Searching With Great Anxiety

In the Gospel reading for today, Mary and Joseph are heading home from celebrating the Passover in Jerusalem, when they realize that they haven't seen their son, Jesus, for awhile. They are tired and they are already thinking about what they have to do when they get back. Joseph probably has some orders to fill that he had to put off for the trip. Mary has a ton of laundry, and there will be shopping to do, because everyone knows that you get rid of everything in the larder before you leave. 

They ask around, thinking that surely he has just been hanging out with his cousins a bit further ahead in the caravan, but no one has seen him. This is concerning. Mary starts to feel that knot in the pit of her stomach, that every mother has felt at least once. 

Joseph is trying to be the calm one, but it is becoming clear that no has seen him and they are going to have to retrace their steps. 

They head back to the Temple, which is the last place they remember seeing him, and as they walk around one of the porticos they hear a familiar voice. It is a young voice. Not the voice of a child, not quite the voice of a man, but they look at each other in immense relief. It is the voice of Jesus.

So many times I think we search for God everywhere, in people, trends, movements, in the world. We don't know that we are seeking God, only that part of us that is restless. Our hearts truly long for the One that made them from eternity, for Himself. We just don't always know it.

We have to turn, or return, to the New Jerusalem, the bride, the Church, if we are to have Peace, We will search everywhere, but when we go to the Father's House, we will find what our hearts desire. There we will find peace, and truth. Our hearts will leap at hearing your voice at last. We are finally in your presence. 

We come in, like Mary and Joseph, and hear that voice, and at first we can't quite make out what He is saying, but the tone and the speech is familiar. We move toward it, and as we come all the way in, there He is! Body and Spirit, teaching and astounding us! Our joy is so great!!! We realize that it wasn't Him that was lost, but ourselves. We are back in the house of the Father, and we are in the right place.

Free, Full, Faithful and Fruitful- In Marriage and in Faith

Romance is the stuff of great literature, great adventure, great marriages and deep faith.

In this world great romance is a call to listen to what our hearts say in the deepest places.
It has a sister, and her name is sacrifice.
To know and understand the truth of romance and why it is such a fundamental concept, it may help to look at two fundamental parts of the way we are created.
The call to union and the call of God to the soul. Both of these things are intrinsic to the human experience, and both of them are original.
Romance is the language of God.

Today the idea of romance has become synonymous with chick flicks, chocolate and flowers.
In a culture where literally everything is commercialized, romance has become something that you purchase the first two weeks in February.
Great romance isn't even understood. There are elements here and there, but a complete set of  components are rarely found together in one place.
The romance between God and humanity began with all of these, but they were quickly lost, and we have been trying to reacquire them ever since the fall.

One place that they can be found is in the Sacrament of Marriage, as it was intended.

The way that God made us to seek, find and "cling" to each other, has an important role to play in how we seek, find, and cling, to God.
Probably the greatest romance ever written is the Bible. It is the passionate seeking of the Bridegroom for the bride. It begins with Him forming hearts that will love Him, His delight at their relationship with Him, His sadness at their betrayal, and His calling, seeking and saving of them with a complete gift of Himself.
There is sweet fruit, choice wine, lovers speaking poetry, a battle where the bridegroom gives His life for the bride, and even a happy ending after all that.
Love's perfect kiss wakes the prince this time.
And this epic is lived out again and again, day after day, in our own stories.

The four pillars of marriage, as defined by the Church, are that it must be free, full (total), faithful, and fruitful. If any one of those elements are missing, the marriage is not what it was meant to be.
All of these pillars can be looked at in light of our relationship with Christ, the bridegroom, as well.

In marriage, the union must be freely entered into. There can be no coersion. A marriage in which one person, or both, feel pressured has an impediment.
So too, our faith can not be coerced in any way. While most of us have our Christening or Baptism at a very young age, this Sacrament initiates us into the family, but when we are old enough to understand, we each must choose to embrace our faith in God, and walk in relationship with Him. A relationship that is entered into by coercion, is not a convenant but a place where someone is being enslaved. Christ came to set us free from all the slaveries that the world tries to impose. He is a lover who waits for His beloved to come to Him and join to Him. He waits for our "Yes".

Marriage must be total. It's an all-in proposition. The spouses become one flesh, and they create something that wasn't before. The two of them make a family, an image of God. The family, within the covenant of marriage, is so total, that the completeness of the two can become another person.
There is a self-giving that has to be complete, or the marriage can't become what it was meant to be.
Our relationship with God is intended to be total as well. We are called to a covenant relationship in which we give ourselves totally to become one with our beloved. We have to be willing to pour all of ourselves out so that God can make us into a new creation. He has certainly kept His part of the deal. He gave us Himself, died for us, and gives even His body. He asks us to go all in as well. He wants us to let go of the things that keep us from throwing ourselves into His arms.

Thirdly, a marriage must be faithful. Once the two become one, there is no place for "other loves".
Obviously, within a marriage infidelity is destructive and it can lead to the death of the relationship. In the relationship between God and His people, infidelity has always been a theme. From the very beginning, when Adam and Eve broke faith with God, there has been an ongoing cycle of calling, covenant, relationship and betrayal between God and His people. There is even an entire book of the Bible, Hosea, in which God compares his people to a prostitute with fickle hearts and wicked desires.
In our own lives so many of us live the same kind of cycle. When we find God we are cleansed, we are renewed and our hearts are pure, and then the inevitable lies of the world whisper to us that God has forsaken us, or that He isn't there, or that we are so fallen that He has given up on us. We listen, like Eve, and we step out into our first dalliance. It may be shortlived, and we may run back to Him immediately and beg to be forgiven, or it may be the beginning of a long series of infidelities in our relationship with Him. A lack of faithfulness that will have the same effect on our relationship with God as it does on a marriage. The wounds, and betrayal are all on our side, but they can lead to the death of the relationship just the same. The difference is that God will always take us back. He will always forgive and the relationship will be healed, and often even stronger.

The fourth pillar in marriage is fruitfulness. The union of the two in a marriage will always give life in some way. Whether it is the conception, birth and upbringing of children, or a Spiritual fecundity that arises from the gift of the spouses to each other.
Our relationship with God is also intended to be fruitful. We are called to union and the gift of ourselves to God results in a lifegiving. The Spirit gives life through our union with Him. God brings new life out of us, as we become "Christ-bearers" in the world.
Mary is the first and prime example of a fruitful relationship with God, that began with her soul uniting entirely with Him in a love that was so powerful that God Himself was conceived in her womb. She was the receiver of this love, but she was also an active participant. Her spousal union with the Holy Spirit remains for us a hope for our own union with Him. We will be fruitful, if we open to receive, as Mary did, the power of His lifegiving love.

God is seeking us with a passionate thirst.
We are His beloved, and He will constantly woo our hearts.
If we surrender to this amazing love, we will be given the most incredible array of gifts, not just at the wedding feast, but here, in this life.
He is your lover, and He wants a free, full, faithful and fruitful relationship with you.
Give Him a chance.

Let Him romance you, in the way that romance was intended.

My Mother, My Queen

The Gospel reading for today is:

John 19:25-34

Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother
    and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas,
    and Mary of Magdala.
When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved,
    he said to his mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”
Then he said to the disciple,
    “Behold, your mother.”
And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.
After this, aware that everything was now finished,
    in order that the Scripture might be fulfilled,
    Jesus said, “I thirst.”
There was a vessel filled with common wine.
So they put a sponge soaked in wine on a sprig of hyssop
    and put it up to his mouth.
When Jesus had taken the wine, he said,
    “It is finished.”
And bowing his head, he handed over the spirit.

Now since it was preparation day,
    in order that the bodies might not remain on the cross on the sabbath,
    for the sabbath day of that week was a solemn one,
    the Jews asked Pilate that their legs be broken
    and they be taken down.
So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first
    and then of the other one who was crucified with Jesus.
But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead,
    they did not break his legs,
    but one soldier thrust his lance into his side,
    and immediately Blood and water flowed out.

As I was praying this morning, these three passages reached out to my heart.  In the first, Jesus asks His mother to be the mother of all of us. She becomes  the new Eve, the new mother of all the living. He does this knowing that the conflict is joined and that the Church on earth, His Bride, will need the help of His mother in the battle for souls. In the second, Jesus consummates His marriage to the Bride, and in the third the Church is born from His side. His perfect Bride.  

The Mother of all the living is there as the Blood and Water come forth, and she stands in our place to receive it. It is the beginning of the New Creation. The power of death can't overcome the love of the Bridegroom and even in death, God creates. He pours out a new life, a new existence. 

 Our mother, is standing there at the cross, as she also stands at the right hand of Jesus with the Church Triumphant in Heaven, and as she intercedes with motherly love for the Church Suffering until they can enter Heaven fully clothed in the wedding garment. 

Her place here with the Church Militant, is right in the heat of the battle. Every morning she is there to help us get our armor on straight, she is our loving guide in the pain and the confusion of the trenches, and in the evening she tends our wounds and lovingly sings us to sleep. Her heart towards the souls that are slogging it out faithfully is a beacon of hope, and that same heart is breaking for her sons and daughters who have either given up, or joined the other side. 

When we are finally at the end of our particular battle, she will take us to the bridal chamber, and she will prepare us to meet her Son, the Bridegroom. She will dress us in our beautiful garment, she will attend us with special graces, which will have the aroma of flowers and exotic spices, and she will hold our hand as she presents us to Him. 

 She is our help. Jesus has given us the mother that He created for Himself. She loves who He loves, the way He loves. She is not just the stately queen mother, standing in the throne room. She does what all mothers do. She prays, she works, she guides, and she never, ever stops loving her children, no matter what.