LECTIO DIVINA FRAGMENTS

These ideas are unrelated thoughts I find interesting.

• On the cross, Pilate wrote INRI (Jesus Nazarenorum Rex Judaeorum), and the Roman Standard was SPQR (Senatus Populusque Romani). One was the kingdom of heaven and its king, and the other was Rome and its king.
• The Red Sea (Reid Sea) parted with a word from Moses and the power of God. The veil in the temple was torn in two pieces by Christ and the power of God. You and I are ripped from the world and made adopted sons and daughters by Christ through the Holy Spirit.
• With Baptism comes dual citizenship, one of the world and one of the kingdom of heaven. Render unto Ceasar that which is Ceasers and to God that which is to God.
• Three moral sins in the early Church: offering incense to the Emperor; adultery, and murder. These had to be forgiven by the community.
• Confession with a priest is humiliating. It is designed to be just that. You must humble yourself before God, represented by the priest, not some fantasy of yours in the mind.
• The Church is founded on Peter, the most sinful of all the Apostles and least likely to succeed.
• Purgatory is a place of second chances, a waiting room for you to make all things new once again.
• You are born as an individual, Baptized as an individual, you sin as an individual who thinks they are god, and you die alone as an individual. You rise to new life in the communion of all saints…forever.
• Hope is the last virtue I will cling onto at death.
• When we are born we must learn how to become more human with each day. When we are born again in Baptism, we must learn how to become more like Christ each day and less like our human inclinations. Life is the accumulation of our choices, both good and bad. Wisdom is knowing the difference between the two.