predication.net

Christianity, therefore, builds in the true sense of the word
«The world of the future». It is briefly expressed in the words:
I believe in the remission of sins, the resurrection of the flesh, and eternal life. However, the future may be far or near in time, at the end of the ages, or even in time. The realization of the Christian ideal appears to theologians who are embarking on conjectures from a different perspective. Some have in mind gradual growth of mustard grain (Mt 13:31) to the Church, until it grows abruptly and gradually, it becomes a tree and the whole earth shall be in his shadow. Others mean earlier a forerunner of the Old Testament and the Savior’s earthly life. The realization of the old promises is preceded by the ruins of the temple in Jerusalem; the bright resurrection of Christ is the opposite of Calvary’s seeming hopelessness, by we should not expect too much improvement here on earth situations, rather catastrophic disappointments in which certify faithful. There is no choice but to leave the speculation of the future. Nowadays, however, one feature of Christian hope makes sense: a firm conviction about the effectiveness of human endeavor and our normal means of Christian life in achieving the goal. No one can doubt that our hope should be based only on God. However, it is reluctant to deduce from this truths immediately hasty conclusions for practical life. Easy cheap surface sighs, such as “Only God Himself will help us out of this difficult situation! Virgo Mary will set us free! » As they sound, these are exclamation is undoubtedly pious. However, when we look at the person of the one who speaks to them is easily tempted respond in a way that looks very ungodly. After In one such sermon, one of the listeners said: «Neither the Lord God nor the Virgin Mary will place us to wash the floor of the church when it is dirty. We have to do something ourselves! » We know that it is not an easy theological question of God’s activity and human cooperation. In practice, however, we must follow the council of St. Ignatius of Loyola: “Pray as if everything depended on God, but work as if everything it was up to you! ” The closest connection between God’s and human activity is manifested in the sacraments. We know only God himself can forgive sins. And yet we kneel to confessor and ask for absolution from the priest. Firmly we trust that God works in priestly words and that they are effective for God’s action to take place. But God works in every good deed, though not in such an infallible way as in the sacraments. Therefore, we believe and must hope that they are effective, that they make sense for neither one of them it is not in vain. They are all like solid stone on building the ideals of the kingdom of God. This firm hope in life, in the sense of earthly wandering, must be emphasized especially today, when people so easily stop believing that it makes sense to live.
Circumstances in which our needs need to be strengthened
1. In the pursuit of perfection. To the novices of religious societies, young theologians often seem like holiness was at hand. The first enthusiasm is like a good wind in of sails. But then comes the thunder, the storm, the storm that drives back. And yet everyone is called to perfection(cf. Mt 5:48).
2. In prayer. Prayer does not become effective amount of words, but trust. If you have faith like mustard grain and you will say to this hill: «Get out of here ta! » – Pass. And nothing will be impossible for you (Matt. 17:20). However, it is this trust that seems difficult. Holy Gregor of Nazians asks if any promise should be made to God, if we really want to pray for something. He believes that such a promise is a good thing. It is not because God gives as if softened by a promised gift, that would be ridiculous. However, we ourselves feel more confident when we promise something to God, we have a stronger hope that we will achieve what we ask for. Every strengthening of hope then benefits prayer.
3. In circumstances where we are overwhelmed by carelessness.
Hebrews (6, 19) likens hope to an anchor. For the sailors of the old light boats, the anchor was the last security when the waves swept the boat too much. Meaning that image is obvious. There are times when man’s strength is only in hope, which he cannot even utter aloud (In silentio et spe fortitudo mea, writes Balvín after the White Mountain). God he purifies our hope by committing disappointments, failures, states of emotional hopelessness. For mystics, these the conditions are manifested by excruciating pain. According to St. John of Crosses are mental depressions often caused by God light penetrates into the soul, which is not yet perfect cleaned. However, these states give a heroic opportunity attitude, to trust in the one God.
4. In temptations when we are afraid of succumbing.
A modern doctor and psychologist who lectures in Rome, is dealt with the issue of bad habits in the area of ​​the sixth commandment. He concluded that they were incurable only until the “patient” himself believes that he can avoid sin, as he says, “I would like to, but …” Certainty is the best support while walking the rope. In moral life we ​​have this certainty God wants to give, even if we are to be well aware of ours weakness. “But let’s stop,” writes Mons. Gray, «off«To compute to God a long monotonous series of our unworthiness, misery only to justify ourselves to ourselves the restlessness and insecurity we carry within us. ” God sometimes strengthens our hope in a special way. It already gives us certain signs of its favor here on earth. We generally call them consolations. There will come moments when all uncertainty disappears when each of us is willing to die because he sees that the sky is open to him. Some saints also had a special vision in which they themselves Christ the Lord assured him of his love for them. No one should despise such special gifts of God because they are special reinforcement. Even the three apostles got them on the hill Tabor to be better armed for reception test. On the contrary, all teachers of spiritual life they warn against looking for accounts and even more against desire after visions and revelations. Christian hope looks to the future, to something it still expects of God. Who is looking consolation, he wants to enjoy the present. To some extent as if throwing away what makes Christian hope so rare, i.e. full confidence in God and in uncertainty.

We all expect something, so we have hope. Often however, we disappoint, our hope has become in vain. What he hopes for
Christian not to be disappointed? Apostles who joined to Jesus of Nazareth, they hoped to live to see the day in which the kingdom of Israel will be restored. This is evidenced by two disciples going to Emmaus (cf. Lk 24:13). They lost hope by the death of Christ, so they were extremely pleased the revelation of the risen Christ. To strengthen hope all the other disciples heard the voices of the angels at the ascension of the Lord on the Mount of Olives: This Jesus, who was taken from you to heaven will come as you saw him go to heaven (Acts 1:11). The hope of the first Christians thus manifested itself in a short prayer: Maran Atha, Come, Lord Jesus! (Rev 22, 20). On that day, as we believe, the kingdom of God will take place. The message of the gospel it will no longer be a program, a promise of the next age, but a living, real presence. Theology therefore expresses the subject of Christian hope a concise formula that has a profound meaning: the whole of Christ. So Jesus comes into the world again, with him everything what is connected with his arrival, t. j. holiness and celebration of the Church, victory of the truth, realization of all the true human ideals, God’s creative and redemptive plans. Hope therefore strengthens faith as a young man seed. The ideal becomes a foggy vision at the moment we will stop hoping for its feasibility. This would be Christianity without the virtue of hope. St. Thomas Aquinas speaks more abstractly when he claims that the only true object of our hope is eternal bliss in God. “So we should not hope for anything less than him on my own. His goodness, which gives good things to creation, no there is nothing less than his being himself. Therefore own and the main object of hope is eternal bliss. ” This statement is supported by St. Tomas for two reasons.
1. Each donor gives what corresponds to his characteristics.
We expect only eternal happiness from an eternally blissful God.
2. The requirements of our will are unlimited, therefore
permanent with another gift she could not even satisfy. Eternal happiness however, it is not just a gift from God. It is also the fruit of human merit. So I must also hope that I will have enough opportunities and opportunities to earn these merits. Saint Thomas thus distinguishes between the primary and the main object of hope,
which is eternal bliss, and a secondary object, that is all that is needed in life for us to be saved. Can we hope to be happy here on earth? Following Christ warns: “Do not promise what Christ does not promise you!” The Savior’s whole life was a cross, so must life his followers. However, it would be wrong to consider the cross for misfortune. God is happiness. If his image grows in us, it increases, as St. Gregor of Nazian, and our bliss. It is a happiness that the world cannot give. However, during our life on earth, the vision of God will remain unclear, as if in a mirror (1 Cor 13:12).
A motive of hope
Theologians distinguish not only the subject but also the motive of hope, that is, on which our trust is based. This, too, is an important psychological element in life. Founder”Jocism”, the Catholic workers’ movement, was tried once explain the difference between a poor person and the so-called proletarians. Not every lord is a proletarian and not everyone the proletarian is poor at this very moment. “Proletarian ism” is a lack of life security. The father of the family
it is not enough to make enough money, he is much more troubled by uncertainty about what will happen tomorrow, whether he will not lose his job, his apartment, his insurance.” Proletarianize the masses” means, according to Cardin, to give them security for the future. However, this is a sociological question, necessary but difficult. The religious problem is going on much more in depth. It’s about how confident we can be in life have at all. From this more penetrating point of view, it seems to us shaky all security social, family, state
and church. Ascetic authors like to refer to Jeremiah’s pessimistic statement: Cursed is a man who trusts in man (17,5). However, Christians are not so afraid of this pessimism. if we cannot rely on anyone and anything in the world, there is still one we can and must rely on, God. “We hope for the good that is from God,” writes St. Thomas Aquinas, “so only with God can it be achieved.” So we do not rely on others or on ourselves. Therefore, they can hope both weak and unstable, and sinners. Therefore, again they cannot bring out virtues and must remember the warning of St. Paul (1 Cor 10: 12; 2 Cor 1: 9): Who thinks that he stands, be careful not to fall. It does not lead to some unsightly disbelief to a neighbor with an inappropriate verse quote? “Don’t trust anyone in the wider world.” The answer is suggested in a humorous way a popular proverb: “To whom the Lord God is holy.” “We must not trust in man and in any other creature,” writes St. Thomas Aquinas, «as if they were the first cause as if they could make the soul happy. Perhaps however, trust people when we look at them as secondary cause, as an instrument by which the soul helps itself in achieving the good that belongs to the ultimate goal. »Hope is as if in a wide field between certainty and impossibility. Therefore, it allows many degrees. The closer to certainty, the stronger the motive on which it is based, and the more we are more personally convinced of that. Christian hope it is based on the promises of God, who cannot be wrong or deceive others. In the Psalms it is therefore compared to rock (pores. Z 26, 6; 39, 3; 60, 3, etc.). The more person personally this faith penetrates, the firmer and more confident he feels. Of the many texts of Scripture, it is sufficient to mention Job (13, 15): If he goes wild me, I won’t even shake, just let me say in front of him your. This will then be my salvation, for the villain does not have access to it.

Many, especially the elderly, claim that today’s people do not trust their problems as quickly as they did in the past. At that time, people, especially in smaller communities, were “familyed” with each other and knew almost everything about each other. However, this statement is not entirely true, because a random and brief conversation with a stranger is enough to know what values ​​he professes, what he claims, what his views are. They have adopted the view that religion is a private matter of man, so it should not be talked about so as not to offend anyone, especially if he is concerned with unbelievers. Today’s gospel, however, makes it clear that public confession of Christ is a prerequisite for eternal life. It is as binding as loving one’s neighbor and showing him mercy. He who is ashamed of Christ must reckon with the fact that he too will be ashamed of the Father from heaven.

But how do we compare these strict words of confession with other statements of Jesus in which religion refers to the chamber of the heart and fights against the Pharisees who used religion for their admiration? But when you go to pray, go to your room, close the door behind you and pray to your Father, who is in secret. And your Father will reward you, for he also sees in secret. And when we add to these words this day, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, even I will deny before my Father which is in heaven, we ask ourselves how we understand it.

Religion has two sides. The first is internal — private, to which Jesus’ words of religious privacy apply. After all, when a person decides to meet God, to speak to him in prayer, it must take place in the depths of his heart, which, of course, he hates publicity. The second is external – public, in which we assume that God is the master of the world, humanity, states, nations… Therefore, the relationship with him can not only be a private matter, it can not be handled only in the chamber of the heart, pushed only into churches or hang his picture in an always closed bedroom. God also has a firm place in public life, he should also be publicly worshiped and respected. After all, even Christ was not ashamed to sacrifice his life in front of the whole public, and therefore we must care about him more than on the opinion of the people. There are situations in life where we have to say straightforwardly, clearly and clearly, that we are believers and stand by our faith.

However, there are situations where our religious feeling prevents us from showing our convictions, and we will say to ourselves: What is it for who I am, what religion I believe in, whether I go to church and approach the sacraments… I will not talk about it with people who they do not understand or do not want to understand it. Didn’t Christ himself tell us not to throw pearls to pigs? Surely each of us has come to such conclusions before, because we have found that it is better to remain silent than to argue about religion, or to act as sectarians who force our views even fanatically and sometimes by force.

Today is different than in the time of Christ or in the Christian Middle Ages. Therefore, we should also understand the words of the Lord in the spirit of our present. Today, it is not necessary to confess Jesus to rulers and kings as he did 2,000 years ago. But we must also not make religion a protest, a demonstration, an opposition… Today’s faith must be an expression of lived, sincere Christianity. The world does not expect great words from us, but a different life, completely different from what people without God lead. According to our behavior, modesty, dedication, willingness to help everyone, people must know that we are in this world, but we do not belong to this world. As people serving this world do not hide from what is their ideal, so it must be clear to everyone from our way of life what our interests and desires are.

Leslie Strobel became a Christian in 1979. An example based on her life also affected her unbelieving husband. He set out on a journey in search of God and finally found him. In his book The Case for Christ, he talks about two years of intense search that led him to Christ. This journalist, who has received several awards in the field of journalism, is now largely dedicated to writing answers to questions asked by unbelievers and often cynical readers of the newspapers for which he works. The change he went through also affected their five-year-old daughter, who once said: Mom, I would like God to do for me what He did for my father. Leslie Strobel’s faith affected the lives of her entire family. This is exactly what the mission of each of us should be. The life of our faith is to affect the life of the environment in which we move.

Lord, give us the strength to profess our faith without fear, not to be ashamed of you.

The heart of Jesus, the brightest beauty …

Over the centuries, Christian iconography has developed the hallmarks of depicted saints through objects of symbolic significance. Sometimes these are objects common to a whole group of saints, as indicated by icons e.g. bishops with a scepter and a miter, martyrs with a palm branch, etc. In most cases, however, they are characters (attributes) individually, derived from the event of the saint’s life, from the legends told and, in the case of martyrs, from the way they are tortured. The way of depiction is different also according to the period of origin of artistic expression, e.g. Gothic, Baroque, etc. According to these signs, it is better to know which saint it is. Many saints are thus depicted with a heart – pierced, burning, wrapped in a crown of thorns, etc.

This is how Augustín, Brigita of Sweden, Filip Neri, František Saleský, František Xaverský, Ignác of Loyola, Jan František de Chantal, Katarína Sienská, Mária Magdaléna de Pazzi, Stanislav Kostka, Terézia Veľká are depicted. What did the artists want to say when they portrayed saints with hearts in this way? The human heart is given special importance: only to God is its mystery fully revealed. We should tremble with piety before this mysterious depth. It is for us the personification of humanity, the source by which the wealth of his personality springs from man. Only the heart can speak to the heart. In it is the true beauty, the real and eternal value of man. Man is as his heart is. That is why Christianity accepts this symbol. It expresses the hidden core of the personality.

This fact will help us understand what is the essence of our reverence for the Divine Heart of Jesus: The believer is captivated by knowing the fundamental truth of our redemption, namely, that God has accepted our human heart. Through Jesus’ Heart, we learn God’s eternal plan of salvation. It is a plan of love. There was hardly another way to better express that God really loves us humans! “What beautiful thing have you found for us, the Savior, that you have loved us so much? “, we sing with the Church in the evening feast of the Divine Heart. That is why we confess about it: The Heart of Jesus, the brightest beauty …

Almighty God could have arranged otherwise to announce salvation to us. An angel could have told us, a prophet could have called us to repentance. However, he knew that only such a thing would affect a person, she would be able to move him, it would affect his heart. And only the language of the heart affects the heart. That is why God accepted the human heart to speak to people in a language that everyone understands – not only the smart and educated, but also the simple and the children. Not everyone has a head to understand great thoughts, but everyone who has a piece of a good human heart will understand when they hear that someone has shed the last blood of their heart to save him from death. Practice also confirms to us that if someone was obtained for Christ, it did not happen through the path of argument, logic, reason, but through the path of the heart. Even the most accurate evidence is cold, because it is not overheated by a good heart, kindness of personality. Herein was the mystery of the effectiveness of Christ’s words on men, that is the mystery of the proclamation of God to this day. Already in the Old Testament, the idea is repeated that only God can enter the human heart (Ps. 7: 10; Ps. 44: 22, etc.). The Gospel also assures us that the heart is an organ for receiving God’s word and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, into which God’s love flows (cf. Mt 13:19; Mark 4:15; Luke 8:15; Acts 2:27; Rom. 2, 15; Gal 4, 6; 1 Cor 1, 22, et al.). Only those with a pure heart will see God (cf. Mt 5: 8). Even Christ cannot be received other than through the heart (cf. Eph 3:17). Heart of St. Augustine was not convinced by the arguments of theologians, but by the kind and fatherly words of Bishop Ambrose. In a book about his conversion (Confessions), he writes that he wept when he heard us sing hymns and songs. They deeply penetrated his heart and awakened piety in him. Therefore, writes St. Makarius: “The spiritual life springs in the spaces of the heart as soon as two mysterious beings meet here – God and man. “Much has already been written about what the hidden power of the Church is, her attraction, which is gaining more and more adherents in all ages, generations and social strata. We Christians know the reason: Christ’s Divine Heart beats in the Church – but secretly but effectively This is the power that can do more than preach, which attracts the heart of a man who may have parted ways with the Church at a young age, lives unchristian, but still has a sensitive place in his heart of affection for the Church of his childhood.

With the heart one understands rather than reason with reason. And as long as man’s heart remains human, he can never completely break and discard the love of Christ. So that is the essence and sense of respect

The life that grows, not the whole life, is divided into time periods. But the parts don’t make sense if we don’t see the whole. The perspective of the future, i.e. hope, therefore necessarily belongs to work, development, progress. Life, which flows like a river in time, is heading for the next moment, tomorrow, so it must reckon with tomorrow and expect it. If the sun stopped shining, it would stop growth in nature. Hope is the sun of people’s lives. Dante rightly wrote at the gate of hell, eternal death, the inscription: “Leave all hope!” So those who have passed away forever have no hope customs and their happiness no longer awaits. In the true sense of the word, however even those who have already attained eternal bliss do not live in hope. Their hope was fulfilled, their faith grew in direct vision and experience. The trinity of faith, hope and love belongs too today to time, to our life here on earth. In eternity, only love does not cease (1 Cor 13: 8).
This psychological reasoning will also help us to understand the need for hope in the Christian sense of the word. We know well what important period in a person’s life is the so-called growing up, period sometimes from twelve, sometimes from fourteen to about sixteen years. Educators of that age they say “hard years”, popularly called “stick years”. It is a time of great change. A new person is being created. For the understanding of young people in this period still remains an interesting Mendouce’s book The Youth’s Soul (Lame de ľ adolescent) called. According to the author, the crisis of youth occurs at the moment when the simple child’s security of action begins to be lost. Children because they do not have big problems. Their thinking corresponds to what is in their circle. Even when a healthy boy cries, he does not know the hopelessness and attainability of desire; the future is straightforward, certain. The period of adolescence, however
it starts with dreaming. The mental horizon begins to open long distances, great desires and desires are born. Surprising their incoherence. What all we didn’t want to be in time maturing! The fourteen-year-old boy doesn’t care that he can’t be a violin virtuoso, an aviation officer, a politician, a scientist, a poet, an entrepreneur, priests … There are many ideals and they are all taken seriously.
In the meantime, however, life remains in its old cramped sidewalks. Parents don’t want to understand that guy she is no longer a little boy and that she is no longer the one she is starting to talk about outside. Therefore, resistance is born against parents, the desire to flee the house, from the environment that suffocates takeoff. Adolescents therefore experience spontaneous, more serious, as everyone around thinks, the eternal contradiction between the ideal and reality. However, it is not possible to live in contradictions. Wanted solution. The character of the future person will be created according to how you resolved the question posed in your youth. The solutions are always personal and therefore diverse. They could however, categorize into approximately four groups. He described the first two types with the subtle satire of Cervantes. The incorrigible idealist is Don Quixote. So that he doesn’t have to renounce his ideals, he does not want to see the world with his real face. Fights against windmills; rural the girl he only dimly saw becomes the fairy-tale ideal Dulcimer. On the contrary, the representative of what is now called bourgeois nature is Quixote’s guide to Sancho Panza. He sees reality up too good, but that’s why he lost his ideals. We will meet both types in daily life. Most cheerful people accept reality, they recognize that the world is as it is. Their ideals are then good for touching ideas and paper festive speeches, which drive away the boredom of everyday life. Idealists are good at “blazing,” as they say. However, they are lost to practical life existence. However, not all idealists are empty quarrels. Some they are revolutionaries. They see well that the world is not responding ideals. But why can’t they turn this world upside down, his systems to destroy and establish a new, ideal order? It appears, that only a little courage is enough. A revolution can also take place succeed. Worse, however, is when a newly formed company again compared with the ideals that led to its creation. Then new discrepancies are identified.
The fourth type has the greatest success in life combat, which we could call an eclectic, a man of choice. He also had many ideals during his adolescence. But you almost are realized that not all could be done. Picked therefore only one of them and for the one as for the pearl from the parable of the gospel (cf. Mt 13:45), he sacrifices everything. He will then become a famous musician, painter, discoverer, I guess and a saint, or, unfortunately, this often happens,
castaway. Whoever bets everything on one card, either wins a lot, or lose everything. All four types: idealist, burgher, revolutionary, eclectic have their weakness. Contradiction between ideals and the fact cannot be completely solved. This is also confirmed by historical development and history of philosophical schools. Plato transferred all ideals to the «world of ideas». Here on earth are only the dim shadows of everything beautiful, noble. Aristotle does not believe in the other world either ideas. He must, as he says, acknowledge his limitations and be content with little.

How God’s providence compares to so many evils with which he is
do we meet in the world?
The saints experience “that to those who love God everything
helps good “{Romans 8:28.) But not everyone has such faith.” If God existed, certain things they could never happen! “, often the unbelievers object. One of them proved his atheism as follows: “They exist wars and horrific crimes. And what does God do? Either he doesn’t want to stop them, and then he’s not good, or he’s not good with them to prevent it, but then it is not omnipotent! “But the existence of evil is also a temptation not to believe in God the Father.
Objections of this kind are ancient. That is why the Church Fathers wrote treatises entitled God is not the cause God’s providence various kinds of evil (cf. St. Basil’s work). Because God he is infinitely good, he can only act in the world good. And yet there are earthquakes, floods, natural disasters and also crimes committed by the wicked people. So where does evil come from? From the sin of the first people and from the sins of all mankind. Saint John Chrysostom he says that God allows them, He does not prevent them. But why? The answer does not seem easy, and therefore The Golden Mouth responds resolutely against those who offend God’s strange indifference and recalls that
divine providence radically transcends divine intelligence. We must firmly believe that evil must also serve good. God acts as a healing physician sick even that the sick must suffer when on they perform their treatments. These words were broadly explained by St. John Chrysostom, who was persecuted and died in exile. Among the recently living saints, let us mention, for example St. Frederik Ozanama, who writes: “If only you wanted to strap on the bed these days to me they are still alive, it would be too short a time to thank you for the days I spent. And my last words would be an anthem of praise for your goodness. ” It is an answer that springs from faith, but it is universal. Can it apply to all evils? After all, they are so diverse.

Physical evils and moral evils
Socrates already distinguished between “physical” evils and “moral”
bad. Pain in diseases, disasters on the road, natural disasters are physical evils. On the contrary, sins and guilty crimes are moral evils. Physical evils, they say Fathers, there are no real evils. They’re like a broom in the hands of a wise father who knows he must punish a mischievous child to bring them up for good. Plug for example, people learn to pray and turn to God only when they fall into poverty or danger. This is evidenced by the ancient proverb of sailors: “Who he cannot pray, let him go to the sea some dangerous storm! And what about moral evil, sin? “How you can live in this world full of evil, “they sigh sometimes people. It’s not easy to believe, but we have to convince them that even evil not caused by God will escape God’s power. Pilate and the Jewish high priests committed greatly serious sins by condemning Jesus to death, and yet the end result of this judgment was the cross, which saved the whole world. According to legend, Saint Prokop, Czech patron, forced the devil to pull the plow by which the saint he cultivated the land of his monastery. What an evil spirit wanted to destroy, he had to build. The legend symbolically expresses what has been verified so many times in the history of the Church and also in the personal experience of believers. God’s providence gospel parable of the prodigal son He shows us how a person discovers the true face of a merciful God only when he decides to return to his father’s house and repents for his delusions. There are cases where the bold expression o felix culpa applies.

Life by nature
People make mistakes and apologize for the fact that it is natural. Is it really natural? If they lived by nature, Dante writes in the Divine Comedy, it wouldn’t be on the world of sin. The Slovak word naturalness is related to by the word to be born, Greek physics has a similar origin and Latin nature. So that’s what God created, and it can
be just good. Such was the meaning of the Greek Fathers expression
nature. God gave man divine life, love, faith, all virtues. All this is natural for him (so-called complete nature, natural nature). It is against nature but sin and corrupt tendencies, evil passions. In the West, the term naturalness has not retained its original meaning. Theologians needed to discern what is in us human and what is divine. Therefore, they called e.g. reason will, feelings by natural gifts, sanctifying grace, on the contrary, by supernatural gifts. That is why they also talk about the supernatural virtues of faith, hope, love. The man has sinned. His mind darkened, his will turned to evil, his body and the senses were seized by passions. We are like that and that is why it is ours naturalness, of course in a very special sense, nature spoiled, fallen (natura corrupta, lapsa). However, she opposes grace. It must be constantly overcome. Following Christ has a whole chapter on the various movements of nature and grace »: Grace invites us to the heights, nature pulls to the ground. We must keep this threefold meaning of the word in mind, when we read spiritual books. It should be noted in which meaning the author uses the term. Otherwise, we would come across statements that are in stark contrast. Once we read, that we are by nature to live and develop it, other times he claims that we must still deny it and kill it. Once it is written that love for God is natural, other times it is proven that it is not natural, but supernatural. All of these statements are true, but according to the meaning in which they are used the word «nature».

To truly know Jesus, we need to pray, adore, and acknowledge that we are sinners. Knowing the catechism is not enough to understand the depth of the mystery of Christ. In today’s first reading, St. Paul prays for the Ephesians. The apostle of the Gentiles asks them from the Holy Spirit for the grace to be strong, strengthened, so that Christ truly dwells in their hearts. This is the middle. Paul plunges into the vast sea that is the person of Christ. But how can we know Christ. How can we understand the love of Christ that transcends all knowledge?

Christ is present in the gospel, reading the gospel we know Christ. And we all do it, or at least listen to the gospel when we go to Mass. As for the study of the catechism: the catechism teaches us who Christ is. But that is not enough. To be able to understand the breadth, length, height, and depth of Jesus Christ, we must first enter the context of prayer, as Paul does, on his knees: ‘Father, send down the Spirit to know Jesus Christ.’

Prayer is needed to truly know Christ.  However, Paul not only prays, he adores this mystery, which transcends all knowledge, and in the context of adoration he asks for this grace of the Lord. We do not know the Lord without this habit of adoring, worshiping in silence, adoring. I think, if I’m not mistaken, this prayer of adoration is less known to us, it is the one we do less. Wasting time – I dare say – before the Lord, before the mystery of Jesus Christ. He is there in silence, in the silence of adoration. He is the Lord and I adore him.

In order to know Christ, it is necessary to have knowledge of ourselves, that is, to be accustomed to accusing ourselves as sinners, to confessing that we are sinners. You cannot adore without indicting yourself. In order to enter this sea without a bottom, without the shores, which is the mystery of Jesus Christ, the following things are necessary: ​​Prayer, ‘Father, send me [the Holy] Spirit to lead me to the knowledge of Jesus.’ Second, adoring secrets, enter into secrets, adoring. And third, to accuse myself: ‘I am a man with unclean lips’. May the Lord also give us this grace that Paul asks for the Ephesians, to know this grace and to obtain Christ.