Wisdom: Come and fill me, O Spirit of Wisdom, and reveal to my soul the mysteries of heavenly things, in their exceeding greatness, power and beauty. Teach me to love them above and beyond all the passing joys and satisfactions of earth and to prefer your wisdom over the so-called wisdom of this world. Help me to grow in your wisdom, especially during temptations, trials, and all the daily challenges that I face. Amen.

Understanding: Come and fill me, O Spirit of Understanding, and enlighten my mind that I may accept and believe the mysteries of salvation and the truths of your kingdom in order to stay on the path to heaven and serve your kingdom in my daily life. Help me to discern what is evil, and enlighten me so that I may be holy here on earth and live forever in the light of your glory with a clear vision of you and the Father and the Son. Amen.

Counsel: Come and fill me, O Spirit of Counsel. Help me and guide me in all my ways, that I may always do your holy will. Incline my heart to prefer only what is good; turn it away from all that is evil, and direct me by the straight path of your commandments to that goal of eternal life for which I long. Amen.

Fortitude: Come and fill me, O Blessed Spirit of Fortitude. Protect my soul in times of trouble and adversity. Sustain my efforts in holiness, strengthen me in my weakness, and give me courage against all the assaults and temptations of my enemies, that I may not be overcome and separated from You, my God and greatest Good. Amen.

Knowledge: Come and fill me, O Blessed Spirit of Knowledge, and grant that I may perceive the will of the Father in all things, in every moment of every day. Give me an awareness of the pointlessness of earthly things and the ugliness of unholy desires, that I may stay pure in all my decisions and use the things of this world only if they bring you glory. Tell me what I need to know for my salvation and for the service of others. Amen.

Piety: Come and fill me, O Blessed Spirit of Piety. Possess my heart. Purify me. Humble me. Enkindle in me such a love for God that I may be satisfied only in his service and lovingly submit to all legitimate authority for the sake of your kingdom. Make me increasingly uncomfortable with everything that is evil, so that I turn away from it and live only in you. Amen.

Fear of the Lord: Come and fill me, O blessed Spirit of Holy Fear. Penetrate my inmost heart so that I may honor, obey and prefer you and my Lord Jesus and my Father God above all else. Help me to despise all things that offend you, and make me worthy to appear before the pure eyes of your Divine Majesty in heaven, where you live and reign forever in the unity of the ever Blessed Trinity. Amen.

Hey y’all, Rosy here, as you can see I’m being rightly shamed into blogging- the benefits of a prolific teammate!  We’re probably going to be switching off days, so the slow days are mine.

—

I think it’s pretty natural to wonder – Why would God create a whole garden and say, “Eat fruit from any tree but that one.”  The tree has the rather intriguing name of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  And really, it’s hard to say that knowing about good and evil is a bad thing.  But I’ve realised lately, from both reflection and a fantastic video from Father Barron I’ll link at the bottom, that it’s not about the knowing.

It’s about trying to be a god.  Who alone knows all, understands all, encompasses all?  Who alone defines what is right and what is not?  God alone.  And when we reject God, and try to do this for ourselves, we are not rejecting the idea of divinity, but styling ourselves as a god.  It is fundamentally a failure of humility and the triumph of arrogance, that we all do in every single sin, to claim as our own the divine right to determine for ourselves right and wrong.

The vast majority of people will identify some basic things as wrong and some as right and will be correct.  But contrary to the atheistic claims of liberation, it is the most limiting experience, because when we are the only filter we recognise, we are inherently fettered to ourselves – a small, small view in a large, large world.

Chesterton has a brilliant piece in his book Orthodoxy on madmen.  As with anything of his, it’s eminently worth reading (and free on Gutenberg.org), but in particular I was struck by his hypothetical discussion with a madman who thinks he’s God.  As he explains it, it may well be that the worldview of a madman, or, to be truthful, any man, can explain the world quite well, but it can only explain it in a small way, as we ourselves are small.

Or it might be the third case, of the madman who called himself Christ.  If we said what we felt, we should say, “So you are the Creator and Redeemer of the world:  but what a small world it must be!  What a little heaven you must inhabit, with angels no bigger than butterflies!  How sad it must be to be God;  and an inadequate God!  Is there really no life fuller and no love more marvellous than yours; and is it really in your small and painful pity that all flesh must put its faith?  How much happier you would be, how much more of you there would be, if the hammer of a higher God could smash your small cosmos, scattering the stars like spangles, and leave you in the open, free like other men to look up as well as down!”

This is not an error restricted to madmen or unbelievers.  It is the constant struggle of all of us against the ego.  The difference between the Christian and the atheist isn’t that one is successful and one isn’t;  it’s that one knows what he’s struggling against, and the other celebrates his own defeat by calling it a victory over superstition.  But contrary to his claims, he has not made the world larger – he has only tried to squeeze it into the small confines of his own head.

Atheist Stephen Roberts has been overquoted now in his saying, “I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”  The answer to it is really quite straightforward.

I contend that we are both theists.  I just believe in a god bigger than myself.  When you understand how inadequate I am as my own god, you will understand why I need a bigger one- and maybe even why you need one, too.  If I am a sufficient standard of good and right in this world, then it is no great world at all.  But if there is a god bigger than my constant failings, then he can make even those serve some good;  then he is truly a great God of a great world.  If my view alone is the vista, I will soon exhaust it.  But if my view is only one part of a great vista, then there is so much more.  And even if there isn’t, it’s a bigger world with my imaginary God than with myself alone.

(Yes, the great philosopher Puddleglum is also worth a reread!)

Thanks for reading.  Comments and criticisms welcome.

-theRosyGardener

c.f. Father Barron has a fantastic video about sin in a series of YouTube vids taken at some conference or other.  I heartily recommend them all, but “Father Barron comments on the Fall” was one that really got me thinking – and he even has another great GKC quote.

I’ll let you skim through Fr. Scupoli’s preliminaries before I start sharing my commentary on the book; luckily, you can find them online for free, along with the rest of his treatise. Of course, I don’t guarantee the site I’ve linked to, just the actual text of The Spiritual Combat.

Once you get through the preliminaries, you’ll have a rough overview of Fr. Scupoli’s fourfold path to victory in spiritual warfare: distrust of self, confidence in God, proper use of the faculties of body and mind, and the duty of prayer. Today, I’ll begin my meditations on the first of these: distrust of self.

Here is the relevant passage for our discussion:

Distrust of self is so absolutely requisite in the spiritual combat, that without this virtue we cannot expect to defeat even our weakest passions, much less gain a complete victory. This important truth should be deeply imbedded in our hearts; for, although in ourselves we are nothing, we are too apt to overestimate our own abilities and to conclude falsely that we are of some importance. This vice springs from the corruption of our nature. But the more natural a thing is, the more difficult it is to be discovered.

But God, to Whom nothing is secret, looks upon this with horror, because it is His Will that we should be convinced we possess only that virtue and grace which comes from Him alone, and that without Him we are incapable of one meritorious thought. This distrust of our own strength is a gift from Heaven, bestowed by God on those He loves. It is granted sometimes through His holy inspiration, sometimes through severe afflictions, or almost insurmountable temptations and other ways which are unknown to us. Yet He expects that we will do everything within our power to obtain it. And we certainly will obtain it if, with the grace of God, we seriously employ the following four means.

First. We must mediate upon our own weakness. Consider the fact that, being nothing in ourselves, we cannot, without Divine assistance, accomplish the smallest good or advance the smallest step towards Heaven.

I would like to focus on our “being nothing in ourselves.” What does this mean?

We are created from nothing, and so our essence, our self, is quite literally nothing. Our very being is, so to speak, on loan from God. And we mustn’t forget this. When we do forget this, or in other words, when we sin, we “reassert our nothingness” in the words of Fr. John Hardon’s wonderfully written Catechism. We reject God’s gift of existence.

Judeo-Christian mysticism has long emphasized this truth: everything we have is a gift, and we ourselves are images reflecting God’s glory, not the masters of a private universe entirely of our own making. Diverse authors talk of our nature as images of the Divine using terms such as “eye of faith,” the “spiritual man,” or the “unseen observer;” but all these terms mean the same thing: that which is aware of being aware.

Let’s investigate this concept with a brief exercise.

Drop everything you’re doing and find a place where you can rest in stillness. Sit back as an observer and watch your thoughts flutter by. Do not intervene; just watch. Everything will continue its maddening course for a brief while even in your absence, but soon things will begin to calm and only the noises of your immediate environment remain. Everything you are aware of in this moment, these noises, the occasional concern that arises in your mind, your personality, your memories, your beliefs, absolutely everything you typically identify with your deepest self, will be seen as something external. All that remains, like the surface of a quiet pond, is the image of God.

Fundamentally, every man is a mirror which reflects the dazzling light of the God through whom we live, move, and have our being. We cannot point to any one thing in ourselves we did not first receive from a friend, or a kind word, or a beautiful picture, or perhaps a good book. To use a metaphor similar to that of the mirror, we are all prisms which capture the colors of the world for a brief moment, only to scatter them back from whence they came as we are tossed along in the winds of the Spirit.

In ourselves, we are nothing; our life is hidden in God.

Don’t be impatient if you find all this hard to grasp. And if the thought of you not ultimately even being in control of who you are disturbs you, if the thought of you being completely helpless and entirely dependent on the existence, on the God, who surrounds you frightens you, that’s okay–it’s supposed to do that.

And that is why this recognition of our nothingness, of our utter destitution, of our unfathomable poverty of spirit, is so vital to spiritual combat–it exposes every flicker of pride and selfishness for what it is: a foolish delusion. To try and clutch the self is like grasping at sand; to exalt the self is like trying to carve a statue out of water because there is nothing solid, nothing unchanging, present to latch onto.

This truth cannot be emphasized enough; by acknowledging and keeping it in mind, we can avoid a great deal of trouble.

Here’s my objective: I’m trying to update St. Thomas Aquinas’ arguments one by one to make them easier to understand for the casual reader not steeped in scholastic philosophy, and this involves redefining his terminology and streamlining it somewhat, which is extremely difficult to do. And it doesn’t help at all that I’m a mathematician by profession. I make spagetti-bowl piles of logic for a living!

Anyway’s, here goes my best shot at the famous unmoved-mover proof.

Argument from Change

By looking at the world around us, we can see some things are changing. Now whatever is changed is changed by another, not by itself. This is because change is nothing but the acquisition of something not had or the loss of something had, and since nothing can acquire something not had unless it is indeed not had and nothing can lose something had unless it is indeed had, it is therefore impossible for a thing to change itself, or in other words, to acquire something from itself it does not have or to lose something to itself it does have. Thus, if that which changes something is itself changed, then it is changed by another.

But this cannot go on forever because then everything would be acquiring something it did not originally have without anything originally having it, which is absurd. So there must be a source of change which cannot be changed, and since time is the measure of change, any such source must exist beyond time.

Moreover, there can only be one such source; otherwise, if there were more, then there would be some distinction between them and thus one would have something the others lack, which would mean the others could be changed by acquiring it—a contradiction of the source’s unchangeableness.

Now in addition to being one, this source has everything which is acquired by anything through change. Furthermore, everything this source has it has infinitely, or else it would be changed whenever anything acquires something from it.

It follows that this source has all truth, all good, all beauty, all power, all presence, all intellect, all will, all personality, and indeed, all things infinitely, for all of these are acquired through change.

Therefore, God exists and is one and the same with this source of change that cannot be changed, which is also self-evidently synonymous with being itself or existence itself.

You are truly holy, O King of all time and source of all holiness. Holy is your only Son, our Lord and God, Jesus Christ. Holy is your Spirit who reaches the depths of all things, even the depths of your own Being. You are God and Father, holy, almighty, all-powerful, awesome, and good, compassionate toward the sufferings of your creation. You formed us from the earth and conferred on us the joy of paradise. When we transgressed your command and sinned, you neither neglected nor rejected us, but rather, as a merciful Father, you sought us. By the law you called us back; by the prophets you guided us; and, at last, you sent your only Son, our Lord and God Jesus Christ, into the world, that he might renew your image in us. He came down from heaven, and, being conceived of the Holy Spirit and taking flesh from the ever-virgin Mary, Mother of God, he dwelt among us and accomplished everything for the salvation of our race.

Growing up, I attended in Bethel Baptist Church, where a dinosaur-themed Vacation Bible School first lured me into the sanctuary at the age of four.  I remember a small, brown Apatosaurus on display—one of the prizes for memory verses—and I resolved to win it.  So I did.

Throughout the years that followed, I became familiar with the central tenets of Christianity and adopted them, opting to get baptized at the age of eight.  Always too precocious for my own good, I studied the Scriptures and often got in trouble for arguing with Sunday school teachers over the proper interpretation of certain passages.  However, toward the end of middle school I became bored with the Baptist Church, whose teachings seemed only to skim the surface.  I began examining my faith and asking the “big questions,” like is the faith tradition I have received trustworthy; why does God allow suffering in the world; is there only one way to heaven; and is there even a heaven at all?

But my religious instructors never engaged my inquiries in these areas. So I was left to explore them alone.

During high school, I took up a serious study of church history and theology as a hobby. That was when I discovered the writings of the early Christians, both orthodox and heterodox. Despite their differences, the religion (or religions) they described appealed to me both intellectually and spiritually. Ultimately, I sided with the orthodox authors, mainly because I found their arguments more balanced and persuasive. By the time of my junior year in high school, I had worked my way up to the medieval mystics.

In the middle of my senior year, it became evident to me that I couldn’t honestly continue to attend my Baptist Church, since I didn’t agree with their manner of worship or their teachings. I also admit to a personal grudge, because the congregation would never make much effort to accommodate me in church activities. For example, they would always ask my family to donate to the annual youth beach trip fund, but they would never reserve wheelchair accessible places (I’m disabled).

I was torn between whether to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy—the artistic, mystical, and liturgical tradition of which held a special appeal for me—or Roman Catholicism, which offered a more thorough and logical explanation of doctrine.  Eventually, with a little prodding from a Catholic girlfriend, my inner Vulcan won out and I went with reason over mystery.

But I remained restless.

College caught me right at the beginning of this spiritual exodus. My classes and time on campus afforded me the opportunity to conveniently investigate different ways of thinking. Above all, my course with Dr. Hawkins allowed me free reign to dive into the holy texts and traditions of non-Abrahamic religions, something I had not yet gotten around to doing. Such experiences broadened my cultural horizons, encouraging me to adopt a more free and philosophical interpretation of the Bible as well as a more advanced and articulate theory of its inspiration that does not discount the work of God in other religions. For example, I realized many of the ideas related by the Upunishads are comparable to those of Christian mystics. I also decided to adopt some concepts from the Tao Te Ching—the basic text of Taoism—into my own worldview, which is otherwise predominantly Thomistic.

Exploring the social scene of campus life also fueled my ongoing spiritual journey. After joining a Roman Catholic fraternity on campus, it became clear to me that man does not live by logic and doctrine alone—mystery is required. I just did not click with the culture of contemporary Christianity, be it Catholic or Protestant. When I first acknowledged this truth, it was very difficult to face because at the end of the day, the modern American churchgoing scene with all its glorious Cartesian ordering, rationalizing, and simplifying was the only world I knew.

Deep down, I wanted all the “smells and bells,” something which I think the ordinary form of the Roman rite has moved away from in recent years. I did explore the traditional Latin Mass, but it just couldn’t compete with the eastern liturgies I had witnessed while visiting Orthodox Churches prior to my conversion. Then I found Our Lady’s Maronite Catholic Church. Not only was it close to my house, it was an eastern Christian community in communion with the Catholic Church. The way I saw it, I could have the best of both worlds. But I had little idea what I was getting into.

From the instant I walked through the door into a narthex jammed with people shouting and laughing in a foreign language over the pungent smell of unknown foods, I felt immersed in some weird knock-off of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Within moments I was kissed and greeted by everyone within a ten-foot radius and ushered into the main sanctuary. Fortunately, the service was almost entirely in English and had exactly the air of mystery I was looking for.

Soon, I was discussing becoming a parishioner with Msgr. Donald Sawyer, the priest there, who is best described as a Lebanese-Texan redneck. During one of my first confessions at the Church, he pulled out a foot-long hunting knife and began casually cleaning his nails! The utter informality and familiarity present in the community was shocking at first. Everybody knew everything about everyone. No one was in a hurry to go anywhere, and it was common for folks to just hang around for hours after services.  I was practically assaulted by invitations to meals and special events!

Though it took some getting used to, I began to feel comfortable inside this laid-back Mediterranean culture. It helped me slow down and taught me to value real people over the endless items on my hectic schedule. I came for mysticism, but I stayed because of the bright smiles and warm hearts. After awhile, I even got used to my fellow parishioners, men included, kissing me on the lips to greet me. Which was mighty strange at first, I must say!

Oh yes, as an addendum, I ended up getting re-baptized and confirmed in the Maronite Church. While studying the Church Fathers in preparation for being a Catechist, I discovered proper intention is necessary for a baptism to be valid. My old Baptist Church was independent and not a member of the Southern Baptist Convention, so baptisms performed by them were not automatically recognized. Moreover, at the time of my baptism, it was made clear that it was not a sacrament but just a public profession of faith. Thus, after speaking briefly with a canon lawyer, he recommended the move for re-baptism, or as its officially called, “conditional baptism.” So, I had the odd privilege of entering the Catholic Church two years after I entered her, and this time in a rite which suited me best.

I suppose all things work out for the greater glory of God and those who love him.

Of course, in an ideal world, everyone would read these documents in their entirety, and that would be that–end of discussion. But since we live in reality, the constraints of daily routines make this practically impossible for most people, so I will summarize the perennial teaching of the Church in the following manner: the Bible is objectively and absolutely inerrant in matters of faith, morality, religion, and those foundational facts–namely historical realities such as the fall of man, exodus of Israel, and resurrection of Christ–upon which these necessarily rest.

There is a lot of meat here, so let us flesh this out.

The meaning of inerrancy when it pertains to the Bible depends on what aspect of Scripture is under scrutiny. Thus, when we say the Bible is inerrant in matters of faith, we mean it teaches, without error, the honest truth about God and his dealings in both the spiritual and the material realms; when we say the Bible is inerrant in matters of morality, we mean it teaches, without error, the honest truth about man’s duties to God and neighbor; when we say the Bible is inerrant in matters of religion, we mean it teaches, without error, the honest truth about how man ought to express his faith in God through the carefully codified acts of worship it recommends, whether they be communal or solitary; and when we say the Bible is inerrant in matters of foundational facts, we mean it teaches, without error, the honest truth about the events and people upon which its other teachings necessarily rest (for example, if there were no real fall of man, or if Christ did not rise from the dead in actual history, it would be absurd to claim the resurrection of Christ saves us from sin).

In closing, dear reader, I pray God’s grace may guide your ongoing exploration of his Word. With all the angels and saints, let us ask in one voice, “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of thy love. Send forth thy Spirit and they shall be created. And thou shalt renew the face of the earth. Amen.”

Q: How did this agreement come about?

A: We met randomly on Facebook, found out we’re both Catholic and have a lot in common, and said, “why not?”

Q: Who are you?

A: Coheleth (not my real name). A 22 year-old male graduate student in math/physics from Texas. I’ve got a penchant for philosophy and theology. You’ll learn a whole lot more about me as we go along. And if you have a question for me, feel free to ask.

Q: What can we expect from you?

A: Great things. Rosy has already got the relational, emotional, feminine aspects of the faith covered. I’ll be covering the more cerebral, doctrinal, masculine portions.

Alrighty then! Let’s get started.

Glad you agree.

Here’s the basic problem:  God in the OT seems mean– we’ve got plagues, floods wiping out earth, destruction, wandering in deserts, wars, etc., and of course, the biggie, the expulsion from Eden.  And then in the NT, in walks Jesus, who’s all about love and kindness and challenging other people’s lifestyles, and who, in many an idyllic view, never seemed to raise his voice or what have you.  The people who see these as highly incompatible have a good point– these don’t really fit.  But they then face the logical problem of this:  if God is truly God as we describe him, his nature ought to be constant.  That is, we say God is Love, God is Truth, etc., and these things don’t change.  Why, then, does God?

And if he does change, why is he worth our worship?  Can’t we pick the one we like better?

I think at the heart of this, though, is a misunderstanding of our predicament as sinners.  I’m like most people, I think, in that I think of most people as basically good people.  I like to think of myself as basically a good person.  And I think (and hope!) there are merits in these opinions.  But we have to understand divine-human relations as, well, a relationship– with the same principle behind it as any relationship:  namely, that it can be broken.

At my university, as at several, and particularly at military colleges, there is an honor code or honor system as you prefer.  Some schools with an honor system have varying punishments, but the strongest honor system schools only have one:  you’re out.  Why?  Because they understand that at the heart of every relationship is trust, and to break trust is to break the relationship.  All that remains is to sever formal ties;  it’s merely a formality.

This is where we stand as human beings.  We’ve broken the relationship between us and God– thousands of times, each of us.  And God is Love, Truth, and Life– so when we leave him, we get Death, Lies, and Destruction.  That’s not a vengeful God of the OT;  that’s justice, as painful as it is to admit it.  Those punishments are what we all deserve.

So why the “difference” between OT and NT?  Well, Jesus.  Because throughout human history, the one God of testaments Old and New had a plan to restore us to him, to bridge the chasm our sin creates between us, with a bloodied cross as our passage.  It’s not that God’s supposed vengence goes away;  it’s that Christ takes upon himself a punishment that is, justly, ours.  As Paul says, the “wages of sin is death.”  That means that the eternal separation and death we deserve gets redirected at Christ, the innocent but willing victim.

The “problem” between OT and NT exists only as a problem of perspective.  Mostly, we like to think of ourselves as the good guys– I know I’d like to idealise myself as right there with John and Mary at the foot of the cross.  But the problem is, we’re really like the thieves hanging right beside Christ.  For those of us who know it, we know we are there justly, not at the whim of a cruel god, but nailed there by our own sins.  The only “difference” between the New Testament and the Old Testament God is that from the Crucifixion onward, there is the opportunity to be like the Good Thief.  That is, to know that our punishment is just, and yet claim Christ’s sacrifice on our behalf:

Remember me, when you come into your kingdom.

–Rosy

Rather, this is about one of “my” beggars.  Remember back in October, when I posted somewhat regularly (sorry!), and talked about my decision to give to beggars?  Well, I can gladly say I’ve kept up with it, and changed the rules around a bit.  I have some “regulars” that I give to, those who I see frequently enough that we recognise each other.  A couple of these people beg at my church.  One of them often begs at my metro stop.

In the beginning, because I saw her so frequently, I tried to give to the lady at the metro stop once or twice a week, figuring I couldn’t give more.  But around Christmas, I gave everybody extra, and I started giving the lady at my metro stop something every time.  My “limits” were only small hurdles I’d built for myself.

She’s always in the same coat.  She has a worn-looking crutch, and a worn-looking face, but it’s always made up a little bit, giving her a look oddly cheery despite her usual implacable sad face.  For over a month, I gave to her every time I saw her, and she smiled at me, and, like many beggars, thanked me profusely and, I think, asked God to bless me.  Then, a couple weeks ago, she actually told me to stop giving to her- I couldn’t understand it exactly, but I think she was saying something like, “I’m fine, you don’t have to give all the time.”

When you’ve seem somebody with a bandaged foot begging on the barely sheltered stairway of your metro station at midnight, well, it stays with you.  So I left off for about a week, before giving her another small bill and saying, “Sometimes it’s possible.”

I was going up the stairs after work and saw her tonight, and I was debating whether I should give tonight or not when she stopped me.  Tonight, she’s selling some roses, too, 100 roubles for 5 (they don’t do dozens here).  She told me to take some, so I picked up a pack of red ones, and she told me to take some white ones, too.  For 200 rubles to help someone who in some sense is nearly a friend, well, it’s not much.

But when I reached for my wallet, she told me not to pay.  I thanked her a lot, and as I started to leave she asked me my name and I asked hers.  Please remember Masha in your prayers.

There are many things I could say, but it comes down to the love of God touching us through each other.  She’s given more than I have, I who have plenty, and I can never repay her.  Ten roses sit in a jar on my dresser because the seed of generosity God planted in me grew in both our hearts.  I couldn’t keep my hard face on for the walk home– that face I use because everyone here seems to wear one.  I simply cradled the flowers and smiled to myself.

The idea of a garden flows throughout literature and popular metaphor for a reason.  It seems to me that God is ever looking to plant a new Eden in our hearts.  I am usually a poor gardener, but in this one small corner of it, I can see the true Gardener’s work, and it is good.