Wedding at Cana Prefigures the Second Coming

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It began to occur to me yesterday how the wedding at Cana, with Jesus being present along with the Blessed Virgin and the apostles, alludes to the Second Coming and the marriage feast of Jesus and His Bride the Church. St. John the Apostle begins his narrative of this wedding with “on the third day…,” and there is an immediate comparison that can be made to Jesus’ Resurrection and how Jesus rose from the dead on the third day. The Resurrection can be interpreted to prefigure the Second Coming. [1]

At the wedding, the wine runs out, and our Blessed Mother says, “They have no wine.” Wine is a word that is tied with the Eucharist. And I think running out of the wine at the wedding corresponds to how Daniel prophesied that the continual burnt offering (which prefigured the Eucharistic sacrifice of the Mass) would be taken away. [2]

So the way I interpret it is just before Jesus’ Second Coming there’s the abomination that makes desolate which in some way takes away the sacrifice of the Mass. And, looking down from Heaven, the Blessed Virgin notices and voices her concern about it to Jesus. This prompts Jesus to return earlier than it would have if it had not been for our Blessed Mother’s intercession. [3]

And Jesus turning the water to wine and the jars being filled up to the brim with the wine prefigures how the veil of the Eucharist will be lifted at Jesus’ Second Coming, and Jesus will be revealed in all His fullness and glory for the whole world to see.

[1] See my other CAF thread (linked here).
[2] Dan 12:11; cross-reference with Rev 18:23, Matt 9:15, Mark 2:20, and Luke 5:35
[3] John 2:4; cross-reference with Matt 24:22
 
livingwordunity said:
…This prompts Jesus to return earlier than it would have if it had not been for our Blessed Mother’s intercession.
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I really like this post, and I hate to be negative about so beautiful a subject… but this one line bothers me very much. Even the Lord Jesus doesn’t know the time of His Second Coming, at least as a man (Matthew 13:32). To say that somehow He’s prompted to get a move-on by His blessed Mother seems very strange to me.

As difficult as it may sound, not everything orbits around the words and actions of the Mother of God. She is the closest planet in the solar system to the blazing Sun that is the Incarnate Son, and she is certainly the catalyst placed into the substance - but she is not the chemist, nor the reactive agent, nor gravity itself.

Otherwise, lovely comparison. 🙂
 
livingwordunity said:
It began to occur to me yesterday how the wedding at Cana, with Jesus being present along with the Blessed Virgin and the apostles, alludes to the Second Coming and the marriage feast of Jesus and His Bride the Church. St. John the Apostle begins his narrative of this wedding with “on the third day…,” and there is an immediate comparison that can be made to Jesus’ Resurrection and how Jesus rose from the dead on the third day. The Resurrection can be interpreted to prefigure the Second Coming. [1]

At the wedding, the wine runs out, and our Blessed Mother says, “They have no wine.” Wine is a word that is tied with the Eucharist. And I think running out of the wine at the wedding corresponds to how Daniel prophesied that the continual burnt offering (which prefigured the Eucharistic sacrifice of the Mass) would be taken away. [2]

So the way I interpret it is just before Jesus’ Second Coming there’s the abomination that makes desolate which in some way takes away the sacrifice of the Mass. And, looking down from Heaven, the Blessed Virgin notices and voices her concern about it to Jesus. This prompts Jesus to return earlier than it would have if it had not been for our Blessed Mother’s intercession. [3]

And Jesus turning the water to wine and the jars being filled up to the brim with the wine prefigures how the veil of the Eucharist will be lifted at Jesus’ Second Coming, and Jesus will be revealed in all His fullness and glory for the whole world to see.

[1] See my other CAF thread (linked here).
[2] Dan 12:11; cross-reference with Rev 18:23, Matt 9:15, Mark 2:20, and Luke 5:35
[3] John 2:4; cross-reference with Matt 24:22
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good stuff Living!
 
Praedicare said:
I really like this post, and I hate to be negative about so beautiful a subject… but this one line bothers me very much. Even the Lord Jesus doesn’t know the time of His Second Coming, at least as a man (Matthew 13:32). To say that somehow He’s prompted to get a move-on by His blessed Mother seems very strange to me.

As difficult as it may sound, not everything orbits around the words and actions of the Mother of God. She is the closest planet in the solar system to the blazing Sun that is the Incarnate Son, and she is certainly the catalyst placed into the substance - but she is not the chemist, nor the reactive agent, nor gravity itself.

Otherwise, lovely comparison. 🙂
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Thank you for your compliment. As for your expressed concern, I didn’t give any specific date in my post for the Second Coming. And when Jesus said that not even He knew the day or hour, I think he only meant that He didn’t know at the time that He said it. St. Thomas Aquinas had a theory about the different kinds of ways that Jesus had knowledge which takes into account how Christ is fully God and fully man. But I based what I said on when Jesus said, “And if those days had not been shortened, no human being would be saved; but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened.” (Matt 24:22) And, keeping in mind how the wedding at Cana prefigures the Second Coming, I based what I said on how Jesus said in response to our Blessed Mother, "O woman, what have you to do with me? My hour has not yet come.” (John 2:4) But then Jesus works the miracle anyway, changing the water into wine.
 
I like your opening post, particularly the first paragraph. I may use this in my own writing if you don’t mind.
The objection made that no one, not even Jesus, knew the time of his second coming doesn’t actually apply. This opening post nor that Cana episode in John’s Gospel don’t speak of when the second coming will arrive. The symbolism of the Cana episode, if it exists, speaks of the nature of the second coming without reference to when it will occur.
By the way, when it comes to the presence of Mary at Cana, her relationship with Jesus is epitomized by her words, “Do whatever he tells you.” She asks Jesus to help after they ran out of wine then. I agree that she is not “the substance,” but her implicit request that something be done can get a divine response. If not, where does the response to our own prayers come from? Or is the second poster saying something I don’t understand?
 
mdgspencer said:
I like your opening post, particularly the first paragraph. I may use this in my own writing if you don’t mind.
The objection made that no one, not even Jesus, knew the time of his second coming doesn’t actually apply. This opening post nor that Cana episode in John’s Gospel don’t speak of when the second coming will arrive. The symbolism of the Cana episode, if it exists, speaks of the nature of the second coming without reference to when it will occur.
By the way, when it comes to the presence of Mary at Cana, her relationship with Jesus is epitomized by her words, “Do whatever he tells you.” She asks Jesus to help after they ran out of wine then. I agree that she is not “the substance,” but her implicit request that something be done can get a divine response. If not, where does the response to our own prayers come from? Or is the second poster saying something I don’t understand?
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Anyone is welcome to use what I wrote in their writings. I’m glad you like what I wrote. 🙂
 
Hi Living, your post has finally prompted me to join the forum and respond after years of simply reading other peoples posts. Your main point references a thought I have had for some time, namely that the Second Coming of Our Lord would come when there are no more Masses celebrated on earth, probably because there are no more valid priests left. This would leave the remnant of the faithful without the critical sacrament of the Mass and crying out to Heaven for Christ to intervene, “They have no wine.” literally.

So " abomination that makes desolate " ultimately prevents the Mass being said anywhere during the final persecution that the Church has to undergo. (CCC 675). This would be a spiritual Armageddon, and could God allow humanity to continue without the sacrifice of Mass?
 
nooooby said:
Hi Living, your post has finally prompted me to join the forum and respond after years of simply reading other peoples posts. Your main point references a thought I have had for some time, namely that the Second Coming of Our Lord would come when there are no more Masses celebrated on earth, probably because there are no more valid priests left. This would leave the remnant of the faithful without the critical sacrament of the Mass and crying out to Heaven for Christ to intervene, “They have no wine.” literally.

So " abomination that makes desolate " ultimately prevents the Mass being said anywhere during the final persecution that the Church has to undergo. (CCC 675). This would be a spiritual Armageddon, and could God allow humanity to continue without the sacrifice of Mass?
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Yep. That’s pretty much how I interpret it. I interpret the first part of the wedding at Cana event as prefiguring today’s Mass which most Catholics seem to take for granted (I’m guilty of this, too). And then starting with the part where our Lady says, “They have no wine” is when it prefigures the last events leading up to the Second Coming. Either the Mass could be taken away by force like with something like the further spread of ISIS, or perhaps it could be the heresy of female ordination that spreads in which there would be no valid Eucharist. In the East, we’ve already seen Catholic churches taken over by ISIS in Iraq and Syria. These churches have had the Mass celebrated there since the time of the Apostles, but now they are desolate and have the abomination of ISIS set up in them. And in the West, there is growing political pressure to get the Church to change Her teachings. The Church has had anti-popes in the past. So perhaps some future Pope might be an anti-pope and give the stamp of approval to the heresy of female ordination. It’s possible that it could even be the first female anti-pope.
 
Thanks for the reply Living.

I would not bring this to the present day, it could be many years in the future, in fact the beauty of this theory is that it is down to us. i.e. the more people we evangelise and bring to the banquet, the further away this event goes. It puts the Mass front and centre in eschatological history, indeed all human history, puts the Church as central and puts the faithful in a key position as it keeps our free will intact regarding the number of practicing Catholics. It also removes worldly politics from the main point of the diminishing number of sacrifices being made every day. How this occurs is fluid, Islam, apostasy in the west, world wide socialism or even little green men, it can be altered according to our acceptance of God’s will on a world wide basis and on an individual basis. Scripture and revelation, public and private, points the way, is the last Pope the Vicar of Christ on earth, the last human priest? When the final Pope is martyred, so ends the apostolic succession and the gates of Hades will seem to have prevailed, which cannot be.

As you say, we take the Mass for granted sometimes, Our Lady asked at Fatima that we go to Confession, participate in the Mass as often as possible and pray the Rosary. This is all connected. If we realise just how important attending Mass is for our own salvation and how it effectively is delaying the coming of the AntiChrist, we would never, ever, take this for granted.
 
Hi Nooooby,

What I meant is that that first part of the wedding at Cana (before our Lady says, “They have no wine”) represents a foreshadowing of the Mass not just for today but as it has been since the birth of the Church and until it is taken away to such a degree that God says that enough is enough, however near or far that may be in the future. The Mass has been taken away in parts of Muslim countries. I don’t know, but God knows the point which crosses the line and begins the countdown (Dan 12:11) to the Second Coming.
 
Loving wishes in our Lord Jesus Christ.

This subject was covered in depth in this book. Here is a link

My mother, who is originally a non-catholic, was very much eager and interested to complete this chapter and the book, after we read few pages together.

:gopray2:
 
Thanks for the link sepgs2004, I have just ordered and will enjoy reading in the run in to Christmas.
 
sepgs2004 said:
Loving wishes in our Lord Jesus Christ.

This subject was covered in depth in this book. Here is a link

My mother, who is originally a non-catholic, was very much eager and interested to complete this chapter and the book, after we read few pages together.
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I think that book by Dr. Brant Pitre is good. I found an article on the internet (here) where Dr. Pitre points out the typological connection between the OT continual burnt offering and the daily sacrifice of the Mass. But in his book, Jesus the Bridegroom, I can’t find where he goes into the connection of how “They have no wine,” said by our Blessed Mother at the wedding, corresponds to how Daniel prophesied that the continual burnt offering, which prefigured the Eucharistic sacrifice of the Mass, would be taken away just before the Second Coming. Instead, he talks about how the wedding at Cana prefigures the Mass of the Church, and then he seems to skip from that to how it prefigures the Second Coming. But my focus here with this thread includes the meaning of why the wine at the wedding ran out and how this prefigures the events just before the Second Coming.
 
livingwordunity said:
It seems like it’s considered taboo by a lot of Catholics to even talk about the scheduled events of just prior to the Second Coming despite the fact that this is talked about a lot in the Holy Bible.
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VERY sad and true. In centuries past, all Catholics knew about the Great Apostasy, the Antichrst, the Signs of the Times, the Second Coming, Judgement, ect…

But not now. Idiotic things like Left Behind and the whole apocalyptic industry has given the end times a bad name, and now Catholics are afraid of it because it reminds them of bible only fundamentalist ridiculous protestants waiting to be raptured or something.

And hardly anybody talks about the age of peace, and the 3 days of darkness…

Dunno why. i think Catholics, while it is GOOD that most ignore end times pop culture hype, they still need to be educated more about the end and what the saints, popes, tradition, and scripture all say.

Micheal O Brien is good at re-igniting this awareness in Catholics.
 
ialsop said:
VERY sad and true. In centuries past, all Catholics knew about the Great Apostasy, the Antichrst, the Signs of the Times, the Second Coming, Judgement, ect…

But not now. Idiotic things like Left Behind and the whole apocalyptic industry has given the end times a bad name, and now Catholics are afraid of it because it reminds them of bible only fundamentalist ridiculous protestants waiting to be raptured or something.

And hardly anybody talks about the age of peace, and the 3 days of darkness…

Dunno why. i think Catholics, while it is GOOD that most ignore end times pop culture hype, they still need to be educated more about the end and what the saints, popes, tradition, and scripture all say.

Micheal O Brien is good at re-igniting this awareness in Catholics.
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Even though it should be obvious that I’m looking at the subject of the events prior to the Second Coming from a Catholic perspective since the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Eucharist are at the center of what I’m saying, I often get falsely accused by other Catholics (mostly the liberal secular humanist ones) of having beliefs like the Protestants.
 
livingwordunity said:
Even though it should be obvious that I’m looking at the subject of the events prior to the Second Coming from a Catholic perspective since the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Eucharist are at the center of what I’m saying, I often get falsely accused by other Catholics (mostly the liberal secular humanist ones) of having beliefs like the Protestants.
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Exactly. And I like that you remember that the world WILL end someday…and the Bible and tradition tells us how. Even if its tied to Fatima, I get accused to being protestant. Or not having the Eucharist. It is so wrong that some Catholics cant even recognize their own true faith.
 
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