Compendium, 1, 1, 2: "God Comes to Meet Man" (10)

10. What is the value of private revelations?

(Catechism 67)
While not belonging to the deposit of faith, private revelations may help a person to live the faith as long as they lead us to Christ. The Magisterium of the Church, which has the duty of evaluating such private revelations, cannot accept those which claim to surpass or correct that definitive Revelation which is Christ.

Private revelation is spoken about from time to time in the Catholic Church - some of it works its way into our liturgy, even, as in the case of St Faustina's vision of Christ's Divine Mercy. But, and this is an important understanding, her vision of Christ's Divine Mercy is able to be incorporated into the liturgy because it is an affirmation of the deposit of faith handed down by the apostles - no one questions the great mercy of Christ. That being said, private revelation, even when given the seal of authenticity after an ecclesial inquiry does not change or add to the deposit of faith. The Church does not have the authority to do so. So though many may pilgrimage to Lourdes to visit the grotto there, and though the Church has authenticated that Marian apparition, the vision does not change the teaching of the Church, but is seen as a help for today - is seen as private. (I might add here that if the vision contravened the deposit of the faith it could not be authenticated by the Magisterium of the Church.)

Most Christians would not question the possibility of private revelation, though I know a few who would. The possibility of private revelation is borne out in smaller ways in our own lives - in little epiphanies that we have as we read the Scriptures, or in the stranger in the grocery store who says the very thing we need to hear the moment we need to hear it, or in the audible voice we hear answer the prayer of our heart. These small illuminations meet a moment, they give hope and encouragement. And we move forward.

Compendium, 1, 1, 2: "God Comes to Meet Man" (6-9)

Jesus is the full and complete revelation of God. Not the canon of the Scriptures, but Jesus. It is perhaps an understood truth, but a distinction worth pointing out. This is why the Catholic Church, and so many other believers, give special reverence to the Gospels. Not because of any difference in level of inspiration or authority, but because of their subject. It is in the Gospels that we are told of the words and work of Christ, it is here that we are shown the life, death and resurrection that purchased for us eternal salvation. The Epistles and Apocalypse are not the fullness, the climax of God's revelation (as a progressive view of revelation that culminates in the canon of God's word rather than in the person of the Word of God demands) - but the fullness of God's revelation is Christ. And just as all of the Old Testament pointed forward to Christ, so the rest of the New Testament points back to him.

I'm including a few sections today because they all speak of God's revelation to man throughout history, culminating in the person of God's Son. God reveals himself to man; God gives himself to man. The revelation of God and the gift of God is himself.

6. What does God reveal to man?

(Catechism 50-53, 68-69)
God in his goodness and wisdom reveals himself. With deeds and words, he reveals himself and his plan of loving goodness which he decreed from all eternity in Christ. According to this plan, all people by the grace of the Holy Spirit are to share in the divine life as adopted “sons” in the only begotten Son of God.

Note the use of "sons" when speaking of our adoption rather than "sons and daughters." This usage is important: We are made "sons" even though we are male and female. Both sexes alike are adopted as "sons" - dependent upon the natural Sonship of Christ. We share in the Sonship of Christ, having a real share in or union with the life of the Blessed Trinity.

7. What are the first stages of God's Revelation?

(Catechism 54-58, 70-71)
From the very beginning, God manifested himself to our first parents, Adam and Eve, and invited them to intimate communion with himself. After their fall, he did not cease his revelation to them but promised salvation for all their descendants. After the flood, he made a covenant with Noah, a covenant between himself and all living beings.

8. What are the next stages of God's Revelation?

(Catechism 59-64, 72)
God chose Abram, calling him out of his country, making him “the father of a multitude of nations” (Genesis 17:5), and promising to bless in him “all the nations of the earth” (Genesis 12:3). The people descended from Abraham would be the trustee of the divine promise made to the patriarchs. God formed Israel as his chosen people, freeing them from slavery in Egypt, establishing with them the covenant of Mount Sinai, and, through Moses, giving them his law. The prophets proclaimed a radical redemption of the people and a salvation which would include all nations in a new and everlasting covenant. From the people of Israel and from the house of King David, would be born the Messiah, Jesus.

9. What is the full and definitive stage of God's Revelation?

(Catechism 65-66, 73)
The full and definitive stage of God’s revelation is accomplished in his Word made flesh, Jesus Christ, the mediator and fullness of Revelation. He, being the only-begotten Son of God made man, is the perfect and definitive Word of the Father. In the sending of the Son and the gift of the Spirit, Revelation is now fully complete, although the faith of the Church must gradually grasp its full significance over the course of centuries.

“In giving us his Son, his only and definitive Word, God spoke everything to us at once in this sole Word, and he has no more to say.” (Saint John of the Cross)

Compendium, 1, 1, 1: "Man's Capacity for God" (5)

5. How can we speak about God?

(Catechism 39-43, 48-49)
By taking as our starting point the perfections of man and of the other creatures which are a reflection, albeit a limited one, of the infinite perfection of God, we are able to speak about God with all people. We must, however, continually purify our language insofar as it is image-bound and imperfect, realizing that we can never fully express the infinite mystery of God.

This morning, before my only-off-site-school-attending child left with her mother, she asked me a series of questions about animals and plants and, specifically, the carnivorous variety. She said a boy had told her of a plant called a flytrap that ate flies. She wondered why they were. What can you say to the ontological musings of a 7-year-old? When she reaches past facts and material knowledge to grab at causes and purposes, what do you say? I first explained, as best as I could, the science - what the plant gained by eating flies and how it went about its business; then I tackled the Why with a question of my own: Is the world more or less interesting because of the Venus flytrap? And what does this plant teach us about God? It teaches us more than we can know probably, but certainly it shows that he is creative and expresses joy in creating. Certainly it tells us that he is a lover of dappled things. Just as a work of art, a poem or an aria, reflects its creator, so does creation, the natural order, reflect its Creator. Which brings us back to man's capacity for God: We need oceans and mountains and galaxies that we might understand something about depth and breadth and height. It is difficult to know something other than what is. And what we are able to know builds on what we already know. We would be, to some degree, diminished without flytraps.

Of course, beside our ability to know stands our limitations of knowing. Our understanding can only fail to comprehend the One whom the universe cannot contain, He Who Is (as icons have wrapped around the head of Christ). So while we do our best to compass the revelation of God, we must not err by saying too much. For God is also Other, stretching out into and beyond the incomprehensible.

On the other hand, our finiteness does not mean that we can know nothing, that we can only be uncertain, or that our doctrinal formulations/understandings have gotten it wrong. The Church teaches what the Church knows and cannot teach what she does not know. Therefore while our language is imperfect, the truths or realities it communicates doesn't change, though our understanding of those realities may grow. And while our understanding of the deposit of faith that has been delivered to us by Christ through the apostles may grow or mature, the tree conforms to the seed. The acorn does not produce a raccoon.

Let me finish with one of my favorite poets, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and his praise for "Pied Beauty":

Glory be to God for dappled things -
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced - fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

Compendium, 1, 1, 1: "Man's Capacity for God" (3-4)

3. How is it possible to know God with only the light of human reason?

(Catechism 31-36, 46-47)
Starting from creation, that is from the world and from the human person, through reason alone one can know God with certainty as the origin and end of the universe, as the highest good and as infinite truth and beauty.

4. Is the light of reason alone sufficient to know the mystery of God?

(Catechism 37-38)
In coming to a knowledge of God by the light of reason alone man experiences many difficulties. Indeed, on his own he is unable to enter into the intimacy of the divine mystery. This is why he stands in need of being enlightened by God’s revelation, not only about those things that exceed his understanding, but also about those religious and moral truths which of themselves are not beyond the grasp of human reason, so that even in the present condition of the human race, they can be known by all with ease, with firm certainty and with no admixture of error.

The certainty spoken of here does not mean scientific certainty - there are no proofs of God that can be verified in a laboratory. The certainty spoken of here is a reliance on man's reason, and the assertion that faith is reasonable. This principle has been key in the ministry of Pope Benedict XVI, that faith and reason are not incompatible, but rather are informed by one another. The Catechism says, " 'Our holy mother, the Church, holds and teaches that God, the first principle and last end of all things, can be known with certainty from the created world by the natural light of human reason.' Without this capacity, man would not be able to welcome God's revelation. Man has this capacity because he is created 'in the image of God' " (34).

Man can know God, as St Augustine puts it, by questioning nature. But that does not mean that the road to faith is without obstacle, or that all men will come to know God through the study of nature. There are many, many obstacles for each of us to come to know God, to share in his life. Thanks be to God, however, that he continually and faithfully draws all men to himself regardless of the difficulties.

Compendium, 1, 1, 1: "Man's Capacity for God," (2)

“You are great, O Lord, and greatly to be praised [...] You have made us for yourself and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” (Saint Augustine)

2. Why does man have a desire for God?

(cf. Catechism 27-30, 44-45)
God himself, in creating man in his own image, has written upon his heart the desire to see him. Even if this desire is often ignored, God never ceases to draw man to himself because only in God will he find and live the fullness of truth and happiness for which he never stops searching. By nature and by vocation, therefore, man is a religious being, capable of entering into communion with God. This intimate and vital bond with God confers on man his fundamental dignity.

Let me make a disclaimer about my profundity. It ain't. Don't expect it, because I don't. Many of these posts are simply quick reflections, some will let the text stand as it is. Some posts won't let the text alone, but would have been better had they done so. I'm just saying. They're more chats than essays.

In this section, Chapter 1 of the Compendium, we begin with a favorite quote from St Augustine: "You have made us for yourself and our heart is restless until it rests in you." We are religious beings, bent ever God-ward, toward his service and toward worship, like wax impressed with his seal. We are restless creatures who seek happiness and justice and truth in all manner of created things. And though they are there for our good and our pleasure, our hearts remain unsatisfied without God. Sometimes they even remain unsatisfied with God because our union with him is imperfect.

As I said in the last post, God wants to share his life with us. He made us capable of communion with him. He made us like him, to some extent. We are created "in his image." All people bear God's image, and it is this that gives us our basic dignity - even when our sin muddies it. Our enemies bear God's image. Our friends. Our children. Our spouses.

And then this wonderful truth: "God never ceases to draw man to himself." Thanks be to God.

I have a friend who left the faith, seeing it as unnecessary to love and life. He is now an atheist, but remains a reader of this blog. (Only, I'm sure, because I entertain the hell out of him.) We've been having a slow conversation about atheistic morality and I agree with much that he says about it. His morality and mine, however, and we'd disagree at this point, rises from the same source - from this imago Dei impressed upon us both alike. It is what we call "natural law," morality written in the fabric of man's being - the degree of which is arguable. (Some, for instance, have no compunction against eating other people. But not even a cannibal thinks that killing indiscriminately is right - rather, if you will, he engages in nutritiously beneficial jingoism.) It is the Catholic's (Christian's) contention that natural law rises up from that which the Compendium is speaking of in this section. During his recent journey to the U.S., the Holy Father spoke on this very topic in an address to the U.N. You can read his speech here.

Compendium, 1, 1: "I believe" - "We believe"

1. What is the plan of God for man?

(cf. Catechism 1-25)
God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself, in a plan of sheer goodness freely created man to make him share in his own blessed life. In the fullness of time, God the Father sent his Son as the Redeemer and Savior of mankind, fallen into sin, thus calling all into his Church and, through the work of the Holy Spirit, making them adopted children and heirs of his eternal happiness.

The plan of God for man is "to make him share in his own blessed life." This idea of sharing in the divine life is called by the Orthodox, theosis, deification or divinization. (I understand the connotations here, but it is not what the Orthodox mean.) It is most famously stated by St Athanasius (4th cent.), "For the Son of God became man so that we might become God." A rather bold statement, I should think, and yet there it is. This is the mystery of the incarnation.

Theosis, though the term is not often mentioned in Catholicism, is salvation. This is what it is about. This is what salvation means, what its purpose is. And this is our end. Theosis is the plan of God for man.

But I tremble for a qualification, so I will add St Athanasius' own: "becoming by grace what God is by nature." We do not "become God" in the sense that we become divine in our very essence (apotheosis is, I believe, still a heresy). We partake of or share in his divine nature. We become holy as God is holy. The doctrine of the Trinity certainly puts limits on the idea.

Here is a series of quotes in the Catechism, on the incarnation, which also speaks on theosis:

460 The Word became flesh to make us "partakers of the divine nature" (2 Pt 1.4): "For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God" (St Irenaeus, Adv. haeres., 3, 19, 1). "For the Son of God became man so that we might become God" (St Athanasius, De inc., 45, 3). "The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods" (St Thomas Aquinas, Opusc. 57, 1-4).

A Plan

I plan to attempt something here that is most likely too big, too high, for me, but will allow me to post more often and at the same time grow in my Catholic faith. I do so with some trepidation, as I've often come across triumphalistic in my faith to people dear to me who do not share my Catholic faith; my intention, however, is to be strictly affirmative without being comparative. In other words, I plan to write a positive presentation of Catholicism through the dialogical literary genre (question and answer format) found within the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church without belittling the faith(s) of others (No rubbish like, "When I was a Protestant I thought that, but now I think this"). I have failed in this before, so I will be relying on my reader(s) to keep me gracious and to keep me orthodox and to keep me writing. I am also notoriously bad at not finishing what I begin, and this project may span an entire year or more. It will be a view of the Catholic faith in four parts, following the Catechism: (1) lex credendi (The Profession of Faith), (2) lex celebrandi (The Celebration of the Christian Mystery), (3) lex vivendi (Life in Christ) and (4) lex orandi (Christian Prayer).

If I discover that it is not working out as intended, I will drop it.

I do not intend to quit writing about the quirkiness of my life or quit sharing the wisdom of my children in this place, but am attempting this project as a spiritual discipline and rule for myself. I don't think it will be too boring. But I could be wrong. And I will keep it concise, covering two or three questions each day. I am also interested in using this time and this resource to create a simple q-and-a type of catechism for my children to begin memorizing. So while I will include the text of the Compendium, I will also be attempting to simplify both question and answer (and, in all likelihood, leaving some things out and combining others) for my children while remaining faithful to the text.

Above all, pray for me. And read. Push back or disagree freely - I appreciate your opinions and views, and simply your participation. And if there are resources you know, existing children's catechisms or such, then please let me know what you know.