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**Don’t be confused by Revelation images

In Acts 8, Philip runs alongside a chariot in which the eunuch of Queen Candace is reading a scroll of Isaiah. Philip asks the eunuch if he understands what he is reading. The eunuch replies, “How can I understand unless someone tells me?” Whereupon Philip gets into the chariot and evangelizes him.
If it were only that simple: that we could explain in simple terms some of the strange things in the bible such as the book of Revelation. Much of the Bible is easy to appreciate. The book of Revelation is not. It is the most misunderstood and misinterpreted book of the Bible.
It is not uncommon to read a commentary we might associate with Fundamentalist and Pentecostal evangelists with outlandish claims. They often claim that Revelation is a series of predictions about our own times, and that the symbols in Revelation are telling us about things happening today.
They’re wrong. Everything spoken of in Revelation has already happened -- everything except one thing: the Second Coming of the Lord at the end of the ages. All else took place a long time ago -- in the time of the author of Revelation!
Revelation is “apocalyptic” literature. We don’t have “apocalyptic” literature any more, so we find it hard to figure out. Ancient people would have a hard time figuring out Dilbert or Star Wars or other literary types which we have.
Apocalyptic literature flourished from about 100 B.C. to 100 A.D. It was consolation literature. It was written to console and to strengthen faith in those who were enduring some sort of crisis. It did this by a strange device: It pretended to have been written long ago, a message revealed to a prophet, and to be a prediction of things to come. Actually “the things to come” had already happened or were happening. This was part of the consolation: The calamities were predicted by God, and he would bring everything out all right.
A second characteristic of apocalyptic was the attitude that there was a general battle between the angelic forces of good and those of evil, and that this battle had spilled over onto earth; this was the reason for the present crisis. But there would be a decisive victory after the Lord’s faithful had been purified in faith. A third characteristic is the coded language. Apocalyptic spoke of many events which had taken place (or were taking place) but did so in coded language.
If we know the crisis and if we can crack the code, we can decipher the apocalyptic. But that’s not simple for us who live 2,000 years later. Many people think that the crisis in Revelation was the persecution of Christians by Rome under Nero and Domitian. Indeed, a good argument can be made that 666 is the numeric value in Hebrew of the name Nero Caesar.
There are other fascinating code breaks also, such as “Babylon” for “Rome.” Some think that the crisis was earlier, that it was the faithlessness of the Jerusalem priesthood. And there are other views. But we need to make one point very clear: The events in Revelation took place a long, long time ago. There are no predictions of things to come (except one: the Second Coming of Christ.)
So don’t fall for a false interpretation of Revelation. Get a good commentary which explains apocalyptic literature. It may not be as fascinating as the description of the locusts with stingers as Soviet (or German or Iraqi) tanks or fighter planes. It may not tell you that the wormwood dropped into the water is water fluoridation.
But it will be faithful to the Lord’s message: It will be a consolation for time of crisis: God knows, and will bring it out all right.
(7/14/06)

**Believe the Bible? Believe the Eucharist.

If we want to believe in Jesus Christ and in the Bible, we must accept the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. It’s a difficult saying for some. How can a modern, scientific person accept this? Well, the Real Presence will forever remain a mystery, but we can attempt to use good theology to explain how it can be.
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) was the greatest theologian the church has ever known. He used the philosophy of Aristotle to explain how the Real Presence was possible. Aristotle said that all being is divided into “substance” and “accidents.” The “substance” is the reality of a thing; a substance needs no other thing in which it must be found in order to exist. An “accident” is that which modifies a substance. We might use the word “appearance” for what Aristotle called “accidents. Such things as size, texture, quantity, location, color, are “appearances” (“accidents.”)
Now, very importantly, there is a real difference between the reality of a thing (“substance”) and its appearances (“accidents.”) It is quite obvious that appearances can change while reality remains the same. An embryo one month after fertilization doesn’t look like a human being; the appearances are of a small mass of protoplasm, not unlike the embryo of any other mammal. But it is a human being! Similarly, we look different now than when we first went to kindergarten, or when we were newly born. But I am the same time we are same person!
If appearances (“accidents”) can change while reality (substance) remains the same, why cannot the reality (substance) change while the appearances (accidents) remain the same? This is what happens in the Eucharist! At the words of consecration of the priest, the reality (substance) of bread and wine are changed into the reality of the Body and Blood of the risen and glorified Jesus Christ. The appearances (accidents) of bread and wine remain. All this is done through the power of the Holy Spirit acting through the human instrument of the priest. It is done because Jesus Christ said it would be so.
We still do not understand. We still find it a tough saying. But good theology can show that it is possible; the word of Christ shows that it is true! Perhaps in future years, there may be better ways of explaining the theology of the Real Presence. The same St. Thomas Aquinas who gave us one theology of the Real Presence also composed a beautiful hymn on the Eucharist, called “Adoro Te Devote.” The second verse of this hymn in one translation goes: “Not to sight, or taste, or touch be credit / Hearing only do I trust secure./ I believe for God the Son has said it,/ Word of truth that ever shall endure.”

**Want more info?

There are many websites with good information about the Eucharist.
Stop first at the Catechsim of the Catholic Church. It has many entries including a section on “signs” from paragraphs 1333-36.
EWTN has an excellent section of its site dedicated to the Eucharist. Go to ewtn.com/faith/teachings .
Catholic.com/library has an excellent article about the Eucharist.
(6/23/06)

**We missed the end of the world

Remember the Y2K scare? We worried about what might happen to the infrastructure of our society -- to our air traffic system, to our electrical grid, and so on. The scare turned out to be a colossal dud.
We also heard our Evangelical brothers and sisters paint dire pictures of the end of the world. Their predictions were fueled by a “rapture” series of books and movies that detailed life according to a protestant view of the end of the world.
Repentance and conversion of heart, of course, are always in order for the Christian. But we need not be more scared now than we ever have been.
First of all, we really missed the third Millennium. Our present calendar system in terms of “Before Christ” (B.C.) and “In the year of our Lord” (A.D. = Anno Domini) was not devised until about 14 centuries ago. At that time, a monk named Dionysius Exiguus thought it would be a good idea to calculate the world’s history in terms of Jesus, the Messiah.
He did the best he could with his calculations, but he was off about six or seven years. Jesus was born in the reign of Herod the Great. But Herod the Great died in the year 4 B.C. (if we use the reckoning of Dionysius!) Obviously it is impossible that Jesus be born four years before Christ! Best reckoning now considers that Jesus was probably born about 7 B.C. or possibly 6 B.C. If so, if we really followed absolute chronology, we missed the millennium years ago. And nothing happened! The world did not end. The dire predictions of the fear-mongering Evangelicals did not come true.
What about some of their other preachments? One of them is that there will be a thousand year reign of Christ on earth after the terrible cataclysm, the revelation of the Anti-Christ, and the final victory of the Lord after he comes again. This results from a misreading of the Book of Revelation. The figures there are intended to express the fact that Jesus shall reign victorious on earth for a very long time before the end. Long, long ago, the primitive Church condemned a strict “Millennarianism” -- the attitude that there would be a thousand year reign on earth. Then, of course, there is the “rapture.” This strange notion comes from the passage in the “Eschatological Sermon” of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels which speak of “one will be taken and one will be left.” Our Evangelical friends consider that a person might be snatched from this world right now and never seen again until the reign of Christ. The passage, of course, refers to the fact that one might be delivered from the expected cataclysm while another would not be delivered.
No one knows when the end of the world will come. We do know that all of the signs of the end took place before the end of the First Century. The gospels tell us that “This generation will not pass away until all these things take place.” Thus all the signs have taken place. It remains for us to watch and to pray in faith, to be ready for the end, and not to be frightened out of our wits by the fear mongering of well-meaning, but mistaken, other Christians. God is love.
(6/16/06)

**Purgatory a merciful gift from God

No one who dies as God’s enemy will get to heaven. You can’t pray such persons out of purgatory because those who die in a state of mortal sin go to hell for all eternity.
All Christians believe in heaven. And nearly all Christians believe in hell. God is all-merciful, but he is also all-just. If a person willfully rejects God and willfully sins mortally, he will surely go to hell.
But what about people who are good people, but who nevertheless fall into lesser sins? How about the case of a ten-year-old boy who steals a 50 cent candy bar from a grocer: He leaves the store and is hit by a truck and killed instantly. He sinned just before he died. He deserves punishment. But he surely does not deserve eternal punishment in hell.
Or, take the case of a person who has repented of his sins, but has not had the opportunity to make everything right; he has not had the opportunity to do penance. He, too, deserves some punishment, but not eternal fire.
Purgatory is not mentioned in the Bible. But Christian tradition going back at least to the second century was strong in its belief of a “place of purification” for such cases above.
Let’s put it this way: We have shown that not everything is contained in the Bible. We have shown that our present Bible, Old and New Testaments, was not compiled into one volume until the middle of the second century A.D.
At the same time that the books of the New Testament were being gathered into one, the Church firmly held and taught this “place of purification.” Inscriptions on the catacombs at Rome (and elsewhere in Europe and the Mediterranean world) speak of prayer for the dead. You don’t pray for someone in heaven; he/she doesn’t need it. You don’t pray for those in hell; it’s useless.
The Church, therefore, was conscious of a “place of purification” for those who died in God’s grace, but were not yet worthy to enter his presence. We can benefit them, while they cannot benefit themselves. One of the early Christian writers, Tertullian, wrote extensively about this place of purification and how our prayers could benefit the souls there. Tertullian wrote around 200 A.D.
Purgatory is a place of mercy: Those who die as God’s friends may be detained there until they are worthy to enter his presence. That’s a lot better than having all sinners go to hell.

**Want more info?

The Catechism says:
1030: All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.
1031: The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned ...
606 The Church formulated her doctrine of faith on Purgatory especially at the Councils of Florence and Trent. The tradition of the Church, by reference to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a cleansing fire:607
(6/09/06)

**Digging for Peter on Vatican Hill

For centuries, Catholic tradition held that Peter was martyred in Rome -- that he was crucified upside down in an arena on Vatican Hill and taken outside and buried in a pauper’s grave in a pagan cemetery.
Around the year 150 A.D., a priest named Gaius referred to the funeral monument of Peter on Vatican Hill. All the ancient witnesses to Church history said that Peter died in Rome.
In 320, the Roman Emperor Constantine (who had given the Church freedom) erected a large church (or basilica) over the grave of Peter on Vatican Hill. To build this church, Constantine disobeyed the law against disturbing graves: he leveled the hill, cut off the tops of pagan mausolea in the cemetery, filled them with earth, and built the church over the pauper’s grave.
The high altar of Constantine’s basilica was over the funeral monument spoken of by Gaius. In the 16th century, the basilica of Constantine was replaced by the present St. Peter’s Basilica; the high altar was, again, over the exact spot of the “trophy (funeral monument) of Gaius.”
Well, the tradition was there, but could it be proved?
In 1939, Pope Pius XII commissioned archeologists to dig under St. Peter’s to find the grave. After years of digging, the pope announced that the grave had been found. The original funeral monument (or at least one column of it) was found. There are magnificent pagan mausolea under St. Peter’s.
But in one spot, there is a simple grave. There are primitive graffiti -- all referring to Peter. There are monograms combining the letters “P” and “E” to form a key. The graffiti and primitive Christian graves focus on one grave.
In this grave a box of bones were found. There were the remains of gold and violet brocade which had clothed the bones. Roman law forbade anyone except the emperor to be clad in such cloth. Science shows that the bones were that of a man who had worked hard, as a fisherman might.
Why, then, the brocade cloth? Scholars reason that Constantine wanted to pay tribute to the chief apostle in the best way he knew how: He clothed the bones of Peter in imperial violet and gold when he re-entombed them.
That Peter was in Rome is scientifically and historically certain. That he was the leader of the New Testament Church is biblically certain. And from the earliest times, Christians have proclaimed that the successor of Peter is the one who takes his place as bishop of Rome.
The bishop of Rome is heir to the promises made to Peter to bind and to loose, to have the power of the keys, to confirm and strengthen his brethren. We call him Pope. If we have the “New Testament Church,” we must have the Pope.
(6/02/06)

**What is the construction of the church?

Several Protestant religious traditions claim to be a restoration of New Testament Christianity. Many of today’s new Holy Spirit-filled converts to the Catholic faith found their way to Rome by studying the New Testament and other early church documents. They found that the only real New Testament Christianity is the Catholic Church.
Consider the structure of the Church. Jesus selected 12 apostles. He sent them forth and empowered them, just as He had been sent forth and empowered by the Father. He promised the Holy Spirit to them so that they would teach his authentic message in truth.
He gave them such authority that, if anyone rejected the apostles, they were rejecting Jesus himself. Read these astounding things in Luke 10:6, John 16:12-15, and John 17:17-18; and all of John 13 - 17.
The apostles spoke with authority. Paul emphasizes his authority as an apostle in Galatians when he says, “Even if an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel other than the one we have preached, let him be accursed!” (Galatians 1:8)
If we have the authentic New Testament Church, then we must have successors of the apostles who speak with the authority of Christ under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The only Church which historically has claimed this is the Catholic Church.
After the ascension of Jesus, the apostles were united around one person. His original name was Simon Bar Jona, but Jesus changed his name to “Rock.” He told him: “You are Rock (Peter) and on this Rock I will build my Church.”
Some Protestants point out that Peter’s name is a masculine noun in Greek, and that the “rock” on which the Church is founded is a feminine noun. They say that Peter is just a pebble, and that the Church is built on the bedrock of Peter’s profession of faith. But in the original Aramaic language, the words are identical. There is but one word for “rock” in Greek, and it is feminine (petra). But you don’t call a man by a name with a feminine ending; so the word was changed!
Even if we might quibble about “rock,” what follows in Matthew 16:18-23 should make it clear: Jesus gave Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Kingdom of heaven is the Church. Keys in the Bible are a symbol of authority. Peter has authority over the Church. And Jesus gave to Peter the power of binding and loosing; this is a rabbinical expression for imposing or releasing from obligations.
It is pretty clear, then, that Peter has authority over the Church from Jesus. And the New Testament shows it. Peter is always listed first in lists of apostles. Peter is the one to proclaim the resurrection. The apostles gather around Peter waiting for the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. Peter preaches the first sermon on Pentecost.
If we have the Church described by the New Testament, we must have Peter and the apostles. And we must have them throughout the centuries. The only Church which has this structure is the Catholic Church. We call the successors of the apostles “bishops.” We call the successor of Peter “Pope.”

**More information

Catholic.com has a lot of information about the early church. For information about apostolic succession, the authority of the pope, papal infallibility, and related topics go to the sites library.
“The first Christians had no doubts about how to determine which was the true Church and which doctrines the true teachings of Christ. The test was simple: Just trace the apostolic succession of the claimants,” the article on apostolic succession says.
(5/26/06)

**Ancient works of the church are a testament

Next to the Didache, the Apostolic Tradition of St. Hippolytus is the earliest and most important of ancient works on the liturgy and practice of the primitive Church.
The work called Apostolic Tradition is dated from 215 A.D. That’s about 65 years after the books which we call “New Testament” were assembled into one volume. This work speaks of the ordination of bishops by other bishops who impose hands on the one to be ordained bishop, and who designate this act by their prayer of consecration.
This is exactly what we do today. The work tells of the ordination of priests in a similar way: the laying on of the hands of the bishop and the words of the consecratory prayer. (See AT, chapters 2, 4, and 8)
The Eucharistic Prayer which is given in Apostolic Tradition is essentially the same as our present Second Eucharistic Prayer.
Chapter 21 speaks of baptism in the Easter Vigil. It speaks of the anointing of the catechumens, of the baptism of children who are too young to speak for themselves (i.e. infants), of the baptismal vows which are identical to the ones we pronounce today, and the anointing with consecrated oil after baptism (confirmation.):
“After baptism, the bishop shall lay his hand upon them invoking and saying ‘O Lord, you have counted your servants worthy of the forgiveness of sins by the laver of regeneration: make them worthy to be filled with your Holy Spirit and send upon them your grace, that they may serve you according to your will. For to you is the glory to the Father and to the Son and with the Holy spirit in the holy Church both now and forever. Amen.’ After this, pouring the consecrated oil from his hand and laying his hand on his head, he shall say, ‘I anoint you with holy oil in God the Father almighty and Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit..’ And sealing him on the forehead, he shall give him the kiss of peace and say: ‘The Lord be with you.’ And he who has been sealed shall say, ‘And also with you.’ And he shall do to each one severally.” Apostolic Tradition, chapter 22.
This description of Confirmation, as the description of Holy Orders, as the description of the celebration of Mass is identical to what we do today. And that was almost eighteen hundred years ago! It was almost contemporaneous with the “New Testament Church.”
These few articles have given just an infinitesimally small insight into the vast heritage of the writings of the Fathers of the Church. Remember, there are 382 huge volumes of these writings in one collection.
And they all bear witness to one blunt fact: The Catholic Church today is identical with the Church of the New Testament, and has an unbroken line of unity through the centuries.
Additional reading is available at catholic.com’s library. Their article on apostolic tradition begins:
Is Scripture the sole rule of faith for Christians? Not according to the Bible. While we must guard against merely human tradition, the Bible contains numerous references to the necessity of clinging to apostolic tradition.
Thus Paul tells the Corinthians, “I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you” (1 Cor. 11:2), and he commands the Thessalonians, “So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter” (2 Thess. 2:15).

**More information

For more information about the early Church Fathers, go to catholic.com/library.
The website newadvent.com has a link that goes to letters, speeches and books from the earliest Christians.
(5/19/06)

**Catholic Diocese of Wichita home page