Tuesday, December 8, 2015

Genesis, Chapter 3, verse 8-10:

⁸ When they heard the sound of the LORD God walking about in the garden at the breezy time of the day, the man and his wife hid themselves from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. ⁹ The LORD God then called to the man and asked him: Where are you? ¹⁰ He answered, “I heard you in the garden; but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid.”

Before the fall both Adam and Eve were unafraid of being exposed to God and they were innocent in that they knew not that they were naked.  Adam states I heard the sound of you in the garden.  We do not know what the sound of God is from the verse.  Was it the same sound as a man walking in the garden?  Or was it the sound of a rushing wind? We do not know; but Adam heard God and he was afraid because he was naked.

On the cross our Lord who always heard the Father was now utterly alone,…And at the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, 'Eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?' which means, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' and he was also naked nailed to a tree. Tradition states that our Lord’s cross rested on the skull of Adam in payment for the fall.  Our Lord paid the ultimate price for our sins.

Christ on the cross reversed the taking of the fruit and the eating by Adam and Eve and became the fruit of life.  Christ on the cross reversed the nakedness of Adam and Eve by being naked himself.  Christ on the cross no longer heard the Father and He was afraid.

The greatest fear is a world without the Father.  Christ brought us at a great price to bring us back to the Father.  We need not fear for God is now in us through the accomplishment of the Holy Spirit.  We must listen to His voice and follow Him.

Mary who was conceived without sin on the Feast day of the Immaculate Conception is our example of courage in the presence of God and His angels.  Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.  Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus.  (Luke 1:30-31)

ON this and the following eight days the Church celebrates, with particular solemnity, the immaculate conception of the ever-blessed Virgin Mary, who, from all eternity, was chosen to be the daughter of the heavenly Father, the spouse of the Holy Ghost, the Mother of the divine Redeemer, and, by consequence, the queen of angels and of men. The consideration of these prerogatives convinced the most enlightened fathers and teachers of the Catholic Church that she was conceived immaculate, that is, without original sin. It is very remarkable that among the shining hosts of saints who have, in every century, adorned the Church no one wrote against this belief, while we find it confirmed by the decisions of the holy fathers from the earliest times. Pope Pius IX., forced, as it were, by the faith and devotion of the faithful throughout the world, finally, on December 8, 1854, sanctioned, as a dogma of faith falling within the infallible rule of Catholic traditions, this admirable prerogative of the Blessed Virgin. It is, therefore, now no longer, as formerly, a pious belief, but an article of the faith, that Mary, like the purest morning light which precedes the rising of the most brilliant sun, was, from the first instant of her conception, free from original sin. (Goffine’s Devout Instructions, 1896)