered a thinker who dissolved the Aristotelian dualism of matter and spirit in favor of a movment though time of an evolving universe. Teihard also found the word "evolution" in Bergson. He connected the very sound of the word, as he says, "with the extraordinary density and intensity with which the English landscape then appeared to me especially at sunset. - the woods seemed to be laden with all the fossil life that I was exploring, from one quarry to another, in the soil of the World". From Bergson, then, Teilhard received the vision of on-going evolution. For Bergson, evolution was continually explanding, a "Tide of Life" undirected by an ultmate purpose. Teihard would eventually disagree with Bergson with respecf to the direction of the universe. Later he put forward his own interpretation of the evolutionary process based on the intervening years of field work.
From 1912 and 1915, Teihard continued his studies in paleontology. He developed experise in the geology of the Eocene Period that earned him a doctorate in 1922.
Through Marguerite Teillhard Chombon, his cousin, Teilhard "entered a social milieu in which he could exchange ideas and receive critical comment from several perspectives. In these surroundings, Teilhard developed his thought until the outbreak of World War I in 1914.
When the war broke out, Teilhard enlisted as a priest-soldier and became a stretcher bearer with the North African Zouaves in January of 1915. He learned the vulnerability and fraility of human beings. His search for "permanent reality" became more and more a joining the Earth to the Spiritual World.
From the Front, Teilhard wrote these words:
"I'd call it 'Nostalgia for the Front'. The reasons, I believe, come down to this: the front cannot but attract us because it is, in one way, the extreme boundary between what one is already aware of, and what is still in process of formation. Not only does one see there things that you experience nowhere else, but one also see emerge from within one an underlying stream of clarity, energy, and freedom that is to be found hardly anywhere else in ordinary life - and the new form that the soul then takes on is that of the indiviual living in the quasi-collective life of all man, fulfilling a function far higher than that of the indiviual, and becoming fully conscious of this new state. It goes without saying that at the front you no longer look on this in the same way as you do in the rear; if you did the sights you see and the life you lead would be more than you could bear. This exaltation is accompanied by a certain pain. Nevertheless it is indeed an exaltation. And that's why one likes the front in spite of everything, and misses it."
(To be continued...)
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Pio's Proverb 100: "Come and see the Woman who is Bride of the Lamb."
"Come and see the woman who is Bride of the Lamb"...is our invitation to the eternal banquet in Heaven where the Bridegroom Jesus will intimately enjoy His Bride the Church for all etenity. By "Our invitation" I mean that we are not just guests at the wedding, we ARE the Bride! We are the Church!
Jesus, Himself, speaks in a parable about this Wedding Banquet. He did so in the parable of the 5 wise virgins and the 5 foolish virgins. All 10 virgins had Faith. All had their lamps burning. But the 5 foolish virgins lamps were going out because they were running out of oil. The oil represents good works that accompany thier and our Faith. We remember that passage that says: "Faith without Works is dead." So works are a manifestation and expression of our Faith. Jesus also said: "No those who say to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of God but those who do the will of my Father." And what is the will of His Father. Jesus said: Love one another as I have loved you."
So how is our supply of oil going? When the 5 fooling virgins tried to borrow the oil of good works from their 5 wise virgins, they find out that one's relationship to Christ cannot be given to another on to Christ...except when we share our Love for Jesus by loving Him in others. So, when the 5 fooling virgines come back with a supply of oil, it is too late. The door is locked. At the end of our life, we cannot suddenly have a life of charity toward others. Yes, we can repent...as did the good theif..but he offered his martyrdom for Jesus...yes, he had to die but did so for and in Christ. But see what Jesus says to these 5 fooling virgins when they knock to come in to the Wedding Feast of the Lamb, He says: "I do not know you." What He is saying is that He did not recognized Himself in them. They did not look like Him in Love for others.
In the end when it is time to go into the Wedding Banquet of the Lord, we will be seen and judge by Jesus by the Charity we have for Him and for others in Him. If we do not have that "wedding garment on", we will be thrown out into the darkness where there will be the weeping and gnashing of teeth. Remember, the wedding garment is supplied by Christ. It is called "Sanctifying Grace". For a person to refuse this Grace is to sin against the Holy Spirit - that is to refuse God's Forgiveness. On the Cross Jesus offered His forgiveness to both thieves by just His lovingly dying for both of them. But Dismus said: "Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And Jesus said: "This day you will be with me in Paradise." The other thief refused this gift and told Jesus: "If you are the Christ, save yourself and us." This "If" is a sign of no Faith. The Good thief simply called Jesus: "Lord" in Faith. Do you notice what the Good works are that the good thief is doing: First of all it is Faith and Secondly it is Prayer and Thirdly it is laying down your life for Jesus."
Are we doing that...do we live a life of prayer and sacrifice...offering all we do in the day for Jesus?
Bottom line: Do we have enough Oil?
Love, Pio
Jesus, Himself, speaks in a parable about this Wedding Banquet. He did so in the parable of the 5 wise virgins and the 5 foolish virgins. All 10 virgins had Faith. All had their lamps burning. But the 5 foolish virgins lamps were going out because they were running out of oil. The oil represents good works that accompany thier and our Faith. We remember that passage that says: "Faith without Works is dead." So works are a manifestation and expression of our Faith. Jesus also said: "No those who say to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of God but those who do the will of my Father." And what is the will of His Father. Jesus said: Love one another as I have loved you."
So how is our supply of oil going? When the 5 fooling virgins tried to borrow the oil of good works from their 5 wise virgins, they find out that one's relationship to Christ cannot be given to another on to Christ...except when we share our Love for Jesus by loving Him in others. So, when the 5 fooling virgines come back with a supply of oil, it is too late. The door is locked. At the end of our life, we cannot suddenly have a life of charity toward others. Yes, we can repent...as did the good theif..but he offered his martyrdom for Jesus...yes, he had to die but did so for and in Christ. But see what Jesus says to these 5 fooling virgins when they knock to come in to the Wedding Feast of the Lamb, He says: "I do not know you." What He is saying is that He did not recognized Himself in them. They did not look like Him in Love for others.
In the end when it is time to go into the Wedding Banquet of the Lord, we will be seen and judge by Jesus by the Charity we have for Him and for others in Him. If we do not have that "wedding garment on", we will be thrown out into the darkness where there will be the weeping and gnashing of teeth. Remember, the wedding garment is supplied by Christ. It is called "Sanctifying Grace". For a person to refuse this Grace is to sin against the Holy Spirit - that is to refuse God's Forgiveness. On the Cross Jesus offered His forgiveness to both thieves by just His lovingly dying for both of them. But Dismus said: "Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And Jesus said: "This day you will be with me in Paradise." The other thief refused this gift and told Jesus: "If you are the Christ, save yourself and us." This "If" is a sign of no Faith. The Good thief simply called Jesus: "Lord" in Faith. Do you notice what the Good works are that the good thief is doing: First of all it is Faith and Secondly it is Prayer and Thirdly it is laying down your life for Jesus."
Are we doing that...do we live a life of prayer and sacrifice...offering all we do in the day for Jesus?
Bottom line: Do we have enough Oil?
Love, Pio
Pio's Proverb 99: "You've Got Mail" - my favorite movie and reasons why!
Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan teamed up again for the third time [Joe Versus Valcano, 1990 and Sleepless in Seattle, 1993] to make a delightful 1998 romantic comedy called "You've Got Mail". Obviously Tom and Meg go together like coffee and cream or two peas in a pod. They may have gotten to know each other well from the other two movies they did together; so perhaps they were not acting at all but just being loving friends toward one another as loving friends do. I just saw this movie yesterday with new eyes. I was delighted and facinated by it for the following reasons:
1) As a writer, I was keenly listening to all the lines. This movie was carefully edited because there was not one extraneouis word in it. Every line and every scene were perfect to move the story forward.
2) The directing by Nora Ephron was perfect. Now why would you think Nora did such a perfect job as if she herself were taking the parts in the movie? She was so "one" with her cast, so "one" with the story line, and so "one" with every scene because SHE wrote it! She ought to know what she wanted to say with this movie because she knew exactly what she wanted to say in her own Manuscript.
3) Joe Fox (Tom Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) have a love relationship on line but in reality they are full of animosity for one another off line. Of course neither know who the other is off line. This tension between being "in love" with a man and being "in love" with a woman you are really out-of-love with in real
life is a good story line. Joe Fox puts Kathleen Kelly out of business by making a mega-store: Fox Books right across the street form her little book's store. She has resentment toward Joe Fox; but he learns that she is the one he has been writing love letters to on line. Joe Fox begins to fall for her in reality. He courts her on and off line now by meeting her and advising her how to handle himslef while she has no clue he is the one she loves. He is clever and shows her subtly that he is the guy by saying things that only her mystery man can say in the way he says it. She gets confused. He off line asks her to forgive him. She never does in the film. But all works well for her financially and career wife because he in the end marries Joe Fox and they both live happily ever after. God story line? Very good!
4) The acting of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan was perfect because they were just being themselves. The greatest stars are those who are the same off screen as they are on the screen. Some of these greats are James Stewart, Gary Grant, Humphy Bogart, Loretta Young, and Judy Garland.
5) The most delightful thing to me is the "use of words." Words to a writer are like colors to an artist. How you put them together is how beautiful the art work becomes. Even using the instant mail through the internet makes a romance move quickly. In the old days when snail mail was the only way and when letters came from overseas in weeks, romance grew slower. Psychologists also caution internet dating users that a false intimacy and emotion can spring up on internet dating exchanges. People project unto another quatities and charm they do not possess in reality. It has been known that persons on line who are writing intimate stuff are not even a woman or man we expected them to be but were the opposite sex then they claimed to be. This false identity can go on for a long while. Some of these men are predators. So, we must be careful on line. But in this movie, all the words written between Joe and Kathleen are perfect as well. Joe - when he stood her up at the restaurant [actually he did go but went as himself not her mystery man] - tried to make excuses on line to Kathleen. But his lies were so out of charcter to his love for her that he deleted every one. He told her the truth but not all of it. Here is the bottom line: "WORDS ARE SACRED". Theologically, Jesus is the WORD of God. After the Incarnation, all words have taken on a character and life of their own. When a writer writes a novel or essay or shot story or a blog, once those words leave his hands, they have a life of their own and say something to the reader that wouid startle him if he knew. Remember, we take in knowlege not as knowlege is but as we are. We color every thing with our view, our emotions, our past experiences, our education, our opinion, our mind-set, our philosophy and our theology. How is then that our words ever get across at all. They don't. The writer just opens the reader to the thoughts in her own mind. She is grateful of the writer has helped her to see what she was thinking in the first place.
6) The ending of the movie makes it - with all of the above - a cinematic Masterpiece. Why? The ending is a culmination of their love, a resolution of all animosity, a fulfillment not only of their desire to sell books to open the minds of children - big and small - and the obtaining for both of them their hearts' desire: an eternal love for one another. Kathleen says it all for both of them when she says in tears: "I wanted him to be you!" She was in fact in love with two men: the one on line and the one she grew to love: Joe Fox. How can this dual love be reconciled? How can her heart be "one"? Her hesitant and long kiss of Joe reconciles all and fulfills all and give all a perfect ending. She has not a tinge of conflict. She has her beloved in her arms and will never let him go. Her mom in heaven who started the book store 42 years ago was smiling as well. This is not only a feel-good movie. It is a portrait-masterpiece of "true love" that says "true love is possible
.........for you....and for me!"
Well, the next time you see "You've Got Mail", please think about what I have just said above; and hopefully, you will enjoy it as much as I did. Have a great movie night!
Love, Pio
1) As a writer, I was keenly listening to all the lines. This movie was carefully edited because there was not one extraneouis word in it. Every line and every scene were perfect to move the story forward.
2) The directing by Nora Ephron was perfect. Now why would you think Nora did such a perfect job as if she herself were taking the parts in the movie? She was so "one" with her cast, so "one" with the story line, and so "one" with every scene because SHE wrote it! She ought to know what she wanted to say with this movie because she knew exactly what she wanted to say in her own Manuscript.
3) Joe Fox (Tom Hanks) and Kathleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) have a love relationship on line but in reality they are full of animosity for one another off line. Of course neither know who the other is off line. This tension between being "in love" with a man and being "in love" with a woman you are really out-of-love with in real
life is a good story line. Joe Fox puts Kathleen Kelly out of business by making a mega-store: Fox Books right across the street form her little book's store. She has resentment toward Joe Fox; but he learns that she is the one he has been writing love letters to on line. Joe Fox begins to fall for her in reality. He courts her on and off line now by meeting her and advising her how to handle himslef while she has no clue he is the one she loves. He is clever and shows her subtly that he is the guy by saying things that only her mystery man can say in the way he says it. She gets confused. He off line asks her to forgive him. She never does in the film. But all works well for her financially and career wife because he in the end marries Joe Fox and they both live happily ever after. God story line? Very good!
4) The acting of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan was perfect because they were just being themselves. The greatest stars are those who are the same off screen as they are on the screen. Some of these greats are James Stewart, Gary Grant, Humphy Bogart, Loretta Young, and Judy Garland.
5) The most delightful thing to me is the "use of words." Words to a writer are like colors to an artist. How you put them together is how beautiful the art work becomes. Even using the instant mail through the internet makes a romance move quickly. In the old days when snail mail was the only way and when letters came from overseas in weeks, romance grew slower. Psychologists also caution internet dating users that a false intimacy and emotion can spring up on internet dating exchanges. People project unto another quatities and charm they do not possess in reality. It has been known that persons on line who are writing intimate stuff are not even a woman or man we expected them to be but were the opposite sex then they claimed to be. This false identity can go on for a long while. Some of these men are predators. So, we must be careful on line. But in this movie, all the words written between Joe and Kathleen are perfect as well. Joe - when he stood her up at the restaurant [actually he did go but went as himself not her mystery man] - tried to make excuses on line to Kathleen. But his lies were so out of charcter to his love for her that he deleted every one. He told her the truth but not all of it. Here is the bottom line: "WORDS ARE SACRED". Theologically, Jesus is the WORD of God. After the Incarnation, all words have taken on a character and life of their own. When a writer writes a novel or essay or shot story or a blog, once those words leave his hands, they have a life of their own and say something to the reader that wouid startle him if he knew. Remember, we take in knowlege not as knowlege is but as we are. We color every thing with our view, our emotions, our past experiences, our education, our opinion, our mind-set, our philosophy and our theology. How is then that our words ever get across at all. They don't. The writer just opens the reader to the thoughts in her own mind. She is grateful of the writer has helped her to see what she was thinking in the first place.
6) The ending of the movie makes it - with all of the above - a cinematic Masterpiece. Why? The ending is a culmination of their love, a resolution of all animosity, a fulfillment not only of their desire to sell books to open the minds of children - big and small - and the obtaining for both of them their hearts' desire: an eternal love for one another. Kathleen says it all for both of them when she says in tears: "I wanted him to be you!" She was in fact in love with two men: the one on line and the one she grew to love: Joe Fox. How can this dual love be reconciled? How can her heart be "one"? Her hesitant and long kiss of Joe reconciles all and fulfills all and give all a perfect ending. She has not a tinge of conflict. She has her beloved in her arms and will never let him go. Her mom in heaven who started the book store 42 years ago was smiling as well. This is not only a feel-good movie. It is a portrait-masterpiece of "true love" that says "true love is possible
.........for you....and for me!"
Well, the next time you see "You've Got Mail", please think about what I have just said above; and hopefully, you will enjoy it as much as I did. Have a great movie night!
Love, Pio
Pio's Proverb 98: The Child in us!
"Unless you become like little children, you will not enter into the Kingdom of God." Jesus was saying a lot more than we know here with His words to our hearts.
Unless we become like little children, we will not even enter into this life either much less the next life:
Children see things clearly: they see clouds not as water vaper hanging above us at perfect atmospheric pressure and altitude to look white and soft. No, they just see animals and faces and heroes.
Children are proof of the epistomological principle that "We see things not as they are but as we are."
For example a child looking at a robin in a nest sees wonder and beauty and bird-babyhood. But a cat sees those same birds as a meal. Why? Because we see things as we are not as they are. A photographer takes pictures of a zebra in the jungle. He sees the beauty and the grace of the herd as they protect one another by staying close to one another to blend together by their stripes because it is hard for a lion to zero in on one zebra when they are huddle together - thus making a kind of zebra-blur of no-individuals. But a lion does not see the beauty of them at all. He sees potential dinner.
Thus, a person who beholds beauty beholds it as he is - not as it is in itself. In itself, a zebra is a complex living system which is ware that it is part of a herd of similar individuals who want closeness, protection and plenty of safe grass and water. Of course in God's eyes, animals are so much more. They are examples of His creative mind. And God has a "Beautiful Mind".
Children - says Mitch Album - need to be children. We need to let them be children - to play and enjoy, to wonder and call one another to with excitement: "Look!" Mitch says we need to imitate children in these four ways:
1) Have conversations face to face [not emails or phone or texting].
2) Build something. Create something. I created a shrine to our Lady. It is 8 feet tall and made of about 500 bricks. I never laid a brick before this; but it turned out great. I painted the statue of Our Lady holding the Christ Child in her arms. I have 20 coats of varnish on the statue. I had the shrine blest by a Jesuit. We sang a song to Mary to dedicate her new shrine. One neighbor said she looks so beuaiful that someone will steal it from me. It doesn't seem that someone would steal Mary and make off with her. Well, if some one would do that, I would pay any ransom for her to get her back.
3) Learn something today you did not know. Kids are always looking for something new which they promptly share. Even when we were trading baseball cards in the 50's, we were sharing baseball stars statistics. "Did you know that........?" I learn several things new everyday...AND I share them all with YOU!
4) Read something. Learn by reading. Kids have so many children's books. I as a grandfather have to read the same story over and over again because that is their world of adventure and make believe. The Engine Thomas and Sir Toppen Hat are real - absolutel real - to children. These characters are sacred. We know that because at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, my grandkids saw Thomas and Sir Toppen Hat!
Fr. Nick astutely has seen a child-like episode between Phillip and Nathaniel in today's gospel. Fr.Nick said "Phillip says to Nathaniel: 'Come and See"! I have found the Messiah!" This cry of "Come and See!" is exactly what kids do when they have found something exciting and great! This playfulness of Phillip to call Nathaniel to the Lord is a good example for us. Jesus uses us...to bring others to Him. He said about Paul: "He is my chosen vessel to bring the good news to the Gentiles." Now Jesus can just make a cosmic announcement from the heavens. He does not do that. He uses personal representatives to call others to Himself. Of course Jesus is imitating the Father who sent prophets all down the salvation history of Israel starting with Abraham. As God the Father changed the name of Abram to Abraham, so Jesus changes Saul to Paul and Simon to Peter and even nick names a few: John and James become "Sons of thunder"! What is Jesus name for you? He calls me "Peter" and pronounces it affectionately as "Petah"! with emphasis on "Pe"!
Does your computer have sound? If so, please google one word: Evancho and you will see and hear a 10-year- old girl who is very tiny but who has an enormous voice. Her viewing public called into the station and told them that she was not really singing; but she was only lipsinging to another person's voice. She sounds like a 35-year-old woman! At 8 years old, her mom took her to see and hear the "Phantom of the Opera!" This was Jackie's first live performance of singing. She went home and started to sing the songs from the Phantom by memory. This was the beginning of her singing career. Now at 10, eventhough she does not have a trained voice, she won first place on that talent show. One of the judges said that he has been judging talent from London to New York and has never heard anything better than this little girl. He admitted he had goose bumps listening to her. I listen to her almost everyday so as to be inspired to do my best, too. But one thing is sure: she is still a little child. She has a child-like amazement at herself and all the love she is receiving from her fans. When asked how she felt, she said she almost cried. Then she answered the question with a made-up word that sounded like "fabulouso" - an coined-Italian word she must made up on the spot. Her mind is beautiful as her face and her voice. She is so innocent. She seems holy. Her singing of "Pie Jesu" is fabulous. Her singing of the "Ave Maria" is song as a prayer. Jackie is the child of year....maybe of the decade....maybe of the century!
Father in Heaven, make us to be as little children so we can enter into this world and into the Kingdm of God in heaven. Make us to see that the Kingdom of God is here right now amongs us...whenever we bring Christ to be seen in us and around us and through us. In Jesus' Name. Amen.
Love, Pio
Unless we become like little children, we will not even enter into this life either much less the next life:
Children see things clearly: they see clouds not as water vaper hanging above us at perfect atmospheric pressure and altitude to look white and soft. No, they just see animals and faces and heroes.
Children are proof of the epistomological principle that "We see things not as they are but as we are."
For example a child looking at a robin in a nest sees wonder and beauty and bird-babyhood. But a cat sees those same birds as a meal. Why? Because we see things as we are not as they are. A photographer takes pictures of a zebra in the jungle. He sees the beauty and the grace of the herd as they protect one another by staying close to one another to blend together by their stripes because it is hard for a lion to zero in on one zebra when they are huddle together - thus making a kind of zebra-blur of no-individuals. But a lion does not see the beauty of them at all. He sees potential dinner.
Thus, a person who beholds beauty beholds it as he is - not as it is in itself. In itself, a zebra is a complex living system which is ware that it is part of a herd of similar individuals who want closeness, protection and plenty of safe grass and water. Of course in God's eyes, animals are so much more. They are examples of His creative mind. And God has a "Beautiful Mind".
Children - says Mitch Album - need to be children. We need to let them be children - to play and enjoy, to wonder and call one another to with excitement: "Look!" Mitch says we need to imitate children in these four ways:
1) Have conversations face to face [not emails or phone or texting].
2) Build something. Create something. I created a shrine to our Lady. It is 8 feet tall and made of about 500 bricks. I never laid a brick before this; but it turned out great. I painted the statue of Our Lady holding the Christ Child in her arms. I have 20 coats of varnish on the statue. I had the shrine blest by a Jesuit. We sang a song to Mary to dedicate her new shrine. One neighbor said she looks so beuaiful that someone will steal it from me. It doesn't seem that someone would steal Mary and make off with her. Well, if some one would do that, I would pay any ransom for her to get her back.
3) Learn something today you did not know. Kids are always looking for something new which they promptly share. Even when we were trading baseball cards in the 50's, we were sharing baseball stars statistics. "Did you know that........?" I learn several things new everyday...AND I share them all with YOU!
4) Read something. Learn by reading. Kids have so many children's books. I as a grandfather have to read the same story over and over again because that is their world of adventure and make believe. The Engine Thomas and Sir Toppen Hat are real - absolutel real - to children. These characters are sacred. We know that because at Greenfield Village in Dearborn, my grandkids saw Thomas and Sir Toppen Hat!
Fr. Nick astutely has seen a child-like episode between Phillip and Nathaniel in today's gospel. Fr.Nick said "Phillip says to Nathaniel: 'Come and See"! I have found the Messiah!" This cry of "Come and See!" is exactly what kids do when they have found something exciting and great! This playfulness of Phillip to call Nathaniel to the Lord is a good example for us. Jesus uses us...to bring others to Him. He said about Paul: "He is my chosen vessel to bring the good news to the Gentiles." Now Jesus can just make a cosmic announcement from the heavens. He does not do that. He uses personal representatives to call others to Himself. Of course Jesus is imitating the Father who sent prophets all down the salvation history of Israel starting with Abraham. As God the Father changed the name of Abram to Abraham, so Jesus changes Saul to Paul and Simon to Peter and even nick names a few: John and James become "Sons of thunder"! What is Jesus name for you? He calls me "Peter" and pronounces it affectionately as "Petah"! with emphasis on "Pe"!
Does your computer have sound? If so, please google one word: Evancho and you will see and hear a 10-year- old girl who is very tiny but who has an enormous voice. Her viewing public called into the station and told them that she was not really singing; but she was only lipsinging to another person's voice. She sounds like a 35-year-old woman! At 8 years old, her mom took her to see and hear the "Phantom of the Opera!" This was Jackie's first live performance of singing. She went home and started to sing the songs from the Phantom by memory. This was the beginning of her singing career. Now at 10, eventhough she does not have a trained voice, she won first place on that talent show. One of the judges said that he has been judging talent from London to New York and has never heard anything better than this little girl. He admitted he had goose bumps listening to her. I listen to her almost everyday so as to be inspired to do my best, too. But one thing is sure: she is still a little child. She has a child-like amazement at herself and all the love she is receiving from her fans. When asked how she felt, she said she almost cried. Then she answered the question with a made-up word that sounded like "fabulouso" - an coined-Italian word she must made up on the spot. Her mind is beautiful as her face and her voice. She is so innocent. She seems holy. Her singing of "Pie Jesu" is fabulous. Her singing of the "Ave Maria" is song as a prayer. Jackie is the child of year....maybe of the decade....maybe of the century!
Father in Heaven, make us to be as little children so we can enter into this world and into the Kingdm of God in heaven. Make us to see that the Kingdom of God is here right now amongs us...whenever we bring Christ to be seen in us and around us and through us. In Jesus' Name. Amen.
Love, Pio
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Pio's Proverb 97: "COURAGE" for the Courageous: Hope for homosexuals and Lesbians.
When St. Augustine was converting from a libertine [had a teenager pregnant living with him and his mother], he heard this voice from Jesus: "COURAGE, I am the food of the strong." Augustine went on to become the bishop of Hippo, Africa. But he struggled with his sexuality and often told Jesus that he would be chaste and follow Him...."but not yet." Letting go of his sexual habits was not easy for Augustine; but having St. Ambrose as a spiritual director surely helped. St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, prayed for 30 years for Augustine to become a Christian. She did go to Bishop Ambrose to get help with her son, Augustine; but St. Ambrose told her: "Donnot not talk to Augustine about God but rather to talk to God about Augustine." She took that counsel and it worked. With a mother who was a saint and a bishop whe was a saint, no wonder Augustine, himself, became a saint. The feast day of St. Augustine and St. Monica are two days apart in the calendar of the saints. Son and mom - they are close.
After Augustine became bishop of Hippo, he wrote something to show that all vocations are inclusive of Jesus' call to holiness and that no one was excluded [that also applies to same-sex oriented males and females. God calls them to holiness, too]. Bishop Augustine wrote: "I tell you again and again, my brethern, that in the Lord's garden are to be found not only the roses of His martyrs. In it there are also the lilies of the virgins, the ivy of wedded couples, and the violets of widows. On no account may any class of poeple despair thinking that God has not called them." To accept this call from God to holiness, the homosexual needs "courage".
COURAGE is also the fourth of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit: "Fortitude (Courage): With the gift of fortitude/courage, we oveercome our fear and are willing to take risks as a follower of Jesus Christ. A person with courage is willing to stand up for what is right n the sight of God, even if it means accepting rejection, verbal abuse, or even physical harm and death. The gift of courage allows people the firmness of mind that is required both in doing good and in enduring evil, especially with regard to goods or evils that are difficult, just like Joan of Arc did."
I once experienced this gift from the Holy Spirit. Actually the gift of courage came just before I reallyneeded it. It was predictive of what was coming. Here is how the gift of courage came to me: I was sitting in the church of the Immaculate Conception during Mass in the morning with the sun coming in throught the great stainglass windows. All of a sudden, I felt a feeling of courage starting to grow in my spirit. It was like slowly turning up the volume of a giant radio or tv. It kept growing until I could hardly bear it. Never in my life before or after have I ever felt that intense of emotion. It was all-pervasive and encompassing. I felt expanded and wonderful. I felt that I could take on an army or lay my head on the block for Christ. I felt that this is what the martyrs must have felt when thrown to the lions or being crucified for Christ. This infused contemplation/experience of courage was being poured into me by the Holy Spirit. I was awed. I do not think that a bishop being consecrated by an archbishop could have felt as much as I was feeling. "COURAGE" is as real or more real than anything we can see or feel on this earth.
St. Thomas Aquinas says that Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, and Counsel direct the intellect, while Fortintude/Courage, Piety, and Fear of the Lord direct the will toward God.
St. Paul said: "God has not given you a spirit of fear but rather a spirit of courage." Also, he goes on to say to the Thessalonians: "We had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition."
In is no wonder, then, that there has been founded a Community called "COURAGE" to give Hope to homosexuals. "Courage, an apostolate of the Catholic Church, ministers to those with same-sex attraction and thier loved ones. It has been endorsed by the Pontifical Council for the Family and by Blessed John Paul II who said of this ministry, 'COURAGE is doing the work of God!' There is also an outreach called 'Encourage' which ministers to relatives and friends of person with same-sex attractions.'"
Blessed John Paul II also said this those who are Courageous enough to join COURAGE: "Trust Christ; listen attentively to his teachings, fix your eyes on his face, persevere in listening to is Word. Allow him to focus your serch and your aspirations, all your ideals and the desires of your heart."
This is precisely what Pope John Paul II is really saying: All homosexuals struggling with same-sex attraction are called to be Saints...no less...than any one who is a single heterosexual struggling to be chaste. Single homo and hetero sexuals are carrying the same cross to remain chaste. Yes, the single hetero has the hope of marriage; but the homosexual does not. Same sex marriage is an impossibilty as much as a square circle is an impossibity. "Male and Female God has made them...and they shall become one flesh", says Jesus. He never said: "Male and Male God created them ...and they shall become one flesh." Marriage is intrinsically between one man and one woman. God created them that way. Marriage mirrors the union of God with His people. In Isaiah, he writes: "I shall espouse you to me......I, your Builder, shall marry you....As a young man delights in his bride, so shall the Lord delight in you." Because the covenant between God and humankind is a "marriage" covenant to show how intimate it is....the most intimate relationship on earth....that is why the Church so ardently protects Marriage as a Sacrament between one man and one woman.
But if a homesexual cannot get married, what is he or she to do with their sexuality?
1) Give it to the Lord. Better to give it to the Lord now than to a partner that will not help you in your last hour on this earth. All the past pleasures and pains of our lives - when remembered - seem like nothing because memory of pleasure and pain do not have any subjective existence. For such a memory to have subjective existence, it would have to be not only recalled but to be existentially re-lived in our now. But all memory is an objectification of a past event not a subjectification of a past event or experience. What this means is that at the hour of our death, our past pleasures and pains will mean absolutely nothing. Only all the holy true love we have given to others or received from others will follow us into paradise. In heaven all those experiences of holy true love - given and received - will be able to be recalled subjectively. [See Jacques Maritain].
2) Homosexuals and lesbians can join "COURAGE" to find true love in a community of love. This "true love" consists in falling in love with Jesus and sharing that love with fellow followers of Jesus who have given their sexuality to Jesus. Also, members of "COURAGE" have a chase loving frienships with other members. Phone numbers are exchanged to support one another. This community is a prayerful, social, supportive, spiritual group of men and women who have same sex-attraction biologically but have the will and courage to submit all they are to Christ and His love for them. They are leading holy lives. There is hope for their future.
3) Many of the medical and psychiatric field believe that homosexuality can be cured. But it is not possible for a person to be living with a same-sex partner to start the healing process. That would be like a heroine addict coming to a clinic that gives him heroine 3 times a day and thus increasing his need for heroine. For the healing process to begin, there has to be a break from practicing it. Every act of practicing homosexual acts deepens it upon the memory and mind associations and endorphins release. "Facilitated synaptic connections in the autonomic nervous system" is the principle of how practice makes perfect. The violinists uses the same synaptic connections in his autonomic nervous system so much that those channels of nerves are so ready to act that the violinists does not think hardly at all how to play that symphony. In a sense his fingers and nerves know exactly what to do spontaneously. Well, in homosexuality, those synaptic connections are facilitated to want more and more - to grow in one's same-sex orientation. There is no cure for someone who wishes to live their live as active homosexual and wants to live and die that way. For him, there is not cure because he does not have to will to be cured. An alchoholic can not be cured if he does not want to go to AA or any such program. His alchoholism is chosen. There is a 12 step program for homosexual based on the 12 step program of AA. I deeply believe that homosexuality can be cured. I have seen it and there are personal testimonies of such cures and studies of cases of such cures. But the gay culture wants to just "normalize" homosexuality. There is according to the gay community nothing to cure. Homosexuality is normal to them. Well, there is a comparitive analogy here: Alchoholics can unite to pass legislation that alchoholism is perfectly natural and part of our free volitional act of drinking for consenting adults. They can that laws that hinder their driving are unconstitutional and that driving under the influence is their right. Say that these alchoholics get legislation passed and even teach children in grammar school that drinking is natural and good for you. They show pictures of the pleasure of drinking as is part of the "right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Well, if such legislation is passed, the pathology of alchoholism remains ontologically true, legislation to the contrary notwithstanding. Similarly, legislation of same-sex unions and calling it marriage does not in anyway take away from the abnormality of Gender Identification Disorder. Quite bluntly, the penis naturally belongs in the vagina not the rectum. This would seem to be very evident in the natural animal world, the bird world, the whale world. But for some reason, this natural law is not accepted by the gay community. If you look at the complete physical makeup of the human bodies of male and female - even without the book of Genesis - you would conclude that these two bodies are complementary. Male-female intercouse is designed for the mutual satisfaction of husband and wife as well as to be open to conceive a new human being. Male bodies are not only not complementary, they cannot ever produce a child. Why? Because union of male to male is abnormal and outside the design of Nature. So, one could easily make an argument from design that homosexuality is a deviation from the norm - an evident abnormality. That does not mean we let our compassion and understanding and love for people of same-sex attraction go. Not at all. I am only advocating and proposing that no one can normalize what is intrinsically abnormal. Again I am not using "normal" or "abnormal" statistically. I am useing it against the standard of the Natural Law...which is really the Law that God created in us. If you have time, please see the 1942 book published in London and then published in 1943 in America called "The Screwtape Letters" by C. S. Lewis. He speaks there about the temptation of homosexuality. Screwtape and Wormwood are corresponding devils who are after a soul of a young man. Their letters to one another would take eight hours to read into a recording device. But a recent one-act play does it in an hour and a half. This is a facinating work that is being resurrected in our own days. The subtlety of the temptation of the devils on this young man really make you think how the deceiver can present evil as good.
4) But there are still those who are committed to the propostion that homosexuality is the norm and perhaps heterosexuality the abnormal? Why must homesexuality need to be cured anyway? Why do we not cure heterosexuals and make them homosexuals? These are legitimate questions; and they have legitimate answers. First of all, as stated above, when we use the term "norm" or "normal", we are talking statistically normality. The mean - the norm - is the top of the bell shape curve arrived at by statiscal analysis of the computed data. According to this model, Elizabeth Taylor was abnormal. Her beauty was in the 2 percentile of all women. The normal women was just really a plain Jane. But her abnormality in beauty did not mean there was any pathology in her. So, when we are using the term "normal", we are not using it in any statiscal model. We are using it in terms of the laws of nature. What is Natural to man is what is considered the norm according to the Natural Law. If heterosexual relationships were abnormal in this Natural Law sense, then that would mean that Health would have to cured because Health would be abnormal according to the Natural Law. Health would be an abnormal state that needs medication or therapy to cure. But if homosexuality was a diviation from the Natural Law, then it would need to be cured by medication and/or therapy. The frequency of homosexuality in the world does not make it the norm in the Natural Law. It would only make it statistically more normal. Here is a good example of acts against the Natural Law that are extremely in the statiscal norm: Abortion. There are over 4000 abortions in the U.S. daily. There are 1.3 million abortions in the US per year. Does that statiscal normalcy mean that it is normal according to the Natural Law? Not at all, 99% of all abortions are blatant violations of the Natural Law and the 5th Commandment of God. That 1% done to save the mother's life, the Church says that in saving the mother, a fetus dies, it is not the killing of the fetus that is the object of the surgery...that only happens as a secondary result. But in 99% of the abortions, all fetuses in the womb are killed as the primary object of the surgery. That is murder. In the Michigan Health Code, the wording is this regarding abortion: "The fetus - homo sapiens - is killed." The bottom line is that statistical norms mean nothing as to Natural Law norms.
Homosexuality is the what God intented for humans. It is a diviation form God's plan and from nature itself.
Homosexuality is not inborn. No one is born a homosexual. It is learned. It is socially, culturally, an family and in some cases taught to an individual. For example - real life - if a young man's first experience is a homsexual one done to him by an older homosexual, his sexuality which would have developed, is fixated there and does not grow. I have talked to many and know their life stories. One story is a boy who had 2 borthers but lived apart from his dad and tried to have close and warm relationship with boys in substitute for his dad's absence and lack of love. When his father came to live with those three boys in the same house for a year, male bonding grew between the homosexual son and the Father as well as male bonding with his brothers who also lived away. The result was that the boy's homosexuality left him. He is married now with children. Homosexuality can be cured with prayer, loving family support, sound Christian spirituality, with communities like COURAGE. What has been learned can be unlearned. But most of all by the Holy Spirit giving the young man or woman the Gift of Fortitude/Courage. This comes with Confirmation and with the asking the Holy Spirit. It was given to me once without my asking. It is the most power emotion I have ever experience. It take Courage to be courageous. Courage is for the courageous. Courage is for the will to turn to Christ and say: "Here I am - body and soul. "totus tuus" - "totally yours"!
5) My experiences with gays:
In Kentucky, I was living with two other men in the 1960's. I did wonder why they occupied the same bedroom instead of separate rooms like I was renting from them. I was so innocent that it did not come to me that they were kay. I lived there for quite awhile. What brought things into the open was that one of the men who seems to want to make me his confidant, came home from work [he was art director], almost in tears. He told me that he had been dismissed from his job because he was found out to be gay. I was compassionate and was not at all judgemental. Quite the contrary, I tried to console him because he and I were both Catholic and had a lot in common. Discrimination of gays in the work place is so very un-Christian. But what really made him open up more to me was when he heard that I have been in a gay bar.
Now, that was again my innocense. I was totally innocent: I was a virgin till I was 27 when I got married to Sharon, the mother of my 6 children. I went into this restaurant downtowm Louisville for lunch. I did serve beer, I believe. But I would not know the difference between a gay restaurant and a straight one anyway. Well while having lunch an older - about 38 years old - came over to my table and started talking as if I had invited him to come over. Being friendly, I just shot the breeze with him innnocently. But then he did something I never experienced before; he touched my knee under the table affectionately. Surely that made me feel very uncomfortable and puzzed really. Even at that point I did not think he was homosexual or coming on to me. I just quickly and politely without giving offense left the restaurant. But evidently the gay community saw me there in that restaurant and got the word around. My landlord - the one who lost his job - heard about it and he questioned me. I told him that it was all an accident and that I would love to be married to a woman. I should not have shared that I was a complete virgin and had not even ever seen a woman in the nude. His mind started to work on all this. He was so amazed that at 21 that I was a virgin, that he decided unilaterally to fix that for me. I learned from another friend of thiers who came to visit, that the owner was planning for tomorrow a surprise party for me. He had invited a lot of people but especially three very amorous and experienced and loose women to this party who were planning to all at once corner me in a private room and make sure that my viriginty was totally gone - by three times as my first time. I was shocked. The person who told me was one who just could not keep a secret; but I was very glad he was that way. That afternoon, I packed all my things - totally - everything in one suitcase and brief case. I kindly told the owner that I was leaving without letting him know I knew about tomorrow's planned orgy which he thought was his kindness for me, really. He was a good guy. After I said my good bye, he thought I would have to pack and have time to talk more with him. But I just went to my room, got my things in my two hands and exited in lest than 50 seconds. I thus was saved from being lovingly raped by three females who were absolutey sure that they would succeed. Well, the Catholic Church taught me regarding sexual temptation: do not negotiate! Flee! I followed that counsel perfectly and remained a virgin for the next 6 years. Seems God rewarded me with 6 children: one for each year I remained virginal.
As an act of kindness, I went on request of my confessor, Fr. Joe, to pick up another priest at Metro Airport coming from New York. He was older man with pepper hair - about 60 or so - and I was about 40 years old with 6 kids. I help him with his bags and put them into my car. He was very friendly and intense in communicating - very present - and direct but very kind and caring. He liked me instantly. I could see that. I did not know why; but he did. We did become friends. [I always like priests because I lived in the seminray with 200 students and about 20 priests. In all those 8 years studying for the priesthood, there was never a hint of or a rumor of nor a person that was homosexual. In those days, such persons of same-sex attraction were not allowed to go to the seminary. But also, there were never a priest that was gay or homosexual. It was truly unheard of because there were none. There never was ever an incident of sexual abuse.] Well, there was something different about this priest I took home to his rectory from the airport. He got my address and started to write to me regularly. He was sharing deep things of his heart with me. He was making me his confidant. I understood that I use to go to priests to ask them to be a counselor or confessor; but this priest was more and more making me his counselor and confidant. I was again too innocent to see anything in it but friendliness. But there was something more. He was falling in love with me. His letters became more and more like love letters - nothing physical but emotional. Finally, I met with him at the monastery and asked him to open up to me what was bothering him. I had an MA in Psychology and new a hidden agenda or subconcious feelings when I encountered them. He finally trusted me enought to tell me his whole life. There was no doubt, he had entered therapy with me. He was making me his psychiatrist. He is the first priest who came to me for counseling. He was older. But he was opening up his heart to me after my promise to keep all that he said in strictist confidence. He told me he had been an active homosexual in the service before entering the seminary. He kept all this hidden from them; and was opening up to me because I was not part of his order. He said he was not practicing and did not after he entered the seminary; but still he had some temptations but overcame them. He said he had feellings for me. I told him that was natural and did not bother me. I was mature enough to not be bothered. Besides I was totally heterosexual - in spirit and body and in hopes. I set aside his feelings for me and tried to help him. Besides his feelings for me were classical case of transference in therapy. [client transferes love for his father to the therapist. If a female client, she could have loving feelings or even infatuation with therapist. If the therapist were to have counter-transperence towards her, they would both be in trouble.] Then the priest revealed he was in great distress and in great fear. Because he was so active in the army, he thought he surely caught AIDS. He could not get a test because he could not take the thought of knowing he had a death sentence. He rather live with not knowing and be miserable with worry than to be devastated with having the disease.
I gave him this DIRECT counsel with authority: "You must get an AIDS' tests! If you have it, you need to get treatment right away. That could save your life. If you do not have AIDS, then you should be on yur face to God in thanksgiving for saving you from this terrible disease. No matter what you have to get the test because either result would not only put you at ease but will either save your life or make you so greatful to God that you will feel joy for the rest of your life." Miraculously, he obeyed me and got the test! He was totally free of any AIDS virus. He was as healthy as anyone in his rectory. I am sure he fell on his face to thank God! He was very joyful from then on. But he later asked an interesting question: "Why did God call me into the priesthood knowing I was homosexual?" My answer was as swift as can be. I said: "You are called to holiness just as all who are baptized are called. It was your baptism that called you to live in Christ. But God had even more in mind for you. He knew you would go to New York and be a publisher. He foresaw all that. He called you into the holy priesthood to write a book to give hope to all homosexuals and gays that they are called to Christ...to live a holy and chaste life in Christ as you are doing. You must write this book and call them to Christ. It is your vocation to tell them of their vocation. You are perfect to do this work for Jesus. You are kind, articulate, literary, engaging, charasmatic. Do what you were put on this planet to do!" He responded to me: "You have helped me more than any psychiatrist on this earth."
I did not see him after that. I decided to remain away because I did not want to be any temptation to him - especially when he said he was battling phantacies of me. I told him that I had to absent myself for the purity of his mind and conscience. I never saw him again. But he wrote once and a while from New York. That was ok...we both were the wiser from knowing each other..and saw the mercy of Christ in one another. In today's gospel, Phillip told Nathaniel: "Come and See!" the Lord. God uses all of use to call each other to Jesus!
6) Male bonding:
Related to homosexual psychological imprinting or learned same-sex behavioral attraction as a substitute for social lack of male bonding, is the father and son relationship. If there is a totally good and warm father-to-son relationship, then there will not be a need for seeking male bonding sexually later in life. But if a father is physically and emotionally distant, the seeds for same sex attraction to substitute for this lack of closeness will have been planted early in the deprived boy. But even if a father is relatively close and home in the household, there will be trouble for his son/s if he is PERCEIVED as very weak or immoral EVEN IF HIS ISN'T. Therefore, a boy's mom who brow beats his dad or calls him no good or dominates him is writing a perscription for homosexuality for that boy. Thus, these two perceived or real latter faults can distance the father from the son emotionally and morally and socially. Any boy with a distant father -- no matter what the cause: psychological, physical, moral, social -- is being set up for homosexuality to fill in the gap left by this disfunctional father. Any boy who is punished by his mom for loving his dad [and this happens from a resentful or jealous mom] is guaranteeing homosexuality for that boy because emotional bonding is being punished. What a boy really needs from his father is affection, availability to listen, a little rough and tumble physical contact, sharing of sports [a ball game played or watched together], going to the art museum together, going to see an exciting movie together that is so stimulating that both father and son need to go and get some hamburgers, fries and cokes to discuss it. No son will become homosexual with a dad like that. My own memories of my dad are warm and caring and affectionate. My dad kissed us kids - girls and boys - on the lips. He hugged us. He listened to us. He shared out successes and our art work. My dad worked 10 hours a day 7 days a week; but he still had time for me. While studying, he cooked a wonderful meal for me and brought it upstairs, served it and told me: "It is time to eat. my son." He was teaching me how to love. When I brought him Holy Communion every Saturday after he retired and was sick, he would say to me: "I love you." Then as I left him, he would call back to me: "Thank you." My dad always separated love and gratitude. When my dad died, here is how it happened: All of us were there at his bedside: all his 7 children and my mom. I had given him his last Holy Communion. He looked up and saw something wonderful...must have been Jesus coming for him. When he stopped breathing, his heart still kept going. He had a perfect heart. Then when all was still, all of kids and mom looked up and waves good-bye to him saying: "Good bye, Pops! Good bye, Daddy! We love you!" The doctor was quite amazed by such a loving send off. My dad did not produce any homosexuals because he was just too loving.
7) Religiously or moral view:
But since the experience of some homosexuals is to fall in love just like heteosexuals do [the same emotion], what's wrong with it? Why does that need to be cured? The relationshipt begins like heterosexual ones: Friendship become love; and then love wants to be sexually shown. Homosexuals move in together or just live a committed sexual union that has emotional overtones. Not all homosexuals have multi-partners. Why cannot these committed, faithful unions between two men or two women be sanctioned by the Church? Well, the Sixth Commandment that forbids adultery also forbids fornication. Unmarried people who indulge in sexual union are committing a sin against the Sixth Commandment. The Church cannot teach that same-sex unions are not sinful; because the Church cannot teach error in FAITH or in MORALS.
But even if other denominations/churches hold that practicing homosexuals are nonetheless still living in union with Christ, that is not what Holy Scriptures say. Holy Scripture is quite specific:
Levitcus 18:22: "You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination."
Levitcus: 20:13: "If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of the have committed a destestable act; they shall surely be put to death. Their bloodguiltness is upon them."
[Interesting that a death penalty is given to this sexual sin making it on the par of those caught in adultery: hence Jesus saves the adulterous woman from being stoned and tells her to sin no more. But he calls it "sin", but still loves her. Jesus invites all homosexuals - male and female - into His Sacred Heart. He loves them all. He invites them to come and trust in His Love for them. Also, there seems to be no stoning for the sin of fornication. Therefore homosexual sins were consider as serious a sin as adultery. Therefore, homosexual acts were forbidden under the Sixth Commandment.]
Romans: 1-18-32: "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them....for even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God, or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to e wise, they became fools..."
"Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God fora a lie, and worshiped and served the creature than than the Creator, who is blessed forever.."
"For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also men abandoned the natual function of the women and burned in thier desire toward one another, men with men committed indecent acts and received in their own persons the due penalty of their error." [What was this due penalty they received into their own persons?]
"God gave them over over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, malice, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice.. without understanding...and, though they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such thinsg are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them." [The gay movement does give "hearty approval" to homosexual practices and life style.]
1 Corinthians 6:9: "Do you no know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God."
The above quote is the most important of all of them in that it refers to "homosexuals" specifically. This term is used for those who have embraced the homosexual life style not merely someone who has a same-sex attraction. We must absolutely understand that the Church does not say that to have a same-sex attraction in itself is sinful. But the same applies to same-sex attraction as to heterosexual attraction: the unmarried cannot indulge in sexual activity or sexual phantasy for the pleasureable arousal of the person. For the married, husband and wife can indulge in sexual activity and in sexual phantasy about each other while near or far from each other.
Let us conclude with more about the wonderful community of COURAGE:
Archbishop of Miami John Favalora supports homosexuals' need for a loving Community "by way of his pastoral letter encouraging Catholic prayers for Courage, an openly homosexual organization with his diocese. His lettter reads in part:
"All Catholics have the right to the truth that sets them free. For that reason, I wish to bring to your attention the Courage Ministry...
"Couarage is a spiritual support group for those who live with homosexual feelings and/or behavior.
"Born in the truth of Jesus' redemptive love for all, Courage Ministry faithfully reflectss Jesus and His Church."..
More of the letter can be read on http://www.renewamerical.us/columns/abbott/071002
To access COURAGE'S own website, see http://couragerc.net/ which states the following:
"Are you or a loved one experiencing homosexual attractions and looking of answers?
"Courage, an apostotlate of the Roman Catholic Chruch, ministers to those who same-sex attractions and thier loved ones."
"From our website you wil will larn about homosexuaity and chastity. By devoping an intereior life of chastity, which is the universal call to all Christians, onw can move beyond the confines of the hoomosexual identity to a more compoete on in Christ."
"In Courage you will get to know men and women who share in your concerns, meeting them online through our Listservs, or in person at Chapter Meetings, Conferences, Days of Recollection, and Retreats."
"Come and see what we are all about. Browse our pages. Get to know our community. You'll be glad you did!"
Dearest Father in Heaven,
Take into Your Heart all those who are struggling with same-sex attraction. You alone know the whole of each son or daughter as to how and why they have come to desire the same-sex as a beloved. You know that every one of these sons and daughter want to love and be loved. Help them to follow Jesus who will give them the desires of their hearts because the Psalmist has said in Ps 37:3-7, "Delight in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." Help your children, therefore to seek Jesus first and He will take care of the rest. Give them to know there in no happiness apart from Jesus or His Holy Spirit. Help them all to hear Jesus words: "If you wish to be my disciple, take up your cross and follow Me."
Give them all the 'COURAGE" to follow Your grace and invitation to this chaste community of love and belonging. Give them all the become Saints since that has been their reason for thier conception and birth. All this we ask in Jesus' Name. Amen.
Love, Pio
After Augustine became bishop of Hippo, he wrote something to show that all vocations are inclusive of Jesus' call to holiness and that no one was excluded [that also applies to same-sex oriented males and females. God calls them to holiness, too]. Bishop Augustine wrote: "I tell you again and again, my brethern, that in the Lord's garden are to be found not only the roses of His martyrs. In it there are also the lilies of the virgins, the ivy of wedded couples, and the violets of widows. On no account may any class of poeple despair thinking that God has not called them." To accept this call from God to holiness, the homosexual needs "courage".
COURAGE is also the fourth of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit: "Fortitude (Courage): With the gift of fortitude/courage, we oveercome our fear and are willing to take risks as a follower of Jesus Christ. A person with courage is willing to stand up for what is right n the sight of God, even if it means accepting rejection, verbal abuse, or even physical harm and death. The gift of courage allows people the firmness of mind that is required both in doing good and in enduring evil, especially with regard to goods or evils that are difficult, just like Joan of Arc did."
I once experienced this gift from the Holy Spirit. Actually the gift of courage came just before I reallyneeded it. It was predictive of what was coming. Here is how the gift of courage came to me: I was sitting in the church of the Immaculate Conception during Mass in the morning with the sun coming in throught the great stainglass windows. All of a sudden, I felt a feeling of courage starting to grow in my spirit. It was like slowly turning up the volume of a giant radio or tv. It kept growing until I could hardly bear it. Never in my life before or after have I ever felt that intense of emotion. It was all-pervasive and encompassing. I felt expanded and wonderful. I felt that I could take on an army or lay my head on the block for Christ. I felt that this is what the martyrs must have felt when thrown to the lions or being crucified for Christ. This infused contemplation/experience of courage was being poured into me by the Holy Spirit. I was awed. I do not think that a bishop being consecrated by an archbishop could have felt as much as I was feeling. "COURAGE" is as real or more real than anything we can see or feel on this earth.
St. Thomas Aquinas says that Wisdom, Understanding, Knowledge, and Counsel direct the intellect, while Fortintude/Courage, Piety, and Fear of the Lord direct the will toward God.
St. Paul said: "God has not given you a spirit of fear but rather a spirit of courage." Also, he goes on to say to the Thessalonians: "We had courage in our God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite of great opposition."
In is no wonder, then, that there has been founded a Community called "COURAGE" to give Hope to homosexuals. "Courage, an apostolate of the Catholic Church, ministers to those with same-sex attraction and thier loved ones. It has been endorsed by the Pontifical Council for the Family and by Blessed John Paul II who said of this ministry, 'COURAGE is doing the work of God!' There is also an outreach called 'Encourage' which ministers to relatives and friends of person with same-sex attractions.'"
Blessed John Paul II also said this those who are Courageous enough to join COURAGE: "Trust Christ; listen attentively to his teachings, fix your eyes on his face, persevere in listening to is Word. Allow him to focus your serch and your aspirations, all your ideals and the desires of your heart."
This is precisely what Pope John Paul II is really saying: All homosexuals struggling with same-sex attraction are called to be Saints...no less...than any one who is a single heterosexual struggling to be chaste. Single homo and hetero sexuals are carrying the same cross to remain chaste. Yes, the single hetero has the hope of marriage; but the homosexual does not. Same sex marriage is an impossibilty as much as a square circle is an impossibity. "Male and Female God has made them...and they shall become one flesh", says Jesus. He never said: "Male and Male God created them ...and they shall become one flesh." Marriage is intrinsically between one man and one woman. God created them that way. Marriage mirrors the union of God with His people. In Isaiah, he writes: "I shall espouse you to me......I, your Builder, shall marry you....As a young man delights in his bride, so shall the Lord delight in you." Because the covenant between God and humankind is a "marriage" covenant to show how intimate it is....the most intimate relationship on earth....that is why the Church so ardently protects Marriage as a Sacrament between one man and one woman.
But if a homesexual cannot get married, what is he or she to do with their sexuality?
1) Give it to the Lord. Better to give it to the Lord now than to a partner that will not help you in your last hour on this earth. All the past pleasures and pains of our lives - when remembered - seem like nothing because memory of pleasure and pain do not have any subjective existence. For such a memory to have subjective existence, it would have to be not only recalled but to be existentially re-lived in our now. But all memory is an objectification of a past event not a subjectification of a past event or experience. What this means is that at the hour of our death, our past pleasures and pains will mean absolutely nothing. Only all the holy true love we have given to others or received from others will follow us into paradise. In heaven all those experiences of holy true love - given and received - will be able to be recalled subjectively. [See Jacques Maritain].
2) Homosexuals and lesbians can join "COURAGE" to find true love in a community of love. This "true love" consists in falling in love with Jesus and sharing that love with fellow followers of Jesus who have given their sexuality to Jesus. Also, members of "COURAGE" have a chase loving frienships with other members. Phone numbers are exchanged to support one another. This community is a prayerful, social, supportive, spiritual group of men and women who have same sex-attraction biologically but have the will and courage to submit all they are to Christ and His love for them. They are leading holy lives. There is hope for their future.
3) Many of the medical and psychiatric field believe that homosexuality can be cured. But it is not possible for a person to be living with a same-sex partner to start the healing process. That would be like a heroine addict coming to a clinic that gives him heroine 3 times a day and thus increasing his need for heroine. For the healing process to begin, there has to be a break from practicing it. Every act of practicing homosexual acts deepens it upon the memory and mind associations and endorphins release. "Facilitated synaptic connections in the autonomic nervous system" is the principle of how practice makes perfect. The violinists uses the same synaptic connections in his autonomic nervous system so much that those channels of nerves are so ready to act that the violinists does not think hardly at all how to play that symphony. In a sense his fingers and nerves know exactly what to do spontaneously. Well, in homosexuality, those synaptic connections are facilitated to want more and more - to grow in one's same-sex orientation. There is no cure for someone who wishes to live their live as active homosexual and wants to live and die that way. For him, there is not cure because he does not have to will to be cured. An alchoholic can not be cured if he does not want to go to AA or any such program. His alchoholism is chosen. There is a 12 step program for homosexual based on the 12 step program of AA. I deeply believe that homosexuality can be cured. I have seen it and there are personal testimonies of such cures and studies of cases of such cures. But the gay culture wants to just "normalize" homosexuality. There is according to the gay community nothing to cure. Homosexuality is normal to them. Well, there is a comparitive analogy here: Alchoholics can unite to pass legislation that alchoholism is perfectly natural and part of our free volitional act of drinking for consenting adults. They can that laws that hinder their driving are unconstitutional and that driving under the influence is their right. Say that these alchoholics get legislation passed and even teach children in grammar school that drinking is natural and good for you. They show pictures of the pleasure of drinking as is part of the "right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Well, if such legislation is passed, the pathology of alchoholism remains ontologically true, legislation to the contrary notwithstanding. Similarly, legislation of same-sex unions and calling it marriage does not in anyway take away from the abnormality of Gender Identification Disorder. Quite bluntly, the penis naturally belongs in the vagina not the rectum. This would seem to be very evident in the natural animal world, the bird world, the whale world. But for some reason, this natural law is not accepted by the gay community. If you look at the complete physical makeup of the human bodies of male and female - even without the book of Genesis - you would conclude that these two bodies are complementary. Male-female intercouse is designed for the mutual satisfaction of husband and wife as well as to be open to conceive a new human being. Male bodies are not only not complementary, they cannot ever produce a child. Why? Because union of male to male is abnormal and outside the design of Nature. So, one could easily make an argument from design that homosexuality is a deviation from the norm - an evident abnormality. That does not mean we let our compassion and understanding and love for people of same-sex attraction go. Not at all. I am only advocating and proposing that no one can normalize what is intrinsically abnormal. Again I am not using "normal" or "abnormal" statistically. I am useing it against the standard of the Natural Law...which is really the Law that God created in us. If you have time, please see the 1942 book published in London and then published in 1943 in America called "The Screwtape Letters" by C. S. Lewis. He speaks there about the temptation of homosexuality. Screwtape and Wormwood are corresponding devils who are after a soul of a young man. Their letters to one another would take eight hours to read into a recording device. But a recent one-act play does it in an hour and a half. This is a facinating work that is being resurrected in our own days. The subtlety of the temptation of the devils on this young man really make you think how the deceiver can present evil as good.
4) But there are still those who are committed to the propostion that homosexuality is the norm and perhaps heterosexuality the abnormal? Why must homesexuality need to be cured anyway? Why do we not cure heterosexuals and make them homosexuals? These are legitimate questions; and they have legitimate answers. First of all, as stated above, when we use the term "norm" or "normal", we are talking statistically normality. The mean - the norm - is the top of the bell shape curve arrived at by statiscal analysis of the computed data. According to this model, Elizabeth Taylor was abnormal. Her beauty was in the 2 percentile of all women. The normal women was just really a plain Jane. But her abnormality in beauty did not mean there was any pathology in her. So, when we are using the term "normal", we are not using it in any statiscal model. We are using it in terms of the laws of nature. What is Natural to man is what is considered the norm according to the Natural Law. If heterosexual relationships were abnormal in this Natural Law sense, then that would mean that Health would have to cured because Health would be abnormal according to the Natural Law. Health would be an abnormal state that needs medication or therapy to cure. But if homosexuality was a diviation from the Natural Law, then it would need to be cured by medication and/or therapy. The frequency of homosexuality in the world does not make it the norm in the Natural Law. It would only make it statistically more normal. Here is a good example of acts against the Natural Law that are extremely in the statiscal norm: Abortion. There are over 4000 abortions in the U.S. daily. There are 1.3 million abortions in the US per year. Does that statiscal normalcy mean that it is normal according to the Natural Law? Not at all, 99% of all abortions are blatant violations of the Natural Law and the 5th Commandment of God. That 1% done to save the mother's life, the Church says that in saving the mother, a fetus dies, it is not the killing of the fetus that is the object of the surgery...that only happens as a secondary result. But in 99% of the abortions, all fetuses in the womb are killed as the primary object of the surgery. That is murder. In the Michigan Health Code, the wording is this regarding abortion: "The fetus - homo sapiens - is killed." The bottom line is that statistical norms mean nothing as to Natural Law norms.
Homosexuality is the what God intented for humans. It is a diviation form God's plan and from nature itself.
Homosexuality is not inborn. No one is born a homosexual. It is learned. It is socially, culturally, an family and in some cases taught to an individual. For example - real life - if a young man's first experience is a homsexual one done to him by an older homosexual, his sexuality which would have developed, is fixated there and does not grow. I have talked to many and know their life stories. One story is a boy who had 2 borthers but lived apart from his dad and tried to have close and warm relationship with boys in substitute for his dad's absence and lack of love. When his father came to live with those three boys in the same house for a year, male bonding grew between the homosexual son and the Father as well as male bonding with his brothers who also lived away. The result was that the boy's homosexuality left him. He is married now with children. Homosexuality can be cured with prayer, loving family support, sound Christian spirituality, with communities like COURAGE. What has been learned can be unlearned. But most of all by the Holy Spirit giving the young man or woman the Gift of Fortitude/Courage. This comes with Confirmation and with the asking the Holy Spirit. It was given to me once without my asking. It is the most power emotion I have ever experience. It take Courage to be courageous. Courage is for the courageous. Courage is for the will to turn to Christ and say: "Here I am - body and soul. "totus tuus" - "totally yours"!
5) My experiences with gays:
In Kentucky, I was living with two other men in the 1960's. I did wonder why they occupied the same bedroom instead of separate rooms like I was renting from them. I was so innocent that it did not come to me that they were kay. I lived there for quite awhile. What brought things into the open was that one of the men who seems to want to make me his confidant, came home from work [he was art director], almost in tears. He told me that he had been dismissed from his job because he was found out to be gay. I was compassionate and was not at all judgemental. Quite the contrary, I tried to console him because he and I were both Catholic and had a lot in common. Discrimination of gays in the work place is so very un-Christian. But what really made him open up more to me was when he heard that I have been in a gay bar.
Now, that was again my innocense. I was totally innocent: I was a virgin till I was 27 when I got married to Sharon, the mother of my 6 children. I went into this restaurant downtowm Louisville for lunch. I did serve beer, I believe. But I would not know the difference between a gay restaurant and a straight one anyway. Well while having lunch an older - about 38 years old - came over to my table and started talking as if I had invited him to come over. Being friendly, I just shot the breeze with him innnocently. But then he did something I never experienced before; he touched my knee under the table affectionately. Surely that made me feel very uncomfortable and puzzed really. Even at that point I did not think he was homosexual or coming on to me. I just quickly and politely without giving offense left the restaurant. But evidently the gay community saw me there in that restaurant and got the word around. My landlord - the one who lost his job - heard about it and he questioned me. I told him that it was all an accident and that I would love to be married to a woman. I should not have shared that I was a complete virgin and had not even ever seen a woman in the nude. His mind started to work on all this. He was so amazed that at 21 that I was a virgin, that he decided unilaterally to fix that for me. I learned from another friend of thiers who came to visit, that the owner was planning for tomorrow a surprise party for me. He had invited a lot of people but especially three very amorous and experienced and loose women to this party who were planning to all at once corner me in a private room and make sure that my viriginty was totally gone - by three times as my first time. I was shocked. The person who told me was one who just could not keep a secret; but I was very glad he was that way. That afternoon, I packed all my things - totally - everything in one suitcase and brief case. I kindly told the owner that I was leaving without letting him know I knew about tomorrow's planned orgy which he thought was his kindness for me, really. He was a good guy. After I said my good bye, he thought I would have to pack and have time to talk more with him. But I just went to my room, got my things in my two hands and exited in lest than 50 seconds. I thus was saved from being lovingly raped by three females who were absolutey sure that they would succeed. Well, the Catholic Church taught me regarding sexual temptation: do not negotiate! Flee! I followed that counsel perfectly and remained a virgin for the next 6 years. Seems God rewarded me with 6 children: one for each year I remained virginal.
As an act of kindness, I went on request of my confessor, Fr. Joe, to pick up another priest at Metro Airport coming from New York. He was older man with pepper hair - about 60 or so - and I was about 40 years old with 6 kids. I help him with his bags and put them into my car. He was very friendly and intense in communicating - very present - and direct but very kind and caring. He liked me instantly. I could see that. I did not know why; but he did. We did become friends. [I always like priests because I lived in the seminray with 200 students and about 20 priests. In all those 8 years studying for the priesthood, there was never a hint of or a rumor of nor a person that was homosexual. In those days, such persons of same-sex attraction were not allowed to go to the seminary. But also, there were never a priest that was gay or homosexual. It was truly unheard of because there were none. There never was ever an incident of sexual abuse.] Well, there was something different about this priest I took home to his rectory from the airport. He got my address and started to write to me regularly. He was sharing deep things of his heart with me. He was making me his confidant. I understood that I use to go to priests to ask them to be a counselor or confessor; but this priest was more and more making me his counselor and confidant. I was again too innocent to see anything in it but friendliness. But there was something more. He was falling in love with me. His letters became more and more like love letters - nothing physical but emotional. Finally, I met with him at the monastery and asked him to open up to me what was bothering him. I had an MA in Psychology and new a hidden agenda or subconcious feelings when I encountered them. He finally trusted me enought to tell me his whole life. There was no doubt, he had entered therapy with me. He was making me his psychiatrist. He is the first priest who came to me for counseling. He was older. But he was opening up his heart to me after my promise to keep all that he said in strictist confidence. He told me he had been an active homosexual in the service before entering the seminary. He kept all this hidden from them; and was opening up to me because I was not part of his order. He said he was not practicing and did not after he entered the seminary; but still he had some temptations but overcame them. He said he had feellings for me. I told him that was natural and did not bother me. I was mature enough to not be bothered. Besides I was totally heterosexual - in spirit and body and in hopes. I set aside his feelings for me and tried to help him. Besides his feelings for me were classical case of transference in therapy. [client transferes love for his father to the therapist. If a female client, she could have loving feelings or even infatuation with therapist. If the therapist were to have counter-transperence towards her, they would both be in trouble.] Then the priest revealed he was in great distress and in great fear. Because he was so active in the army, he thought he surely caught AIDS. He could not get a test because he could not take the thought of knowing he had a death sentence. He rather live with not knowing and be miserable with worry than to be devastated with having the disease.
I gave him this DIRECT counsel with authority: "You must get an AIDS' tests! If you have it, you need to get treatment right away. That could save your life. If you do not have AIDS, then you should be on yur face to God in thanksgiving for saving you from this terrible disease. No matter what you have to get the test because either result would not only put you at ease but will either save your life or make you so greatful to God that you will feel joy for the rest of your life." Miraculously, he obeyed me and got the test! He was totally free of any AIDS virus. He was as healthy as anyone in his rectory. I am sure he fell on his face to thank God! He was very joyful from then on. But he later asked an interesting question: "Why did God call me into the priesthood knowing I was homosexual?" My answer was as swift as can be. I said: "You are called to holiness just as all who are baptized are called. It was your baptism that called you to live in Christ. But God had even more in mind for you. He knew you would go to New York and be a publisher. He foresaw all that. He called you into the holy priesthood to write a book to give hope to all homosexuals and gays that they are called to Christ...to live a holy and chaste life in Christ as you are doing. You must write this book and call them to Christ. It is your vocation to tell them of their vocation. You are perfect to do this work for Jesus. You are kind, articulate, literary, engaging, charasmatic. Do what you were put on this planet to do!" He responded to me: "You have helped me more than any psychiatrist on this earth."
I did not see him after that. I decided to remain away because I did not want to be any temptation to him - especially when he said he was battling phantacies of me. I told him that I had to absent myself for the purity of his mind and conscience. I never saw him again. But he wrote once and a while from New York. That was ok...we both were the wiser from knowing each other..and saw the mercy of Christ in one another. In today's gospel, Phillip told Nathaniel: "Come and See!" the Lord. God uses all of use to call each other to Jesus!
6) Male bonding:
Related to homosexual psychological imprinting or learned same-sex behavioral attraction as a substitute for social lack of male bonding, is the father and son relationship. If there is a totally good and warm father-to-son relationship, then there will not be a need for seeking male bonding sexually later in life. But if a father is physically and emotionally distant, the seeds for same sex attraction to substitute for this lack of closeness will have been planted early in the deprived boy. But even if a father is relatively close and home in the household, there will be trouble for his son/s if he is PERCEIVED as very weak or immoral EVEN IF HIS ISN'T. Therefore, a boy's mom who brow beats his dad or calls him no good or dominates him is writing a perscription for homosexuality for that boy. Thus, these two perceived or real latter faults can distance the father from the son emotionally and morally and socially. Any boy with a distant father -- no matter what the cause: psychological, physical, moral, social -- is being set up for homosexuality to fill in the gap left by this disfunctional father. Any boy who is punished by his mom for loving his dad [and this happens from a resentful or jealous mom] is guaranteeing homosexuality for that boy because emotional bonding is being punished. What a boy really needs from his father is affection, availability to listen, a little rough and tumble physical contact, sharing of sports [a ball game played or watched together], going to the art museum together, going to see an exciting movie together that is so stimulating that both father and son need to go and get some hamburgers, fries and cokes to discuss it. No son will become homosexual with a dad like that. My own memories of my dad are warm and caring and affectionate. My dad kissed us kids - girls and boys - on the lips. He hugged us. He listened to us. He shared out successes and our art work. My dad worked 10 hours a day 7 days a week; but he still had time for me. While studying, he cooked a wonderful meal for me and brought it upstairs, served it and told me: "It is time to eat. my son." He was teaching me how to love. When I brought him Holy Communion every Saturday after he retired and was sick, he would say to me: "I love you." Then as I left him, he would call back to me: "Thank you." My dad always separated love and gratitude. When my dad died, here is how it happened: All of us were there at his bedside: all his 7 children and my mom. I had given him his last Holy Communion. He looked up and saw something wonderful...must have been Jesus coming for him. When he stopped breathing, his heart still kept going. He had a perfect heart. Then when all was still, all of kids and mom looked up and waves good-bye to him saying: "Good bye, Pops! Good bye, Daddy! We love you!" The doctor was quite amazed by such a loving send off. My dad did not produce any homosexuals because he was just too loving.
7) Religiously or moral view:
But since the experience of some homosexuals is to fall in love just like heteosexuals do [the same emotion], what's wrong with it? Why does that need to be cured? The relationshipt begins like heterosexual ones: Friendship become love; and then love wants to be sexually shown. Homosexuals move in together or just live a committed sexual union that has emotional overtones. Not all homosexuals have multi-partners. Why cannot these committed, faithful unions between two men or two women be sanctioned by the Church? Well, the Sixth Commandment that forbids adultery also forbids fornication. Unmarried people who indulge in sexual union are committing a sin against the Sixth Commandment. The Church cannot teach that same-sex unions are not sinful; because the Church cannot teach error in FAITH or in MORALS.
But even if other denominations/churches hold that practicing homosexuals are nonetheless still living in union with Christ, that is not what Holy Scriptures say. Holy Scripture is quite specific:
Levitcus 18:22: "You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination."
Levitcus: 20:13: "If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of the have committed a destestable act; they shall surely be put to death. Their bloodguiltness is upon them."
[Interesting that a death penalty is given to this sexual sin making it on the par of those caught in adultery: hence Jesus saves the adulterous woman from being stoned and tells her to sin no more. But he calls it "sin", but still loves her. Jesus invites all homosexuals - male and female - into His Sacred Heart. He loves them all. He invites them to come and trust in His Love for them. Also, there seems to be no stoning for the sin of fornication. Therefore homosexual sins were consider as serious a sin as adultery. Therefore, homosexual acts were forbidden under the Sixth Commandment.]
Romans: 1-18-32: "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them....for even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God, or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to e wise, they became fools..."
"Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, that their bodies might be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God fora a lie, and worshiped and served the creature than than the Creator, who is blessed forever.."
"For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also men abandoned the natual function of the women and burned in thier desire toward one another, men with men committed indecent acts and received in their own persons the due penalty of their error." [What was this due penalty they received into their own persons?]
"God gave them over over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, malice, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice.. without understanding...and, though they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such thinsg are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them." [The gay movement does give "hearty approval" to homosexual practices and life style.]
1 Corinthians 6:9: "Do you no know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolators, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God."
The above quote is the most important of all of them in that it refers to "homosexuals" specifically. This term is used for those who have embraced the homosexual life style not merely someone who has a same-sex attraction. We must absolutely understand that the Church does not say that to have a same-sex attraction in itself is sinful. But the same applies to same-sex attraction as to heterosexual attraction: the unmarried cannot indulge in sexual activity or sexual phantasy for the pleasureable arousal of the person. For the married, husband and wife can indulge in sexual activity and in sexual phantasy about each other while near or far from each other.
Let us conclude with more about the wonderful community of COURAGE:
Archbishop of Miami John Favalora supports homosexuals' need for a loving Community "by way of his pastoral letter encouraging Catholic prayers for Courage, an openly homosexual organization with his diocese. His lettter reads in part:
"All Catholics have the right to the truth that sets them free. For that reason, I wish to bring to your attention the Courage Ministry...
"Couarage is a spiritual support group for those who live with homosexual feelings and/or behavior.
"Born in the truth of Jesus' redemptive love for all, Courage Ministry faithfully reflectss Jesus and His Church."..
More of the letter can be read on http://www.renewamerical.us/columns/abbott/071002
To access COURAGE'S own website, see http://couragerc.net/ which states the following:
"Are you or a loved one experiencing homosexual attractions and looking of answers?
"Courage, an apostotlate of the Roman Catholic Chruch, ministers to those who same-sex attractions and thier loved ones."
"From our website you wil will larn about homosexuaity and chastity. By devoping an intereior life of chastity, which is the universal call to all Christians, onw can move beyond the confines of the hoomosexual identity to a more compoete on in Christ."
"In Courage you will get to know men and women who share in your concerns, meeting them online through our Listservs, or in person at Chapter Meetings, Conferences, Days of Recollection, and Retreats."
"Come and see what we are all about. Browse our pages. Get to know our community. You'll be glad you did!"
Dearest Father in Heaven,
Take into Your Heart all those who are struggling with same-sex attraction. You alone know the whole of each son or daughter as to how and why they have come to desire the same-sex as a beloved. You know that every one of these sons and daughter want to love and be loved. Help them to follow Jesus who will give them the desires of their hearts because the Psalmist has said in Ps 37:3-7, "Delight in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." Help your children, therefore to seek Jesus first and He will take care of the rest. Give them to know there in no happiness apart from Jesus or His Holy Spirit. Help them all to hear Jesus words: "If you wish to be my disciple, take up your cross and follow Me."
Give them all the 'COURAGE" to follow Your grace and invitation to this chaste community of love and belonging. Give them all the become Saints since that has been their reason for thier conception and birth. All this we ask in Jesus' Name. Amen.
Love, Pio
Monday, August 22, 2011
Pio's Proverb 96: What is and Why is there "White"?
Really, why is there "white" at all. What is it? It is a color we see; but why and what is it?
Let us look at this scientifically, philsophically and theologically:
Scienctifically:
White light which differs from just plain white as does the sun to the moon is the fullness of color. White light contains all the colors. If you take a prisimum and let white light pass though it, what happens? A prism separates white light passing through it into the colors of the rainbow. So, therefore, white light contains all colors in it. This seems a little miraculous - whether we see it happening in a prism or in a rainbow in the sky. How can something white become manifested into all colors? Or better yet, how can many colors add up to white light? As a painter for many years, if I put all the primary and secondary colors I have in my paintbox together and paint them delicately and gently on a white canvass, I will certainly never get white as a result. It is only white light that can mix all colors into itself and come out white light. This is a marvel.
Man can only paint actually with colors that it can see. Paint mixers use colors that are imitation of colors seen in nature and then mixed to make colors that are not found in nature. But this could not happen if man could not see colors in the first place. How can we see colors?
Human kind and primates are the only inhabitants on this planet that can see color. It takes neurons to fire and cause an image upon the retina. There are color sensitive cones on the retina. These color cones are only found in humans and primates. So, you dog or cat or bird or bumble bee do not see colors. Bees are sensitive to ultraviolate rays. Some flowers emit ultraviolate which attract bees. Well, why do male ducks look so much more beautiful than female ducks. They hope to attract females or are the ones who choose mates. The beautiful green necks must be seen as green by the female. The females do not see color as we do. But they are very aware of the beauty of form of a male duck and perceive a male's ducks beauty. I believe the male ducks beauty and all the colors of animals are for our edification not theirs. But the fact is that we can see color. That being the case we use color for everything. We can teach piano by color coding for young children to learn more easily. We can paint beautiful paintings of nature, flowers, birds, animals, sunsets, even other humans. We can see color and make colors to be used in our traffic lights, in our cars, in our walls, in our computer screens. Color is all around us. People with near-death exerience tell of the incredible colors in heaven - greater than our imagination can dream of.
Philsophically:
Epistomology is the branch of Philosophy that asks the question, "How can we know?" How can we know that we know that we know?
Let us look at this scientifically, philsophically and theologically:
Scienctifically:
White light which differs from just plain white as does the sun to the moon is the fullness of color. White light contains all the colors. If you take a prisimum and let white light pass though it, what happens? A prism separates white light passing through it into the colors of the rainbow. So, therefore, white light contains all colors in it. This seems a little miraculous - whether we see it happening in a prism or in a rainbow in the sky. How can something white become manifested into all colors? Or better yet, how can many colors add up to white light? As a painter for many years, if I put all the primary and secondary colors I have in my paintbox together and paint them delicately and gently on a white canvass, I will certainly never get white as a result. It is only white light that can mix all colors into itself and come out white light. This is a marvel.
Man can only paint actually with colors that it can see. Paint mixers use colors that are imitation of colors seen in nature and then mixed to make colors that are not found in nature. But this could not happen if man could not see colors in the first place. How can we see colors?
Human kind and primates are the only inhabitants on this planet that can see color. It takes neurons to fire and cause an image upon the retina. There are color sensitive cones on the retina. These color cones are only found in humans and primates. So, you dog or cat or bird or bumble bee do not see colors. Bees are sensitive to ultraviolate rays. Some flowers emit ultraviolate which attract bees. Well, why do male ducks look so much more beautiful than female ducks. They hope to attract females or are the ones who choose mates. The beautiful green necks must be seen as green by the female. The females do not see color as we do. But they are very aware of the beauty of form of a male duck and perceive a male's ducks beauty. I believe the male ducks beauty and all the colors of animals are for our edification not theirs. But the fact is that we can see color. That being the case we use color for everything. We can teach piano by color coding for young children to learn more easily. We can paint beautiful paintings of nature, flowers, birds, animals, sunsets, even other humans. We can see color and make colors to be used in our traffic lights, in our cars, in our walls, in our computer screens. Color is all around us. People with near-death exerience tell of the incredible colors in heaven - greater than our imagination can dream of.
Philsophically:
Epistomology is the branch of Philosophy that asks the question, "How can we know?" How can we know that we know that we know?
Pio's Proverb 95: Queen Mother of All Creation!
Mary's title of "Mary Queen of all Creation" which is the name of my church down the street does not mean that Mary is the creator of all Creation. It only means that she is the Queen Mother of All Creation. In the Old Testament, the mother the King was called the Queen Mother. Queen Elizabeth is Queen Mother; her mother was called Queen Mother. Bethsheba, mother of Solomon, was Queen Mother.
Fr. Nick [Beloved Pastor of Our Lady Queen of Creation Parish] said at Mass today said: So, today, we understand Mary's title as Queen of all Creation as a Feast Day to honor her role which first celebrated on May 31, `954 by Pius XII. Pope Paul VI moved this feast day to August 22 because since Pope Pius XII created the Feast Day of Mary's Assumption in 1950 for August 15, 1950, then it was fitting that her Coronation - the culmination of her life - would take place 7 days later. This put her Assumption and Coronation in chronological order.
The Gospel reading for this Feast Day today is taken from Luke's account of Mary's Annunciation: The Angel Gabriel coming to her to obtain her consent to be the Mother of God - the beginning of her co-redemptive role with Jesus. So, Mary's Annunciation [which is the first joyful mystery of her rosary] is fulfilled in her Coronation as Queen of heaven and earth - all creation - [which is the fifth glorious mystery of her rosary.]
Why do we Catholics make so much about Mary? Is that not taking away the Glory of Jesus. Not at all for the following reasons:
1) Without Mary's consent to the Angel, how would Jesus come to this world as a God-man?
Without Jesus' coming to die for us, there would be no redemption. Hence, she is a co-redeemer in the sense that she was the necessary mother of Our Redeemer. Yes, since He did ascend back to heaven after His Resurrection, He could have descended from Heaven directly - body and soul. But how would He then be truly human? He had to be fully human to offer Himself as atonement for all the sins of manking. He was th new Adam to do it right this time. God wanted Jesus to be His son by a conception that was caused by the Holy Spirit and a human mother. I am not sure how God would have handled Mary's "No thank you." But God knew that Mary had NEVER ever said "No" to God. She because of her Immaculate Conception had never sinned. She was free to sin; but she freely chose NOT to sin. She was and is the best of us...who are only human. Her being Mother of God and Queen of Heaven of Earth and Immaculately Conceived -- all -- do not in any way elevate her above "human". She remains human always and for all eternity. Because of that the Protestant belief that Catholics worship Mary is totally unfounded. Jesus told told the devil, "You shall worship God alone." Those words are to all of us lest we worship money, sex, power or posessions [which actually possess us more than we possess them.]
2) Mary was a free agent. She could have politely said, "No thank you." Her hesitancy after the Angel's announcement was not "doubt" like Zachariah who leanred from an Angel that John the Baptist was coming as his son. Zachariah said "How can I know this?" He doubted. Mary did not do that at all. She asked "How can this be since I do not know man." She had made a vow of virginity; angel or no angel, she was not going to break that vow. The Angel assured her tha what would be conceived in her was by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. As soon as she hears that explanation, she says: "Let it be done to me according to your word." Her response is immediate after she understands her body would always remain virginal before, during and after the birth of Jesus.
3) Mary is more devoted to each one of us, her children, than we are of her. There have been many saints who have honored and been devoted to Mary: St. Bernard, St. Lewis de Montfort, St. Francis, St. Therese of Lisieux and St. Bernadette. But all those saints devotion rolled into one person cannot begin to equal the incredible devotion of Mary for each one of us. She stood under the cross and heard her son tell St. John: "Son, behold your mother." "Mother, behold your son." It was Jesus, Himself, who established Mary as "Mother of all the living" as was Eve. But Mary was even more so because she is now our Spiritual Mother whom Jesus Himself created for not only Himself but for us. He knew we all would need a "Mom" like Mary, His mother.
4) All the great saints knew Mary's love for them: Blessed Pope John Paul II the Great surely did.
Our Lady of Fatima saved his life when he was shot in St. Peter's square. St. Juan Diego and the children of Fatima - all - were directly chosen by Mary to be saints. She is the maker of saints. Her greatest joy in heaven is bringing her children home to heaven to be with her as her children forever. Taking imperfect us and making us saints is quite an undertaking. She often has to change our poopy diapers [in confession to Jesus through a priest], wash us up [forgiveness of our sins by the Holy Spirit], feed us [in Holy Communion with Jesus], heal us [by anointing of the priest], and encourage us with the truth [by reading the Word of God] and being there for us when we die [by all those Sacraments above.]
5) We simply cannot get to heaven without Mary. We would have no Jesus without her. She instructs all of us as she did at the Wedding Feast of Cana. She said to the head waiters and to us: "DO whatever He tells you." She is the greatest evangelized on the planet and in heaven. She did go with St. Paul to the sea in ships. No; she sat home knitting. But her holiness reached to the ends of the earth.
6) Mary is not only Queen Mother of All Creation, she is Mother of Faith. St. Elizabeth said of Mary who came to help her in her six month-pregnancy: "Blessed is she who believed that what was promised to her would be fulfilled." At the wedding feast of Cana, Mary tells Jesus "they have no wine." she simply tells the waiters: "Do whatever He tells you." She said this after getting an apparent "no" from Jesus ["How does that concern us?"]. Mary does not need to wait for an answer. She has faith! Under the cross, her heart breaks but she believes His words that on the third day He would arise. His disciples were surprised at his resurrection; Mary was not. She was a Woman of Faith. She is Queen of Faith! She will lead us to all faith in her Son, Jesus.
"Hail Holy Queen, our life, our sweetness and our hope", pray for us. "Holy Mary, Mother of God, Mother of Faith. pray for us now and at the hour of our death." Keep us close to Jesus, Mary, as close as He was when He nursed at your breasts and heard your heart beating. Amen.
Love, Pio
Fr. Nick [Beloved Pastor of Our Lady Queen of Creation Parish] said at Mass today said: So, today, we understand Mary's title as Queen of all Creation as a Feast Day to honor her role which first celebrated on May 31, `954 by Pius XII. Pope Paul VI moved this feast day to August 22 because since Pope Pius XII created the Feast Day of Mary's Assumption in 1950 for August 15, 1950, then it was fitting that her Coronation - the culmination of her life - would take place 7 days later. This put her Assumption and Coronation in chronological order.
The Gospel reading for this Feast Day today is taken from Luke's account of Mary's Annunciation: The Angel Gabriel coming to her to obtain her consent to be the Mother of God - the beginning of her co-redemptive role with Jesus. So, Mary's Annunciation [which is the first joyful mystery of her rosary] is fulfilled in her Coronation as Queen of heaven and earth - all creation - [which is the fifth glorious mystery of her rosary.]
Why do we Catholics make so much about Mary? Is that not taking away the Glory of Jesus. Not at all for the following reasons:
1) Without Mary's consent to the Angel, how would Jesus come to this world as a God-man?
Without Jesus' coming to die for us, there would be no redemption. Hence, she is a co-redeemer in the sense that she was the necessary mother of Our Redeemer. Yes, since He did ascend back to heaven after His Resurrection, He could have descended from Heaven directly - body and soul. But how would He then be truly human? He had to be fully human to offer Himself as atonement for all the sins of manking. He was th new Adam to do it right this time. God wanted Jesus to be His son by a conception that was caused by the Holy Spirit and a human mother. I am not sure how God would have handled Mary's "No thank you." But God knew that Mary had NEVER ever said "No" to God. She because of her Immaculate Conception had never sinned. She was free to sin; but she freely chose NOT to sin. She was and is the best of us...who are only human. Her being Mother of God and Queen of Heaven of Earth and Immaculately Conceived -- all -- do not in any way elevate her above "human". She remains human always and for all eternity. Because of that the Protestant belief that Catholics worship Mary is totally unfounded. Jesus told told the devil, "You shall worship God alone." Those words are to all of us lest we worship money, sex, power or posessions [which actually possess us more than we possess them.]
2) Mary was a free agent. She could have politely said, "No thank you." Her hesitancy after the Angel's announcement was not "doubt" like Zachariah who leanred from an Angel that John the Baptist was coming as his son. Zachariah said "How can I know this?" He doubted. Mary did not do that at all. She asked "How can this be since I do not know man." She had made a vow of virginity; angel or no angel, she was not going to break that vow. The Angel assured her tha what would be conceived in her was by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. As soon as she hears that explanation, she says: "Let it be done to me according to your word." Her response is immediate after she understands her body would always remain virginal before, during and after the birth of Jesus.
3) Mary is more devoted to each one of us, her children, than we are of her. There have been many saints who have honored and been devoted to Mary: St. Bernard, St. Lewis de Montfort, St. Francis, St. Therese of Lisieux and St. Bernadette. But all those saints devotion rolled into one person cannot begin to equal the incredible devotion of Mary for each one of us. She stood under the cross and heard her son tell St. John: "Son, behold your mother." "Mother, behold your son." It was Jesus, Himself, who established Mary as "Mother of all the living" as was Eve. But Mary was even more so because she is now our Spiritual Mother whom Jesus Himself created for not only Himself but for us. He knew we all would need a "Mom" like Mary, His mother.
4) All the great saints knew Mary's love for them: Blessed Pope John Paul II the Great surely did.
Our Lady of Fatima saved his life when he was shot in St. Peter's square. St. Juan Diego and the children of Fatima - all - were directly chosen by Mary to be saints. She is the maker of saints. Her greatest joy in heaven is bringing her children home to heaven to be with her as her children forever. Taking imperfect us and making us saints is quite an undertaking. She often has to change our poopy diapers [in confession to Jesus through a priest], wash us up [forgiveness of our sins by the Holy Spirit], feed us [in Holy Communion with Jesus], heal us [by anointing of the priest], and encourage us with the truth [by reading the Word of God] and being there for us when we die [by all those Sacraments above.]
5) We simply cannot get to heaven without Mary. We would have no Jesus without her. She instructs all of us as she did at the Wedding Feast of Cana. She said to the head waiters and to us: "DO whatever He tells you." She is the greatest evangelized on the planet and in heaven. She did go with St. Paul to the sea in ships. No; she sat home knitting. But her holiness reached to the ends of the earth.
6) Mary is not only Queen Mother of All Creation, she is Mother of Faith. St. Elizabeth said of Mary who came to help her in her six month-pregnancy: "Blessed is she who believed that what was promised to her would be fulfilled." At the wedding feast of Cana, Mary tells Jesus "they have no wine." she simply tells the waiters: "Do whatever He tells you." She said this after getting an apparent "no" from Jesus ["How does that concern us?"]. Mary does not need to wait for an answer. She has faith! Under the cross, her heart breaks but she believes His words that on the third day He would arise. His disciples were surprised at his resurrection; Mary was not. She was a Woman of Faith. She is Queen of Faith! She will lead us to all faith in her Son, Jesus.
"Hail Holy Queen, our life, our sweetness and our hope", pray for us. "Holy Mary, Mother of God, Mother of Faith. pray for us now and at the hour of our death." Keep us close to Jesus, Mary, as close as He was when He nursed at your breasts and heard your heart beating. Amen.
Love, Pio
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Pio's Proverb 94: Popes ARE Rock Stars!
Blessed Pope John Paul II was truly a Rock Star in two ways: he was more popular than any rock star has ever been and he ROCKED Europe, causing the downfall of Communism without firing a shot or dropping a bomb. He, himself, was the bomb! When the News Media and Press asked him how he was able to collapse Communism when the U.S. with all its armed forces could not, the Pope just humbly answered: "When the tree is rotten, it falls." The Popes visits to Poland and support of Solidarity was surely a big factor in Communism's collapse. When Communism fell, so did the Berlin wall collapse as well. Pope John Paul made a modern-day marched around the "communistic wall's of Jerrico" by God's commision; and all the walls fell down. The world was amazed and delighted. Russia prior to the collapse of Communism sent a man to assassinate the Pope, but Our Lady of Fatima saved him [gratefully admits the Pope] who was shot but recovered. Later, the Pope retalliated by going into the prison,blessing and forgiving Surhand - and embracing him. Russia sends bullets; the Pope sends love and forgiveness. Who won! 'Nough said.
But what really made Blessed John Paul a true Rock Star was his invention of "World Youth day." Here millions of young people came to see him and sing with him and listen to him tell them to "Not be afraid". I was at one of his World Youth Days in Denver. These kids came from around to world to see him, cheer him and be inspired by him. Of course, he was a showman by trade. He did have a Ph.D. in Philosophy but more so he was a dramatist. He wrote plays for the stage and film. Burt Lancaster played in his beautiful film -play "The Jeweler". [Pope John Paul said that drama was the most impactful way to get a truth across to people.] This is a deep movies which is so insightful of marriage that you would think that the Pope would have had to have been married to write such a work. There were rumors that before becoming a priest that he was married but his wife was killed in occupied Nazi Poland. When asked about this by the press, he smiled and did not answer. But he also did not deny it. He was an incredibly loving and affectionate man. But he gave this great loving heart to God and to the World. His wife was the Church, and he loved her to "death do us part."
There is something I wish to explain from my own experience with Blessed Pope John Paul Ii when I saw him at the Silver Dome in Pontiac. I was not real close; but I could see him and hear him well. This was not television; this was live-in-person encounter: a "close encounter of the heavenly kind." When he came out to greet the people, something happended to my heart spiritually and physically: I felt an enormous love for him - warm and real - deeply spiritual! I truly wondered how this was possible since I had never met him before and have not been able to be friends. Of course, I often prayed for "The Pope's intentions" after Mass and Communion. But would that have created such a mystical bond of love between a sheep and his shepherd?
What happened here never had happened to me before or after. I had a full-blown intense spiritual love for a man I have never met until that moment. This love was infused into me from above. The Holy Spirit gave me this love for Jesus Christ dwelling in John Paul II. It was Jesus who I was loving. The Pope was only the outer skin of Jesus, so to speak. I was in the presence of a Saint who carried Jesus to me more than any human being ever has done. I have met many holy people before: abbots, bishops, priests, nuns. But this was totally different. I was meeting Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of Pope John Paul. He was the Sacrament - a living and walking Sacrament of Jesus' Real Presence. Perhaps that is why when the Pope was dying, people came through the night under his window singing Polish songs to comfort him and let him know he was at "home" and was going soon going "home". When at his funeral, more people came in person to his funeral Mass than had ever convened in the history for any event in the history of mankind. Also, too, the world was watcing it all on Televesion on Vatican Television and EWTN. More than 200 countries were watching his final goodbye to the world he loved.
Pope Benedict XVI, though not as charamatic or good looking or crowd-connecting as Pope John Paul, still has a charmisma all his own:
1) He has the greatest theological mind in the Church.
2) He can kiss babies and children with as much charm and affection as Pope John II.
3) His encyclicals are inspired - heart-felt and moving teachings that lead and call the Faithful to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
4) His smile and charm are unigue and attractive - to old and young.
5) Just two days ago, Pope Benedict entered a large church in Madrid, Spain, and started to walk up the aisle. 1600 nuns - mostly young - greeted him with love and praises and applauds. You would think he truly was a Rock Star! They all loved him because he is an "alter Christus" - "another Christ" as all priests are. But these nuns are wearing their wedding dresses - their habits. Why? Because they want everyone to know that they are married to Christ. They have given up the human marriage pleasures for the pleasure of being brides of Christ. Their celibacy is a proclamation in the Resurrection of Jesus who said that "in heaven we will not marry or be given in marriage but will be like angels." Additionally, I understand from experience that these nuns are being given a Love from the Holy Spirit for Pope Benedict as the Vicar of Christ on earth [as I was given for Pope John Paul II]. The Holy Spirit can and does create Love in us for His own. There is also some personal charisma that Pope Benedict XVI has: while in Madrid, I saw a crown of 1.8 million chanting "Benedito! Benedito! Benedito!" It began to rain hard. Those shielding the Pope from the rain were not successful because the strong wind blew the rain sideways. The Pope clutched unto this papers which was his speech. He was laughing a little. He could not complete his speech. He did not get up..just sat there smiling as he looked out at the throng who were reveling in the rain which was cooling them off from the hot Spainish sun. But the crowd were urging him to go on with the talk and not consider the rain. An annoncer came on to ask for the crowd of young people to pray for an abatement of the rain storm. They did and the rain abated a little. But the crowd and the Pope were having a great time! How many Rock Stars could gather on a concert 1.8 million? Has it ever happened. Well, it happens every World Youth Day Concert by Pope John Paul and Pope Benedict. Why? Easy answer: the are Supre Rock Stars!
Therefore, Popes are true "Super Rock Stars" because Jesus Himself is the "Super-Star" of all stars. He is King of "rock and rolling" in God!
Love, Pio
But what really made Blessed John Paul a true Rock Star was his invention of "World Youth day." Here millions of young people came to see him and sing with him and listen to him tell them to "Not be afraid". I was at one of his World Youth Days in Denver. These kids came from around to world to see him, cheer him and be inspired by him. Of course, he was a showman by trade. He did have a Ph.D. in Philosophy but more so he was a dramatist. He wrote plays for the stage and film. Burt Lancaster played in his beautiful film -play "The Jeweler". [Pope John Paul said that drama was the most impactful way to get a truth across to people.] This is a deep movies which is so insightful of marriage that you would think that the Pope would have had to have been married to write such a work. There were rumors that before becoming a priest that he was married but his wife was killed in occupied Nazi Poland. When asked about this by the press, he smiled and did not answer. But he also did not deny it. He was an incredibly loving and affectionate man. But he gave this great loving heart to God and to the World. His wife was the Church, and he loved her to "death do us part."
There is something I wish to explain from my own experience with Blessed Pope John Paul Ii when I saw him at the Silver Dome in Pontiac. I was not real close; but I could see him and hear him well. This was not television; this was live-in-person encounter: a "close encounter of the heavenly kind." When he came out to greet the people, something happended to my heart spiritually and physically: I felt an enormous love for him - warm and real - deeply spiritual! I truly wondered how this was possible since I had never met him before and have not been able to be friends. Of course, I often prayed for "The Pope's intentions" after Mass and Communion. But would that have created such a mystical bond of love between a sheep and his shepherd?
What happened here never had happened to me before or after. I had a full-blown intense spiritual love for a man I have never met until that moment. This love was infused into me from above. The Holy Spirit gave me this love for Jesus Christ dwelling in John Paul II. It was Jesus who I was loving. The Pope was only the outer skin of Jesus, so to speak. I was in the presence of a Saint who carried Jesus to me more than any human being ever has done. I have met many holy people before: abbots, bishops, priests, nuns. But this was totally different. I was meeting Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of Pope John Paul. He was the Sacrament - a living and walking Sacrament of Jesus' Real Presence. Perhaps that is why when the Pope was dying, people came through the night under his window singing Polish songs to comfort him and let him know he was at "home" and was going soon going "home". When at his funeral, more people came in person to his funeral Mass than had ever convened in the history for any event in the history of mankind. Also, too, the world was watcing it all on Televesion on Vatican Television and EWTN. More than 200 countries were watching his final goodbye to the world he loved.
Pope Benedict XVI, though not as charamatic or good looking or crowd-connecting as Pope John Paul, still has a charmisma all his own:
1) He has the greatest theological mind in the Church.
2) He can kiss babies and children with as much charm and affection as Pope John II.
3) His encyclicals are inspired - heart-felt and moving teachings that lead and call the Faithful to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
4) His smile and charm are unigue and attractive - to old and young.
5) Just two days ago, Pope Benedict entered a large church in Madrid, Spain, and started to walk up the aisle. 1600 nuns - mostly young - greeted him with love and praises and applauds. You would think he truly was a Rock Star! They all loved him because he is an "alter Christus" - "another Christ" as all priests are. But these nuns are wearing their wedding dresses - their habits. Why? Because they want everyone to know that they are married to Christ. They have given up the human marriage pleasures for the pleasure of being brides of Christ. Their celibacy is a proclamation in the Resurrection of Jesus who said that "in heaven we will not marry or be given in marriage but will be like angels." Additionally, I understand from experience that these nuns are being given a Love from the Holy Spirit for Pope Benedict as the Vicar of Christ on earth [as I was given for Pope John Paul II]. The Holy Spirit can and does create Love in us for His own. There is also some personal charisma that Pope Benedict XVI has: while in Madrid, I saw a crown of 1.8 million chanting "Benedito! Benedito! Benedito!" It began to rain hard. Those shielding the Pope from the rain were not successful because the strong wind blew the rain sideways. The Pope clutched unto this papers which was his speech. He was laughing a little. He could not complete his speech. He did not get up..just sat there smiling as he looked out at the throng who were reveling in the rain which was cooling them off from the hot Spainish sun. But the crowd were urging him to go on with the talk and not consider the rain. An annoncer came on to ask for the crowd of young people to pray for an abatement of the rain storm. They did and the rain abated a little. But the crowd and the Pope were having a great time! How many Rock Stars could gather on a concert 1.8 million? Has it ever happened. Well, it happens every World Youth Day Concert by Pope John Paul and Pope Benedict. Why? Easy answer: the are Supre Rock Stars!
Therefore, Popes are true "Super Rock Stars" because Jesus Himself is the "Super-Star" of all stars. He is King of "rock and rolling" in God!
Love, Pio
Friday, August 19, 2011
Pio's Proverb 93: St. Bernard: Youngest Bishop ever!
St. Bernard - a Franciscan Saint - was ordained a priest. In only two years after his ordination, he was conscrated a Bishop. He died at the age of 24 and was canonized a Saint soon afterwards.
We all know what it means to be on a "fast track". We think of "fast tracking" for those who climb up the corporate ladder like a rocker. But what of a saint that does that? St. Dominic Savio was only 12 when he died. If Jacinta and Francesco of Fatima are cononized [and their causes have already been begun], the will be the youngest Saints in the history of the Church. Of
Of course, St. Therese of the Child Jesus, declared Doctor of the Church by Blessed Pope John Paul II, was only 24 years old when she died - the same as St. Bernard. St. Joan of Arc was even younger - about 19 years old when she was martyred.
How does God and why does God make such young Saints? Well, besides the obvious explanation given by Jesus Himself: "Unless you become like a little child, you will not enter into the Kingdom of God,"
there are some possible theological reasons.
1) God sometimes sweeps His beloved ones away to heaven while they are at their peek of innocence and holiness. When they are perfect, He takes them to Himself to shine forever.
2) Some souls are born with great graces. St. Anthony of Padua who only lives to his early 30's seems to be consecrated to God in the womb.
3) God takes great and holy souls to Himself to show us that what is important for all of us is to "know, love and serve God and be happy with Him in heaven."
4) God may take some souls early because He simply loves them so much and wants to give them perfect happiness. Is it possible that God just can't wait to give Himself fully to a beloved son or daughter. Every relationship with God between a soul and God is totally unique - a mysterious union - beyond our imagination. The love between a particular Saint and God is a love story of unsurpassing beauty and goodness. God gives this relationship all eternity to grow, develop and deepen. God is Love....God is the Lover or lovers. He creates intimate relationships with Himself that not even the Church has ever recorded because these relationships keep on growing - in knowledge and love - forever and ever. The love between God and Our Lady now is beyond her dreams. She is the greatest soul in heaven after Jesus; and her beauty and love and knowledge of God keeps growing and growing. Her Assumption was her launch into the abyss of God's Love. And God has that kind of plans for you and me.
Father, into your hands we commend our spirit. You know the whole of all our conversations with you on this earth and in all eternity. You can see the total of every act of our love for you. We cannot dream of how our love relationship with You will be billions of heaven years into eternity because all our love for You and Yours for us will be and is now totally present to you. Maybe that is why You overlook our faults. You see our love for you growing for all eternity. We LOVE You, Father! One day You will come and lift us out of the cribs of this world just as a Grandfather lifts His 2-year old out of her crib after waking up from her afternoon nap. She will cling trustingly to Your arms and let You carry her into Your eternally loving, tender and cherishing Heart - forever and ever. Amen.
Love, Pio
We all know what it means to be on a "fast track". We think of "fast tracking" for those who climb up the corporate ladder like a rocker. But what of a saint that does that? St. Dominic Savio was only 12 when he died. If Jacinta and Francesco of Fatima are cononized [and their causes have already been begun], the will be the youngest Saints in the history of the Church. Of
Of course, St. Therese of the Child Jesus, declared Doctor of the Church by Blessed Pope John Paul II, was only 24 years old when she died - the same as St. Bernard. St. Joan of Arc was even younger - about 19 years old when she was martyred.
How does God and why does God make such young Saints? Well, besides the obvious explanation given by Jesus Himself: "Unless you become like a little child, you will not enter into the Kingdom of God,"
there are some possible theological reasons.
1) God sometimes sweeps His beloved ones away to heaven while they are at their peek of innocence and holiness. When they are perfect, He takes them to Himself to shine forever.
2) Some souls are born with great graces. St. Anthony of Padua who only lives to his early 30's seems to be consecrated to God in the womb.
3) God takes great and holy souls to Himself to show us that what is important for all of us is to "know, love and serve God and be happy with Him in heaven."
4) God may take some souls early because He simply loves them so much and wants to give them perfect happiness. Is it possible that God just can't wait to give Himself fully to a beloved son or daughter. Every relationship with God between a soul and God is totally unique - a mysterious union - beyond our imagination. The love between a particular Saint and God is a love story of unsurpassing beauty and goodness. God gives this relationship all eternity to grow, develop and deepen. God is Love....God is the Lover or lovers. He creates intimate relationships with Himself that not even the Church has ever recorded because these relationships keep on growing - in knowledge and love - forever and ever. The love between God and Our Lady now is beyond her dreams. She is the greatest soul in heaven after Jesus; and her beauty and love and knowledge of God keeps growing and growing. Her Assumption was her launch into the abyss of God's Love. And God has that kind of plans for you and me.
Father, into your hands we commend our spirit. You know the whole of all our conversations with you on this earth and in all eternity. You can see the total of every act of our love for you. We cannot dream of how our love relationship with You will be billions of heaven years into eternity because all our love for You and Yours for us will be and is now totally present to you. Maybe that is why You overlook our faults. You see our love for you growing for all eternity. We LOVE You, Father! One day You will come and lift us out of the cribs of this world just as a Grandfather lifts His 2-year old out of her crib after waking up from her afternoon nap. She will cling trustingly to Your arms and let You carry her into Your eternally loving, tender and cherishing Heart - forever and ever. Amen.
Love, Pio
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)