The Word Made Flesh

I have personally spoken to some Catholics who left the Faith because they believe they were not nourished spiritually by the word of God; that there was a disconnect between Scripture, the sacraments, and their daily life.  But why is this the case?  After all the Second Vatican Council taught that Sacred Scripture provides spiritual nourishment to the People of God in order to enlighten our minds, strengthen our wills and set our heart’s on fire with the love of God (cf. Dei Verbum, 23).  Why isn’t this the experience of many Catholics, especially those who are leaving the Church or who come to church for the sacraments but watch TBN to hear the word of God?

The Spirit-filled joy that the disciples experienced on the road to Emmaus can only come from God’s Word, which is not just pages in a book but is a Person—our Lord Jesus Christ.  In the Word, we don’t just read about Jesus: we encounter Him!  In the Word, we don’t just become friends with Jesus: we fall in love with Him.  In the Word, we don’t simply say we are good people: we give our lives to Him.  In His goodness and wisdom, God chose to reveal Himself and to make known to us the purpose of His will through Christ, through whom we have access to the Father in the Holy Spirit, and in whom we come to share in the love and life of God (cf. Dei Verbum, 2).

When we come together at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we should not sit back like mere spectators while the readings pass us by because our minds are someplace else.  We need to walk more closely with Jesus on the road to Emmaus.  When the word of God is proclaimed, we should praise God and exclaim with joy, “Did our hearts not burn within us when he opened the Scriptures to us?”  We need to recapture a sense of awe and wonder in listening to and appreciating the depth of God’s word (see Nehemiah 8:8-10).

So how do we “hear” God at Mass?  Yes, we listen to the readings and read Scripture but when do we actually hear God?  We must remember that God’s words are not just pages in the Bible but that The Word became flesh and dwelt among us!  We listen to the Word with our ears but in order to truly hear Him we must take Saint Benedict’s advice: “Listen to the Master’s precepts and incline the ear of your heart.”  The heart is the starting place of hearing the Word of God and observing it.

The key to listening with your heart is silence.  The Scriptures cry out to us, “Truly I have set my soul in silence and peace” (Psalm 131:2) and again: “Indeed, you love truth in the heart, then in the secret of my heart teach me wisdom” (Psalm 51:8) and once more: “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:11).  We must foster of atmosphere of prayerful silence in order to hear the Word of God and allow that voice to change our lives.

What is the connection between the Word of God and the Mass?  In the Mass, the Liturgy of the Word comes first because we receive Jesus in the Word of God as we prepare our hearts, minds, and souls to receive him body, blood, soul, and divinity in the Liturgy of the Eucharist.  “Word and Eucharist are so deeply bound together that we cannot understand one without the other: the word of God sacramentally takes flesh in the event of the Eucharist.  The Eucharist opens us to an understanding of Scripture, just as Scripture for its part illumines and explains the mystery of the Eucharist.  Unless we acknowledge the Lord’s real presence in the Eucharist, our understanding of Scripture remains imperfect” (Pope Benedict XVI, Verbum Domini, 55).

The Church sees the connection between word and sacrament as so important that we will receive a wonderful new English translation of the Mass in November at the start of the church year on the First Sunday of Advent.  The entire Church in the United States has been blessed with this opportunity to deepen its understanding of the Sacred Liturgy, and to appreciate its meaning and importance in our lives.  The long-term goal of the new translation is to foster a deeper awareness and appreciation of the mysteries being celebrated in the Liturgy.

Let us renew our love for the word of God!  Let us give Sacred Scripture the attention it deserves.  Let us listen attentively to what the Lord is saying to us in His word!  Let us say with King David, “Your word is a lamp for my steps and a light for my path.  I have sworn and have determined to obey your decrees” (Psalm 119:105).  Let us say with Jeremiah, “When I found your words, I devoured them; they became the joy and the happiness of my heart” (Jeremiah 15:16).  Our Father in heaven doesn’t care how many passages of Scripture we memorize: that’s not important.  What’s important is how we live what we believe!

Let us be on fire for the Lord!  Let the fire of His love burn away everything that turns our hearts away from him.  When we encounter the Living God in this way, the paralyzing grip of sin will give way to the peace of blessed assurance:  “Did our hearts not burn within us when we heard the Word proclaimed and when we received Our Lord in the Eucharist?”  When we have the courage to live the truth and beauty of our Catholic faith, the fire of the Spirit will consume us.  As Catholics, we know that there is no resurrection without crucifixion, and knowing that “for the sake of the joy that lay before him Christ endured His cross,” let us “not grow weary and lose heart” (Hebrews 12:3).  Let us always choose to follow Jesus who through the fire of His love, will lead us from sorrow to joy, from despair to hope, from death to everlasting life.

©2011 Aurem Cordis and Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers

Kyrie Eleison

Quite often, after leading a parish mission, I am approached by someone who wants to spend time talking about a serious issue in their life.  I remember the story of a teenager who was abused as a child and as a result, was very sexually active, abused drugs and alcohol, and was dating a much older man.  She was clearly anxious and in tremendous pain.  She knew that she was acting contrary to God’s will and had to make a major change in her life, a change that included the very painful decision to end a relationship with a man she had grown to love but who actively pursued an illicit and illegal relationship with her.  She was scared but could not let go because she was afraid to trust God.

After encouraging her to seek God’s mercy and peace in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, I said this to her, “Right now, there is a young man on his knees praying to meet someone like you.  This is a young man who is willing to give his heart, his mind, his soul and his body to you and to only you, and to the children you will have together, for the rest of your life until your dead.  That is a love worth waiting for because that is a love worth dying for.”

A love worth dying for.  This is the depth of the love and mercy that God the Father has for us: His Son endured the cross, carrying the weight of our sins on his shoulders.  In his tremendous suffering, He was allowed to experience alienation from God and endured the ultimate consequence of sin: death.  But by His resurrection, Christ has conquered sin; he has triumphed over death and has shattered the gates of Hell.  God’s love is so immense, His power so limitless and His embrace so tender and intimate, that Love Himself brings forth life.

When Jesus appeared to Saint Margaret Mary, He showed her His heart to demonstrate how much He loves us.  He said to her, “Behold the heart that has loved so much and has been loved so little in return.”  He is loved so little in return because we don’t truly believe in the love, the promise, and the mercy of God the Father.

Our Lord told Saint Faustina of the mercy He wants to give to the world, if only we will believe in His love.  If we are honest with ourselves, we realize that we are often lukewarm at best.  Sunday after Sunday we hear the Word of God and receive our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist and yet we walk away, for the most part, unchanged knowing full well that Christ is calling us to change our lives and become one with Him, which means we must reject popular opinion and the ways of the world.  We allow ourselves just enough faith to be comfortable until that faith calls us to stand-up for the truth that makes us uncomfortable.  Then, like the Apostles, we lock the doors of our minds and hearts, cowering in the fear of being rejected and unpopular.  Each one of us has been set apart when we were consecrated to the Most Holy Trinity on the day of our baptism.  We have been set-aside for a holy purpose.  To do God’s work, we cannot think or act like everyone else; we are to follow in the footsteps of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Jesus appears to His apostles and says, “Peace be with you” precisely because they were not at peace: they were afraid.  Today, because we don’t trust in the God’s mercy, we keep Jesus at an arm’s distance so that our lives don’t have to change.  We don’t want to let Jesus get too close because we know that when we do, His tender mercy will transform us.

It is at these times that we must take comfort in the Father’s endless mercy and be at peace without being afraid to be vulnerable before the Lord.  The Holy Spirit breathed on the Apostles and they were given the authority to forgive sins — our sins.  When we really know that our sins are forgiven, we have nothing to fear.  If we truly believe in the promises of Our Lord, we can be at peace.  We live in a day and age when the mercy of God is more necessary than ever before and as our Lord told Saint Paul, “Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.”  And because there is a great deal of sin in the world, the Lord provides an overwhelming abundance of grace that is available to us in the sacraments.

Sacraments are not just empty rituals; we don’t just go through the motions of coming to church and walk out unchanged.  What happens in all of the sacraments, and especially at Mass and in the sacrament of Reconciliation, are realities more profound and powerful than anything we can ever hope to experience in this world.  The worst sin that we could ever commit is like a drop of water in the ocean of God’s infinite mercy.  His love for us is endless; it is beyond anything we could ever grasp or imagine.  As big as our sins might be, they are nothing for the Lord.

When we come before the priest in Confession and hear those beautiful words of absolution, we walk out with the knowledge–the unshakable knowledge–that our sins have been removed from our souls.  In His mercy, the Lord looks us right in the face, as He looked at Thomas two thousand years ago, and He says, “Doubt no longer, but believe.”

When we give ourselves over to God’s divine mercy in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, when we love with a love worth dying for and are no longer afraid and in doubt, we will have the courage to place our hands in the wounds of Christ, and profess with confidence and joy and faithfulness with Thomas, “My Lord and my God.”  Heavenly Father, for the sake of Your Son’s sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world.

©2011 Aurem Cordis and Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers

Climbing the Mountain of the Lord

Shortly after the twins were born, I spent one of my many sleepless nights thinking about how my life has changed since the day I met my wife: how I abandoned the thought of becoming a Benedictine monk; how I moved across country, leaving the only home I had ever known; how entering into a life-long commitment of loving communion and intimacy has changed my relationship with God; not really having an appreciation for how four young children can–all at the same time–exhaust me to the point of numbness; make me mad enough to pull out what little hair I have left; make me laugh until I cry; and fill me with so much love and joy that I can barely keep my heart in my chest.  My life has not just changed; it has truly been transfigured.  I have gone from just living for myself, to dying to myself in loving sacrifice and service to my wife and children in the same way that Christ sacrificed his life for his Bride, the Church.

Lent is a time of setting ourselves apart with the Lord as we prepare to enter the tomb and die with Him on Good Friday, so that we may rise to new life with Him on Easter Sunday.  As we make our way up the mountain with Christ Jesus, we won’t need to worry about what to bring; we don’t need hiking boots, or a backpack, or water.  Instead, the Lord gives us all that we need in prayer, abstinence, and fasting, which strengthen our souls for the journey.  The sacrifices we observe during Lent are designed to help us come face-to-face with our weakness before God; weaknesses that we offer to our Lord as spiritual sacrifices which empty us of sin so that God can fill us with His life.

But with transfiguration comes fear and death.  We fear because in order to be truly transfigured to Christ, we must abandon sin, which means removing all obstacles that prohibit us from loving God alone and making ourselves vulnerable before the God who made us.  It means exposing the weakest parts of who we are in the Sacrament of Reconciliation so that God can make us strong.  It means becoming blind to the ways of this world so that Christ can lead us.  Transfiguration means dying to ourselves so that we can rise with Christ in glory.

During His transfiguration, Jesus’ face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light.  John the Baptist’s father Zechariah foretold that Jesus would be the dawn from on high that would break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and guide our feet in the way of peace.  We live in a world of eclipse, in a world consumed by a darkness whose far-reaching shadows of abortion, contraception and pornography are cast across the threshold of family life.  Our only hope for salvation is in God’s mercy and infinite love.  When we truly live our Catholic faith with fidelity and joy, we bear witness in a convincing manner to the victory of God’s love over the power of evil in ourselves and in our culture.

Moses and Elijah, representing the law and the prophets of the old covenant, are with Jesus, who is the Word made flesh, and who will offer his body and blood for a new and everlasting covenant.  Blessed Mother Theresa of Calcutta once said, “We cannot separate our lives from the Eucharist . . . Jesus has made Himself the Bread of Life to give us life.  Night and day, He is there.  If you really want to grow in love, come back to the Eucharist, come back to that Adoration.”   The reality of Christ’s presence in the Eucharist, as Mother Teresa so beautifully reminds us, is at the heart and soul of what it means to be Catholic.  The Eucharist is the principal source of strength and nourishment for our souls precisely because it is Christ himself whom we receive.  The power of the Eucharistic Christ—present at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and in Adoration—gives us the perseverance and fortitude to stand up to the convictions and truths of our faith: to be the disciples that Christ calls us to be.  The Eucharist is not just important to evangelization: the Eucharist is evangelization!

The Eucharist exists to make us the Body of Christ, to make us the sacramental representation of Jesus Christ on earth.  Our being changed into Christ is what the Eucharist is all about. “The Eucharist is the intimacy of the union of each person with the Lord” (von Balthasar, 284).  Thus, it is in eating and drinking the body and blood of Christ that we truly become what we receive; and in receiving the Eucharistic Christ, we receive the grace that gives us the courage to say with Saint Paul, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20).

In this acceptable time let us pray that the King of the universe will send forth the Holy Spirit to fill us with His grace so that we may worship Him with our lives.  This Lenten season, if we give everything to the Lord and follow Him with all our hearts, the Spirit will shower us with His blessings. Let us rise and not be afraid for it is good that we are here.  As we come down from the mountain and go back into the world, let us pray for our own transfiguration, that we become living sacraments of God’s divine life, and true symbols and witnesses of that loving relationship to the world.

©2011 Aurem Cordis and Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers