Lent Reflection: Temptations of Christ in the Desert (Part 1)

Introduction

When scripture is quoted and the text is not provided, please look to the bottom of the reflection for the text of the scripture.

Let us start by looking at the text from the Gospel according to Matthew.

Mat 4:1-11 

(1) The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the desert, so that the devil could test him. (2)  After Jesus had gone without eating for forty days and nights, he was very hungry. (3)  Then the devil came to him and said, "If you are God's Son, tell these stones to turn into bread.” (4)  Jesus answered, "The Scriptures say: 'No one can live only on food. People need every word that God has spoken.' " 

(5)  Next, the devil took Jesus to the holy city and had him stand on the highest part of the temple. (6)  The devil said, "If you are God's Son, jump off. The Scriptures say: 'God will give his angels orders about you. They will catch you in their arms, and you won't hurt your feet on the stones.' "  (7)  Jesus answered, "The Scriptures also say, 'Don't try to test the Lord your God!' " 

(8)  Finally, the devil took Jesus up on a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms on earth and their power. (9)  The devil said to him, "I will give all this to you, if you will bow down and worship me.” (10)  Jesus answered, "Go away Satan! The Scriptures say: 'Worship the Lord your God and serve only him.' "  (11)  Then the devil left Jesus, and angels came to help him.

For this time I’d like to focus on the first two verses.

Now, at first read, it does seem strange that the Holy Spirit would lead Jesus into the desert so that he could be tested, and not just tested, but tested by Satan. Should it really surprise us though? I mean, how would Jesus, being fully human, really, really know who he was if he didn’t face a challenge? Our beliefs are shaped not only by intellectual arguments, but also more strongly by experience. If Jesus did not experience the temptations, and emerge triumphant, would he know what he believed? Having faced the temptations that Satan put to him, and emerged victorious, he was able to concretely testify to what his mission was. He was able to define, for both himself, and us what he came for. You need to be confronted by an idea to form an opinion.

We must also understand that for Jesus to find and save the lost sheep, he must enter the place where it has been lost. He must totally follow down the path that leads to such a loss of self, and in order for redemption to occur, he must conquer the things that cause man to lose himself. However, if Jesus where to give into these temptations, it would not be possible for him to redeem us. In addition, if he did not face the temptations then Jesus would not be able to redeem us, because he would have no contact with us, no opportunity to truly find us (See Heb 2:18). Often we hear the expression, “Don’t judge unless you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.” This is true. Perhaps we can extend this and say, “Don’t try and help unless you can see the person’s shoes.” In this way, many charitable actions would be saved from failure. Sending money to a foreign place is not much help to the people. What they need is recognition. For someone to get close enough to understand the problems. When you send money from afar, you cannot have any idea of whether the project addresses the needs. The philanthropist must immerse himself in the problems, in the pain, of the one he seeks to help. Only in that way can he know what to do.

Back to the Gospel, what I am trying to say is this: Jesus was led by the Spirit to the place where he could find fallen humanity and from there begin to guide us home. He felt our pain, experienced our problems. He knows what we need. And not only did he walk a mile in our shoes, I’m sure in 40 days he covered more ground than that.

Also, notice that Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights in the desert before he was tempted. A period we try to emulate during lent (except that we have some respite each Sunday). This is very important because it was an opportunity for Jesus to learn in the School of Silence. In the School of Silence a person is left to find only himself or herself, their core identity, and in this core identity we recognise our relationship with God. But if the noise of the world is never escaped we can never discover the boundless beauty of this relationship. And if we don’t recognise Jesus, who is also God, when he comes to save us by pointing the way home, how will we ever find the way out of our “lostness”? Jesus built strength in the School of Silence and knew His Divinity (knowledge hidden from the devil), with this knowledge He was ready to refuse anything the devil could offer him. If we, too, are able to move away from the noise of the world we will also discover our relationship with Jesus and be able to know what we are created to be. A discovery so precious, the pearl of great price (Mat 13:46) if you will, that nothing can remove God's peace from us.

Let’s look at the 40 days part. Now, honestly, no matter how bad the food available is, nobody can go without it for 40 days and nights. Impossible. So what is this trying to tell us? The early Church Fathers stretched numerology a bit and said that the four represents the world (North, South, East, West being four corners of the world) and the 10 to represent the 10 commandments, or the law. Hence, 40 represents the law expanded to embrace all nations. And this is consistent with Jesus’ teaching. Another way to view this number is to see in it the reflection of the events in salvation history: Noah’s Ark (rain for 40 days and nights), the 10 commandments (Moses went up Mount Sinai for 40 days), and the Exodus (40 years in the desert). In this, we see Jesus connecting himself, identifying himself, with salvation history. 

As a closing for this introduction, I’d like to point out a link to the Old Testament. Where Adam was tempted in the garden he succumbed, as has humanity since. When Jesus was tempted in a place that would become the place of reconciliation and healing, the antidote to the sin, its opposite side, just as the desert is the opposite of the garden. And the antidote to our fallen condition is Love. Jesus teaches always how to love. From the above I think we can see that this love is one of compassion, of entering into the others suffering. The world needs this love. That Christians enter into each other’s “passion” if you will. That we have com-passion. Let’s use the time of lent to feel compassion for those who are less fortunate, and then let’s do something for them.

Scripture verses:

Heb 2:18  And now that Jesus has suffered and was tempted, he can help anyone else who is tempted.

Mat 13:46  and having found one pearl of great price, he went and sold all that he had, and bought it.

Novena to the Holy Face of Jesus begins today

Today is the start of the novena to the Holy Face of Jesus, leading up to Ash Wednesday.
You can find the text for the novena at this site: www.holyface.eu/novena.html
From the site we learn also:

There has been devotion to the Holy Face ever since Our Lord walked the earth. His mother looking down into the manger and seeing the Face of a beautiful Boy, the eyes of St. Mary Magdalen as she looked up at Him with love after anointing His Feet with perfume, St. Veronica whose veil, along with the Holy Shroud, is the basis for our depictions of Christ in the icons upon which we've gazed for two millennia.

Victory for Life and Fiscal Sanity: U.S. House Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood

By Deacon Keith Fournier

2/18/2011

Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - On Friday, February 18, 2011 the U.S. House of Representatives, by a margin of 240-185, voted to cut off federal funding to Planned Parenthood. The vote did not proceed along strict party lines. The vote did however reveal those members who have a conscience and care about what the American people truly want and those who do not.

Those who voted to cut off tax dollars to this organization are to be commended. That included 11 Democrats. Those who voted against this legislation, including 7 Republicans, ought to be publicly exposed. The one who voted "present" may be the worst offender. We will find out the names of the members in each category and inform our readers. The champion of this legislation was Rep. Mike Pence, who said after the historic vote:

"This afternoon's vote is a victory for taxpayers and a victory for life. By banning federal funding to Planned Parenthood, Congress has taken a stand for millions of Americans who believe their tax dollars should not be used to subsidize the largest abortion provider in America. I commend my colleagues in both parties for taking a stand for taxpayers and a stand for life. I encourage my colleagues in the Senate to support this legislation and end federal funding of Planned Parenthood once and for all."

We commend Congressman Pence and others, like Pro-Life Champion Congressman Chris Smith, whose courage and tenacity have led to this important vote. We urge our readers to pray fervently for those in the Senate who will soon be asked to consider this legislation. We also encourage everyone reading this article to continue to make their support of this legislation crystal clear to their own Senators. 

In 2009 I examined Planned Parenthood's 2007-2008 Annual Report. As a 501 c3 organization (with an affiliated "Action fund" for its more overtly political efforts) they have to make the report available to the public. I well understand the role and function of such reports having led not for profits groups in the past. It keeps members, supporters and friends aware of the organizations use of their funds and gives the organization the opportunity to self promote.

Planned Parenthood is built on a lie. They dress themselves up as a "Health Care Provider" while they include the taking of the lives of innocent children in the womb as a "service" under their offering of "reproductive services". They have insinuated themselves into the global delivery of "medical services" receiving massive government funding as this report clearly confirms. Included in these "medical services" is the killing of children in the womb.

There is nothing "reproductive" about abortion, it always kills a human person. It is certainly not a service to the child, the mother, the father or society. Nor is it "health care". Funding it is morally repugnant. Extracting tax dollars from all of us to do so is immoral and maddening..

Their 2007 - 2008 Report took their claims to a level of audacity which I had never seen. As a part of their outreach to "clergy" who condone their work, they honored a woman who referred to the killing of children in the womb through surgical strikes and chemical weapons as "Sacred Work" and "Prophetic Work".

They gave her the "Davis Award", named after Reverend Tom Davis, a minister in the United Church of Christ and his wife. Davis wrote a book entitled "Abortion -- Is it Necessary?" in which he contended that the "sacred work of justice," requires that America provide abortions to women. He is the chair of the "Clergy Advisory Board" of Planned Parenthood.

In the early paragraphs of their 2007- 2008 report they claimed "Planned Parenthood is the leading sexual and reproductive health care advocate and provider, with 93 years under our belt. And in the near future, we will play a unique role in helping to shape the health agenda for the new administration." They certainly succeeded in their prediction. The current Administration is has become their greatest ally. However, today's important vote portends a change is in the air.

Thursday evening brought a three hour long, impassioned floor debate over this legislation. The defenders of the indefensible, using our tax dollars to fund the work of Planned Parenthood, used their tired old rhetoric, calling the proponents of the legislation, including women, of waging a "war on women". Fortunately, they failed. 

In her recent story written before the vote, Catholic Online's Jennifer Hartline said of Congressman Pence,  "Pence is among many pro-life heroes in Congress who are actively pursuing the permanent defunding of Planned Parenthood.  He's certainly gotten Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richard's attention with his Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act."

"Between the Pence amendment and the Live Action videos that reveal PP's utter disregard for children's welfare and safety and their disdain for the law, Richards knows that PP's federal gravy train is under serious threat of derailment."

She is referring to Cecile Richards, the President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America who lobbied hard to prevent the passage of this amendment.

Jennifer Hartline continued, "Finally, the political facade is being melted away and many Americans are beginning to see Planned Parenthood for what it truly is; an organization that profits from the destructive sexual activities of minors and adults - and quite possibly criminal sexual activities - and the wanton extermination of babies.  And thankfully, many more Americans are asking, "Why should we pay for this?" 

"We shouldn't be paying for this.  Let the vocal and wealthy celebrities and abortion advocates in the country donate to their pet cause and keep PP operating if they choose, but keep our tax dollars out of it.  I choose not to fund PP.  I choose to value and protect my neighbor in the womb.  I choose life.  What about it, Cecile?  Aren't you supposed to be pro-choice? Thanks to Pence, Chris Smith of NJ and other unyielding defenders of life, the current Congress is poised to finally defund Planned Parenthood permanently."  

Cecile Richards responded after Friday's vote in these words, "The outcome of this vote is not a surprise, but it is radically out of step with mainstream American values and it is out of line with the issues voters want Congress to focus on." No, Ms. Richards, it is your organization which is out of step with mainstream American values and we are determined to stop paying its tab.

Next stop is the US Senate. Representative Pence had a message for his colleagues there, "I encourage my colleagues in the Senate to support this legislation and end federal funding of Planned Parenthood once and for all." We must all help to ensure they get the message loud and clear.

- - -

Catholic Online asks that you join with us and help in this vital mission bysending this article to your family, friends, and neighbors and adding our link (www.catholic.org) to your own website, blog or social network. Let us broadcast, we are PROUD TO BE CATHOLIC!

Front page news: Shame on you "abortion charity" Marie Stopes!

I had a little trouble believing my eyes this morning as I caught a glance of the front page of the "Metro" free morning newspaper (distributed in London). First thing that caught my eye was the wording in the headline: "Abortion charity", excuse me? I am still confused on this issue. I thought that to be a charity you had to pass the public benefit test. Now I may be extremely conservative in my views, but killing people is not a public benefit. Nor is encouraging them to get infected with sexually transmitted diseases (the UK already has the highest rate of STD's among teenagers in Europe). Not only is "abortion charity" an oxymoron, it is moronic. Disgusting. And never mind the real definition of charity as "love in action". We need to really bring back the meaning to the charity business. Bring back the love. Without love there can be no "love in action", no real charity.
But then that is not all. Apparently Marie Stopes International thinks it appropriate to tell teenagers that anal sex will help them enjoy themselves without getting pregnant. I almost fainted. "One up the bum, no harm done, you won't be a mum" or something equally ridiculous. I'm sorry, I think this is a strong argument against the theory of evolution. How can anybody with good genes be this stupid. You may not be a mum, but your chances of getting HIV just skyrocketed. Maybe they should be more truthful and sing "One up the bum and you won't live long." Someone wake me from this nightmare. This is even worse then the time I saw advertising on the side of a London bus informing teenage girls that they will get a free £10 music voucher with  their pap smear test. And only a little less worse than the show on public TV "The joys of teen sex" (I kid you not, Channel 4 is airing this idiocy).
I have scanned the image in so that you can see I haven't made this up, I know all sane individuals would never believe it.
And this is all a little bit Monty Python if you ask me. Once you consider the above and then look at the lead picture story about Rihanna being upset that her song about sex and sadomasochism has been edited by the BBC. I'm confused, you don't want to have sexy songs unless they are about anal sex? Or is it that it is only okay to publicise children's sex. No? Maybe it is only okay if it involves killing infants then, must be. Disgusting. Marie Stopes hang your heads in shame.
Let us take this time to pray for the youth, for those who are involved in the abortion industry and also those involved in the sexualisation of children. May God grant them a change of heart and show them the path of true Love. Amen.

Weekly reflection from the Jesuit Institute

This is this weeks reflection from the Jesuit institute in South Africa, it deals with the conflict in the Arab countries of North Africa by starting with a quote from the Qur'an. Nice approach. Enjoy:

Quotation:  "Whoever recommends and helps a good cause becomes a partner therein, and whoever recommends and helps an evil cause shares in its burden." (Qur’an, 4:85)

Reflection:  It is hard to know how to react to what is happening in Egypt.  At first our hearts might be gladdened by the sight of ‘people power’ on the streets: after all popular protest is something that helped bring down a bad government in South Africa. 

But then we might feel dismay and anger at the use of violence, certainly by the Government forces but also by some protestors.  Then we might feel concern that the protests are being orchestrated by certain groups or shock at the violation of great treasures in the museums.  And we might feel anxiety at what happens to peace in the Middle East if this stable but undemocratic regime falls, or fear for the plight of the Christian minority if there is a new Islamist government. 

The quote from the Qur’an reminds us always to return to understand the cause – for in that we will find the measure of what is of God and what is not.

Prayer:  God, the Almighty the Compassionate.  We ask your blessing on the people of Egypt and all the people of Africa.  Give wisdom, compassion and courage to those in authority, those on the streets and those with the power to influence. 
Amen.

Fr. Barron comments on Abortion: Shocking Numbers out of New York

Father Robert Barron gives his usual profound insight.

Check him out at www.wordonfire.org

I highly recommend his weekly homily podcasts.

The Lottery of Life

I came across this in mid October last year and it keeps coming back into my mind and thought I should post it. It is from remarks made by the Archbishop Chaput of Denver. He is very outspoken on life issues and has a way of cutting to the heart of things. You can see the full address here. Below I have added my highlights:

Some of you may know the short story, “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson. If you don’t, I need to spoil the ending to make my point.  But I promise the story will still be worth reading.

“The Lottery” is set on a summer day in a small town in 1940s America. The people are assembling for a very old annual ritual.  The ritual has something to do with imploring a good corn harvest -- but there’s no mention of any God, and no clergy anywhere in the picture.

Each person in the village lines up to draw a slip of paper from an old wooden box.  Tessie Hutchinson, a young wife and mother, draws a slip with a black mark.

From that moment, the story moves quickly to its conclusion. The lottery official gives the word, and the villagers move in on Tessie.  And they stone her to death.

“The Lottery” is one of the most widely read stories ever published in my country. And for good reason.  It’s well told. The ending leaves you breathless. Teachers like it because it provokes sharp classroom discussions.

Or at least it used to. 

A few years ago, a college writing professor, Kay Haugaard, wrote an essay about her experiences teaching “The Lottery” over a period of about two decades.

She said that in the early 1970s, students who read the story voiced shock and indignation. The tale led to vivid conversations on big topics -- the meaning of sacrifice and tradition; the dangers of group-think and blind allegiance to leaders; the demands of conscience and the consequences of cowardice.

Sometime in the mid-1990s, however, reactions began to change.

Haugaard described one classroom discussion that -- to me -- was more disturbing than the story itself. The students had nothing to say except that the story bored them. So Haugaard asked them what they thought about the villagers ritually sacrificing one of their own for the sake of the harvest.

One student, speaking in quite rational tones, argued that many cultures have traditions of human sacrifice. Another said that the stoning might have been part of “a religion of long standing,” and therefore acceptable and understandable.

An older student who worked as a nurse, also weighed in. She said that her hospital had made her take training in multicultural sensitivity. The lesson she learned was this: “If it’s a part of a person’s culture, we are taught not to judge.”

I thought of Haugaard’s experience with “The Lottery” as I got ready for this brief talk. Here’s where my thinking led me:

Our culture is doing catechesis every day. It works like water dripping on a stone, eroding people’s moral and religious sensibilities, and leaving a hole where their convictions used to be.

Haugaard’s experience teaches us that it took less than a generation for this catechesis to produce a group of young adults who were unable to take a moral stand against the ritual murder of a young woman.  Not because they were cowards.  But because they lost their moral vocabulary.

Haugaard’s students seemingly grew up in a culture shaped by practical atheism and moral relativism. In other words, they grew up in an environment that teaches, in many different ways, that God is irrelevant, and that good and evil, right and wrong, truth and falsehood can’t exist in any absolute sense.

This is the culture we live in, and the catechesis is on-going. But I don’t think this new kind of barbarism – because that’s what it is; a form of barbarism -- is an inevitable process.

It’s not easy to de-moralize and strip a society of its religious sense. Accomplishing the task requires two key factors: First, it takes the aggressive, organized efforts of individuals and groups committed to undermining faith and historic Christian values. Second, it takes the indifference of persons like you and me, Christian believers.

I want to focus on the second factor, because it involves us.

Christians in my country and yours -- and throughout the West, generally -- have done a terrible job of transmitting our faith to our own children and to the culture at large.

Evidence can be found anecdotally in stories like Kay Haugaard’s. We can also see it in polls showing that religious identity and affiliation are softening.  More people are claiming that they’re “spiritual,” but they have no religion.

Religion is fading as a formative influence in developed countries.  Religious faith is declining in Western culture, especially among Canadian and American young people. This suggests that the Church is actually much smaller than her official numbers would indicate. And this, in turn, has implications for the future of Catholic life and the direction of our societies.

What’s happening today in the Church is not a “new” story.  We find it repeated throughout the Old Testament.  It took very little time for the Hebrews to start worshipping a golden calf.  Whenever the people of God grew too prosperous or comfortable, they forgot where they came from.  They forgot their God, because they no longer thought it was important to teach about him.

Because they failed to catechize, they failed to inoculate themselves against the idolatries in their surrounding cultures.  And eventually, they began praying to the same alien gods as the pagans among whom they lived.

We have the same struggles today.  Instead of changing the culture around us, we Christians have allowed ourselves to be changed by the culture. We’ve compromised too cheaply. We’ve hungered after assimilating and fitting in.  And in the process, we’ve been bleached out and absorbed by the culture we were sent to make holy.

If our people no longer know their faith, or its obligations of discipleship, or its call to mission -- then we leaders, clergy, parents and teachers have no one to blame but ourselves. We need to confess that, and we need to fix it. For too many of us, Christianity is not a filial relationship with the living God, but a habit and an inheritance. We’ve become tepid in our beliefs and naive about the world.  We’ve lost our evangelical zeal. And we’ve failed in passing on our faith to the next generation.

The practical unbelief we now face in our societies is, in large measure, the fruit of our own flawed choices in teaching, parenting, religious practice and personal witness. But these choices can be unmade. We can repent.  We can renew what our vanity and indifference have diminished.  It’s still possible to “redeem the time,” as St. Paul once put it. But we don’t have a lot of time.  Nor should we make alibis for mistakes of the past.

Sixty years ago, when Shirley Jackson wrote “The Lottery,” she could count on her readers knowing what right and wrong were. She lived in a culture that reflected a broadly Christian consensus about virtue and moral integrity.  That’s no longer the case.

The culture we live in today proselytizes for a very different consensus -- one based on political and moral agendas vigorously hostile to Christian beliefs.

A recent article in the New York Times went directly to this point. It was about a new ad campaign launched by supporters of homosexual “marriage” in New York. The campaign features politicians and Hollywood celebrities making a series of reasonable-sounding arguments.

One example is from the actress, Julianne Moore. Her ad begins, “Hi, I’m Julianne Moore, and I’m a New Yorker. We all deserve the right to marry the person we love.”

The New York campaign is misleading and ultimately ruinous to real marriages and families.  But when Christians don’t understand the content or the reasons for their own faith, they have no compelling alternative to offer.

The points I’ve been making are these:

First, either we form our culture, or the culture will form us. Second, right now, the culture does a better job of shaping us than we do in shaping the culture. And third, we need to admit our failures, and we need to turn ourselves onto a path of repentance and change, and unselfish witness to others. 

The central issue in renewing Catholic catechesis has little to do with techniques, or theories, or programs, or resources. The central issue is whether we ourselves really do believe.  Catechesis is not a profession.  It’s a dimension of discipleship. If we’re Christians, we’re each of us called to be teachers and missionaries.

But we can’t share what we don’t have.  If we’re embarrassed about Church teachings, or if we disagree with them, or if we’ve decided that they’re just too hard to live by, or too hard to explain, then we’ve already defeated ourselves.

We need to really believe what we claim to believe. We need to stop calling ourselves “Catholic” if we don’t stand with the Church in her teachings – all of them.  But if we really are Catholic, or at least if we want to be, then we need to act like it with obedience and zeal and a fire for Jesus Christ in our hearts.  God gave us the faith in order to share it.  This takes courage. It takes a deliberate dismantling of our own vanity.  When we do that, the Church is strong. When we don’t, she grows weak. It’s that simple.

In a culture of confusion, the Church is our only reliable guide.  So let’s preach and teach our Catholic beliefs with passion. And let’s ask God to make us brave enough and humble enough to follow our faith to its radical conclusions.