The Blessed Virgin Mary at Zeitoun – July 27, 2020

The Blessed Virgin Mary praying before the Cross on St. Mary’s Coptic Church

The Blessed Virgin Mary and a dove above St. Mary’s Coptic Church

What was the most prolifically witnessed apparition of the Virgin Mary in the 20th century? Most would say Our Lady of Fatima in 1917 Portugal, where approximately 70,000+ people witnessed the Miracle of the Sun. This, however, would be incorrect. The most prolifically witnessed miracle of the Virgin Mary in the 20th century, and perhaps ever, was at Zeitoun, Egypt from 1968 to 1971. Zeitoun, Egypt is one of the locations where the Holy Family supposedly stopped on their flight to Egypt, fleeing King Herod’s murder of the innocents some nineteen centuries earlier. From April 2, 1968 to May 29, 1971, the Virgin Mary appeared weekly on average, especially around feast days, on top of St. Mary’s Coptic Church in Zeitoun for all to see. This was not something just witnessed in a mystical vision, but it was a supernatural experience of sight and olfactory senses perceived by massive crowds of people over a few years. This was ontologically different from previous Marian apparitions. In addition, this occurred in a predominantly Muslim country and at a Coptic Church, perhaps the reason why Catholics are less familiar with it.

The Blessed Virgin Mary was witnessed by at least hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions, including Copts, Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, and even secular Marxists, like the former Egyptian President Abdel Nasser. This supposedly greatly influenced him in his relations with Christians, who at the time were being targeted by having red crosses painted on their houses to mark them. This was also a time of rapid expansion of Islamic fundamentalism. Perhaps, Mary had come to mollify these tensions against Copts and Christians in this very vulnerable time. Egypt had recently been defeated by Israel ten months earlier in the June 1967 Six-Day War. The Zeitoun years were a turning point from the ’67 war to the Camp David Accords, and finally, a peace treaty with Israel in 1979, on the one hand, and deeper into Islamism and the Muslim Brotherhood on the other.

Yet, the miraculous nature of the apparitions could not be overlooked and drew Egyptians’ full attention. Black and white photographs exist showing a brightly luminous being, the Blessed Virgin Mary on top the Church. The apparitions would begin with a ball of light gradually materializing, and then, taking on the form of the Virgin Mary. One described Mary as “bright as a million suns.” They called her Our Lady of Light. She was accompanied by other phenomenon as well. Large, luminous doves moved swiftly across the sky, and at times flying in formations of two, seven or twelve, and in the shape of a cross. Incense as from “millions of censors” billowed up around her with a sweet fragrance. There were mysterious flashing lights, a canopy of shooting stars, like “a shower of diamonds made of light,” as one witness recalled. Many miraculous healings occurred too, from blindness, polio, paralysis, cripples, cancer and terminal illness. There were also spiritual conversions of Muslims and others to Christianity.

The Vatican made no official statement on its authenticity but deferred to the Coptic Orthodox Church. The Coptic Church investigated the matter and determined it was an authentic and true phenomenon. The civil government as well concluded that something real was happening at Zeitoun. At one point, the authorities even investigated a fifteen-mile radius for electronic devices and cut all power off to the area to create a blackout, yet Mary continued to appear.

The story begins much earlier, however, around 1920, when a Coptic Christian, Tawfik Khalil Abraham, who owned this spot of land in Zeitoun, was about to build a hotel there. Then, the Blessed Virgin Mary visited him in a dream requesting instead that he build a Coptic Church in her honor. If he did so, she promised to perform a miracle there sometime in the future. In 1925, the Coptic Orthodox Church of St. Mary was completed. Then, as promised, the miracle happened years later beginning on April 2, 1968. Two Muslim parking garage attendants noticed a woman on the top of the Church and thought she was about to commit suicide. One of the attendants, Farouk Mohammed Atwa, yelled up to her “Lady, don’t jump!” Soon, a crowd had gathered and realized that this was no ordinary woman but the Blessed Virgin Mary herself. The apparitions continued unabated, with Mary appearing for a few nights each week for the next three years. People from all around began to come to St. Mary’s in Zeitoun to see the miraculous apparitions. The crowds grew larger and larger. By some accounts, 250,000 at the highpoint would come nightly to watch for Mary appearing from Heaven.

Despite the length of the apparitions and the mass witnessing of her by so many people, the Blessed Virgin Mary did not speak or deliver any verbal messages. She maintained an attitude of prayer bowing towards the cross and blessing the people. Mary was seen gliding slowly about the domes of the Church, sometimes standing for two to three hours in the same spot, and at times kneeling before the cross on the roof. She acknowledged the people’s presence by smiling at the crowd and blessing them with her hands. Mary had long white and blue robes, and a veil of bluish-white light. She had physicality. They could see her garments moving in the warm night breeze. She had a dazzling crown on her head with a halo of bright light. Sometimes the witnesses saw her with the infant Jesus, or sometimes with the twelve-year old Jesus, and other times, with St. Joseph. Still other times, she was seen carrying a cross, or an olive branch—a symbol typically for peace and unity. Bishop Athanasius of Beni Soueiff, sent personally from the Coptic pope, said, “There she was, five or six meters above the dome, high in the sky, full figure, like a phosphorous statue, but not so stiff as a statue. There was movement of the body and of the clothing . . . she was very quiet, full of glory.” One Coptic priest noted that, “there were rays [of light] coming down from her hands,” like depicted in the miraculous medal.

Coptic Bishop Marcos who witnessed her said when Mary looked at the crowd, it seemed as though “she concentrated her eyes on them exactly.” Despite the number of people, it felt personal and individual. One witness, an American, Pearl Zaki, described being there, “Yet I think each person present, as I talked with them and understood, felt alone with her and drawn completely to her.” A certain Coptic Christian, Dr. Khairy Malek, who witnessed the apparitions, said he could even see her teeth when she smiled at them. At one point, the crowd turned and began shouting up towards the moon. When Dr. Malek turned, he saw the Virgin Mary’s “whole face stamped on face of the moon.” Clearly, something extraordinary and profound was happening in Zeitoun between 1968 to 1971. The next question is why then, and why there?

As mentioned, Zeitoun, Cairo was one of the traditional locations that the Holy Family had fled to escape the slaughter of the innocents under King Herod, as Gospel explains: “Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there till I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” (Matt. 2:13) Nevertheless, King Herod still carried out his murderous intent against the infants, “…in a furious rage, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under.” (Matt. 2:16) Perhaps, the Blessed Virgin Mary appearing at Zeitoun was to honor the Holy Family’s flight to Egypt from Herod’s massacre of the innocent children.

Blogger and author Emmet O’Regan has pointed out that 1968-1971 was the very same timeframe for the mass legalization of abortion in the world. In April 1968, the very same month that Zeitoun began, the United Kingdom enacted the Abortion Act. This was the initial break in the dam inundating the world with legalized abortion. This quickly spread to the United States in loosening abortion laws in 1969, and soon thereafter, Roe v. Wade was argued in 1971, and decided on January 22, 1973. This opened the doors to the mass slaughter of the innocents worldwide. It is the beginning of Herod’s slaughter of the innocents on an apocalyptic level. The world has been sacrificing the blood of millions of innocent babies every year ever since. By the Blessed Virgin Mary appearing at these sites of the Holy Family’s flight from Egypt, it was perhaps Heaven’s warning of a new massive slaughter of the innocence about to happen again.

Zeitioun is very much like Blessed Virgin Mary’s dramatic and unprecedented warning at Fatima in 1917, just before the unleashing of the errors of Communism upon the world in the Russian Revolution. Yet, at Zeitoun there were no messages, no visions, and no secrets. Mary’s message was her silent presence in that time and at that location. The Blessed Virgin Mary came, again, in unprecedented fashion in Zeitoun, perhaps, to warn the world of new evils that were about to be unleashed upon it — this time with abortion. Perhaps, it was an appeal, too, against the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in Egypt, like hotbeds in the city of Assiut.

Maybe not coincidentally, apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary were seen there in 2000-2001, and again, in 2006, in Assiut — which is also traditionally the southern most point that the Holy Family travelled to in their Egyptian flight. Another purported apparition, then, occurred in Warraq, Egypt in 2009, among other locations. Was the Blessed Virgin Mary retracing the steps of the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt some two millennia later? In these unprecedented revelations, the Blessed Virgin Mary came to Zeitoun as Our Lady of Light, that is, the Woman clothed with the Sun with a crown on her head, much like the great portent that appears in Heaven (Rev. 12:1).

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

The Book of Life and Treasure in Heaven – May 3, 2020

This pandemic shutdown is, if nothing else, a time for us to hit the “reset button” in our lives. As money and livelihoods are slipping away and diminishing, we remember that everything in this world is fleeting. As Ecclesiastes says, all is vanity! Our tenuous existence is a reminder that we need to keep our eyes on heaven — our true eternal home. This lockdown is an opportunity for us to focus more on the weightier things of life and eternity.

Here is one idea to contemplate: Everything we do of value in the eyes of God gains us eternal merit, reward, and glory in heaven for all eternity.

Each passing moment is a great opportunity for us, one of potentially eternal significance. From moment to moment, we have the ability to make deposits into our heavenly futures. Jesus urges as much, “lay up to yourselves treasures in heaven.” (Mt. 6:20) Many people work in the world to build up as much wealth as possible. We check endlessly the size and growth of our bank accounts and 401Ks. If this worldly wealth is here today and gone tomorrow, should we not work even more diligently for the wealth that endures forever? If we want to be greedy in this life, we should at least be greedy for the eternal things that matter most.

How do we build up these treasures in heaven? Jesus gives one hint, by urging us to do our good deeds and prayers in secret: “But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Mt. 6:6) By doing it just for God, it is God who will repay us. And, God sees all.

Each little action, word, deed, prayer, or sacrifice that we do in our mortal lives is recorded. Think of that. In each passing moment, God “time-stamps” an eternal recording of it. Each instant in time passes never to return again. However, we will see these time-stamped moments reviewed at our Last Judgment. They are the measure by which God will judge us. God calls the recorded actions of our lives the “Book of Life.” St. John gives testimony to this: “Also another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, by what they had done.”(Rev. 20:12) The Book of Life is like a balance sheet for our lives. Each bad deed and word is recorded as negative balance in the Book of Life, while each good deed, and prayer, and sacrifice as a profit.

Jesus speaks of these negative debts we will have to account for: “I tell you, on the Day of Judgment men will render account for every careless word they utter.” (Mt. 12:36) We will be held accountable for even a single careless word. That is a meticulous accounting! This should shock us to watch whatever we do at any given moment and not stumble, especially not carelessly taking the Lord’s name in vain. Moreover, mortal sin left on the balance sheet of our soul keeps us eternally in the red, in more senses than one, forever paying for that debt.

If every careless word is recorded and accounted for, then, likewise, every good word, prayer, sacrifice and deed is also recorded, and rewarded.

When we realize that everything we do has an eternal weight, it is a strong motivation to do what’s right and what’s good. It is a motivation to be holy. When you say a Rosary in the morning, realize that that time spent can never be taken away from you. It is now fixed forever in the Book of Life for you. If you pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy one afternoon, or fast one day, or contemplate the Stations of the Cross, or give alms to the needy, those too can never be taken away from your ledger recorded in the Book of Life.

Salvation is more than the balance sheet of our deeds and “gaining points,” this is true, but it is a part of it. What we do matters! Of course, faith in Christ, humility, love, and the sacraments are essential. However, we can build up our treasures in heaven by our prayers, deeds, and sacrifices as recorded in the Book of Life.

How can we know that God pays attention to us in such minute and particular detail? Jesus reveals this exquisitely detailed love of God for us that “even the hairs of your head are all numbered.” (Mt. 10:30) God loves us so much that each tiny individual hair on our head has a number! God notices every seemingly insignificant detail of our lives, more than we can ever imagine. If he has even catalogued the very hairs on our head, how much more does he notice all that we do out of love for him. God knows and appreciates every one of our intentions to please him while on our struggle to climb up the mountain of holiness.

Our perfect motivation should always be to strive to do good out of love for God alone. Love of God is our focus. As fallen beings, however, we know that we are also driven, to some degree, by selfishness and reasons of rewards. Jesus does not dismiss this as a motivation for us, but rather, encourages us to build up this spiritual treasure. I take this as a real heavenly treasure, not of gold or such, of course, but rather, an unimaginable light, joy, and holiness reflecting the glory of God — a partaking in the Beatific Vision. This treasure is what St. Paul references: “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him.” (1 Cor. 2:9) Our treasure is a kind of wonderful surprise awaiting us, if we but try to do the will of the Lord in this life.

So, let’s get to work building up those heavenly treasures that will last forever! As Jesus exhorts us: “Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to render to every man according to his works.” (Rev. 22:12)

We’re All Protestants Now – April 2, 2020

With many of the sacraments effectively shutdown across the country and world the Catholic faithful have become de facto Protestants. All dioceses are on lockdown with the coronavirus pandemic afflicting the world. In practical terms, this means no Mass, no reception of the Eucharist, no confession to a priest, no Baptisms, no Confirmations, and no marriages. It is less clear, if, or where the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick is proceeding. The sacrament of Holy Orders is obviously still going forward with men in the seminary. The sacraments for the laity, however, have, for all intents and purposes, stopped. Bishops have generally either stopped them outright, or allowed for pastors to decide, or given specific caveats of “in case of an emergency” of death. The Church without her everyday, normal sacramental grace has become, at least temporarily, Protestant.

The cessation of large gatherings as at Mass is the correct decision for right now. Coronavirus must be curtailed as quickly as possible. The Church has appropriately recommended that the faithful, in lieu of sacramental confession, try to make regular perfect acts of contrition. One prominent Protestant teacher, who I generally like and appreciate, recommended that Catholics use this moment to give up sacramental confession altogether. Not good! The sacrament of divine healing is a pillar of our faith and a bulwark of grace for the delicate state of our souls.

Protestants have been advocating for ending sacramental confession ever since Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on to the door of the castle church in Wittenberg, Germany on October 31, 1517. Luther’s second thesis addressed penance directly: “This word cannot be understood as referring to the sacrament of penance, that is, confession and satisfaction, as administered by the clergy.” In other words, Luther was declaring that Jesus did not intend for us to reconcile ourselves to God through the Sacrament of Confession. Our current plague-riddled world of 2020 that has squashed sacramental grace is the realization of Luther’s thesis. We know this is temporary, but it does not dull the pain of our present predicament.

We, as a Church, must embrace this moment of the Cross, and accept the will of Christ in this crisis. Yes, we should make perfect acts of contrition, and yes, we should make spiritual communions. These are good things. Using this time in “corona-purgatory” to reform our daily lives with repentance and penance is a great use of our time. This is perhaps an opportunity to push again in these final days of Lent for our heartfelt metanoia and turning away from sin. This passion in our Church should draw us closer into the Passion of Christ. It does not, however, mean we should jettison our sacramental life. Rather, once this crisis is over and we return fully to the sacraments, I believe, our sacramental life will be so much more alive. This pandemic, which has deprived us of the sacraments, will make us appreciate them all the more. Perhaps, this is the silver-lining in the whole saga: we will as a Church rediscover, like never before, Christ and the real presence of his grace in the sacraments.

A Stiff-necked People, Plague, Penance, and the Promised Land – March 24, 2020

“Then if you walk contrary to me, and will not hearken to me, I will bring more plagues upon you.” (Lev. 26:21)

The stoppage of ALL public Catholic Masses in the United States, and in many places around the world, is unprecedented. We know that private celebrations of the Mass by priests continue, but nevertheless, public Masses have ended. One has to go back to the 300’s A.D. in Rome, before Christianity became legal with Emperor Constantine, to find a time when no public Masses were offered anywhere. The Eucharist and the Mass are the source and summit of the Catholic faith. Yet, there is a blackout of public Masses everywhere now. This should grab our attention.

The Old Testament offers many examples when God grabbed the undivided attention of his people by sending plagues upon them too. This does not mean that plagues are synonymous with sin. There is not a one-to-one correlation, as Jesus said in the New Testament (John 9:3). It does not mean someone suffering from the virus, or any other ailment for that matter, has sinned in some way. No, not at all – think of the righteous, but long-suffering, plague-afflicted man, Job.

However, the Bible does make it abundantly clear that plagues can be a tool that God uses to discipline his people and to draw them back to himself. A good father chastises his children when they make bad choices, or are doing something harmful to themselves or others. The global size, scope, and unprecedented nature of the current COVID-19 pandemic suggest something unique is happening.

We, as a Church and a society, continue to stubbornly embrace a moral turpitude against the sanctity of life and marriage and the family. Furthermore, there are unresolved ecclesiastical sexual scandals within the hierarchy of the Church. Others have even made the connection to the public, fertility-goddess ceremony of the pachamama idol in the Vatican during the Amazonian synod last fall and the current outbreak. There is no denying that a certain laxness has crept into the Church in belief and in practice. We see this reflected in flippant casualness in regards to the Real Presence of Christ in Blessed Sacrament. This same lessening of the faith can be discerned in the other sacraments as well, like infrequent Confessions. Worse still, some have left the Church all together. In short, there has been a general falling away from the faith.

In similar instances in the Old Testament, God called his people a “stiff-necked people” (Ex. 32:9), because they were stubborn, obstinate, and recalcitrant in their sins and unbelief. When they refused to repent, God did at times send plagues upon them. In the Book of Exodus, God dealt with the hard-heartedness of pharaoh by sending ten plagues upon him and the Egyptians for not letting his people, the Israelites, go free to worship Yahweh. The last plague, the death of the firstborn sons, led to the freeing of the Israelites, and the institution of the Passover sacrifice. Out of the plagues, God ultimately brought something good, as pharaoh finally relented and let his people go.

The plague that brought the first Passover is the same Passover sacrifice that Christ celebrated at the Last Supper, or the first Catholic Mass. The Passover sacrifice was a prefigurement to the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross, the true Paschal Lamb of God, and the Eucharist. It is the same public sacrifice that God permits now to be stayed by a plague.

It was not just the Egyptians who had to contend with plagues because of their hard-heartedness. The Israelites, too, in their wilderness wanderings often times strayed from the will of the Lord, descending into idolatry and immorality. Even at the foot of Mount Sinai, the mountain of God, as Moses was receiving the Law, the Israelites worshipped the golden calf and “rose up to play,” a euphemism for sexual immorality. God immediately answers this with a plague: “And the Lord sent a plague upon the people, because they made the calf which Aaron made.” (Ex. 32:35)

There are numerous other instances throughout the Old Testament that God chastises his own beloved people through plagues:

“While the meat was yet between their teeth, before it was consumed, the anger of the Lord was kindled against the people, and the Lord smote the people with a very great plague.” (Num. 11:33)

“behold, the Lord will bring a great plague on your people . . . ” (2 Chron. 21:14)

“they provoked the Lord to anger with their doings, and a plague broke out among them.” (Psalms 106:29)

We get the point. Plagues are one means that God turns us away from sin and leads us back into obedience and sanctity. It is a wake up call. Sin has consequences. This is not something our sophisticated modern ears really want to hear. To our insulated Disney World perspective of life, if you will, these are foreign concepts. The reality of sin and just punishment is something we wrestle with. Yet, here we are.

This corona event may be a necessary prick to our consciences. But, one may ask, for what reason? Perhaps, it is a reminder that God is in control, and he has established his unchanging law and commandments that we are obliged to follow. The coronavirus has been an earthquake to our society, to the world, in terms of our collective health, economy, and way of life. It is an unmistakable call to penance. We avoid activities now that would endanger our mortal bodies, but what about preserving our immortal souls? This is a spiritual event. It is like a large, blinking, neon yellow “CAUTION” sign to stay on the straight and narrow path to eternal life.

The physical crisis is a symptom of our underlying spiritual crisis. It is meant to wake us from our spiritual slumber. We know that God only allows evil for an ultimate, though mysterious, greater good. Scripture tells us that God “desires all men to be saved.” (1 Tim. 2:4) Our heavenly Father wants every single one of us to be in Heaven with him. We must play our part though by turning away from sin, and offering repentance and prayer. This great momentary pause in things is an opportunity for us. It is our monastic moment, cloistered in our homes, to examine honestly the state of our souls. Perhaps, if we loosen our stiff-necks and turn away from sin, then later, like the Israelites, we may enter into the Promised Land.

Fatima, Baal, Mt. Carmel, and the Brown Scapular – March 9, 2020

On October 13, 1917, the Virgin Mary appeared at Fatima declaring, “I am the Lady of the Rosary,” and instructing the visionary children again “to pray the rosary everyday.” This is one of the great messages of Fatima to pray the rosary each day, in addition to the devotion of the first five Saturdays. What seems to be less well known and associated with Fatima is the devotion of the brown scapular. In that final apparition, Lucia saw Mary and our Lord pass through the mysteries of the rosary: first, she saw Mary and Jesus as part of the joyful mysteries; and then, they came in the sorrowful mysteries; and finally, the glorious mysteries.

It is specifically in this last vision of the glorious mysteries that Lucia saw Mary as the Queen of Heaven and Earth in the form of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel holding in her right hand the brown scapular. Sister Lucia would later affirm, according to a Carmelite priest Fr. Howard Rafferty, in an interview on August 15, 1950 that, “The rosary and brown scapular are inseparable. You cannot have one without the other.” The scapular is integral to the original message. Just as the Virgin Mary asks each of us to pray the rosary every day, so too, according to Sister Lucia, does Mary want us to wear the brown scapular. This is why she was holding the brown scapular in the vision, as if asking us to take it and wear it.

What is the brown scapular? If you are like me, I knew relatively little about it until recently. The brown scapular is imaged after the brown habit or garment that the Carmelite monks wear. These are the two brown wool cloths the monks wear over their shoulders covering their front and backside. The brown scapular is this garment in miniature form. It is a sacramental of the Church. “Scapular” is derived from the “scapula bones,” or the shoulder blades that the garment covers. The Carmelite monks wear the brown garment as a type of mantle covering themselves, an idea that originally shows up with them in history around the 13th – 14th century at Mt. Carmel in Israel. Tradition has it that Mary first gave the brown scapular to St. Simon Stock.

The Carmelites were the original order consecrated to the Virgin Mary. This is why they hold a special place in Mary’s heart. They pattern their lives after her, just as “Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart”(Luke 2:19). So too, the Carmelites contemplate these heavenly matters and consecrate themselves to the Virgin Mary. Thus, the Carmelite mantle is synonymous with consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The brown scapular is the passing of this Carmelite garment to the secular world in miniaturized form. The large brown garment that covers the body in the ascetic world is shrunk to two little brown cloth pieces attached by strings in the lay world. It is the same Carmelite spirituality and Marian devotion extended to the average layperson living within the hubbub of common life.

The idea of the Carmelite mantle extends all the way back to Elijah’s mantle in the Old Testament. The prophet Elijah had challenged the false-prophets of Baal at Mt. Carmel. Baal was the demonic god of the Canaanites, whose religion demanded idolatrous worship, cultic orgies with temple prostitutes, and even the sacrificial offering of infants. That is, the Canaanite religion was a depraved mixture of idolatry, sexual immorality, and human sacrifice. Elijah challenged the 450 priests of Baal at Mt. Carmel to see whose “god” would consume an offering by fire, a kind of liturgical battle. Baal, of course, did not answer, and the false-prophets stood mute. Elijah, on the other hand, called on the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and fire from heaven consumed the offering. Elijah, through Yahweh, defeated Baal and the false-prophets. This is the legacy of Mt. Carmel. Later, Elijah parted the Jordan River by touching his mantle to the waters (2 Kings 2:8), and thus, re-enacting the parting of the Jordan by Joshua and the Red Sea by Moses. This is a prefigurement to the Sacrament of Baptism. It is at that point that Elijah is taken up to heaven – linking the notion of Baptism to heaven. The brown garment, then, which is the Carmelite monks’ habit, is by extension reminiscent of the mantle of Elijah at Mt. Carmel.

In modern times, we battle the same type of false-prophets of Baal that Elijah battled in ancient days on Mt. Carmel. The worldly influence of modernism pushes on us various forms of idolatry, especially money, power, materialism, and extreme political correctness. Sexual immorality too is rampant in our society. Even child sacrifice is the law of the land with nearly unencumbered abortion on demand. Baal and Baal-worship is alive and well in Western Civilization. Yet, just like in biblical times at Mt. Carmel, God comes to defeat Baal again. In our New Covenant era of the Gospel, God crushes the head of Baal through the Virgin Mary. Our Lady of Mt. Carmel asks us to embrace this special devotion and consecration to her Immaculate Heart through wearing the brown scapular.

We know the essential conditions of the Fatima promise: to pray the rosary daily, make frequent confessions, receive the Eucharist often, make spiritual sacrifices, as well as fulfill the first five Saturdays’ Devotion of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Yet, Mary also appeared at Fatima as Our Lady of Mt. Carmel offering us the brown scapular. Through a simple enrollment ceremony with a priest or deacon, we can consecrate our brown scapular and seek to live that consecration each day. It must be of great importance if Mary made sure to present it to the world again in such a very purposeful and dramatic fashion as at Fatima. The final apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes was also on the feast day of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, July 16th. Wearing the brown scapular is something very easy and takes little effort. Yet, it is a strong affirmation and a tangible sign of our consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. It is a badge of our desire to live holy lives each day under the mantle of her guidance and protection.

The Centrality of the Blessed Virgin Mary – Dec. 3, 2019

Advent is a good time to meditate upon the central role of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the conception and nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, that is, the central role of Mary in our redemption.

As Marino Restrepo was being held hostage for six months in 1997 by Columbian FARC rebels and near death, he had a great mystical experience of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Blessed Virgin Mary. In his testimony, he describes a vision of the Virgin Mary to whom he was united by “a spiritual umbilical cord.” He further testifies to her centrality: “Everything that I was receiving from Heaven went through her first. Similarly, everything that emerged from my heart and moved towards Heaven passed through her.” Mr. Restrepo experienced what the Catechism calls the “motherhood of Mary in the order of grace” as the “Mediatrix.” (CCC no. 969; Lumen Gentium 62) That is, the sanctifying grace of Jesus Christ is distributed to us through the intercession and mediation of the Virgin Mary.

We see this in the Incarnation. God willed for the Son not to be manifested directly, but to be born through Mary. God the Creator manifests himself through the intermediary of his creature. The Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary and she conceived Jesus and nourished his body through a physical umbilical cord. When the Holy Spirit comes upon us in faith and the sacraments, spiritual nourishment is given to us as the Mystical Body of Christ. Mary is the spouse of the Holy Spirit, who produces the Mystical Body of Christ in each soul by way of a spiritual umbilical cord. Jesus attests to this spiritual conception and birth: “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” (Jn. 3:6) The Virgin Mary is literally our spiritual mother by order of grace to those who are the children of God.

St. Louis de Montfort speaks of the important intercession and mediation of the Virgin Mary as seen in the typology of Rebekah, the wife of Isaac, in the Old Testament. In the Book of Genesis, Jacob, the younger son, claims the blessing his father Isaac, and all the inheritance that entails, rather than the rightful inheritor, the first-born son Esau. Jacob puts on the garments of Esau and tricks the father Isaac into blessing him instead. These are typologies for Christ and us. Esau, as the first-born son of the father, and rightful inheritor of the father’s blessing, is a typology of Christ, the first-born Son of God the Father. Jacob, on the other hand, as the younger son, who puts on the garments of Esau, and receives the blessing of the father, is a typology for us, as Christians. We are not worthy of receiving the blessing of God the Father and his inheritance, but only through “putting on Christ” (Gal. 3:27; Rom. 13:14) are we blessed by God the Father and receive the inheritance of eternal life. By putting on Christ in Baptism and the sacraments, we receive Christ’s “white garments”of sanctifying grace of purity and righteousness (Rev. 3:18). This is the idea of substitution found through the Old Testament that the younger son receives the merits due to the first-born. This finds its fulfillment in the New Testament where Christ the first-born Son’s garments are given to us. Our unworthiness is substituted with Christ’s worthiness.

The typologies found in Genesis with Jacob, Esau, and Isaac extend to Rebekah too. It is Rebekah, a type for the Virgin Mary, who instigates the blessing upon Jacob. It is Rebekah who takes the “best garments”of the first-born son Esau and “puts them on”the younger son Jacob, as the text reads: “Then Rebekah took the best garments of Esau her older son, which were with her in the house, and put them on Jacob her younger son.” (Gen. 27:15) It is Rebekah, behind the scenes, directing Jacob to put on Esau’s garments and receive the blessing of the father Isaac. Rebekah helps the quiet Jacob, who stays home with her, over the strong, self-serving hunter, Esau. St. Louis de Montfort equates Jacob with the righteous and Esau with the reprobate. In fulfillment of this typology, it is the Virgin Mary who comes to aid the faithful and devout Christian and clothes us with the garments of her Son, Jesus Christ, the first-born, in order to secure the blessing of God the Father and inherit eternal life. As St. Louis de Montfort wrote in True Devotion to Mary: “She clothes us in the clean, new, precious and perfumed garments of Esau the elder – that is, of Jesus Christ her Son – which she keeps in her house, that is, which she has in her own power, inasmuch as she is the treasurer and universal dispenser of the merits and virtues of her Son, which she gives and communicates to whom she will . . .” Just as Rebekah clothed Jacob with the finest garments of Esau to secure the blessing of Isaac the father, so too, does the Virgin Mary clothe us with the finest garments of Christ’s sanctifying grace in order to secure for us the blessing of God the Father for eternal life in Heaven.

St. Louis de Montfort calls Mary our “mediator with the Mediator.” The world, he says, is unworthy to receive directly from God himself so it receives grace through the intermediary of Mary, just as the world received the Incarnation of the Son, not directly, but through the intermediary of Mary. The Incarnation, and thus the Redemption, happened through Mary, and so, the on-going redemption of man continues to happen through the mediation of the Virgin Mary.

The life of Christ attests to her centrality too. Jesus lived in humble obedience in the house of Mary for thirty years! Think of that. He lived solely honoring his mother for the vast majority of his earthly life. This is the example par excellencefor us. If she was good enough for the Son of God to remain in humble obedience to for thirty years, surely we too should commit ourselves to honoring her. The angel Gabriel greeted Mary with the angelic salutation, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.” (Lk. 1:28) If Heaven greets Mary in such a way, as one full of grace and conceived without sin, surely we should invoke the Immaculate Virgin Mary in such a way too. The Annunciation is after all the moment of the Incarnation. In praying the Rosary, we are glorifying the work of God in the Incarnation. The Virgin Mary is the mother of the Incarnation and the Redemption. Mary points always to him. It is to Jesus through Mary, as she commands, “Do whatever he tells you.”

The beginning of Genesis frames the main struggle through history. The enmity that God speaks of in Genesis 3:15 is primarily between the serpent and “the woman.” The original woman, Eve, is another type for the second Eve, Mary. Adam and Eve were the original progenitors of humanity and source of Original Sin. Jesus and Mary are the spiritual progenitors of the children of God and the fixers of sin. In perfect symmetry, God wills the redemption of man through the new Adam, Jesus, and the new Eve, Mary. The sin of Eve is undone in the obedience of Mary. The first woman was instrumental in the fall, and the second woman is instrumental in the redemption. And, this redemption is ongoing. It is “the woman,” Mary who mediates Jesus’s first miracle at Cana, and it is “the woman” Mary, who Jesus entrusts the beloved Apostle John to from the Cross. The ancient enmity between the serpent and the woman reaches its final, apocalyptic climax in Revelation with “a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (Rev. 12:1) This is followed by the portent of “a great red dragon” whose head she will crush.

The enmity between the woman and the dragon is alluded to in the symbols of St. John Bosco’s prophetic dream of the two great columns: One great column has the Blessed Virgin Mary on the top of it, and on the other greater, taller column is the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist. The two great columns secure “the ship” of the Church under “waves” of attacks by the world, as he explained the vision, “Only two means are left to save her amidst so much confusion: devotion to Mary Most Holy and frequent Communion.” This seems more relevant now than ever before.

Gabrielle Bossis and the Intimate Life of the Soul – October 2019

“Do you know what we’re doing in writing these pages? We’re removing the false idea that this intimate life of the soul is possible only for the religious in the cloister. In reality my secret and tender love is for every human being living in the world” (p.293).

This is a quote from a book called He and I, written down by French laywoman, nurse, and mystic, Gabrielle Bossis, who recounts the words of Jesus that she heard as inner locutions. Ms. Bossis lived from 1874 to 1950, and who in her sixties began having an interior mystical-dialogue with Jesus. Her journal is a recording of this miraculous intimate conversation.

Pauline Books and Media has just released a daily devotional guide, Jesus Speaking: Heart to Heart with the King, featuring quotes from Ms. Bossis’ book.

It should be noted that Bossis’ writing falls under the domain of “private revelation” that no one is obliged to believe or follow, as the Catechism states: “Throughout the ages, there have been so-called ‘private’ revelations, some of which have been recognized by the authority of the Church. They do not belong, however, to the deposit of faith” (CCC 67). That is to say, private revelation must never contradict the deposit of faith, and even if it does not contradict the faith, it still does not necessarily need to be believed or followed by the faithful. The majority of private revelations are false. I do not believe the Church has ever made an official declaration on her writing, although it has an Imprimatur from Msgr. Jean-Marie Fortier, Archbishop of Sherbrooke, Quebec from November 14, 1969.

That being said, I believe it is possible that these are the words of Our Lord to Ms. Bossis. In my humble opinion, they ring true. I first read He and I a number of years ago and was moved by it. It paints a portrait of Jesus as an extremely loving and empathetic Creator who is deeply concerned about the most intimate details of each person’s life. For example, Jesus tells Gabrielle on March 6, 1947:

“I need each one of you as though you were the only person in the world, as though the cosmos had been created for you alone . . .” (p. 193).

Jesus instructs Gabrielle on how to live every day for the Lord and consecrate every action to him. We are all called to live holy lives (1 Pet. 1:16). One of the ways we live holy lives is by actively participating in the sacraments, as he addresses Gabrielle on March 5, 1948:

“My invitations are sent out at Baptism and again in my sacraments. It is for you to respond even though imperfectly” (p. 220).

In regard to the Eucharist, Jesus tells Gabrielle on May 27, 1948:

“The thirst for union with you is so great that I want to be consumed by you in order to merge our minds, our beings. I want to be your thinking and your doing” (p. 229).

On October 11, 1940, Jesus reminds Gabrielle, who was an actress, that we are all performing our actions on a grand stage before Heaven, and the saints, and angels:

“What a spectacle for Heaven! Because you are all performing before the angels and saints. You see, you are still on the stage” (p. 67).

We are to live our lives in daily unity with Christ. We can unite our ordinary mundane lives with his life in the past. Jesus lived the life of the God-man in ordinary circumstances, and so by doing, he divinized ordinary actions and supernaturalized ordinary life. The Catechism attests to this:

“The hidden life at Nazareth allows everyone to enter into fellowship with Jesus by the most ordinary events of daily life” (CCC 533).

Jesus tells Gabrielle the same thing on May 23, 1946:

“I ask my children for the most ordinary actions: eating, drinking, sleeping, working, your whole day united with mine in the past, your actions dipped in my blood and clothed in my merits. There is nothing difficult about this; it heals you of your usual poverty and wraps you in the richest garment. Acquire the habit by gazing at me as I gaze at you” (p. 176).

Jesus tells Gabrielle to practice the morning offering and to offer him things throughout the day from our daily routines. He tells her on October 15, 1943:

” . . . but in the morning say, ‘Everything will be for you, my great friend.’ Then from time to time during the day, a little word such as, ‘This is for you.’ It will warm your heart and bring balm to mine” (p. 118).

On the same day, he spoke about making atonement for sinners. This is the symbiotic relationship of the communion of the saints. We are baptized into Christ’s Mystical Body and are mediators and intercessors as part of his priestly people (1 Pet. 2:9). Jesus tells Gabrielle that we should do our part for the salvation of sinners by offering him everything in our lives:

“My child, don’t lose a single minute. Time is short for saving so many souls. It is not merely by praying that they are saved, you know, but through the actions of even the most ordinary lives lived for God. Offer me everything. Absolutely everything, united to My life on earth. What wealth! Give it to poor sinners, most of them are just ignorant. You have known and received so much. Take pains to help them. You will comfort this heart of mine so full of tenderness, and you will satisfy justice. Offer me all the crosses of the world” (p.117-118).

Indeed, we can offer up our sufferings, in conjunction with Christ’s Passion (Col. 1:24), for the sake of sinners in the world, as Jesus tells Gabrielle on July 11, 1946:

“You take your place in the sacrifice for which the crown is prepared. You play your part in the unfinished symphony of my passion. Love these last sufferings. They are part of your travel wardrobe. The most ordinary sufferings – heat, insects, unforeseen mishaps, petty annoyances that you offer me in expiation – are part of the harvest of the autumn of your life in this ever-marvelous springtime of love” (p.180).

Jesus the God-man had divine foresight and knowledge of all of us and all that we would do in our lives, as the Catechism states: “Jesus knew and loved us each and all during his life, his agony and his Passion, and gave himself up for each one of us” (CCC 478).

Jesus made a similar statement to Gabrielle on October 30, 1947:

“Any suffering that you offer me with love eases my sufferings. You know that I saw everything in advance, right to the end of the world” (p. 208).

Christ’s divine foreknowledge has been expounded upon in papal encyclicals as well. Pope Pius XII wrote in 1943 on the Mystical Body of Christ:

“. . . in that vision all the members of his Mystical Body were continually and unceasingly present to him, and he embraced them with his redeeming love” (Mystici Corporis Christi, 75).

In his Passion, as Jesus beheld the sin for all humanity for all time, he became “very sorrowful, even to death”(Matt. 26:38). In 1928, Pope Pius XI wrote:

“Now if, because of our sins also which were as yet in the future, but were foreseen, the soul of Christ became sorrowful unto death, it cannot be doubted that then, too, already he derived somewhat of solace from our reparation, which was likewise foreseen . . . And so even now, in a wondrous yet true manner, we can and ought to console that Most Sacred Heart which is continually wounded by the sins of thankless men” (Miserentissimus Redemptor,13).

Precisely because Jesus is the God-man, we can ease his Passion in the past by our reparations and acts of love and mercy in the present.

These are just a few excerpts from Gabrielle Bossis’ spiritual book. There are many more spiritual nuggets within. Prayer, the sacraments, sacrifice: this is all part of the intimate life of the soul. It is a good meditation on living a Christ-centered daily life.

Holiness and the Sacramental Life, A Review – July 2019

The Church is in crisis. Mass attendance has dropped to historically low numbers, and even of those, gray-haired people far outnumber young people. The Church is facing a demographic implosion. Many Catholics lack even the basic catechetical knowledge of their faith. The catechumenates entering the Church are instructed in the mystagogy of the faith, but the greater body of Christ is also in need of a renewed catechetical mystagogy. Fr. Philip-Michael Tangorra seeks to address this need in the Church with his well-written book Holiness and the Sacramental Life. Part of the problem in the Church today is that “the sense of mystery and understanding of the faith has been lost,” as Fr. Tangorra writes. A catechetical understanding of the faith is necessary, but what is truly of “vital importance in the Church today” is a return to the mystery and beauty of the Catholic Church, in order “to wake up the sleeping Catholic.” If people do not see the mystery and beauty of the Church, they will not be drawn to it, or for those who have left, drawn back into it.

This is reflected at first on a material level, with beauty of the Church in sacred art, and sacred architecture and sacred music. These should draw us to the source of all beauty, who is God. The beauty in the arts should draw us to the beauty of God. The beauty in the Church should reflect the surpassing beauty and grandeur of God. However, beauty is also reflected in the sacred mysteries of the Church, the seven sacraments, and especially in the sacred liturgy of the sacrifice of the Mass. It is in the seven mysteries of the Church that we make our spiritual pilgrimage of this life.

Fr. Tangorra frames his whole work around this spiritual pilgrimage, with the exitus, of God’s self-revelation and communication to humanity in the person of Jesus Christ, and in the reditus, humanity’s return back to unity with God. This is the journey all mankind must make, to varying levels of success and failure. It is through the mediation of the Catholic Church, the “universal sacrament of salvation,” that the faithful are especially blessed to receive the sanctifying grace of Christ. It is in the mysteries of the sacraments that we encounter Christ and are “purified, illumined, and perfected” by him, and through them. This is the theme throughout Fr. Tangorra’s book, that is, the threefold process of purification, illumination, and perfection of the faithful through the sacramental encounter with Christ. In this spiritual pilgrimage of exitus and reditus we assume our respective spots in the ecclesiastical choir before God.

It was through the open side of Christ that the comingling of blood and water flowed out. We must receive the sacramental water of Baptism and the sacramental blood of the Eucharist in order to gain admittance “to enter the kingdom, the Body of Christ.” Part of the problem with the loss of the sense of mystery in the Church is the denial of the efficaciousness of the sacraments. If the sacraments are merely signs and symbols, and not truly efficacious in giving sanctifying grace, why would one continue with them? Fr. Tangorra points out that the sacrament of Baptism, and Confirmation, in particular, make one ontologically different. An ontological difference exists between the baptized and the non-baptized, as the baptized has been incorporated into the mystical Body of Christ. In Baptism, Christ makes “all things new.” (Rev. 21:5) The sacramental character imparted in Baptism is brought to maturity and fullness in the Sacrament of Confirmation. We are anointed to share in the threefold offices of Christ as priest, prophet, and king. Taken together, through Baptism and Confirmation, we become adopted sons of God, partakers in the divine nature, “living stones,” a spiritual house, “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation.” (CCC 1268)

As the baptized and confirmed, all of the laity is a part of the common priesthood of the faithful. And so, what are the implications of that? As Fr. Tangorra points out, this means that all of the faithful, including the laity, have “a mediatory capacity.” The laity can and should offer intercessory prayers and sacrifices, by virtue of our sharing in the life, death and resurrection of Christ. In Baptism, one dies with Christ into the water, and then, rises with Christ out of the water. The Christian must live out their vocation of picking up his or her Cross and following after Christ on his via dolorosa. We must die to ourselves and share in the suffering of the Cross. Yet, this is not empty suffering. This is suffering that when it dies and falls in the ground, it grows again to new life. As Catholics, our suffering, united with Christ, can be efficacious, intercessory, and mediatory for ourselves and for others, as part of the Communion of the Saints. We are priests offering sacrifices in our lives, for the salvation of souls and to the glory of God. As Fr. Tangorra states, “even the way we drive our cars should bear witness to the resurrected glory of Jesus.” In other words, offer up that road rage and allow it to be crucified with Christ.

As part of the common priesthood of the faithful, we offer not only sacrifices, but also prayer. The Church is called to sanctify the whole day by praying without ceasing. This is an integral aspect to living a holy and sacramental life. Fr. Tangorra mentions various forms of devotional sacramentals to aid in our sanctification of the day, including praying the Divine Office or the Liturgy of the Hours. In praying the Liturgy of the Hours we seek to sanctify the day by praying seven times from morning to nighttime. Praying without ceasing should include other devotionals as well, such as the Rosary, chaplets, novenas, and the Stations of the Cross among other meditations and prayers. In response to Our Lady of Fatima’s urgent request to “pray the Rosary every day,” our daily routine must include at least five decades of the Rosary each day. This is truly a minimum effort we should be making as part our vocations as Christians.

In Baptism, we receive the white garments of Christ’s sanctifying grace. Yet, we know as sinful, fallen people, these white garments are dirtied regularly, and often. Christ has left us the means to wash our dirty garments clean, to make them white again in sanctity and righteousness, as Isaiah wrote, “though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.”(Is. 1:18) This is the blessed assurance we have in the Sacrament of Penance, or Confession. The priest, acting in persona Christi, is able to forgive us of our sins and offer absolution through his ecclesiastical mediation of the fruits of the paschal mystery. Christ’s sanctifying grace is transmitted to the Church most commonly through the sacraments. Confession enables us to maintain our friendship with God, and continue on our reditusspiritual journey back to Him.

The final approach of our reditusjourney is as we come to the hour of death. Christ provides forgiveness of sins and healing at this late stage too with the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. We can partake of this sacrament at any point in our lives, but it is especially important in that fateful time before passing over to our final judgments and eternity. This is our final chance to wash the white garments of our souls to be as clean as possible. As like water, bread, and wine, the use of holy oil is an ordinary substance used in the sacraments to transmit extraordinary graces.

The ordinary signs and symbols of the sacraments make present the invisible realities they signify. This is true in the holy Eucharist, where ordinary bread and wine become the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ. Fr. Tangorra quotes St. Cyril that the Eucharist is the pinnacle of mystagogical instruction. Christ is spiritually present in the Word of God in scripture and He is present in the faithful of the Church, but Christ is present bodilyin the Eucharist. This is not cannibalism, as many understood Jesus at the time, but a partaking in His spiritualized resurrected body in a sacramental way. Through the mediation of the priesthood of Christ, “divine things are made available to humanity.” As Fr. Tangorra writes, “The whole purpose of the sacred liturgy is to offer humanity, through the priesthood of Jesus Christ, entrance into the inner communion of love of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”

The vocational sacrament of Holy Orders is necessary to perpetuate and promulgate the sacramental mediation of Christ to humanity. The ministerial priesthood is able to consecrate the Eucharist, and in effect, nourish the Church. The other vocational sacrament is that of Marriage. The Sacrament of Marriage images the love of Christ, the Bridegroom, for His Church, the Bride. The spousal love of husband and wife is a sign and symbol of the spousal love of Christ and the Church. Marriage and fruitful family life is meant to nourish vocations to the Sacrament of Holy Orders as part of a symbiotic relationship.

The liturgy of the Mass, Fr. Tangorra states, “imitates the journey of Christ’s life on earth.” The Mass reaches the sacrifice of Golgotha in the consecration, and then the Resurrection event in Communion. The one Church partakes in the one Eucharist mediated by the one High Priest Jesus Christ. In the liturgy, all of humanity is offered up to God the Father so “that they may be one, even as we are one.” (Jn. 17:11) Fr. Tangorra mentions that there are numerous sacred liturgical rites throughout the Church, but he focuses considerable discussion on the Roman Liturgy, in both its ordinary and extraordinary forms. In a Church where there is, at times, some tension between those who practice the ordinary form and those who practice the extraordinary form of the Mass, it is good to hear Fr. Tangorra write that “neither of the two forms of the Roman liturgy are in any way deficient for our spiritual and intellectual formation as Christians . .” Both the ordinary and the extraordinary forms of the Roman liturgy are valid. The sacramental mysteries are valid too, despite any shortcomings of the priest, as declared by the Church doctrine of “ex opera operato” (i.e., “the work which is worked”), is valid regardless of the holiness, or lack of holiness, of the individual priest.

Fr. Tangorra concludes with the spiritual pilgrimage that reaches its apex in the Mass: “The exitus-reditusmovement of purification, illumination, and perfection is stamped throughout the sacred liturgy, but the Mass, above all, is that sublime act of worship that, through a union with the Paschal mystery, elevates humanity and draws it back into perfect harmony with the divine.” Fr. Tangorra’s book is in many ways a tour of the Catechism. It points us towards the way of looking for beauty and mystery in the Church and the sacraments. Rediscovering the beauty and mystery in the sacramental life of the Church is ultimately how the Church will be revitalized. Jesus said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by Me.”(Jn. 14:6) The Catholic Church is the mediator of Christ’s sanctifying grace on earth, and as such, it is through the sacraments that we find the way, the truth, and the life. The sacramental life is our spiritual pilgrimage that brings us back into communion with God.

Kecharitomene – March 1, 2019

The word “kecharitomene” (κεχαριτωμένη) is used only once in the Greek New Testament. It does not appear anywhere else in Greek literature. The Gospel writer, Luke, appears to have created it out of thin air. This Greek word is, in some respects, very much reminiscent of another Greek word seemingly created out of thin air in the Gospels, “epiousios” (ἐπιούσιον), which also only appears in Jesus’ Our Father prayer. Epiousios is translated as our “daily” bread but its literal meaning is our “super-substantial” bread, as translated in the Douay-Rheims bible, based off of St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate translation. It was a special, singular word to express a special, singular phenomenon – the Bread of Life. Epiousios is translated in most modern translations as “daily,” however, the literal meaning that St. Jerome conveyed, hints at the Eucharist, the bread above material substance.

In a similar manner, Mary is a special, singular creature in Salvation History. She became the Tabernacle where Christ would dwell. Mary is the new Ark of the Covenant where God would dwell in her womb. Christ, the Son of God, was clearly without sin and second Person of the Trinity. How could Jesus a Person of the Godhead dwell anywhere but somewhere immaculately pure and clean? He could not co-dwell somewhere with sin. That is impossible. The archangel Gabriel came to the Virgin Mary at the moment of the Annunciation and declared to her, “Hail, full of grace.” (Lk. 1:28) He seems to address her more with a title than descriptive language. He addresses her more for who she is rather than what she is. Who is she? She is “full of grace.” Eighteen hundred years later, Mary came to St. Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes, France referring to herself as, “I am the Immaculate Conception.” Mary was reiterating the words of Gabriel in Luke 1:28. The Immaculate Conception is the one full of grace.

How could one have been “full of grace” before the life, death, and resurrection of Christ? According to Ineffabilis Deus, Mary was given the sanctifying grace of Jesus Christ, her Son, by way of anticipation of His Redemption. This is the underlying teaching of the Immaculate Conception. Mary was preserved from Original Sin to make her a suitable dwelling place for the Second Person of the Trinity. The Immaculate Conception made possible the Incarnation. The Annunciation led directly to the Incarnation, as Mary gave her fiat to do the will of the Lord. Kecharitomene is the Greek word St. Luke used for the angel Gabriel’s address to Mary as “full of grace.” In the Rosary, we pray over and over, these special and singular words of the angel Gabriel at the Annunciation and the Incarnation, “Hail Mary, full of grace.” We are invoking the name of Mary, Kecharitomene, over and over again. She is “Full of Grace” and “the Immaculate Conception.” Mary is the Theotokos, the Mother of God, “the woman,” who crushes the head of the serpent, through her seed, the Messiah. Kecharitomene was that blip in the matrix, where the devil was undone. Sin was undone in one creature, preserved in grace, in order to bear the Savior of the world.

Just another reason to pray your five decades of the Rosary every day!

Pilgrimage to the Holy Land – Dec. 23, 2018

I was privileged recently to go on a pilgrimage with Fr. Dwight Longenecker and forty-eight other pilgrims to the Holy Land. We were retracing the steps of the Magi from Jordan into Israel. The pilgrimage was based on the historical detective work that Fr. Longenecker produced in his book Mystery of the Magi: The Quest to Identify the Three Wise Men. One of the main points of this intriguing book is to demythologize the story of the Magi and root them in history. Why does this story need demythologizing? There is nothing overtly harmful to the faith in the present-day retelling of the “three kings,” typically named “Melchior, Caspar, and Balthasar,” who come from distant countries like “Persia, Babylonia, and India.” The only issue is that parts of it are fable. It is these fable-parts that are used to attack the faith, calling it just another made-up myth of the Church. Fr. Longenecker’s book blunts this attack by placing the Magi in a historical context.

Modern secularists like to cast a wide net, portraying not only Christmas, but also the life of Christ as fable. They say there was no virgin birth, no miracles, and no resurrection. According to them, we can know very little about the historical Jesus, what he did or said, or even if he existed at all. God becoming man is just another made-up story, falling into the genre of ancient Near East mystery religions. In short, Jesus is a myth. Worse yet, the people who believe the myth are foolhardy and weak of mind. Marx and Lenin called religion the ‘opium for the people.’ Prominent atheist Richard Dawkins even goes so far as to write children’s books trying “to save kids” from the perils of religion. Christmas is scary!

In one sense, they are right. Christianity is myth. Christianity highlights the themes of good and evil, tragedy and triumph, supernatural feats and ordinary failings. The archetypal hero with a thousand faces can be seen in the Bible. These profound undercurrents of truth run deeply through the human soul. Christianity is a myth, but it is, as C. S. Lewis called, a ‘true myth:’ “a myth working on us in the same way as the others, but with this tremendous difference that it really happened.” God’s myth is greater than man’s myth, as it is incarnational in nature.

C.S. Lewis’ good friend, J.R.R. Tolkien, penned a modern-day mythic tale in his Lord of the Rings books, weaving in Catholic themes about heroes, truth, death and redemption. G.K. Chesterton spoke about Christianity as the fulfillment of myth as well: “The Catholic faith is the reconciliation because it is the realization both of mythology and philosophy. It is a story and in that sense one of a hundred stories; only it is a true story.” God’s true story is revealed to us in the events of the life of Christ.

Lewis, Tolkien, and Chesterton used myth in the truest and most profound sense of the word. That is, all the spiritual truths that percolated up into ancient man’s mind found their realization in the person of Christ. The use of myth today is more of the petty, slanderous kind, with accusations of “untruth.” Think of the ancient Christian “Icthys”fish symbol (“Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior” used by 1st century Christians to mark secret meeting spots in the time of pagan persecutions), which is now mocked on cars with the labels “science” or “Darwin.” The irony is that the more science digs into Christianity, the more evidence of its truth is discovered. This has been no more evident than in recent Biblical archeological discoveries.

Fr. Longenecker’s book establishes the Magi in history, just as many of the archeological sites we visited on our pilgrimage fix Judaism and Christianity in history. There are the caves at Qumran near the shores of the Dead Sea where nearly a thousand scrolls or fragments of scrolls were discovered beginning in 1947. These are the writings from the Jewish religious sect known as the Essenes, contemporaries of Jesus. The archeological discovery found copies, in part or in whole, for nearly all the books of the Hebrew Bible, except Esther. More importantly, the 2,000-year-old scrolls show only minor divergences from modern translations of the Old Testament. This proves the many textual critics of the Bible wrong. The text of the Bible has remained intact and substantially unchanged throughout its history.

The pilgrimage also allowed us to see first-hand that we are now in a ‘golden age’ of biblical archeology. Ironically (to some), this golden age is powered by scientific advancements and new disciplines; things like archaeoastronomy, Lidar studies, and ground penetrating radar, to name just a few. There are examples of new discoveries everywhere you go in Israel and Jordan. In 1986, two fisherman and amateur archeologists uncovered the “Jesus boat” in the muddy lakebed in the Sea of Galilee during a severe drought. The fishing boat was radiocarbon-dated to between 120 B.C.-40 A.D., or roughly the time of Christ. The Apostles would have fished in a boat exactly like this one. In 2004, the “Pool of Siloam” was discovered, where Jesus cured a blind man by having him wash mud out of his eyes. (Jn. 9:7) A drainage repair crew working on pipe maintenance uncovered large stone steps down into the pool. In 2007, archeologists discovered the long-lost tomb of Herod at his Herodium fortress. In 2009, while building a retreat house along the northern side of the Sea of Galilee, crews unearthed the remains of a first century synagogue at Magdala (home of Mary Magdalene). This discovery is now the oldest synagogue in the Galilee, with the oldest known representation of the Temple on the “Magdala Stone,” and is likely one of the hallowed grounds where Jesus frequented and taught.

In October 2016, a renovation project funded by National Geographic was done at the tomb of Christ in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Some historians had previously believed that the original cave was not there, not that old, or doubted that this was the actual site of Christ’s burial (and resurrection) at all. An archeologist using ground-penetrating radar, however, proved them wrong. He was able to determine that the original cave walls were, in fact, still present. The simple cave is still there underneath the millennium of marble, icons and incense of the ornate Edicule shrine.

Mortar samples, taken from between the limestone cave-surface and the marble slab of the tomb, carbon-dated to about 345 A.D. This is exactly the right time frame when the Emperor Constantine would have discovered the tomb and built the current shrine around it. The Emperor Hadrian had built a pagan temple to Venus over the Christian holy site, as a means to cover up Christ’s burial spot, and presumably to stop Christian worship there. Constantine subsequently destroyed the pagan shrine and excavated the site around 326 A.D., nearly matching the 345 A.D. date, and lending credence to this being the actual location of Christ’s tomb. Modern science again proved the historical veracity of Christianity.

At no place in the pilgrimage did Old Testament typology burst forth more into New Testament history than at “Shepherd’s Field,” an eastern suburb of Bethlehem. It is the site traditionally where the angel announced the birth of Christ to the shepherds tending to their sheep. The shepherds were the precursors to the Magi in worshiping the Christ child. The prophet Micah had made an ancient prophecy (8th century B.C.) of the birthplace of the Messiah in the city of David, Bethlehem: “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me, one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose origin is from of old, from ancient days.”(Micah 5:2) The Messiah, “the Son of David,” would be born in Bethlehem, like King David before him.

This is the prophecy that was cited to king Herod by his wise men, when the Magi came looking for the newborn king of the Jews. Herod also perverted this into his maniacal slaughter of the innocence in Bethlehem. At Shepherd’s Field, the angel of the Lord appeared to the shepherds, saying: “And this will be a sign for you: you will find a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”(Lk. 2:12) This “sign” would be the fulfillment of Micah’s prophecy. The shepherds and the location were not coincidental either.

These were no ordinary sheep and no ordinary shepherds. Shepherd’s Field is where thousands of lambs were born and used for the daily sacrifices, and more importantly, the Passover sacrifices at the Temple in Jerusalem, as intimated in the ancient Jewish oral tradition of the Mishnah(e.g., Shekalim, 7.4) and Alfred Edersheim’s The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah (Bk.2, Ch.6). The “shepherds” were not ordinary shepherds either, but most likely Levite priests. They were specifically stationed there at Shepherd’s Field to pasture the sheep and preserve the newborn lambs ‘without blemish’or ‘broken bone,’ to meet the requirements of the Law for Temple sacrifices. The unblemished lambs were then chosen from Shepherd’s Field in Bethlehem and kept for the annual Passover sacrifice in the Temple in Jerusalem.

Shepherd’s Field and Bethlehem highlight the convergence of Christ, biblical prophecy, God’s true myth, and archeology. Jesus was the fulfillment of the angel’s announcement to the shepherd-priests. It is fitting that when the shepherds came to the manger, they found not a baby lamb, but the baby Jesus wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. Jesus is the true ‘Lamb of God,’who was the fulfillment of the Passover sacrifice of the lamb, in order to take away sin and keep us from death. John the Baptist knew Jesus fulfilled this typology of the Passover lamb, saying: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”(Jn. 1:29) Like many of the Christian sites in the Holy Land, the scriptures, Old Testament typology, and history come together to reveal the divine plan in the person of Jesus Christ.

Diving even deeper into the Old Testament symbology, Jesus is the Passover lamb who must be eaten. He is the fulfillment of God’s true myth rooted in history. The little town of Bethlehem means ‘house of bread’ in Hebrew and ‘house of meat’ in Arabic. Bethlehem intimates the ‘bread and flesh’ of Jesus in the Eucharist. Jesus was also placed in a manger (i.e., a feeding trough), symbolism hinting that he is food that gives life. It is no wonder that when the shepherd-priests found the newborn Christ-child, as the angel had announced, “all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them.”(Lk. 2:18) This same wonder is with us still in the ongoing afterglow of the birth of Christ.