A Covenant of Peace

 Look around and be distressed;
Look within and be depressed;
Look to Jesus and be at rest.

(Corrie Ten Boom)

"Covenant" is not a word we use much today, except in gated communities, where the meaning seems to have evolved into the opposite of its original.  The only real covenant we have left today is marriage-- where two are made one flesh, one family, one bond.

The original covenant God made with Abraham was a covenant of blood -- a covenant in your flesh, God called it:  My covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant (Gen. 17).

By the time of Jeremiah and the other prophets, however, we hear that that covenant in the flesh means little:  

How gladly would I treat you like sons and give you a desirable land,

the most beautiful of any nation.

I thought you would call me "Father" and not turn away from following me.

But like a woman unfaithful to her husband,

so have you been unfaithful to me, O house of Israel," says the Lord (Jer. 3).

Break up your unplowed ground and do not sow among thorns.

Circumcise yourself to the Lord, circumcise your hearts,

you men of Judah and people of Jerusalem (Jer. 4).

...even the whole house of Israel is uncircumcised in heart (Jer. 9).

The result of abandoning the covenant, or the bond with God, is that the beautiful land "...has been ruined and laid waste like a desert that no one can cross" and, furthermore,

Death has climbed in through our windows and has entered our fortresses;

it has cut off the children from the streets and the young men from the public squares (Jer. 9).

The prophets, however, notably Jeremiah, promised a new covenant, "not like the covenant I made with their fathers...[.but] I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts....they will all know me from the least of them to the greatest" (Jer. 31).

And Ezekiel says, "I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be an everlasting covenant....My dwelling place will be with them; I will be their God and they will be my people" (37).

....a covenant of peace.  The mark of those who dwell with God.  At the Last Supper, Jesus promised: "My peace I give you. I do not give it to you as the world gives.  Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid."  Finally, it is given to us --- the covenant of peace.  Corrie Ten Boom, despite the worst that Nazi Germany could do to her family and to her, knew that peace.  As do the world's martyrs today.

If you would find the dwelling place of God on earth today, look for the "pearl of great price" -- that peace within men's souls.  It is the sure sign of the new covenant!

Who Is Your God?

 When God appeared to Moses in the burning bush, He identified Himself:  I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

In my last entry, "We Believe," I wrote about faith in God not only in terms of our own stories, but in terms of the faith and friendship of those we love and trust.  When I hear how God has worked in your life, your story extends my own experience of God and increases my awe of His glory and Presence.

When God says to Moses, "I am the God of your father," He identifies Himself with the stories Moses has heard from his own family.  Although this may be Moses' first encounter with the Divine Presence, he undoubtedly has heard and absorbed family stories going back hundreds of years of how this God revealed Himself to the Israelites.  So already Moses knows something about this God who now reveals Himself to Moses.

I am the God of Abraham.....Who was Abraham's God?  He is God in search of man before man begins to search for God.  He is the God Who calls in the depths of our souls, "Come, and I will show you...."  

The God Who says, "Get up, leave this place and come to a place I will show you."  The God who has a plan for us:  I will bless you and you will be a blessing!  Not just bless us, but bless all those who are connected to us generation after generation.  

When we read the stories of the Bible, it might be helpful to ask ourselves, "Who is the God of Isaac,.....of Jacob.....of Moses....of David....of Mary.....of Jesus?

As we ponder these stories, we come to know not only their God but our God ---- the God of our fathers and mothers, the God of our friends and heroes.  We, too, have our stories but have not attended to them in terms of Who God has been to us.  If God is to be found anywhere, surely it is in our histories.  Spiritual directors often tell us to look back over our lives in ten-year sections, searching for where God has been in each decade of our lives.

Most of us in our youth, I would hazard to guess, sneered at the stories our parents told us -- if indeed they spoke of God at all.  And yet, now that we are old, we might look back with reverence on those stories as well as our own experience, and say to God, "I had heard of you with my ears, but now I behold you with my eyes!" (Job 42:5)

We Believe.....

 Bishop Robert Barron's video series on The Creed is packed full of thought-provoking statements.  Last night, after viewing episode 1 of the series, a friend and I were discussing Barron's insights on the first two words of the Creed:  I/we believe...

We used to say "We believe in God...." when I was growing up in the Catholic Church.  Now we say, "I believe...." each Sunday.  Barron argues that the question should remain open as to the most appropriate response.  He agrees that it is good for us to declare, each one of us, that "I" believe -- to make our own statement of belief, regardless of what others believe.  And of course, that stance appeals to our independent, individualistic culture, especially in the West today.

However, the statement "We believe" carries its own justification.  The faith of one not only strengthens that of the other, but it also imparts a particular joy of unification and friendship.  C. S. Lewis' classic essay on Friendship in his book Four Loves cannot help but bring joy to anyone who has experienced the kind of friendship he describes.  

According to Lewis, friendship, unlike erotic love, always welcomes the third, fourth, or fifth person into the relationship.  For friendship is not two people looking at one another, but rather it is two people looking together at a third "thing" which both love and enjoy.  The enjoyment of my friend in stamp collecting, birdwatching, traveling, wine-tasting, or whatever draws us together, enhances my own joy because now I see the object not only from my own perspective but also from the perspective and experience of my friend.  And when my friend dies, I lose not only my friend, but also his/her enjoyment of the third thing which we both enjoyed.

For the past 15 years, a group of about 6 to 12 of us have been meeting on Wednesday mornings to read, study, and talk about our faith.  The group began as a bible study, but eventually merged into a  book study, wherein we read the chosen book together (not individually at home), stopping to comment on, reflect on, question, or discuss what we are reading.  Our current study is Four Witnesses by Rod Barrett, a history of the earliest church reflected in the writings of Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp, Ireneus of Lyons, and Justin Martyr.

As we openly discuss our reactions to the faith and experience of the early church, we tend to reveal our own stories and spiritualities.  Here is where "we believe" becomes strength to all of us.  We are absorbing what the Fathers of the Church believed and lived, with considerable impact on our own lives and stories --- but the faith reactions of one person in the group also impacts the faith and reactions of the others.  The insights given to one become the insights of all because we trust and respect one another --- and we are all built up together into one body with "living stones," in the words of Scripture.  The "I believe" eventually, through thoughtful exploration, becomes "We believe..."

For those of us who believe and live the communion of saints, living and dead, the circle widens even further.  Most of us chose patron saints when we were confirmed.  Mine was Therese of Liseux, for no other reason at the time than that I was a sixth-grade girl, and the statue of St. Therese in our church was beautiful.  But grace....grace.... itself went before and behind me.  Now, as an adult, I have discovered that my spirituality matches that of St. Therese, and her "beliefs" have strongly impacted and confirmed my own experience.  When my own spirituality cannot climb to the heights of that of the great saints, I find consolation in the littleness of St. Therese, in the simplicity of her everyday life.  And her reflections often pierce my soul.  

The same might be said of the writings of Padre Pio, Ignatius of Loyola, St. Benedict and so on....their unique faiths, their different approaches to the enjoyment of God, all serve to enhance my own faith and give me joy.  It has been said that the "life of the world to come" included in our credal statement means that as friends at last, we will all enjoy one another's enjoyment of God and of the ways He has worked in our lives.  Something to look forward to, indeed!

Bread of the Presence

 When I first started reading the Old Testament, one of the curious things I came across was the reference to the "showbread" in Exodus 25.  Even before Moses was given instructions for the Tent of Meeting , or Tabernacle, he was instructed about three things which were to be placed inside it:  

The Ark of the Covenant, a golden box held up by carved angels on either side;
A menorah, for permanent light within the tabernacle; and
A golden table for wine/libations and "showbread."

Showbread?  What was the bread showing?  and to whom?  Why was it called "showbread"? 

Fortunately, modern translations of the Bible have transcribed the actual Hebrew expression lehem ha panim as "Bread of the Presence."  Some scholars argue that the expression should be translated as literally as possible, because the Hebrew word panim is actually the word for face.  Therefore, the most literal translation of the Hebrew is the Bread of the Face.  In this view, The Bread of the Presence is somehow a visible sign of the face of God.

In the desert Tent of Meeting and later in Solomon's temple, the Bread of the Presence was to be on display at all times, even though only the priests were actually allowed in the inner chamber of the Temple.  However, three times a year, all the Jewish men living in Israel were commanded to "appear before God" in the Temple -- but, again, the literal Hebrew reads, Three times a year shall all your males see the face of the Lord, the Lord God of Israel" (Exodus 34:23 and 23:17).  In this commandment, the Hebrew word used is panim, the same word used for the Bread of the Presence, or the Bread of the Face.

During those three feastdays, in order to fulfill the commandment, the priests used to remove the Golden Table of the Bread of the Presence from within the Holy Place so that the Jewish pilgrims could see it.  They would lift the Golden Table up and exhibit the Bread of the Presence on it to those who came up to the festival, saying to them, Behold, God's love for you! (Babylonian Talmud, Menahoth 29A).

God is nothing if not patient; we are talking about 3500 years of lessons here.  C. S. Lewis says that symbols teach us what the mind is not yet ready to absorb.  The Jewish people knew God's Presence in their midst from the very beginning of their liberation from slavery.  The forty years they spent in the desert liberated them from pagan symbols and sacrifices and prepared them to know and obey the God Who Cared for them as a Shepherd.  

Every Catholic church today still holds the Tabernacle, the Menorah / sanctuary lamp, and the Bread of the Presence, or the Face, of God.  Our "Tent of Meeting" tells us that there is a Living Presence in our midst:  Behold, God's love for you!

It is Not Good......

 At the moment of creation, God surveyed all that He had made and pronounced it "very good."  Each thing was "good" in itself, but the whole of creation in balance and relationship to one another was seen as "very good"(Gen. 1:31).

The one thing that God saw as Not Good was for man to be alone (Gen. 2).  Though Adam was lord of the universe, he was lonely.  Though all the animals came to him, he was lonely, and God allowed him to experience his loneliness in order to know that for which he was made -- relationship and companionship.

God Himself is a communion of Persons.  From the poetry of Genesis 1, we know that the phrase "in the image of God" created He him actually refers to "male and female."  From the Theology of the Body taught by John Paul II, we understand that our very bodies teach us that we were not made to be alone.  We are made for the purpose of communion.  We want to know and to be known, to love and be loved.  

We are not just bodies; man has an interior life that needs to be inhabited.  We speak about the "soul," but what exactly is the soul of man?  It is made up of the mind, the heart/emotions, and the will.  All of us, whether we see it or not, want "the other person" in our lives to see and understand the ways we think, the things we love, and what we most desire.  And we want the other, in seeing us, to say, "It is good that you are here!"

St. Augustine taught that the three "goods" of marriage are grace, children, and friendship.  No one will ever have your back as much as your spouse, in an ideal marriage -- because your partner sees your mind, heart, and will and is willing to sacrifice him/herself to sustain, nurture, and grow the person you are at your core.

In the same way, C. S. Lewis describes friendship:

In a perfect friendship...each member of the circle feels, in his secret heart, humbled before all the rest,  Sometimes he wonders what he is doing there among his betters.  He is lucky beyond desert to be in such company.  Especially when the whole group is together, each bringing out all that is best, wisest, or funniest in all the others.  Those are the golden sessions; when four or five of us after a hard day's walking have come to our inn; when our slippers are on, our feet spread out toward the blaze and our drinks at our elbows; when the whole world and something beyond the world, opens itself to our minds as we talk; and no one has any claim on or any responsibility for another, but all are freemen and equals as if we had first met an hour ago, while at the same time an affection mellowed by the years enfolds us.  Life ---natural life--- has no better gift to give.  Who  could have deserved it?

 

On the Work of Digging Ditches

 The human body can survive only three days without water.  How long can our souls survive without the living water of God's Presence?

C.S. Lewis says that our religious practices of worship, prayer, Scripture reading, etc. are not the thing itself, but only the preparation for our encounter with God.  He likens our practices to digging a channel for grace, waiting for the arrival of water:

When we carry out our religious duties, we are like people digging channels in a waterless land, in order that when at last the water comes, it may find them ready....There are happy moments, even now, when a trickle creeps along the dry beds; and happy souls to whom this happens often (Reflections on the Psalms).

It seems to me that this is our answer to those who claim they get nothing from attending Mass.  They are waiting either to be entertained or to experience some kind of encounter with Divinity.  Many Catholics have left the church because they "were not being fed." While I do not deny that homilies and maybe music could often be better, I do not think God withholds His Presence -- His living water -- from us because our services are dull.  Any more than He would withhold His grace from us because our prayers are dull and unimaginative.  

One of the Psalms says, "God inhabits the praise of his people!"  God commands us to praise Him because our praise opens the channel of our hearts to receive His grace:  He gives Himself to us in our worship.

A rough analogy might be the beauty of our natural world.  As long as we continue to walk with our heads down and our hearts heavy, refusing to look up at the sunrise, the sunsets, the horses in the meadow, the lapping water along the shore, and the majestic rise of the mountains on the horizon, all these wonders are dead to us, doing nothing to restore our sense of beauty and harmony.  Once we give ourselves a moment to appreciate what is all around us, they in a sense "give themselves" back to us.

Our parish offers adoration of the Blessed Sacrament twice a week.  To engage in adoration is to simply sit in the Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.  Nothing need be said, much as it is to sit quietly with someone you love and trust, without saying a word.  Exciting? No.  Inspiring? Not always. But one always leaves knowing they have been in a living Presence.  The result is often Peace, Stillness, Confidence, a lessening of Fear, Trust.  

Living Water for thirsty souls!

No Longer Slaves

 As proof that you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying out, "Abba, Father!" So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son then also an heir....(Gal. 4).

According to the Babylonian creation myths, the gods created humans as slaves, to do the tedious work of caring for the world, work the gods had no interest in doing.  In the books of Romans and Galatians, however, St. Paul makes it clear that God the Creator is not interested in slaves but rather in sons and daughters.  He sent Jesus, His only begotten Son, that in Him we might have full rights as children of God.

No matter how obedient and observant we are to the Law, we are not "sons" (and daughters) of God until His own Spirit resides in our hearts.  God would have us share in his being and nature---strong wherein he cares for strength; tender and gracious as he is tender and gracious; angry where and as he is angry.*

Without knowing the heart of the Father from whence comes the law, we always risk making the law unto our own interests.  When we come to think with him, when the mind of the child is the mind of the Father, then we will act as the Father would act.  Jesus said, "My words are not my own; they belong to the One Who sent me."  And, "If you knew Me, then you would know my Father also." (Jn. 5).

If we as Christians could say the same, we could change the world. But there is such a gulf between us and the Father that we could never know the Father's heart and mind except for the Son, who sends His own Spirit into us.  Paul says, "If anyone has not the spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ."  And "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God."

There is but one spirit, the Spirit of Truth.    We are the sons and daughters of God the minute we lift up our hearts, the moment we begin to cry Father.  But it takes a long time to redeem all of our thoughts and ways -- to finish this new creation/ this new birth of the Holy Spirit.  As long as there remains in us the least taint of distrust, the least lingering of hate or fear, we have not yet completed our apprenticeship as sons and daughters -- we are just getting ready one day to creep from our chrysalids and spread the great heavenly wings of the psyche of God.*

Then we shall be sons (and daughters) in full manifestation.  Our bodies will then fully reflect our souls.  " For all of creation awaits the outshining / revealing of the sons of God" (Romans) .  Then the earth and all its creatures will shout for joy because we are no longer slaves to sin but finally ready to tend to the creatures and to the earth itself.  Then shall the wolf dwell with the lamb, and the leopard lie down with the kid and calf, and a little child shall lead them.  When we are no longer slaves, but sons, with the Spirit of God dwelling in us!

* words taken from George McDonald's Unspoken Sermons