1. The Liturgy of the Mass.
It is through the Liturgy that Holy Mother the Church teaches us the complete teachings of Jesus Christ. Every Sunday, from Advent up to Christ the King, all the truths of Divine Revelation are taught to us in the Liturgy, gradually, from what is easy going on to the more difficult teachings and instruction is complete by the Feast of Christ the King. In one LiturgicalYear, either A, B or C, any Catholic can learn the complete teachings of Christ……in summary form.
As we go to the next cycle, though the Gospels are almost identical, there should be a deeper understanding of the teachings of Christ. And as we go through many years, one’s knowledge should really go deeper. There is no end to how deep we can understand the teachings of Christ considering the fact that these are eternal truths. So there is no end to understanding them.
A great help, of course, is the priest celebrating Mass. Though he is only a mouth piece of the real Priest, Jesus Christ, it is a great help if he can teach the truths as intended by Holy Mother the Church. Teaching them gradually, in proper order and showing the continuity between each Gospel. Ideally, he should be able to start teaching with the simplest truth then go forever deeper and deeper in teaching that parish. If he does this, a stay of three years could transform the parish into a community with the four visible marks of the true Catholic Church as enumerated in the Nicene Creed.
As of now, it would be very rare to find a Parish or Diocese with the four visible signs of the Catholic Church. Why? Catechesis is very defective. Parishes and Dioceses are not producing Catholics.
2. Martha and Mary and the art of praying.
Last Sunday we saw two sisters representing two ways of lives; the active life with Martha as a type. And the contemplative life with Mary as its type. Both of them have Faith, Hope and Charity. Except Martha’s was imperfect; while Mary was near perfect (because perfection can only be attained in heaven.)
The Gospel on Martha and Mary is a continuation of ‘love of neighbour.’ Both of them loved their neighbour. Martha in an imperfect way while Mary in a more perfect way. Their way of life is the proof of the level of their love of neighbour.
Since both of them have the theological virtues, both of them were praying. The Gospel of the 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time describes how Mary was praying; what was she really doing as she sat at the feet of Christ? She was praying contemplatively. How do you do that? St. Teresa of Avila, who is a saint who have reached the heights of prayer with St. John of the Cross wrote; ‘contemplative prayer is praying the Our Father every second. And putting the words into practice every second.’ Sounds simple. Well, everything in the Catholic Religion sounds simple but quite difficult to put into practice.
3. ‘Teach us how to pray.’
The apostles were being introduced by Christ into a very new way of life based and very new doctrines. They saw the need to learn, also, a new way of praying quite different from the way they prayed in the Old Testament. So they asked Christ how is this new way of praying. How can they pray so that God will hear them and respond to their prayer? Christ said; ‘when you pray say……’
4. The Lord’s prayer.
The ‘Our Father’ as written by St. Matthew had seven petitions. St. Luke enumerates five petitions. The explanation of both is identical. St. Luke just compressed them into five but discussed it completely as St. Matthew did. The explanation of both Evangelist can be found in the explanation of the Fathers of the Church, like St. Augustine and Origen; and later on by St. Thomas of Aquinas and Pope Benedict.
The ‘Our Father’ shows the seven steps of spirituality. In the ascending order, it begins with the seventh step ‘But deliver us from evil.’ And goes up to the first step which is ‘Our Father.’ So the first step in the spiritual life is to avoid all evil thus ‘deliver us from evil.’ Then the final goal is that we become children of God thus we can call Him ‘Our Father.’ Obviously, we cannot call God ‘Our Father’ as long as we are still sinners. Each step follows one another. The second follows the first, the seventh follows the sixth. We cannot skip.
5. ‘And subject us not to the trial.’
This is the last petition of the ‘Our Father.’ It is the first thing that we pray for as a sinner. We pray that first; God help us to stop sinning, since we cannot stop sinning without the help of grace. But then, God still continues to put us under test. These test are, intentionally, given to us by God as part of our training. Sometimes these test comes in the form of temptations. In this part of the prayer we ask God to help us pass our test or come out of our test victorious. Thus we are asking God to take us away from evil, from our enemies and from sin.
If God grants us this request in prayer, then we are well on the way to God and we shall not fear the devil.
6. ‘For we, too, forgive all who do us wrong.’
Since in the next ascending petition we shall be asking for the forgiveness of sin, before God forgive us our sin we must first forgive those who sin against us.
Remember that our final goal is to receive God which symbolically is to receive the Holy Eucharist. Sometimes, we commit sin and are unable to receive Holy Communion. What can we do if there is no confession available and we want to receive Communion? Forgive all those who have offended you. This way God will forgive you your sins. Thus cleansed from your sin you can receive Holy Communion.
Only after doing ‘good works’ can we implore the remission of our own sins. Since the just man sin 7 times 7 a day no one is free from sin in a day. This, however, should not prevent us from receiving Holy Communion. St. Thomas of Aquinas wrote; ‘the goodness of God takes away the severe punishment of sin if we forgive our debtors, those who injure us and have not restored what was due.
‘As we, also forgive everyone that is indebted to us, we want God to imitate us by sharing to us the kindness we show our debtors.’ This is the spirit of this portion of the prayer. ‘Forgiving our debtors is the greatest cause of our greatest pardon.
We have few debtors. While we owe God very much. If God demands a little of what we owe we would perish. Yet He promises to forgive our many debts if we forgive the little debts of our debtors. This is the easiest and fastest way of having our sins forgiven. Most of us do not have the leisure of going to confession for the forgiveness of our sins. By the very words of Christ; forgiving our debtors as mentioned in the ‘Our Father’ is a very good substitute. Just be sure you forgive all your debtors permanently.
7. ‘Forgive us our sins.’
This petition is for the removal of evil of guilt. Sins are debts . When we sin we owe God, thus we must pay back. If we have gotten something unjustly since it is not ours we are bound to restitution; we must return what we have taken.
Our will belongs to God so it must be used according to His Will. When we violate God’s Will we have taken away from God something that belong to Him. So we must return it. How do we do that? By enduring something against our own will or by doing God’s Will. This way we are absolved; our guilt is forgiven, St. Thomas wrote.
So living a life of self-denial (deny thyself) and living a life according to God’s Will is an act of restitution for our sins. And one of God’s Will is for us to forgive those who have sinned against us.
8. ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’
This bread is the bread for the mind and the heart. It is knowledge, wisdom and strength. It is the Bread of the Eucharist that we should eat daily. We are not supposed to eat This Bread every time we recite the Our Father. In the Eastern Rite Communion is only once a week. In monasteries in the olden times, Communion was only once a year due to the lack of priests and since monasteries are in far flung places inaccessible to most priests. So Holy Communion or the daily bread is received spiritually often described as ‘spiritual communion.’ Many spiritual writers had shown the advantages of this practice over sacramental communion. Well, for one thing, it can be done any time and as often as one wants to do it.
While the soul must be sinless before he can receive Sacramental Holy Communion it is not the case when making ‘spiritual Communions.’
9. ‘Our Father, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come.’
In ascending order, this is the goal of the prayer. Both Luke and Matthew described this as the final goal of spirituality which we should pray for. This is the first petition which cannot be attained without all the previous petitions.
We can only call God ‘Our Father’ if we have no present sins, if we forgive our enemies, if we have our past sins forgiven, and if we have received the kingdom of God.
Before we can address God ‘Our Father’ we have to abandon all earthly concerns and rise up to the spiritual level because God is there. Though He is every where He is present in a unique way in the supernatural level. We cannot rise up there without the grace of God. We need the grace of God to be able to ask and to be able to do the seven petitions of the ‘Our Father’ (five petitions in St. Luke.)
So we pray to be able to rise up to heaven and address the Father who is in heaven. Again, at this point, all worldly concerns must be set aside. Other wise we will not be able to rise; thus the emphasis that “He is in heaven.”
‘He is in Heaven’ where there is no evil (evils are in the earth.) In heaven everything is hallowed (holy) like God’s name. Heaven is, also, God’s kingdom where God’s Will is followed. Thus we continue our prayer that that kingdom of God may come to us; i.e. that we, also, be like the creatures in heaven completely subject to God’s Will even though we are still on earth. Thus, ‘Thy Kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.’
Conclusion.
Many have commented on ‘Amoris Laetitia.’ Evidently the exhortation is an encouragement to sin for couples. It is not an exhortation to obey a command that everybody can easily obey with the availability of God’s grace.
Pope Francis is in a haste to spread its errors throughout the Catholic world. He had commanded bishop’s conferences to rush in implementing it. The Philippine Bishop’s conference with its President, Bishop Villegas, is pushing its immediate implementation though most bishops have not read it and some bishops had mentioned that they have not discussed its unclear aspects.
Cardinal Muller of the CDF, staunch defender to the Doctrines of the Faith had just been fired for saying that the ghost writer of ‘Amoris Laetitia’ and consequently Pope Francis who believe so much in him have heretical ideas.
Cardinal Sarah, another staunch defender of true doctrine had been slapped into silence when his recent instruction on saying Mass ‘Ad Orientem’ was contradicted by Pope Francis. Add to this the additional appointments in the Curia, Schonborn and Madariaga, both known for heretical beliefs……..it seems that destruction of the Church of Christ as we know it, is in full swing with the introduction of the Argentine new religion of tolerance of sin and ‘just do it’ morality.
As a result of the exhortation, couples are emboldened to commit the sin of adultery, sex perverts are encouraged to continue as they are, pagans and Protestants have become respectable in their errors, etc. People are encouraged to remain in their sin while the Pope down to the Bishops and priests are encouraged to spread scandals which is a more grievous sin than adultery and perversion.
Today, people do not want to be delivered from evil. Modernism, that was born with the Fall of Bastille, teaches man’s right to do what he wants, when the very act in itself of doing what you want is a sin (my will and not God’s Will).
How can they call God ‘Our Father’ when they do not want to be ‘delivered away from evil’ thus will not be able to rise up to be able to call God ‘Our Father.’ No way can they rise up to call God their ‘Father.’ And all these people, specially from the Pope, down to the Cardinals, like Kasper, and down to the priests are reciting the ‘Our Father’ in their Masses. Their father is Luc****. The seven petitions they recite in the ‘Our Father’ become lies. And their Mass is hypocrisy. Implement ‘Amoris Laetitia’ and see if you can recite the ‘Our Father’ and mean every word as described above by St. Augustine and St. Thomas of Aquinas. Who are they?
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