The Importance of Being

The Moment of Conception
 
Take a moment and think of when God conceived you in his heart of Great Love.

It happened, You were conceived in God's love.  He 'knew you before you were born.'

Now consider a conceived child in the womb. Now the embryonic cells form the different parts to make a whole. Now the heart, mind, muscles, limbs form.  Now the mouth, eyes, ears, hands form.

Think of a human person conceived with an act of love moving and growing in the womb.  Now the child is born, straining to breath and cry and longing for love.

If I was conceived in God's love for me, before the beginning of time, it would make sense that God had also planned for me a soul at the moment of my conception. It is logical to assume that all persons conceived as embryonic stem-cells, whether through a loving or hateful or ambivalent acts, were conceived in the beginning by The Creator.  Thus, they have souls at the formation of DNA combining and developing to create a new person.

The Present Rational
 
Therefore, it is not rational for a nation of any people to serve themselves by denying the conceived person.

If the conceived person is recognized physically, then we must apply as a nation our national standard given by the constitution. "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

The general welfare would logically include the health of the unborn.

Then, if the conceived person is recognized as a creation of God and as one known before time, we must see that a conceived person falls under the domain of God before man. Humanae Vitae states: "Those who enjoy the gift of conjugal love, while respecting the laws of the generative process show that they acknowledge themselves to be not the masters of the sources of human life, but rather the ministers of the design established by the Creator."

The key portion, 'respecting the laws of the generative process.'

If we deny the conceived person physically and spiritually we harm not only that conceived person, but the many that surround him also.

The Modern Approach

The current discussions are a model of a state of disagreement. Take this portion of Plato's Republic and place it in the mouths of any rational politician.

"Is there anything worse for a state than to be split and fragmented, or anything better than cohesion and unity?" 
'No'
"And is not cohesion the result of the common feelings of pleasure and pain which you get when all members of a society are glad or sorry at the same successes and failures?"
'Certainly.'
"But cohesion is dissolved when feelings differ between individuals, and the same events, whether of public or individual concern, delight some and dismay others."
'Of course.' 
"And doesn't this happen when the members of society no longer agree in their use of the words "mine" and "not mine", "somebody else's" and "not somebody else's"?"
'That is very true.'
"So the best-ordered state is one in which as many people as possible use the words "mine" and "not mine" in the same sense of the same things."
'Much the best.'


Now, take a moment and think of when God conceived you in his heart of Great Love.

It happened, You were conceived in God's love.  He 'knew you before you were born.'

Now consider a conceived child in the womb. Now the embryonic cells form the different parts to make a whole. Now the heart, mind, muscles, limbs form.  Now the mouth, eyes, ears, hands form.

Think of a human person conceived with an act of love moving and growing in the womb.  Now the child is born, straining to breath and cry and longing for love.

Can you say, "Not Mine."  "Somebody Else's."


 

The Great Humility of the Manger

"When it is all over you will not regret having suffered; rather you will regret having suffered so little, and suffered that little so badly."
-- St. Sebastian Valfre

I may have written of it before, but I have had many Christmas Eve's where I was alone.

One in particular I remember, in search of Christ, I drove to the stables nearby. I knew there was a donkey that the owners were always mean too, but when I visited he always let me rub his forehead.

I thought that if I spent some time with him in the cold stable, I might be that much closer to Christ and die to my desires to be with family for Christmas Eve.

I don't know the donkey's name, but there he was and what a triumphant joy it brought to me to share some time with him. He was very smelly, as was everything at this stable, but I could always see in his eyes that he loved the love.

Christ looks with those infant eyes upon us from his crib of straw and invites all who suffer and are sorrowful to love. It is up to us to pray for those we love and join our suffering with Christ's as a small token of our gratitude for salvation through his living.

The Most Divine Dessert

The last lecture my professor in Fundamental Theology gave us was on doctrine.  I have this great metaphor for apples and apple pie, apple tart, baked apples, well you get the idea.
The apples are the principles, always staying the same, the doctrine always developing into something wonderful for the people, with the right guidance of course!  I didn't get to share my theory, professor was a football fan as soon as class let out.

From Dei Verbum
"This tradition which comes from the Apostles develops in the Church with the help of the Holy Spirit. For there is a growth in the understanding of the realities and the words which have been handed down. This happens through the contemplation and study made by believers, who treasure these things in their hearts through a penetrating understanding of the spiritual realities which they experience, and through the preaching of those who have received through Episcopal succession the sure gift of truth. For as the centuries succeed one another, the Church constantly moves forward toward the fullness of divine truth until the words of God reach their complete fulfillment in her.

This is Why I Love Jesuit Spirituality

Yes!  A New Jesuit Review disseminates what Ignatius intended.  This comes via WDTPRS, and I am so glad to have read it.

Please read the following article in it's full found on the New Jesuit Review.




Ignatian Spirituality and the Apostleship of Prayer by James Kubicki, S.J.

                 Saint Ignatius Loyola was not a monk who withdrew from the world in order to find God. Rather, he marked out a path by which active priests, religious, and lay people would find God in the midst of the world. Two phrases capture the essence of his approach....