What was heard before creation came into being, what is the harmonic that underlies, the sound of the cosmos?
Today in Rome begins the Synod on Evangelisation and on Thursday the Year of Faith begins to mark the opening of the 2nd Vatican Council. Today Sts Hildegard of Bingen and John of Avila will be declared Doctors of the Church. Today is also Rosary Sunday and today the Gospel speaks about marriage, Jesus saying Moses allowed divorce but I teach its permanence, I teach that remarriage after divorce is the same as adultery.
For our forefathers adultery was one of the great sins, on the level with apostasy or murder. Every culture seems to have allowed divorce and subsequent remarriage except the followers of Jesus. St Paul tells us the reason is because marriage is based on Christ's relationship with his Church, a relationship based on mutual giving, on the irrevocable exchange of a promise that binds for life, of a word given that is irrevocable.
Our relationship with God is one that we see in terms of family, feminist baulk at the idea of God as "Father" but it is this that Jesus came reveal. I asked recently at a funeral what will God say to the deceased when she comes into his presence, I suggested the answer is he will say "Daughter" and she will say "Father" and this is what will occupy eternity. This filial relationship in which God calls us "Son" or "Daughter" and we respond "Father" is ultimately what Jesus the only begotten Son came to reveal, and through adoption is something we are called to share in. "Belonging" is something all human beings yearn for, we understand it as belonging to our heavenly Father, as Christians we will use the word "Communion". Communion with Jesus, most especially in sharing in his Body and Blood is about entering into this filial relationship with the Father. Our marriage to him by becoming one in his Body and Blood, in His Eternal self giving, the Sacrifice of the Cross, is about God calling us Son/Daughter here and now. It is a pledge of the eternal relationship with the Father.
It is this Mystical Marriage with the Lamb that is what Catholic Evangelisation is about, bringing the world, man by man, woman by woman into Communion, a marriage, with Christ, in our union with the Only Begotten, we hear the full force of his Father and Our Father calling us by name "Son", "Daughter".
In the Our Lady we see Christianity perfectly lived out, here is the beauty of the Father/Daughter relationship. In the Mysteries of the Rosary Mary participates fully in the the Life, Death and Resurrection of Christ her Son and the Son of God. Here the Father constantly calls out "Daughter".
And when we pray the Rosary uniting our hearts to the Life, Death and Resurrection of Christ we hear and participate in the echo of God calling the Mother of his Son, "Daughter".
11 comments:
God bless you for this post, father. The whole 'inclusive' language experiment, for a certain generation and probably beyond, was/is anything but. St. Hildegard ofBingen did not have the 'deceitful-distracting-divisive-discouraging' psychoanalytic pcing (perverted-consciousing) of language 'closing' off grace.
It wasn't divorce that Moses allowed, it was the issuing a certificate that removed the stigma of capital criminality from a woman's second marriage while assuring that her children from that marriage were not mamzerim.
Apart from that, the remarriage was adulterous in all other respects save in the case of "porneia" (Heb. issurei bi'ah): a valid marriage between a man and a woman between whom sexual relations were forbidden to each other.
The Holy Rosary is Mary's Psalter.
It is a shortening of recitation of the 150 Psalms.
The addition or subtraction of any Mysteries of the Holy Rosary is to make it no longer the Holy Rosary.
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Pablo,
So?
Beautiful thread, Fr Ray.
While Jesus' teaching is explicit it worries me that the Church appears to view divorce and re-marriage as completely unforgivable sins, leading to a lifetime excommunication, is this really what he intended?
It is the sound heard between the two halves of a verse when reciting chant.
"...And when we pray the Rosary uniting our hearts...
Pablo,
So?..."
It is important we stand on Truth when we are participating in Catholic things, like praying the Holy Rosary, in example.
If we take a spiritual walk in the garden of Heaven in reciting the Rosary, we must indeed pray that Rosary.
The true one.
As for the 'Eternal Sound' I find this strange.
Sound relies on quantitative elements; the structure necessary for 'sound' did not exist before Day 1 of Creation.
I cannot understand how sound can exist before creation, according to Roman Catholic teaching on the Six Days of Creation.
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Pablo there have been, and are, various forms of Rosary, not all have 150 Aves.
But if prayer is offered by someone who deliberately places himself out of visible communion with Peter what is its value?
Pablo - Gregorian chant springs out of silence. If you go to a monastery where the monks chant the office you can listen for it, as I said it is the silence between the two halves of each verse of the psalms.
The silence is also perceptible from Qui pridie quam pateretur in the EF mass which is another reason why it should be said in this form as often as possible.
"...What was heard before creation came into being..."
"...Pablo - Gregorian chant springs out of silence..."
Thank you.
My understanding of the question was slightly different from yours.
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