In
Accordance with The Scriptures (aka Always We Begin Again)
“I am reminding you, brothers and sisters, of
the Gospel I preached to you, which you indeed received and in which you also
stand. Through it you are also being saved, if you hold fast to the Word, I
preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I handed on to you as of
first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance
with the Scriptures; that he was buried; that he was raised on the third day in
accordance with the Scriptures.” 1
Corinthians 15:1-3
Jesus said to Thomas, “I am the way and the
truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know
me, then you will also know my Father. From now on you do know him and have
seen him.” John 14:6-7
Piety
For I
am the least of the apostles, not fit to be called an apostle, because I
persecuted the church of God. But by
the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me has not been ineffective.
Indeed, I have toiled harder than all of them; not I, however, but the grace of
God [that is] with me. Therefore,
whether it be I or they, so we preach and so you believed. 1 Corinthians 15:9-11
Study
St.
Paul gives a pretty good summation of Sacred History in his letter to the
people of Corinth. “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures; that he
was buried; that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the
Scriptures.”
These
are lessons that we study over and over and over. Every celebration of the Mass (daily and
weekly) begins with the same words. “In
the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit…” When one liturgical cycle ends, the next day,
another begins virtually right where the last period started.
Advent/Christmas
starts us off close to the beginning of a new calendar year. Turning the calendar pages focuses everyone
on the fresh start, the New Year’s Resolutions, parades, football games, and
the proverbial ball dropping in Times Square.
Another time that we naturally focus on a renewal is in September when
schools reopen after summer vacation.
Back to school also means back to religious education and meetings of
the Knights of Columbus and whatever Church groups to which you might belong.
January
1 and September 1 also mark two of the beginning dates for Benedictines who
re-read the Rule of St. Benedict from cover to cover three times per year. May (now) is also the time when we remind
ourselves of those lessons.
On this
Feast of Saints Philip and James, Benedictines around the world are huddled
over these words that begin the Prologue to the Rule once
again:
Listen carefully, my
child, to my instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart. This
is advice from one who loves you; welcome it, and faithfully put it into
practice. The labor of obedience will bring you back to God from whom you had
drifted through the sloth of disobedience. This message of mine is for you,
then, if you are ready to give up your own will, once and for all, and armed
with the strong and noble weapons of obedience to do battle for Jesus, the
Christ.
Action
In
these seven weeks of the Easter season, when the blooming azaleas and spring
flowers surround us reminding us of life bursting out all over again, it is an
excellent time to begin a new journey. Benedict advises us that we cannot do it
alone. You do not just climb into your
Toyota, arms with a smartphone tuned to WAZE for turn-by-turn directions and
ask Siri the way to heaven.
You
also probably do not want to consult Siri or Google. Benedict and St. Paul and Jesus of Nazareth
are good mentors. They give us an
excellent place to start and a worthy goal to pursue: the way the truth and the
life. Jesus does not ask anything of us
that He has not offered. Take obedience,
for example. Today we hear again: “If
you ask anything of me in my name, I will do it.” Anything.
ANYTHING!
If you
have drifted off – or run away willingly a la the Prodigal Son – then we can
listen and obey the way to get back as revealed in Sacred Scriptures and
religious traditions. Always, we begin again.
What
first steps can you take again this month?
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