We have been hearing a series of parables from Matthew’s Gospel these past few weeks explaining what the Kingdom of God is about. Today, in simile form, he explains the kingdom of God, centered around the idea of discovery. God is like a treasure that someone finds in a field. It is like a merchant discovering the finest pearl. It is like a net that is thrown into the sea that catches all kinds of fish.
Through these examples, the kingdom of God is both commonplace and rare at the same time. It is familiar to us, but it also can be surprising. God’s kingdom is to bring us joy when we encounter it. Jesus ends today’s Gospel by stating that every scribe who has been instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like one who brings from his storeroom both the new and the old. Jesus suggests to us that God’s kingdom is both ancient and new. It is both expected and unexpected.
Catholic theology uses the principle of “both/and” to express complementary spiritual and doctrinal truths that exist together in our faith in creative tension, rather than forcing us to make a choice between these principles or truths. Some of these things may seem like opposing concepts, but they can exist together at the same time.
Let us start with God himself. God is both immanent and transcendent. In being immanent, God is present to us here on earth. He is accessible to use and is actively involve with us and with all of his creation. God, the creator the universe, is still active here in the universe and he is present in our human experiences. God is also transcendent, meaning that as the creator of the universe, he is beyond time and space. The greatness and holiness and power of God is beyond our human capabilities and our human understanding. Even though we can know God in different ways and learn about God, God is still separate from the created world and independent of us. We human beings can strive toward the holiness and perfection to which God calls us and which is exemplified in God, but we will never achieve the holiness and perfection of God. These two concepts of immanence and transcendence may seem contradictory and independent of each other, but they both co-exist with each other and they are important aspects of God that exist together at the same time.
I know that the youth and some of their parents are studying apologetics this summer. It if first and foremost important of us to always be learning about our faith and to understand the concepts of our faith. Apologetics then helps us explain our faith to others. With us being in a stronghold of the Baptist Church here in Clinton, and with Catholicism being a small part of Christianity in our Diocese, it is important for us to understand our Catholic faith and to be able to explain importance concepts of our faith to others.
Next, I would like to look at Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition as two important Pilars of our Catholic faith. Many of our Protestant and Baptist brothers and sisters see Scripture as being the sole foundation on which our Christian faith is built. We Catholics also see the eminent position of Scripture in our faith. In the Mass we are celebrating today, we not only have the liturgy of the Word that has four different readings from Scripture, both from the Old and the New Testament, but also so much of what the priest says at Mass in taken directly or indirectly from Scripture. The Catholic Church teaches that God is the ultimate author of Sacred Scripture. Through the Holy Spirit, God inspired human authors, which at the same time, preserving the human authors’ free will and unique personalities, allowing these human authors to communicate God’s divine intentions through Sacred Scripture and ensuring the texts convey the truth of salvation. However, at the same time, Catholic theology teaches that Sacred Tradition come from the same divine source as Sacred Scripture, that Sacred Tradition is to be accepted by the faithful with equal devotion. While Sacred Scripture is the written record of God's word throughout history, Sacred Tradition is the living transmission of the faith, which includes the Apostles' oral preaching, their examples, and the institutions and Traditions that have been established in the history of the Church. Our belief in the Trinity and the Assumption of Mary and praying from the dead all are connected to beliefs found in Scripture, but they were explicitly developed and passed down through the Sacred Tradition of the Church and are seen as truths of our Catholic faith.
Finally, we have God’s grace and good works as important components of God’s plan of salvation. Catholics believe that salvation is a freely given gift that we receive when we cooperate with God’s grace through faith. However, we must actively live out our faith through our actions and good works. It is not enough to be a hearer of God’s word. We need to be a doer of God’s word. We receive God’s grace in our lives, but we have the free will to accept it or to reject it. We are to see ourselves as workers in the vineyard of the Lord, actively cooperating with the grace that God gives us on our journey of faith. But we Catholics in no way see us earning our salvation through these good works. Through the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives, God works in us through our works.
There is always so much to learn about God’s kingdom, so much to discover about his kingdom. To the people of Jesus’ day, he was telling them that God’s kingdom was closer than they realized. Jesus invites all of us to discover the treasures of God’s kingdom that are around us. As I have mentioned in the examples about, some of the aspects of God’s kingdom may surprise us.
No comments:
Post a Comment