Word to the Wise
Wednesday, January 5, 2022 - Wednesday after Epiphany, or Jan. 9
[1 John 4:11-18 and Mark 6:45-52,290]"If God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love to brfought to perfection in us..... God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him.....There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not perfect in love. [1 John]
JANUARY 5 ST. JOHN NEUMANN cssr (Wednesday after the Epiphany)
Many is the home where I have seen the words, "God is love!" stitched and framed and hanging on the wall, and those are not the only places. God's love is continual, even when we are not very "lovable," but it is hard to experience that love completely when we are afraid of God. One of the types of fear that I encounter frequently in the Sacrament of Reconciliation is the kind of scrupulous guilt that refuses to accept full forgiveness and worries excessively about a "valid" confession! Love is not "guilt relief." God's forgiveness is given in love.
In preaching parish missions, I emphasize the importance of forgiveness to achieving true Christian love. We have to do the best we can with this. We will not be perfect. If we were, we would be God! If we emphasize (as stated in the traditional "Act of Contrition") the "loss of heaven and the pains of hell," we are emphasizing punishment. The First Letter of John tells us that is not a good form of love. The goal is in the first lines of today's first scripture - to receive God's love and give it to others. AMEN