Jesus is the Church

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"...where two or three gather in my name, there am I..."

When it comes to their faith lives, folks with a deep conviction can be extremely defensive.

I've even heard some go so far as to claim that those who don't follow the same belief system and faith practices they do will even end up in hell when they die.

The fact is that neither you nor I, nor anyone else on this planet, has any idea whether any individual human being is going to end up in heaven or hell for eternity. 

That lack of knowledge holds for everyone from your local rabbi to the Pope. Our ultimate fate is God's alone to know.

My own faith is rooted in Jesus Christ. I practice and celebrate that faith in the Catholic Church. That is mostly because it is the church in which I was born and raised. I went to Catholic school for 12 years as a child and teen. I even later graduated from a Catholic university as an adult.

While it is my belief that my Catholic Church is the best way to practice the Christian faith, in no way to I believe it is the only way. In the end, it's not about the Mass or the building or the priest. The Church is none of those things.

The Church is Jesus Christ. He is not only the center, he is everything.

In Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus says: "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of  all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."

In the famous verse of John 14:6, Jesus says: "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

Nowhere does Jesus say that in order to get to heaven you must go to church - any church. He says that all authority is his. He says that he is truth and life. He says to follow him and his teachings if you want to be assured of eternity with the Father.

What is a Saint, and Who Goes to Heaven?

This past weekend, the Catholic Church enjoyed a rare celebration of the canonization of two of it's former leaders, John XXIII (pictured) and John Paul II. In the ceremony, both men were recognized and publicly proclaimed as saints.

We understand that sainthood for an individual bestows upon them some special designation and title, but do you really understand what makes someone a saint?

Have you ever considered the question for yourself: could I be a saint? Could someone you know, or have known, in your life be a saint?

The answer to that question leads to an even bigger one, so let's answer it quickly and get on to that bigger question. Yes, you may be a saint. Yes, you may have known saints during your life, personally and intimately. In fact, I am quite sure that every single human life is touched by saints on a regular basis.

The difference between those formally proclaimed as a "saint" by the Church and the ones that most of us encounter in our daily lives is in the process of formal recognition and proclamation, as well as the degree in which they served God during their lifetime.

At What Price Your Soul?

We're all human. We're all weak. We all yield to sins of the flesh at one time or another in our lives. We all misplace our priorities from time to time.

Some of us live in a perpetual state of yielding to temptation. There are many among us who willingly commit sins, often the same ones over and over, and who believe that we have time to overcome these. We'll stop. We'll make amends. We'll confess, and do penance, and pray, and convert our lives. Just not yet. Not today. Not this moment. I need one more.

When we willfully and repeatedly engage in the same sin, over and over, in full knowledge that this is exactly what we are doing, then we have given over a portion of our lives to the devil. We may as well have sat down across a table from Satan and shook his hand over the deal.

There are many who call themselves Christians who on this very day are living a life of sin. They are carrying on an extra-marital affair, either cheating on their own spouse, or engaging in a relationship with someone who is married, or both. They are stealing from a business, social organization, charity, maybe even a church. They are selling drugs, or taking illicit drugs.

I don't think that I am over-stating things at all if I make the unverifiable claim that there are literally millions of alleged "Christians" across the globe committing these sins, and many others, on a regular basis. Maybe you have been in the past, maybe you are right at this moment, one of them.

If we do indeed truly believe that Jesus Christ is our personal savior, that he willingly gave up his life on a cross for the very sins that we are committing, then how long can we keep doing so without our conscience overwhelming us and giving us pause?

The Fall

Here on earth, it's the "Fall" season, and last night we were reminded of that fact with the now-annual modern rite of the "Fall Back" act of turning clocks back one hour in a return to standard time from daylight savings time.

But those are not what we're going to talk about here in reference to the Fall. We're going to take a look back at mankind's fall from grace, and even further back, to the fall from heaven which led to that one in Eden.

Most people are aware of the name "Lucifer", and in Christian tradition the name has been assigned to the principal angel with glory as bright as the morning star who led a revolt in heaven against God.

The term Lucifer should not, however, be understood to be a proper name of "the Devil" or "Satan", merely a reference to that state from which he has fallen, that place in the glory of heaven itself.

The devil is but one of what were originally angelic creatures created by God as spiritual beings in a state of innocence. They ultimately became evil as a result of their own willful act, and when this act saw them cast out in the first 'Fall from Heaven', they turned their gaze towards God's human creation, leading us to sin and to our own separation, or the 'Fall of Man' from paradise.

That first fall of the angels came when, as Isaiah told in reference to the King of Babylon in his own day, and as is applied originally to Lucifer "Thou said in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mountain of the covenant, in the sides of the north, I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High."

The angel known as Lucifer led a rebellion of angels in heaven, seeking a place above God. The result was a war like none ever seen here on earth. As described in "Revelation" or the "Apocalypse": "there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon (Lucifer), and the dragon fought and his angels, and they prevailed not..."

The result of this rebellion, and the victory by Michael and the angels of heaven, was the 'Fall from Heaven' referred to earlier: "..neither was their place found anymore in heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."

Lucifer/Satan had ultimately committed the first sin of "pride", or the excessive love of one's own excellence. Through the love of his own worth, he attempted to withdraw himself from subjection to Almighty God. He was able to get the angels opposed to the Divine Incarnation to follow him.

These angels were jealous at the very thought of a lesser being, a human, being raised above them. That is how they saw Jesus, a man who would be raised above them.

The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed

In the final moments of one of television's greatest dramatic series of all-time, "Lost", the character of Ben Linus finds himself in a situation that sums up our understanding of purgatory very well.

He is just not ready to join the rest and move on into the light. Ben is left on the outside of the group, outside the church and the joyous gathering going on inside.

Most people know that this coming Thursday is Halloween, and many are aware that the following day is celebrated as "All Saint's Day", the feast which commemorates all those who have obtained the beatific vision in heaven, and which is a Holy Day of Obligation in the Catholic Church.

But you may not be aware that it is followed immediately by another very important remembrance day, "All Soul's Day", which is set aside specifically for the cause of the entire Church praying for those souls of the faithful who departed this life, but who were not first cleansed of their venial sins and/or separated from their attachment to mortal sins.

These faithful have not been abandoned by God permanently. They have not been damned to the hell of the lonely desolation that will be the eternal separation from His glory, which is the fate awaiting those who have willfully died as non-believers.

What's So Funny, God?

There is a famous old Yiddish proverb that has had many takes on it over the years, widely attributed to Israel Furman in 1968, which is itself a take on the Bible's Psalm 33:10 verse reading "The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; he frustrates the plans of the peoples."

That saying of Furman's? "Man plans, and God laughs."

The actual translation of the Yiddish would be that man proposes, and God disposes. In other words, we can make all the plans that we want here on Earth in regards to our lives, but in the end it will be God's plan that will come to pass, whether or not that coincides with our own plans, hopes, and dreams.

The saying came to me this morning as I contemplated a recent dual tragedy which has struck a family that I know personally. They suffered a sudden, recent, untimely death, and now immediately on top of that tragedy have suffered yet another major blow. Without going into details, still fresh and painful for many, there are a number of people suffering because of these twin tragedies right now, and a few whose lives have been completely devastated.

How do we possibly make sense of such apparently senseless tragedy? How can any of that be a part of God's plan for those individuals, for that family? And what does it have to do with that old Yiddish saying that I mention in the beginning of this piece?

No matter what age, we all make plans. Young people plan on where they're going to meet after school, what they're going to do this weekend. Students plan on what courses they are going to sign up for in the next semester or school year. Folks make plans for with whom they want to begin or continue a relationship, how many children to have, their career choice, where they are going on vacation, what's for dinner tonight, and much more.

But how many plans have you made in your life, small or large, only to have something intervene to delay, change, or completely thwart those sometimes well-conceived plans?

It's Hard to Dance With a Devil On Your Back

Florence Welch awoke one morning after a particularly long, hard night of partying and drinking way too much. This particular morning-after found her body exhausted, her mind a scramble, and her soul depressed.

She wasn't particularly happy about what she could remember about that previous night. At the time she thought she was having a good time, but she didn't think about the consequences.

That is always going to be a problem, not realizing the fullness of the price that you are going to have to pay for the mistakes that you are willfully making right now in your life.

Florence Welch is a singer and a songwriter, and so the outlet that she chose to help her express and overcome her feelings that morning was to pen a song called "Shake It Out", one that she had her band, 'Florence and the Machine', set to music and video.

The bible tells us that Satan was an angel in God's heavenly army. The single most beautiful and magnificent angel, he was known as Lucifer, the angel of light. There was something about him that stood out, and it was noticed by other angels as well. His ego grew so large that he eventually believed that he could take God's place, and so he rebelled against God.

Of course, he could not win, but you could not tell him that. In the end he was banished from heaven for eternity, along with a third of the angels. They had chosen to follow Satan in his folly.

Cast down to earth, they looked about at God's creation knowing how important this world was to the Almighty. In particular, Satan saw the man and woman who were particularly beloved by God.

Adam and Eve had been created in God's own image, and they dwelt in a garden paradise without a care. They had no idea of the danger that was now approaching. They didn't even know of the concept of danger or fear. How could they possibly have been prepared for the devil?

Heaven Can't Wait

One of my all-time favorite songs is the beautiful ballad "Heaven Can Wait" recorded by the artist 'Meatloaf' from his classic "Bat Out of Hell" album and written by his longtime collaborator Jim Steinman.

The message of the song is that the singer has found such a deep, fulfilling, passionate love in their life here on earth that, despite it's promise of eternal beauty and peace in God's presence, as far as they are concerned heaven can wait.

I'm not going to waste any time in bashing the song or it's lyrics. This is one of the most simple and timeless love songs in modern music. But it does provide an opportunity to take a closer look at one of the most wide-spread mistakes that we as humans make. The mistake is in not understanding and accepting that no matter the beauty or peace provided us by anything or anyone here on earth, it pales in comparison to what is promised in Heaven.

The vast majority of us operate within the framework of our daily lives as if this is it, that this life is the only one that we get, so we need to live it to its fullest. How many times have you heard the phrase "life is short" or "life is meant to be lived" in defense of some course of action that someone is taking.

The truth of the matter is that, while a human lifespan on earth is relatively short, our promised existence in God's presence in Heaven is eternal. And while we certainly should strive for happiness and peace in our time here on earth, and strive to spread those to others, life is not meant to be lived to the point that we experience every sensation, good or bad, in our human lifetimes.

Playing With House Money

I just heard a reporter on the ESPN flagship program 'SportsCenter' mention that the Baltimore Ravens players feel that they are playing today's AFC Championship game vs. the Pittsburgh Steelers with "house money."

It struck me because I had just prior to that been reading in the newspaper that some of the Philadelphia Eagles and Arizona Cardinals were both using that same phrase this past week, that their respective teams would be playing the NFC Championship game with that same "house money."

For those who don't understand, what the term 'playing with house money' refers to is the attitude that you have nothing to lose. It is an old gambling phrase that alludes to being so far ahead already in your expected winnings that you are not playing with your own money, you are playing with that 'house money' (the casino or sponsoring organization of the gambling being referred to as the 'house'.)

So what the NFL teams here are saying is that they were not expected to get this far, or that they are such underdogs in todays games, that they have nothing to lose.

I would argue that this is nothing more than a way to handle the pressure that they actually are feeling. I would argue that this is misleading in the sports context, and the same goes with your own life.

Just as in today's respective conference title tilts, there is no such thing as a day in your life with nothing on the line.

Jesus' Sermon on the Plain

Most everyone has heard of Jesus' unforgettable lessons taught at what has become known as the "Sermon on the Mount", what I believe to be the greatest single speech or teaching ever given.

On that day, as recorded in Matthew's Gospel, Jesus gave us the Beatitudes and the Lord's Prayer and the Golden Rule.

He told us that we are the "salt of the earth" and the "light of the world", that we should love our enemies, and taught mankind on a wide variety of issues from divorce to money to managing our anger.

But lesser known was his "Sermon on the Plain", as described in Luke's Gospel.

After beginning with some blessings similar in many ways to the Beatitudes, Jesus goes on to warn us of our own greed and selfishness:

"But woe to you who are rich, for you have received your consolation. But woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep. Woe to you when all speak well of you, for their ancestors treated the false prophets in this way."

Bummer, huh? I mean, this Jesus was some tough guy to please, huh?