Is God propitiated in the Mass?

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cpayne said:
I don’t really understand the question. However, here’s a stab at it. Writing to the Galatians, Paul said that Christ was “evidently set forth as crucified among you.” How could this be possible? Christ was only crucified once, right? That is the propitiatory sacrifice. However, in God’s timelessness, that sacrifice is set before us at each Mass and we participate in it by the reception of communion in faith. My first post, and the first post of Gottle, remain my answer to the OP.
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One thing we have to remember is that in heaven there is no past and no future, both of these are the heavenly now. Time is a device or concept that helps us to keep order in our system, but to God all is now. If this is so the Mass taking place in time allows us to plug into the heavenly now. In the heavenly now Christ’s crucifixion/sacrifice is not something that happened 2000 years ago. As time bound creatures this is difficult to grapple with.
 
rwoehmke said:
One thing we have to remember is that in heaven there is no past and no future, both of these are the heavenly now. Time is a device or concept that helps us to keep order in our system, but to God all is now. If this is so the Mass taking place in time allows us to plug into the heavenly now. In the heavenly now Christ’s crucifixion/sacrifice is not something that happened 2000 years ago. As time bound creatures this is difficult to grapple with.
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I agree; this goes along with what I was trying to say.
 
cpayne said:
I don’t think it is a historical reminder simply because the Galatian church did not see Jesus crucified. In their services, He was “openly set forth” before their very eyes as crucified. He is the propitiatory sacrifice; in that He is set forth before the Church, and we participate in that event. Is there a recurring point to this recurring question that I am missing? Evidently the answers given are not satisfactory?
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Our Lord was “openly set forth crucified” in the apostle Paul’s writing ministry, preaching ministry, and personal life. Why do you want to focus on the Mass in your interpretation? Very little in the apostle Paul’s writings specifically address the Eucharist.

How do you see the question that went with the post to which you refer? However you understand ‘propitiation,’ does the participant in the Mass participate in the propitiation of God associated with the ‘propitiatory sacrifice’ of the Mass? The issue is not the blessings which flow from propitiation–forgiveness, redemption, reconciliation, and more. The issue is the connection between the participant of the Mass, and the propitiation which is the basis for the above blessings.
 
rwoehmke said:
One thing we have to remember is that in heaven there is no past and no future, both of these are the heavenly now. Time is a device or concept that helps us to keep order in our system, but to God all is now. If this is so the Mass taking place in time allows us to plug into the heavenly now. In the heavenly now Christ’s crucifixion/sacrifice is not something that happened 2000 years ago. As time bound creatures this is difficult to grapple with.
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Is our Lord still on the cross in “the heavenly now?”
 
bcoger said:
Is our Lord still on the cross in “the heavenly now?”
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Yes. He is also eternally resurrected and seated at God’s right hand.

I accept that the reference in Galatians could very readily have been to Paul’s teaching and preaching ministry, where Christ was “evidently set forth as crucified.” Too bad Paul made that mistake. He obviously should have realized that Jesus was no longer crucified. 😃
 
cpayne said:
Yes. He is also eternally resurrected and seated at God’s right hand.

I accept that the reference in Galatians could very readily have been to Paul’s teaching and preaching ministry, where Christ was “evidently set forth as crucified.” Too bad Paul made that mistake. He obviously should have realized that Jesus was no longer crucified. 😃
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I am not following what you are saying. Our Lord is still on the cross? He is seated at the right hand of God? How could He be on the cross and simultaneously seated at the right hand of God? The cross is humiliation. The right hand of God is glory. He is clothed in glory and simultaneously naked in humiliation? For 40 days He was with His disciples after His resurrection. When did He reattach Himself to the cross?
 
bcoger said:
I am not following what you are saying. Our Lord is still on the cross? He is seated at the right hand of God? How could He be on the cross and simultaneously seated at the right hand of God? The cross is humiliation. The right hand of God is glory. He is clothed in glory and simultaneously naked in humiliation? For 40 days He was with His disciples after His resurrection. When did He reattach Himself to the cross?
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Yes—as I mentioned earlier, He is the Lamb slain “from the foundation of the world.” Since God exists timelessly, God sees the crucifixion and resurrection as eternally occurring. Another way to think of this is that the crucifixion and resurrection are eternally before God always (from the foundation of the world). Christians in a sense live in two worlds—in the world where Jesus was crucified 2,000 years ago and then afterwards resurrected, and in the world where this idea of sequential time does not apply. The N.T. distinguishes these ideas of time as chronos and kairos. In chronos, Jesus is no longer on the cross. In kairos, He is.
 
cpayne said:
Yes—as I mentioned earlier, He is the Lamb slain “from the foundation of the world.” Since God exists timelessly, God sees the crucifixion and resurrection as eternally occurring.
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When our Lord was crucified, He was wearing outer garments and an inner garment. The outer garments consisted of the head gear, the sandals, the girdle, and the tallith (outer garment with fringes). The soldiers divided the outer garments among themselves. The inner garment was seamless. Rather than divide it, they cast lots for it. When the soldiers were finished, our Lord was absolutely naked on the cross. Do you expect to see our Lord naked on a cross in heaven?
 
bcoger said:
When our Lord was crucified, He was wearing outer garments and an inner garment. The outer garments consisted of the head gear, the sandals, the girdle, and the tallith (outer garment with fringes). The soldiers divided the outer garments among themselves. The inner garment was seamless. Rather than divide it, they cast lots for it. When the soldiers were finished, our Lord was absolutely naked on the cross. Do you expect to see our Lord naked on a cross in heaven?
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I try to see Him naked on a cross at all times. I also try to see Him resurrected as the Lord of the universe. What I will see in heaven, I am not sure of yet. See earlier post on the difference between chronos and kairos. In the same way, we are to see ourselves as “dead unto sins” (always) and “alive unto righteousness” (always).
 
cpayne said:
I try to see Him naked on a cross at all times. I also try to see Him resurrected as the Lord of the universe.
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You try to see Him with His private parts exposed? Why doesn’t the Church want to see Him with His private parts exposed?
 
bcoger said:
You try to see Him with His private parts exposed? Why doesn’t the Church want to see Him with His private parts exposed?
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“Naked on a cross” was your phrase, not mine. I expect He had on a cloth or something. At any rate, I’m pretty sure He had “private parts,” just as I’m pretty sure Mary and Joseph saw Him naked as a jaybird.

In heaven, I doubt that these questions will be uppermost in my mind.
 
cpayne said:
“Naked on a cross” was your phrase, not mine. I expect He had on a cloth or something.
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The tunic without seem for which the soldiers cast lots was the inner garment (i.e. underwear). The apparel which the soldiers divided among themselves was worn over the tunic. In other words, our Lord was wearing nothing on the cross. The cross was ultimate humiliation. That is the real reason why our Lord was wearing nothing on the cross.
 
bcoger said:
The tunic without seem for which the soldiers cast lots was the inner garment (i.e. underwear). The apparel which the soldiers divided among themselves was worn over the tunic. In other words, our Lord was wearing nothing on the cross. The cross was ultimate humiliation. That is the real reason why our Lord was wearing nothing on the cross.
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Sounds all right, but I cannot know for sure one way or the other. Not a crucial point, anyway.
 
cpayne said:
Sounds all right, but I cannot know for sure one way or the other. Not a crucial point, anyway.
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How much certainty is there in the conclusion that the timelessness of eternity must mean our Lord hangs on a cross for eternity? The closest thing we have to a glimpse into eternity is the book of Revelation. There are some twenty seven references to the Lamb in the book of Revelation. Not one of these references has our Lord on a cross. The Lamb stands. The Lamb breaks seals. The Lamb exercises wrath. The Lamb is in the center of the throne. The Lamb wages war. The Lamb has a marriage ceremony and supper. The New Jerusalem does not need Sun or Moon because its lamp is the glory of the Lamb.

How then is the Lamb identified as the Lamb? He is identified as the Lamb by the wounds in His hands and side, not by continuing to be hung on a cross.

On the cross our Lord was not only humiliated, He was rejected. That is why our Lord on the cross said, “My God, My God why have You forsaken Me?”

Paul put it this way.

Gal. 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us—for it is written, “CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE”—

To say that our Lord remains naked on the cross is to say that He remains cursed.
 
Once again (and I do mean ONCE) I think you are confusing chronos and kairos. In chronos, obviously Jesus hung on a cross 2000 years ago and is no longer there. In kairos, the eternal moment of God, His crucifixion is always before God. You say when Revelation calls Jesus a Lamb standing as it had been slain, that refers only to His wounds in His hands and feet. So are we to infer that when the Bible calls Jesus the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, that means He has had wounds in His hands and feet eternally? If not, according to you, how could He be 'identified as the Lamb"? If so, how did He get these wounds?

By the way, the timelessness of God and His comprehension of all time in an eternal instant is fairly standard doctrine. I wouldn’t deny these ideas, if I were you, just because I don’t like Jesus being on a crucifix.
 
The OP of this thread is not thinking on a level of a Christian who has the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to understand the fact about the Holy Mass.

To even think that Jesus cannot be “on the cross” and present at the throne of God standing there at the same time is to deny the power of God to make all things possible. To be in two different times at once and visible in any form or time or mannar.

Get off the deadly reformation ride that has been infecting the Church since Luther, Calvin and Zwingli.

God is not bound by time or space. Once you come to realize that then you can accept the truth concerning the Holy Mass. The Sacrifice of Calvary, and the landing of the space shuttle today we see as an event of the past and of the present- but to God they are all at once- one big NOW so to say.

Ken
 
kleary said:
The OP of this thread is not thinking on a level of a Christian who has the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to understand the fact about the Holy Mass.
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Do you have an answer for the arguments in post #32?
 
bcoger said:
How much certainty is there in the conclusion that the timelessness of eternity must mean our Lord hangs on a cross for eternity? The closest thing we have to a glimpse into eternity is the book of Revelation. There are some twenty seven references to the Lamb in the book of Revelation. Not one of these references has our Lord on a cross. The Lamb stands. The Lamb breaks seals. The Lamb exercises wrath. The Lamb is in the center of the throne. The Lamb wages war. The Lamb has a marriage ceremony and supper. The New Jerusalem does not need Sun or Moon because its lamp is the glory of the Lamb.

How then is the Lamb identified as the Lamb? He is identified as the Lamb by the wounds in His hands and side, not by continuing to be hung on a cross.
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On the cross our Lord was not only humiliated, He was rejected. That is why our Lord on the cross said, “My God, My God why have You forsaken Me?” **Paul put it this way.

Gal. 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, having become a curse for us—for it is written, “CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE”—

To say that our Lord remains naked on the cross is to say that He remains cursed.
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Jesus was quoting Psalm 22.
 
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