Where Did Christianity Go Wrong Continued?

Richard Rohr

From the Center for Action and Contemplation

Western Christianity

The Christian Contemplative Tradition
Sunday, September 16, 2018

Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy have a long tradition of teaching contemplation or nondual consciousness. But its systematic teaching was primarily held in the Eastern “Greek” church; the Western “Latin” church was more extroverted and aligned with empires.

Serious contemplative teaching—very upfront in the desert fathers and mothers—is surely found in Celtic Christianity (outside of empire), and is continued by leaders of many monasteries, for example, by John Cassian (360–435 CE), Pseudo-Dionysius (5th–6th centuries), and Hugh of St. Victor (1096–1141) in Paris. Later mystics like Bonaventure (1221–1274), Francisco de Osuna (1497–1541), the unknown author of The Cloud of Unknowing (late 14th century), and 16th century mystics Teresa of Ávila (1515–1582) and John of the Cross (1542–1591) also taught nondual consciousness. It held on much longer in the religious orders than the ordinary local church or with the common priest or bishop—whose ministry was an occupation more than a search for God or a “school for the Lord’s service,” as St. Benedict (480–547) described. [1]

Most Western mystics exemplified contemplation, as did Jesus, much more than they directly taught it. Maybe this is part of the reason many Christians lost it, and why good theological teaching and practice is now so important today. After the fights of the Reformation, and after the over-rationalization of the 17th and 18th century Enlightenment, many of us Western Christians became very defensive, wanting to prove we were smart and could win arguments with the new secularism. We imitated the rationalists while using pious Christian vocabulary. It took the form of heady Scholasticism and rote formulas in Catholicism, and led to fundamentalism and memorized Scripture verses providing their own kind of “rationalism” among many Protestants.

Catholic doctrines (such as transubstantiation, papal infallibility, and hierarchical authority) came to be presented in a largely academic and juridical way (or, for the sacraments, with an almost magical interpretation), as opposed to a contemplative or mystical way. Frankly, all of this inspired few and drove many away from Christianity. Most priests were educated this way until the much-needed reforms of Vatican II in the 1960s. Thomas Merton (1915–1968) was very influential in reintroducing contemplation to the West. Now it is again taught in Christian arenas all over the world under different names.

What we now call contemplation—a unique way of knowing—is a rediscovery of our earlier Christian practice. Basically, contemplation is the way you know and think of yourself when you are sincerely praying and present—as opposed to thinking, arguing, or proving.

As Archbishop Rowan Williams, former leader of the Anglican Church, told the Synod of Catholic Bishops in Rome:

Contemplation is very far from being just one kind of thing that Christians do: it is the key to prayer, liturgy, art and ethics, the key to the essence of a renewed humanity that is capable of seeing the world and other subjects in the world with freedom—freedom from self-oriented, acquisitive habits and the distorted understanding that comes from them. To put it boldly, contemplation is the only ultimate answer to the unreal and insane world that our financial systems and our advertising culture and our chaotic and unexamined emotions encourage us to inhabit. To learn contemplative practice is to learn what we need so as to live truthfully and honestly and lovingly. It is a deeply revolutionary matter. [2]

Despite centuries without systematic teaching of nondual consciousness, many seekers have now come to contemplation as the fruit of great suffering or great love. These are the quickest and most universal ways that God uses to destabilize the self-referential ego. Those transformed by life and grace come to enjoy the presence of God, others, and even themselves. They have connected with their deepest Source, an identity that goes far beyond ideas of right and wrong.

Great suffering, great love, and contemplative practice can instill in us “the same mind which is in Christ Jesus” (see Philippians 2:5-11, 4:4-7, and 1 Corinthians 2 and 3). Indeed, I believe contemplative, nondual consciousness is the mind of Christ.

Gateway to Presence:
If you want to go deeper with today’s meditation, take note of what word or phrase stands out to you. Come back to that word or phrase throughout the day, being present to its impact and invitation.

[1] Benedict, Rule, Prologue. See Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict: A Spirituality for the 21st Century (Crossroad Publishing: 2014, ©1992), 21.

[2] Archbishop Rowan Williams, Address to the Synod of Bishops in Rome (October 10, 2012), http://rowanwilliams.archbishopofcanterbury.org/articles.php/2645/archbishops-address-to-the-synod-of-bishops-in-rome.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, Silent Compassion: Finding God in Contemplation(Franciscan Media: 2014), 63-65.

Image credit: Country Gate at Dawn(detail), Anton Goncharov.

"Eastern Christianity"

In building a faith prespective for yourself, may I suggest caution in accepting only one theogical view.  If you choose only to accept a faith based within one particular doctrine, you run the risk of become very fundamental.  A healthy theological prespective will include the wisdom shared by many.   Richard Rohr's prespective is worth listening to.   Richard Rohr From the Center for Action and Contemplation Week Thirty-seven Eastern Christianity Universal Restoration Thursday, September 13, 2018 The shape of creation must somehow mirror and reveal the shape of the Creator. We must have a God at least as big as the universe, or else our view of God becomes irrelevant, constricted, and more harmful than helpful. The Christian image of a torturous hell and God as a petty tyrant has not helped us to know, trust, or love God. God ends up being less loving than most people we know. Those attracted to the common idea of hell operate out of a scarcity model, where there is not enough Divine Love to transform, awaken, and save. The dualistic mind is literally incapable of thinking any notion of infinite grace. The common view of hell and a quid pro quo God is based not on Scripture but on Dante’s Divine Comedy—great poetry, but not good theology. The word “hell” is not mentioned in the first five books of the Bible. Paul and John never once use the word. Most of the Eastern fathers never believed in a literal hell, nor did many Western mystics. Eastern fathers such as Origen, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome, Peter Chrysologus, Maximus the Confessor, and Gregory of Nazianzus taught some form of apocatastasis instead, translated as “universal restoration” (Acts 3:21). Origen writes: An end or consummation is clearly an indication that things are perfected and consummated. . . . The end of the world and the consummation will come when every soul shall be visited with the penalties due for its sins. This time, when everyone shall pay what he owes, is known to God alone. We believe, however, that the goodness of God through Christ will restore [God’s] entire creation to one end, even [God’s] enemies being conquered and subdued. [1] Morwenna Ludlow describes Gregory of Nyssa’s two arguments for universal salvation as: a fundamental belief in the impermanence of evil in the face of God’s love and a conviction that God’s plan for humanity is intended to be fulfilled in every single human being. These beliefs are identified with 1 Corinthians 15:28 [“so that God may be all in all”] and Genesis 1:26 [we are made in God’s “image and likeness”] in particular, but are derived from what Gregory sees as the direction of Scripture as a whole. [2] If we understand God as Trinity—the fountain fullness of outflowing love, relationship itself—there is no theological possibility of any hatred or vengeance in God. Divinity, which is revealed as Love Itself, will always eventually win. God does not lose (see John 6:37-39). We are all saved by mercy. Any notion of an actual “geographic” hell or purgatory is unnecessary and, in my opinion, destructive of the very restorative notion of the whole Gospel. Knowing this ahead of time gives us courage, so we don’t need to live out of fear, but from an endlessly available love. To the degree we have experienced intimacy with God, we won’t be afraid of death because we’re experiencing the first tastes and promises of heaven already. Love and mercy are given undeservedly now, so why would they not be given later too? As Jesus puts it, “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living—for to God everyone is alive” (Luke 20:38). In other words, growth, change, and opportunity never cease, even during and after death! Why would it be otherwise? Gateway to Presence: If you want to go deeper with today’s meditation, take note of what word or phrase stands out to you. Come back to that word or phrase throughout the day, being present to its impact and invitation. [1] Origen, On First Principles, trans. G. W. Butterworth (Ave Maria Press: 2013), 69-70. [2] Morwenna Ludlow, Universal Salvation: Eschatology in the Thought of Gregory of Nyssa and Karl Rahner (Oxford University Press: 2000), 239. Adapted from Richard Rohr, Hell, No! (Center for Action and Contemplation: 2015), CD, MP3 download. Image Credit: Deesis Mosaic (detail), 13th-century, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey.

Where And When Did Religion Go Wrong?

 

 Early Christianity

A Changing Religion
Monday, September 3, 2018

Much of what Jesus taught seems to have been followed closely during the first several hundred years after his death and resurrection. As long as Jesus’ followers were on the bottom and the edge of empire, as long as they shared the rejected and betrayed status of Jesus, they could grasp his teaching more readily. Values like nonparticipation in war, simple living, inclusivity, and love of enemies could be more easily understood when Christians were gathering secretly in the catacombs, when their faith was untouched by empire, rationalization, and compromise.

Several writings illustrate this early commitment to Jesus’ teachings on simplicity and generosity. For example, the Didache, compiled around 90 CE, says: “Share all things with your brother, and do not say that they are your own. For if you are sharers in what is imperishable, how much more in things which perish!” [1]

The last great formal persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire ended in 311 CE. In 313, Constantine (c. 272-337) legalized Christianity. It became the official religion of the Roman Empire in 380. After this structural change, Christianity increasingly accepted, and even defended, the dominant social order, especially concerning money and war. Morality became individualized and largely focused on sexuality. The church slowly lost its free and alternative vantage point. Texts written in the hundred years preceding 313 show it was unthinkable that a Christian would fight in the army, as the army was killing Christians. By the year 400, the entire army had become Christian, and they were now killing the “pagans.”

Before 313, the church was on the bottom of society, which is the privileged vantage point for understanding the liberating power of Gospel for both the individual and for society. Within the space of a few decades, the church moved from the bottom to the top, literally from the catacombs to the basilicas.The Roman basilicas were large buildings for court and other public assembly, and they became Christian worship spaces.

When the Christian church became the established religion of the empire, it started reading the Gospel from the position of maintaining power and social order instead of experiencing the profound power of powerlessness that Jesus revealed. In a sense, Christianity almost became a different religion!

The failing Roman Empire needed an emperor, and Jesus was used to fill the power gap. In effect, we Christians took Jesus out of the Trinity and made him into God on a throne. An imperial system needs law and order and clear belonging systems more than it wants mercy, meekness, or transformation. Much of Jesus’ teaching about simple living, nonviolence, inclusivity, and love of enemies became incomprehensible. Relationship—the shape of God as Trinity—was no longer as important. Christianity’s view of God changed: the Father became angry and distant, Jesus was reduced to an organizing principle, and for all practical and dynamic purposes, the Holy Spirit was forgotten.

Gateway to Presence:
If you want to go deeper with today’s meditation, take note of what word or phrase stands out to you. Come back to that word or phrase throughout the day, being present to its impact and invitation.

[1] Didache 4:8. See Tony Jones, The Teaching of the Twelve: Believing and Practicing the Primitive Christianity of the Ancient Didache Community (Paraclete Press: 2009), 23. More about the Didache is available at http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/didache.html.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, Dancing Standing Still: Healing the World from a Place of Prayer (Paulist Press: 2014), 48-51; and
Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality (Franciscan Media: 2008), 100.

Image credit: Saint Catherine's Monastery (detail), built between 548-565 near the town of Saint Catherine, the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt.

"I Don't Belong Here"

              A Message by long time friend, singer song writer and Lay Preacher:  Lawry MacLeod:

                                              I  Don’t Belong Here                         Aug. 26, 2018.

Two years ago, a gentleman by the name of Brian Justin Crum, appeared on America’s Got Talent and sang a song called “Creep”.  He told a bit of his life story, about being gay, being ostracized and beaten up because of it, and how he poured himself into music to escape his torment.  Then he sang, and when he was finished, something extraordinary happened.  For three whole seconds, there was absolute silence; no one moved, no one spoke, no one cheered.  His last chorus read, “I’m a creep, I’m a weirdo, what the (heck) am I doing here?  I don’t belong here, I don’t belong here.”  After those three ominously-quiet seconds, all 2000 people in that theatre erupted into a cacophony of clapping and screaming and cheering and every judge, except Simon Cowell, gave Brian a standing ovation.  There were smiles and tears, whispers of amazement and shouts of adulation.  And Simon Cowell gave one of the most amazingly positive reviews he has ever shared on the show.  If you have a computer or an I-pad or I-phone, go to youtube and type in “agt” and the word “creep” and watch the video for yourself. 

What was it that caused that three second stand-still?  What was going through the audience’s minds in that moment that totally immobilized them?  Did they think, “He’s gay so I’m not going to encourage him,” or “Who sings songs about creeps and weirdos,” or did they sense and perhaps share Brian’s despondency in “I don’t belong here”?  

            I was going to quote all kinds of examples from scriptures of people who didn’t fit in, didn’t quite fit the mold, didn’t think they were worthy; people who were displaced into someone else’s country or the outskirts of the village or the dark corner of someone’s thoughts.  But I’m going to cut to the chase and say, “Jesus was the most displaced person ever to walk this earth.”  He voluntarily left heaven to come to earth.  He said so himself, “My kingdom is not of this world.  I don’t belong here.”  As long as he remained incognito, everything was fine, but no, he had to go and make his presence known with a public baptism with voices from the sky and doves landing on his head.  And then he started speaking out, and speaking out loudly, against the current religious and political status quo.  And not just in Jerusalem but on every shore and hillside he could get to. 

For three years he pushed people to their limits; good and bad.  Who is this Galilean with his outrageous belief that he is the son of God?  Who is he to tell me I’m a sinner.  What right has he to forgive whatever I’ve done?  He doesn’t belong here.  Crucify him.  And in the end, he felt the hand of the people pushing him out, pushing him up to Golgotha; up to where they would be rid of him.  Just days before he was lifted up on the cross he shouted at God and said, “I know this is what I am supposed to do.  I know I wasn’t meant to stay here.  I don’t like the method you’ve chosen for my deportation, but I trust you to make sure I get home safely.”  Even the thief on the cross beside him said, “You didn’t do anything wrong, you don’t belong here.” 

Many ill-informed people consider foreigners a threat to their set of values but which set of values?  Are we more agitated towards immigrants who worship God differently from us, or those who live here but don’t worship God at all?  Who is the real enemy, where does the true evilness lie, who should we be exonerating as model citizens?  Our morning reading from Ephesians has the answer, “¹⁰ Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. ¹¹ Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. ¹² For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”

Have you ever felt or said, “I don’t belong here?”   Have you ever heard anyone say, “I don’t belong HERE?”  ²⁸ “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  Did you catch all that?  “All you who are weary and burdened.” “I am gentle and humble in heart.”  “You will find rest.”  You belong here. 

From 1 Kings Solomon said, ⁴¹ “As for the foreigner who does not belong to your people Israel but has come from a distant land because of your name— ⁴² for they will hear of your great name and your mighty hand and your outstretched arm—when they come and pray toward this temple, ⁴³ then hear from heaven, your dwelling place. Do whatever the foreigner asks of you, so that all the peoples of the earth may know your name and fear you, as do your own people Israel, and may know that this house I have built bears your Name.”

            And lastly from Ephesians again, “¹⁸ And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. ¹⁹ Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador.”  Now say, “I belong here,” and believe it.

                                                     Brian Justin Crum "Creep"

"There is Room For All"

Does anyone know the difference between a parable and a fable?  They are both forms of storytelling to illustrate a moral truth. Jesus taught mostly in parables, other religions or spiritual teachers use great fables in their illistrations.  Parables use people in their stories and fables use plants, animals or things to as their form of illustration. 

July 29 2018 Readings:    John 10: 7-16   Romans 14:9-12 

This morning I want to offer you a short fable that I was told while visiting friends in Kingston Jamaica in the late 1980’s.   A minister friend I got to know from the United
Church of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands needed to go visit her herbalist for some medication and I was invited to come along.  Rev. Yvette told me he was also a very wise local Yogi who lived in the foot hills surrounding the city of Kingston.  He was a medical practitioner who uses the natural elements of plants and herbs, as alternative medicine to help fight disease or to relieve a medical condition.  I was also told at the time that this particular Yogi was also a spiritual master and I would find him very interesting.   After meeting him, I was prompted to ask him a spiritual question.  So, I asked, “how do you understand all the different religions in our world?   The gentleman went quiet for a moment and then he said this to me. 

There was a time before the written word, when God spoke through creation itself.  Even if you had never learned to read, Nature if we look closely can reveal to us everything we need to know.  For Nature was and still is for me he said, the first holy book.   Let me offer you this fable.   Every country and contentment on this planet has a main river source that we might call the countries main artery.    In Canada you have the St. Lawrence River system, in England you have the Thames, in Germany the Rhine, in India the Ganges, in China you have the Yangtze, in Africa the Zambezi, and so on and so on.   All rivers, each with their own unique and distinct water flows and offers a rich resource to its country.  All the rivers and streams of this world have something in common and it is where they eventually will all join together and that of course is in the ocean.  If you were to go out into the center of the ocean and scoop me a pail of water, could you tell me which part came from the St. Lawrence, the Thames, the Rhyne, or the Yangtze?  I see the same for all the great religions of our world, said the Yogi, eventually we were all meant to come together in the shelter of God’s compassionate love for one another.

I truly believe that this was one of the most important moments in the cultivation of my theological perspective and my openness to the wisdom teachings of the other religions in our world.   I have often over the years reflected on this wisdom story and others looking for the depth of their true meaning as I attempt to follow in the ways of Jesus.   It was also the spark that lead me to discover that others spiritual writings, Aboriginal, Buddhist, Islam, Zen, etc. contained within their words traces of the teachings of Jesus.  The passage we heard from John 10: 16 speaks to this wisdom.  {KJV} 16 And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.  They may at times use different language and parables or fables to describe the way of Holiness but they in themselves no longer threaten my faith as a Christian.  In fact it actually has reinforced and deepened my root in the resurrected Christ.   Let us keep in mind that all religions are man created and that includes Christianity.  Unfortunately all man made religions have been used at times to promote hatred, violence, and to justify the killing of the innocent.  Even today there are groups of Christians who feel there is justification for killing others and is reinforced by their interpretation of our scripture.      

I believe as did the Apostol Paul and was stated in the passage from John by Jesus himself that one day every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that the Christ, which was with God in the beginning Genesis 1: 26 and is Lord of all.  In fact one of the most important themes throughout the New Testament is that the day is coming when we shall all be one affirming and inclusive people with one as our God head.  

I leave this fable with you for contemplation during my holiday time away. Looking forward to sharing with you once again upon my return at the end of Sept.   

"A prophet In Our Time"

Father Richard Rohr shares his prophetic voice!! 

Hope and Humility
Wednesday, July 18, 2018

At a time when our politics may seem bleak and hopeless, poet, peacemaker, minister, and scholar John Philip Newell offers us both encouragement and challenge:

We live in a moment of grace. Through the hedges of our divisions we are beginning to glimpse again the beauty of life’s oneness. We are beginning to hear, in a way that humanity has never heard before, the essential harmony that lies at the heart of the universe. And we are beginning to understand, amidst the horror and suffering of our divisions, that we will be well to the extent that we move back into relationship with one another, whether as individuals and families or as nations and species. . . .

[Newell reminds us of the Holocaust and how Germany, under Hitler’s command, murdered millions of Jews in Poland.] The German nation was not alone in this. Some of our worst inhumanities as nations, including Britain and America, have been perpetrated on foreign soil and kept at a distance, as if to hide from our own soul the sacrilege of what we are doing. . . . Something in our collective psyche has pretended that the families of another land are not as sacred as the sons and daughters of our own. . . .

Think of the hubris of our lives. Think of our individual arrogance, the way we pursue our own well-being at the neglect and even expense of [others]. . . . Think of the hubris of our nationhood, pretending that we could look after the safety of our homeland by ignoring and even violating the sovereignty of other lands. Think of the hubris of our religion, raising ourselves up over other wisdom traditions and even trying to force our ways on them. Think of the hubris of the human species, pretending that we could look after our own health while exploiting and endangering the life of other species. . . .

[This] is opposite to the way of Jesus, who taught the strength of humility, of being close to the humus, close to the Ground from which we and all things come. The humblest, says Jesus, are “the greatest” (Matthew 18:4). Not that following Jesus’ path of humility is straightforward. Constantly there is tension—the tension of discerning how to love our neighbor as we love ourselves, how to honor the heart of another nation as we honor our own homeland, how to revere the truths of another wisdom tradition as we cherish our own inheritance, how to protect the life of other species as we guard the sanctity of our own life-form. Jesus knew such tension. He was tempted to use his wisdom and his power of presence to serve himself, to lift himself up over others. But to the tempter, he says, “Away with you, Satan!” (Matthew 4:10). Away with the falseness of believing that I can love myself and demean others.

"All are Worthy of LOVE "

                    When did you first learn about or experience acceptance and love?  

July 15, 2018    1 John 4: 7-14         John 14: 21-24                     

The love of Christ is the central element of Christian belief and its theology, but may I suggest that “This Love” cannot be considered exclusive to Christianity.   The love of Christ refers both to the love Jesus has for all people regardless of their sexual orientation, race, color or religion, and the love Christians hold in their hearts for Jesus who embodied the resurrected Christ.  Read about it in 1 John 4: 19.  This love only exists because from the very beginning God in Christ first loved us.   When we hear about this radical extraordinary non discriminating love, we may begin to feel poorly that our love for Christ is somehow inadequate.  Could it be that a lack of accepting his love for us often makes us feel inferior, jealous or unworthy?  The only love our human nature knows is conditional love.  We feel it, measure it, and we share it but we a sense its elusiveness, flipped one minute you have it the next minute its gone, why doesn’t it last?  What is missing here?   Let us try and look at Gods love as an all-encompassing circle dance, what goes around comes around.  To make it complete we must be able to truly feel, see and measure the love that first came to us because it was God who first loved us.  God send out a love that was cosmic in proportion.  This love is so radical most cannot comprehend it because it is totally free of the law and is without conditions.  It does not discriminate and it cannot be earned.  Human logic cannot comprehend it.  The difficulty that occurs is that if I have not accepted and taken in this radical love into my own life,  how then can I mirror for others to see.  I cannot show you something I personally do not know or have for myself.  In fact the only love many of us can share or mirror is our human love that is a one way love. You know the kind of love I mean, it is love with conditions and often the conditions are unspoken.    Often there is a blockage, and it usually is this:  I do not believe that all Gods children are worthy of this radical love.  The moment I exclude someone I make that belief part of my reality.  This thinking is contrary to Jesus’ love for us.  Many of us side with the eldest son in the prodigal story.  This wayward son was not worthy nor did nothing to deserve the Fathers love.   but what he believed brought jealousy, and anger to his reality.    

  

The theme of God’s love is the key element within the Gospel of John.  In his Gospel, John uses the metaphor of the Good Shepherd to symbolize the sacrifice of Jesus based on His love and obedience to his Fathers will.  John tells us that we are to show our love for Christ by following in his teachings.  John 14:23: Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them.   And in 1 John 4: 19 we hear:  "We love, because He first loved us", here John expresses a mirroring of Christ's own love.  Towards the end of the Last Supper, Jesus gives his disciples this commandment: "Love one another, as I have loved you ... John 15: 12.

How can we do that if we do not believe He Loves us without conditions?  Jesus goes on to say in John 13: 35.   "By this shall all men { and my I add women} know that you are my disciples”.  The most often missed point here is that these Disciples of Christ are not bound by any known religious affiliation at that time.   They were referred to as “People of the Way” The words Christian or Christianity did not yet exist.     Does that surprise you? If that were the case then, why should it not be the same today?  We do not profess Christianity as Lord, we profess Christ as Lord of "ALL", or at least some of us do.  

The love of Christ is also expressed in the Letters of Paul.  The basic theme of Ephesians is that of God the Father initiating the work of salvation through Christ.  Jesus willingly sacrifices himself based on this radical love and obedience to His Father will.  And some think it was our sin that nailed him to the cross.   Have you ever considered that it was Love that kept him on the cross, not the nails in his hands and feet? 

Ephesians 3:17-19 tells that one of the necessities of knowing the love of Christ, is to follow his teachings, which again are not bound by religious affiliation, because His love teachings are universal and can be found hidden within the writings of many religions around the world.  In order to know His Love for us we must seek Him personally, to understand and to contemplate on his wisdom and knowledge.  Religious doctrine and dogma is not his way folks, that way has only divides us and create exclusive religious groups and denomination.   

Many prominent Christian figures have expounded on the love of Christ. Saint Augustine wrote that "the common love of truth unites people, the common love of Christ unites all who follow His way".   Saint Benedict instructed his monks to "prefer nothing to the love of Christ".   Saint Thomas Aquinas stated that although both Christ and God had the power to restrain those who killed Christ on Calvary, neither did, and it was due to a form of perfect love, the love of Christ.   We today might call this perfect love, love without conditions.  Saint Teresa of Avila considered perfect love to be love that imitated the love of Christ.    

May we as Christians begin to be more diligent in reflecting THE LOVE OF CHRIST within our lives never forgetting that Christs’ love is for everyone, Christian and Non-Christian alike.