27/01/2023

The persecution of the early Christians was first experienced in Jerusalem where Jesus had been the first victim, the High Priest and the Sacrifice, once and for all. Jesus was crucified and the way the truth and the life was opened for all and for ever. The Mass is the reflection of that once and for all, eternal event. 

Jesus the co-equal Son empties himself of the power of his divine being and freely accepts the abandonment by the Father. Even though Jesus knows what the outcome will be, the pain of this abandonment becomes real in his acceptance of human time and in the garden he pleads that it might pass and  the cry of the Son on the Cross is ultimate pain that we his creation have brought to Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

God cannot be understood. My words are confused lost in the mystery that I can worship but never understand. Mark tells us that the Apostles who lived and worked with Jesus had to have some of his sayings explained to them but he does not claim to have had secrets told to him and the other disciples that were not shared with all humanity.

God wants us all to turn to him of our own free will. In our humanity we share the instincts of the animals but we are much more than our pre-coded bodies which flinch from pain and can pursue pleasure. Each one of us at the moment of conception has our soul breathed into us by the Holy Spirit. 

The Incarnation has changed the nature of humanity both body and soul . Our Souls are a precious image of God's own nature and have to be protected from the rampaging evil that still fills the world. That is what the old penny catechism means by "know love and serve".

Jesus by emptying himself to become the seed smaller than the mustard seed and accepted by Mary has become the Resurrection, our protection from all evil but we have to make the choice for ourselves. God has created us to be free beings and it is in our free choice of Truth in which he delights and fills us with his love.

Dear Lord let my being be filled with your love and the wish to serve you during my life-time. You know what I am to become. May your Mother the source of your body help me and all her children to become the holy ones that you have created us all to be and may her prayers and those of the saints protect us from the devil and may your mercy continue to inspire the penitence of the Holy Souls.