Northern Virginia Catholic Bible Study & Apologetics
Opening Prayer:
If you think of this world as a place simply intended for our happiness, you will find it quite intolerable; think of it as a place for training and correction and it’s not so bad. – C.S.Lewis
And as your Son 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. Amen.
Upcoming major holy days: All Saints Day, Nov 1; All Souls Day, Nov 2.
Survey – A “Mary Class” won the voting by a large margin, so that will be our topic next month on Nov 20.
Quote of the week:
“O God!” I cried and that was all. But then what prayers in the entire universe are but an expansion of that one cry? For the heart of all prayer is not what God can give us, but God that we want. – George Macdonald
Next week: November 29th is the 5th Tuesday of the month, so it’s not in the ordinary rotation. We will still meet. I will cover All Souls Day, All Saints Days, and the positive growth of Catholicism around the world (except for Europe!).
TODAY: 1 Edification (demons vs ghosts), 1 Saint Trivia, 1 Catholic Topic (What is Limbo?)
Gospel Reading – 30th Sun in Ordinary Time (10/27), Mark 10:46-52 – Bartimaeus Receives His Sight
Member Questions: 1) Sacraments? The Sacrament of Eucharist, Confirmation, Marriage, Holy Orders
Edification from last week: What is the difference between a demon and a ghost?
A demon is a fallen angel, a devil. They hate humans and want us in hell at any cost for we are beneath them by nature yet God made us his children and heirs to the Kingdom.
Ghosts, properly understood, are disembodied souls, which belong to human beings who have died. Most often, they are residents of purgatory, where they undergo a period of purification before entering heaven. And yes, these souls are occasionally permitted to return to earth to seek our prayers.
Trivia Question: Which saint gave a homily AFTER he was beheaded?
St. Denis. Story: Due to the persecutions inflicted by the Emperor Decius (~250 AD), the Catholic Faith had been waning in Gaul (France). Seven bishops were sent there to revive the faith, headed up by Bishop Denis. They journeyed to what is now the city of Paris. Denis built a church on the Seine Island and set up the first episcopacy in that beloved city. With the help of two inseparable companions, Denis brought countless souls into union with God.
The pagan priests hated him for it. They eventually incited the governor to arrest Denis and his companions. The Christian priests held fast to the Faith despite many tortures. Finally, they were beheaded.
Legend has it that Denis picked his head up off the ground and carried it from Montmartre, the site of his martyrdom, to the future site of the Abbey of St. Denis—and preached a sermon along the way! What a sight that must have been to the pagan priests! Now the eloquent St. Denis is regularly portrayed holding his own head in his hands.
What is Limbo?
The word limbo comes from the Latin limbus, meaning to be on the edge, or border.
In the OT, limbo was the place where the good went to await salvation brought by Jesus. It was a place of natural happiness, but not supernatural happiness.
In the NT, limbo was traditionally taught as a place between heaven and hell where good (uncondemned) souls who died without baptism would go.
In Dante’s Divine Comedy (his 3 poetic books on his visions of visiting Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven), Limbo is a place outside of Hell where unbaptized but virtuous pagans live (Socrates, Aristotle, Plato. Homer, Julius Caesar…).
Dante visiting Limbo
All that said, the Catholic Church has never officially defined Limbo or stated that souls actually go there. Though Limbo has been a debated theory in the Church for over a millennium, Catholics are not required to believe in it as a doctrine.
In 2007, Pope Benedict authorized a document by the International Theological Commission (ITC) called The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized that downgraded Limbo to a theological hypothesis.
Additionally, in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, there is no reference anywhere to limbo. Concerning children who die without baptism, the Catechism says, the church can only entrust them to the mercy of God as she does in her funeral rites for them.
Gospel Reading – Mark 10:46-52 – Bartimaeus Receives His Sight
Setting… Jesus is now leaving Jericho (next stop is Jerusalem for the last time).
Gospel: Mark 10:46-52
As Jesus was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd, Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus,sat by the roadside begging. On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, “Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me."
And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he kept calling out all the more, "Son of David, have mercy on me."Jesus stopped and said, "Call him."
So they called the blind man, saying to him, "Take heart; get up, Jesus is calling you." He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus.
Jesus said to him in reply, "What do you want me to do for you?"
The blind man replied to him, "Master, I wish to see."
Jesus told him, "Go your way; your faith has made you well …saved you."
Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way.
Exegesis
First verse – where are they? On the outskirts of town where the poor and outcasts were.
Note the name, Bartimaeus, is actually Bar-Timaeus. Bar is “son of.” Peter is sometimes called “Simon Bar Jonah.”
Bartimaeus continually calls Jesus and he is rebuked (told to shut up). He has no place, no status in society.
Jesus says to call him. He uses “call” 3x, meaning Jesus is taking the initiative. God calls us into relationship.
But when Bartimaeus comes, Jesus says, “What would you like?” Isn’t it obvious? Yet, Jesus wants the man to ask. He does this often. He wants his followers to respond, to engage, to agree, to decide. A relationship takes two interacting.
Bartimaeus calls Jesus “Master.” The Greek is “Rabbouni,” which also means teacher or Rabbi. He wants to be a disciple.
Faith… once again, Jesus teaches that faith comes first. With faith in Jesus Christ, all things are possible.
Bartimaeus is “immediately healed and followed him on the way.” He becomes a disciple.
What is another meaning to the Way?
Christianity was called “The Way” for its first 10 years. “Christianity” first shows up about 43AD in Acts 11:26.
Paul: I persecuted the followers of this “Way” to their death. – Acts 22:4
Jesus: I am the way, the truth, and the life. – John 14:6
Way (discipleship). Truth (Jesus is God’s revelation to man). Life (eternal life in Heaven/freedom from sin).
OT reference… In Exodus, the “way” was considered the way to the Promised land/freedom from slavery in Egypt.
Jesus’ “Way” is the New Exodus and the path to eternal freedom; freedom from slavery to sin (fall of man).
The Pinnacle of Sacraments: The Eucharist – Greek for gratitude. Also called Holy Communion, meaning union with God.
We know that “sacrament” is the meeting of heaven and earth, of God and man.
We’ve discussed a few times that the Eucharist is the greatest of the sacraments. Why?
1. It represented the pinnacle of God’s love for us, that he would suffer and die for us – to pay for our sins so that we could have forgiveness-for-the-asking – and open up the gates of Heaven. Because of this, this sacrifice is what made all the other sacraments possible.
2. As the incarnation when God enters into humanity, Jesus enters into the bread and wine so we can share personally in his sacrifice, fulfilling the first Passover when God shared lamb sacrifice with the Israelites before they fled Egypt.
3. The institution of the Eucharist made it possible for Jesus to remain with us physically and spiritually for all time. This is the definition of “sacrament” – the physical and spiritual are united, upon which grace is poured out.
4. This “supernatural bread” is also reflected in the Lord’s Prayer and shows yet another link between God and man:
In “our daily bread” – the second “daily” comes from the Greek word, epiousios, meaning supersubstantial or supernatural, which changes the one day into every day – unending/forever. The word “bread” connotates sustenance for life – in this case, supernatural life; and “breaking bread” implies friendship and family – in this case, friendship with God and being invited into God’s family.
5. This act of Jesus at the Last Supper fulfils his earlier preaching in the synagogue at Capernaum in John 6:
“I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness and died, but this is the bread that comes down from Heaven so that a man may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from Heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh (the unblemished sacrificial lamb).” – John 6:37-50
Everything Jesus said was to set the stage for the Last Supper. There, he holds up the bread and wine and says, “This is my body,” and “This is my blood,” and “Do this in memory of me.” I underlined these words because it’s important to understand what Jesus means by “this,” “is,” and “memory.”
When Jesus said, “this is,” in that moment he transformed the inner substance (essence) – not the externals – of the bread and wine into his body and blood. When he repeats “this” in the next passage, “Do this in memory of me,” he is referring to the same this – his body and blood. He is saying to do the exact same thing as him. Finally, Jesus says the bread and wine IS his body and blood, not “represents my body” or “symbolizes my blood.” The bread and wine became his body and blood right then and there. Given that his sacrifice was yet to happen, he is oddly making the bread and wine at the Supper into what his sacrifice will have accomplished after it is completed. He was giving them this miracle ahead of time.
Why? What would be the point of changing the bread and wine into his body and blood at the Last Supper?
Because it was the night of the Passover which Jesus had come to replace, fulfill, and elevate, like everything else.
Because instead of the required “unblemished lamb” for the Passover, Jesus was the “Unblemished Lamb.”
Recall the first Passover when God shared the sacrificial lamb with the Israelites in a meal before they fled slavery in Egypt. All of this prefigured Jesus’ Passover meal. You could call the Last Supper the Last Passover, because it would be the last sacrifice ever needed. This time, Jesus offers himself up as the Passover lamb that God is now sharing with his people, which will bring about our freedom from slavery to sin and death. Heaven is being reopened for the first time since the Fall of man. This freedom is not the temporary life like what was given to the Israelites in the first Exodus, but eternal life.
Lastly, the words “do this in memory of me” don’t do the translation justice, but “memory” is the best word we have. The Greek word, “anamnesis,” doesn’t just mean a “recollection of events,” like our celebration on July 4th remembers Independence Day; instead, it is a sacramental action by which we draw on the power of a past event and experience its effects in the present. This is how the Jews celebrate the Jewish Passover. When celebrating Passover, they must recall the exact original events and even involve the children in reenacting those past events to make them present again. Here, again, Jesus elevates Passover to make it truly real and truly present. His last miracle on earth was a gift of his presence to us as we share in that same Passover (Last Supper) meal for all time.
In Mass, we are watching another incarnation at each consecration: by the power of the HS, the substance/essence of the bread and wine are turned into the resurrected, glorified Christ, just as he did at the Last Supper and instructed us to do. If the physical Incarnation was miraculous and important for our salvation, then his miraculous physical presence was every bit as important at the Last Supper when he gave himself to us in the Eucharist.
I’ve heard Protestants think incorrectly that we are offering a “new sacrifice” at every Mass. They haven’t done their homework. Jesus’ sacrifice of himself ended the need for all sacrifices ever again. The Mass isn’t celebrating a “new” sacrifice but the SAME sacrifice, which is ever-present. You may recall that Jesus retained his bodily scars and nail holes after his resurrection and took these wounds with him at his Ascension – that is precisely because his sacrifice was eternal. This also makes sense since he is still forgiving our sins 2000 years later. If that is hard to understand, then consider that Jesus’ sacrifice 2000 years ago is not limited by time or finite human thinking. His sacrifice is eternally present to us in the Mass.
Graces received in the Eucharist
Because Jesus incarnates himself through the HS into the bread and wine, if we take Communion in faith, then the graces we receive include sustenance for our spiritual life, unity with Christ, a strengthening of our supernatural nature, an increase in power over sin, and a defense against the loss of the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love. The Church describes the Eucharist not only as the “fountain of all graces,” but the source and summit of the Christian life. All other sacraments are oriented toward it.
“The Gnostics abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not admit that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, the flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in His graciousness, raised from the dead.” – St. Ignatius Antioch, Apostolic Father, Bishop of Antioch, Disciple of the Apostle John.
How often can you receive the Eucharist?
A Catholic in good standing (state of grace) can receive the Eucharist as many times as he or she attends Mass, even multiple times in one day.
Speaking of which, why not go to Mass and receive the Eucharist daily? Mass is only 30 minutes, you should give it a try. BTW, I have this Mass app on my phone: www.masstimes.org. It tells you the Masses that are right around you, any time, any day, wherever you are in the world.
The question was asked, “If the Eucharist is the same original sacrifice of Jesus for all time, why do we need to re-present his sacrifice it at every Mass?”
Five reasons (perhaps there are more):
1) Command. Jesus said for us to do so.
2) Ongoing Forgiveness. Jesus’ original sacrifice is ever-present, and in that sense, ongoing. He is still forgiving our sins 2000 years later. That’s the meaning of why he retained his wounds after his resurrection and took them with him back to Heaven.
3) Gratitude. Humans are not automatically grateful beings; we forget to appreciate what we have until we don’t have it any longer. In this case, it is the unfathomable love that caused this sacrifice to happen. Having it mad present to us weekly helps us to not lose our gratitude for being given forgiveness and access to Heaven.
4) Grace. Because of all the graces he gives to us when we partake faithfully in the Eucharist. One cannot increase one’s relationship with Christ more than by receiving him physically into our lives, as often as possible.
5) Becoming Sons and Daughters of God. Though the Eucharist is a physical experience, even more so we are being spiritually transformed into Heavenly beings, as preparation for our next life.
Closing Prayer:
Prayer of Mother Teresa
People are often unreasonable and self-centered.
Forgive them anyway.
If you are honest, people may cheat you.
Be honest anyway.
The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough.
Give your best anyway.
In the end, it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway.
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