Friday 26 August 2016

21st Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year "C") 2016: Jesus learned obedience

Here's the reference from the Catechism of the Catholic Church I quoted, in reference to the idea that we must identify our will with God's, and with every person - indeed, all of creation - if our prayers & lives are to ever make sense. St. John Chrysostom's point is especially relevant: remember, it's because "God so loved the world..."

2825 "Although he was a Son, [Jesus] learned obedience through what he suffered." (Hebrews 5:8) How much more reason have we sinful creatures to learn obedience - we who in him have become children of adoption. We ask our Father to unite our will to his Son's, in order to fulfill his will, his plan of salvation for the life of the world. We are radically incapable of this, but united with Jesus and with the power of his Holy Spirit, we can surrender our will to him and decide to choose what his Son has always chosen: to do what is pleasing to the Father. (John 8:29)

In committing ourselves to [Christ], we can become one spirit with him, and thereby accomplish his will, in such wise that it will be perfect on earth as it is in heaven. (Origen, De orat. 26:PG 11,501B.)

Consider how Jesus Christ] teaches us to be humble, by making us see that our virtue does not depend on our work alone but on grace from on high. He commands each of the faithful who prays to do so universally, for the whole world. For he did not say "thy will be done in me or in us," but "on earth," the whole earth, so that error may be banished from it, truth take root in it, all vice be destroyed on it, virtue flourish on it, and earth no longer differ from heaven. (St. John Chrysostom, Hom. in Mt. 19,5:PG 57,280.)

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