FLESH BE GONE

“Is it not your inner cravings that make war within your members?” —James 4:1

Our inner cravings (Jas 4:1) for pleasures (Jas 4:3) and our prideful (Jas 4:6) friendship with the world (Jas 4:4) are the origins of the conflicts and disputes in our lives and in this world (Jas 4:1). “Therefore submit to God; resist the devil and he will take flight. Draw close to God, and He will draw close to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, you backsliders. Begin to lament, to mourn, and to weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into sorrow. Be humbled in the sight of the Lord and He will raise you on high” (Jas 4:7-10).
This is not only the message for Lent next week, but also for life. “We lived at the level of the flesh, following every whim and fancy, and so by nature deserved God’s wrath like the rest” (Eph 2:3), but “those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their flesh with its passions and desires” (Gal 5:24). By God’s grace and only by God’s grace, we must “put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the desires of the flesh” (Rm 13:14). “You are not to spend what remains of your earthly life on human desires but on the will of God. Already you have devoted enough time to what the pagans enjoy” (1 Pt 4:2-3).

Prayer: Jesus, if You set me free, I will truly be free (Jn 8:36).
Promise: “If anyone wishes to rank first, he must remain the last one of all and the servant of all.” —Mk 9:35
Praise: For several decades, Linda has spent several weeks each summer organizing evangelistic missions to bring Jesus to rural Appalachia through the Legion of Mary.

There is a time to be born and a time to die

A sermon on Ecclesiastes
by St Gregory of Nyssa
[ c.330 – 395 A.D. ]

There is a time to be born and a time to die. God grant that mine may be a timely birth and a timely death! Of course no one imagines that the Speaker regards as acts of virtue our natural birth and death, in neither of which our own will plays any part. A woman does not give birth because she chooses to do so; neither does anyone die as a result of his own decision. Obviously, there is neither virtue nor vice in anything that lies beyond our control. So we must consider what is meant by a timely birth and a timely death.There is a time to be born and a time to die. The fact that there is a natural link between birth and death is expressed very clearly in this text of Scripture. Death invariably follows birth, and everyone who is born comes at last to the grave.
It seems to me that the birth referred to here is our salvation, as is suggested by the prophet Isaiah. This reaches its full term and is not stillborn when, having been conceived by the fear of God, the soul’s own birth pangs bring it to the light of day. We are in a sense our own parents, and we give birth to ourselves by our own free choice of what is good. Such a choice becomes possible for us when we have received God into ourselves and have become children of God, children of the Most High. On the other hand, if what the Apostle calls the form of Christ has not been produced in us, we abort ourselves. The man of God must reach maturity.
Now if the meaning of a timely birth is clear, so also is the meaning of a timely death. For Saint Paul every moment was a time to die, as he proclaims in his letters: I swear by the pride I take in you that I face death every day. Elsewhere he says, For your sake we are put to death daily and we felt like men condemned to death.
How Paul died daily is perfectly obvious. He never gave himself up to a sinful life but kept his body under constant control. He carried death with him, Christ’s death, wherever he went. He was always being crucified with Christ. It was not his own life he lived; it was Christ who lived in him. This surely was a timely death-a death whose end was true life.
I put to death and I shall give life, God says, teaching us that death to sin and life in the Spirit is his gift, and promising that whatever he puts to death he will restore to life again.

Reflection

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TRIPLE FAITH

“I do believe! Help my lack of faith!” —Mark 9:24, our translation

The father of a demon-possessed son told Jesus that His disciples were not able to free his son. Jesus “replied by saying to the crowd, ‘What an unbelieving lot you are! How long must I remain with you? How long can I endure you? Bring him to Me’ ” (Mk 9:19). Jesus indicated that the lack of faith of the crowd and His disciples prevented the boy from being freed. In other words, our faith, or lack of it, sometimes makes a big difference for other people. Look at how Jesus healed the paralytic after He saw the faith of the stretcher-bearers of the paralyzed man (Mk 2:5).
Jesus remarked not only about the lack of faith among His disciples and the assembled crowd. He also challenged the father of the demon-possessed boy to exercise his faith. Jesus said: “All things are possible to one who believes” (Mk 9:23, our transl). The father accepted Jesus’ challenge and cried out: “I do believe! Help my lack of faith!” (Mk 9:24, our transl.) Thus, the faith of parents often makes a critical difference for their children.
Finally, we are all expected not only to depend on others’ faith but to have faith ourselves. Jesus repeatedly says in the Gospels: “Your faith has saved you” (e.g. Mk 5:34). We are saved by grace through faith (see Eph 2:8). Unlike the faith that accepts God’s healing, the faith accepting salvation can never be someone’s else faith, but only our own faith.
In summary, we are responsible to have faith for ourselves, and often responsible to have faith for our families (especially our children) and faith for others. Be men and women of faith.

Prayer: Father, give me faith to move mountains (Mt 17:20), drive out demons, and conquer kingdoms (Heb 11:33).
Promise: “If one of you is wise and understanding, let him show this in practice through a humility filled with good sense.” —Jas 3:13
Praise: When Mary went to a Bible study, her heart began to burn with a love of God’s Word.

Christ is our head, and the wise man keeps his eyes upon him

A sermon on Ecclesiastes
by St Gregory of Nyssa
[c.330 – 395 A.D. ]

As no darkness can be seen by anyone surrounded by light, so no trivialities can capture the attention of anyone who has his eyes on Christ. The man who keeps his eyes upon the head and origin of the whole universe has them on virtue in all its perfection; he has them on truth, on justice, on immortality and on everything else that is good, for Christ is goodness itself.We shall be blessed with clear vision if we keep our eyes fixed on Christ, for he, as Paul teaches, is our head, and there is in him no shadow of evil. Saint Paul himself and all who have reached the same heights of sanctity had their eyes fixed on Christ, and so have all who live and move and have their being in him.
The wise man, then, turns his eyes toward the One who is his head, but the fool gropes in darkness. No one who puts his lamp under a bed instead of on a lamp-stand will receive any light from it. People are often considered blind and useless when they make the supreme Good their aim and give themselves up to the contemplation of God, but Paul made a boast of this and proclaimed himself a fool for Christ’s sake. The reason he said, We are fools for Christ’s sake was that his mind was free from all earthly preoccupations. It was as though he said, “We are blind to the life here below because our eyes are raised toward the One who is our head.”
And so, without board or lodging, he travelled from place to place, destitute, naked, exhausted by hunger and thirst. When men saw him in captivity, flogged, shipwrecked, led about in chains, they could scarcely help thinking him a pitiable sight. Nevertheless, even while he suffered all this at the hands of men, he always looked toward the One who is his head and he asked: What can separate us from the love of Christ, which is in Jesus? Can affliction or distress? Can persecution, hunger, nakedness, danger or death? In other words, “What can force me to take my eyes from him who is my head and to turn them toward things that are contemptible?”
He bids us follow his example: Seek the things that are above, he says, which is only another way of saying: “Keep your eyes on Christ.”

Reflection

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TURN THE OTHER CHEEK

“But what I say to you is: offer no resistance to injury.” —Matthew 5:39

Jesus sounds so naive. Everybody knows we must resist injury. Jesus says that after we’ve been hit on one cheek, we should turn the other. We’ll get killed if we take His advice. However, the Sermon on the Mount is not “advice”; it is the Lord’s command. Yet we rationalize that Jesus’ message in the Sermon on the Mount is poetic, symbolic, anything but literal.
Sometimes Jesus does not speak literally, as when He said to gouge out our eye (Mt 5:29). So we’re tempted to assume the Sermon on the Mount, especially this part of it, must not be literal. However, Jesus did literally turn the other cheek, hand over His garments and walk the extra mile (Mt 5:39-41), even up Mount Calvary to be crucified.
If we deny that the Sermon on the Mount is literal, we may be denying that we must imitate the crucified Christ. Jesus is literally calling us to a radically different lifestyle. Following Jesus is not just a modification of a worldly life but an utterly new way to live.
Will you decide to be a Christian on Jesus’ terms — not as other people are, not as you want, but as He wills? Accept the Preacher and the preaching of the Sermon on the Mount.

Prayer: Jesus, it’s impossible to be a Christian without Your constant amazing grace. Pour out the Holy Spirit upon me (Rm 5:5) and give me the grace to receive in docility.
Promise: “For the wisdom of this world is absurdity with God.” —1 Cor 3:19
Praise: Praise the risen Jesus, the only Way to the Father (Jn 14:6). Alleluia!

Without love everything is in vain

A treatise on Charity
by St Maximus the Confessor
[ c.580 – 662 A.D. ]

For God is far superior to all his creation, since everything which exists has been made by God and for him. And so, in deserting God, who is beyond compare, for the inferior works of creation, a man shows that he values God, the author of creation, less than creation itself.Charity is a right attitude of mind which prefers nothing to the knowledge of God. If a man possesses any strong attachment to the things of this earth, he cannot possess true charity. For anyone who really loves God prefers to know and experience God rather than his creatures. The whole set and longing of his mind is ever directed toward him.
The Lord himself reminds us: Whoever loves me will keep my commandments. And this is my commandment: that you love one another. So the man who does not love his neighbour does not obey God’s command. But one who does not obey his command cannot love God. A man is blessed if he can love all men equally. Moreover, if he truly loves God, he must love his neighbour absolutely. Such a man cannot hoard his wealth. Rather, like God himself, he generously gives from his own resources to each man according to his needs.
Since he imitates God’s generosity, the only distinction he draws is the person’s need. He does not distinguish between a good man and a bad one, a just man and one who is unjust. Yet his own goodness of will makes him prefer the man who strives after virtue to the one who is depraved.
A charitable mind is not displayed simply in giving money; it is manifested still more by personal service as well as by the communication of God’s word to others: In fact, if a man’s service toward his brothers is genuine and if he really renounces worldly concerns, he is freed from selfish desires. For he now shares in God’s own knowledge and love. Since he does possess God’s love, he does not experience weariness as he follows the Lord his God. Rather, following the prophet Jeremiah, he withstands every type of reproach and hardship without even harbouring an evil thought toward any man.
For Jeremiah warns us: Do not say: “We are the Lord’s temple.” Neither should you say: “Faith alone in our Lord Jesus Christ can save me.” By itself faith accomplishes nothing.For even the devils believe and shudder.
No, faith must be joined to an active love of God which is expressed in good works. The charitable man is distinguished by sincere and long-suffering service to his fellow man: it also means using things aright.

Reflection

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“I BELIEVE IN THE HOLY, CATHOLIC CHURCH”

“On this rock I will build My church, and the jaws of death shall not prevail against it.” —Matthew 16:18

At the Masses of Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday, all the Catholics of the world will be asked to renew their baptismal promises. The last of the baptismal promises is: “Do you believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy, catholic Church?”, etc. When we renew our baptismal promises, we acknowledge that we were baptized in one Spirit into one body, the Church (1 Cor 12:13). In baptism, we have committed ourselves to remain faithful to one another as members of the body of Christ. Thus, we are obligated to celebrate Mass each Sunday with the other members of Christ’s body, and to go to Confession annually to be reconciled with the Church. We must also pray for, support, serve, and obey the Church. Moreover, it is not an option for a Catholic to join another Christian denomination or religion. This would be denying our baptismal promises.
Do you love the Church as Jesus loves the Church? If you are to make the last baptismal promise, you must be willing to lay down your life for her (Eph 5:25). In baptism, we have made the commitment to love the Church unconditionally, even when it is most unlovable. This is humanly impossible, but the Holy Spirit, Who birthed the Church, will give us the grace to love the Church. In the power of the Spirit, love the Church and live the new life through baptism.

Prayer: Father, may I grieve over those who have left the Church. Give me confidence that You will lead them back.
Promise: “God’s flock is in your midst; give it a shepherd’s care. Watch over it willingly as God would have you do, not under constraint; and not for shameful profit either, but generously.” —1 Pt 5:2
Praise: St. Peter imitated Jesus in his ministry and in crucifixion, leaving a strong example for later popes (see 1 Pt 2:21ff).