It is already, and this far north the weekend brought more
snow [!], two weeks since what follows was first written. However other than
necessary spell checking have left it as written:
IT is the day after Mercy Sunday whereon two Pope: Francis
and Emeritus Benedict, participated in the canonization of two other Popes:
John xxii and John Paul ii.
Speaking of the two Saints Pope Francis noted: Saint John XXIII and Saint John Paul II were not afraid
to look upon the wounds of Jesus, to touch his torn hands and his pierced side.
They were not ashamed of the flesh of Christ, they were not scandalized by him,
by his cross; they did not despise the flesh of their brother (cf. Is 58:7),
because they saw Jesus in every person who suffers and struggles. These were
two men of courage, filled with the parrhesia of the Holy Spirit, and they bore
witness before the Church and the world to God’s goodness and mercy. They were
priests, bishops and popes of the twentieth century. They lived through the
tragic events of that century, but they were not overwhelmed by them. For them,
God was more powerful; faith was more powerful – faith in Jesus Christ the
Redeemer of man and the Lord of history; the mercy of God, shown by those five
wounds, was more powerful; and more powerful too was the closeness of Mary our
Mother. In these two men, who looked upon the wounds of Christ and bore witness
to his mercy, there dwelt a living hope and an indescribable and glorious joy
(1 Pet 1:3,8).
Indeed
St. John the Apostle, speaking of St. John the Baptist, uses similar language
in the Gospel, language which should be spoken truthfully of all the baptized:
…a witness to the Light…[cf. 1:7]
The
Baptist also bore further witness of Jesus when, crying out: This is He of whom I said, “After me comes
a Man who is preferred before me, for He was before me.” [ cf. 1:30]
Ven. Bishop Fulton Sheen frequently notes, in particular in
his major work THE LIFE OF CHRIST, how the Evangelists in the Holy Gospels
“understate things.”
John’s “…He was before me.”, is one such understatement!
We know from the Lucan infancy narrative [cf. Lk. 1:57-63
& 2:4-7]John the Baptist and Jesus were about the same age, as cousins
would have been known to each other since childhood, John in the chronological
order having been born before Jesus clearly knew in mere human terms he was
older than Jesus.
Yet here, long before Jesus will declare of Himself [cf.
Jn.8:58] His precedence, the Baptist can neither contain His love for Jesus nor
his true understanding of reality, that Jesus IS God.
[Jesus is the “I AM”. Satan is the: “I am not.]
Here too St. John the Apostle continues declaring who Jesus
truly is v.16: And of His fullness we
have all received, and grace for grace.
There is a sort of back and forth flow with St. John’s
writing, namely He speaks about this event and includes the above truth about
the result of Jesus’s death and resurrection, namely transformation into Jesus
through baptism is receiving divine fullness – we become co-heirs with Jesus of
all that He receives from the Father.
Of course what we do with such a gift, in a word how we use
our freedom, this is the journey, the struggle, the pilgrimage of life.
v.17: For the law was
given through Moses, but grace and truth come through Jesus Christ.
All the rest of St. John’s account of the words and actions
of Jesus throughout the remainder of this Gospel will underscore this fact and
after Jesus’ resurrection and ascension will come the outpouring of the Holy
Spirit who will pour grace and truth within us, living gifts for our journey,
activating, as it were, all sacraments.
As St. John Paul has written: In His
intimate life, God “is love,” the essential love shared by the three divine Persons:
personal love is the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the Father and the Son.
Therefore He “searches even the depths of God,” as uncreated Love-gift. It can be said that in the Holy Spirit the
intimate life of the Triune God becomes total gift, an exchange of mutual love
between the Divine Persons and that through the Holy Spirit God exists in the
mode of gift. It is the Holy Spirit who is the
personal expression of this self-giving, of this being-love. He is
Person-love. He is Person-gift……..As the Apostle Paul writes: “God’s love has
been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to
us.” [cf. St. John Paul’s encyclical on the Holy Spirit paras.10.1/10.2
V18: No one has seen
God at any time.
It is true that Moses, for example {cf. Ex. 33-20} had
intimate encounters with God, however God had to veil His face by various
means, as with Elijah who covered his own face when he encountered God. [cf. 1
Kings 19:11]
Indeed in Exodus as referenced above because as God says: …no man can see My face and live…God
tells Moses not only will he put Moses in the cleft of a rock, but for extra
protection, for Moses, God will cover him with his hand.
Still even these encounters are such that Moses’ face will
be so brilliant from the Sinai encounters, Moses will have to veil his own
face!
Only ONE human being has ever seen God and lived, because
being God Himself He has in His divine nature seen the Father and the Holy
Spirit, but in His Incarnate human flesh Jesus is never shown to us as having
an encounter with the Father face to face as it were – in this Jesus shares our
own limitation – we know God who knows us, we yearn to see Him face to face, a
yearning which finds its ultimate fulfillment in the beatific vision.
St. Paul says at the end of his great hymn on love: For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then
face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as also I am
known. [cf. 1 Cor. 13:12]
No comments:
Post a Comment