THE ENERGY FROM GOD: THE AUTHENTIC CHURCH IS ONE.

To long to be present to Christ in the upper room of my inner self (Matthew 6:5) is to have anticipation of just being in the presence of the one you love, and waiting. To accompany me at all times in that highest form of Catholicism (one that makes a difference to me and where I can make a difference to it) I have the security of the quantum entanglements of the four marks of the Church. At this highest level of Catholicism, one where I alone translate what Christ taught through all five levels of the Church, these strands of God’s energy from Rock of Ages through to me, all take the same pathway, being a forward living Catholic (as opposed to someone right now who goes back to an already formed and neatly packaged doctine or Scripture).

It is the time the Church Militant took down through all those centuries, bloodied and bruised from trying to get it right one last time, that is the unspoken part of the Church that those who look back cannot replicate. They were not present back then when there was panic among the disciples when Jesus died, and there were only rumors of His being seen by others. They did not feel the fear that comes with not knowing what to do but being strongly directed to do it nonetheless. The martyrdom of blood was not the only death the early Church experienced. The martyrdom of having to take bits and pieces of Jewish Scriptures and traditions and make them into something where Christ would be present to them was, and still is, the notion that, in the end, we have Faith, Hope, and Love, but the greatest of these is Love. That Christ would entrust the development of his Church, now charged with moving to the next level of its evolution, to fallible and sinful humans is jaw-dropping. Peter, first among equals of the Apostles, was the least likely to succeed, yet Christ put His hands on Petrus and said He was the continuation of that Church that is inerably linked with the bedrock of God.

In the Old Testament, God promised a covenant that would not be broken and would last forever. The four marks of the Church are stark evidence of the continuity of the four marks from God through Abraham and the Prophets, fulfilled with the Incarnation of God as The Christ, passed on through the Church in each century as it moves forward to end up with me and how I use all of this rich heritage to love God with all my mind, all my heart and all my strength and my neibhror as myself. (Deuteronomy 6:5 and Matthew 22:36) The circle remains unbroken, and with a continuity that I can use as I try to become more like Christ and less like me (capacitas dei) each day (conversio morae).

MY CATHOLIC HERITAGE AS IT WOBBLES ITS WAY DOWN THE CENTURIES TO ME

John 20-21 speaks of the reason we have Scriptures to help give us stories and examples of what it means to love others as Christ loved us.

“Conclusion.^*

30 Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of [his] disciples that are not written in this book.^s

31 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.^t (John 20)

and again in John 21:

Conclusion.

24 It is this disciple who testifies to these things and has written them,^* and we know that his testimony is true.ⁿ

25 There are also many other things that Jesus did, but if these were to be described individually, I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written.^o“

What follows are some thoughts about a mark of the Church, ONE, and its implication for the Catholic Church as interpreted by My Catholic Faith using the four marks of the Church as boundaries. I wrote this list when I was in rehabilitation from Cardiac Arrest on April 2, 2025.

1. The Church Universal is the living embodiment of Christ in the NOW, who was, is, and will be at the end of the ages.
2. The Church Purgative is our second chance to make a first impression with Christ by once again trying to have in us the mind of Christ Jesus.
3. There is only ONE Church: those in heaven, those still struggling on earth, and those who must purify themselves in the Blood of the Lamb.
4. Each of these marks is not theoretical but is meant to help me (the individual Catholic) link up all the way back to the rock, The Rock of Ages.
5. The authentic way, the truth, and the life I must lead is when I tap into all those centuries of believers and realize that all humanity sings “Holy God, we praise Thy Name.”
6. ONE is the mark that mitigates against individualism (rationalism that what I believe is correct because I believe it), hijacking the meaning of Christ’s message to suit their own personal agenda.
7. ONE means there is only one way, one truth, and one life that comes forward, down through the centuries.
8. ONE is the dynamic and real relationship between me and God, using the energy that comes from the Holy Spirit through Christ to the glory of the Father.
9. ONE is a direct line of energy that exists through the Church that I can assess with Faith and Love. This forward energy moves with the tides of time, always adding consciousness and complexity to what it is, be it the individual or the Church Militant.
10. ONE is the infallible truth from God through Christ and accessed by the Church Militant, and ultimately means so that I can place myself in the presence of Christ and say, “My Lord and My God.”
11. ONE is the continuity and consistency from the bedrock, through Church Universe, and again manifested in time through the Church Militant, the living Body of Christ on earth, the local Church with the Bishop as the Christ figure for the community, and more specifically, the parish where I have a spiritual home.
12. Within this framework, moving forward down through the centuries, I come onto the scene and am faced with discovering my deepest level of humanity possible. The answer does not come from the world, but, paradoxically, is the opposite of what my human nature instinctively defaults to as I defend my turf. This is an unbroken lineage from God to me and makes itself available for me to place myself in the presence of God and wait, knowing that the love of Jesus will overshadow me in silence and solitude. ONE is that unbroken quantum thread of energy from God made just for me in each moment that I abandon my will to see a deeper reality to my humanity. I have all I need to make the jump from my humanity to the next level, spirituality, but with one exception. The mental universe (the one in which I find meaning and purpose) will not give me, by itself, the energy I need to move to that next level of my evolution. Natural selection may end with the physical universe and carry over onto the mental universe, but life moves inexorably forward in time, in the sense of adding complexity and consciousness, even to spirituality. (See the model in the Teilhard map. Unattributable).
13. The unique characteristics that mark a member of the human race from all other living things are the two qualities of human reasoning and free will to make decisions based on the choices of good or evil for me, right now, at this moment in time. Once these choices are made, time continues its relentless march toward its destiny, Point Omega (with God in heaven). Once made, any choice becomes part of who I am (the good as well as the bad). I have reason and free will to recognize that some choices will keep me stranded in the mental universe of the world. To rise to that next level of humanity, my deepest level and one that is established as the intelligent progression of my evolution, I must use my reason and free will of choice to abandon, strip away all that I know is true, what love is, and all that I have learned will make me happy in this life, to embrase an invisible and undefinable reality, to choose the opposite of what I know, what I can see with my senses, and my cherished freedom to choose what is good for me, to enter the kingdom of heaven on earth that leads to fulfilling my humanities longing for resonance to the dissonance of original sin.
14. ONE is not just an arithmetic number but rather a span of control that is the energy of God and into which I can tap, if I am baptized and confirmed in the Holy Spirit. ONE links me as I live out what remains of my time on earth with the power needed for me to look back on my heritage (most of which I have no clue) with a golden thread of energy from Christ, through the ONE Church, to me the only ONE in existence who can use these marks of the Church to claim my inheritance as an adopted son (daughter) of the Father on earth. It is no accident that the Nicene Creed begins with, “I believe in God…).
15. ONE is the link between God and me, but forward in time from Christ to every day, not backward
16. I use the Scriptures with all the drama that comes from centuries of humans trying to decipher what is good and what is bad for them. For me to pick up the Scriptures today and read them, if I am not authorized to do so by the weight of all those events and people who have contributed to its tradition, is to have the words but not a link from me to God by being ONE.
17. God is ONE, but the never-ending story of people trying to figure out what it means and how it fits into their view of what humanity looks like is as diverse as each individual human who has ever lived. ONE is the span of the energy of God from the basement of the building through the five layers of the Church Universe, so that I can say, “Jesus is Lord.
18. ONE links me up directly, through the Church, through all the centuries in an instant, so that I can choose to live in the presence of Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. It is no wonder that an early Church saying was, “Outside the Church, there is no salvation.”

Next up is the topic: The authentic Church is Holy.

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