Understanding salvation via Paul, Revelation

And, more to the point, understanding salvation through this sports analogy that I will explain here. The scriptural basis for the analogy are the writings of Paul, and the Book of Revelation (Apocalypse).

Entire churches of faithful, believing and presumably, but not assured, "saved," are chastised as a whole by Paul, with loving charity and concern, but very strong language. Likewise in the Apocalypse John hears the chastisement of entire faithful, believing and presumably, but not assured, churches, "saved bodies of the faithful," before the revelation of the final days commences.

Notice that in no place is a single Christian isolated for correction within an otherwise correct church. Paul criticizes the entire church when SOME of them receive the sacrament of the bread with unworthiness, or worthily but with lack of respect.

If people are "saved," as some Evangelical Protestants attest, while being surrounded by those who commit wrong (yet consider themselves saved too), then Paul, in the abundance of his guidance, would have included at least one example of chastising a hypocrite or one in error within an otherwise worthy church body.

The same is of course true when the Angel of God, through Christ, evaluates and chastises entire faithful churches, at the end.

This is why you must understand salvation as it actually is, as the Bible states in Truth, not in your "auditing," "good deed" and "fire insurance" mindset. The sports analogy will demonstrate this for you.

American baseball is characterized by a dual purpose. It is of course a team sport with the objective of winning. But it is also equally an individual sport where each player accrues statistics of his performance (each and every game) that are his lasting legacy and that travel with him from team to team.

Thus you can have a great player with a great heritage of statistics and honor, even if he never played on a winning team. You can also have winning teams without great individual players. Most avid baseball fans follow individuals and their statistics, often separate from a local team that they actually support.

Salvation is like that, but here we need to fulfill the analogy by describing the disastrous effect that use of steroid and other performance or other addictive drugs have had on the entire sport.

We can and do have an entire era of "high performing individuals" who received their statistics while using immoral and illegal drugs. We also have teams that have won games due to these unethically enhanced individual players.

Suppose you are a great player, but you are on a team that is winning (and thus adds to your statistics) because other people, your team mates, are using performance enhancing drugs. You accumulate valid statistics and play straight (since you do not "use") but you know your team mates "use" and in return your statistics are enhanced because the "users" pull in more win and run and other opportunities for you with their presumably enhanced performance aids.

Salvation, and the possibility of losing your salvation, is exactly like that. If you are a "saved" person among other "saved" persons, but you deviate in any way from the ethics of God, no matter what the reason, the entire body of the "saved," including your own "salvation," is in question.

Don't ask me: read the Bible.

The entire Old Testament demonstrates God addressing and rewarding/punishing the hoard of Israelites as a whole. Presumably not every single person, man woman and child, danced in front of the gold calf while Moses was with God. Yet all are chastised. God does not document in the Bible "except for Moishe, Sarah and Fred, who sat the profane dance out and just watched on the sidelines while silently disapproving." The entire Old Testament validates what I am explaining to you, which is that God does not single out people among the wicked, (or those who are "good" but in error) and give them a salvation "pass" card, even as they eat, live, love and worship with the body that is IN ERROR.

Likewise the Gospel and the other New Testament books demonstrate that even with loving concern, Jesus, Paul, and the other Apostles, chastise entire towns, entire church bodies, entire groups of the "faithful," without once singling out the "good guy" whose rear end is just warming the pews but "is not going along with the error of the rest."

The Bible demonstrates over and over that it is God's will that people are saved, or not, as a GROUP in addition to individually. You all have taken that truth and turned it into the error of competing denominations (destroying Jesus' instructions on unity) rather than understanding that the saved individual must not only strive for continual obedience and purity but also, like a plant, survive or fall with the purity of the presumably "saved" fellow members and community. You can deny it all you want but the Bible is the Bible and God's word is final. You cannot say that God's word is perfect, but then make up scenarios that God did not choose to endorse in the Bible, and instead, God condemns.

understanding spiritual warfare

I understand that many passages in scriptures have the power of sounding like a succinct rallying call, one that "cuts to the chase" and inspires people. However, you have to be very cautious about any particular scripture passage being your "motto," your "vow" (remember, Jesus most strongly warned against making any vows before God, ANY, no matter how worthy appearing) or having a passage be like your Cliff Notes (study summary) that gives you a "bottom line" for your spiritual life. The reason I am writing this is that I know many are fascinated with much of what Paul wrote, particularly Ephesians 6:10-18. (I'm not going to type it out because if you look it up yourself you really should read the whole short chapter 6 to have it in context).

Here's the problem. Whenever someone extracts one saying from the Bible, one is in danger of doing a transplant from the common understanding of the Bible authors and participants to the people of the time (which is what God intended) to reworking those quotes into a modern context.

First, a silly example for a smile. Suppose the Bible wrote about whales traveling in pods and how important it is to be like whales and travel in pods. Some modern people might think, "Whoa! The Bible is saying to always carry your IPods!" Yeah, I'm being silly but I want you to right up front understand what I mean about transplanting a valid scripture, but said in a certain understanding (that all observant Jews who were the early Christians, especially Paul, well understood about God and human life) into a modern cultural set of blinders that has trimmed away much of the richness of understanding of what they wrote about and lived within.

OK, so here is the problem with passages like Ephesians 6:10-18 taken out of context. Paul is writing about the need to "arm" one's self in spiritual combat, against the dark forces that rule earth. He is of course entirely correct. However, people of his time (and your own Christian and Jewish ancestors, and the Muslims too) would have understood this the way it was intended, and not the way moderns would view it. You see, moderns want "bad guys," especially "bad guy aliens" or "good guy superheroes." So many moderns see Eph 6:10-18 as validation that evil spirits walk the earth and manipulate people. Often moderns then view this as permission to shun or harm those they think are "on the other side." I mean, war has two sides, right? Combat is "against" someone, right?

OK, now, slam on the brakes. Who wrote this scripture? Where was the war at? How did Paul "know" there's a battle with dark spirits on one side against the good guys?

Well, here's the bombshell of understanding you have all forgotten. Paul was on "both sides." Paul was a Jew, a highly observant Jew, but he was also a Roman citizen. Ta da! When you forget that you have total misunderstanding of what Paul means as combat. Romans had enslaved the Jews. Paul "belonged" to both sides, as he was both a highly religious Jew (the slave) and a highly placed and favored Roman citizen being prepared for high secular office (the slave owner).

Remember, Jesus was crucified because he would not lead an armed rebellion (using his miracles as firepower) on behalf of the Jews against the Romans. Jesus was not crucified because he did not "wrestle....against principalities,...rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places..." This is why Paul emphasizes WE WRESTLE NOT AGAINST FLESH AND BLOOD (Eph 6:12).

PAUL IS POUNDING IT INTO PEOPLE'S HEADS THAT NO FLESH AND BLOOD IS "THE ENEMY" BECAUSE DUE TO THAT ERROR JESUS WAS CRUCIFIED.

Notice too that when he writes about battling principalities, powers, rules of darkness and spiritual darkness and spiritual wickedness, he is speaking of battling SIN and FAITHLESSNESS. He is not speaking of battling either evil "spirits" in the way that people think of them today NOR is he speaking of declaring a group of people (like Romans, the hot enemy at the time) as being either demonic or flesh and blood enemies. No one is more qualified to role model and speak of that than PAUL, who was both well placed Roman citizen AND Jewish/now Christian oppressed.

Paul did not stop being Roman and renounce it for Christianity. Duh, read the scripture, as he invoked his Roman rights to trial throughout his ministry and died in Rome (via the means of death given to Romans, the sword, not crucifixion, like Peter suffered.) Paul did not say, "Hey, crucify me just like the Lord was." He took advantage of being Roman elite right to the end and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, because he stayed alive longer to get the Gospel spread through his Evangelizing without being hypocritical.

So people well understood Paul's words in Ephesians and elsewhere as the battle being against the dark forces of SINS and UNBELIEF, not against evil "spirits" the way moderns think of them, or one group of humans against the other. Paul was against the bad spirituality (to use the modern terms) that is festering and spread in high places and principalities (places of authority, both secular and religious) via sin, hypocrisy and disbelief. Paul did not go to Rome to fight "against" them in "combat" to "defeat them." Paul went, like Peter, to Rome to defeat spiritual darkness (paganism and corruption) and CONVERT THEM. Spiritual combat aims at conversion, NOT fighting imaginary sources of power. No imagination is needed about the source of darkness if you read the scriptures and I don't mean just Satan. So I now need to explain the second part of this confusion, and let's use another example.

Let's use HIV/Aids disease as an example. No, I'm not causing grief by using this example but rather it is a perfect example to study. Sometime in the past century, scientists have a good idea but of course will never know exactly, the virus jumped from simian species like chimps onto a single human being. It then modified and changed as it adjusted to being in a human body and became the disease we are all too familiar with today.

So my first point is that Adam and Eve were the origin of the first sin, which was disobedience to God per temptation by Satan. Adam and Eve were tempted to "know as much as God," so to speak, so they ate the apple so they could know what evil was like. (There was nothing in the apple by the way. It was the sheer act of disobedience to the all good and loving God that opened their eyes to evil. I mean, if they had kicked God in the shins they would have also gotten the same info, the same 411, about good and evil because just being mean and disobedient to God is the initiation into sin and evil).

Now, once HIV/Aids jumped the one time to a human, it does not need to rejump from ape to human with each person who is infected, I mean, duh, right? Same with the flu or common cold. It does not need to be reinvented each time someone gets sick with cold or flu, right? Likewise is spiritual darkness. Satan only had to tempt Eve and her take it to Adam, and Satan can sit back in his lawn chair and watch. So when Satan is "at work" or there is spiritual darkness, it is not Satan running around reinventing temptation with each generation of each human being. Like Aids, it is out there and people spread it through contact with each other.

To misunderstand Ephesians 6 is like what happened with demonizing specific groups who suffer from HIV/Aids. Every type of person gets HIV/Aids, yet certain groups (like gay men) became demonized as the "causes." When one views Ephesians 6 in the wrong way, one is tempted to do likewise, to nominate yourself as the "clean" and "clear" "spirit warrior," and to thus thrust on the "other side" the "dark principalities" role and that is totally false to what Paul said AND LIVED.

Paul, following in Jesus' path, was condemning the unseen darkness of sin, disbelief, hypocrisy, spiritual slavery and corruption, while at the same time dampening down the tendencies to want flesh and blood warfare which he (as a persecutor) had also succumbed to, which is to kill the "enemy" in bodily form.

So Paul's inspiring words must be correctly understood as being against the dark invisible powers of sin, hypocrisy, corruption and disbelief, and not against invisible cartoon absurd imaginary "spirits" like so many modern dopes believe.

How to understand spiritual combat? Read about sin in the Bible. Start with these passages BY PAUL in 2 Timothy.

2:3 Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.
2:5 And if a man also strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully.
2:9 Wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil-doer, even unto bonds; but the word of God is not bound. (Paul is saying he is treated like a bad guy, even put into prison, but despite what is done to him God's truth cannot be imprisoned).
2:15 Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
2:16 But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness.
2:24 And the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient.
2:25 In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves, if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.
2:26 And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will.

I put 2:26 in bold italics because that's the heart of it. Satan has set the original snare and that is the combat, to EVADE THAT SNARE. Satan has no need to run around inventing new snares and sending evil spirits to go after each person in each generation, duh. That is the combat, to recover themselves (pull themselves out of the snare that, like slavery, humans are born into through sin and continual temptation.)

3:13 But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived.
3:15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
(Notice that Paul is referring to scriptures still being needed, and that is OLD TESTAMENT scriptures, as New Testament didn't exist yet as Paul wrote this).
3:16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.
3:17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

What is the remedy, the "armor," the "combat" that Paul orders, to deal with the worsening evil of humans over time (3:13)? Scriptures, particularly the Old Testament for wisdom, and as the training path toward perfected humans into obedient goodness to God. PAUL ENDORSES NO OTHER APPROACH OR WAY.

4:2 Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering and doctrine.

You have to read page after page after page of what Paul truly instructs before one can enjoy, be inspired by, understand, and "follow" the much loved punch lines of Eph 6:10-18.

Here is further reading to understand the dark power is sin and disobedience, not imaginary sci fi aliens or evil spirits etc.

Separates from God Isa 59:2
Its wages: death Rom 6:23
Begets moral cowardice Josh 7:11-13
Hardens the heart Heb 3:13
Is very destructive Ps 34:21
Caused Israel's downfall 2 Chr 28:22-23
Causes misery Job 15:20
Brings reproach Prov 14:34
Enslaves the will 2 Tim 3:13
Excludes from heaven 1 Cor 6:9, 10
The forgiven warned "not to continue in sin" John 5:14, John 8:11, Rom 6:12
All have sinned Rom 3:23
All have gone astray Isa 53:6
To claim sinlessness is to lie Prov 20:9, 1 John 1:8-10
Jesus alone without sin 1 Pet 2:21-22
Through Satan's deception and subtlety Gen 3:1-13, 2 Cor 11:3
In the heart Matt 15:18, 19
Through lust of flesh James 1:13-15
Against the Holy Ghost Matt 12:31-32
Is destructive Prov 11:3
Is inexcusable John 15:22
Man obdurate in sin Amos 4:6-11

"the greatest Christian who ever lived?!"

This is in one of the Rev. Billy Graham's daily question columns: "The Apostle Paul was the greatest Christian who ever lived."

Goodness, people who know me know that I love and admire Billy Graham, and I often agree with him. But now to 1) set the record straight and 2) show that I do not hesitate to critique even those I often agree with, here goes.

That is a flat out wrong statement and incredibly misleading. Its potential to be misleading is why I am going to make this a small case study in faith.

First of all, if you ask anyone why they admire Paul (say nothing of actually designating him the greatest Christian) they would start to list the many works of Paul.

Oh dear. Hmm. Yep, you got it. They fall into the trap of putting works before grace.

Paul himself would rip his hair out if he caught anyone calling him the greatest Christian based on his many works. After all, writing the Epistles is works, not grace. Evangelizing is works, not grace. Even miracles are works, not grace. Standing up to others in debate is works, not grace.

Paul received grace when he, as the Christian persecutor Saul, was thrown from his horse by the resurrected Jesus Christ. Everything after that was works. Yes, of course, these were works inspired by the Holy Spirit and under the guidance of Jesus Christ, but you can say that about the Twelve Apostles, the disciples, the martyrs and many, many, MANY unnamed and unknown early Christians.

So it is impossible to state who is the "greatest Christian," period. In fact, Jesus Christ rebuked the Apostles when they argued among themselves who was the greatest. Why would someone as wise as Rev. Graham then apply the label that Jesus did not permit his own Apostles to claim?

Rev Graham, like just about every other Christian (and many non-Christians) today is vulnerable to that slippery slope of admiring works, works, works, even as they preach grace, grace, grace. I have yet to have a conversation with any grace admiring Christian whose thoughts, deeds and preachings actually match their professed admiration of grace! It is nearly impossible to find anyone who is able to have a conversation about God, sanctity and the Holy Spirit without them focusing one hundred percent on works, works, works.

That is why Jesus Christ nipped all that sort of thought and talk right in the bud when the Twelve Apostles debated who was the greatest even among themselves, say nothing of being the greatest Christian of all time!!!

There is no such thing as "the greatest Christian of all time." If there was such a person, you would have to have an amount of GRACE measuring device, not an amount of WORKS measuring device. Who can measure how much grace exists in a person? Only God and the angels (the angels being able to observe grace in humans through God's eyes).

If someone were to search in the Bible (as they should, as the scriptures should be the first reference point, no?) to see if there is a "grace measuring device," what would they find? Read along with me:

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin's name was Mary. And when the angel had come to her, he said, "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women."

...

And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God."

Luke 1:27-28, 30

Mary is the only person in the scripture to receive word from God directly that she is full of grace. No matter how much you might leaf through the Bible citing folks who were "blessed" and who received blessings (such as health, children, prosperity) from God, Mary is the only one who is documented to have been "full of grace" (grace being the unmerited by WORKS gift from God) in the Bible.

Thus if someone is going to have a "let's declare the greatest Christian who every lived" contest, where a Christian is a follower of Jesus Christ, the Bible states that Mary is the only one who is 1) full of grace and 2) was in such a state before her "works," which was to bear the infant Jesus.

You can see why Jesus nipped discussion of being "the greatest" right in the bud with Apostles. Will not all of you do the same, to avoid the misleading temptation of excessive honoring of so-called works? Paul would be the first to rip his hair out by the roots if he were alive to hear such discussions.

Now, just to complete this discussion, let's exercise our logic and faith using an analogy. Well, it is not so much an analogy but to help you to use Mary, therefore, as a kind of litmus test if one were determined to know "the greatest Christian" based on grace.

If you did not have an angel, Gabriel, sent by God to know that Mary was "full of grace," how would you go about finding someone in modern times (let's say the last thousand years) who has "a lot of grace?" How in the world could you identify and measure it? A person who is a theologian? Oh oh, that's works. A person who does a lot of 'good deeds?" Oh oh, that's works. Someone who plants many churches? Oh oh, that's works. Someone who is an inspiring preacher, puts out DVD's and has a great "following?" Oh oh, that's works. Someone who seems wise and filled with knowledge of God? Oh oh, that's works.

There have been many who would be considered in the "top thousands" list of "greatest Christians," but you will never know their names because they were unrecognized as such in their times. They are the grandmothers and grandfathers who raised children of true faith and who were of humble origins, and probably never conducted a particular good deed, so to speak, in their life. Think of the many unknown anonymous people who clung onto in secret their Christian faith when under dictators, for example, doing nothing other than making sure they prayed, kept their Bibles, and raised their children as genuine Christians. They wear the invisible crowns from God of being filled with grace, not works, and being not-rich, not-famous, not-schooled and not-historic figures, they went to the Lord known only to Him.

So that is the first thing to keep in mind, that the more one is clothed in works, the less one is able to actually see their invisible robes of grace. Paul is actually so laden with works (righteous works, don't get me wrong) that it is impossible for modern people to appreciate what grace he had indeed. People are dazzled by works so much that they do not see the quiet invisible soft folds of grace underneath. They assume that great grace abounds, but that actually is not true, if you check the scriptures. Scriptures teach how to recognize grace only via the gifts and the fruits of the Holy Spirit, not through church plantings, arguing with others about the faith, documenting "how the early church worked," or even via miracles and other God given deeds (yep, remember deeds means works).

Thus the second thing to think about when one ponders who is a "great Christian" (forget about the "greatest" or whatever) is to observe the following in people as they GENUINELY ARE, and not via their visible works and "deeds."

The Gifts of the Holy Spirit:

Fear of the Lord
Piety
etc. (look them up under my previous postings)

The Fruits of the Holy Spirit:

Continence
etc. (look them up under my previous postings)

You will see that these are genuine qualities of character, not deeds. You see, when grace from God (and God alone) infuses a person, that person exhibits these qualities, listed above, not increasing "deeds" or "works," regardless how worthy they are.

The most obvious example might be someone who is a generous person but with average or lukewarm faith in God. He receives grace from God and instead of "increasing his charitable works and good deeds," dedicates more and more of his day to his prayer life, if that is his calling from God. Using that logic you can understand how an average or lukewarm charity giver might receive grace from God and actually renounce the secular life and become a priest or a deacon. Grace is not the petrol for making a car go to more and more numerous and varied worthy destinations! Grace is living within gratitude and glorification of the one and only God who gave you "the car." That is the vast difference between deeds/works (however worthy) and grace.

No one can be a "great Christian" without having an inflow of grace that is beyond any merit or receipt due to works. The word "great" has to be reserved for those who really are "great" and not, like the vast majority, "acceptable" or "good enough." Do not kid yourselves, most Christians who achieve heaven do so because they received at least a "C" on their report card; very few have even B's or, much as you may think so, A's. Most Christians who make it to heaven are "good enough," and by no means "great," especially in these modern times where people are so goal and agenda driven, even in their faith, thinking they can "list" their ways into heaven. Even those who know better and who truly love the Lord must always guard against 1) the temptation of works and 2) the worse temptation that they can evaluate and assess someone else's acceptability to God, even someone who seems slam dunk obvious like St. Paul.

This is why I am making such a big thing of this one observation, because I have repeatedly seen that it is at the core and heart of many of the diversions among Christians of one hundred percent fidelity to God. Works, works, works and the "I'm OK, you're OK" mindset is the ruin of many good Christians and blinds them to potential receipt of grace.

I hope you have found this helpful.

Important reflection about violence and St Paul

This is a reflection about St Paul that is particularly pertinent during the time when we commemorate the Lord’s suffering and death. Many sermons correctly point out, as the scripture relates, that while Jesus answered the questions of Pilate, he did not resist what would be his inevitable execution. Jesus himself explains that he could have summoned both earthly and heavenly forces to defend and free him, but as this is not his realm, but heaven is his true home and destination, he did not.

Well before the Passion and Crucifixion Jesus taught the Apostles, the disciples and all who attended his sermons and believed that his followers should turn the other cheek. Another time the Apostles wondered why Jesus did not send fire down upon a town that had rejected him. Jesus explained that he came to save souls, not to kill.

Now, you might at this time guess that I’m going to compare Jesus and what he taught to Saul, he who was the persecutor of Christians, before he was confronted by the resurrected Jesus, converted and became St. Paul. You would be wrong, as that is not where I am going with this reflection but, rather, to a far more important point. I am going to point out to you the dire, deadly consequences of not obeying Jesus in all matters.

Suppose that the Apostles and disciples listened to Jesus about passive resistance (to use a modern term) with one ear, but with the other ear succumbed to temptation to “fight back when attacked,” immediately after Jesus was crucified. That would be the attitude of modern society, not the Church, today. We have “enemy lists” and “preemptive strikes,” and we declare enemies of not only terrorists who are declared enemies but also those who “aid and harbor them.” Here is what would have happened.

Immediately after Jesus was crucified, resurrected, and ascended into heaven we had our first Christian martyr, Stephen, who was stoned as he forgave his murderers. A young man tended to the cloaks of the stoners and that was Saul. Saul then developed zeal, a murderous zeal, where he not only spied and reported on the disciples and their converts, those who Jesus and the Apostles had converted to Christianity, but he hunted them down in person in order to bring them to their deaths.

This, in fact, was what Saul was hastening to do on the road to Damascus, when the resurrected Jesus confronted him and threw him from his horse, blinding Saul with the light of his glorified body. But what if as soon as Stephen was stoned, the Apostles and other Christians had made “an enemies list?” What if they had recognized right away what a scourge Saul was to the early Christians, including themselves, and decided, as moderns glorify in real acts and in entertainment media, “take him out first?” What if the Christians had ignored Jesus in this one matter and had killed Saul?

If that thought terrifies you, it should.

Thank God on your hands and knees that the Apostles and disciples, and all the martyrs and early Christians, obeyed Jesus in all matters, most particularly in this one. If I want to give myself the horrors and make myself sick to my stomach, all I have to do is think of one stupid cowboy from modern times urging the Apostles after Stephen was killed to make an “enemies list” and conduct “preemptive strikes” in order to have a “justifiable defense” and “defend ourselves and our faith.”

If just one of the disciples had been of that mindset, to ignore Jesus in “just this one matter,” and had killed Saul before he became St. Paul, Christianity would not exist today.

It is not that St. Paul was so instrumental to the Christianity that I say this, though obviously he is the one who brought Christianity to the Gentiles and not only the Jews. It would be that through the action of one or a handful of people, those early Christians would have demonstrated their lack of worthiness and faithlessness to God, who had sent Jesus to be heard, believed and obeyed in ALL matters, not “most of them” with “exceptions cause it’s an emergency and ‘Jesus would understand.’” God would have allowed Christianity to die on the vine because disobeying Jesus within months of his resurrection would have indicated that the soil and the plants were not worthy.

When we say that God has a perfect plan, that is the truth, but the very people who say God has a perfect plan and seem to believe in God often think that they know better than God. This is the dire, extreme, and impossible to exaggerate peril of modern humans, both believers and non believers. While not a single one of the Apostles, disciples or early Christian converts, those of Jesus himself and the next few generations, were unfaithful to all that Jesus taught, including going to their death in non-resistance, can I say that about a single person living today? Do not people happily “cherry pick” what Jesus said and did, saying “Jesus would understand that these times are ‘different?’” People spy on each other’s supposed ‘transgressions,’ gossip, and target for malice those on their personal and clique “enemies list.” I know, for I have had a prominent place on the “enemy list” of those who supposedly believe in God and Jesus.

When I think of the people who have spied on me and thus misunderstood my actions, or inactions, and attributed judgmental “identities” to me (including the Harlot of Babylon, a crown I guess many Catholics have to bear), I think of how those people would have shot Saul right through the heart in “self defense,” thinking that “Jesus would understand.”

No, Jesus would not and does not “understand” such a mindset, and God will be severe in his judgment.

The next time you think that you have “secret knowledge” about who someone “really is” and whether they are “worthy in their faith or not,” imagine your hands on the trigger of a gun pointed at the head of Saul and you blowing his brains out in “self defense.”

Suffering, both of humanity and of Jesus Christ

Here is more about understanding suffering, particularly, during this time of Lent, more accurately understanding the suffering of Christ. I am, however, focusing on this subject to rectify human understanding of suffering, since that has been terribly warped in modern times, particularly in the extremes (avoidance or glorification and willful infliction) that I described in my first post on this subject. So in this posting bear in mind the analogy I introduced in that post, which is that suffering is, like paper from a tree that is used once or for a short amount of time and then discarded or recycled, a natural occurrence when one is alive and one encounters a boundary of loss. Check that post out again if you didn’t read it before or remember, before proceeding here.

There are two things about modern society that have contributed to the warping of understanding of human suffering. One is that humans have, as I explained in that previous post, isolated and commoditized suffering as a free standing quantity or experience that can and should be “managed.” But that is neither intellectually, spiritually or emotionally correct, nor how humans have biologically evolved to encounter and deal with suffering. Humans have not evolved in a way that views suffering as a standalone quantity or quality of life. One evidence of that evolution is how quickly the human body recovers from an individual experience of physical pain. When one hits one’s self on the thumb with a hammer, for example, it really hurts and going forward, sure, you remember that it hurt. But if you think about it, it is difficult to bring to perfect memory recollection a rerun of the experience of that pain, short of actually doing it again. Natural childbirth is another example where mothers through the generations sure remember the agony that some, but not all, births entail, yet are preserved from having perfect rerun in their minds of that pain.

Furthermore, athletes will tell you that you learn to “play through’ chronic pain from sports, for example. As an athlete who for a while was in a martial art that involved contact (being hit by a sword or a fist) I can attest that the first few times hurt “more” than subsequent times. Part of pain is the surprise and “unfairness” of it (disproportionality) that contribute to its severity of initial “suffering”, and that with training can be managed. So the first time I was really whipped with a fencing foil it sure hurt, but as one develops one “takes the hit” while already thinking about one’s next move, and thus does not focus on the pain like one did as a beginner. Boxers can probably tell you the same thing. So these are just some of the evidences that humans have evolved to have a lasting “lesson” of pain but not a perfect rerun and recollection of pain over and over again. If humans had that they would be immobilized from risking pain in hunting, agriculture, building, giving birth and sheer survival activities (such as when there was no central heating or electricity during very cold weather). Humans are not meant to nor are they evolved to “preserve” pain and thus suffering in perfect replicable images in either their body or their mentality. People can much more easily recall the bliss of a perfect date, for example, in great detail than they can the detail of a strike of physical pain, or the details of heart rending suffering that was once experienced. They recall how awful it felt, but it is difficult, thankfully, to “mediate” one’s self back into perfect recollection of all the aspects of that pain since time and understanding always moves a body and mind forward.

So here is where we can start to understand how isolating and “commoditizing” pain is an error, and how it crept into modern society, to humans’ great disadvantage. When I was young “popular psychology” was just beginning to become part of social discourse. In other words, what had been before that part of the doctor’s or psychiatrist’s office was now a subject that average people talked and read about. One of the first things that was printed in the public media was a “grief scale,” where people were assigned “points” to understand their “level of pain” after various tragic events or during life pressures. Thus “the death of a spouse” would get something like “10 points” assigned to it, meaning that it was viewed as a high pain and stress experience, while things such as job loss, etc had lower numbers of points. When as a teenager I first saw that I thought “Oh, oh, this is wrong and a problem.” While it is “understandable” that humans try to “self understand” and medical technicians try to “quantify,” it is totally bogus and erroneous, and a result of succumbing to one of the scourges of temptation of humans, which is to dehumanize and decouple from their context their own humanity. It is a temptation and a professional and societal laziness and it is wrong. Part of it is a result of the industrial revolution where humans obtained their factory assembly line mentality, where “one part fits all.” Look at computer interface standards and their importance and you see what I mean. Humans started thinking of themselves and each other in terms of standard parts and interfaces that can be counted and quantified.

Here are some examples to help you to understand how to identify this problem and see its fallacy and danger. Compare two widows, where each has had the death of their husband. Can the grieving be compared between them if one was married for a long time and one for a short time? What about if one is left destitute while the other, while unhappy, has more than adequate means to survive? What if one has children and the other does not? What if one has great faith and believes her husband is in heaven, while the other does not believe? While losing a loved spouse is a terrible loss, it is patently false and misleading to assign a “point” level to the totality of experience. In fact, medical people have even been “suspicious” of “denial” if a widow handles a spousal death as a “5” rather than as a “10,” if you know what I mean. Or the reverse happens, and I have seen that in actual clinical context. Medical personnel underestimate the pain of things they can assign numbers to. I have seen grieving widows be totally undertreated in individual and group therapy because medical personal have a mentality that quantifies their experience rather than have a holistic understanding of how totally shattering it can be.

Here is another example taken from sociology and anthropology. There are many studies of cultures where the most severe punishment possible is not death or torture but either exile (being thrust physically outside of the community) or “shunning” (where one stays in the community but is avoided and not interacted with as if one were invisible or did not exist). Studies have shown that people have died from the suffering of both exile but more particularly of shunning. Anthropologists discovered that in such societies the suffering of the shunned is so great that it can and does cause death. Fast forward to modern times and think about the high degree of alienation that many, particularly the youth feel, and also the problem of the “violent ex-“ who kills his ex- and even their children rather than be “without them.” When one relies on numerical and isolating experiences of pain in the medical and social community one is left not only ignorant but pointed in the totally opposite direction of genuine human experience and problems. Moderns have not only forgotten their own human experience (the pain of shunning for example) but they now wield in a very dark way that form of suffering while denying its social or medical existence. Humans used to know very well the suffering of exile or of shunning and used it as a social “last resort” for the most egregious of perceived or real behaviors. Today we have the dual problem of 1) not understanding individuals who are experiencing either externally or internally the suffering of a form of exile or shunning AND 2) actually using the “nerve endings” of such pain to market products and develop destructive social cliques and behaviors that prey on the fear of shunning and, worse, promote a sense of shunning by exaggerating real or perceived social divisions.

Racism is the most obvious example of shunning in widespread practice, in a way, and so I think those who have experienced or studied racism may be the first to understand my point here. Afro-Americans for a long time were the suffering “invisible” people expected to move among the wealthy and enfranchised, doing their work, but through segregation not expected to be “visible” and participatory. That was enormous suffering and has, thankfully, been dramatically alleviated in the last few decades by desegregation, equal rights, and social progress and societal mindset. Still, even racism cannot fully articulate the horror of individual shunning since even during the worst of racism people still had their own families, education, socializing and human-to-human interaction. Individual shunning is far worse because the person is denied all ties with surrounding humanity, including speech. You might think that does not exist in such sophisticated, refined and enlightened culture as today, but think again. Think about two examples already mentioned above: youth who are alienated, feeling out of touch with life itself, both as an individual condition and also a “popularity” and clique or gang way, and violent ex’s, who are bereft and feel invisible and totally alienated from life without their ex. The suffering of such people, whether one believes it is founded, reasonable and “justifiable” is truly “off the scale.” One cannot quantify the suffering of a person who is shunned or in a position that replicates the physical sensation and also the emotional and spiritual consequences of an alienating isolation that is akin to being shunned.

This is one reason that society sees remarkable suffering, self harm and violence that seems “baffling” to people who are part of the “majority,” who do not understand why, for example, a violent ex will kill his ex, their children, their family, friends, strangers, etc before, usually, killing themselves. On comment boards people repeatedly key in, in understandable frustration, “Why doesn’t he just kill himself rather than take everyone along with him?” See, that is the perfect example of how people no longer understand their own humanity based suffering. Anthropologists would tell you that societies that shun would understand fully well why someone who feels shunned might snap and react in exactly that same way. Modern society seems to have invented the nuclear bomb but then juggles with it and puts it in video games and then denies it exists, to use another analogy. Humans viscerally know the suffering of shunning, but then after generations of knowing about it and using it as last resort, now both “forget” that it even exists and the horrible harm that it causes but still for marketing, entertainment and other purposes, including some very dark ones, “pushes those buttons” in other people, among each other, and themselves. Thus people inflict the worst of shunning and alienating experiences on each other yet at the same time it itself is shunned, invisible and denied. As another example of this, society will push the importance of sex yet also push how inadequate a potential partner most people are. And you wonder why child abuse is out of control? Society pushes sexual gratification constantly while at the same time teaching an elite reward and shunning disapproval for those who are not “hot.” As a result, individuals, both men and not even some women, feel alienated from the “total sexual experience” they feel they are entitled to, and fill in the gaps with children.

To wrap up the point about quantifying suffering and its temptation and error, think about the implications of what I have explained here. Not only do people miss the mark in understanding their own legitimate and genuine suffering, but society has “manufactured” new ways of suffering that did not exist before. One suffers the death of a spouse, for example, but is treated in a “standard interface” cookie cutter approach due to it being a “medical pain scale and insurance reimbursed” isolated phenomenon on the one hand. On the other hand society has invented new forms of commoditized suffering, which is to be promised total sexual gratification, while at the same time reducing marriages, increasing the population of single people, yet putting them in a caste system of “hot or not,” “in or out.” Unrealistic expectations of sex, for example, are pushed on society while at the same time the most reliable and dependable forms of gratification, such as within marriage, are shattered, and people have turned into wild dogs operating within a bizarre and cruel self imposed caste system of sexual availability and desirability in intimacy. And you wonder why violent ex’s kill, and why so many now prey on the young, who are both defenseless but also deemed to be open and non-judgmental in that area where the offender is hurting. Society has manufactured of its own freewill forms of suffering that make me tremble for the survivability of humans and this is just a few examples.

The second problem with modern warping of suffering is also, in part, a result of that cookie cutter factory line mentality toward modern industrial and technological life. There is a tendency for many to “sound byte” suffering. We can use the example of the suffering of Jesus Christ to better understand this.

People are impatient with their understanding of each other and themselves and so they always try to “bottom line” their own understanding or in movie jargon “cut to the chase scene.” This is, as I’ve pointed out, not the normal evolved human condition and is, in fact, counter to evolutionary development and also is not an asset in survivability. Thus you see people encapsulate (again, how very modern, like taking a pill) not only their own experiences, and that of others, but that of the divine. You have a slogan understanding of life, including the divine, and that warps the human mindset and specifically understanding real normal life such as suffering. Therefore modern people differ from all of the previous generations by trying to bumper sticker God as “Christ died for your sins” or “Jesus suffered for you” etc. People have reduced, like a sauce on the stove, their own humanity and their understanding of divinity to encapsulated sound byte jargon of “understanding,” which is not actual understanding at all.

Jesus was not born in order to suffer and to be crucified. Jesus was born even though he knew he would suffer and be crucified. There is one hell of a difference.

The suffering of Jesus never was an “objective,” an isolated phenomenon that is a goal. The suffering was the inevitable consequence of being alive and his taking a stand. They did not invent scourging, mocking and crucifixion just for Jesus. That was the common form of punishment for the “lowest of the low” who were judged criminals or treasonous. It was also a punishment used to terrorize and subordinated population into total submission. This makes it doubly ironic that the Jews who persecuted Jesus turned to Rome to inflict the very punishment that was used to keep Roman territories and the conquered people in line.

Thus people in modern times erroneously use the foreknowledge of the prophets that Jesus would be the Messiah, rejected, suffer and be crucified as making the suffering the “meaning,” the sound byte, of his entire life and mission. Some of this is willful, deliberate and somewhat blasphemous misunderstanding, while other of it is a consequence of lazy modern people who try to cookie cutter and sound byte into capsules everything, including the divine.

Jesus did not come to humanity in order to suffer and to die. Jesus came despite knowing that he would suffer and die.

The message of Jesus was not that he was stripped, whipped, spit on, crowned with thorns and crucified. The message of Jesus was that he arose from the dead.

I’m not trying to put bumper sticker makers out of business, or to minimize the redemptive value of suffering, far from it. I’m trying to restore the glory of actually understanding it.

Was St John the Baptist born to be beheaded? Obviously not, and so when one contemplates the one who declared the coming of Christ one can better understand the risk of the suffering sound byte that I am pointing out to you. John the Baptist is rightfully revered, but his entire ministry lives on in baptism, not slogans that “John the Baptist: born to be beheaded for you.”

Likewise the focus on the physical component of the redemptive suffering of Jesus Christ, done ONCE for ALL, misses the entire point of the ministry of Jesus. Yes, it is important to have gratitude to Jesus for having suffered and died for all, but one must have a sane and balanced approach to that understanding, one that is modeled after the Gospels and Epistles themselves. None of the Apostles or disciples glorifies the physical suffering of Jesus; they document it but do not focus on it at all. Instead, as St Paul repeatedly explains, it is Christ crucified (the death, not the pain) and resurrected from the dead that is everything, absolutely everything.

John 20: 27-28
Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.” Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!”

The Apostle Thomas declared he would not believe the others had seen the resurrected Jesus “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe” John 20:25. And so Jesus appeared to him and allowed him to do that very thing, saying “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed” John 20:29. Think about this: Thomas would be the last person to think that Jesus was nailed to the cross so that he, Thomas, would have wounds to put his fingers into and believe. Yet that mentality has crept into many in modern times that the objective of Jesus was the suffering he endured rather than belief that his resurrection from the death of crucifixion engendered.

Just as a brief aside to teach you another way to apply logic, think about this. If the actual suffering and crucifixion of Jesus were the “objective,” would not one expect that after Thomas believes only after seeing the wounds that Jesus would order that all Apostles obtain similar wounds and “pass that along” through the generations? Would we have bishops undergo nonfatal crucifixion wounds generation after generation, to pass it “on,” if the suffering and the wounding were the point? Instead we have the breaking of the bread, the consecrated wine, the consecrating oil, the laying on of hands in ordination, and baptism of the faithful. No where is the “suffering” passed on as witness of faith. Use logic, people, and it will never fail you.

John 20:30-31
Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of [his] disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written that you may [come to] believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name.

What John did not write: And therefore we each of us drive a nail through our own hands when we become bishops so that we share in the suffering of Christ since that is the sign of faith and the whole point of his coming.

Protestants are sometimes the most contradictory on this point, and I say this with affection, not criticism. They criticize Catholics for having a crucifix (the body of Christ displayed on the cross) rather than a cross (Methodists have the cross with a red fabric draped over it) since they feel that Catholics are stuck in the crucifixion and not the resurrection, which they symbolize by the empty cross. Yet who are the ones who tend to write and verbalize the most rhetoric about the suffering of Jesus “on behalf” of the saved? Yep.

Catholics display the crucifix as a reminder that Jesus actually died, not as a reminder of his tortures. It is the fact that Jesus actually died, one, and resurrected, two, that is the essential foundation of the entire faith and the New Covenant with God, not the suffering. The fact that Jesus performed his ministry knowing of the suffering that he would work through and resurrect from that makes it “redemptive suffering,” not the suffering itself. Whenever you are tempted to be confused about this, repeat the slogan “John the Baptist was not born to be beheaded.” John the Baptist can continue to make straight the way of the Lord by today being a sanity and perspective touchstone to put the death and suffering of Jesus in the proper context. Then one can read what St. Paul wrote with restored perspective and clarity, without the strange posttraumatic intrusive thoughts about suffering that this lost generation is afflicted by.

Hebrews 2:8
Yet at present we do not see “all things subject to him,” but we do see Jesus “crowned with glory and honor” because he suffered death, he who “for a little while” was made “lower than the angels,” that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

Hebrews 2:14
Now since the children share in blood and flesh, he likewise shared in them, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life.

St. Paul could not be clearer that it was not the suffering, but the death and resurrection of Christ that once, for all, showed everyone that they should not fear the devil of bodily death and the sin that fear tempts humans to commit. Instead, St. Paul explains, Jesus demonstrated once for all that one does die, but one then goes to God in eternal life.

Hebrews 2:18
Because he himself was tested through what he suffered, he is able to help those who are being tested.

In Biblical language “testing” does not mean being quizzed. When St. Paul uses the term “tested” and when one reads about saints being “but to the test,” that is more of a term that comes from refining of ore, for example, where impurities are melted away. Thus Jesus showed that he could suffer bodily and emotional harm the same way that any human would, “be tested,” and come through it all the way, which is to die and the demonstrate through his resurrection and his witness that God is in control and that life everlasting exists in heaven, and does not end in the slavery of the devil of bodily death and sinful behavior.

Hebrews 9:11-14
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.

This, by the way, is one of the Biblical justifications that Catholics use on Ash Wednesday, when the sign of the cross is marked on their foreheads. It is a ritualized reminder of these words of St Paul that no longer, as in the Old Covenant, are the heifer’s ashes needed to sanctify the defiled, but that the blood of Christ, shed once for all, is the cleanser that the ashes once were under the Law.

Hebrews 10:26-29, 31
If we sin deliberately after receiving knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains sacrifice for sins but a fearful prospect of judgment and a flaming fire that is going to consume the adversaries. Anyone who rejects the Law of Moses is put to death without pity on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Do you not think that a much worse punishment is due the one who has contempt for the Son of God, considers unclean the covenant-blood by which he was consecrated, and insults the spirit of grace?... It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

I include this because passage because again I must correct the notion that the physical suffering of Christ somehow “clears the way” for people. St Paul warns FELLOW CHRISTIANS that if they sin deliberately after knowing the truth of what Jesus has proclaimed that “there no longer remains sacrifice for sins but a fearful prospect of judgment and a flaming fire.” A profane and immodest treatment of the sacrifice of Jesus is an insult to “the spirit of grace” and will result in falling into the hands of the living God who will judge and who will cast into hell. St. Paul would be shocked to the core of his being by ghoulish and profane modern perspectives regarding “the covenant-blood by which he [Jesus] was consecrated.”

I could cite much, much more from St. Paul but I have demonstrated my point and it is better that people now read scripture on their own with clear eyes and understanding after this commentary I have provided.

The suffering of Jesus was not an exceptional phenomenon to be encapsulated as glorifying suffering. In fact, the reverse is true where suffering is not glorified and instead Jesus stoops in order to undergo what humans do to each other, and the natural boundary of life which includes death, in order to show the open path to the one true God. I have demonstrated how to read several selections from scripture and observe that the suffering is not a quantity or a quality, but simply a signpost along the way of the totality of the ministry of Jesus Christ. I have also given you a tool to use, showing how the saints remain a welcome friend, wise counsel and aid to today, where one can realign inappropriate thoughts about human suffering and the suffering of Jesus with the yardstick that “St John the Baptist was not born to be beheaded.” Finally I have pointed out that humans are in great peril of encapsulating and making into sound bytes entire perspectives of human and divine reality and that this encapsulating and “sloganizing” of human or divine reality results in dire and destructive perpetuating error that must be corrected in this time of physical, moral and spiritual crisis.

Galatians 3:1-4
O stupid Galatians! Who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publically portrayed as crucified? I want to learn only this from you: did you receive the Spirit from works of the law, or from faith in what you heard? Are you so stupid? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh? Did you experience so many things in vain?-if indeed it was in vain.

I include this to remind you that glorifying in things such as the physical suffering of Christ is like thinking one is saved through works and not grace, because merely counting the wounding of Christ is like relying only on works and denying faith.

Romans 6:5-11
For if we have grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection. We know that our old self was crucified with him, so that our sinful body might be done away with, that we might no longer be in slavery to sin. For a dead person has been absolved from sin. If, then, we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. We know that Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over him. As to his death, he died to sin [my notation: this phrase "he died to sin" means that Jesus died on account of sin being done to him of his unjust condemnation and thus in death moved out of the reach of further harm by sin to him] once and for all; as to his life, he lives for God. Consequently, you too must think of yourselves as [being] dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus.

Just as a dead body cannot be forced to sin, since that person is dead and thus absolved from sin, living people must be like a dead body toward sin. To use a scientific term the living must be like inert matter that does not bond or interact with any sin. This is another, more oblique, way to apply scripture to my admonishment to you all that sinful behavior and suffering cannot be “managed,” accounted for and commoditized, since that is interacting with sin and not being, as Paul warns one must be, “dead to sin” and instead “living for God in Christ Jesus.” Those who commoditize suffering are interacting with sin and are not dead to sin. Insensitivity and worse the promotion of suffering in others is an obvious example, as is the enumeration of occult practices, including self harming in order to do suffering “accounting,” which is not only wrong but blasphemous.

Understanding God: advice and role models

In my previous post in the series “understanding God” I explained how the error of predestination is the result of misunderstanding the attribute of God’s all knowingness. I want to dovetail a related concept here, just to build upon this basis of understanding.

God is impossible to fully understand, not because he keeps part of himself secret, but because his vastness of “perspective” is genuinely unknowable. In fact, the more that the great religious minds have come to know God, the more they are in awe of all that is unknowable by the human mind, which is bounded by limitations of matter, energy and time. Saint Thomas Aquinas is the shining example of the saint who most used intellectual and logic capabilities to explain faith and through the centuries many have revered and studied him for precisely that reason. He is the one who has brought generation after generation to God through “the human mind.” Thomas Aquinas left volumes of writings, all based on faith and logic through reasoning, which are treasures today. Still, what was the thing that enraptured him so much that ultimately he stopped writing? It was the mystery of God in the Holy Mass, specifically in the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. The way that God reveals himself, physically and spiritually, in the Holy Mass, in all its mystery and simplicity was what gave Aquinas more understanding, and at the same time more awe of the mystery, than any intellectual progress in understanding God.

Before I continue on my main point, let me make an aside. Many people outside of the Catholic Church misunderstand why Catholics venerate the saints so much. There are two reasons, one of which is related to how we understand being part of their community, the “communion of saints,” even as they are already in heaven and we are still alive here on earth. The other reason that I want to explain to you is that the saints are teachers and role models, not just as examples of holiness and redemption, but also in the many varied ways that each of them grew in their understanding of God. There are many techniques, for lack of a better word, for individuals to better understand God and often one or two saints are role models that a person can relate to in their progress themselves toward understanding God. St. Thomas Aquinas has for centuries been the inspiration for those who desired or needed to approach their understanding of God through a rigorous path of logic and reasoning. He is one of the thirty-three Doctors of the Church. Yet in direct proportion to his logic, reasoning and intellectual approach to God, Aquinas also had an intense and mystical communion directly with God, one that yielded miraculous fruits. Thus one of his titles is “The Common Doctor,” for he leads the average person to reason their way to God, while another of his titles is “The Angelic Doctor,” for his mystical qualities are comparable to how the angels themselves know God. I cannot recommend St Thomas Aquinas highly enough, therefore, to modern generations for veneration and role modeling in emulating his intellectual approach, and being inspired by the divine gifts that he, in parallel, received.

In his prologue to his best known work, The Summa Theologica, he wrote: Since the teacher of Catholic truth must instruct not only the advanced but also the beginners, according to the word of St. Paul (1 Cor. 3:1-2), “as to little ones in Christ, I fed you with milk, not with solid food…” so that the purpose and intent of this work is to treat those things that pertain to the Christian religion in a manner suitable to the instruction of beginners…with confidence in the divine help, try to present the contents of sacred doctrine as briefly and clearly as the matter allows.

Father Rengers in his book “The 33 Doctors of the Church” comments that “St. Thomas, who fought fro and is remembered for his emphasis on the place of reason in theology, relied primarily on the guiding hand of divine love” and quotes St. Thomas, “Ardor precedes illumination, for a knowledge of truth is bestowed by the ardor of charity.”

Just as another aside, Shiite Muslims have a similar understanding of saints with Catholics, where they understand that saints are to be revered, but not worshipped, and that saints are the role models for not only their virtue but also their methods of learning about God and teaching accordingly.

Therefore, St. Thomas Aquinas, who has such an intellectual approach to teaching about God, role models and articulates two important things to bear in mind,. One is to always remember that “baby steps” are needed in understanding and teaching about God, not demonstrations of one’s supposed intellectual prowess and “sophistication” of thought. He critiques previous works as being too difficult and agenda driven for many to learn from, and that is a problem that moderns are especially vulnerable toward. Indeed there is an entire industry of very marginal people writing books about God and faith who have little if any solid factual education, particularly in Christianity, yet peddle to the public books filled with the most bizarre and arcane claptrap, presented as “lofty” and sophisticated “spiritual insight.” In contrast, the greatest “expert” in God in modern times, Thomas Aquinas, always built his writings on solid intellect and baby steps, ensuring that neither his doctrine nor the readership goes even one inch astray. When Aquinas taught he started with the basics, from truly the very beginning, such as why God created humans, and what are the attributes of heaven, not with sweeping declarations of his “personal revelation” and condescending “wisdom.” The true geniuses, especially those on the subject of God and faith, are always remarkably humble and allow only one step at a time on solid factual and theological foundation that is not of their own invention.

The second thing that Aquinas role models and articulates is that when writing about God, one cannot, no matter how intellectual, write from a perspective of no love. No one can accurately discuss or represent God if one does not have or actively aspire to having love of God. At the face of this, moderns might object that loving God presents then “bias” into written works about God, but on examination that is ridiculous. God is love and all of love comes from God. One cannot genuinely write about God, including in a strictly intellectual way, without having love of God, “ardor” as St Thomas calls it or at the very least is seeking to have love of God, acknowledging that as his or her objective in writing and study. To attempt to write about God without loving God as God exists (and not how you wish him to be) is like a chemist trying to write about chemistry but not believing in hydrogen, or a physician writing about the treatment of wounds and refusing to believe that bandages exist, or a home builder who seeks to build a shelter but refuses to believe there is such a thing as walls and a roof. Thus one cannot explain or study God without feeling love of God as he is, since ultimately the sum total of understanding God is understanding and feeling love of God. One can no more understand God without loving God than one can hope for rain in a drought yet not believe in water.

So to understand God one must take baby steps based on sound and factual basis of reasoning, but one must also have love of God in one’s heart as one’s motivation, even if that love is painfully imperfect at first. One other error that moderns make is the excessive focus on God, specifically in Jesus Christ, as some sort of symbol of unconditional “love,” a love that excuses sin, and is not actually directed toward genuine love of God or genuine, rather than self serving, loving charity of neighbor. If one reads the Gospels, yes, Jesus preaches a great deal about love and charity, but he also in equal measure dishes out a great deal of criticism and reminder of the penalty of failure and of a continually sinful and godless life, which will end in being burned as the chaff. Moderns, ever since the so-called hedonistic “Love Generation,” ignore the reality of what Jesus taught about God and instead portray Jesus as some sort of pastel colored ever forgiving and ever accepting love machine. In order to write intellectually honest and correct works about God, one must have genuine love of God as either one’s reality or one’s objective, and not an agenda driven self serving interpretation of the “endless boundaries” of God’s love.

For example, many of the saints loved to read about God and write about God. But there is a remarkable difference between their motivations and the motivations of many today. The saints loved to read about God because they loved God, not because they were trying to analyze, dissect and understand him with the intent of controlling his powers. For example, when one is truly in love one wants to know more about the object of one’s love because love creates the desire to know more and immerse one’s self in the loved one’s milieu. One should not, however, wish to read more and more about one’s loved one as a way to manipulate and control him or her. Thus one who is well balanced seeks to read about God because one loves God, or wishes to love God or love him even more, and not to wrest imaginary “secrets” out of God as a way to accomplish some sort of secondary agenda in one’s life.

Likewise the saints loved to write about God because, again, they loved God and wished to share their love of God with others. Similarly, many moderns also misunderstand and misuse their own motivations for writing about God. Far too many, especially in the so-called New Age arena, write about God in order to show off their supposed enlightenment and cash in on it. I’m not saying that one cannot charge money for a book, to earn a living or to at least break even in the cost of publication. What I am saying is that too many so called “spiritual” writers write about God or their New Age “spirit” as ways to self promote. They often proclaim their “humility” while at the same time puffing up their possession of spiritual “insight” and “gifts.” Thus you have New Age Hindus or Buddhists or whatever actually writing and marketing books about Jesus Christ, and then doing the “talk show circuit” as “spiritual experts.”

Think again about my example of the chemist who wants to write a chemistry book but does not believe in the existence of hydrogen. Would you want to read anything that he or she has to say? Would you want to conduct any of his or her experiments? I mean, go ahead, light up that cigarette since hydrogen does not exist, LOL. That would be irresponsible and crazy enough, to be a chemist who does not believe in the existence of hydrogen and teaches accordingly. However, imagine this. Suppose it is a biologist who writes that chemistry book and the biologist is both is not a chemist, but also does not believe in hydrogen! So that author would not even be an irresponsible expert; he or she would be an irresponsible non-expert, a uneducated intruder into the field of chemistry.

Now imagine that a biologist writes a book about chemistry where not only do they not believe in hydrogen, but they think that neon has been treated “unfairly” and does not get sufficient “attention,” and thus pushes a “neon agenda” throughout their chemistry book. “It’s not fair that neon is an inert gas,” the author thinks, and decides to insert neon into many equations and chemical reactions in the place of the actual element that occurs there. They do not believe in hydrogen, and they think that neo does not get enough attention. Thus they teach that the chemical formula for water, H2O, is actually Ne2O. Need some water? Smash some neon and oxygen together!

To understand God one must understand God the way God actually is, based on the facts of God’s interaction with the faithful and his inspired words on the subject, not on how someone wants God to be in order to enable their own agendas. The saints are the reliable way who show the genuine path to understanding and loving God, and that is why thousands of these role models exist. The saints have all come to God in a myriad of lifestyles and life experiences, so there’s a saint that resonates somewhere for anyone in any station of life. However, they all come together in one commonality, which is orthodox and reliable, faith and reasoning based understanding and love of God. None of them, no matter where they came from in life, “made up” out of their own minds their own theology and their own “interpretation” of God. They found their way on their own paths to the same God; they did not invent different Gods as the result of “going their own way.” I cannot believe how foolish people are today when some of them basically say they are finding the “right” God who “suits their needs.” I’m sorry, but there’s only one God, the powerfully eternally consistent one, who is waiting when your life is over and you are judged, and it’s not the “convenient” God who was “best suited to your lifestyle.” God is God and the same God, no matter what people are doing on earth, or even if this planet is blown to smithereens. God never changes and it does not matter one iota if you think that God is not “suitable to your present needs.”

To summarize, just as one learns how to drive a car from someone who knows how to drive, one can rely on studying one or more of the saints for ideas about how to better understand God and make him real in your life. Do not let “the blind lead the blind.” People used to read about and study the saints so that they would have ideas and role models about how to learn about God, not to follow the saints to the stake, LOL. Many saints were not martyrs and had even ordinary and non-dramatic lives, with the problems and challenges that all average people encounter in life.

Let me give an example of how that works best, and how that might be misunderstood. St. Paul has been through the centuries one of the most frequently role modeled of the saints, but there is a correct way to role model St. Paul and an incorrect way to role model St. Paul. Remember that Paul, when he was still Saul and a violent persecutor of Christians, was an ardent believer in God. Saul was extremely God fearing and very studious in his Jewish faith. It was this love of God that became extremist zealotry which motivated his erroneous persecution of Christians. In a way Saul was like the Pharisees who persecuted Jesus because obviously the Pharisees believed very much in God. So both Saul and the Pharisees were filled to overflowing with belief in God’s existence and in the tenets of their faith. In a way Saul was better than the Pharisees because he was not a hypocrite. Saul did not have the material and prestigious benefits of the wealth of the priesthood, for example; he was a tent maker. However, obviously Saul was worse off than those Pharisees who only argued with Jesus but who personally did not seek his death, leaving that to the other Pharisees. Saul did not argue with Christians; he sought to arrest them and have them killed. Then Saul was thrown from his horse on the way to Damascus by the light and the voice of the resurrected Christ, and he was converted.

Therefore St. Paul has been a role model for many generations of Christians who relate to several aspects of his life: his belief in God but disbelief in Jesus, his dramatic conversion rather than one based on gradual study, his transformation from a destroyer of a faith to a planter of churches, and his suffering for the faith through many trials and pains after his conversion to Christianity. However, I have noticed that St. Paul has been somewhat popular as a modern role model for those who did not believe in God at all. I’m not saying that such moderns are not welcome to use St. Paul as a role model, far from it, I welcome it. But I need to point out that an important aspect of understanding St. Paul is that he always was a God fearing pious believer. The resurrected Christ’s confrontation with him did not prove to Saul that God existed, since Saul always believed that, but was irrefutable proof of the identity of Jesus Christ as specifically the Savior and the Messiah. Moderns who do not believe in God but seek him through St. Paul’s role modeling tend to make one mistake accordingly. Moderns who do not believe in God and role model themselves after St. Paul tend to maintain an inner weakness toward disbelief and pagan practices. This is because St. Paul does not offer in his own life a refuting of total disbelief or of pagan superstitions because he himself had no need of that witness and testimony in his own life, since he always believed in God.

Thus selection of a “role model” saint is very important to proper faith formation. People who have no belief in God or cultist pagan New Age temptations are often better off emulating saints who grew up in pagan households who then converted. They can surely, and should, venerate and honor St. Paul studying, as all aspiring and actual Christians should, his life and his writings. But for moral support and for approaching God through the proven path that is most near one’s own actual situation in life, one should look at the other saints for guidance and both moral and intellectual support. For example St Justin Martyr is one of the best known and helpful of the saints to those who come from a disbelieving, pagan, or excessively secularized pseudo-intellectual background. Justin Martyr lived circa 100-165 and was of a very educated pagan family. As a pagan teacher of philosophy, rhetoric, history and poetry he was inspired by an old man who had met to study Christian Scripture. He became a Christian at the age of thirty, debated with pagan philosophers, and opened a school of philosophy. Justin Martyr was raised as a child, became an intellectual, a teacher and ultimately converted when paganism was by far the majority, and Christianity was the radical, persecuted minority. Thus someone with a very godless background, especially one that was intellectual, can especially relate to Justin Martyr and his existing writings.

For many generations Christian men, whose vocation was to have an average married life with children looked to St. Joseph, spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary and stepfather to Jesus, for their path and inspiration, even though Joseph authored no testimonies or sacred literature. During the generations where many did not read or write, who were poor, and who attempted only to do the best they could for their families, the deeds of St. Joseph, his obedience to God, and his love of Jesus were all the inspiration that they needed. They read about the Apostles, studied the Bible and their catechism, but they simply loved St. Joseph. I still remember the time when millions of men looked to St. Joseph for their support and strength, finding God through St. Joseph’s humble and unique example. Oddly we live in times where people buy St. Joseph statues and bury them in the ground upside down so that they can have “better luck” in selling their real estate properties. Maybe that has not been the right approach to God, no? St. Joseph is often forgotten except as a pagan practice to shill someone’s real estate. How sadly the times have changed. As St. Joseph has fallen away as a role model for the average Christian man, we have a real estate crisis (where his statue was used for pagan purposes, not totally a coincidence) plus we have the epidemic of stepfathers and “boyfriends of the mother” brutalizing and killing infants. A generation of humans is very much like the saints that they emulate, and, to their detriment, the saints that they ignore or defy in role modeling. I can think of no more stark example, except for the degrading of God himself, of the downfall of an entire category of humans (men) and their falling away from the best human role model they ever had, St. Joseph, spouse of Mary and step father to Jesus.

Thus to better understand God it is obvious that hundreds and indeed thousands of saints who have already found their way there can and must provide role modeling and example setting to people from a full diversity of life experience and perspective.

Further, one does not better understand God by omitting one’s God given intellect and believing any baloney that anyone makes up and sells to you, including your own self delusion. Far from abandoning reason and intellect, Christianity, Islam and Judaism are rich in the opportunities to use your brain, not put it in mothballs (or some other chemicals).

Additionally, love of God, even if it is unknown to you or painfully incomplete, must be your motivation for seeking to understand God. Motivations other than love of God all lead to truncated, misleading or dead ends and great error in interpretation. Likewise, however, the love of God must be understood correctly, and not as human labeling of weakness or hedonism as being justified by some open ended sloppy agenda based philosophy of supposed “love.” God’s love is infinitely strong and infinitely pure, and one cannot understand God if one has an unwillingness to understand that. God is both understanding and forgiving, but one must also remember that God’s purity of love is never compromised. Thus that which is stained and full of sin, no matter how much God “loves all his children,” cannot enter heaven.

The many paths to finding the one true God as demonstrated by the thousands of saints, both famous and mostly unknown, demonstrates again that God wishes all to find him, and does not “predestine” anyone to heaven or hell. Like evolution and natural selection has developed many thousands of species of birds in nature, for example, each person finds the same God in their own heart and soul through various paths. What is important to remember is, however, that the paths are all real and grounded on actuality, not self invented delusion. The saints demonstrate that people can and do come to God in various directions at various times in their lives: some were child saints, holy at even a small age, while others became saints late in life after much error and sinfulness. Obviously if people were “predestined” God would not have allowed such many examples of those who individually find sanctity and role model to others. Just to close this topic, here is the statement of the Catholic Church doctrine regarding predestination:

1037. God predestines no one to go to hell; for this, a willful turning away from God (a mortal sin) is necessary, and persistence in it until the end. In the Eucharistic liturgy and in the daily prayers of the faithful, the Church implores the mercy of God, who does not want “any to perish, but all to come to repentance”:

Father, accept this offering
From your whole family
Grant us your peace in this life,
Save us from final damnation,
And count us among those you have chosen.

PB16 explains St Paul's "justification" view

His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI offers an easy to understand explanation of what St. Paul really meant in his writings about "justification," a much cited but often misunderstood concept.

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=14376

Prayer to God by St. Paul

1 Thessalonians 3:9-13

What thanksgiving, then, can we render to God for you, for all the joy that we feel on your account before our God? Night and day we pray beyond measure to see you in person and to remedy the deficiencies of your faith. Now may God himself, our Father, and our Lord Jesus direct the way to you, and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we have for you, so as to strengthen your hearts, to be blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his holy ones. [Amen.]

Judas and Saul (before being Paul) shared

Both the betraying Apostle Judas and the Jewish zealot Saul (who later became St. Paul) had something very good in common. They both fervently, and even fanatically, believed in the reality of the one true God, as revealed to the Chosen People, to whom they belonged, the Israelites.

Many modern people misunderstand "sound bytes" about both Judas and Saul and think they were unbelievers who lacked faith. Actually, the opposite is true. They both had enormous faith in God. What they shared was such a great faith in God, with accompanying zealotry, that they failed to recognize Jesus Christ. This is where the comparison between the two ends. Judas actually was chosen by Christ and worked side by side with him, yet in the end did not recognize him. Saul never met Christ and thus didn't recognize the Jesus Christ that he had heard about and who he had only "seen" in the faces of Christians who believed, and who he helped to persecute.

However, the minute that Saul met the resurrected Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus, he saw and believed. This is how two people who shared a great faith in God demonstrated radically different characters and faith profiles. Judas didn't believe even as he lived with Jesus and saw him, spoke with him, and learned from him with his own eyes and ears. Saul immediately knew Jesus and believed when he was thrown down from his horse and saw the resurrected Christ.

I mention this because it's instructive to people who ponder the events related in the Bible, but also part of my constant work to debunk cults. There are cultists today who "relate" to either Judas or Paul. It would be laughable if it were not so serious. You see, no one can "relate" to either Judas or Paul (Saul) without having an unshakeable belief in God. Modern cultists do not have that, thus they have absolutely no reason to "relate" to either Paul or Judas. In fact, they have no right to "relate" to either of them, because both would spit on and trod upon any modern human who is cultist or denying of God himself.

The same is true of Lucifer, by the way. Many modern cultists "relate" to him and have "faiths" dedicated to him. Again, this would be funny if it were not so sad and serious. Lucifer himself would be the first to attest to the reality of the one God, the person of God, not some "squishy" view of God as a force of nature or something like that. Lucifer, also known as Satan, is demonstrated in the Bible as being very knowledgeable about God, quoting scripture and even initiating conversation with God. The last thing that Satan would "respect" is "believers" in him who then portray him as replacing God, or that God does not exist, or that God is not in charge and active in the world. Satan seeks to shake one's faith and make bad choices, but he never would seek (and is indeed horrified and contemptuous) of people who read the Bible only enough to learn that he exists, and then ignore the reality of God (whose own scripture Satan quotes).

Furthermore, even the stupidest and lowest minion of Satan's, the "demons," recognize not only God but Jesus and fear his authority on sight. Demons trembled at the sight of the approaching Jesus, knowing of the both the reality of God and the authority that Jesus had over them, including the ability to cast them out. Demons hailed Jesus first, before he even spoke to them.

Satan and the demons are enraged by so called "Church of Satan" and other "believers" who basically conduct "identity theft" on Satan by portraying him as someone who is not subject to God, or who competes with God as a divinity (that is not true, Satan's only sin was disobedience, not usurping of power) and Satan most firmly hates and scorns people who "cherry pick" his existence from the Bible and then frame him as being the "reason" to not believe in God. Satan's "gig" is disobedience (with the inevitable result of hell), not disbelief in God himself. Satan, for example, tests Job's faith in God, not his belief in God. These are two real differences that people with a moderate IQ and thinking ability should understand. Satan does not attempt to portray God as not existing. Satan seeks to shake people's faith in God's goodness, mercy, love and attentiveness to individual humans. Satan tries to do this when people suffer at the hands of other humans, when they experience cruelty and deprivation because, frankly, people are not so nice. Satan does not cause human cruelty to other humans and he never denies the existence of God. Satan has nothing but scorn for people who do not understand that and further, he despises those who "identify theft" him, and he does not have a nice greeting for them when his alleged pseudo "followers" fall into his hands in their eternity in the very real fires of hell.

I hope that you find this helpful.

Another example of St Paul and Bible reference

1 Corinthians 15:31

Every day I face death; I swear it by the pride in you [brothers] that I have in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Here Paul is declaring his pride in both individually and in community with the faithful that he faces death every day for the sake of Jesus Christ. Paul means this both literally (the danger of martyrdom) and symbolically, for death no longer has fear for those who follow the one who conquered death, Jesus Christ.

We have no way of knowing if Paul was actually thinking of this passage in Psalms when he wrote the above passage in Corinthians, but here you see that King David had a very similar thought and feeling. The footnote points the reader to Psalm 44:23.

Psalm 44:23

For you [God] we are slain all the day long, considered only as sheep to be slaughtered.

King David is here, as he always did, referring like Paul to both physical danger but also the symbolic role of the faithful as sheep to experience the slaughter for God at the ends of their lives, and also the day to day surrendering of their clinging to life. So while David wrote this psalm during a time of trouble, he did not mean that literally the faithful were being killed in battle or something all day. Like Paul or, rather, centuries before Paul, David articulated the embracing of constant exposure to the danger of death in the glory of trust in God.

So here, whether St. Paul was actually drawing upon his memory of this psalm in his writing or not, you can see the identical inspired mindset separated by centuries between David and Paul. This gives you a better understanding of the continuity of inspirational thought and the shared metaphor for both of these holy men's comprehension of the new definition of death for the faithful who trust in God, as David personally avows, and in Jesus Christ, as Paul avows and exhorts others.

Bible Reading: Hebrews 2:1-10

This is from a letter by St. Paul. I am bothered that "the modern consensus is that the letter was not written by Paul." Some modern scholars are such dopes and meat heads and I have little use for them. When the church of Alexandria in Egypt recognized Hebrews as a letter of Paul, and the rest of the East agreed, followed by the West, they knew what they were talking about. It's later scholars who overthink and expect a consistency of tone as if these were edited and standardized written documents and not what they were, which is committing to writing what were verbal orations. So here is a beautiful example of Paul's rhetoric, for he includes a direct citation from the Book of Psalms, and links it to his testimony about Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 2:1-10
"Exhortation to Faithfulness"
Therefore, we must attend all the more to what we have heard, so that we may not be carried away. For if the word announced through angels proved firm, and every transgression and disobedience received its just recompense, how shall we escape if we ignore so great a salvation? Announced originally through the Lord, it was confirmed for us by those who had heard. God added his testimony by signs, wonders, various acts of power, and distribution of the gifts of the Holy Spirit according to his will.

"Exaltation through Abasement"
For it was not to angels that he subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. Instead, someone has testified somewhere:

"What is man that you are mindful of him,
or the son of man that you care for him?
You made him for a little while lower than the angels;
you crowned him with glory and honor,
subjecting all things under his feet."

[The above is quoted from Psalm 8:5-7. He then goes on to interpret that section of Psalm 8 as prophecy of Jesus Christ.]

In "subjecting" all things [to him], he left nothing not "subject to him." Yet at present we do not see "all things subject to him," but we do see Jesus "crowned with glory and honor" because he suffered death, he who "for a little while" was made "lower than the angels," that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

***
This is remarkable because when you read this text it is though you are literally listening to Paul as he preached to a Jewish audience. While Paul is known as the Apostle to the Gentiles, he did not "specialize" and ignore preaching to the prime Jewish audience wherever he found them. You can tell this was a mixed audience, because he says "someone" rather than citing "it is written," thus he is not assuming that the listeners know the Book. However, by quoting from the Book he is also speaking directly to the Jews in the audience, who would be very familiar with most of the Psalms. So Paul quotes from what we now call the Old Testament, and then with both the Jewish and Gentiles in his audience on the same frame of reference, he now explains how this Psalm was a prophecy of precisely Jesus Christ.

The reason that some scholars, I think, doubt this letter as being Paul's is because it is clearly a sermon that has been preserved in the form of a letter. So the letter lacks the self identifying flourishes and personal references that some scholars rely on to believe they can identify the speaker as Paul. If so they are overlooking the reference to "our brother Timothy" in 13:23 or feel that is not sufficient. But that is just being silly and having excessive scruples. Paul preached ceaselessly wonderful and intellectual sermons, and he is the one who consistently demonstrated in the surviving Epistles that he taps his prodigious religious formation and zealotry from when he was a very pious and learned Jew. You can't read this and not recognize that someone, one of the disciples (writing in Greek), captured for Paul on his behalf in this letter much of the "best of" all his sermons and step by step witness and faith formation for those who were both Jewish and Gentiles in his audience. That is why it does not have the "to my friends at here there and everywhere" address and flourish in the beginning. It was a letter that was not so much to a specific group as a letter that captured the essence of his "best of" preaching, and also why it alternates doctrinal teaching with moral exhortation. The reason it differs in style is because his "secretary," to use a modern term, combined like I said, to use another term "the best of Paul's preaching" in one "letter."

I hope you find these observations helpful.