Northern Virginia Catholic Bible Study & Apologetics House rules/notes… 1. Meetup is www.meetup.com/catholicbiblestudy Zoom Meeting Logon info is the same every week: Zoom ID: 861 1782 2081 Password: 406952 2. Questions encouraged. If you have questions about anything, you can ask in the chat, email the Meetup group, or me directly at ron@hallagan.net. 3. Unedited recaps of meetings are posted via Meetup after our meeting. The final edited recap is posted within a week by Taylor on our Catholic Catacombs Light website at www.catholiccatacombs.wixsite.com/website/recaps. Taylor will notify everyone on Meetup with the link. 4. Respectfulness. We will be discussing differences between religions and between Christian denominations, and agree to be respectful at all times. Specifically, Protestants are our friends and brothers in Christ; in fact, I personally owe part of my return to the faith to them! 5. No politics. It would be easy for us to self-destruct, but that’s not our goal. Our goal is to learn/understand/apply the Bible and our Catholic faith. 6. Prison fellowship – opportunities to volunteer one Saturday per month for 2 hours (12-2 or 2-4) serving Catholic prisoners at the Fairfax County Jail. Ask Ron (ron@hallagan.net) or Gina (gmasterson99@gmail.com) for details. Why do this? "I was in prison, and you visited me." – Matt 25:36 7. Catholic Prayer & Fellowship. Are you interested in praying with other Catholics during the week? Fellow member Jason Goldberg has started just this at “Catholic Prayer, Fellowship, and Spirituality Meetup.” Sign up at: https://www.meetup.com/online-catholic-prayer-fellowship-and-spirituality/ 8. I highly recommend seeing “The Chosen” TV series. We seek a relationship with Jesus Christ, which is not easy at first. It helps when we can relate to a person that we have seen and heard. They have captured the real Jesus as close as any film I’ve ever seen. https://thechosen.link/1Y1R7. 9. RSVP Reminder: Please RSVP whether you are attending the meeting or just reading the Recap notes afterwards. The more RSVPs, the more Meetup will give us exposure, which will draw more people to us, which is our way of evangelizing! Please RSVP when you get the Meetup invite weekly. Our Bible Study Format: 5 min prayers, 10-15 min Catholic topic, 40-45 min on the main topic from weekly List below: Week 1: Oct 5 - Gospel Week: Week 2: Oct 11 – Bible Week (Gen àRev): We just started Exodus, the 2nd book of Moses. Exodus meeting #2. Week 3: Oct 18 – Survey Topics Voted on by Members: We are currently graduating from Purgatory.
Ö 1) Jesus’ Greatest Parables 2) Hell, Purgatory, Heaven 3) Christian Comparisons 4) Great Women in the Bible 5) World Religions 6) Book of Revelation 7) Major Heresies and Church Councils
Week 4: Oct 25 – Member Questions Night
1. How should we celebrate/honor the Christian Sabbath Sunday?
2. The History of the Mass going back to Cain & Abel, and the sublime meaning of the Eucharist in the present.
3. Love and Unity are two of the Holy Spirit’s Trinitarian descriptions. How are these different? How do they affect us?
4. The knowledge of God is “participatory.” Is that why nonbelievers have difficulty?
5. Are Charity and Love synonymous? How are they different? What are the 4 highest forms of Charity?
6. Do we have suffering for a reason? How do we offer up our sufferings? When should we embrace the cross vs wait for a miracle?
7. Jesus says to love God with all our might and our neighbors as ourselves. 1) What if we don’t love ourselves? 2) How do we love God? 3) How exactly do we love the people we can’t stand, or are bad people?
8. Anatomy of a sin. Degrees of separation from God vs degrees of closeness.
9. What is justice? Is it always good? Does God cause bad just things to happen? If one suffers but the results are good, is that justice?
10. Jesus says his yoke is easy and burden light, yet elsewhere he says we must pick up our cross and suffer. How do we reconcile these two things?
11. How can we lose our salvation?
Next Holy Days
Solemnity of All Saints – Nov 1
Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Souls Day) – Nov 2
Opening Prayer
Hear, O Israel! The Lord is God, the Lord is one!
We shall love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our might,
And our neighbor as ourselves. (Dt 6:4-5, Lev 19:18)
And as Jesus taught us to pray:
Our Father Who art in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us this day our daily Bread;
And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us all. Amen.
Hear, O Israel! The Lord is God, the Lord is one!
We shall love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our might,
And our neighbor as ourselves. (Dt 6:4-5, Lev 19:18)
Last week, we talked about the Our Father, and how Jesus taught his disciples to pray in a new way.
If we go back to Deuteronomy 6:4 (1300 BC, Moses), God says, “Hear O Israel...” God is teaching them to pray. The Jewish prayer, that is prayed daily, 2x, 3x/day – the same one Jesus prays in The Chosen – is called the “Shema.” The word means “Hear, O Israel.” That is us!
Q: God calls them/us to pray daily, multiple times daily. Why?
Because we forget about God. In this lifetime, our desire for shortcuts, the easy way and the things of this world, will be calling us all the time. They aren’t bad, but they can go bad easily if we let them lead us by the nose. The only way to stay in the driver’s seat is to keep God in our passenger seat.
Q: What does Paul mean when he says, “Clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and stop thinking about the desires of the flesh.”
Christ was sinless, which means he came here as the perfect human being. Do we not seek to be perfect in all the things in our life? Should we not then seek to be “like him”?
Q: Does the fact that Christ is perfect cause us pause in our effort to be “like him”?
Of course not. We don’t think we will be “perfect” in anything, do we? We intrinsically know it’s the journey, not being perfect in this lifetime.
Q: How do we be like him?
To get started, ask him. Invite him along. Remind yourself during the day. Ask, how am I doing?
All he wants is the chance to walk with you and help. Tiny steps are wonderful. One step forward, 2 steps backwards is okay! Soon it will be 2 steps forward, 1 step backwards!
Next week: “Love your neighbor as yourself”… What if you don’t love yourself?
Dante’s Divine Comedy (trilogy): Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso
Purgatory, Final
As we travel through the Mountain of Purgatory, we must always keep in mind that – as we have been showing with the seven deadly sins – all sins are all self-centered distortions of love that humans make through the agency of human freedom.
Beginning with a disproportionate and unrealistic sense of our own importance, pride (ego, self-centeredness, arrogance) stealthily lays the foundation for sins of self-absorption and excess.
Given the many varieties of sin – pride, greed, sloth, anger, etc. – and their opposing virtues – humility, generosity, zeal, understanding – might be better understood as looking at love like a diamond. How many faces are there?
A single cut diamond has 8 facets (a full cut has 57 facets).
If we take the 8-cut, you might think of these as the primary descriptions of Love: humility, generosity, service, peace-maker, courage, moderation/temperance, and understanding,
Each of free-will’s potential divergences from Love have their own descriptions – pride and arrogance, greed, self-centeredness, wrath, gluttony, sloth, infidelity, and lust – but again, these are deficiencies, or abuses, of their counterparts.
Love as a single cut diamond
The divided/fragmented human.
Purgatory is not punishment. The “purifying” is a restoration of the whole person.
Dante and Virgil move on to the 5th Terrace: GREED and COVETOUSNESS.
The 9th and 10th Commandments warn us against covetousness (Thou shalt not covet our neighbor’s spouse; thy neighbor’s goods). We can also see greed in the word covetousness in this quote from Jesus:
“Watch out and guard yourselves against every form of covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” – Luke 12:15
Q: Covetousness sounds a lot like envy. What’s the difference?
Covetousness belongs to both Greed and Envy – they are all variations on the same theme:
Greed – I want, and I want more, and then I want more still…
Covetousness – I want what you have (possessions, accomplishments, spouse, you name it)
Envy – I am unhappy because you have something that I don’t have. I deserve it and should have it, not you.
The distinctions can overlap depending on each situation. They are simply different ways of looking at a similar problem: an insatiable desire for money, power, ambition/reputation/image (mammon).
On this 5th level, there are people face-down in the dirt, where all they can grasp, or possess, is… dirt. Dante sees a famous poet from the first century – Statius – whom he admired.
Upon seeing Virgil, he comes over to him and falls at his feet. Poets are not generally known for their greed so Virgil is shocked, and asks him, “Why are you here? What happened to you?”
Statius explains that it wasn’t greed in the normal sense; it was extravagance and wastefulness. He couldn’t spend it fast enough, but it was for reckless enjoyment only. “I never gave any of it away,” he says. Dante seeks his advice...
“Search for a holy desire in how all things can be used.”
Freed of his purgatorial trials, Statius will soon follow Dante and Virgil the rest of the way up the mountain.
Q: The Sin is Avarice/Greed – disordered love of riches/possessions (idolatry). What is the opposite virtue?
Charity/Generosity – giving without expectation or resentment
Dante is next taken to the 6th Terrace of Gluttony.
There, they meet throngs of people who are skin and bones with sunken eyes such that they couldn’t be recognized any if they were your own siblings.
Gluttony is an unregulated love for food and drink. Aside from the overindulgence of the gift of the fruit of the earth, gluttony has the power to cloud one’s clearness of mind and judgment and to limit one’s capacity to do good.
A remarkable tree rises up in their midst on the sixth terrace that excites desire for food and drink in all the souls present only to immediately frustrate this craving, for these souls are reconciling the damage that gluttony has brought.
From the branches and leaves of the tree resounds an anonymous voice summarizing infamous examples of intemperance and gluttony in one case, and exemplary instances of temperance in the other.
The gluttonous feasts of the Romans are an example of such abuse, followed by the biblical scene at the wedding feast at Cana, in which Mary tells her son Jesus "they have no wine" to underscore Mary's concern not for herself but for the welfare of the guests.
A hero of temperance who is highlighted is of course none other than John the Baptist, who wore a garment of camel’s hair and subsisted on locusts and wild honey.
Q: Gluttony is a disordered love of food and drink resulting in continual overconsumption. What is the opposite virtue?
Temperance/Abstinence (moderation/self-control).
LUST
We will now follow Dante to the Terrace of Lust.
The Terrace of Lust is a sensitive one for Dante and one gathers that he had a way with women. But …
Q: What is lust?
The dictionary says it is the “intense or uncontrolled sexual desire or appetite,” – and it is correct – especially the word “appetite.”
Similar to having an appetite for a good steak, how much do we really think about the cow we’re eating? We don’t, except for maybe that it was grass fed. Or if you are a vegetarian, when you are eating whole fresh-dug, braised parsnips, how much are you concerned about that family of parsnips that were just dug out of their homes? You’re not.
The same is true with our appetite of lust: we really don’t care about the person who is gratifying us, because it’s not about them, it’s about us. It is about immediate self-gratification, which is the lowest animal behavior humans can satisfy.
Q: We say the animal “appetites” for these things constitutes the lower human nature. Is this “dis” on animals?
Actually, animals are achieving their designed nature. When we act like animals, we are not, because we have free will and our spiritual natures call us to a higher, more sacred place, whether it’s food, relationships, or sex.
Therefore, you could say that the animals are acting admirably, whereas humans have the free will to override those all day long.
Q: How’s this freedom working for humans?
Aside from alcoholism, drug addiction, pornography, obesity, hatred, betrayal, lies, rape, murder, and war, it’s working great! Animals don’t tend towards these kinds of issues because they don’t have the burden of free will.
Q: What are these “appetites” you speak of, besides lust?
Most are covered by the Seven Deadly Sins. That’s why they are called vices.
Pride – the appetite/desire to be God, to be seen as the best, the only, etc.; arrogance, vanity, pretention, self-centered.
Envy – the appetite to possess what others have that is more or better than what you have; jealousy, bitterness, covetousness.
Anger – uncontrolled emotional appetite to get even or settle a perceived injustice; petulant, temperamental, wrathful.
Sloth – the appetite for nothing; lack of any “good” desire, lack of caring; spiritual laziness, indifference, ennui, stands for nothing.
Greed – insatiable appetite for wealth or possessions; avarice, selfishness, possessiveness, at times, a predatory desire to win.
Gluttony – the appetite for consumption, overindulgence, intemperance.
Lust – intense/uncontrolled appetite for sex; licentiousness, eroticism, lechery, promiscuity, debauchery, unchastity.
Q: How do we deal with these problems?
The first thing always is to act on reversing our own fall – which is God. We kicked him out of our life, so we invite Him back in.
Second, make him part of our everyday life. God gave us the power of free will for a reason – to learn how to love. It’s a high bar, but the rewards are even higher.
Q: Why is Lust placed at the top of the mountain, closest to Heaven?
Sex in our finite existence is about two becoming one in an expression of love and its power to create new life. The endgame of all new life is Heaven, so we are part of creating life that now can journey towards/into Heaven.
Lust does a full stop on all this because it is all about immediate self-gratification, the opposite of love. Love is about giving and putting others first. Lust is about taking and objectifying the other.
Q: What is the opposite Virtue?
Chastity, which means to refrain from sex outside of one’s marriage. But the heart of it also has to do with intent, not merely actions.
Modesty, meaning not presenting oneself in front of others, especially in public, with the hope of attracting lustful eyes.
Q: Does the Church consider sex bad?
Not at all. It is meant to be part of a marriage commitment, to bring joy, laughter, and babies!
Sex becomes something higher, something sacred, when it is treated with such holy respect.
Q: Who is the Image of the Ideal?
Mary, again at the Annunciation… “How shall this be since I not know not man.”
Chastity was not seen as negative, but a model of holiness. Priests become priests to give their lives to God, to marry the Church, to dedicate all their efforts to helping others.
Again, to honor your relationship with your spouse is to be holy and chaste.
Dante is now near the end of his journey. He comes upon a wall of fire.
It’s a long way to the other side. He feels it’s intense heat and stops as he encounters the Angel of Chastity. The angel tells Dante he must go through it to finish his purification – the “fires of lust” – before he can leave.
Dante is filled with fear at the prospect of walking through the flames, which he knows he must do. Indeed, Dante knows that his desire must be transformed by the fire so that he can be elevated into Heaven.
But Dante refuses to go. He is afraid of the pain that this final purgation in the fire will cause him, but also he is so attached to his lust, he fears what will happen to him if he gives it up. What will be left of him?
Virgil tells Dante that the fire will be painful, but that it will not cause death. “My dear son, there may be pain here, but there is no death.”
Dante won’t budge.
Virgil tries to convince him, that this is necessary, and to trust him. After all this time together, would he mislead Dante now? Finally, Virgil reminds him this is not a fire of punishment but a fire of purification, a fire of love.
Dante steps into the fire. The blazing fire takes all his breath away as the flames travel beyond the pain of hot coals to something we might think of as a nuclear blast.
He knows not how long it is, but he finally exits the fire. He has been purged of all lust, all disordered love. The angel appears and wipes the last mark from his forehead. He is then ready to ascend to the top of Mount Purgatory to meet Beatrice, his guide through Heaven. t
Q: Did you notice what sits atop of the Mountain of Purgatory?
Earthly paradise, but not Heaven.
In Dante’s story, Purgatorians will return to where the fall happened (Paradise), but this time it will be to pick up where Adam & Eve left off. Now that Jesus has reversed The Fall, and we have been purified of our lesser attachments, we can now complete the walk into the 7th Day – Heaven – which our first parents were unable to do.
On the one hand it is sad for Dante because he has to say goodbye to Virgil, who was not only a hero of Dante’s but like a father figure to him through this long and shocking journey through Hell and Purgatory. But Virgil can go no further because he did not make it to Heaven, so he cannot enter there. He is from Limbo, which is neither heaven nor hell, but there is no suffering. He is there with Socrates and many other fascinating characters who were good people but not saved. Perhaps they will get another chance to accept God’s offer at the end of time (Judgement Day).
Dante now meets Beatrice, the love of his life when he was young, but she died. She was beautiful and religious – like an angel in Dante’s mind – but she hardly gave Dante the time of day. When Beatrice died, she went to heaven.
It turns out that it was Beatrice who made the request to Mary, Jesus’ mother, to grant Dante this tour – to help him get his life on track before it was too late. Mary granted Beatrice’s request and an angel was sent to Virgil – another poet – to give Dante his initial tours.
Now Beatrice will take over.
Dante is stunned – both at the surrounding paradise and at seeing Beatrice – and he asks if he has arrived in Heaven.
She explains that it is merely Earthly Paradise. What he is seeing is what earth was, should have been, and may again be in the end.
Two rivers…
Dante is shown that he must now bathe in the River of Forgetfulness – which wipes away one’s past, including all past sins. These are no longer necessary.
Then Dante is told to bathe in the 2nd river, the River of Good Memories, which restores all good and virtuous memories.
Dante is cleansed and refreshed and new and weightless and every other thing! He is ready to rise beyond and visit the stars (Heaven) – in the next book.
Question at the end: Does the Church teach this?
All I can say is that Dante was a genius and a Thomas Aquinas fan, it makes perfect sense, and every Pope has recommended reading it.
Closing Prayer
Dear Lord
Thank you for the knowledge that makes us wiser.
Thank you for the forgiveness every time we ask.
Thank you for the help you offer along our journey
For it is through our trial and errors with you that we learn your ways and raise ourselves up closer to You.
Hail Mary, full of grace the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
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