[The following is the forth segment of a six-part blog, and is a revised version of a Lenten reflection given to my Lay Dominican Chapter on March 11, 2024. All italicized names are references to sources that will be fully listed after the 6^th segment. While I am a fan of gender inclusive language, for various reasons, I found it easier to stick to Paul’s terminology for purposes of this discussion.]

In the last three segments, we looked at how our spiritual life is about becoming one with God who is selfless and self-giving, how a part of our fallen nature (dubbed the “Old Man,” in reference to something in Paul’s letters) resists this union, how we have to give birth to the New Man, and how the Old Man sabotages our efforts to do so.  Today, we want to tackle why the Old Man sabotages; why he can not see that God’s way is in his best interest.

In the book “God and His Image,” Fr. Barthelemy, analyzed the dialogue between Job and his friends, and concluded that humans have false perceptions about God, and that these misperceptions causes us to doubt whether God really cares for us. He then looked at the dialogue between Adam, Eve, and the serpent to explain the root of these fears and misperceptions.  From this analysis he surmised that: 

–   Humans want the ability to be their own God; the right to determine right and wrong for themselves

–   Humans want to believe that they are good, even when they do not do what they should

–   Humans are uncertain about whether God has their best interest at heart

–   Humans fear that God created them to be subordinate to him; that they are really his slaves

–   Humans fear being exposed, being found “naked,” and being judged for what they really are – sinners.  

In summary, the story of Adam and Eve helps us to understand that the Old Man living within each human subconscious doubts whether he can trust in divine providence and love. He fears that he is being lied to, held in check by these lies, and subordinated to God. Thus he sabotages any effort to bring the New Man to birth.  Barthelemy. What the Old Man doesn’t understand is that in his desire to avoid being subordinate to God, he has in fact made himself a slave. When he convinces us to place ourselves in the spotlight, to feed our ego, or to order our activities around our desires, we become a slave to our passions. Garrigou-Lagrange.

To make matters worse, the Old Man believes that God thinks like a human, and that he responds to disrespect the same way we do.  In human relations, we tend to nurture spite and ill will towards anyone who disrespects us. We sever relationships with that person until he or she performs some level of reparation (the more humiliating the better), and then slowly consider whether to let that person back in.  Barthelemy. 

I don’t know about you, but modern culture seems to confirm that we have these false perceptions, and that some of them may be rooted in our subconscious. How often do we say or hear others ask questions like why would a good God do or allow this or that? We live in a world in which God is sometimes linked to Old Testament beliefs of revenge, hatred, and violence. BXVI. We live in a world that demands retaliation when someone else does something we do not like, but mercy when it is us who wants the behavior to be seen as righteous.  Our culture encourages us to look out for me, myself, and I, and to look down on others who do not see things the same way we do.  

In our next segment, we will talk about how God heals these misperceptions.  

In Him,

dw 

© 2024 Debra Weldon

[The following is the third of a six-part blog, and is a revised version of a Lenten reflection given to my Lay Dominican Chapter on March 11, 2024. All italicized names are references to sources, which will be fully listed at the end. While I am a fan of gender inclusive language, for various reasons, I found it easier to stick to Paul’s terminology for purposes of this discussion.]

In the last two segments, we talked about how our spiritual life is about becoming one with God who is selfless and self-giving, and about how a part of our fallen nature resists this union. We named this part of us the Old Man, a term used in Paul’s letters, and how we have to give birth to the New Man. Today, we want to talk about how and why the Old Man sabotages our efforts. 

The Old Man sabotages our efforts because he knows that the birth of the New Man is his death. In his efforts to stay alive, uses a lot of tricks.  It is important to know that he is sly and cunning.  He stays in the dark of our subconscious because he knows the conscious self would reject his thoughts. He puts on the guise of religion, and offers our conscious self various idols or false images in hopes that the conscious self buys into a watered down versions of God; watered down versions of what it means to be Christian. He tries to sell our subconscious on a God who is comfortable and easy to live with.  He is so subtle that we can buy into these false gods without even knowing it. We are capable of living for a long time without suspecting that he is gradually tainting our image of God, and he placates our conscience by remaining faithful to a god, but a god far removed from the true God we think we are worshiping. Barthelemy.

There is nothing he won’t do to stay in the dark. He wants to go on living as “a parasite in the bosom of our good intentions, in the bosom of all that passes for what is noblest in man’s heart.” There is nothing he cannot make use of or twist to his own ends. Barthelemy. 

Let me show you an example.  I recently read the following description of the church in Galatia, which summarizes what was going on in Galatia and why Paul wrote to them:  

The Church at Galatia found freedom too demanding and too indefinite. They sought to return to the Old Law. In the Old Law, they found control and safety. There was no need for humility or vulnerability.  In effect, the freedom found in charity was too ambiguous and bereft of the kind of certitude they were used to. Olson. We can see in this description the wiliness of the Old Man who seeks to convince us that:

– we need to take charge of our relationship with God, and make up our own rules on how to live it;

– we need benchmarks or standards against which to judge our progress, and sometimes these benchmarks are about comparing ourselves to others, which can result in the sin of judging others against our benchmarks; and

– God’s gift of salvation isn’t gratuitous; that there is some amount of doing that is required. 

The Old Man wants us to forget that the doing [how we live our Christian life] is about becoming, because becoming what we were made to be [one with God who is love] is the means by which we put the Old Man to death.  We need to allow the Holy Spirit to bring the Old Man’s works into the light so we can watch out for his tricks. We need the Holy Spirit to heal our perceptions of God and any watered down ideas that limit our ability to live the fullness of life Christ purchased for us. 

In the next segment, we will look at why the Old Man resists.

In Him,

dw 

[The following is the second of a six part blog, and is a revised version of a Lenten reflection given to my Lay Dominican Chapter on March 11, 2024. All italicized names are references to sources, which will be fully listed at the end. While I am a fan of gender inclusive language, for various reasons, I found it easier to stick to Paul’s terminology for purposes of this discussion.]

In the last blog, we defined the spiritual life as becoming one with God who is love, we laid the foundation for understanding that some part of our fallen nature resists such union with God, and we used Paul’s Old Man metaphor to describe this part of us. Today, we will pick up with the question – who is this Old Man? 

We can say that the Old Man is the part of us that wants to live in the flesh. He is enamored with the goodness of creation, and, instead of giving the Creator praise for such goodness, he seeks to usurp such beauty for himself. For reasons I will explain later, he likes to hide in our subconscious, while he tries to trip us up.  Barthelemy.

In John 3:19-21, Jesus talks about living in the light, and a part of this means allowing the Old Man, his beliefs, and his sabotage to come into the light.  We have to see the good, the bad, and the ugliness within us. Self-awareness is an important part of the spiritual life.  We need to look at the fallen part of human nature, and how the Old Man seeks to sabotage our efforts to live the divine life in Christ. 

There are many ways one can describe the Old Man.  From the perspective that life is about becoming Christ who is love, then we can see the Old Man in our pride; in how our thoughts, desires, and inclinations are predominately focused on ourselves: 

“my conveniences, my pleasures, my preferences, my possessions, my prospects, my plans, my sufferings, my desires, my aspirations, my reputation, my freedom.” Dubay.

It can also manifest as self-rejection. Our subconscious might experience something like this, “[a]s soon as someone accuses us or criticizes us, as soon as we are rejected, left alone, or abandoned, we find ourselves thinking: ‘Well, that proves once again that I am a nobody.” Nouwen. 

In addition, there are some who think that there is a deep seated fear in the subconscious of all humans, something buried in the dark, that we are worthless. The Old Man might be whispering to all of us – “if people really knew me, would they still love me?”  He might be whispering, “I am no good.” Nouwen.  Some would say that the prideful self is a means of burying the fear of worthlessness by projecting a self-confident facade into the world. Nouwen. 

The truth is, I am broken, you are broken, everyone is broken. Nouwen. The only way to heal this brokenness is to give birth to the New Man, and in the next installment, we will look at how and why the Old Man seeks to sabotage our attempts to give birth to the New Man.

In Him,

dw 

[The following six part blog is a revised version of a Lenten reflection given to my Lay Dominican Chapter on March 11, 2024. All italicized names are references to sources, which will be fully listed at the end.] 

Our talk today is called God is Love, but, it is less about what it means that God is love, and more about what it means for us that God is love.  But let’s start at the beginning, and go from there. 

First, it seems to me that we have to start by asking ourselves – what is love?  The answer to this question is Jesus, who fully reveals to us the God who is love. His incarnation, life, death, and resurrection tell us that the definition of love is selflessness and self-giving.  Pope Benedict highlights this when he said, “[I]n dying on the Cross, by giving himself in order to raise and save man, Jesus expressed love in its most sublime form.” BXVI.

We can also explain this definition of love in the incarnation where Jesus selflessly gave up all the glory of heaven, emptied himself, entered into his creation, and became one of us. Phil 2:6. We can go even further and say that Jesus became man so that we might become what he is. 2 Peter 1:4 [human participation in the divine nature]. This concept has been called theosis, deification, or divinization throughout the history of Christianity.  

So, the Word became flesh so that we could become one with God who is love; however, to experience such union we must first share in the nature of his only begotten Son. We must put on Christ to share in the divinity of God. Romans 13:14. Put differently, our status as children of God is in the body of Christ. Olson. We must become one with him who is the only begotten Son of the Father to become all that we were intended to be. 

This then brings us to the question of whether we want to become one with him.  I imagine the answer for all of us is yes, but no.  I mean look at St. Paul who after his major conversion still bemoaned the fact that he did what he didn’t want to do. Rom 7:18-25.  Something within us seems to resist this movement towards becoming love. While we were created good, and maintain that ontological goodness instilled in us at creation, human nature is a fallen nature.   

Paul used a couple of metaphors when he spoke of this nature – 1) flesh and spirit and 2) the old and the new man.  In the next segment, I will elaborate on this Old Man metaphor, and try to shed some light on some of the things that need to happen in us if we are to become one with God who is love.

In Him,

dw 

Last night, some lyrics from the song “My Lord and My God” by Anthony Carnesi kept playing in my mind.  At the same time, I was seeing the slides that accompany the song on YouTube. There is a part of the song where Jesus is hanging on the cross while singing, “Love me. Why don’t you love me? Please love me. Oh how I long for your love!”  At some point, I realized that things had changed. I was singing those words to him and he was showing me the image of himself on the cross.  I kept begging him to love me, and he kept showing me the image.

As I pondered this, the idea of love languages came to mind.  On numerous occasions, I have witnessed people communicating to their beloved in their own love language, but the beloved, with a different love language, was unable to receive the act as love. For instance, if someone communicates love through service, and the beloved expresses love through quality time, then the beloved may appreciate the acts of service, but probably will not receive the act as love since they would prefer one-on-one time instead.

The same maybe true in our relationship with God. If we have incorrect impressions of how God is supposed to make us feel loved, we won’t receive what he is truly offering us as love. His ways are beyond us, and how he loves can be very different than what we expect.

In fact, the song I mentioned above illustrates how God speaks his love to us by pouring himself out in total selfless love as he did by dying a brutal death on the cross for our sins.  I imagine the typical human reaction to this is guilt and shame. If so, then his act of love is probably not being received as love. 

For those who do not have the tools to deal with the intensity of how his death makes them feel, his self-giving on the cross can be received as a fact without much emotional response. Some might reject his love language because they feel like they are being judged. Some may experience other forms of confusion about the meaning of his death, and be unable to receive his act of love. 

As we approach Good Friday, the commemoration of his death on the cross, I encourage you to spend some time with the Holy Spirit asking him if he sees you as begging for his love, which has already been poured out for you, because you have flawed impressions about his love language.  Talk to him about healing any false impressions, and ask him to help you be more open to understanding the way in which God actually loves you. I invite you to listen to Anthony’s song (link below). Listen to his loving response to Jesus’ act of love, and ponder whether there is anything to learn from him. As you finish your time of prayer, spent some time thanking Jesus for his sacrifice, for any healing you received that allows you to better receive his love language, and for his continued efforts to help you better respond to his act of love.

Link to “My Lord and My God” by Anthony Carnesi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEsTx0wab-A   

In Him,

dw 

In the last two parts, we talked about the problems of living in the extremes of (i) respecting his power and might, and (ii) ways of living in the Holy Spirit. Today, I want to talk about living in the tension between the crucifixion and the resurrection.

Over the years, I have chatted with people who stress the importance of living in the resurrection. Their point is that God died for our sins, and the implication seems to be that our only response is to accept His gift. However, I would offer a few scriptures that indicate this is not the only response.  First, Jesus himself said if you wish to follow me, you must carry your cross and die to self. Mk 8:34, Lk 9:23, Lk 14:27, Mt 16:24-27.  Second, in Romans 8:16-17, Paul tells us that we will rise with him if we suffer with him. We cannot live in the resurrection without the crucifixion. 

In other conversations, people seem caught up in guilt. They seem stuck at the foot of the cross. It is true that the spiritual life requires an ever growing sense of self-awareness, a sense of accountability for the choices we make, and a need to carry crosses and die to self.  At the same time, Paul, who persecuted Christians before converting, regularly spoke of the joy of being a disciple and apostle of Christ. [e.g., 1 Thess 1:6].  He lived a life of self-awareness in joy, gratitude, and thanksgiving. 

To further this point, I would mention that there are many stories of saints who grew in self-awareness and greater love of God while meditating on Jesus’ passion. Therefore, it seems to me that when we meditate on the passion properly, we encounter God’s mercy; his love. Such encounters should amaze us and cause love and joy to well up within our hearts.  In this, we see the fruits of the Holy Spirit playing out in our lives.  

In closing, as I wrote this blog, I started to understand that maybe the only proper way of living the resurrection is through the crucifixion. I have found from my own practices of carrying crosses and dying to self, as I have practiced detachment from worldly things,  I have become more docile to the Holy Spirit and more Christ-like in the world around me. I find myself experiencing more fruit of the Holy Spirit.  I think that in these practices we learn the true meaning of the resurrection – life as a means of living, moving, and having our being in God.  Acts 17:28.

Spend some time with the Holy Spirit reflecting on your own method of living in the tension between the passion and the resurrection. Do you find yourself consumed by guilt because Jesus died for you? Do you have a growing sense of self-awareness? Are you being drawn into a greater appreciation of God and his love for you? Are you practicing Jesus’ mandate to die to self and carry your cross?  Ask him to help you find the proper balance between these two. Close your time of prayer thanking him for helping you grow in your personal relationship with him.

In Him,

dw 

In the last blog, I talked about Christian life as living in the tension between two extremes. I examined two extremes related to his power and might, and the need to live in the tension between the two. Today, I want to look at extremes on how one might live life in the Spirit.

This concept came up recently when I was talking to a non-Catholic friend about life in the Spirit. She was focused on the freedom that comes with following him. She seemed to believe that Catholics did not experience such freedom because of our focus on the hierarchical churches’ teachings. While my friend and I seem to have a very balanced view of these things, I want to visit the extremes at the heart of both of these positions.

On the one hand, freedom in the Spirit has led people to incredible spiritual heights, but there are others who have experienced great strife because they accidentally followed the wrong voice.  To see the impact of following the wrong voice, we need only look at the early church and the heresies that arose in relation to questions like – was Jesus a man, a spirit appearing as a man, or true God and true man.  People, believing the Spirit told them one answer or another, contributed to a lot of confusion and tension in the early church. This type of thing still happens for we occasionally hear about people committing a crime because they believed God told them to do so. There is freedom in the Spirit, but we must always be aware that there are other spirits talking to us as well. 

The other extreme is living a life with minimal to no interaction with the Holy Spirit. Christians in this regard can get caught up in a rules based approach, and can lose their freedom under the new covenant.  In my opinion, the true problem with this extreme is that it robs the Holy Spirit of his proper place in our spiritual development. While Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, the Holy Spirit is the one who shows us the way. He is the Spirit of truth, the Sanctifier, the Comforter, the Advocate, and so much more. In fact, when you read the Old Testament, you see story after story of people failing to be faithful to God. Then, in Ezekiel 36:27, we hear him prophesy that God would place his spirit within us so that we could be faithful to the covenant. The Holy Spirit plays a crucial role in our spiritual development.

In looking at these extremes, it seems that there should be some tension between freely living in the Holy Spirit and having some checks and balances; some way of taking heed of the scriptures that instruct us to always discern or test what we hear in prayer. [e.g., 1 Jn 4:1 and Rom 12:21].   For Catholics, we can rely on Church teaching, which is based on lessons learned over 2,000 years from people properly and improperly living life in the Spirit.  The Catholic Church recognizes the need for each Christian to have a personal relationship with God, a relationship that allows the Holy Spirit his proper place in directing our lives. It also recognizes that God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, and that our life in the Spirit will not take us outside of the boundaries of church teaching. If we hear the Spirit directing us otherwise, it is a good time to stop and ask questions to ensure that we are listening to the correct voice. 

Spend some time with the Holy Spirit pondering your own relationship with him. What does your relationship with him look like? Is your spiritual life about following a code of conduct without any assistance from him? What checks and balances do you have in regards to your freedom in the Spirit? Ask him how you can better live the tension between these extremes.  As you pray, watch for images, memories, thoughts, and words.  These are typical vehicles by which he speaks to us. However, I encourage you to use some form of discernment in regards to how you interpret anything you receive in prayer.  Close your prayer thanking him for helping you grow in your personal relationship with him. 

In Him, 

dw 

It seems to me that Christian life involves some level of living in the tension between two seemingly contradictory things. The problem is that it is easy to fall into one extreme or the other, instead of keeping them in balance. Let me give you an example. 

On the one hand, God is all-powerful. We are called to a proper fear of the Lord, to recognize and respect his awesomeness and power, and to humbly acknowledge our created nature in light of his power and might.   On the other hand, he is father. He is loving, gentle, and kind. He wants us to approach him in love.

Let’s look at the extremes of these two seemingly opposing concepts.  First, the ancient Israelites are a good example of living in an extreme fear of the Lord. Remember when they were living at the base of Mount Sinai? They were invited up the mountain to fellowship with God, but when they saw the lightning and heard the thunder, they chose to stay at the base of the mountain. They asked Moses to be their mediator. Exodus 19:10-25, 20:18-21. They had a proper fear of the Lord, but they took it to an extreme, and they lost the opportunity to enter into fellowship with their creator. 

Second, there is also an extreme of living an overly casual relationship with him. There is a difference between bringing God down to our level and recognizing him with us in all of his power and might. When we do the former we denude him of his power and might. We lack a proper and respectful fear of the Lord. We make him like a created being, one who is not so powerful. We can also see this extreme in people who rationalize God’s love for them. They stress they are ok, and God loves them where they are.  The problem with this position is that they tend to want to stay where they are, but God wants more for them. In both situations, he wants to use his power and might to transform them into a new life. He wants to reveal himself to them in deeper and more personal ways.  Their casual relationship causes them to miss out on all the “more” God has in store for them.  

So, what does a life lived in a proper tension between these extremes look like? I am sure there are many ways of describing this; however, as I pondered this question, I had an image of a child’s proper respect of parental power and authority. The child was sitting on the parent’s lap. They played and hung out together. However, the child was always in awareness of the parent’s authority and power. They were not equal, but there was a gentleness and proper respect between them.  

Spend some time with the Holy Spirit pondering your own relationship with him.  Be open to him showing you where you are failing to live in the proper tension between these two extremes. It is his job to convict you of sin and lead you to all truth. Jn 16:8, 13. It is one of the ways in which he leads us to the more he has in store for us.  As you pray, watch for images, memories, thoughts, and words.  These are typical vehicles by which he speaks to us. However, scripture regularly reminds us that a mature spirituality understands the need to continuously discern his voice to ensure that we are not being led astray. [Examples: 1 Jn 4:1, Rom 12:2, 1 Thess 5:21, 2 Cor 11:13-15, and 1 Tim 4:1]

Close your prayer asking him to show you how you can better live in balance between these extremes, and thank him for helping you grow in your personal relationship with him. Maybe spend a few moments pondering how you might put into action all that you learned in prayer.

In Him,

dw 

© 2024 Debra Weldon

Last weekend, Fr. Carl Joseph OP made a comment that Jesus came to restore our humanity.  I had just finished watching the Divergent trilogy, which also contained a concept of restoring humanity, and I immediately saw the stark contrast.   

For those of you who haven’t seen the movie or read the books, the concept in the final part of the series goes like this:

The story is set in a post nuclear war scenario. The people of Chicago believed themselves to be the only survivors.  However, as the story progressed, the audience learned that other people lived outside of Chicago and that many of the people who lived in the generations leading up to the nuclear war chose to be genetically enhanced. There was a belief that genetic enhancements caused the loss of humanity, which resulted in the nuclear war. The isolated citizens of Chicago were actually an experiment, an attempt to regain humanity by trying to purify broken DNA. The divergents were those who were moving towards pure DNA. However, by the end of the series, it became evident that even those who were considered pure were not humane, either. 

While we are not yet (to my knowledge) at a place of genetic enhancements, we still live in a broken world, and it was into this broken world that Jesus was born with the mission of restoring our humanity by metaphorically perfecting our DNA.  In addition to restoring us to right relationship with the Father, he did this by showing us how to live a humane life, and he gave us the ability to live that life in grace.  As we learn to follow his example of selfless living, we regain our humanity by living the way we were created to live.  As we become more and more fully incorporated into the body of Christ, the more we metaphorically share in his pure DNA. The result of this sharing is that our lives become less and less broken, and we become more and more divergent.

Spend some time with the Holy Spirit looking at the way you are living your life. Do your choices look more like that of the average person who contributes to the brokenness of this world, or are you moving in a direction, with the help of grace, of becoming divergent and living a life in Christ?  Ask him to show you how you can better cooperate with grace in order to live a less broken life.  As you close your time of prayer, thank him for showing you the way of becoming pure by living a divergent life.

In Him,

dw 

Advent is a season of hope, but what is hope?  From a secular perspective, it is something like a wish. “I hope for this or that.” There is no real expectation that one will receive this or that. It is just a wish.  

This understanding of hope is not the same thing as scriptural hope, which in its most basic sense, is trust in God and his promises.  In fact, when I look at scripture, I see a key theme – God is trustworthy, even when his people are not.  While his ways are not our ways [Mark 8:33], and it may not always look like he is faithful, as we continue to read scripture, we see his promises fulfilled. 

What is God’s promise?  To protect us from harm? No.  To give us prosperity if we are faithful? No.  I would say his promise is to love us always, and, if we let him, to conform us to him in love.  I propose this is an important perspective because eternity is a life spent with God who is love [1 Jn 4:8].  

More traditionally, Jesus promised to be with us until the end of time [Mt 28:20]. No matter how alone we feel, we are not alone. Nothing can separate us from his love [Rom 8:38].  God tells us that he knit us in our mother’s womb [Ps 139:13], and we can trust that our lives will not end in emptiness. We have purpose in him, with him, and through him. What an important message for all those living without hope in our time! 

What we know from his promises is that our existence is rooted not so much in this world, but in an eternity of living love with our creator. What we know is that no matter how much we want this world to be perfect it isn’t; however, even in its imperfection, all things work to the glory of God [Rom 8:28]. All things, no matter how evil in appearance, work to shape us and to conform us to Christ’s body, if we let it. If we let him. 

Even in all of this, it is important to know that hope is something that is instilled in us by the power of the Holy Spirit [Ro 15:13]. It is a gift from God.  It is a grace.  We do our part by choosing to believe that he stands by his promises, and he bolsters and strengthens that decision within us.  Even in hope, we are not alone. 

In closing, I want to share something I recently heard. God, who is outside of time and space, fulfilled his promises completely at the moment of creation. Thus, we are not waiting for him to fulfill his promises. We are waiting to experience this fulfillment in our time and space.  I don’t know about you, but relying on a God who’s promises have been fulfilled is way more encouraging than waiting on God to do what he promised to do. God has already worked everything that will ever happen to his glory, and his glory is the fulfillment of his promises. Now, that is something we can trust in. 

Spend some time with the Holy Spirit considering hope. Does your hope look more like a wish that things work out, or do you have a firm belief that God is always faithful. As you pray about this, be open to seeing areas in your life that look a little less hopeful, areas where you need to put in some work.  If such things become visible to you, invite him in to heal those areas of your life.  If events have impacted your trust in God, ask him to show you how these experiences worked to his glory or to otherwise reshape your perspective, and to heal the wounds created thereby. Ask him to bolster your hope in him. Thank him for the gift of hope, for his faithfulness, and for all that he has done to perfect you in his love. 

In Him,

dw 

“May the God of hope fill [each of] you [this Christmas] with all joy and peace … by the power of the holy Spirit” [Ro 15:13].