I don't have to go to Mass to be a good Catholic, or do I?

I don't have to go to Mass to be a good Catholic, or do I?


Someone may say: I don't have to go to Holy Mass to be a good Catholic; I'm a good person? I don't hurt anyone. I'm no worse then anyone else and in fact I'm a lot better then many of those who go to Church. Anyway, going to Mass makes you no more of a Christian then entering a stable makes you a horse.

To this I will respond with the following points:

1: No prayer can compare to the prayer of Christ. If, however the prayer that you pray at home can possibly top that of God's only begotten Son then do not be greedy; let the whole Church know and we will surely gather at your house next Sunday and every other Sunday from now on. P.s We will bring the towels to wipe up the blood you shed as apart of your sacrifice as well we will bring the Sacred Chalices so that having rung the towels out over the Chalices we may drink the price of our salvation at your expense. After all, Sacred Scripture does state, “Without the shedding of Blood there can be no remission of sin.” Are you sure, however, that you can afford to make this sacrifice each week because each of us are sinners and fall into sin weekly even daily and will need to make recourse to the cleansing power of blood sacrificially shed? I ask this since you are not eternal and hence you will have to offer your sacrifice each and every Sunday; unlike that Sacrifice offered by Christ, which being eternal only had to be offered once and this in a perpetual way so that others at any time may benefit from His shed blood. Can you really die each week? If you are up to it please let me know. You can reach me at 1-800-I am-confused.

2: The social nature of the human being points to the reasonableness of gathering with other Christians to celebrate what Christ has accomplished and made available to all who will receive it. I have never heard the sound of one hand clapping and I doubt that I ever will. Do you ever go to parties? Why not stay at home and enjoy your glass of red wine or couple of beer in the privacy of your own room? It sounds kind of strange, doesn't it. After all, something worth celebrating is worth celebrating with others. While the Holy Mass is not a party it is a celebration that is truly out of this world. It is a celebration of cosmic proportions. It is the celebration and triumph of life over death, grace over sin. The social nature of humanity also speaks to the validity of this statement, 'a sorrow shared is a sorrow cut in two.' We have being created by God from our conception to exist within a community namely, the human family, and by extension we live out our lives in the context of communities. Having created us, God knows much better then us what we need to live a fully human life. If in God's wisdom, he saw fit to plant us in the context of families and societies then are we going to disregard this plan when it relates to the spiritual realm which is the Church or in other words the family of God.
Have you ever loved two friends very dearly, friends who do not love one another yet not necessarily hating one another either? Then you know the feeling of wanting unity among them. Is this not the feeling of the child whose parents are divorced yet his or her love for each parent is quite deep. Doesn't this child want the reunion of his/her parents? Doesn't the child's love hunger for this unity?
Love desires that what is loved may be united with all other things or persons that are loved. Christ loves me. He loves you. The perfection of His love hungers for a true union of love between us whom He loves. If we claim to love Him, truly love Him that is, then we will also love His loves, or are we spiritually divorced from our Lover's loves. The perfection of this union happens through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in our reception of Holy Communion, which is the heart of the Beloved beating uncontrollably. To gaze upon the Beloved without seeing in His darling eyes the reflection of all that He loves is to be truly blind to Divine Love.

3: The Christian life begins at Baptism, when the Holy Spirit imprints upon the human soul the life of the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. In Baptism the soul is immersed into the communion of the three Divine Persons of the Holy Trinity and is therefore radically oriented toward being relational. For the Christian, the life they receive in Baptism demands that it be lived out in the context of their brothers and sisters who have also been immersed into the same communion of Divine Persons. Within the celebration of Baptism each person, child or adult, is not only immersed in holy water three times as the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is invoked but is also anointed with Sacred Chrism just as Christ was anointed by the Holy Spirit as priest, prophet and king. In the Old Testament, priests, prophets and kings were the only ones anointed and this anointing always entailed a mission or task. This vocation or call to mission was always to be lived out in the context of the community of faith, for every gift received is a gift to be shared and that is what makes a gift, namely, the ability to bring people together in unity. This Sacred Chrism with which the Baptized are anointed is blessed by the Bishop alone. No one else can bless holy oil for sacramental purposes except for a priest in emergency situations. So the fact that the Bishop alone can bless this oil with which all the Baptized are anointed points to a unity existing among the baptized which finds its visible manifestation in the Bishop who is in each territory, which is also known as a diocese, the sign of Christ the good shepherd. So to be a Christian is to be Baptized and to be Baptized is to be anointed and to be anointed is to be signed with Sacred Chrism which is blessed by the Bishop. As the central figure of unity within each diocese the Bishop is the connection that each Christian has with Jesus Christ for the Bishop is the visible link between us and Christ who conferred on the Apostles who were the first Bishops of the Church the power and authority to confer the grace of Baptism upon all Christians so that they may be one just as the Father and Son are one in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus also said that He is the vine and that Christians are the branches. The logical conclusion of this statement is this: if I am united to Christ who is the Vine as a branch, I am automatically united to those other branches which are also united to Christ. If I am united to Christ I cannot deny the fact that I am also united to other baptized Christians. So to live as if I am not united to other Baptized Christians is a cause for reflection upon whether I am really united to Christ or not. I cannot possess Jesus as if He is mine alone. I cannot have a 'me and Jesus' Christianity. I cannot privatize the Vine nor the faith of the Church. If I seek to, I am in no respect faithful to the Gospel message of Jesus. It is through the Holy Sacrament of Baptism that we are grafted on to Christ the Vine as branches. To receive the gift of being grafted on to the Vine, which is Christ, we must not fail to acknowledge our responsibility to the other branches to which we are united through Christ. It is at Holy Mass that we gather to celebrate the Vine and our union with Him and pray for the strengthening of our union with Him and one another.
The anointing we received in Baptism continues the Priesthood of Jesus Christ. The heart of Priesthood is sacrifice and St. Peter tells us in his letter that as the baptized we are called to offer spiritual sacrifices through Christ to the Father. What in essence is being said by St. Peter is that the Baptized are called to unite the daily sacrifice of their lives with the Holy Sacrifice of Christ celebrated in the Holy Mass to God the Almighty Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit. It is only in union with Christ's Holy Sacrifice that our daily sacrifices become a pleasing fragrance before the throne of God the Almighty Father in heaven.

4: Jesus says in John's Gospel, 'if you love Me you will keep my commands.' On the night before Christ died we celebrated the Passover meal with his disciples. While at Table He took bread in His sacred hands and having given thanks He broke the bread and gave it to them saying, “Take this all of you and eat it, this is My body which will be given up for you.” He then took the cup and having given thanks He gave the cup to His disciples saying, “Take this all of you and drink from it, this is the cup of My blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant, it will be shed for you and for all, so that sins may be forgiven, do this in memory of Me.” As we can see, the celebration of the Last Supper is a command from Jesus. This command is the heart of the Holy Mass in which we receive the substantial presence of Christ in His Body and Blood although in a sacramental manner.(This sacramental manner does not mean, however, and I repeat, this does not mean that Holy Communion is a symbol of Christ's Body and Blood. Rather this Sacramental presence of Christ in what appears to be ordinary bread and wine is in fact the body and blood of Christ who is God. Is this not the most awesome mystery possible, so awesome in fact that Jesus knew that His divine presence in Holy Communion would boggle the minds of His Church that He had to command her to “do this in memory of Me.” If we say we love Christ, we must love Him as He has asked us to love Him and if we don't then our love for Him is not real. It is only lip service. To love Christ therefore is to keep His commands and He commanded us to gather to celebrate His Divine presence in Holy Communion.

5: To build upon what was said in #4 we must look to chapter 6 of John's Gospel in which Jesus says, “unless you eat and drink the flesh and blood of the Son of Man then you have no life in you.” We need to eat and drink His Body and Blood on the threat that we will not have life in us if we do not. Those who faithfully eat and drink His Body and Blood are also given the promise not only of life, but life eternal. This is why Holy Communion is spoken of as the Medicine of Immortality. Who wants to live forever? Then Holy Mass here we come.

6: The Holy Sacrifice of Calvary is not a mere abstraction that happening nearly 2000 years ago saves us. Rather this Holy Sacrifice is concretely present to us at each Mass as time gently bows its head and genuflects as eternity shines for a brief 60 minutes. The Holy Sacrifice is eternal. It happened in time but because it was an offering of the Eternal Son of God it has an eternal quality which transcends the limits of time. This eternal quality Christ alone can accomplish and He perpetuates this Holy Accomplishment in every day and age by tightly and intimately hugging the man He calls to be Himself so as to conceive in this man's soul by the working of the Holy Spirit the same who was conceived in the womb of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ the Author and finisher of our faith.
The historical significance of Calvary is not our salvation if we understand its significance as something we intellectually lassoe through faith some twenty centuries later. Rather the historical significance of Calvary becomes significant for us by virtue of its eternal significance. The historical significance of Calvary acknowledges the eternal significance of Calvary, because it is not bound to the limits of time. It is this eternal significance, which is perpetuated in the Holy Mass that enables all people of every period in history to work out their salvation with fear and trembling albeit in an unbloodied manner according to the Sacramental will of God. This eternal significance is perpetuated because Christ has mirrored Himself, His very Self in the souls of those men whom He has called to Himself so as to continue His saving mission.
The Priest is Christ in your midst, who daily offers His one-time sacrifice. If you are to be saved you must unite yourself to Him. Christ forever lives to intercede for us and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass celebrated daily on Altars throughout the world is this 'Intercession'. Just as Christ said, 'without Me you can do nothing', these words are equally true of the Priest in our midst, who is at the head of the Church. Without the Priest we can do nothing for he is Christ in our midst and he has the marks to show it albeit in his soul, which is symbolically expressed in and by his ecclesiastical attire, which worn faithfully serves as a reminder to himself and the world around him of his consecration.
We are not saved by ourselves but by Christ alone. It is Christ who gives us the Liturgy; we do not concoct our salvation. It is by uniting ourselves to Christ as His body that we pass beyond the veil. Salvation is entirely gift and this stems from the saving sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, who in Himself is the Priest. Therefore when you prayerfully gather for Holy Mass with your eyes you see a mere man but by the power of the Holy Spirit before you stands another Christ to whom you must humbly unite yourselves if you would be saved for there is no other name given under Heaven by which we can be saved and this name and identity are engraved in the soul of the man who becomes priest so that Christ being in your presence can save your soul.

7: God has willed to express Himself and His plan of salvation in this world in a sacramental manner. The world sacrament means: A visible sign of an invisible reality. It is also a visible sign of an invisible grace. So God makes the mystery of Himself and His saving grace, which is necessary for our salvation, present through visible signs and symbols. The Sacraments are also guarantees of God's grace. Though God may offer His grace to us at any time and in any place as He chooses He has given His word that the Sacraments which number up to 7 will guarantee the transmission of grace each and every time they are received. In the Sacraments we are guaranteed a grace filled encounter with God. Why not choose what God has willed to offer us as a sure path to Him. These Sacraments form the backbone of the Church's life with the Most Blessed of the Sacraments being the Heart of the Church's life namely the Eucharist which is the source and summit of the Catholic Christian life celebrated in each and every Holy Mass.

8: Many hands make light work. The Gospel speaks about Christian mission-we are sent out in two's. Jesus did not say, 'you go home and I will come later.' Rather, He said, 'go out into all the neighboring towns and villages to which I myself will also come.' Love is not love which does not seek to go out of itself for the other and Christian mission is directed at bringing the love Christ has for us to others so as to attract them to communion with Christ.

9: When the Lord Jesus returns in His great glory, He will be returning for His Bride which is His mystical Body. He is not returning only for her big toe which chose to be hidden away from the rest of the mystical Body in some sock drawer.

10: The Church building is Holy because it was consecrated. In other words, it has been set apart for the worship of God. To use an analogy and not meaning to be irreverent by means of the analogy I ask does a person pee in the kitchen or sleep in the porch? No, people pee in washrooms and they sleep in bedrooms. These places have been designated for good order. So in a worldly sense even the non-religious see the purpose of 'consecrating' or setting apart times and places for certain things. How much more should we as children of God acknowledge the Consecration that the Church building has received for prayer and worship?

11: Jesus says, 'a city built on a hill cannot be hidden,' and 'no one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel basket.' We must share our talents with the community. We cannot be selfish about such gifts. Our vocation is a calling to bear fruit for the whole Church. We all have belly buttons don't we? They serve to remind us that we can't survive on our own and that we are dependent upon others. Baptism in a real sense is like a spiritual belly button which leaves us dependent upon Holy Mother Church for our spiritual survival. In the spiritual level, however, we cannot sever our umbilical cord lest we wish to impale ourselves upon our own ego. The Church for the Baptized is what the Dialysis machine is for the person with kidney failure.
Who ever heard of a banana tree eating its own fruit? It is always picked and disseminated to others who rejoicing in it give praise to God for it recognizing that though the bananas came from the banana tree the ultimate source of the trees fruitfulness comes from God.
Laughing is always more enjoyable when you have someone to laugh with because the other person's laughter can serve as an occasion for our own laughter to be intensified. Let our gifts and talents therefore be the same in the service of God.

12: You may say, 'I am basically a good person...” The error in this kind of thinking is of such a kind that it doesn't take into account the truth that Jesus Christ is the standard. So for example: You may be able to jump 15 feet long distance and I may only be able to jump 10 feet and so you may say about yourself, 'I don't need to go to the gym to work on my jumping because in comparison I am a pretty good jumper.' But what if we are asked to jump the Grand Canyon? If you can jump twice your normal distance on that day and I can jump three times my normal distance that same day the reality is that both of us are going to plummet to our death's because the task before us is beyond comparative success. Christ alone can bridge the gap and this with His Cross. Remember that there is an infinite degree of perfection between Christ and us with Him being the standard. So what was it we were saying about being basically good persons not needing to go to Holy Mass?

13: You say, 'I can pray at home.' Let me ask you, 'What does your prayer consist of? Are you always asking for something? Looking to be bailed out? How would you like it if the one you loved the most in this life treated you the same? Is God, the Beloved of your soul or simply a cosmic ATM machine from whom you get what you want and then abandon until the next time you're in need? Shame on us if we treat Divine Love with such ingratitude?
Prayer is a conversation of love; it is not a one way street. Through God will speak to you anywhere if you open yourself up to Him, His preference is to speak to you at the Holy Mass. At home you may speak to Him, but He likes to speak as well, and this through the heart of His Son torn asunder on the Cross perpetuated at every Holy Mass.

Indulgences

(An indulgence is the extra-sacramental remission of the temporal punishment due, in God's justice, to sin that has been forgiven, which remission is granted by the Church in the exercise of the power of the keys, through the application of the superabundant merits of Christ and of the saints, and for some just and reasonable motive.) The above definition of an Indulgence was taken from www.newadvent.org


If I really loved You, Lord, I would embrace every opportunity to grow in faith, hope and love. Do I seek out indulgences to better prepare my soul to be free of the temporal punishments due to sin so that I may not tease You with my love by delaying our union after this life by having to undergo further purification?
I know that Divine Love is not impatient but He does deserve my greatest efforts in working toward perfection in this life so that I may not cause His perfect love to wait for me on account of the slowness of my love.
Grant me a true hunger for indulgences so that I may not be accountable for neglecting the knowledge I have today with regard to how I could have better prepared myself for eternity.
May I not rob 'Love' of a Milli-second of my love by neglecting to use all the graces at my disposal for my greater sanctification and lasting union with the Divine Bridegroom of my soul.
Lord, in Your great mercy admit the Holy Souls into Your Thrice Holy presence. Amen

Homily on The Fatherhood of God, 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time Luke 11:1-13 cycle C

In today's Holy Gospel, Our Blessed Lord responds to the request of one of His disciples by teaching them how to pray. The Lord's Prayer or the Our Father as it is most commonly known is the model prayer for all Christians. In teaching His disciples this prayer the Lord Jesus was revealing then as now that the First Divine Person of the Most Holy Trinity is Father. In the Old Testament God is called Father 11 times while in the New Testament He is called Father 170 times.
But why do we call God Father? No doubt many of us may have asked ourselves this question in addition to ones like it such as: is God male or female, can God be called mother? If God is neither male nor female then why is God called Father?
The very fact that our Blessed Lord calls the First Person of the Trinity Father is reason enough. But let us explore these questions a little more in-depth so as to deepen our knowledge and love of the Father whom Jesus reveals in His very own prayer, the prayer which becomes ours through the grace of Holy Baptism.
God, as Holy Mother Church teaches is neither male nor female, He is Spirit. Yet, however, the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity who with the Father and the Holy Spirit is one God did become a human being and more specifically became a male human being. So in one sense a person who claims that God is male is correct in so far as they are speaking about the mystery of the Incarnation.
God has imprinted or stamped upon our bodies a theology that we cannot escape. Our bodies are filled with theological meaning. So given the fact that Jesus had a male anatomy does this justify the belief that men are superior to women? Of course not. But it does certainly teach us something about the first Person of the Most Holy Trinity. For in addition to becoming a human being so as to put an end to sin and the empty promises of the devil, Jesus came to reveal the first Person of the Most Holy Trinity and He did so as Father. So was Jesus' male anatomy a product of chance? Was it assumed so as to appease a male-dominated/patriarchal society? Or was it a necessary element of His mission? In other words, did Jesus, the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity who has existed eternally with the Father and the Holy Spirit, intentionally choose a male anatomy with full freedom motivated only by His mission, a mission which is inseparable from His very own Person? Aided by Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition Holy Mother Church confidently proclaims the strength of our Blessed Lord, who is not weak minded or easily pushed around by the passsing shadows of cultures and societal taboos. We see one example of this in Our Lord's conversation with the Samaritan Woman at the well, an action heavily frowned upon by the Rabbi's of Jesus' day.
Jesus chose a male anatomy precisely because He wanted to proclaim the Mystery of His Father, who through Baptism has become Our Father also. Jesus' choice to have a male body is also a reflection of His desire to uncover the original meaning of what it meant to be male and female according to God's creative plan and intent. God's creative plan entailed the reality of sexual differentiation and the call to experience the fruitfulness of sexual complementarity. Both this differentiation and complementarity are in God's creative plan aimed at revealing the Mystery of Himself and our call to participate in His Divine life.
In what way then does sexual differentiation and complementarity reveal this mystery? A prudent reflection upon the sexual anatomy of both male and female reveals the call to communion that exists between man and woman within the confines of holy Matrimony. It also reveals that the male anatomy expresses itself as a gift which the female anatomy is designed to receive. The male anatomy is designed therefore to initiate and the female anatomy is designed to receive. This differentiation and complimentarity speak to a much deeper truth, which they as symbols herald through their bodies. This truth involves the mystery of Masculine Personality and Feminine Personality. Masculine Personality is characterized by 'giving' or 'initiating', whereas the Feminine Personality is characterized by 'receiving' and 'dependence'. Now while these personalities are expressed visibly by one specific anatomy, ie. Masculine personality=male anatomy and Feminine personality=female anatomy this does not mean that a man does not possess to varying degrees this feminine personality or that a woman does not possess to varying degrees masculine personality. What this does say, however, is that a male anatomy reveals the truth of masculine personality while the female anatomy reveals the feminine personality. The whole of this revelation transcends the horizontal meaning that it has for the relationship existing between men and women by symbolically pointing us to the vertical meaning that it inherently makes visible, a meaning that teaches us about God and our relationship to Him. God is completely masculine in His personality while in relationship to Him all of creation bears a feminine personality. As a result we see the covenant language of the Holy Bible characterized by spousal analogy. In the Old Testament we read that God is the Divine Bridegroom of His holy people Israel who is spoken of as bride. This analogy is carried over into the New Testament and given it's fullest expression in the new covenant established by Christ the Divine Bridegroom with His bride the Church, a covenant sealed with the Blood of His Cross.
So this analogy works itself out like this:
God and Israel
Christ and Church
Bridegroom and Bride
Male and Female
From the Fatherhood of God flows the esteem in which Holy Mother Church defends the Traditional definition of Marriage as the covenant capable of existing between one man and one woman witnessed and blessed by Christ's representative the Priest.
This also touches on the issue of those men and women who have been born with or possibly cultured into a homosexual orientation. By it's nature a union of this type obscures and dismisses the very reality of God's covenant love for the world which is seen in Christ's love for His bride the Church and by Sacramental extension in the love expressed between man and woman within the confines of Holy Matrimony.
Finally, the Fatherhood of God which Jesus reveals through everything He does and says sheds light on the issue of a male oriented Priesthood. Without a proper education in the theology that is inherently present within our bodies as male and female this particular point could simply be dismissed as an issue of inequality that has it's roots in a patriarchal era. In fact this is why the Priest is called Father because as the representative of Christ through Holy Orders he is empowered to continue the mission of Jesus which is to uncover and destroy the works of satan and to reveal the first Person of the Most Holy Trinity whom Jesus in today's Gospel teaches us to call Father through the intimacy of prayer.
Any attempt to divinize the earth, which is common among the adherents of mother earth worship is to deny or at least obscure the Fatherhood of God. It is to reject that God is a loving Father from whom every grace and blessing flows. Supporters of mother earth who place a god-like quality upon creation are deceived and when persistent in this error after having been informed are seriously dangerous to others not to say anything about their own spiritual condition. Mother earth worship is much like the story told in the Book of Genesis about Adam and Eve who instead of waiting upon and trusting in the Fatherhood of God to provide for them they chose at the instigation of satan, father of lies, to reach out their hands and take instead of receiving as God had intended. They got caught up in the gift and not the true gift, which is the Giver of the gift. Is this not what mother earth worship does? It sees the gift of the earth as the Giver of the gift which we can be at one with as if it were the underlying principle of all existence as is common among various strains of Hindu and Buddhist belief (the belief that there is one reality that we must work toward so as to be freed from the false sense of the self). In essence mother earth worship denies the distinction between us and God by placing a godlike quality upon the earth which we must strive to be at one with. This pursuit leaves little space for the necessary mediation of Jesus Christ in experiencing perfection. The Fatherhood of God reveals our creatureliness and our utter and complete dependence upon the generous and all loving God who created us. Mother earth worship removes this sense of dependence by replacing it with a sense of mutual exchanges thereby limiting the need to acknowledge one's dependence. Mother earth worship is in my estimation characterized by pride, impersonalism and intolerance toward rightful distinctions.
In the story of Adam and Eve it was they who took the initiative, which is the prerogative of God. They were implicitly denying their creatureliness by not acknowledging the limits placed upon them. Their action revealed an unwillingness to be Feminine in their relationship with God, they were not going to simply stand by and wait upon someone else to offer hand-me-downs.
Yet in God's punishment upon the Woman He says that her giving birth will be characterized by pain and yet her desire will be for the Man. Does this not also carry within it according to the same theology stamped upon their bodies that even though humanity lifted up it's foot against the Fatherhood of God in the Garden our deepest desire is still for Him, a gift however which can only be received not taken. The punishment levied against the Man entailed making his livelihood by the sweat of His Brow. Was this not the plight of the Son of Man, The Christ who in making a livelihood for His family had to undergo the sweat of His brow on the wood of the Cross so as to mediate between the Father and the Woman the possible union that was her desire in the midst of her suffering. The woman symbolic of the whole human race injured her relationship with the Fatherhood of God by overstepping her bounds and yet despite her sin her desire for divinity would not be diminished but rather it would be given birth only with great difficulty. Is this giving birth not indicative of humanity's interior struggle with self mastery which will happen only by it's union with the Man who will make fruitful her attempts by laying down his life on the wood of the Cross thereby initiating the plan of salvation by the sweat of His brow. In this story as the Father levies out punishment He does so not only upon humanity but upon His own divinity which would be subjected to the pain of a frail human nature torn and ripped asunder on the Cross.
Today, let us give thanks to God for revealing the very mystery of salvation in the theology imprinted upon our bodies. Let us be proud to be a male or a female acknowledging that our particular body proclaims symbolically the mystery of Christ's sacrificial love for the Church and the Church's response to Christ of reception through the sacred action of 'Remembrance', which is the mystery of the Father's love for the world, a love that flows from His initiative. May our sins never blind us to the perpetual truth of this mystery proclaimed so well in John's Gospel, "For God so loved the world that 'He gave' His only begotten Son so that all who believe (receive Him in faith) may not perish but have everlasting life.