HOW SMALL IS YOUR GOD?

In Richard Rohr's "Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality," (which I highly recommend), on page 148 he offers an example of how God forgives and transforms us. Here are a few lines:

Paul, of course, in the New Testament, is presented as a transformed accuser, a converted persecutor, maybe even a mass-murderer, whom we now call a saint. No one had been more pious, Jewish and law-abiding than Paul (Philippians 3:5-16). He was a perfect Pharisee, as he said, and suddenly he realized that in the name of love he had become hate, in the name of religion he had become a murderer, in the name of goodness he had become evil.

Paul was set up to recognize the dark side of religion, the scapegoating mechanism, the self-serving laws of small religion. He went global and that changed everything, and is probably why most of us are reading the bible today." 148

During the Easter season the daily mass lectionary took us through the story of the early church with readings from the Acts of the Apostles, so we're familiar with the story of Saul's conversion as well as the opposition of the Pharisees and Scribes. One phrase in the above passage caught my eye, however, and gave me pause: "the self-serving laws of small religion." 

What does "small religion" look like? I'm afraid that a description might start hitting pretty close to home for some of us. "Small religion" limits God's sphere of action to members of the particular in-group, those who have the legal formulas for pleasing God and the moral laws which, if obeyed, guarantee one's entrance into eternal reward. 

The first Christians were, as we know, all Jewish. When non-Jews began being converted to Christ and seeking Baptism, these Jewish Christians faced a momentous decision: Should non-Jews be required to become Jews first and follow Jewish dietary laws and observe the sabbath? The principles of "small religion" were telling many of these Jewish Christians to insist that any convert must observe Jewish laws (Acts 15:1). 

But Peter, Paul and others, seeing how the Holy Spirit had come down upon these gentile converts, insisted that there be no such restrictions placed on the gentile converts. Thanks in great part to Paul, who had once been a champion of "small religion," the temptation to make Christianity a "small religion" of exclusivity and self-serving laws had been overcome, and the Good News could then begin to spread throughout the Gentile world with a speed that still to this day amazes even atheistic historians and scholars.  

To what extent is my religion a "small religion?" The answer is not a matter of black-or-white, but one of degree. For example, to what extent am I so preoccupied with obeying rules and regulations that I overlook any intimate personal relationship with God? To what extent is my God a fearsome enforcer who punishes us sinners (the contrary of the loving Father revealed to us by Jesus in the parables)? What is my God's attitude toward atheists, or Buddhists or Jews or Protestants or folks of a different political viewpoint? To what extent is my religion confined merely to Church and its clear boundaries, obligations, authority structure and so forth? I'm afraid that there are Catholics who take great comfort in the "small religion" aspects of our Church and ignore the saving message of the Universal Christ who came to save the whole of humanity. We could all do well to listen to the message of a certain visionary priest and scholar.

 

The French Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), was a priest, scientist, paleontologist, theologian and philosopher who taught that the idea of evolution was at the center of God's ongoing plan for the world, and that everything in the universe was taking part in this development; the Universal Christ and his mystical body were part of this evolution that was heading toward one ultimate goal. 

Since tomorrow is the feast of Corpus Christi, it seems appropriate to share with you some of his thinking on the subject of the Holy Eucharist.

His vision of the Holy Eucharist is a perfect antidote to "small religion's" view of the world. When he gazed at the host as he elevated it during mass, he saw not God captured in a small wafer of bread for the benefit of the people attending mass, but saw rather a point from which infinite energy of divine love radiated out  beyond the farthest galaxies into the entire universe, and into every electron and every atom in every molecule in the universe. This is not "small religion!" He encourages us to see ourselves as members of the Body of the Universal Christ, the One who loves all of creation with unbounded love. This is the Christ that Saint Paul spent the rest of his life preaching.

May the graces of the Holy Eucharist open our hearts and minds to this vision of a universal Christ and a universal Church!

Chardin could hardly have imagined the universe shown in this 2024 photograph!

WHERE IS GOD?

Heaven Touches Earth 

The gospel passage for Yesterday's feast, the Chair of Saint Peter, included that famous quotation,

 a

“I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.

Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven;

and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” (Mt 16:19)

As I was reflecting on that gospel passage I was reminded of that idea that I have mentioned in this blog previously: in both Jewish and Christian tradition there is this basic belief that “heaven touches earth.”

For Jews at the time of Christ, heaven touches earth in the Torah and in the Temple.  God is present in both of these in a special way. In addition they see God is acting in history, in such acts as delivering his people from Egypt, or knocking down the walls of Jericho.

For Christians, heaven has touched earth once and for all when God

took on human flesh and dwelt among us. We celebrate that presence as focused in a special way in the sacraments, but also in the idea that Jesus is present in others around us:  “Whatever you do to the least of my brothers you do to me.” 

God Touches Earth 

But it occurred to me this morning that maybe this idea of heaven touching earth is misleading and incomplete when stated this way. I find it more powerful to say instead, “GOD is constantly present on earth and in heaven.”

God is present everywhere, and in everything in creation. In trees and rocks in oceans, and in stars, and of course in each one of us who is created in the image of God. 

To deny that God is present in everything we would have to say that therefore God is not present everywhere in creation, that there are limits to God‘s presence! But a God who has limits cannot possibly be God. There are plenty of passages in the New Testament that point towards the belief that God is indeed present in each of us.

God is in ME!

So I have revised my understanding of the idea that “heaven touches earth“ by saying that “heaven and earth are touching in me,” that is, “God is living in me!” 

Saint Paul even says “It is no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me.” Let the implications of that sink in: I suddenly realize that I have to act as if God is present in me. What does that look like? For an answer me might look at the gospel assigned for today, the Seventh Sunday of Ordinary Time:

Jesus said to his disciples:

“To you who hear I say,

love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,

bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.

To the person who strikes you on one cheek,

offer the other one as well,

and from the person who takes your cloak,

do not withhold even your tunic.

…

love your enemies and do good to them,

and lend expecting nothing back;

then your reward will be great

and you will be children of the Most High,

for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.

Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

The whole New Testament is a guide for how we should behave if Christ is living inside of us. When we read or listen to the Scriptures, then, we might want to listen for those passages that are meant to teach us how to behave as if God is present inside of us. Let me end with this example from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount:

"Set no limits on your love, just as your Heavenly Father sets no limits on His love." (Mt. 5:48 Jerusalem Bible Rev. Ed.)

HEAVEN TOUCHING EARTH

I want to make use of a lens that I've used before to a look at a truth of our faith, namely our Judaeo-Christian religious tradition's foundational belief that heaven can touch earth. 

Jerusalem Temple

The God of the Israelites intervened in history at special moments to deliver the chosen people. As time went on, Judaism came to relive that "heaven touched earth" in more permanent ways. First, God was present in a unique and permanent way in the Jerusalem temple, and second the Lord was especially present in his Word, the Torah.  

We Christians have just finished celebrating the season of Christmas, the event in which heaven touched earth definitively, once for all, when God came became a human, "the Word became flesh" as a little baby. During the Christmas season the liturgy delighted us by unfolding various aspects of this mystery via the feasts of the Epiphany, the Holy Family, and the Baptism in the Jordan. 

Over the past week, the lectionary for daily mass has been presenting excerpts from the Letter to the Hebrews, actually a long sermon written to encourage Christians in the face of (if I might borrow from the U.S. Bishops' website) "a weariness with the demands of Christian life and a growing indifference to their calling (Heb 2:1; 4:14; 6:1–12; 10:23–32). The author’s main theme, the priesthood and sacrifice of Jesus (Heb 3–10), is not developed for its own sake but as a means of restoring their lost fervor and strengthening them in their faith."  

Here is the excerpt used in today's (Saturday's) mass: (Heb 9:2-3, 11-14)

A tabernacle was constructed, the outer one,

The Holy Place and the Holy of Holies

in which were the lampstand, the table, and the bread of offering; 

this is called the Holy Place.

Behind the second veil was the tabernacle called the Holy of Holies. 

But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that have come to be, 

passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by hands, 

that is, not belonging to this creation, 

he entered once for all into the sanctuary, 

not with the blood of goats and calves but with his own Blood, 

thus obtaining eternal redemption.

For if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of a heifer’s ashes 

can sanctify those who are defiled 

so that their flesh is cleansed, 

how much more will the Blood of Christ, 

who through the eternal spirit offered himself unblemished to God,

cleanse our consciences from dead works to worship the living God.

If we look at this passage through the lens of "heaven touching earth," we see Christ in his role of High Priest joining heaven to earth in still another way:

But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that have come to be, 

passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by hands, 

that is, not belonging to this creation, 

he entered once for all into the sanctuary, 

not with the blood of goats and calves but with his own Blood, 

thus obtaining eternal redemption.

Christ the High Priest

Just as he joined heaven to earth at his incarnation, he does the same thing here. The Latin word for priest, pontifex, means literally "bridge-builder," one who bridges the gap between the human and the divine. As members of Christ's body, as sharers in his priesthood, we bridge the gap that once existed between heaven and earth.

The author of Hebrews, we're told above, uses this image of Christ the High Priest to encourage and strengthen the Christians of his day whose fervor was beginning to weaken. May this image of heaven touching earth strengthen and encourage you and me as well!

A LIGHT TO THE NATIONS

 

.
A NEW PERSPECTIVE

Appropriately enough, it was on Christmas morning that the James Webb Telescope was launched, to take up its position one million miles from the earth, with the mission of gathering the infrared light emanating from the earliest galaxies close to the time of the big bang. You may remember my post of Dec. 11, 2021, concerning the title "Christ" as referring to the Word through whom the whole universe came into being. Well, I recently came across a post that shows I've been thinking for some years about the "Cosmic Christ," including on the feast of the Epiphany a few years ago. So I would like to offer that same post again, from January 6, 2018. Here it is. 

 

I mentioned in a previous post that I’m reading a book entitled The Divine Dance: The Trinity and Your Transformation, by Richard Rohr. I’m taking my time, trying to digest the ideas and their implications. Rohr presents a whole different way of looking at the mystery of the Trinity, a different perspective on the Father, the Sound and the Holy Spirit at work in the world and in me. Every couple of pages I highlight a sentence and say to myself, “Ah! That makes so much sense!” I highly recommend the book. There’s a website you might like to visit.

EPIPHANY GIFT

This morning I began reflecting on the readings for tomorrow’s solemnity of the Epiphany using some of the ideas in Rohr’s book. One of the points he makes is that when we start from the point of Trinitarian theology, we find a great foundation for interfaith dialogue and friendship. Intelligent dialogue with other religions is much easier when we are not using Jesus as our only “trump card.”

Up to now, we’ve generally used Jesus in a competitive way instead of a cosmic way, and thus others hear our belief at a tribal “Come join us -- or else” level. A far cry from the Universal Christ of Colossians “who reconciles all things to himself in heaven and on earth.” In short, we made Jesus Christ into an exclusive savior instead of the totally inclusive savior he was meant to be. ….

Once Christians learn to honor the Cosmic Christ as a larger ontological identity than the historical Jesus, then Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, and spiritual-but-not-religious people have no reason to be afraid of us. They can easily recognize that our take on such an Incarnation includes and honors all of creation, and themselves, too.

This passage from page 210 of the book assumes the premises set out in the first 200 pages, of course, but maybe you can see that it was a perfect prelude to reading the story of the visit of “magi from the east” who came to worship the infant king of the Jews. From one point of view you’d have to say that they are intruders, pagans, who are out of place in the middle of this story of how Christ came to earth to save us Christians. Fortunately they return home right away, so we don’t have to think about how they fit into the plot. But from the perspective of Trinitarian theology, which includes the notion of a “cosmic Christ,” it makes perfect sense that people from all around the world would be attracted to the incarnate One “who reconciles all things to himself in heaven and on earth.”    

I enjoyed reflecting on the Epiphany story from this different perspective. The wise men from the east were welcome guests who had as much right as any human being to seek, find, and honor their newborn Savior.   

The magi seemed to bring with them this morning not just the three famous gifts, but also a challenge for all us Christians to see Christ not as the exclusive Savior sent for us Christians, but as God’s gift to the entire universe and all those who dwell in it.

FILLING THE SPACE

 

This past Tuesday, the Solemnity of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, we celebrated the Eucharist with our students from grades 6 through 12. Because of COVID we decided to gather the almost 600 kids for mass outdoors, on our soccer field. Under the warm sun we sang and prayed and listened to the Word of God being proclaimed. 

Six hundred kids at mass.

We instruct the students that when they're reading in public they need to "command the space" or "fill the space with your voice." While this is good advice for speaking in the gym or the auditorium, it becomes curiously challenging when you're outdoors. How do you "fill the space" when you're standing under a clear blue sky? I thought of this as I took in the beautiful scene from my vantage point, my concelebrant's chair. How do we "fill the space" with our celebration of mass? The answer came immediately -- it was the visionary thought of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a Jesuit priest. My post for August 21 is good background for this post. In it I wrote:

If you know a little about Chardin then you won't be surprised that when he was celebrating mass, he would elevate the consecrated host or the cup and see the power radiating from them not just to the faithful attending that mass but to every human being, all members of Christ, and then further into every living thing, and then to the atoms and molecules that compose every speck of matter in the farthest reaches of the universe.

So as Fr. Edwin, the Headmaster, raised the consecrated host against the vast sky, with the sound of a helicopter and a few trucks as background music, I sensed the power of the Universal Christ radiating from the consecrated bread in every direction, extending farther and farther, past our fences, past the county courthouse and the colleges down the street, past the tall buildings of  Newark's skyline, and radiating instantly to the entire planet and to our galaxy and out beyond the farthest reaches of the stars. Talk about filling the space!

 Here's a quotation from Fr. Chardin's journal, entitled "Mass on the World," which also formed part of my vision that morning:

“To interpret adequately the fundamental position of the Eucharist in the economy of the world . . . it is, I think, necessary that Christian thought and Christian prayer should give great importance to the real and physical extensions of the Eucharistic Presence. . . As we properly use the term “our bodies” to signify the localized center of our spiritual radiations . . ., so it must be said that in its initial and primary meaning the term “Body of Christ” is limited, in this context, to the consecrated species of Bread and Wine. But. . .the host is comparable to a blazing fire whose flames spread out like rays all round it.”

(Photos courtesy of Graybee Ministry)

I hope that we'll be able to have mass outdoors again soon. Maybe including the little ones from our Elementary Division, which would make a thousand voices singing the praise of the Universal Christ who is transforming the world at every instant everywhere in creation. We, as Eucharistic People, are able to participate in the mysterious and beautiful way that Christ in the Eucharist "fills the space" of the entire universe. Starting from our soccer field in downtown Newark.

THE EXPANDING EUCHARIST

 

St. Pius X

August 21 is the memorial of Saint Pius X. His pontificate (1903-1914) was marked by lots of important diplomacy and other significant achievements. He tried desperately to keep Europe from descending into war, but his efforts failed. Within a few months after the outbreak of World War I he died of a broken heart. But he is perhaps best remembered for encouraging the frequent reception of holy communion. At the time of his papacy people would attend mass but would seldom receive the Eucharist. His efforts helped to change that custom, and prepared the way for other reforms that made the Blessed Sacrament more and more accessible to the faithful.

Chardin

Coincidentally, I've been slowly reading my way through "Teilhard de Chardin on the Eucharist: Envisioning the Body of Christ," by Louis Savary. Through reading this book, my understanding of and my attitude toward the Eucharist have been tremendously deepened and expanded. If you know a little about Chardin then you won't be surprised that when he was celebrating mass, he would elevate the consecrated host or the cup and see the power radiating from them not just to the faithful attending that mass but to every human being, all members of Christ, and then further into every living thing, and then to the atoms and molecules that compose every speck of matter in the farthest reaches of the universe

Chardin thinks of Christ under three aspects. The past Christ, who was born in Bethlehem, lived for about 30 years, died and rose again  Then there is the Present Christ, the head of the Mystical Body, who lives in our hearts and is present everywhere. The third aspect of Christ is one that we seldom if ever think of: the Future Christ, the Universal Christ whose power and presence extend to the farthest reaches of the universe, who holds everything in being and who will one day bring all of creation into one single point of Divine Love.

When Chardin as a priest gazed on the consecrated host and the cup, he experienced the presence of all three Christs. But I was especially captivated by his image of the bread and wine being transformed into the presence of the universal Christ. This sent me a couple of times to YouTube to type in "Hubble," the telescope that has extended our view of the universe beyond our imagining. (You should try looking at a couple of these videos yourself.)

The second part of Savary's book about Chardin is composed of suggested meditations based on Chardin's view of the Eucharist. Of course most of us encounter the Eucharist only at mass, but I'm privileged to spend 50 minutes each morning in front of the Eucharist displayed in the monstrance on the altar in the abbey church. The meditations are turning out to be very powerful. For example, gazing at the host and imagining a certain person contained inside it (as we're all members of Christ, this isn't heretical). It may be someone who is sick or in some distress. Then praying for that person and ask the Lord to watch over that person or heal them or give them whatever gift it is that they most need right now. Another meditation involves visualizing the power radiating from the host outward to fill all of creation. 

These meditations are certainly inviting me to expand my idea of the Eucharist far beyond a private, personal welcoming of Jesus into my heart to enjoy His presence. Thanks to Chardin's way of seeing the world and the Universal Christ, my sense of the meaning of the Eucharist is deepening every day. 

Saint Pius X must be gratified to see people sharing in Chardin's deep vision of the power of the Sacrament. 

An enhanced image from NASA of galaxy clusters

SMALL RELIGION, SMALL GOD

 I'm rereading Richard Rohr's "Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality," which I highly recommend. On page 148 he offers an example of how God forgives and transforms us. Here are a few lines:

Paul, of course, in the New Testament, is presented as a transformed accuser, a converted persecutor, maybe even a mass-murderer, whom we now call a saint. No one had been more pious, Jewish and law-abiding than Paul (Philippians 3:5-16). He was a perfect Pharisee, as he said, and suddenly he realized that in the name of love he had become hate, in the name of religion he had become a murderer, in the name of goodness he had become evil.

Paul was set up to recognize the dark side of religion, the scape-goating mechanism, the self-serving laws of small religion. He went global and that changed everything, and is probably why most of us are reading the bible today." 148

During the Easter season the daily mass lectionary has been taking us through the story of the early church with readings from the Acts of the Apostles, so we're familiar with the story of Saul's conversion as well as the opposition of the Pharisees and Scribes. One phrase in the above passage caught my eye, however, and gave me pause: "the self-serving laws of small religion." 

What does "small religion" look like? I'm afraid that a description might start hitting pretty close to home for some of us. "Small religion" limits God's sphere of action only to members of the particular in-group, those who have the legal formulas for pleasing God and the moral laws that, if obeyed, guarantee ones entrance into eternal reward. 

The first Christians were, as we know, all Jews. When non-Jews began being converted to Christ and seeking Baptism, these Jewish Christians faced a momentous decision: Should non-Jews be required to become Jews first and follow Jewish dietary laws and observe the sabbath? The principles of "small religion" were telling many of these Jewish Christians to insist that any convert must observe Jewish laws (Acts 15:1). But Peter, Paul and others, seeing how the Holy Spirit had come down upon these gentile converts, insisted that there be no such restrictions placed on the gentile converts. Thanks in great part to Paul, who had once been a champion of "small religion," the temptation to make Christianity a "small religion" of exclusivity and self-serving laws had been overcome, and the Good News could then begin to spread throughout the Gentile world with a speed that still to this day amazes even atheistic historians and scholars.  

To what extent is my religion a "small religion?" The answer is not a matter of black-or-white, but one of degree. For example, to what extent am I so preoccupied with obeying rules and regulations that I overlook any intimate personal relationship with God? To what extent is my God a fearsome enforcer who punishes us sinners (the contrary of the loving Father revealed to us by Jesus in the parables)? What is my God's attitude toward atheists, or Buddhists or Jews or Protestants? To what extent is my religion confined merely to Church and its clear boundaries, obligations, authority structure and so forth? I'm afraid that there are Catholics who take great comfort in the "small religion" aspects of our church, and ignore the saving message of the Universal Christ who came to save the whole of humanity. We could all do well to listen (again?) to the message of a certain visionary priest and scholar. 

The French Jesuit, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), was a priest, scientist, paleontologist, theologian and philosopher who taught that the idea of evolution was at the center of God's ongoing plan for the world, and that everything in the universe was taking part in this development; the Universal Christ and his mystical body were part of this evolution that was heading toward one ultimate goal. His vision of the Holy Eucharist is a perfect antidote to "small religion's" view of the world.

When he gazed at the host as he elevated it during mass, he saw not God captured in a small wafer of bread for the benefit of the people attending mass, but a point from which infinite energy of divine love radiated out  beyond the farthest galaxies into the entire universe, and into every electron and every atom in every molecule in the universe. This is not "small religion!" He encourages us to see ourselves as members of the Body of the Universal Christ, the One who loves all of creation with unbounded love. This is the Christ that Saint Paul spent the rest of his life preaching.

May the graces of the Easter Season open our hearts and minds to this vision of a universal Christ and a universal Church!

YOU WILL DO GREATER WORKS THAN THESE

 

I'm presently enjoying Louis Savary's Teilhard de Chardin on the Eucharist. Chardin, you may know, was a Jesuit and a scientist who thought in terms of the ongoing evolution of all creation in our own day as heading toward a point of culmination in the future in the Universal Christ. His evolutionary perspective expands our narrow, comfortable view of the world to include the entire universe in the embrace of the Universal Christ. I'll share here some of Savary's Introduction, and hope that his words will speak to you as beautifully as they did to me.

Jesus of Nazareth once predicted that we -- those who had faith in him -- would be able to do everything he could do and more. "Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father" (john 14:12). Has this prediction proven to be true?

Yes, indeed.

The most prominent abilities of Jesus of Nazareth were huis abilities to heal illness and to cure people of mental or spiritual sickness (demonic possession). Jesus may have healed many people in one day. Today we may not be able to heal by mere touch as Jesus did. Perhaps, sometime in the future, when human consciousness has evolved, some among us may develop this ability.

Nevertheless, today, hospitals around the world, many founded by believers,
collectively heal tens of thousands of people every day. Technologies have helped develop surgical procedures and prosthetics that could never have been possible in Jesus' day, nor even a century ago. The Body of Christ on Earth evolves in its healing abilities each year as pharmaceutical laboratories develop drugs that help prevent and cure scores of physical and mental maladies. These companies have developed an arsenal of drugs to reduce pain and alleviate suffering. Today, biological science allows health-care technicians to adjust an individual's DNA by editing it, thus offering hope for a better, longer life for many. Medical technology is producing its own share of healings that would have been considered miracles a generation ago. 12

Savary goes on to list the advances in psychology and the social sciences as advancing the development of the Body of Christ, but here's the paragraph that caught my attention (the book was published in 2021): "Improvements in travel and communication make it possible for people to build and maintain friendships and families no matter where they live, thus providing another advance on how members of the Body of Christ can express love and care for each other." 13

During the past year of being locked down "remote" from one another, we've gotten accustomed communicating with one another via Zoom, Google Chat, Google Hangout, Skype. It's hard to keep track of all the platforms that keep coming out to facilitate our communicating with one another during the pandemic. When I read the paragraph above I realized that I was missing an important fact: I have been communicating with friends and acquaintances around the world at nio cost, seeing them and conversing easily in real time. Thanks to Savary and Chardin I got a deeper appreciation of the web of relationships that we humans have continued building during and because of the pandemic. The Universal Body of Christ continues to evolve.

Of course, I still pray for the day when we can share in the bread-and-wine Body of Christ, but meanwhile we can continue to take advantage of the advances in modern communications that allow us to build relationships of love and intimacy and so build up the Body of Christ in the best way we can.

 

PERSPECTIVE FOR ADVENT

I'm taking this opportunity to tie together for myself a few thoughts and events that have affected me during this past week.

First, on Monday our monks' schola recorded a favorite Advent song of mine: "O Come, divine Messiah," a song of longing and hoping. (I hear that the recording got posted on the abbey's Facebook page.) As we sang, I felt my heart and my spirit truly longing for the Lord to come. Our longing during this season is, of course, focused on the nativity, an event in a particular place at a particular time in history. The emphasis is on Baby Jesus, God becoming a human being. But events in my life have encouraged me to expand my vision way beyond the stable in Bethlehem, and to consider also the infinitely wider notion of "The Christ" that I've reflected on previously in this blog (find it in the "labels" column).   

Second, I learned early this week that a very close friend of mine has received a dire diagnosis of cancer that will involve surgery. This news really upset me, and encouraged me to pray even harder than usual for this special loved one. 

Third, I don't think that it was a coincidence that I found myself looking at a video from the Hubble telescope and being drawn into the vast beauty of outer space. There are hundreds of similar short videos to choose from. One that I like is the flight through the Orion nebula. The sense of infinite vastness helped me to put into perspective both my friend's cancer and Jesus' birth in that little town of Bethlehem.

Fourth, again, not by accident, I happened to start reading a book that was given to me months ago, Chardin's "Hymne de L'univers," a lyrical, mystical approach to all of creation that starts way out there in the infinity of God's love for the world, using metaphors of fire and light, and the "real presence" of Christ expanding from the host on the altar to the utmost bounds of the universe. Very early in the book, Chardin meditates on the image of God's power and presence as fire. Here is a translation of part of his reflection:

 It is done.

Once again the Fire has penetrated the earth
Not with the sudden crash of thunderbolt,
riving the mountain tops;
does the Master break down doors to enter his own home?

Without earthquake, or thunderclap:
the flame has lit up the whole world from within.
All things individually and collectively
are penetrated and flooded by it,
from the inmost core of the tiniest atom
to the mighty sweep of the most universal laws of being:
so naturally has it flooded every element, every energy
every connecting link in the unity of our cosmos,
that one might suppose the cosmos to have burst
spontaneously into flame.

So, this week has helped me to deal with the news of my dear friend's illness by seeing it against the background of God's infinite, fiery love for all of creation.

It's been a good week.

CHRIST ON MY WALL

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After writing last week's post about icons, I took down the one I painted in 1986 and re-hung it where I

Icon I painted in 1986

 can see it all the time, especially when I'm sitting in my chair reading or praying. I'm very glad I did --The image of the Universal Christ keeps revealing more and more about who he is and who I am. You may want to read the previous post, entitled "Icons" before continuing.

The reflections about Christ that I've been sharing in the past few weeks are based for the most part on the thoughts of the Franciscan Fr. Richard Rohr. This week I'm going to let him speak for himself through a few quotations from his book "The Universal Christ."   Page references below are from this book.

[Rohr quotes a long excerpt from Carryll Houselander, a 20th Century mystic, in which she describes an experience she had while riding in a crowded subway. She suddenly saw Christ present in each of her fellow passengers in the most vivid and way, "living in them, dying in them." And not only in them but in every person who ever lived. Then Rohr comments on the long passage.]

The question for me -- and for us -- is, Who is this "Christ" that Caryll Houselander saw permeating and radiating from all her fellow passengers? Christ for her was clearly not just Jesus of Nazareth but something much more immense, even cosmic, in significance. How that is so, and why it matters, is the subject of this book. Once encountered, I believe this vision has the power to radically alter what we believe, how we see others and relate to them, our sense of how big God might be, and our understanding of of what the Creator is doing in our world. (pp 2-3) 

... The revelation of the risen Christ as ubiquitous and eternal was clearly affirmed by the Scriptures (Colossians 1, Ephesians 1, John 1, Hebrews 1) and in the early church, when the euphoria of the Christian faith was still creative and expanding. In our time, however, this deep mode of seeing must be approached as something of a reclamation project. When the Western church separated from the East in the Great Schism of 1054, we gradually lost this profound understanding of how God has been liberating and loving all that is. Instead, we gradually limited the Divine Presence to the single body of Jesus, when perhaps it is as ubiquitous as light itself -- and uncircumscribable by human boundaries. 

We might say that the door of faith closed on the broadest and most beautiful understanding of what

early Christians called the "Manifestation," the Epiphany, or most famously, the "Incarnation" -- and also its final and full form, which we still call the "Resurrection." But the Eastern and Orthodox churches originally had a much broader understanding of both of these, an insight that we in the Western churches, both Catholic and Protestant, are now only beginning to recognize. (p.4)

... 

We cannot overestimate the damage that was done to our Gospel message when the Eastern ("Greek") and Western ("Latin") churches split, beginning with their mutual excommunication of each other's patriarchs in 1054. We have not known the "one, holy, undivided" church for over a thousand years.

But you and I can reopen that ancient door of faith with a key, and that key is the proper understanding of a word that many of us use often, but often too glibly. That word is Christ.

What if Christ is a name for the transcendent within every "thing in the universe

What if Christ is a name for the immense spaciousness of all true Love?

What if Christ refers to an infinite horizon that pulls us from within and pulls us forward too?

What if Christ is another name for everything -- in its fullness? (p.5)

These paragraphs are a sample of the kind of thinking that has been shaping my meditations and reflections since at least April, as you may have noticed if you've been following my recent posts.

So, the icon that's speaking silently and eloquently to me from its new place on the wall has helped me to get some perspective on Covid, racial polarization, presidential tweets and all manner of things. 

May the risen Christ bless all of us and keep us safe!