The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today resonate with many of the spiritual touchstones in my experience of Truth and Love as a follower of Jesus.
Image: Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton in St. Paul Catholic Church, Westerville, Ohio | photo by Nheyob
The reading from the First Letter of John advises believers about testing the Spirits.
* [3:19–24] Living a life of faith in Jesus and of Christian love assures us of abiding in God no matter what our feelings may at times tell us. Our obedience gives us confidence in prayer and trust in God’s judgment. This obedience includes our belief in Christ and love for one another.1
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* [4:1–6] Deception is possible in spiritual phenomena and may be tested by its relation to Christian doctrine (cf. 1 Cor 12:3): those who fail to acknowledge Jesus Christ in the flesh are false prophets and belong to the antichrist. Even though these false prophets are well received in the world, the Christian who belongs to God has a greater power in the truth.2
Psalm 2 states God’s promise to His anointed that happy are all who take refuge in him.
* [Psalm 2] A royal Psalm. To rebellious kings (Ps 2:1–3) God responds vigorously (Ps 2:4–6). A speaker proclaims the divine decree (in the legal adoption language of the day), making the Israelite king the earthly representative of God (Ps 2:7–9) and warning kings to obey (Ps 2:10–11). The Psalm has a messianic meaning for the Church; the New Testament understands it of Christ (Acts 4:25–27; 13:33; Heb 1:5).3
In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus Begins His ministry in Galilee addressing the needs of crowds of people.
* [4:17] At the beginning of his preaching Jesus takes up the words of John the Baptist (Mt 3:2) although with a different meaning; in his ministry the kingdom of heaven has already begun to be present (Mt 12:28).4
Joan Blandin Howard reflects that we have been sitting in a darkness of disease, a pandemic. COVID-19. Sitting in the darkness of pain, suffering, death. Separation and isolation. Facing challenges in every corner of life: employment, housing, food, education, parenting, marriage, family life, elder care, and on and on. Each one of us sitting in our own unique darkness. Many days and nights we might have prayed, where is the light? When will this end?
Recently, we may have asked the same questions – where are you God? Jesus, why aren’t you here healing me and mine? I can’t hear you. I can’t see you. I can’t feel you. Come, Lord, come – let me hear your voice, let me see your face, let me feel your touch. I am begging you, come to me. Please...One morning I realized how well I had slept. I awoke rested and refreshed. Although alone, I knew I had been safely held. In the day’s quiet, I experienced the smile of my grandmother and the giggle of my sister – not feeling as distant as they actually were. In the brilliance of the sunrise, I felt the warmth of light. In the glow of the sunset, I was washed of the grit of my fears. I knew that all along the way, even wearing a mask, I had seen, heard and felt the presence of my God… You are not alone. I am with you.5
Philosopher, Gerard J. Hughes SJ, invites us to find, in the pictures on our Christmas cards and the presentation of our cribs, something of both the simplicity and the mystery of the Incarnation, for which our words are inadequate. Christmas – celebrating the birth of Jesus – is the perfect time to remind ourselves that we do have words for talking about things which simply surpass our understanding. Yet even when we talk about our own universe, with its mysterious origins, its ‘big bang’, it's ‘dark matter’, its tiny objects – strings, for want of a better word – vibrating in ten dimensions, we say what we can while at the same time recognising that our models and imagery are inadequate to capture that distant reality. Even comparatively ordinary concepts like ‘matter’ or ‘consciousness’ defy our precise understanding.
So it’s no wonder St Paul said that in this life we can see God only as if in a kind of dark mirror. To say that Jesus Christ is both God and man is the best we can do: but it will mislead us if we think that we can simply add his being God to his being a man, as if these were two realities on the same plane, one of them rather greater than the other. We need to recall that being God is not just an extra set of characteristics that Jesus has – some additional bits, as it were, to make him a special kind of man; his being God is an infinitely mysterious reality, an utterly other dimension, for which we do have words, but of which we have almost no grasp at all. Almost no grasp. We might think of the deepest experiences of the great mystics – people like Theresa of Avila, or John of the Cross, or Ignatius Loyola, who in many words (as Theresa and John did) or in very few (as Ignatius), tried to point us in the direction of an experience which, as they themselves would insist, is ultimately beyond any words.6
Don Schwager quotes “The true light of revelation to the Gentiles,” by Chromatius (died 406 AD).
"The Evangelist commemorated in this passage the prophet's words: 'Beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles: the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light' (Matthew 4:15-16) In what darkness? Certainly in the profound error of ignorance. What great light did they see? The light concerning which it is written: 'He was the true light that illumines everyone who comes into this world' (John 1:9) This was the light about which the just man Simeon in the Gospel declared, 'A light of revelation to the Gentiles and a glory for your people Israel' (Luke 2:32). That light had arisen according to what David had announced, saying, 'A light has arisen in the darkness to the upright of heart' (Psalm 112:4). "Also, Isaiah demonstrated that light about to come for the enlightenment of the church when he said, 'Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you' (Isaiah 60:1). Concerning that light also Daniel noted, 'It reveals the profound and hidden things, knowing those things which are in darkness and the light is with it' (Daniel 2:22), that is, the Son with the Father, for even as the Father is light, so too is the Son light. And David also speaks in the psalm: 'In your light shall we see light' (Psalm 36:9), for the Father is seen in the Son, as the Lord tells us in the Gospel: 'Who sees me, sees the Father' (John 14:9) From the true light, indeed, the true light proceeded, and from the invisible the visible. "He is the image of the invisible God," as the apostle notes (Colossians 1:15)." (excerpt from TRACTATE ON MATTHEW 15.1)7
The Word Among Us Meditation on 1 John 3:22–4:6 comments that many have speculated over the centuries about the “antichrist,” referred to here and in several other places in John’s letters. But the word simply means someone who is opposed to Christ. In John’s time, that included people who claimed to be Christian but who rejected the truth that Jesus was both fully human and fully divine.
But the Incarnation—God becoming man—is one of the central mysteries of our faith. It is at the heart of the Creed we recite at Mass, and it is the basis for our belief in Jesus’ presence in the Eucharist. We might be tempted to view physical reality somewhat as these false teachers did—as tainted in some way. And that could lead us to think of ourselves primarily as souls who will one day be freed of their bodies to enjoy a “pure” union with God in heaven forever. That view fails to take into account two important truths. First, because God is all-good, everything that he created is good. As we see in Genesis, he is delighted with his creation; he even calls it “very good” (1:31). Original sin corrupted our human nature and physical reality, but that never was God’s design or intention.8
Friar Jude Winkler emphasizes holding on to tradition in our efforts to test the spirits. The “world” in 1 John, the “flesh” of Paul, and the “concupiscence” of Saint Augustine are conquered by Christ. Friar Jude reminds us that Jesus outreach to all begins with the pagan people in Galilee.
The Franciscan Media, Saint of the Day, Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton writes that while in Italy with her dying husband, Elizabeth witnessed Catholicity in action through family friends. Three basic points led her to become a Catholic: belief in the Real Presence, devotion to the Blessed Mother and conviction that the Catholic Church led back to the apostles and to Christ. Many of her family and friends rejected her when she became a Catholic in March 1805. To support her children, she opened a school in Baltimore. From the beginning, her group followed the lines of a religious community, which was officially founded in 1809.
Elizabeth Seton had no extraordinary gifts. She was not a mystic or stigmatic. She did not prophesy or speak in tongues. She had two great devotions: abandonment to the will of God and an ardent love for the Blessed Sacrament. She wrote to a friend, Julia Scott, that she would prefer to exchange the world for a “cave or a desert.” “But God has given me a great deal to do, and I have always and hope always to prefer his will to every wish of my own.” Her brand of sanctity is open to everyone if we love God and do his will.9
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, quotes Paul: “For now we see through a glass, darkly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.” —1 Corinthians 13:12.
Contemplative prayer is a form of unveiling, because it reveals what is going on beneath the polished and busy surfaces of our minds, our hearts, and our bodies. When we finally get still enough, contemplation can live within us in pure, open moments of right here, right now. This is enough, this is fullness. If it is not right here, right now, it doesn’t exist. If we don’t know God now, how would we know God later? The mystics say we won’t. We will not recognize God later if we cannot recognize God now. It is a matter of seeing God now through the shadow and the disguise.10
Revelation of Love and Truth in Christ is an experience in the here and now as we orient our actions to follow the Will of God.
References
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