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The Object of our Desire

05 Monday Feb 2018

Posted by Fr. Moore in Uncategorized

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Memorial of St. Agatha

Mark 6:53-56
And when they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret, and moored to the shore. And when they got out of the boat, immediately the people recognized him, and ran about the whole neighborhood and began to bring sick people on their pallets to any place where they heard he was. And wherever he came, in villages, cities, or country, they laid the sick in the market places, and besought him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment; and as many as touched it were made well.

“…immediately the people recognized Him…”

Why is it that the people immediately recognized Jesus? The people had heard of a miracle worker who could bring healing to those who are sick. And this is why they sought Him out. At this time they did not know who Jesus really was. After all, that was a point for His miracles, that the people could gradually come to understand who He is – the Son of God. But they did not know this at this time, they only knew what He could do. They recognized Him only as the the fulfillment of their desires. In essence, when they saw Him it was as the answer of “what can you do for me?”

Now let us ask in what way did St. Agatha recognize Christ? Her recognition of Christ was completely different from the people in today’s Gospel. When she looked upon Christ it was not as the one who would bring fulfillment to her desires. Instead, when she looked on Christ she recognized the object of her desire. Her question to Christ was not “what can you do for me?” but, “what can I do for you?” She had a proper understanding of who Jesus Christ is – the Son of God and Lord of the Universe. And it is through this proper understanding and through her recognition of Christ as the object of her desire that she received the grace from God to endure her cruel martyrdom.

As Christians we too are called to recognize Christ in the way that St. Agatha did: as the One who is the object of our desire. In our pilgrimage of faith, though, we all begin at different points along the path of following Christ; some of us are closer to those in today’s Gospel and others are closer to St. Agatha. But unlike those in today’s Gospel, who may be excused for recognizing Christ incorrectly as merely the fulfillment of their desires, we must learn to always recognize Christ as did St. Agatha – the true Object of our desire and to whom we should only ask, “What can I do for you?”

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Lewis on the Presence of Christ

03 Tuesday Jun 2014

Posted by Fr. Moore in C.S. Lewis, Presence of Christ, Promises of Christ, Thought for the Day, Uncategorized

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Faith

I believe this is the first time I have posted something from Narnia but there is good reason for doing so. Narnia is much more than stories to entertain children – Lewis wrote them for a purpose: to teach truths that are otherwise hard to explain. (At least that is what I remember from something else Lewis wrote on his understanding of myth.) And in a world where we are so wrapped up in only those things that we can see this passage can teach us all – children and adults – something very important: that what we perceive with our senses is not all that exists. Take the Blessed Sacrament for example – what appears to be before us is bread and wine when in reality it is the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinty of Jesus Christ. I bring this up as an example because it seems to me that Lewis is trying to teach us about the presence of Jesus in the following passage. (Nevermind that he was an Anglican and, therefore, the Mass he attended was invalid and therefore Jesus was not physically present in the Eucharistic service Lewis attended. Let us look beyond that – as we should with everything that comes from a non-Catholic author – to the Truth that is contained within it.)

[Lucy] turned on and found to her surprise a page with no pictures at all; but the first words were A Spell to make hidden things visible. She read it through to make sure of all the hard words and then said it out loud. And she knew at once that it was working because as she spoke the colors came into the capital letters at the top of the page and the pictures began appearing in the margins. It was like when you hold to the fire something written in Invisible Ink and the writing gradually shows up; only instead of the dingy color of lemon juice (which is the easiest Invisible Ink) this was all gold and blue and scarlet. . . . And then she thought, “I suppose I’ve made everything visible, and not only the Thumpers. There might be lots of other invisible things hanging about a place like this. I’m not sure that I want to see them all.” At that moment she heard soft, heavy footfalls coming along the corridor behind her; and of course she remembered what she had been told about the Magician walking in his bare feet and making no more noise than a cat. It is always better to turn round than to have anything creeping up behind your back. Lucy did so.

Then her face lit up till, for a moment (but of course she didn’t know it), she looked almost as beautiful as that other Lucy in the picture, and she ran forward with a little cry of delight and with her arms stretched out. For what stood in the doorway was Aslan himself, the Lion, the highest of all High Kings. And he was solid and real and warm and he let her kiss him and bury herself in his shining mane. And from the low, earthquake-like sound that came from inside him, Lucy even dared to think that he was purring.

“Oh, Aslan,” said she, “it was kind of you to come.”

“I have been here all the time,” said he, “but you have just made me visible.”

“Aslan!” said Lucy almost a little reproachfully. “Don’t make fun of me. As if anything I could do would make you visible!”

“It did,” said Aslan. “Do you think I wouldn’t obey my own rules?”

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis

Aslan (Jesus) makes an important point here – if God says He will do something then He will do it! “Lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.” (Matthew 28:20b, RSV-CE) Even though we may not experience Him with our senses (i.e. we do not see His human body) we must believe He is with us because He has promised to be.

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Good Article about Dietrich von Hildebrand

19 Thursday Dec 2013

Posted by Fr. Moore in Uncategorized

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Almost 14 years ago, before I had met him, a good friend of mine wrote an article about Dietrich von Hildebrand. I recently found this article when I was trying to do some research about von Hildebrand. It is a fairly long article but does give some very good insight into the thinking of von Hildebrand. The author is Thomas Howard, who is a Catholic author (many of his books are published by Ignatius Press) and is also the man who, more than any other man on this earth, I credit with leading me into the Catholic Church.

The article can be found here. While you are looking that article up why not click here and see some of Thomas Howard's books. The first two listed – On Being Catholic & Evangelical is Not Enough – are both very good.

Posted with BlogsyPosted with Blogsy

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Fr. Moore

Fr. Moore

Parochial Vicar Our Lady of the Atonement San Antonio, Texas FrMoore@truthwithboldness.com

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