http://usccb.org/bible/readings/102013.cfm
“As theologian Martin Borg says in The God We Never Knew, ‘Tell me your image of God and I will tell you your theology.’ That's why the Inquisition knew the imagination was such a dangerous thing. . . .There are so many images of God in the Old and New Testaments that entire books have been written on this topic. Some of our evangelical brothers and sisters have gone through the Bible and come up with a list of over 230 names or images that are used for God . . .
For many Catholics, among the best impacts of Vatican II have been the many and varied biblical images of Father, Son, and Spirit that replace that of the rather stern policeman and judge which many people had for a long time. Today some people in the Church either cannot understand the fear that motivated many people in their faith, or else they argue that it is overstated. My friend Margaret is a foil for both positions.
In 1952, Margaret was the night charge nurse for the operating theaters in a large Catholic public hospital. The nuns worked six a.m. to six p.m.; Margaret worked six p.m. to six a.m. On Wednesday, February 27, 1952, she came off her twelve-hour shift having raced from case to case for the entire night. She was dead on her feet and starving. On arrival home at her apartment, Margaret cooked herself up a large plate of bacon and eggs and devoured it. As she finished her breakfast, her roommate walked through the door sporting a big black cross on her forehead. Jane had just been to six-thirty a.m. Mass on Ash Wednesday. Margaret had just consumed bacon on a day of fast and abstinence. Convinced she was in a state of serious mortal sin and seized by panic, Margaret says she raced to the bathroom and tried to make herself vomit. When that wasn’t successful, she very carefully caught the bus to St. Patrick’s Church, which was where the first confessions in town started at eight a.m. Margaret was not then, and is not now, a religious nut or a Catholic zealot. She was a very normal Catholic for her time. ‘I thought that if I died before I could get to the confessional box, I would go to my final judgment and God would say, ‘Look, Margaret, you have been a good Catholic, you’ve gone to Mass, said your prayers, and recited the Rosary. But what are we going to do about the bacon? I’m sorry, my dear, the bacon is a deal breaker, off to hell for you for all eternity.’ I really believed that I know it sounds crazy now, but when I told my nursing friends what had happened later that day, they all thought I had done the right thing. No one thought I was mad.’
Staying with this powerful and persuasive image, when we stand before God with the weakness and sinfulness of our own life, God will not settle old scores, take revenge, and exact retribution. Rather, God will be perfectly just and completely compassionate. How can I be so confident? Because that is the way Jesus acted with those he met, and this is the overwhelming picture he paints of God in heaven in the Gospels. Whatever image we find helpful in our prayer, we do not believe in a nasty God in heaven with the loving Jesus who came on earth and the emboldening Spirit who abides with us still.” (Richard Leonard, SJ ~ Why Bother Praying)
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“The first gift of struggle is the call to conversion – the call to think differently about who God is and about who I am as an individual. It calls us to think again about what life really means and how I go about being in the world. These are deeply spiritual questions that touch on our notions of God as well as on our ideas of ourselves.
To the patriarchal mind-set God is mighty warrior, stern judge, law-giving father, under whose dominion all things fall. To grow spiritually in the image of this God is to be in control, to conquer what is unacceptable in us and around us. To dominate at all costs. To get what is our due.
But there is another way to think about God. To the newly retrieved feminist mindset of nearly every spiritual tradition, God is not only caring father but birthing mother as well, who brings new life with the rising of every sun and the descent of every inner darkness. To grow spiritual in the image of our mother God is to be open to newness, to expect surprise, to understand pain, to sooth hurt, to nurture difference rather than to deny it.(Joan Chittister ~ Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope)
So what is the Good News for us?
What is your image of God?
Let us pray:
The most essential factor is persistence - the determination never to allow your energy or enthusiasm to be dampened by the discouragement that must inevitably come. (James Whitcomb Riley)
Persistence is incredibly important. Persistence proves to the person you're trying to reach that you're passionate about something, that you really want something. (Norah O’Donnell)
For Courage by John O’Donohue
When the light around you lessens, and your thoughts darken until
Your body feels fear turn cold as a stone inside,
When you find yourself bereft of any belief in yourself
And all you unknowingly leaned on has fallen,
When one voice commands your whole heart, and it is raven dark,
Steady yourself and see that it is your own thinking that darkens your world,
Search and you will find a diamond-thought of light,
Know that you are not alone and that this darkness has purpose; gradually it will school your eyes
To find the one gift your life requires, hidden within this night-corner.
Invoke the learning of every suffering you have suffered.
Close your eyes. Gather all the kindling about your heart to create one spark,
That is all you need to nourish the flame that will cleanse the dark
Of its weight of festered fear.
A new confidence will come alive, to urge you toward higher ground
Where your imagination will learn to engage difficulty
As its most rewarding threshold!
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