15/12/2023

In trying to know the truth about themselves and God human beings have realised that the extent of God is unbounded. He is timelessly infinite. To the gifted ones recorded in the Old Testament the limits of our knowledge of him is limited to the revelations he makes to them, his people and his prophets. 

To me and to all of us living thousands of years after "IAMIAM"  expelled Adam and Eve, saved Noah tested Abraham and again saved the Chosen Ones through Moses, there are thousands of prayers and thoughts made by men, guided by either their reverence or disbelief, available to consider in my own witness to what it means to be alive in the wonder that is God's Providence, this  World, the material universe.

Today in the first reading IAMIAM is portrayed as having "regret". "If only" is a phrase often on my lips. It is a phrase that acknowledges a greater or lesser failure in my life. God's Perfection is such that "failure" is impossible for him. Annoyance is a petty human emotion. My "if only" is always about missing an opportunity. God cannot do that.

In the New Testament IAMIAM reveals more about his "Being". He is Father Son and Holy Spirit three persons but only one God. Jesus never forgets that the Father has sent Him, the Son, to finally reverse the wrong paths that humanity is always choosing. Incarnate Son is the total Being of God and with him is Love, the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is God/Man on Earth. Our Lady is truly "Theotokos" both on Earth and in Heaven. "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased" is the voice of human fatherhood. Jesus always called the Evergreater, the Almighty one Abba, "Daddy". He thus brings human being into the creator of all. He also told us to do the same. The Love that is  God is not an abstraction but love that we know in our own hearts. 

We can be disappointed when our efforts come to nothing, when our children let us down, when Mammon proves to be a false friend. God knows all possible results of the freedom he gives to us and we know that it is we, only we who are responsible for own sin, that we really do create out of our own being all the "if onlies" that are the only ones that are known to him.

Dear  Lord, I pray that I can become a beloved son and have done with  "if only" for ever. Let me find the way to end my life secure in your fatherly love and let the prayers of Mary who became our mother on Calvary inspire all your people to welcome Jesus on the feast of his Nativity for which we are now preparing.