ENERGY FROM GOD: THE AUTHENTIC CHURCH IS HOLY.

Here is a quick review of where I am in terms of exploring how God’s energy flows from the Divinity (Trinity) through the Catholic Church forward in time, through to the present day. The Church is both a repository and a depository of all that is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic in reality, a direct quantum entanglement of marks that allow me to be a direct recipient of God’s energy, as I can receive it. These entanglements are a line of energy from Divinity to Humanity and through the Catholic Church to me, the ultimate purpose for whom Christ became a ransom for many on the cross. This energy comes not from what we know as nuclear fission or fusion, which is the result of chemical and physical interactions, but rather is an energy that is alive and provides the lift we need to go from mere evolution of the species to evolution of my individual humanity. Christ, as God, is this quantum entanglement. When we reach out to Jesus in silence and solitude to just be present to Him and keep our mental mouths shut, there is a transfer of God’s energy (grace) that fills me as I am capable of receiving it. (capacitas dei) All I have to do is tell God that I respect His boundaries set for humans so that they can rise again and again to move to that next level of our evolution, one that depends on my choosing it. I call that prayer.

Energy is one of the few constants (the others being love and truth). There is a direct pipeline from God to me, not from me to God, whereby I receive a power outside of myself now, in each moment of each waking day, where I have the energy to be an adopted son (daughter) of the Father and await the coming of the Lord in the Second Coming.

This energy flows one way, forward in time, until it reaches me, the end-user and purpose for which all reality has been created. This energy is grace or overshadowing with a source of power that is outside of human experience and can be accessed only if I place myself in the presence of Christ and wait in silence and solitude.

The Church Universal (Catholic Church) is the context in which I can use all the ways that Christ left to his followers to be ONE. The sign of contradiction is found in each of the four marks (one, holy, catholic, and apostolic), each one interconnected with the others as one church, yet with many ways in which each individual human processes what that means. This oneness is also diverse, as each human possesses the ability to discover their deepest human longings through their energy. And that brings us to the second mark of the Church, Holy.

DIVERSE MEANINGS OF BEING HOLY IN MY VIEW OF REALITY

WHOLELY — What might seem as a conundrum of terminologies, HOLY means being human at that deepest level of the race, one that wholly fulfills the human evolution from animality through humanity and then ultimately to spirituality. Each member of the human race must be wholly who they are in terms of their nature (e.g., human) and discover what that means. We are born in original sin, but have the tools, thanks to Jesus Christ, and the truth, thanks to the Holy Spirit through the Church Universal, to become what our humanity was created for, but which we ditched (Adam and Eve) because of pride and selfishness.

With Christ, who chose to give us the example of humility and selflessness by abandoning all reason and free will as a gift to the Father as a ransom for many, all humans have that deeper level of being, one that is HOLY, one that is accessed only through humility and selflessness, just as Christ taught us.

ALL – Another dimension to HOLY is the notion of all. All, in the sense that I use it, refers to the ability in my spiritual self (as opposed to just being human and using all the right signals for my reason) to give ALL to God, the KENOSIS, of Philippians 2: 5-12 (complete emptying of pride and selfishness) to become HOLY as Christ is HOLY. The purpose of life is to love God with ALL my heart, ALL my mind, and ALL my strength and to love my neighbor as myself. (Deuteronomy 6:5 and Matthew 22:36) I become HOLY when I give myself totally and unreservedly to God to bring into myself the Holiness of God to fill up my sins and squeeze out my reliance on my pride and selfishness to think I can create boundaries. I can only access this HOLY by having in me the mind of Christ Jesus (Philippians 2:5) by placing myself as much as I can (ALL) in the presence of true Holiness (conversion from my sinfulness to trying to have Jesus within me).

PERFECTION — Christ bid us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. I don’t think Christ is telling me to be God as much as God comes down through the Church to allow me to receive that love through Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit. There is no perfection on earth, as God is perfect. Humans have neither the capacity nor the capability to be like God, but Jesus, both God and Human, can share what our nature can endure as Christ fills up our gas tanks each day. I strive for perfection with Christ as my way, truth, and life, given the rocky road that original sin afforded me. Baptism took away original sin, so that we could be the fullest extent of our humanity (perfect as my humanity will allow while I still live). I still must take up my cross daily, so daily Lectio Divina, Eucharist, Scripture Reading, the Rosary, and Penance. This means perfect, until I get to heaven, is a constant struggle to stave off the effects of original sin, will demand constant prayer and conversio morae (purposefully starting the day with the Morning Offering, and struggle to overcome the onslaughts of the Devil who uses society to obfuscate the way, the truth, and the life that leads to a fulfillment of my human nature at the highest level (perfect as I can be perfect).

WE VENERATE MARY AND THE SAINTS BECAUSE THEY ARE HOLY– All baptized Catholics (including Orthodox) are holy, and receive the gifts of priest, prophet, and king as part of the ceremony. They are saints (lower case s) and struggle with the martyrdom of ordinary living. In this notion of HOLY, I emphasize the authentic Catholic Church has a long-practiced tradition, one it still uses today, to venerate the saints. From the times of the first martyrs of blood and ordinary living, the Church militant venerated those who have given their lives for their beliefs that Jesus is Lord. As the Catholic Church moved forward throughout the Centuries, the process became more formalized or juridical but no less authentic. It was the Church Universal celebrating the Hall of Fame recipients by asking for their intercession in the Eucharist and Baptism/Confirmation. The early martyrs were venerated for having in them the mind of Christ Jesus, to the extent that they gave their lives for another (Jesus). Less traumatic were all those early believers gathered each day as the community of Faith, but were martyrs of ordinary living, having to live out the rest of their lives in practicing what Christ taught us to do (Love one another as I have loved you). If you look at the list of Popes, from Peter through the first fifty Popes, in unbroken succession, they were martyrs of blood. https://www.vatican.va/content/vatican/en/holy-father.index.html

One thing to remember about Popes. They are all sinful persons and need to seek forgiveness for their sins, just as all of us are. The thing that is most distressful about looking back on history is that we don’t remember the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” made by each individual person as they played out their destiny in time. The authentic church has cuts and bruises as it bungled its way through time, picking up what was good and discarding what was bad. It shows the signs of fatigue from the fight with Satan, it shows the scars of going down the wrong path, only to be reminded by individual humans that we must not lose sight of the reason why we carry our crosses each day, to be like Christ more and more. He must increase and I must decrease.

HOLY means how each person discovers the truth to lead a life that is worthy of emulation, e.g., Communion of Saints. We venerate Mary because of her trust and humility in abandoning her will to accept the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, although she probably had no idea of what that meant as she lived out her life. A sword would pierce her heart as she saw her son hang upon the cross and Himself be pierced by a lance. She is the archetype for the Church, which is why we often refer to the Catholic Universal church as Mother Church. From the earliest time of the martyrs in blood, Christians used the burial sites and often relics to be contained within the altar as the sacred table of the Last Supper, the place upon which each of us shares in the Real Presence of Christ, body and blood, soul and divinity. HOLY means the person we venerate as a Saint (Hall of Famer), thought sinful like us, had in them the mind of Christ Jesus to such a degree that they gave their ALL. We are a continuation of that heritage that is from the time of the Apostles, braving the gauntlet of living in each century.

Look up the site for Butler’s Lives of the Saints to see the Church Authentic, the Church HOLY, venerating those who lived their lives faithfully with Christ as their center. It inspires me to this day. https://www.ecatholic2000.com/butler/lives.shtml and https://www.ecatholic2000.com/saints.shtml?src=tm

Remember that the Church HOLY moves forward in time, not backward, accumulating its crown of thorns and scourging at the pillar of each age, indeed, each person baptized with water and the HOLY Spirit, and so to become an adopted son or daughter of the Father. HOLY means that those who took Christ as their Lord and Savior become the feet and hands of Jesus in each age. The Institutional Church was founded by Christ so that you and I can be what we profess, adopted sons and daughters of the Father and heirs to God’s kingdom on earth and in heaven. My heritage is the worth and value of those multitude of witnesses to Christ, each in their own way, using the Church Universal in each generation to figure out what the way Christ left us to find the truth and so live a life on earth that prepares us for heaven. Along the centuries that the Church Universal wobbles back and forth in its search for the way, the truth that Jesus gave to the Apostles through the Holy Spirit, and all those ways He Instituted to give us grace through the Sacraments, the remnant of humanity guarded the core zealously (dogmas, Ecumenical Councils and Creeds) whille otherwise adapting to the changing complexity and consciousness of each crisis around them. The Church Universal is the compendium of this wisdom and knowledge, especially since its members, those in each age, are faithful to the calling of Jesus to keep His commandments, inherit the kingdom of heaven in heaven by living out their lives as adopted sons and daughters of the Father, until Jesus comes again in glory to judge the living and dead. The Church Universal is an institutional one, but not of this world. Christ is the head, and we are the living body. Those in heaven worship before the throne of the Lamb of God, those on earth still struggle with the effects of original sin and doing what is right according to how Jesus taught us, and those awaiting their purification in the place of second chances, Purgatory.

These four quantum strands that come from God to me and from me to God are lifelines from heaven to earth; each of them (one, holy, catholic, and apostolic) carries different aspects of who God is and how we are made in that image and likeness. These ties that bind are dynamic and produce the energy from God that all humanity, and especially me and you, needs to sustain our resolve to be aware that the only way to reach that next level of our evolution is by tapping into this energy through the living Body of Christ, the Church Universal.

And this is the quantum entanglement from God to the me’s in each generation, in each age. HOLY is that strand of enlightenment, that unbroken thread of energy moving inexorably forward in time, all the while growing in complexity and consciousness to reach that last phase of our human evolution. This one is not the race growing older, but each individual must choose to move to that next level of their humanity, an individual choice, not a collective one.

As one trying to have in me the mind of Christ Jesus by using Cistercian practices and charisms, each day I wake up and must remind myself that today is not yesterday. I must, over and over, seek mercy and forgiveness for my sins, be humbled to sit next to Christ on the couch of the upper room of my inner self, and wait in profound peace, profound love to have the one I love overshadow me with an energy not of this world. In every age, each individual has a reason for their actions and the ability to choose what is good or bad for them. In this last part of human evolutionary change, it is all about the individual choosing to follow the boundaries set forth by God for us to be human at that deepest level, or me setting my own boundaries using what I can scrape together within my lifetime. This choice does not have the energy to elevate me to the next level of maturation and intelligent progression. Only God can do that (Faith), and only if I, as an individual, ask for it. (Belief) I am HOLY when I tap into the four marks of the Church and use them as conduits back in time, using the same four lines that have come down (forward) through the centuries.

The HOLY church with sinful people (except for Christ and Mary) moves forward in space and time to provide ME with what I need to get to that next level of my human evolution, and so prepare myself for a life to come that defies human words. All I can say at this point in my life is, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me, a sinner,” and mean it from the bottom of my heart.

HOLY means that, as a member of the Body of Christ, I use what Christ has given to me, as handed down like a relay runner from person to person, from age to age, so that I can abandon my will to embrace that which is antithetical to my human experiences and thought processes, to become more than I ever could with just human energy.

LEARNING POINTS

• No one can say Jesus is Lord, says the Scriptures, without the Holy Spirit. If that is true, then those who have constructed what they think Jesus would have wanted in their relationship are to be judged by God and not anyone within the Church Universal. Who knows the mind and heart of each human but God, and God is merciful. Having said that, Jesus has left us instructions on how to get to heaven, and even more importantly, showed us how. The HOW is through the Catholic Church, not because it is better than anyone else, but because it has an unbroken line of tradition and traditions moving forward from Jesus to the present and to you and me and then back to Christ in a direct line of succession.
• If I, as a Catholic of the Roman Rite, read Scriptures as part of my Lay Cistercian practices, I go back to the time of the Apostles in an unbroken lineage of people of Faith who did the same thing down through the ages, I have roots. I have an unbroken chain of God’s energy as passed down through the Catholic Church in each age (and to make new wine in the hearts and minds of each individual who has been baptized).
• I can see and feel the quantum entanglements of ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, and APOSTOLIC, because I inherited this way as instituted by Christ to give me (and you) truth uncorrupted by the onslaughts of the world, so that I can lead a life that is reflective of the one that Christ wanted me to have, as he walked the shores of Galilee and taught the Beatitudes to the crowd. The link goes from the Apostles in their time to me and from me back to God’s energy, through the Catholic Church. Christ is the head of this Church Universal and is HOLY. The Church is given the authority to bind and loose, not only to St. Peter, but to the successors of the Apostles (Bishops), but it is composed of people like us who are prone to bad choices. Christ says I am the WAY, the TRUTH, and the LIFE. The Church Universal is that gathering of believers in each age and generation who are ONE in their adherence to the teachings of Christ, but do so as unique and individual Catholics. The Catholic Church is HOLY because all of the baptized are called to be HOLY and perfect, but live in a world of both good and bad choices for what it means to be fully human as nature intended. Christ says, “Learn of me for I am meek and humble of heart.” This is not a slogan to be sloughed off as a television commercial, but rather a way to die to self so that I (and you) can rise to that new level of spirituality, not through any earthly energy we have but by tapping into those quantum entanglements from God directly through the Old Testament, the New Testament, The Church Universal from Apostles to Pope Leo XIV through my diocesan Bishop of Pensacola-Tallahassee through to my parish, Good Shepherd, Talllahssee to me and from me to use the Cistercian practices and charisms so that Christ may increase and I decrease.
• Am I biased for the Catholic Universal, Roman Rite? I hope so in the best sense of those words.
• All four marks of the Church take on even more significance when I use them as a conduit from God to me and from me to God, through the Church. This is why we venerate Mary and the Saints throughout all the history of this banged-up group of faithful trying to make Jesus real to them in age without falling off the path of righteousness by deleting or altering what has been our heritage. Clothes and garments change, the political encumbrances of the Popes may wax and wane, but what is true and cherished about Christ is preserved from the time of the Apostles to the end of days.
• All Saints and we saints are HOLY when we do God’s will and not our own, when we have to struggle with our beliefs, asking God to help our unbelief. It is the struggle that gives me value in my personal pathway to Parousia, but it is also part of the struggle of the Church Universal to try to interpret Christ to those around us. The value of the Church Universal is not being HOLY as much as struggling to keep Christ centered as their Lord and Savior in the midst of onslaughts by the Devil.
• You may know people who are sincere yet prone to seek factions and emphasize the truth of the Church Universal, rather than quietly practicing the spiritual and corporal works of mercy with any fanfare. (Matthew 6:5)
• In the midst of all the seeming confusion that the Church experiences each day, which was always there from the time of the Apostles and will be there until the Second Coming of Christ in glory, HOLY means living a life of one who experiences the martyrdom of ordinary living. The four marks of the Church, rather than being an academic exercise for intellectual debates or determining which Church is the true one, are gifts from God for each individual one of us to TRY to be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect. The Church Universal is the branches, Christ is the trunk, and the Holy Spirit is the roots, but I am the one who, in my own way, can say “Thy will be done,” and produce good works as a result of my encounter with Christ through the four marks of the Church.
• Because the Church Universal is HOLY yet populated by flawed individuals who try to do God’s will through Christ using the energy from the Holy Spirit, I have the opportunity in silence and solitude to experience that same HOLINESS by going to that upper room in my inner self and sitting next to Jesus, then just waiting, supremely happy to be with the one I love.

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