My Friend the Friar
A podcast where we learn about our faith and share what it takes to live a Catholic Christian life through conversations and contemplations with my friend the friar, a Discalced Carmelite Priest.
My Friend the Friar
Suffering, Faith, and Mary's Enduring Influence
In this episode, Father Stephen brings his profound insights into how aligning our struggles with Christ's can be a transformative experience, offering both psychological relief and spiritual growth. Together, we explore the idea that suffering, while difficult, can be a path to deeper faith and redemption.
We also look to Mary, the ultimate example of steadfast faith and unwavering commitment, as a source of inspiration. Delving into the pivotal events of her life, such as the Nativity and the Presentation in the Temple, we reflect on her openness to God's plan despite the mysteries and challenges she faced. Through her story, we learn about the power of embracing those on the margins and maintaining faith amidst uncertainty. Mary's journey is a testament to the enduring strength found in faith and love, setting a path for us all to follow in times of adversity.
As we wrap up this heartfelt conversation, we celebrate Mary's enduring connection to the Church and her role in our spiritual lives. We reflect on her prayerful presence and intercession for the Church, especially during critical moments like before Pentecost. This episode culminates with a discussion on the significance of Mary's assumption, underscoring her as a symbol of redemption and divine love.
Have something you'd love to hear Fr. Stephen and John talk about? Email us at myfriendthefriar@gmail.com or click here!
I'm Aida Lee and you're listening to my Friend the Friar. Welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining me and my friend the Friar, Father Stephen Sanchez, a Discalced Carmelite Priest. Good morning, Father, Good morning. Are y'all avoiding germs like the flu and stuff, Because I hear it's going around?
Speaker 2:It is everywhere and unfortunately those of us in ministry don't have that luxury of avoiding it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, those of us with children don't either. So Sophia came home yesterday. She's like I don't feel good, and then all night long she's been hacking in coffins. So I'm just like unclean. Go to your room, stay away from me, don't touch me. I can't afford to be sick. Yeah, no joke. So then, before we get started and try and wrap up our education, we're not going to wrap up today. You don't think so? No, okay, well, as we move toward the conclusion of Lumen Gentium, Chapter 8, Article 8, are we calling it?
Speaker 1:Chapter 8. I didn't want to say something. I didn't want to say something Again. Well, sorry, I want to say something about an interaction I had with my mom. I thought it was really I don't know. I thought it was something for me to consider and maybe it's something for you and anyone who listens to consider. And I asked her you know, hey, is this okay if I talk with Father Stephen about it? And she's like yeah that's fine.
Speaker 1:So I went down. Her birthday was the other day. She just turned 70 just a couple weeks ago, or a couple days ago yeah, this is the 18th of January, so just a little bit ago and I was down there sitting with her and chit-chatting and, um, I always carry my rosary in my pocket and I was telling her the other day I was looking at the crucifix uh, part of the rosary and I was thinking about how christ uses the things that take place in our life to draw us near to Him and I was reflecting on that and I was reflecting on what it must have been like to be at the foot of the cross to see Him. You know, unable to move and all that kind of stuff, and in pain. And you know unable to move and all that kind of stuff and in pain and you know everything. And for some reason it made me think of my mom, because she has difficulty moving and her body hurts and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:And I thought I've been reading about some of the martyrs and the early Christians and stuff and how they, they like, longed for martyrdom. Right, they, if they would even write like I would. I hope I get to suffer and die like Christ. And so all those kinds of thoughts kind of connected in my head and I thought to myself, you know, I, I, I imagine how frustrating it is, you know, for my mom, like for me, if I could move all of a sudden. I would be pretty frustrated, right. But how beautiful to be able in some way to suffer alongside Jesus and to experience part of what he must have experienced on the cross. Experience part of what he must have experienced on the cross.
Speaker 1:And so it was just a really kind of interesting kind of contemplation and um, and we ended up at my mom and I, at the, at the end of just kind of hanging out and talking, I told her I was going to get her a crucifix for her wall, um, for, uh, for her bedroom. So when she's, you know, sitting there, laying there and kind of in the silence of of her own mind kind of thing, that she'd be able to reflect on it too. And she said she'd like that. So, anyway, just a thought, like I said, I wanted to share with you and see, kind of, maybe it's helpful for you, maybe it's helpful for someone else out there who's going through some hard times.
Speaker 2:I think there is document that the church put out on suffering and the idea of sharing suffering with others or, as we say, uniting it to the cross with others, or as we say uniting it to the cross.
Speaker 2:part of that on the psychological side is to get us out of our own self. So part of the healthy side the psychological side is that it helps me to remove my attention upon myself. I'm not locked up in the bubble of myself. I'm not locked up in the bubble of myself. And then by turning it around and uniting it to the suffering of Christ and making it therefore redemptive, is that this suffering, whatever it might be, whether it's your mom dealing with her situation right now, struggling the idea of my body, is not answering to my will that struggle, kind of right.
Speaker 2:You can't talk, you can't move, these things. It's very frustrating, right? So part of that, then, is that I offer it up for all those who you know, whatever, whatever the offering is for, therefore, what it makes it, it's redemptive in that it makes, by joining it to the suffering of Christ, by no-transcript, because he was true God, true man. So, part of the spiritual side, without getting deep into another two-hour discussion on suffering, yeah, I think it's very helpful, but I think it's a matter of learning to move away from our self-preoccupation and joining it to the suffering of Christ. And we talk about suffering for Christ, but that happens not necessarily with the idea of I want to suffer. It is a matter of I accept the suffering that comes to me, right, and joining it to Christ.
Speaker 2:Even though there are saints that talk about I want to suffer, but that's the language that we use, but the reality is other than that.
Speaker 2:In the, for example, the example that I've used before is, as I stand outside of a family and I look at the family and the suffering that I see is having to go to work, having to provide for the children that are ungrateful, having to change diapers, having to feed them, having to send them to school and getting up and doing all this stuff for them. From the outside it looks as if it's suffering, but within that particular reality that I am not a part of, it is not suffering. It is a gesture of love, and so that is the difference. The difference is we talk about suffering, but the person that is in love with Christ doesn't see it as suffering. The person that is in love with Christ sees it as a gesture of love for Christ and for the church that Christ loves. So it's a matter of perspective, and so I always tell people suffering for the sake of suffering is pathological, and God does not want that.
Speaker 1:God does not want that.
Speaker 2:It's a matter of where are you in your relationship with the lord right, and so this, then, is the understanding that we should have uh.
Speaker 2:That is why, for example, um, if you remember uh in chirp, the gospel, that we have uh for the evening before and sat on Saturday the gospel of the institution right, and we have Jesus washing the feet and where we have Peter unable to accept the fact that Jesus is doing something so humiliating? Because Peter sees it outside of the relationship. Jesus is in the relationship and he doesn't see it as humiliating. He sees it as a gesture of intimacy and love. Same thing here with the suffering. It is a matter of where are you in your relationship with Christ, the deeper you are in that relationship with Christ. Suffering is not suffering. Suffering is a gesture of love that you make towards Christ and also towards his church, whom he loves, and therefore you love towards Christ and also towards his church, whom he loves, and therefore you love because Christ loves. And it is a gesture of love for the community outside of myself.
Speaker 1:So oh, and you know it's kind of an interesting, it's a good contemplation, I think, when it comes now to segue back into our topic, mary, because you know we love at best dimly right because of our sin Right, and you know, and how great is her love because it's not encumbered by that sin, because it's not encumbered by that sin, and equally, like, how great must her suffering have been to like watch her son be crucified and all that kind of stuff, and so, and I think where we left off last time was kind of this comparison between how Eve it was like Eve's obedience was undone by Mary's obedience.
Speaker 2:Right, so excellent segue.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:So, speaking again, speaking of the image that you brought up of Mary at the foot of the cross, right Again this whole idea of faith and Mary as the archetype of what it is to be a disciple, a faithful disciple. And so let's go to Articles 57 and 58 of archetype, of the pilgrim church's journey of faith. Now, archetype we're not talking about a psychological archetype, we're not talking about Jungian archetype here. By archetype we mean model and example, right, this is the model and example. For example, in the Lord of the Rings, gandalf is the archetype of the wisdom figure. Gandalf is the sage. Gandalf is the wisdom figure, so he is the archetype, he is the model and example of what it is to be wise. Aragorn is the archetype of healthy masculinity, right, the healthy king, right, the. So there, what we mean by archetype is the model and example, right?
Speaker 2:So the council fathers are saying that Mary is the model and example of what it is to be a faithful pilgrim. Excuse me so, in Article 57, the Council Fathers say this is from the Magentium. This union of the mother with the son in the work of salvation is made manifest from the time of Christ's virginal conception up to his death. It is shown first of all, when Mary, arising in haste to go to visit Elizabeth, is greeted by her as blessed because of her belief in the promise of salvation and between Mary and the Word made flesh. And the work of salvation is that as soon as Mary conceives the Word first, they say in her heart and in her womb what is the first thing that she does? She ministers. The first thing she does is to go and help, go and take care of her older cousin who is, uh, pregnant and in her sixth month. I think is what the scripture says.
Speaker 2:So it is, and again, it's not a matter of people don't understand or don't appreciate the difficulty of that ministry, because it's not a matter of you. You know, getting on 35 and going up north for an hour or so, it is, you know. We don't know if she walked because it's not. You know, having or did they have enough money to hire a donkey, or because you couldn't afford a mule or a horse because the horse was for warriors and mules were warriors too. So a donkey, could you afford? A donkey on you?
Speaker 2:know, the money that joseph had from being a carpenter and so, and then it would take days, and in the heat, and so do you travel, and so there's bandits and there's all. This was a very, very difficult undertaking that most of the time we just pass over. We don't think about the difficulty and the act of faith that Mary knew it was a dangerous thing, mary knew it was going to be a very difficult thing, and yet she's moved by the word to go and attend to her cousin, to her cousin. Okay, so this then is part of that the union between the mother and the son in the work of salvation, in this what we call the visitation. So continuing on with number 57.
Speaker 2:This promise of salvation and the precursor, john the Baptist, leaped with joy in the womb of his mother. This union is manifest also at the birth of our Lord, who did not diminish his mother's virginal integrity but sanctified it. When the mother of God joyfully showed her firstborn son to the shepherds and magi, when she presented him to the Lord in the temple, making the offering of the poor, she heard Simeon foretelling at the same time that her son would be a sign of contradiction and that a sword would pierce the mother's soul that out of many hearts, thoughts might be revealed when the child Jesus was lost and they had sought him, sorrowing. His parents found him in the temple taking up the things that were his father's business, and they did not understand the word of their son. His mother, indeed, kept these things to be pondered over in her heart. So these are all examples of what it is to be a pilgrim, disciple in faith.
Speaker 2:So the idea of Mary giving birth, the idea of, all of a sudden, why are the shepherds here? The shepherds were the marginalized of the society and the magi were non-believers or non-Israel, they didn't belong to the covenant, and so for them to come and for her to like okay, I don't know what this is about. I trust in God's plan. This is part of God, god's plan unfolding. So I need to be able to enter into that and embrace that. And then, at the presentation that we're celebrating tomorrow, so in the face of the presentation, when the Lord is brought into the temple and fulfilling the law Mary and Joseph were faithful abiders of the law and then to hear Simeon and Anna talk about the baby and they're like what, what Anna talk?
Speaker 2:about the baby and they're like what, what? And then this, you know, oracle of Simeon. You know foretelling her sorrow. So all of these are moments of faith, and so it could have been otherwise. And, as you said before too, I have absolutely no idea what it's like to be immaculately conceived. I'm not even going to try to guess, but what would our reaction be in those situations if somebody tells me something like this about my child, or you know, like, okay, loony dude, he's one of those church people who never leaves the church and he's just crazy. Um, so there's a lot of different things that are being presented here by the council fathers in term of mary's journey of faith yeah, and so you know what, go ahead.
Speaker 1:one of my, one of my favorite things about the christmas narrative, um, is the the shepherds. Because when it was just random one year at christmas, like the light bulb finally turned on in my head and I was like not just that the shepherds were marginalized, but like what do shepherds protect? Well, they protect the sheep and their lambs, and Jesus is the Lamb of God. So of course God would send shepherds to protect him, kind of thing. And I was just like what you know, mind him kind of thing. And I was just like what you know, mind blown kind of thing.
Speaker 2:So did you get up in the middle of mass and go I got it, I got it yeah.
Speaker 1:I almost wanted to. I was like what, oh my goodness.
Speaker 2:God moments. Yeah, so, continuing on in number 58 of the chapter 8, and again, this is again the whole idea of Mary's journey of faith In the public life of Jesus, mary makes significant appearances. This is so even at the very beginning. When the marriage feast of Cana moved with pity, she brought about, by her intercession, the beginning miracles of Jesus, the Messiah. In the course of her son's preaching, she received the words whereby, in extolling a kingdom beyond the calculations and bonds of flesh and blood, he declared blessed those who heard and kept the word of God, as she was faithfully doing.
Speaker 2:After this manner, the Blessed Virgin advanced in her pilgrimage of faith and faithfully preserved in her union with her Son onto the cross, where she stood in keeping with the divine plan, grieving exceedingly with her only begotten Son, uniting herself with a maternal heart with his sacrifice and lovingly consenting to the immolation of this victim, which she herself had brought forth. Finally, she was given by the same Christ Jesus, dying on the cross as a mother to his disciple, with these words Woman, behold thy son, woman, behold thy son. Okay, so the whole idea of Mary as the model and exemplar of what it is to be a faithful disciple as we journey through space and time as a pilgrim church. So we have here in number 58, the first thing that is brought up is the wedding at Cana. And when Jesus says, woman, what is this to you? And I, I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my time is not coming. My time is not coming what Right?
Speaker 2:And Mary's response is do whatever he tells you. She had faith right. She had faith in this son and she had faith in this situation right. And so there's a lot of things going on here. In this sign. We're talking about John's gospel, so John doesn't use the word miracle, he uses the word sign. So the sign here is about one. We talked about the wedding cup in in the jewish uh, marriage ceremony, right, yeah, the whole idea of wine.
Speaker 2:Wine is joyful, wine is part of the wedding banquet. Uh, wine for then also is being presented to us as eucharist. It it is. It is the blood, right, and it is this new wine. And so, as the ablutions, all the water that is used for all the ceremonial cleansing, is done away with and replaced with wine, is replaced with the sacraments. This is the way we would understand it Then that there's something here, there is a faith stance here, that Mary is not just Mary, but Mary is also, at this moment, an image and model of the church, the believing community, right? So there's a lot going on in this sign that the council fathers are bringing up, right.
Speaker 1:And then it goes to— and anybody who hadn't listened to that episode, it's called the Link Between the Jewish Marriage Customs and the Last Supper Great episode On our podcast. Yeah, yeah, and oh, and there's actually—there's two of them, because then the other one is exploring the symbolism of wine and marriage in Jewish and Catholic traditions. So yeah, there's a lot going on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so yeah there's a lot going on, yeah, and so then the next thing is where Mary doesn't say anything, that this is the part that they bring, where they say your mother's looking for you, and Jesus says who are my mother, my brothers? And so then this whole idea of fidelity, what is it to be faithful to Christ? To be faithful to Christ is to belong to his body, to belong to his family, and so one of the things that we have to deal with as believers is that, many times, our blood family is not part of the faith family, and so one of the things that we have to deal with, then, is the idea that I have to understand that my faith family is my family. This is who I by blood. I now belong to this new group, and it's difficult because we have natural bonds.
Speaker 2:Obviously, we have natural bonds with our blood family, but my real blood family, the real blood family, is now the community of faith that I belong to, and Mary is seen as this model and image of this faithful disciple, then the last thing that they bring in this number is the one that you, the example that you brought up earlier, is Mary at the foot of the cross, and the faith stance is that Mary, even though she sees this, this is the consequence, right, we see her son enduring the passion, we see her son being rejected. We see her son being spat upon. We see her son being condemned to a very shameful death for a Jew, on being condemned to a very shameful death for a Jew, not just to be crucified because to be hung on a tree is to be lost we would say perdition to be damned. Right To be in a situation where the Jewish faithful would see that this is a damning thing this person is damned because they're being hung on a tree but also a very shameful death because they were crucified naked.
Speaker 2:And again, I've always brought this up in other situations where I say, to this day, we still can't deal with the shame because to this day, we still have Jesus on a cross with a loincloth, because we really cannot deal with the idea of a naked Jesus, because it's not and it has nothing to do with being prudish, it has to do with shame, it's the vulnerability. The person is completely exposed, and so this is again another situation. And then for Jesus to tell his mom this is your son. You know the beloved disciple right, this is your son.
Speaker 2:And for Mary then to take that to believe that this whole idea of this faith is that all these different things are being torn apart. Our world is being torn apart. For those of us that don't have the luxury to be immaculate, what is it like for an immaculate heart to suffer this? It must be something beyond my capacity to understand or our capacity to understand. But also there's this Immaculate Heart that is willing to say I still believe. I know that God is faithful, even though this doesn't make sense, even though this does not. I cannot wrap my head around this. I don't know how, but I know that God is faithful. I don't know how this is going to turn out, but all I do know is that God is faithful, and that is in the stance of the faithful disciple that Mary represents for us. And there's this idea of what does faith encompass? Right, and it is encompassing this ability.
Speaker 2:One of the things I tell people is that you genuinely, genuinely, have to believe that God is my loving Father and that, as my loving Father, he holds me in the palm of His hand. And as he holds me in the palm of His hand, I have to trust and believe that, whatever happens in my life, whatever occurs in my life, for good or ill, is part of God's design and part of God's will for me to grow in my own sanctity, in my own redemption, my own journey. And I have to believe this that, yes, we live in a broken world. It's not a world that God wanted us to live in. He wanted us to live in Eden. But this is the world that we're living in.
Speaker 2:And so I have to believe that, in spite of the brokenness of the world, in spite of my suffering for the consequences of my own decisions or other people's decisions, that somehow God, who is the God of history, will bring it all to completion, and it is for the health and well-being of each one of us. I have to believe that, or else life would be unbearable. And that is the faith stance, that is Mary's stance, the stance that we have. Our devotion to Mary is not just about praying the rosary. Our devotion to Mary is imitating the model of faith that she has exemplified for us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's funny too. This morning's mass readings from Hebrews. Paul says faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, those are great readings this week and next week for Hebrews.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So okay then I think, before we go on to Article 59, we have been talking about three different. We've been talking about the five steps, the three different steps ahead. Let me recap that right. So there are five different steps of Mary's role in the salvation of history. One was the Old Testament prophecies, which was Article 55. Two was the New Testament, mary's obedience, which is Articles 56 and 57, which we just finished. The next point is point three, mary's receptive faith, which is I'm sorry, okay, I haven't had enough coffee yet Step two. You're going to have to edit this. Step two New Testament, mary's obedience, article 56. Mary's receptive faith, which is step three, which is articles 57, 58,. And now we go to step four, or point four Mary's connection to Christ brings her to be intimately connected with the church, and this is article 59. And then the fifth point the church sees herself in Mary's assumption. That's part three of chapter eight. So we'll go to that next, but first we have this point Mary's connection to Christ brings her to be intimately connected with the church.
Speaker 2:Article 59 is Mary at prayer with the apostles in preparation for Pentecost, 59. But since it has pleased God not to manifest solemnly the mystery of the salvation of the human race before he would pour forth the Spirit promised by Christ. We see the apostles, before the day of Pentecost, persevering with one mind in prayer with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren, and Mary, by her prayers, imploring the gift of the Spirit who had already overshadowed her in the Annunciation. Finally, the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all guilt of original sin, on the completion of her earthly sojourn, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory and exalted by the Lord as Queen of the Universe, that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of Lords and the conqueror of sin and death.
Speaker 2:Okay, again, the Council Fathers pack a lot into this one paragraph, this one number, number 59. This whole idea of persevering with one mind in prayer with the women and marry, the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren. Okay, remembering that before Pentecost, brethren. Okay, remembering that before Pentecost, the community is being persecuted. They're afraid they're going to be dragged out and be crucified, they're hiding, they don't know what to do. Then they have the experience of, on the road to Emmaus, there's the experience of the resurrection, and then they're told to go and wait for him. And so they go and they're praying and they're excited Now that they're excited, but they still don't understand what's going on. So they're in this crossroads of faith, of trying to understand what they've experienced with the crucifixion and now the experience of the risen Lord, and now they're all coming together and praying and waiting for this coming of the Lord, whatever that might be.
Speaker 2:And so here we have, then, mary, then, as a symbolic of not just, again, not just Mary the mother of Jesus, but Mary as model and image of faithful disciple praying for and imploring God to manifest His will right, what is your will for us?
Speaker 2:And so what is the will?
Speaker 2:The will is that the Holy Spirit comes down upon them and inflames them and blesses them, and they have the gift of tongues and they go forth to preach the good news of this reconciliation that is wrought in Jesus, the Lamb right. And so here we have, then, this idea of Mary, who is the mother of Jesus, but also a model and image of the Church. Then, for us, then, what is she exemplifying? She's exemplifying for us this idea of interceding for the Church, praying for the Church, praying for the coming of the Spirit. Are we following that model and example of Mary that prays for the well-being of the Church, the greater Church, the community of faith, as the community finds itself right, and are we capable of doing it in that same spirit and dedication that Mary shows as is exemplified in the Gospels that we're told? And here again I think it's for us to look at do we intercede for the entirety of the church and do we intercede for God's will, or do we have a particular thing that we want and we try?
Speaker 2:to convince God of that thing that we want. Again, different approaches, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's easy for us to get caught up in ourselves, right, yeah, yeah, it's easy for us to get caught up in ourselves, right? This is kind of what we were talking about earlier. Yeah, yeah, but in all aspects of life, it's easy for us to shrink our world down to just us, or just our family, or just our job, or just our whatever. Right, right.
Speaker 2:And the difficult part is and this is true of all spirituality well, christian spirituality about the rest of the world, uh, is to get beyond our self-interest. Can I find a way to not be so worried about my self? Right? Can I understand that I belong to a people, that my identity is not just me, but my identity is belonging to this people who has been now sealed with the blood of the lamb right, this greater community that I belong to?
Speaker 1:yeah, okay, well, and that's like sin. When you sin like you don't just hurt yourself, you hurt the church yes, right. Right, yes, which is part, I guess why the public nature of confession.
Speaker 2:Yes, right, the communal yeah, their communal, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so then they end this paragraph with referring to the assumption, without necessarily saying the assumption about what's taking up body and soul into heavenly glory. So this is, then, part of Mary's model and image, exemplar of the faithful disciple, but also as model and image of believing church. All of us are called to share in that Trinitarian life of Father, son and Spirit. That's what we're called to. And so Mary, as immaculate, then conceived without sin, as the tabernacle of the covenant and the incarnation of the covenant, right as that, we would say, physical temple where the Word was conceived, right, the consequences of all this, the God's choice, her being immaculately conceived, all this, and then in Mary, what we have is in the assumption. We have the promise of our own assumption, because in the creed we proclaim and believe that in the resurrection of the body right, we as Catholics believe that our body is a part of who we are. We don't leave it behind. It will be transformed, it will be conformed to the image of Christ's transformed and glorified body. We don't know what that is, but we know, we believe that and we proclaim that. And so in Mary you have, then she is the first of us. She is the first of our kind as human persons. Not that Jesus is not a human person, but Jesus is true God and true man. We have in Jesus that unique marriage between God and man. But Mary as redeemed, jesus is the redeemer. Mary is the first of the redeemed that enjoys that promise that we all have. We all have that promise If we are faithful disciples in according to the mercy and love of God, the Father. The desire is that we share in that, and so Mary represents that church. Mary represents that community of faith we would talk about in old Catholic language, we would talk about the church triumphant, all the saints that are with the Lord now, all the saints that are in glory with Mary. That she represents this community and it is a community that we're all called to. So it's a matter of us, then, as pilgrims and looking at Mary, see that the consequence of my fidelity, the consequence of my being other-centered as Christ is, and to be other-centered as Mary was, other-centered in the image and likeness of Christ, her Son, that the consequence of that is to live and to share in the Trinitarian life in the fullness of my being. So Mary is fully who she is, who God meant her to be, as she enjoys the Trinitarian communion in that experience of love that exists between Father, son and Spirit. And that is what we're all called to. We're all called to that. That is what we are destined for, that is for us.
Speaker 2:When Catholics talk about predestination, that's what they mean. We mean for us, predestination means that God has desired for all of us to share in that Trinitarian life. It doesn't necessarily refer to those that are marked for salvation, those that are marked for damnation. Predestination for us is God has predestined us all to share in the Trinitarian life. Now, whether we want to go or not, that's up to us, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's like you can't even contemplate what that must be like either.
Speaker 2:No, it's all speculation, because we don't know.
Speaker 1:I heard somebody talking um. I think it was like on pints with aquinas, but I don't know if he was quoting someone else. But he was saying how it's like, um, it's like if you were an infant in the womb and like you're wondering what it must be like after you're born like you'd have no idea.
Speaker 1:You couldn't even imagine what it's like outside of the womb, um, and how similar it must be like after you're born. Like you'd have no idea. You couldn't even imagine what it's like outside of the womb and how similar it must be when we die.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and so part of this whole idea of Mary being queen, right, and it's not because she, it's not like she entered a contest and like, okay, so I won the queen of universe contest?
Speaker 1:No yeah.
Speaker 2:It is because Jesus is Lord of Lords. Yeah.
Speaker 1:His communion with us, his love for us is so deep and so transformative and unitive is that we share in his kingship.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it's like the queen mother is like the king might, and probably then the wife of a previous king. So here it would not be the queen mother, here would be the queen, she would be the queen in the fact that we, as church, are both bride. We are bride, we're called to be bride of Christ, the church is the bride of Christ, and so Mary is the first of the bride of Christ, which is really weird for us to talk about, since Mary is his mom.
Speaker 2:But it's not the bride in that kind of way. It is the only way that we can speak of union in a way that is sort of comprehensible for us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's one of those things where there's so many layers to the symbolism that it's like….
Speaker 2:Yeah, the only image and this is the Old Testament image, the Old Testament image of marriage. It's not that it's marriage, but it's the only thing that we can. It's the only reference point that we have, and this reference point is is like trying to equate um, a, very, a, very smart, smart, uh, I was going to say mammal, whatever with Einstein. So it's radically different, but it's the only thing that we have is intelligence or intellect, right? And so here, the only thing we have is this idea of marriage, which is what, which is complete and total gift of self to another, right, yeah, it's union, right, right.
Speaker 2:So it's really about union. It's not about marriage, it's about union and gift of self to others. So here then, mary's queenship is the queenship of the church, the queenship of the Bride of Christ. Christ, not because it is a merit that they have earned, but it is a gift that the king gives to the bride. The union is so deep that they themselves become, you would say, regal. They share in the regal nature of Christ because of the depth of union. I know it's a very difficult concept to talk about. We're talking all about speculative theology and trying to talk about, you know, things that are difficult to talk about, but that's where the Council of Fathers went, and so that's where we have to try to get in there and try to dive in there and find the richness of these images that they have used.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, and they started at the very beginning of chapter eight. They're like we're not trying to lay everything out there and define everything, right, that all of this is for the benefit of the church, right? And so these are things to contemplate, like what does it mean? Because, you know, as men, we even perceive marriage as one way, versus like my wife would think of it. Mean because, right, you know, as men, we even perceive marriage as one way, versus like my wife would think of it differently, right, because she's a woman, so she has a different kind of experience and intellect towards those kind of concepts and so it's just something to pray with and something to really spend time in contemplation.
Speaker 1:Right, right, right. You know well, uh, what do you say? You want to wrap this one up here before we move on to the church the blessed virgin and the church, which is the fifth point.
Speaker 2:The church sees herself in Mary's assumption, that assumption being the effect of redemption.
Speaker 1:So that'll be the next point we cover alright. Well, father, thanks for this. You're very welcome. God bless yeah, everybody, thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time.
Speaker 2:Tell your mom we're praying for her.
Speaker 1:I will Bye Bye.
