In theology a person is an individual substance of a rational nature and so the Holy Spirit is a person, it is of the same essence of God The Father and of God The Son, it is the same Divine Essence, the same Divinity therefore it is God but it has its own intellect and will.
A careful study of the Holy Scriptures perfectly shows that the Holy Spirit speaks, the Holy Spirit says, the Holy Spirit prevented Paul from going to Asia (Acts 16: 6), the Holy Spirit moves into action, the Holy Spirit is saddened…. the Holy Spirit is quoted in dozens of texts in specific action cleary proving that He is a rational person with an intellect.
A person is a substance with a will and an intellect with a rational nature is the same difference between a human person and an animal: we would never say that an animal is a person because, although it has some instinct and even feelings,it doesn’t has an intellect nor a rationality and neither an intelligent will. An animal doesn’t reflect upon itself. Most animals don’t even know that they are their own entity: a cat may mistake his own image for another cat in the mirror they don’t have this intellectual concept of their individuality, they don’t have a will, they don’t plan the future as we do, they don’t worry, they don’t study, they don’t rationalize as we do that’s why we do not consider animals as “persons”.
Yes they do have a body therefore having a body doesn’t define a person, having an intellect and a will does.
Likewise, angels are persons. Every single angel is an individual person.
Also God is one God ,only one Divine Essence, only one Divine Nature, it’s not three Gods, there is ONLY ONE GOD but in three persons:
God The Father, God The Son and God The Holy Spirit do have their own individualities within the Holy Trinity and this Divine Holy Family forms the Family we are called to belong to, to be Sons and Daughters of the Holy Trinity. They become hosts of our souls and we are to receive the Holy Trinity inside the temple of our body, blood soul and humanity. Inside each of our own human inner personal universe, we are to receive the Holy Trinity as a guest into our souls.
We get to pray for the Holy Spirit to come, to enlighten us, to guide us, to impart to us His 7 gifts as recorded in Isaiah 11:1 -3. The seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are, according to the Catholic Tradition: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of God. Starting to develop a personal relationship with God The Holy Spirit adds a whole other dimension in our relationship with God!!!
Rediscovering the nature, the essence, the very definition of what and who God is, is absolutely amazing!!! Understanding that God is a Holy Trinity, Three Persons in one God, one and only God, one only Divinity, one Essence in Three Persons: God The Father, God The Son and God The Holy Spirit.
To define God, we have to go back to 1st John chapter 4 verse 8: “God is love”.
But how do you define love when God is infinte and we humans as so limited to grasp the deep things of God?
Well, how would you define a table to an extraterrestrial being from another system? A text with a definition might do. A picture even better… How about cooking? We would need to show a person with some food doing some action of cutting, mixing, pouring, heating, stiring… We do agree that showing a picture of a person with a tomato in the hand would not do. We would also need to show the action of actually cutting or peeling or manipulating the tomato to convey the concept of cooking. It therefore must have 3 components: a person, some food, and the action of cooking…
Well love is also an action, love is a action verb. Not just a feeling as movies would have us believe. It is a verb. To define love, we first need a lover, a person who loves, who generates love, who gives love, and that person is God the Father.
We also need a recipient, a beloved, another person who receives love, that person is God The Son.
And because love is an action, it is an action verb, we need something to be done between them two, an action, a verb, love is embracing, giving, forgiving, gifting, protecting, caring, kissing, taking care of, feeding, providing, sacrificing, listening to, watching over, looking after, waiting, stroking, hugging, cuddling, covering, sheltering… it’s a verb and this verb is so powerful that it takes on its own identity with a will and an intellect, and as a rational individuality this person is God the Holy Spirit who is Charity, who is Love in action Itself. SEE SECTION ON “THE HOLY TRINITY”.
In the account of the Creation in Genesis 1:27 The Holy Trinity appears for the first time as God speaks in the first personal subject pronoun of the plural form, “Let us make man in Our Image”. Who was God speaking to in such a plural form? The Three Persons cooperated as One Concert of Love in This Divine Work of Creation.
This Triad, this Trio, those Three Persons, from the very same and unique Divine nature and essence, live as One God. They are co-eternal, they always existed, not one came before another as God lives outside of time, He created time for humans but He Himself is not subjected to time. They are co-equal and consubstantial of the same substance, the same Essence, the same God, one Divinity in three persons. They share the same Divine Nature or Essence. They are distinct persons, yet possess one inseparable, undivided Divine Substance.
To exemplify what God is in our little human minds and brains that are too limited to understand what the Holy Trinity is, God has tried to explain to us who He is using concepts that the human mind can grasp yet The Most Holy Trinity still remains a Mystery as God is infinite and cannot be contained nor understood by a limited mind.
The Holy Spirit has given us to understand that in the Holy Baptism we received the three theological virtues: Faith, Hope and Charity. Each one gifted by a Person of the Holy Trinity. Faith from The Father. Hope from the Son. Charity from the Holy Spirit.
In the Confiteor prayer, when we confess our sins we pray the following: “I confess to Almighty God and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done, and in what I have failed to do”, the thoughts being related to The Father, the words because God The Son is the Verb, The Word, The Logos, and in works relating to God The Holy Spirit in action in our lives that we offend by our wrongdoings or by our omissions of good actions or lack of action when we fail to act upon His promptings.
Also, The Holy Trinity acts in our lives through the three sacraments of Christian Initiation. The first Sacrament of Baptism makes us Sons of God of God the Father by adoption within the Son. Through the Sacrament of the Holy Communion we receive God The Son in the Holy Eucharist. In the Sacrament of the Confirmation we receive a personal downpour of God’s Holy Spirit.
The Triune God is LOVE; God The Father is the Source of Love, God The Son is the Incarnate Love and God The Holy Spirit is the Love being Poured out upon us.
God the Father is connected directly to our will and therefore we need to conform our will to the Will of God. As the Holy Mother of God The Son, the Will of God must become our own will, “Fiat Mihi Segundun Verbum Tuum” said the Virgin Mary to the Arcangel Gabriel relating to Her the Message of God. “Fiat Voluntas Tua” said Jesus Himself to His Father when He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane. Our will must come to be what God The Father wills, our intellect relates to God The Son and all memory to God The Holy Spirit. These are the 3 highest faculties of our Human Soul, perfectly compatible and formatted to be configured according to God in His Three Persons.
The Holy Trinity therefore consists of a Divine Family to which we are all called and predestined to belong to. God called all of us, every single human being, to become part of his Divine Family. Not all humans will respond to the call as every human has free will but all of us were called to be Sons and Daughters of God to enter into the Divine Family and to be adopted as Sons and Daughters of God.
ILLUSTRATION: The same as the human hand has five fingers, when we are created we are called to be part of a family with persons who take care of us whatever the circumstances that we may have on Earth.
– As the middle finger God The Father is the Central Person,
– God Our Father, as the middle finger of our hand has God the Son “at his right hand”, the index represents God The Son who points out to The Father: he came to the Earth to teach us about The Father. to show us The Father, to take us back to The Father and to bring us back to The Father. Jesus Christ is the index,
– God the Holy Spirit could be symbolized by what we interestingly call in English “the ring finger”; it is the finger where we put the ring of a married person. It is appropriate as God the Holy Spirit is the very person who literally married or espoused the Holy Virgin Mary to put the seed of God into her womb so that God the Son would be born as God Incarnate, as a human being and we, humans, are also called to receive God the Holy Spirit into our souls as it cleanses our entire being at our Baptism. We also receive Him contained in the Holy Communion and we receive Him personally too in the Holy Sacrament of the Confirmation.
– Therefore right next to the ring finger is the little finger: it is shorter than the others but it is still the closest to the Holy Trinity and that is Our Mother the Holy Virgin Mary, who is the closest being next to the Holy Trinity, above all angels, being Herself Queen of Angels. The little finger is actually right next to the ring finger because God the Holy Spirit is Her Spouse: The Holy Virgin Mary was literally impregnated by the Holy Spirit who put the seed of God into Mary’s womb to beget the Son of God Incarnate, God The Son in flesh, The Incarnate Word of God Jesus Christ and so Mother, The Holy Mother of God the Virgin Mary, is that fourth finger that is shorter than the other three, but the closest to them.
– And finally we have a fifth finger which is the thumb. The thumb seems to be separate from the others, it doesn’t even reach the height of the others, it is very mobile and that finger represents our Guardian Angel: it is of the Heavenly Realm. It is not human, it’s part of the hand because it does work and acts in presence of God the Holy Trinity but it is very mobile because it actually accompanies us here below on Earth since our conception all the way throughout our lives until our personal judgment. He is with us every single day of our lives. The thumb shows us the way. murmurs into our ears what we should or should not do, constantly reminds us of the right path and guides us. And therefore we pray: “Angel of God, my guardian dear, To whom God’s love commits me here, Ever this day (or night) be at my side, To light, to guard, to rule, and guide. From sinful stain O keep me free, And at death’s hour, my helper be. Amen”. He will try to put us on the right path to bring us back to the Holy Trinity, to show us the way to go home: that is our Guardian Angel.
Therefore every single one of us, every single human being, we actually live right in the palm of God’s hand, in the palm of a Divine Family watching over us, in the middle of a Heavenly cradle. This is when God closes His Hand and we are safe under the protection of God the Father, God The Son, God the Holy Spirit, with also The Holy Virgin Mary, Our Lady Terror of Demons, Virgen Potens, Most Powerful Virgin and with the constant care of our Guardian Angel, whoever we are, whatever our circumstances here on Earth, social background, with a human family or without a human family. We are never alone, we have a family!!!!
We have God The Father God The Son God The Holy Spirit and Mother Mary and our Guardian Angel. every single one of us!!! We have a family and we are all taken care of!!!!
The Cross is the very sign of our salvation. It is not some pagan symbol that the Catholics borrowed from Babylonians or Egyptians as JWs claim.
The prophecy of Ezekiel chapter 9 reads: “1 Then he shouted loudly for me to hear, ‘The scourges of the city are approaching, each carrying his weapon of destruction!’ 2 Immediately six men advanced from the upper north gate, each holding a deadly weapon. Among them was a man dressed in linen, with a scribe’s ink-horn in his belt. They came in and halted in front of the bronze altar. 3 The glory of the God of Israel rose from above the winged creature where it had been, towards the threshold of the Temple. He called to the man dressed in linen with a scribe’s ink-horn in his belt 4 and Yahweh said to him, ‘Go all through the city, all through Jerusalem, and mark a cross on the foreheads of all who grieve and lament over all the loathsome practices in it.’ 5 I heard him say to the others, ‘Follow him through the city and strike. Not one glance of pity; show no mercy; 6 old men, young men, girls, children, women, kill and exterminate them all. But do not touch anyone with a cross on his forehead. Begin at my sanctuary.’ So they began with the old men who were in the Temple. 7 He said to them, ‘Defile the Temple; fill the courts with corpses; then go out!’ They went out and hacked their way through the city. 8 While they were hacking them down, I was left alone; I fell on my face, crying out, ‘Ah, Lord Yahweh, are you going to annihilate all that is left of Israel by venting your fury on Jerusalem?’ 9 He said, ‘The guilt of the House of Israel and Judah is immense; the country is full of bloodshed, the city full of perversity, for they say, “Yahweh has abandoned the country, Yahweh cannot see.” 10 Then, I too shall neither give one glance of pity nor show any mercy. I shall repay them for what they have done.’ 11 The man dressed in linen with the scribe’s ink-horn in his belt then came back and made his report, ‘I have carried out your orders.’ “ https://www.catholic.org/bible/book.php?id=33&bible_chapter=9
The cross was the symbol of Jesus’ crucifixion. It redeemed us from sin and death and the cross becomes the mark of our salvation. Historically, there is ample evidence that Jesus died on a cross and not on a single pole as JWs claim. Do your research. Don’t get caught up in some empty debate resulting from a couple of dissident marginalized critics and remote historical exceptions. Also study the Shoud of Turin. Jesus died on a cross. SEE SECTIONS ON “THE CROSS” AND “THE SHROUD OF TURIN”.
In Ezekiel chapter 9 verses 3 to 4, the prophet talks about a man clothed with linen who had the writer”s ink-horn in his belt and he had to go in the midst of the city, in the midst of Jerusalem, and put mark, a sign, upon the foreheads of the men who sighed and mourned for all the abominations that were done in the midst of the city and anyone who did not have the mark would be killed . In the original Hebrew text, the word for “mark” is TAW and in the Hebrew alphabet this letter is the letter T. In the ancient Hebrew language which is slightly different from modern Hebrew, it wasn’t just the letter t. The letter TAW that the scribe with the ink-horn had to write on the forehead of people for them to be saved was actually a cross: the horizontal bar was lower. It was a cross, as a sign announcing the crucifixion and the need to have faith in the sacrifice of our Redemptor Jesus Christ!! Furthermore, it also means “alliance or pact”!!!
Also this letter TAW in Hebrew is written with two characters תָּ֜ו. The first one is a cross and the second character actually represents a man, a male human being or it can also represent a nail, as a nail used to set up a tent or a nail to nail a man on a cross during an execution!!
That is the mark that is to be written on the forehead of every person that is to be saved!! This discovery for me was amazing!!! MUST SEE: THE CROSS – The Cross: Jewish or Pagan?
Also the cross, the shape of the cross as in 2 perpendicular lines crossing each other is actually the foundation of the universe: theologians talk about the “cosmic cross”. If we analyze the world, the universe, most solid trusctures are actually based upon some form in the shape of a cross, every house, every door post, is actually built using two perpendicular beams or boards or planks or wooden pieces that will actually make the structure stronger… any piece of furniture, a bed, a chair, a cabinet, a cupboard, a fence, all of those are actually built with elements forming crosses because it’s actually the most solid shape or form in the universe. Light, stars, the sun, all shine with rays whose light is reflected in the form of a cross. Everything in the universe is based on a cross and therefore it is absolutely ludicrous to say, as Jehovah’s Witnesses claim, that the Catholics adopted the cross from some Egyptian or Babylonian pagan teaching or practice. The cross existed way before any civilization. It existed when God created the universe. Pagans didn’t invent the cross. The Catholic cross doesn’t come from pagan god nor civilization. God had purposed the cross to be the foundation of our salvation itself: it is the principle of the “cosmic cross”. SEE SECTION ON “THE CROSS”.
456 With the Nicene Creed, we answer by confessing: “For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven; by the power of the Holy Spirit, he became incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and was made man.”
457 The Word became flesh for us in order to save us by reconciling us with God, who “loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins”: “the Father has sent his Son as the Saviour of the world”, and “he was revealed to take away sins”:70
Sick, our nature demanded to be healed; fallen, to be raised up; dead, to rise again. We had lost the possession of the good; it was necessary for it to be given back to us. Closed in the darkness, it was necessary to bring us the light; captives, we awaited a Saviour; prisoners, help; slaves, a liberator. Are these things minor or insignificant? Did they not move God to descend to human nature and visit it, since humanity was in so miserable and unhappy a state?71
458 The Word became flesh so that thus we might know God’s love: “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.”72 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”73
459 The Word became flesh to be our model of holiness: “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me.” “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me.”74 On the mountain of the Transfiguration, the Father commands: “Listen to him!”75 Jesus is the model for the Beatitudes and the norm of the new law: “Love one another as I have loved you.”76 This love implies an effective offering of oneself, after his example.77
460 The Word became flesh to make us “partakers of the divine nature”:78 “For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God.”79 “For the Son of God became man so that we might become God.”80 “The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods.”81
II. THE INCARNATION
461 Taking up St. John’s expression, “The Word became flesh”,82 The Church calls “Incarnation” the fact that the Son of God assumed a human nature in order to accomplish our salvation in it. In a hymn cited by St. Paul, the Church sings the mystery of the Incarnation:
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. and being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.83
462 The Letter to the Hebrews refers to the same mystery:
Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, “Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, Lo, I have come to do your will, O God.”84
463 Belief in the true Incarnation of the Son of God is the distinctive sign of Christian faith: “By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God.”85 Such is the joyous conviction of the Church from her beginning whenever she sings “the mystery of our religion”: “He was manifested in the flesh.”86
III. TRUE GOD AND TRUE MAN
464 The unique and altogether singular event of the Incarnation of the Son of God does not mean that Jesus Christ is part God and part man, nor does it imply that he is the result of a confused mixture of the divine and the human. He became truly man while remaining truly God. Jesus Christ is true God and true man. During the first centuries, the Church had to defend and clarify this truth of faith against the heresies that falsified it.
465 The first heresies denied not so much Christ’s divinity as his true humanity (Gnostic Docetism). From apostolic times the Christian faith has insisted on the true incarnation of God’s Son “come in the flesh”.87 But already in the third century, the Church in a council at Antioch had to affirm against Paul of Samosata that Jesus Christ is Son of God by nature and not by adoption. the first ecumenical council of Nicaea in 325 confessed in its Creed that the Son of God is “begotten, not made, of the same substance (homoousios) as the Father”, and condemned Arius, who had affirmed that the Son of God “came to be from things that were not” and that he was “from another substance” than that of the Father.88
466 The Nestorian heresy regarded Christ as a human person joined to the divine person of God’s Son. Opposing this heresy, St. Cyril of Alexandria and the third ecumenical council, at Ephesus in 431, confessed “that the Word, uniting to himself in his person the flesh animated by a rational soul, became man.”89 Christ’s humanity has no other subject than the divine person of the Son of God, who assumed it and made it his own, from his conception. For this reason the Council of Ephesus proclaimed in 431 that Mary truly became the Mother of God by the human conception of the Son of God in her womb: “Mother of God, not that the nature of the Word or his divinity received the beginning of its existence from the holy Virgin, but that, since the holy body, animated by a rational soul, which the Word of God united to himself according to the hypostasis, was born from her, the Word is said to be born according to the flesh.”90
467 The Monophysites affirmed that the human nature had ceased to exist as such in Christ when the divine person of God’s Son assumed it. Faced with this heresy, the fourth ecumenical council, at Chalcedon in 451, confessed: Following the holy Fathers, we unanimously teach and confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ: the same perfect in divinity and perfect in humanity, the same truly God and truly man, composed of rational soul and body; consubstantial with the Father as to his divinity and consubstantial with us as to his humanity; “like us in all things but sin”. He was begotten from the Father before all ages as to his divinity and in these last days, for us and for our salvation, was born as to his humanity of the virgin Mary, the Mother of God.91
We confess that one and the same Christ, Lord, and only-begotten Son, is to be acknowledged in two natures without confusion, change, division or separation. the distinction between the natures was never abolished by their union, but rather the character proper to each of the two natures was preserved as they came together in one person (prosopon) and one hypostasis.92
468 After the Council of Chalcedon, some made of Christ’s human nature a kind of personal subject. Against them, the fifth ecumenical council, at Constantinople in 553, confessed that “there is but one hypostasis [or person], which is our Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Trinity.”93 Thus everything in Christ’s human nature is to be attributed to his divine person as its proper subject, not only his miracles but also his sufferings and even his death: “He who was crucified in the flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ, is true God, Lord of glory, and one of the Holy Trinity.”94
469 The Church thus confesses that Jesus is inseparably true God and true man. He is truly the Son of God who, without ceasing to be God and Lord, became a man and our brother: “What he was, he remained and what he was not, he assumed”, sings the Roman Liturgy.95 and the liturgy of St. John Chrysostom proclaims and sings: “O only-begotten Son and Word of God, immortal being, you who deigned for our salvation to become incarnate of the holy Mother of God and ever-virgin Mary, you who without change became man and were crucified, O Christ our God, you who by your death have crushed death, you who are one of the Holy Trinity, glorified with the Father and the Holy Spirit, save us!”96
IV. HOW IS THE SON OF GOD MAN?
470 Because “human nature was assumed, not absorbed”,97 in the mysterious union of the Incarnation, the Church was led over the course of centuries to confess the full reality of Christ’s human soul, with its operations of intellect and will, and of his human body. In parallel fashion, she had to recall on each occasion that Christ’s human nature belongs, as his own, to the divine person of the Son of God, who assumed it. Everything that Christ is and does in this nature derives from “one of the Trinity”.
The Son of God therefore communicates to his humanity his own personal mode of existence in the Trinity. In his soul as in his body, Christ thus expresses humanly the divine ways of the Trinity:98
The Son of God. . . worked with human hands; he thought with a human mind. He acted with a human will, and with a human heart he loved. Born of the Virgin Mary, he has truly been made one of us, like to us in all things except sin.99
Christ’s soul and his human knowledge
471 Apollinarius of Laodicaea asserted that in Christ the divine Word had replaced the soul or spirit. Against this error the Church confessed that the eternal Son also assumed a rational, human soul.100
472 This human soul that the Son of God assumed is endowed with a true human knowledge. As such, this knowledge could not in itself be unlimited: it was exercised in the historical conditions of his existence in space and time. This is why the Son of God could, when he became man, “increase in wisdom and in stature, and in favour with God and man”,101 and would even have to inquire for himself about what one in the human condition can learn only from experience.102 This corresponded to the reality of his voluntary emptying of himself, taking “the form of a slave”.103
473 But at the same time, this truly human knowledge of God’s Son expressed the divine life of his person.104 “The human nature of God’s Son, not by itself but by its union with the Word, knew and showed forth in itself everything that pertains to God.”105 Such is first of all the case with the intimate and immediate knowledge that the Son of God made man has of his Father.106 The Son in his human knowledge also showed the divine penetration he had into the secret thoughts of human hearts.107
474 By its union to the divine wisdom in the person of the Word incarnate, Christ enjoyed in his human knowledge the fullness of understanding of the eternal plans he had come to reveal.108 What he admitted to not knowing in this area, he elsewhere declared himself not sent to reveal.109
Christ’s human will
475 Similarly, at the sixth ecumenical council, Constantinople III in 681, the Church confessed that Christ possesses two wills and two natural operations, divine and human. They are not opposed to each other, but co-operate in such a way that the Word made flesh willed humanly in obedience to his Father all that he had decided divinely with the Father and the Holy Spirit for our salvation.110 Christ’s human will “does not resist or oppose but rather submits to his divine and almighty will.”111
Christ’s true body
476 Since the Word became flesh in assuming a true humanity, Christ’s body was finite.112 Therefore the human face of Jesus can be portrayed; at the seventh ecumenical council (Nicaea II in 787) the Church recognized its representation in holy images to be legitimate.113
477 At the same time the Church has always acknowledged that in the body of Jesus “we see our God made visible and so are caught up in love of the God we cannot see.”114 The individual characteristics of Christ’s body express the divine person of God’s Son. He has made the features of his human body his own, to the point that they can be venerated when portrayed in a holy image, for the believer “who venerates the icon is venerating in it the person of the one depicted”.115
The heart of the Incarnate Word
478 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: “The Son of God. . . loved me and gave himself for me.”116 He has loved us all with a human heart. For this reason, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, pierced by our sins and for our salvation,117 “is quite rightly considered the chief sign and symbol of that. . . love with which the divine Redeemer continually loves the eternal Father and all human beings” without exception.118
IN BRIEF
479 At the time appointed by God, the only Son of the Father, the eternal Word, that is, the Word and substantial Image of the Father, became incarnate; without losing his divine nature he has assumed human nature.
480 Jesus Christ is true God and true man, in the unity of his divine person; for this reason he is the one and only mediator between God and men.
481 Jesus Christ possesses two natures, one divine and the other human, not confused, but united in the one person of God’s Son.
482 Christ, being true God and true man, has a human intellect and will, perfectly attuned and subject to his divine intellect and divine will, which he has in common with the Father and the Holy Spirit.
483 The Incarnation is therefore the mystery of the wonderful union of the divine and human natures in the one person of the Word.
Incarnationis Mysterium – BULL OF INDICTION OF THE GREAT JUBILEE OF THE YEAR 2000
VIRGEN MARY TELLS HER NEVER TO GIVE UP PRAYER AND TO SEEK COUNSEL FROM PRIESTS
Since When Is It Vain to Pray the Rosary? When Jesus condemned praying “vain repetitions,” was he condemning all repetitious prayer? No. Nope. Definitely, absolutely not.
In some Protestant books on deliverance, one is encouraged to speak directly to, and command, the demons. This is imprecatory prayer, a direct command. It is critical to understand that imprecatory prayer directly commands a demon, which is a tacit acceptance to a personal battle with that demon, while deprecatory prayer asks God to act against the demon. The Catholic Church has understood that the full authority to command demons was given to the Twelve Apostles, therefore a priest needs Apostolic authority given to him by a bishop before he engages in a battle with a demon. Of course a bishop, cardinal, or pope can do an exorcism at any time.
ABSOLUTE MUST SEE: DEMON TELLS EXORCIST TO SAY THE FATHER PRAYER FROM THE HEART!!!!!
The most normal form of unceasing prayer in the Orthodox tradition is the Jesus Prayer. The Jesus Prayer is the form of invocation used by those practicing mental prayer, also called the “prayer of the heart.” The words of the prayer most usually said are “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.” The choice of this particular verse has a theological and spiritual meaning.
HOW TO BLESS YOUR FOOD – Minute 6:45
“Whenever I bring groceries into the house I would just say : “In the name of Jesus I bind all spirits of death and disease off of all this food in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.” And then I would bless all the food before I unpacked it and then I like it was good but then as you individually eat things one by one you do do that.
Alzar o no las manos durante el Pade Nuestro… Raise your hands during the Lord’s Prayer?
Jesus, Take Care of It.” Don Dolindo’s Prayer of Abandonment
Mind’s eye, prayers and imagination
Surrender Novena (All 9 Days) – Let Jesus Take Care of Everything
ACTIVE AND PASSIVE NIGHTS OF THE SOUL
“The divinization of one’s passivities.”
This is a line from one of the great spiritual works of the twentieth century, The Divine Milieu by the French Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. In that seminal text, Teilhard famously distinguished between the divinization of one’s activities and the divinization of one’s passivities. The former is a noble spiritual move, consisting in the handing over of one’s achievements and accomplishments to the purposes of God. A convinced Jesuit, Teilhard desired to devote all that he did (and he did a lot) ad majorem Dei gloriam (to the greater glory of God). But this attitude, Teilhard felt, came nowhere near the spiritual power of divinizing one’s passivities. By this he meant the handing over of one’s suffering to God, the surrendering to the Lord of those things that are done to us, those things over which we have no control. We become sick; a loved one dies suddenly; we lose a job; a much-desired position goes to someone else; we are unfairly criticized; we find ourselves, unexpectedly, in the valley of the shadow of death. These experiences lead some people to despair, but the spiritually alert person should see them as a particularly powerful way to come to union with God. A Christian would readily speak here of participating in the cross of Christ. Indeed how strange that the central icon of the Christian faith is not of some great achievement or activity, but rather of something rather horrible being done to a person. The point is that suffering, offered to God, allows the Lord to work his purpose out with unsurpassed power.
In some ways, Teilhard’s distinction is an echo of St. John of the Cross’s distinction between the “active” and “passive” nights of the soul. For the great Spanish master, the dark night has nothing to do with psychological depression, but rather with a pruning away of attachments that keep one from complete union with God. This pruning can take a conscious and intentional form (the active night) or it can be something endured. In a word, we can rid ourselves of attachments—or God can do it for us. The latter, St. John thinks, is far more powerful and cleansing than the former.
When we experience interior aridity, darkness, desolation, what to do? Fr. Joseph Iannuzzi explains
How Can I Improve My Prayer? (Aquinas 101)
MUST WATCH – How God granted specific prayers of exorcist –
See Minute 1h07mn about curse of gout
See Minute 2h19mn about God’s punishment
See Minute 4h06mn about liberating freemason buildings
You Too Are Christ: The Ongoing Incarnation, Then and Now
Combating Evil as an Integral Part of Becoming Holy ~ Fr. Ripperger
TRANSFORMING OUR STATE OF SERVANT INTO THE REWARDING IDENTITY OF A SON
FORGIVENESS – If you are struggling to forgive someone you hate, watch this. Catholic priest explains.
SELF KNOWLEDGE
Lack of Clarity ~ Fr. Ripperger
Act Against Your Attachments – Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermon
Take Care of Your Soul
CHRISTIANS ARE CALLED TO TAKE UP THE SPIRITUAL FIGHT AS ANOTHER CHRIST
DETACHING ONESELF
PROPER BEHAVIOR IN A CHURCH
Ways to Cure Sadness
MUST SEE: To contain oneself within God and not to have perfect peace is impossible
The moment you feel disturbed it is that you are making a little exit
WHEN ONE PLACES ONE’S TRUST IN HUMILY THAT PEACE COMES TO THE SOUL
Mental Prayer and Reasons People Don’t Advance
Be sincere – Venerable Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
Life is Worth Living – Venerable Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
Forgive
If you are struggling to forgive someone you hate, watch this. Catholic priest explains.
TRUST = Total Reliance Upon God’s Saving Truth
EXERCISE DIVINE PACIENCE
The Importance of Being Detached From All Created Things
ABSOLUTE MUST SEE: HOW TO BUILD VIRTUE: a virtue grows and is increased by its contrary
ABSOLUTE MUST SEE: Difference between grace, virtue and gift
DETACH FROM EARTHLY GOODS AS AT DEATH WE WILL HAVE TO ANYWAY
CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYERS
Fr. Joseph Iannuzzi: “Silence is the medium through which God always speaks.”
Old Pots – Venerable Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
The next time you’re going to Eucharistic Adoration, try this
Shoot for heaven, not purgatory!!! Minute 1:12
DEVIL UNABLE TO SEE OUR CONFESSED SINS
IMPORTANCE OF CONFESSION AND ABSOLUTION
THE SNARES FROM THE DEVIL TO IMPEDE PEOPLE FROM CONFESSING
DON BOSCO’S VISIONS
OUR LADY’S ADVICE TO THE BOYS OF DON BOSCO
Don Bosco’s Soul Shaking Letters From Our Lady | Ep. 25
What FIAT means
Lucas 1 v. 8
Entonces María dijo: “He aquí la esclava del Señor: Séame hecho según tu palabra”. Y el ángel la dejó.
SAINT LOUIS MARIA GRIGNON DE MONTFORT – Del Amor Para Jesús Sobre Todas Las Cosas
Bienaventurado el que conoce lo que es amar a Jesús, y despreciarse a sí mismo por Jesús. Conviene dejar un amado por otro amado, porque Jesús quiere ser amado sobre todas las cosas. El amor de la criatura es engañoso y mudable, el amor de Jesús es fiel y durable. El que se llega a la criatura, caerá con lo caedizo; el que abraza a Jesús, afirmará en Él para siempre. Ama a Jesús y tenle por amigo, que aunque todos te desamparen, Él no te desamparará ni te dejará perecer en el fin. De todos has de ser desamparado alguna vez, ora quieras o no. Ten fuertemente con Jesús viviendo y muriendo, y encomiéndate a su fidelidad, que Él solo te puede ayudar, cuando todos te faltaren. Tu amado es de tal condición, que no quiere consigo admitir a otro, mas Él solo quiere tener tu corazón y como rey sentarse en su propia silla. Si tú supieses bien desocuparte de toda criatura, Jesús morará de buena gana contigo. Hallarás casi todo perdido cuanto pusieres en los hombres, fuera de Jesús. No confíes ni estribes sobre la caña vacía; porque toda carne es heno, y toda su gloria caerá como flor de heno.
Why total Surrender Is the Only Way to Heaven | Fr. Mike Schmitz and Bishop Robert Barron
EVERYTHING WE DO IS OUT OF LOVE, OF GOOD OR EVIL
Divinisation – Deification – Theosis
Conversion – Fr. Donald Calloway: Conversion Story. South Louisiana Tour – Metairie, LA
Discernment session for people contemplating service in holy orders or religious life
“The thoughts, feelings and desires one has within the experience of peace and stillness in the presence of Christ are God’s thoughts, feelings and desires. This is how God reveals what He wants-His will-of us and for us. When one is in that holy place in Christ, one’s desires are Christ’s desires, what one wants is what God wants. God puts His thoughts, feelings, and desires into us. In that experience, God’s will is within my will. This is an important lesson. In order to know God’s will, one simply needs to pay attention to one’s thoughts, feelings and desires when one is experiencing the peace, stillness, clarity and gratitude found in the presence of Christ. God’s will, his desire for you, is not out there somewhere! It is found in your own desire when you are in Christ! That is the will of God for you! This cannot be stressed enough.”
“Fear is an obstacle. “Fear is useless, what is needed is trust” (Mark 5:36). If God says fear is useless then it is useless. Fear is the enemy of discernment because it comes from the devil. So what can help us to trust? Love! 1 John 4:18 says, “Perfect love casts out all fear”. When we are in love with God, we can trust him, because we know him. We begin to discover the wisdom of God whereby we will want to do things God’s way and not ours. … God does not reveal himself by fear or through fear. God does not scare anyone into anything. God reveals his desires to us and draws us by a peaceful presence. It is the Enemy who scares men into and out of things. The Enemy reveals his desires through fear.
Just as God’s will is found in one’s own thoughts, feelings, and desires that flow from the experience of the peaceful presence of Christ, so the will of the Enemy is found in one’s own thoughts, feelings, and desires flowing from the fear, pressure and confusion that come from the Enemy. In the experience of fear, pressure and confusion, the Enemy puts his thoughts, feelings and desires into us. The Enemy reveals his desire in fear. He leads us by a fear flowing from a false belief, a lie. The Enemy drives a man by a fear of something false, while Christ draws a man by a peaceful presence to something that is true.”
“In prayer, God is calling us into a “spiritual childhood”. “I assure you, unless you change and become like little children, you will not enter the Kingdom of God” (Matt. 18:3). As parents, how many times did we experience our children (or a small child) running into our arms and just holding on to us and hugging us for an extended period of time? We must learn to be held [by God]. This kind of intimacy is difficult for many and especially for men. It might be good to have them take a few minutes and reflect on John 13:25, where the Beloved disciple lays his head on the Lord’s chest. Imagine yourself doing so and while doing this lay all your concerns, fears and dreams on his chest. Surrender them to the Lord. Simply rest in his embrace.”
FRUSTRATION AND ANGER OF PRIEST SOMETIMES
PRIESTHOOD & GENDER: GENDER IS SCRIPTURE – CHRIST CAME TO REPAIR THE SIN OF ADAM NOT EVE
Seis mujeres de Ohio serán las primeras en formar parte del Orden de Viudas en EE.UU
Breaking Negative Soul Ties – Explaining the Faith with Fr. Chris Alar
Don’t blame someone else when you’re weary – who are you yoked too?
PARENTS SHOULD TEACH BY EXAMPLE
CHOOSE YOUR FRIENDS CAREFULLY – CONSIDER THEIR WORDS Eclo 6, 5-17. El amigo fiel no tiene precio.
Lectura del libro del Eclesiástico. UNA palabra amable multiplica los amigos y aleja a los enemigos, y la lengua afable multiplica los saludos. Sean muchos los que estén en paz contigo, pero tus confidentes, solo uno entre mil. Si haces un amigo, ponlo a prueba, y no tengas prisa en confiarte a él. Porque hay amigos de ocasión, que no resisten en el día de la desgracia. Hay amigos que se convierten en enemigo, y te avergüenzan descubriendo tus litigios. Hay amigos que comparten tu mesa y no resisten en el día de la desgracia. Cuando las cosas van bien, es como otro tú, e incluso habla libremente con tus familiares. Pero si eres humillado, se pone contra ti y se esconde de tu presencia. Apártate de tus enemigos y sé cauto incluso con tus amigos. Un amigo fiel es un refugio seguro, y quien lo encuentra ha encontrado un tesoro. Un amigo fiel no tiene precio y su valor es incalculable. Un amigo fiel es medicina de vida, y los que temen al Señor lo encontrarán. El que teme al Señor afianza su amistad, porque, según sea él, así será su amigo.
DON’T BE OVERCONFIDENT IN THE HOUR OF JUDGMENT – Eclo 5, 1-8. No tardes en convertirte al Señor.
Lectura del libro del Eclesiástico. NO confíes en tus riquezas, ni digas: «Con esto me basta». No sigas tu instinto y tu fuerza, secundando las pasiones de tu corazón. Y no digas: «Quién puede dominarme?», o bien: «Quién logrará someterme por lo que he hecho?», porque el Señor ciertamente te castigará. No digas: «He pecado, y ¿qué me ha pasado?», porque el Señor sabe esperar. Del perdón no te sientas tan seguro, mientras acumulas pecado tras pecado. Y no digas: «Es grande su compasión, me perdonará mis muchos pecados», porque él tiene compasión y cólera, y su ira recae sobre los malvados. No tardes en convertirte al Señor, ni lo dejes de un día para otro, porque de repente la ira del Señor se enciende, y el día del castigo perecerás. No confíes en riquezas injustas, porque de nada te servirán el día de la desgracia.
