Transparent World
Father Tony’s Midweek
Message
November 21, 2012
People who say that they
somehow do not believe in God usually mean they do not believe in a
guy (always a male, usually with a white beard) “out there”
somewhere who interferes on occasion with matters and demands our love and
worship. (“He is, after all,
a ‘jealous’ one, he!”) This
is, however, a petty caricature of the living, creating Ground of Being
and Love Itself. God is not
“out there” somewhere. God is
beneath and behind all. Luke
describes St. Paul speaking to the Athenians and saying of God “In him we
live and move and have our
being” (Acts 17:28).
This is an important idea,
since otherwise, God is diminished and we are left with reducing the
object of our worship to a kind of supernatural wacky great uncle or an
imaginary friend with super powers.
Such a god is not really God, but a sort of demiurge or
daemon. When we feel hurt or
anguish, it is easy to feel betrayed by such a Deity. God thus diminished is far removed
from the good we see all about us, all of which comes from God
directly.
“Life
is this simple: We are living in a world that is absolutely transparent
and God is shining through it all the time. This is not just a fable or a
nice story. It is true. If we abandon ourselves to God and forget
ourselves, we see it sometimes, and we see it maybe frequently. God shows
[God’s] self everywhere, in everything - in people and in things and in
nature and in events. It becomes very obvious that He is everywhere and in
everything and we cannot be without [God]. It's impossible. It's simply
impossible. The only thing is that we don't see it.” --Thomas Merton (in remarks to
monastic novices).
Faith
is trust in this Ground of Being, who is not less than personal. Indeed, the doctrine of the Holy
Trinity teaches us that God is
more than personal, and includes the social as well.
I
think that gratitude is the
emotion that best connects us with God. Trust is a close second. Both of these are in fact
expressions of love. And God
is, in fact, Love Itself. Love, trust, and gratitude give us eyes to see
God.
In
prayer and meditation, try to reflect on the Beauty of God’s Holiness
while feeling this love. It
helps. Peace and
Grace, Fr. Tony+
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