L
Lief_Erikson
Guest
This thread is meant to be a sister thread to The Catholic’s “Falling in love with Mother Mary.” Here’s his: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=331458
I know exactly what he means in that thread, and just wanted to devote this thread to what we love in the Catholic Church. This Easter, I was just overflowing with loving praise for the Church, and I’ve been wanting to share those sentiments, for the glory of Jesus’ Church. So last Easter, after the Saturday Vigil service, I wrote down these documents in an 8 page (double space) document of praises. Please share and add your own positive feelings, experiences or praises of Christ’s Church to this thread!
What I’ve written, as follows, is what I wrote, which I hope adheres fully to what is true and certainly is what I feel. Please pass it over and skip directly to writing your own comments praising the Catholic Church, if you want to! This is just what I feel, everyone else write what you feel!
I’ve been just overflowing with the praises of the Church for so long, throughout my months as a Catholic, without a real outlet. I feel some inner relief at finally having poured all this out somewhere! But not enough; I’m writing a short book in honor of the Virgin Mary and another in honor of the Eucharist. I can never write enough of the praises of these stunning lights of God’s glory, these totalities of joy in the Christian journey.
Here’s what I wrote concerning our Holy Mother Church:
4/11/09
Oh Church of Christ, fair creature of God, beautiful, beloved. What right have I to be even in your presence, much less counted among your company by your Sovereign? Holy and glorious Catholic Church, soul of wisdom, spirit of incomparable light. I am a grain, a mere speck, but you are the world’s fairest treasure, the bounty of her fields, the most precious flower blooming in her heart.
I see the throngs of Catholics and wonder, “How do I deserve to even stand nearby these, these that are one in the glory of God?” They are one, as the Trinity of God is One. They as people are flawed, but as Catholics they are one in Christ; they form the unity of the Body of Christ—how have I deserved that I should stand surrounded by them, by these outpourings of the radiance of the Church? Catholics are candles on the shelf, sparks of the great fire. They are one in the Lord.
The Holy Catholic Church, how can I find words to thank her? Let me speak of an individual Catholic, try to express my thoughts of these mere humans, mere bits of earth made sacred through baptism . . . You have been consecrated to the Lord in the waters of the Most High from birth. Whether your parents were devout or not, they were Catholic. They escorted you to Mass, and you heard the Word of God from the mouth of His anointed representatives. At Confession you were cleansed of all your sins from childhood—how blessed, to live such purity, such angelic whiteness from youth rather than piling sins upon your head endlessly as does the rest of the world. You were catechized, and even if you ignored or forgot much of what you learned, you nonetheless had before you always, constant and present, the Pillar of Absolute Truth magnified in splendor. You could turn to her, your Holy Mother the Church, at any second you desired to know what God’s will for your life is. The rest of us, separate from you, wandered in guesswork and fragments.
The graces of Confirmation anointed your brow, holy oil the world does not know that sealed you in the great Spirit and power of God. Light poured into your life, whether you knew it or not. Light took you, light kept you, light mastered you. You may have turned from that light—some do, yet you received it, and it is there inside your soul to this day. You need not grasp at shadows, or walk in the Lord in the lands of the incomplete; you have before you all the bounty of God, and living in the Catholic Church you have it still, a boundless field of treasures to pick what you please from as soon as your heart desires the Christ who raised you.
You, oh blessed Catholic, have lived with God from infancy, and when you came of age, your teeth chewed on His flesh and your lips drank His blood, making you unified with Divinity in the Heart and Soul of His glory. You tasted the liquor of Heaven, and to the extent that you loved it, you received the love of infinity in the purest form it may be known throughout all the world. The Love of God has anointed you, and though we sin in this world, the Catholic Church has been there for you whether you were there for her or not. Her members fail, her Spirit is ever-glorious.
Oh Church of Christ! How have I deserved to become attached to your Body? How is this even possible, how imaginable? It is beyond my spirit to comprehend how such grace can be that a mere no one such as I should have been granted unity with your divine entity. Let me try to describe what I feel for you, for the members of your heart, oh Church of Godliness.
You are the angel that stands upon the world and distributes wheat with both hands, offering full loaves of bread and cups of wine to any who will open their hands to receive them. Yours is the house of gold, yours the splendid city. All love springs from your heart. Love is the breath you breathe and kindness the fingers of your hands.
Do I exaggerate? Let me describe the great assembly that dwells in your fields! In you are the Sacraments, the power of life itself. The whole of creation is made complete in the Incarnation of God that rises at Mass between the fingers of even one of your priests’ hands! Inside that scrap of bread is the totality of the universe made one, the power of God that creates continents fulfilled! In that scrap of bread alone is the fullness of all God’s Love, the entire bounty of Heaven made manifest!
Yet we stumble, we do not receive as we should, so the Sacrament of Confession comes to us. That loving Sacrament becomes ours, by which any sin on Earth can be forgiven. This sweet Sacrament of infinite love fuses our souls with God’s so that no distance we carve can endure.
I know exactly what he means in that thread, and just wanted to devote this thread to what we love in the Catholic Church. This Easter, I was just overflowing with loving praise for the Church, and I’ve been wanting to share those sentiments, for the glory of Jesus’ Church. So last Easter, after the Saturday Vigil service, I wrote down these documents in an 8 page (double space) document of praises. Please share and add your own positive feelings, experiences or praises of Christ’s Church to this thread!
What I’ve written, as follows, is what I wrote, which I hope adheres fully to what is true and certainly is what I feel. Please pass it over and skip directly to writing your own comments praising the Catholic Church, if you want to! This is just what I feel, everyone else write what you feel!
I’ve been just overflowing with the praises of the Church for so long, throughout my months as a Catholic, without a real outlet. I feel some inner relief at finally having poured all this out somewhere! But not enough; I’m writing a short book in honor of the Virgin Mary and another in honor of the Eucharist. I can never write enough of the praises of these stunning lights of God’s glory, these totalities of joy in the Christian journey.
Here’s what I wrote concerning our Holy Mother Church:
4/11/09
Oh Church of Christ, fair creature of God, beautiful, beloved. What right have I to be even in your presence, much less counted among your company by your Sovereign? Holy and glorious Catholic Church, soul of wisdom, spirit of incomparable light. I am a grain, a mere speck, but you are the world’s fairest treasure, the bounty of her fields, the most precious flower blooming in her heart.
I see the throngs of Catholics and wonder, “How do I deserve to even stand nearby these, these that are one in the glory of God?” They are one, as the Trinity of God is One. They as people are flawed, but as Catholics they are one in Christ; they form the unity of the Body of Christ—how have I deserved that I should stand surrounded by them, by these outpourings of the radiance of the Church? Catholics are candles on the shelf, sparks of the great fire. They are one in the Lord.
The Holy Catholic Church, how can I find words to thank her? Let me speak of an individual Catholic, try to express my thoughts of these mere humans, mere bits of earth made sacred through baptism . . . You have been consecrated to the Lord in the waters of the Most High from birth. Whether your parents were devout or not, they were Catholic. They escorted you to Mass, and you heard the Word of God from the mouth of His anointed representatives. At Confession you were cleansed of all your sins from childhood—how blessed, to live such purity, such angelic whiteness from youth rather than piling sins upon your head endlessly as does the rest of the world. You were catechized, and even if you ignored or forgot much of what you learned, you nonetheless had before you always, constant and present, the Pillar of Absolute Truth magnified in splendor. You could turn to her, your Holy Mother the Church, at any second you desired to know what God’s will for your life is. The rest of us, separate from you, wandered in guesswork and fragments.
The graces of Confirmation anointed your brow, holy oil the world does not know that sealed you in the great Spirit and power of God. Light poured into your life, whether you knew it or not. Light took you, light kept you, light mastered you. You may have turned from that light—some do, yet you received it, and it is there inside your soul to this day. You need not grasp at shadows, or walk in the Lord in the lands of the incomplete; you have before you all the bounty of God, and living in the Catholic Church you have it still, a boundless field of treasures to pick what you please from as soon as your heart desires the Christ who raised you.
You, oh blessed Catholic, have lived with God from infancy, and when you came of age, your teeth chewed on His flesh and your lips drank His blood, making you unified with Divinity in the Heart and Soul of His glory. You tasted the liquor of Heaven, and to the extent that you loved it, you received the love of infinity in the purest form it may be known throughout all the world. The Love of God has anointed you, and though we sin in this world, the Catholic Church has been there for you whether you were there for her or not. Her members fail, her Spirit is ever-glorious.
Oh Church of Christ! How have I deserved to become attached to your Body? How is this even possible, how imaginable? It is beyond my spirit to comprehend how such grace can be that a mere no one such as I should have been granted unity with your divine entity. Let me try to describe what I feel for you, for the members of your heart, oh Church of Godliness.
You are the angel that stands upon the world and distributes wheat with both hands, offering full loaves of bread and cups of wine to any who will open their hands to receive them. Yours is the house of gold, yours the splendid city. All love springs from your heart. Love is the breath you breathe and kindness the fingers of your hands.
Do I exaggerate? Let me describe the great assembly that dwells in your fields! In you are the Sacraments, the power of life itself. The whole of creation is made complete in the Incarnation of God that rises at Mass between the fingers of even one of your priests’ hands! Inside that scrap of bread is the totality of the universe made one, the power of God that creates continents fulfilled! In that scrap of bread alone is the fullness of all God’s Love, the entire bounty of Heaven made manifest!
Yet we stumble, we do not receive as we should, so the Sacrament of Confession comes to us. That loving Sacrament becomes ours, by which any sin on Earth can be forgiven. This sweet Sacrament of infinite love fuses our souls with God’s so that no distance we carve can endure.
God bless you brother!!!