Reflections by Father Hector January -December 2012

Holy Mary, Mother of God pt 1; part 2

The parable of the two little children

The parable of the two little children

  In one of her letters, St. Therese of Lisieux relates a delightful parable that helps us to understand better the mercy of God. In her story, there is a father with two small children, who are basically a couple of troublemakers. The father shows up one time and the boys realize that they are in trouble for their mischief. The first child is filled with fear and moves away from his father, afraid of his punishments. The second one runs to him and embraces him while he tells him how sorry he is for having misbehaved. The father is so moved by the trust of his child that even though he knows in his heart that his son is most likely to get in trouble again, he knows he is now truly sorry and wants to make things right. The father lovingly forgives him. His tender mercy gets the upper hand. He loves his son too much to do anything else.

  With this powerful parable, which shines with many biblical themes, especially the loving mercy of God, we are inspired to relate to the Father in a new way. It doesn’t take much to realize that either we have failed the Lord in a serious way or that we don’t seem to do all the good things we should, and perhaps we are tempted to fear approaching God, for He is all good and we are not. We are afraid that, most likely, we will be punished.

  That is not the way in which God wants us to relate to him. He is our Father before he is our judge. He is all just but, first of all, He is all merciful. Blessed John Paul II writes that the mercy of God triumphs over his justice. We know in faith that such is the case in this life. While we are still in this world, we always have the opportunity of turning to the Lord, whose mercy has the power to destroy our sins and give us the new life of grace. This is the time for mercy. At the same time, the more we receive his mercy, the more we will be able to treat others with mercy as well.

  The Lord God is our Father in Heaven, and He invites us to make the choice to trust in him as much as we possibly can, so that when we sin we may run to him without even thinking about it, telling him that we are sorry while embracing him with loving confidence, allowing him to bathe us in his loving mercy, cleansing us from sin and clothing us with his new life.

  Jesus Christ reveals the Face of the Father to us and in his tender mercy, when He forgives us we enter into the embrace of love that unites forever Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Could there possibly be a greater joy than enjoying the love that gladdens the heart of the Most Holy Trinity? That is precisely what life in Heaven will be like, but even in this world we are offered a foretaste of it, when we turn to the Lord in confidence to be forgiven and renewed.

  The next time we are aware of having failed the Lord, instead of trying to forget about it, or to worry in fear or even worse, to be discouraged, let us simply be like the second child in the parable and run to our Father in Heaven and while we embrace him, let us tell him how sorry we are and how much we love him. His loving embrace will be more eloquent than words.

  Sincerely yours in Christ, …. Fr. Héctor.   

The radical dignity of Marriage

(Second and final part)

   Marriage is the natural institution uniting one man and one woman. It is also the life-long commitment between husband and wife, oriented towards the formation of a family and the union of love between spouses. Therefore, same-sex unions could never be given by law (either natural or civil) the character or the equality with marriage. This would be a grave injustice against the natural order of Creation, established by God himself. Besides that, the human institution of marriage, which is sanctioned by natural law is divinized by the power of God’s grace through the sacrament of Matrimony and it becomes a true way of holiness for husband and wife, who truly share a divine calling to be married to each other, to mutually help the other person to become a saint and to be open to receiving the gift of children, which always are a gift from God, who entrusts them to their parents so that they may share with them the unconditional love He has for them as his own children. 

  At this time, the Colorado legislation will be addressing legislation concerning same-sex ‘civil unions’, which for all legal purposes would have the same rights as marriages. The Catholic bishops in Colorado are encouraging us to actively participate in a post-card campaign addressing representatives, with the goal of promoting and defending the truth of marriage, opposing a legislative initiative which is gravely unjust because it promotes a false equality of rights between marriage (always between a man and a woman) and same-sex unions, which gravely violate both natural and divine law.

  I ask each person to please participate in this campaign by taking the time to fill out the post-cards appropriately and by giving them back to the ushers. We will mail them for you.

  We are Catholics and have been given the beautiful gift of Truth which is Christ himself, who is also the Way and the Life. Let us be more closely united to the Lord Jesus by giving witness to the truth of marriage, a true way of holiness for husband and wife, called to love one another, and to love their children with the love of God the Father himself.

  Sincerely yours in Christ,

Fr. Héctor.

Holy Mary, Mother of God

(Second and final part)

  What would we do if we were invited to go with the shepherds to adore the Son of God laying down in the manger, with the Mother of God on one side and with St. Joseph on the other? As a matter of fact, we do have a very similar privilege every time we come to Mass, for there we are invited to adore Jesus Christ himself who is fully present in this sacrament. We worship him in his Divinity and in his Sacred Humanity. In Holy Communion we truly receive the Body and Blood of the Son of God. Words cannot explain this mystery and words cannot express sufficient gratitude.

How should we have to prepare if an angel came down from Heaven inviting us to come and adore Baby Jesus? In the exact same way as we should prepare to receive the Eucharist: By praying with eager expectation and preparing a worthy dwelling place for the Messiah by actively renouncing sin in our lives and going to Confession if our sins are grave. Going to Communion without being in the state of grace would be even more disgraceful than ignoring the invitation of an angel to go to Bethlehem to adore the Messiah. It would be something similar to actually going there and despising the Son of God with mockery or even with bitter hatred.  

  My brothers and sisters, as the new calendar year begins, let us make the choice to surrender our lives to God by entrusting them to the loving care of Mary, Mother of God. Let us pray to Our Blessed Mother daily, honoring her with the recitation of the Rosary, offering our cares, worries, difficulties and sufferings to her motherly care. Let us especially pray through her intercession so that we may grow in our love for Christ in the Eucharist, realizing that receiving him in Holy Communion is the single greatest privilege we could possibly have in this world.

  Sincerely yours in Christ,

  Fr. Héctor.  

Holy Mary, Mother of God

(First of two parts)

  How beautiful our Catholic Church is! On January 1st, the very first day of the calendar year, we celebrate the solemnity of Mary, Mother of God. In such a way we entrust our lives to the loving intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This celebration takes place in the context of the Christmas season which begins on Christmas Eve and continues for many days until the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, this year on January 9th. 

 At the heart of the Christmas celebration, we find the mystery of the Virgin Mother. She was chosen by God himself to be the Mother of his Son, while remaining ever Virgin. This wondrous deed was announced to her by the Archangel Gabriel on the day of the Incarnation: The Son of God, without renouncing to his Divinity, fully embraced our humanity. Since Jesus is the Son of God, the Blessed Virgin Mary is the Mother of God, because He was conceived in her through the power of the Holy Spirit.

  Just imagine the kind of love Mary had for Jesus in her womb, knowing that his Sacred Heart was beating at unison with her own, the Heart of the world that so loved each person that would ever live, that He came down from Heaven to become Our Savior. Long hours of silent joy and adoration were most likely spent by the Mother of God for her Son in her womb and then, when He was born in Bethlehem, both her and St. Joseph were lost in contemplation, awed by the beauty of the Son of God entrusted to them. In that simple cave, surrounded by animals they were the first witnesses of the coming into the world of the ‘fairest among the children of men’ and the memory of the most beautiful face of the Divine Child would remain with them for the rest of their lives.

To be continued and concluded next week.