Terms I don’t like – Apocrypha (when referring to the Deuterocanonical Books)

Terms I don’t like – Apocrypha (when referring to the Deuterocanonical Books)

Protestants of the last couple of centuries tend to reject what they call the Apocrypha (Deuterocanon), while Catholics accept it as being divinely inspired. This distinction is important because the acceptance of the Deuterocanon as being canonical pretty much necessitates belief in Purgatory and intercessory prayer.

In what may seem to be a nonsequitor, I’d like to point out that the word “prodigal,” as used in the prodigal son, means wasteful. However, if you ask most people what prodigal means, they would incorrectly tell you that it means wayward.

I bring this up because the term “Apocrypha” has also taken on new meanings over the centuries. Before Luther, the Catholic Church itself used the term Apocrypha, because the word had the Greek meaning of the “hidden books.”

Since Luther, however, the word has taken on the meaning of spurious. Catholics now use the term Deuterocanon or Deuterocanonical Books. To Catholics Apocrypha is a loaded term. For Catholics the Apocrypha refers to the gnostic gospels, etc.

Luther wasn’t the first person to reject the Deuterocanonical Books. Marcion of Sinope was Luther’s forerunner. He believed that none of the Old Testament belonged in the Bible. He also rejected Matthew, Mark, and John, along with parts of Luke.  

Luther wanted to eliminate the books of James, Revelation, and the Deuterocanonical Books from his Canon of Scripture. Fortunately, he was talked out of it, but when he published a translation of the Bible where he regrouped the Old Testament so that it had a special section in the back called the Apocrypha.

Luther did so for two reasons. The first was that James, Revelation, and the Deuterocanonical Books did not conform to his theology. The second was that European Jews of the 1500s (Luther’s time) did not accept the Deuterocanonical Books as a part of their Bible. He felt that this compromised the legitimacy of the books. This second point is very important and I’ll get back to it in a few moments.

Initially all Protestant Bibles included the Deuterocanonical Books. The King James Version contained the Deuterocanon with cross references from the Protocanon in the margins. In 1615, in England, the Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury imposed a year’s imprisonment as penalty for publishing Bibles without the Deuterocanonical Books. It wasn’t until 1827 when the British Foreign Bible Society decided to drop the Deuterocanonical Books from the Bible. Some sources state that the decision was made to save on the cost of paper. Other sources state that it was due to pervasive anti-Catholicism in England (Most people don’t know that to this day it is still illegal for the British monarch to marry a Catholic.)

The Jewish Canon

As noted above, Luther rejected the Deuterocanonical Books because most European Jews during his time did not accept them. However, Jews during the time of Jesus did accept them.

During the time of Jesus, there wasn’t a defined Canon. According to Wikipedia, Jewish scholars first translated the Torah into Koine, or common, Greek in the 3rd century BCE. Koine Greek was a universal language that was spoken throughout the Roman Empire. The translation process took several years and became known as the Septuagint (LXX). The LXX included the Deuterocanonical Books. Both Philo and Josephus ascribed divine inspiration to the LXX.

Wikipedia says “the New Testament writers, when citing the Jewish scriptures or when quoting Jesus doing so, freely used the Greek translation, implying that Jesus, his Apostles and their followers considered it reliable.”

Not only did the New Testament writers favor the LXX over the Hebrew Scriptures; they included a boatload of references to the Deuterocanonical Books as documented by this guy.

One good example of a New Testament reference to the Deuterocanon is Hebrews 11:35, which discusses the heroes of the Old Testament.

Women received back their dead through resurrection. Some were tortured and would not accept deliverance, in order to obtain a better resurrection.

This is a clear reference to 2 Maccabees 7, which is even acknowledged by Barnes Notes on the Bible, a respected Protestant resource. The passage from Maccabees is the only example in scripture of someone being tortured and refusing to accept release for the sake of a better resurrection. When the verse from Hebrews is read in context, it would be difficult to claim that Paul didn’t consider Maccabees (and thus prayer for the dead) as being on the same level as the rest of the Old Testament.

The weight of evidence strongly suggests that the writers of the Bible believed that the Septuagint was scripture. We are instructed by 2 Timothy 3:16 that all Scripture is inspired. Adherents of Sola Scriptura must accept the Deuterocanonical Books based upon this verse.

When we learn why some Jews after the time of Jesus came to reject the Deuterocanonical Books, it should cause us to embrace the books all the more.

In “Why Catholic Bibles are bigger,” Gary Michuta explains that during the Second Jewish Revolt (A.D. 132-135) Christians were still considered a Jewish sect. Christians were pressured by Rabbi Akiba ben Joseph to renounce Jesus, join the revolt, and accept Bar Cochba as the Messiah. Of course, Christians refused this apostasy and were treated by Jews as heretics and traitors.

According to Wikipedia, the Council of Jamnia was headed by the Rabbi and it addressed “the loss of the national language, the growing problem of conversions to Christianity, based in part on Christian promises of life after death. What emerged from this era was twofold: A rejection of the Septuagint or Koine Greek Old Testament… and the inclusion of a curse on the "Minim" which probably included Jewish Christians.”

(A few years ago I looked at the Jewish Encyclopedia entry on the Council of Jamnia and it acknowledged that participants of the Council did indeed curse Christians. (The entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia is acknowledged in the Wikipedia article) In preparing this post, I referred to the Jewish Encyclopedia again, but interestingly the article on Jamnia has been removed – unless I goofed and didn’t see it.)

The Council, which was made up of survivors of the Pharisees, was not enamored with Christianity. It especially disproved of the Gentile Christians, who primarily spoke Greek. When the Council specified that it wanted to purify Judaism of Greek influences it was saying that it wanted to purify Judaism of Christianity. The formerly accepted Deuterocanon suddenly fell into disrespect because it was highly favored by Christians, who believed that it pointed toward Christ, and it was written in Greek.

The Council banned any scripture that wasn’t written in Hebrew. Ironically the Dead Sea Scrolls subsequently demonstrated that at least some of the Deuterocanonical Books were, in fact, written in Hebrew. (Note that the Hebrew language might not have been the only sacred language used by the Israelites. There is some evidence that the Ge'ez language was also used in ancient times.

According to Wikipedia, “Starting approximately in the 2nd century CE, several factors led most Jews to abandon use of the LXX. The earliest gentile Christians of necessity used the LXX, as it was at the time the only Greek version of the Bible, and most, if not all, of these early non-Jewish Christians could not read Hebrew. The association of the LXX with a rival religion may have rendered it suspect in the eyes of the newer generation of Jews and Jewish scholars.”

Luther based his decision to exclude the Deuterocanon based, in part, on the decision of a Council that cursed Christ and Christians, and whose purpose was to combat Christianity.

One final note about the Council - We know that at the time of Christ there were a variety of Jewish sects (Sadducees, Pharisees, and others, all with theological disagreements. According to Michuta, “Judaism was comprised of as many as twenty-four distinct parties...and each...had its own distinctive theology and preferences in matters of canonicity (p. 13).” The Council represented only one sect. The Falasha Jews of Ethiopia, for example accepted the Deuterocanonical Books through modern times.

Christianity’s acceptance of the Deuterocanonical Books

Catholic Answers documents Christianity’s acceptance of the Deuterocanonical Books as being scripture as far back as Apostolic times. A similar reference is on EWTN. Documents citing the Deuterocanonical Books as being scripture include:

·                     The Didache (A.D. 70);

·                     The Letter of Barnabas(A.D. 74);

·                     Clement of Rome (A.D. 80);

·                     Polycarp of Smyrna (A.D. 135);

·                     St. Irenaeus (A.D. 189);

·                     Hippolytus (A.D. 204);

·                     Cyprian of Carthage (A.D. 248);

·                     Council of Rome (A.D. 382);

·                     Council of Hippo (A.D. 393);

·                     Council of Carthage III (A.D. 397);

·                     St. Augustine (A.D. 397);

·                     The Apostolic Constitutions (A.D. 400);

·                     St. Jerome (A.D. 401); and

·                     Pope Innocent I (A.D. 408).

Protestants sometimes cite three sources in claiming that the Deuterocanonical Books weren’t used by early Christians. These are St. Jerome, Athanasius, and Origin.

·         While Jerome originally was dubious about the Deuterocanon, he changed his mind. He included them in the Vulgate. He referred to Sirach as being scripture: “Does not the Scripture say: ‘Burden not thyself above thy power’ [Sirach 13:2] “ (Jerome, To Eustochium, Epistle 108, in NPNF2, VI:207)

St. Jerome also said: “What sin have I committed if I follow the judgment of the churches? But he who brings charges against me for relating [in my preface to the book of Daniel] the objections that the Hebrews are wont to raise against the story of Susannah [Dan. 13], the Song of the Three Children [Dan. 3:29–68, RSV-CE], and the story of Bel and the Dragon [Dan. 14], which are not found in the Hebrew volume, proves that he is just a foolish sycophant. I was not relating my own personal views, but rather the remarks that they are wont to make against us. If I did not reply to their views in my preface, in the interest of brevity, lest it seem that I was composing not a preface, but a book, I believe I added promptly the remark, for I said, ‘This is not the time to discuss such matters’" (Against Rufinius 11:33 [A.D. 401]).

·         Athanasius accepted the book of Baruch as part of his Old Testament (Festal Letter 39).

·         Origin accepted all of the Deuterocanonical Books; he simply recommended not using them in apologetics with Jews.

I certainly concede that there was hesitation by some to accept the Deuterocanonical Books. However, there was significantly less controversy in their acceptance than there was in establishing the canon of the New Testament.

Though most Protestants nowadays reject the inclusion of the Deuterocanonical Books by the Councils at Hippo and Carthage, it was those very same early Church councils that are cited by Protestants as being guided by the Holy Spirit for establishing the canon of the New Testament. 

Religious Ecstasy - Pt. 3

Praying for Signs, Visions, or Miracles

According to St. John of the Cross, in his book Ascent of Mount Carmel, although our prayers for signs (as in "Lord, give me a sign!"), visions, or miracles are occasionally granted; we should not pray for such things.

God has laid down rational and natural limits for man's governance. To desire to pass beyond them is not lawful, and to desire or seek out anything by supernatural means is to go beyond these limits and is not pleasing to God

God occasionally grants petitions for signs or miracles to affirm weak souls by granting them favors. However, this is not because He desires us to commune with Him in that manner or by those methods; it is that He gives everyone certain grace in the manner best suited to each individual.

Though God may answer such requests, they are not pleasing to him because they demonstrate a lack of faith.  It is unnecessary to pray for signs or visions since the Holy Spirit has already provided us with the Gospel and it is sufficient for all guidance. In all our needs, trials, and difficulties, there is no better or surer answer than prayer, trust, obedience, and hope.

According to St. John of the Cross, it is not lawful under the New Covenant (or the Law of Grace as St. John of the Cross calls it) to ask anything of God by supernatural means, as it was under Mosaic Law.

Under the Old Covenant, such communion with God was not only lawful, but it was also necessary because at that time faith had no firm foundation and many of the books of the Bible had not yet been written.

During Biblical times, every time God spoke, He revealed the mysteries of our faith and the things leading to it.

But at the moment when Christ was dying on the Cross and said "It is finished," an end was made to the ceremonies and rites of Mosaic Law (except those specifically affirmed by scripture and Sacred Tradition).

Now that faith is founded in Christ, and the law of the Gospel has been made manifest, there is no reason to enquire of Him in that manner, nor for Him to speak or to answer as He did in former times. The Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes St. John of the Cross on this matter.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

65 "In many and various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son." Christ, the Son of God made man, is the Father's one, perfect and unsurpassable Word. In him he has said everything; there will be no other word than this one. St. John of the Cross, among others, commented strikingly on Hebrews 1:1-2:

In giving us his Son, his only Word (for he possesses no other), he spoke everything to us at once in this sole Word - and he has no more to say. . . because what he spoke before to the prophets in parts, he has now spoken all at once by giving us the All Who is His Son. Any person questioning God or desiring some vision or revelation would be guilty not only of foolish behavior but also of offending him, by not fixing his eyes entirely upon Christ and by living with the desire for some other novelty.

There will be no further Revelation

According to St. John of the Cross, whoever desires to receive anything in a supernatural manner is finding fault with God for not having given us a complete sufficiency in His Son. If we leave the path given to us, we are not only guilty of curiosity, but of great audacity.

Furthermore, even under Mosaic Law it was not lawful for everyone to enquire of God. He did not answer all men, but only the priests and prophets. It was from their mouths that the people learned Mosaic Law and its correct interpretations. If a man desired to know anything of God, he asked a prophet or a priest and not God Himself. It was the prophets and of the priests who determined whether signs, visions, or miracles came from God.

It is not proper for us to pray for signs, visions, or miracles. For one thing, we may be conditioning our faith, on receiving such miracles.

Luke 4:12

Jesus said to him in reply, "It also says, 'You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.'"

Secondly, signs and visions can just as easily come from Satan, putting the one who prays into grave peril, presumption, and sins that spring from pride.

According to St. John of the Cross, "To desire to commune with God by such means is a most perilous thing, more so than I can express, and that one who is affectioned to such methods will not fail to err greatly and will often find himself in confusion.

This is not to say that God no longer speaks to us. For instance, the miracle of Fatima clearly predicted the course of the twentieth century.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

66 "The Christian economy, therefore, since it is the new and definitive Covenant, will never pass away; and no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ." Yet even if Revelation is already complete, it has not been made completely explicit; it remains for Christian faith gradually to grasp its full significance over the course of the centuries.

67 Throughout the ages, there have been so-called "private" revelations, some of which have been recognized by the authority of the Church. They do not belong, however, to the deposit of faith. It is not their role to improve or complete Christ's definitive Revelation, but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history. Guided by the Magisterium of the Church, the sensus fidelium knows how to discern and welcome in these revelations whatever constitutes an authentic call of Christ or his saints to the Church.

Christian faith cannot accept "revelations" that claim to surpass or correct the Revelation of which Christ is the fulfillment, as is the case in certain non-Christian religions and also in certain recent sects which base themselves on such "revelations".

According to St. John of the Cross, God desires not that any man by himself alone should believe his experiences to be of God, or should act in conformity with them, or rely upon them, but rather should believe the Church and her ministers.

Free and Independent Press?

According to the U.S. Department of State:

 The arena for communication and public debate has become dominated by the media: radio and television, newspapers, magazines, books – and increasingly by newer media such as the Internet and satellite television.

…One (function) is to inform and educate. To make intelligent decisions about public policy, people need accurate, timely, unbiased information.

…Commentators point to another increasingly important role for the media: “setting the agenda.” Since they can't report everything, the news media must choose which issues to highlight and which to ignore. In short, they tend to decide what is news and what isn't. These decisions, in turn, influence the public's perception of what issues are most important.

Media Coverage of March for Life

In August 2010 Glenn Beck hosted the Rally to Restore Honor. According to Wikipedia, the attendance of the rally is disputed. A scientific approach using three experts with their own methodologies placed the crowd size at about 87,000, while media reports ranged from 80,000 to 500,000. Since "honor" is a subjective term, the goals of the rally were not well-defined. The secular media covered the event and gave it a great deal of publicity.

In October 2010 Jon Stewart held the Rally to Restore Sanity, which drew about 200,000 people. The rally was a spoof of Glenn Beck's rally and its goals were even less defined than Beck's. The secular media covered the event and gave it a great deal of publicity.

Yesterday on January 24th, the anniversary of the infamous Roe v. Wade decision, the March for Life drew about 300,000 people. The goals of the event were well-defined as it was a protest against abortion. However, the secular media ignored the event. If there was even a single media report on it, I haven't seen it.

It is possible that the media decided that the public just isn't interested in the topic. It is noted, however, that the majority of Americans opposes abortion, while the government has dug in its heels in support of the "institution." That would seem to be newsworthy - that and the fact that 52 million babies have been killed since Roe v. Wade.

It seems that the public is interested in the March for Life, based on its Internet buzz generated from blogs and Internet forum postings. It compares favorably to the other rallies mentioned above.

·        When you Google "Rally to Restore Honor" you get 146,000 hits.

·        When you Google "Rally to Restore Sanity" you get 882,000 hits.

·        When you Google "March for Life" you get 788,000 hits.

Why did the media cover the two relatively frivolous events while it ignored the March for Life?

One reason might be that the media is controlled by fewer corporations than it had in the past. In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the U.S. Now the U.S. news media is controlled by no less than eight corporations. If these eight corporations decide that they don't want to give press to an event, it just won't happen.

According to Noam Chomsky (who you won't often see quoted on a religious-themed blog):

"The real mass media are basically trying to divert people. Let them do something else, but don’t bother us (us being the people who run the show). Let them get interested in professional sports, for example. Let everybody be crazed about professional sports or sex scandals or the personalities and their problems or something like that. Anything, as long as it isn’t serious. Of course, the serious stuff is for the big guys. 'We' take care of that.

What are the elite media, the agenda-setting ones? The New York Times and CBS, for example. Well, first of all, they are major, very profitable, corporations. Furthermore, most of them are either linked to, or outright owned by, much bigger corporations, like General Electric, Westinghouse, and so on. They are way up at the top of the power structure of the private economy which is a very tyrannical structure. Corporations are basically tyrannies, hierarchic, controlled from above. If you don’t like what they are doing you get out. The major media are just part of that system.

What about their institutional setting? Well, that’s more or less the same. What they interact with and relate to is other major power centers—the government, other corporations, or the universities.

Most people would agree that a successful democracy requires on a free and independent press. I'm not so sure that we have that in this country.

37. Do not love the idolater

The 37th commandment of Mosaic Law is to not to love the idolater.

Where in scripture?

Deuteronomy 13:9

Do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him.

According to Jewish tradition, one may not love a person who entices others to worship idols. According to Chabad.org, though Jews are commanded to love every other Jew, – even a sinner – an inciter is the exception to this rule.

New Testament References

Matthew 22:39

…You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Romans 13:8-10

Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments, "You shall not commit adultery; you shall not kill; you shall not steal; you shall not covet," and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this saying, (namely) "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Love does no evil to the neighbor; hence, love is the fulfillment of the law.

As Christians, we are called upon to love the sinner, but hate the sin.

As an aside, some people credit the phrase “love the sinner, but hate the sin,” to Mahatma Gandhi. The phrase, however, can be traced back to St. Augustine, who wrote “With love for mankind and hatred of sins.”

Conclusion

Not binding on Christians  

36. Do not missionize an individual to idol worship

The 36th commandment of Mosaic Law is to not missionize an individual to idol worship.

Where in scripture?

Deuteronomy 13:7-12

If your own full brother, or your son or daughter, or your beloved wife, or your intimate friend, entices you secretly to serve other gods, whom you and your fathers have not known, gods of any other nations, near at hand or far away, from one end of the earth to the other: do not yield to him or listen to him, nor look with pity upon him, to spare or shield him, but kill him. Your hand shall be the first raised to slay him; the rest of the people shall join in with you. You shall stone him to death, because he sought to lead you astray from the LORD, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that place of slavery. And all Israel, hearing of it, shall fear and never again do such evil as this in your midst.

Jewish tradition forbids individuals from enticing others to worship idols. Anyone who tries to persuade others to worship idols is to be put to death by stoning, regardless of whether the enticer is successful in his efforts.

New Testament References

Ephesians 5:5

Be sure of this, that no immoral or impure or greedy person, that is, an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.

It is clear that we are forbidden from worshipping idols and from enticing others to worship idols. That part of the Mosaic Law is binding on Christians.

As we noted in a previous post, however, Christians must not put idolaters to death.  

New Testament Reference

Romans 12:19

Beloved, do not look for revenge but leave room for the wrath; for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord."

Conclusion

Binding on Christians  

Religious Ecstasy - Pt. 3

In the last post I reviewed the first book of St. John of the Cross' of Ascent of Mount Carmel. This post will resume the summary and commentary starting with the first part of Book Two.

The book provides a handbook on how to achieve “mystical union” with God. Before proceeding I should note that God dwells with, and is present substantially in, every soul. What St. John of the Cross means when he writes about mystical or divine union is a transformation that is more supernatural. Union comes to us when we conform our wills to the will of God. In order to do this we must rid ourselves of everything that is repugnant to the Divine and transform ourselves through love and obedience.

We can receive knowledge from either of two channels. The first is the natural channel, which uses the senses. The second is supernatural. In the last post we discussed how we should cut ourselves off from the information we receive from our bodily senses. With the supernatural manner, however, information comes to our souls over and above our natural ability. It is this last type of information that we are seeking.

The second book of Ascent of Mount Carmel metaphorically describes the next part of the journey - which deals with faith - as midnight of the dark night. Compared to the total light of God, faith is still the dark night for the soul, but it gives off its own illumination. As we travel through the night, we become more sensitive to that illumination and become united with God in simplicity, purity, love, and solitude.

Faith has the ability to overwhelm the senses. The previous post described how a person should deprive himself of the natural “light” of senses so that it will only be his faith that gives light to the darkness.

Faith tells us about things that we have never seen and helps us to attain knowledge that we can't receive through the senses. It has a faculty for the supernatural, whenever God chooses to allow us a glimpse of the supernatural. Faith comes to us through grace, but we can "culture" it through certain habits and disciplines.

In order for us to be guided by solely by faith, we must not only cut ourselves off from the distractions of the physical senses, we must also be blind itself to certain things that we see with our imagination during prayer and meditation. When we imagine spiritual entities/things such as God or Heaven, we usually picture them based on things that we have seen with our own eyes. Of course, God is much greater than anything we could ever imagine. We don’t have minds that can comprehend the infinite and perfect. When we try to envision God, Heaven, we are limiting Him, the way He works in us, and our progress toward mystical union.

Therefore, we should take our sensory deprivation one step further. When we have reached the point where it is appropriate to do so, we should strip our prayer and contemplation of visual images. Passing beyond all that can be understood naturally, our souls will come to desire what cannot be known to the senses. The more we emphasize our rational experiences and knowledge, whether it is spiritual or not, the more we lose focus of the supreme good, and the more we are hindered from approaching it.

It is very important to note, however, the use of imagination during prayer is necessary for all beginners. The use of the senses during the early part of our faith journey serves as remote means to union with God. Many people will be satisfied to stay in this “step” of their spiritual journeys and stay there forever. There is nothing “wrong” with that. If we are seeking a mystical union, at some point we will need to pass beyond that point, but if we do it too soon, we risk moving “backward.”

St. John of the Cross gives us the signs we can use to determine whether we should abandon the use of mental pictures during the course of prayer and meditation. He says that all three of these signs must be present.

1. You no longer take pleasure from using imagination during prayer and instead find aridity.
2. You no longer desire to fix your prayer upon particular “objects,” exterior or interior.
3. The surest sign is that the soul takes pleasure in being alone, and waits with loving attentiveness upon God, without making any particular meditation, in inward peace and quietness and rest and without acts and exercises of the faculties.

As we transition from one state to the other, we will hardly be aware of the change for two reasons.

1. At the beginning, the change is very subtle and almost imperceptible; and 
2. Having been accustomed to the first form of meditation, we may not notice the switch toward the more spiritual since we don’t yet understand it.

Conforming Ourselves to God’s Will

God communicates to us all the time, but we must learn to listen. We can prepare ourselves for this by conforming ourselves to God’s will.  We must learn to become creatures of certain habits, which in time will become automatic and involuntary. In this process, some of our old habits must be annihilated.

According to St. John of the Cross, God gave us “power to be transformed in God …being born again through grace, and dying first of all to everything that is of the old man, are raised above themselves to the supernatural, and receive from God this rebirth and adoption, which transcends all that can be imagined.”

There can be no perfect transformation if there is not perfect purity, and our enlightenment, illumination, and union with God will be according to the proportion of our purity. (However, during our journey we must be cognizant of the fact that true perfection is for God alone.) This process gives us security against the deceits of the devil and against self-love and its ramifications, which subtly deceives us and hinders us on our spiritual journeys.  

Throughout his book, St. John of the Cross continually uses scripture to support all his contentions. However, he emphasizes Mark 8:34-35 - He summoned the crowd with his disciples and said to them, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and that of the gospel will save it.

According to St. John of the Cross, “True spirituality seeks for God's sake that which is distasteful rather than that which is delectable; and inclines itself rather to suffering than to consolation; and desires to go without all blessings for God's sake rather than to possess them; and to endure aridities and afflictions rather than to enjoy sweet communications, knowing that this is to follow Christ and to deny oneself.”

An example of true spirituality is to never discuss whether we “get something out of mass.” If we think in those terms we are completely missing the point. We are there to worship God, not for our enjoyment.

Contrary to popular belief, religion isn’t necessarily a “feel-good thing.” Too often we use religion for consolation when life becomes harder, and ignore or compartmentalize it when life is easy.

According to St. John of the Cross, “Christ is known very little by those who consider themselves His friends: we see them seeking in Him their own pleasures and consolations because of their great love for themselves, but not loving His bitter trials and His death because of their great love for Him.”

God does not necessarily want you to be rich. He cares more about your eternal salvation than your luxuries. Scripture is clear that we should embrace our sufferings. When we offer them up to God in obedience and humility we receive graces beyond imagination. When we join our sufferings to Jesus, we transcend time and space, and in our own humble ways we share in his sufferings.

Collosians 1:24 - Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking  in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church

We are so far removed from the Age of Faith that very few of us remember (and it is now rarely taught) that when we offer up our sufferings to God, suffering is a blessing. This process gives meaning and value to our sufferings. When we only feel sorry for ourselves, suffering is of absolutely no value.

In taking the narrow way, there is room only for self-denial. “If a man resolves to submit himself to carrying this cross -- that is to say, if he resolves to desire in truth to meet trials and to bear them in all things for God's sake, he will find in them all great relief and sweetness wherewith he may travel upon this road, detached from all things and desiring nothing.

“The soul that practices this suffering and annihilation will achieve all that those other exercises can achieve, and that can be found in them, and even more. If a soul be found wanting in this exercise, although its meditations and communications may be as lofty as those of the angels, he will not progress. Any spirituality that would fain walk in sweetness and with ease, and flees from the imitation of Christ, is worthless.”

St. John of the Cross emphasizes, however, that just as using imagination during prayer is important for beginners, so too is the use of religion as a consolation. For novices, it may be the only way to get through serious setbacks in life. However, for most of us, it is something that we need to move beyond (which is not easy in this era of hedonism).  

Supernatural Experiences Involving the Senses

As we proceed along our journey we may encounter supernatural experiences that involve our bodily senses. If we do, our first inclination might be to celebrate and embrace the experiences. These experiences might involve the senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.

• With respect to sight, some people may have visions that involve Heaven, life after death, or people who have passed on. 
• With respect to hearing, we may hear voices or instructions. 
• With respect to smell, we may perceive certain fragrances, such as the smell of roses, which is often linked to visions of the Blessed Mother.
• Though it might be less common, some people may be conscious of unexplainable sweet tastes.
• With respect to touch, some people may feel what they believe is the touch of grace. To some, as if they are infused in a physical way with ecstasy.

We may feel that they are a gift or a grace. However, St. John of the Cross instructs that we must never rely upon them or accept them, but must always fly from them, without trying to ascertain whether are good or evil. The more exterior and physical they are, the likely it is that they come from God (God most likely to communicate to the spirit rather than to the senses). Therefore, such things are more likely to come from Satan than from God.

When we have these types of experiences, we should immediately consult with a spiritual advisor who is knowledgeable about spiritual theology. If we rely on experiences and information that aren’t coming from God, at the very least we run the risk of falling into error and presumption and allow vanity to grow within us.

The experience may seem to be of greater importance than they truly are because they are more readily felt. When we go after them, we abandon faith because we use them as our guide, but the more attention we pay to such things, the farther we stray from the true means, which is faith/trust without proof.

When a supernatural experience comes from God it produces its effect on the spirit at the very moment when it appears or is felt, without even giving the soul time or opportunity to deliberate whether to accept or reject it. If we need to contemplate as to whether the experience is from God or is diabolic, it probably does not come from God.

Even if the source of a supernatural experience (involving the senses) originates from God, we should not desire it because it is a detour from, rather than a path to, mystical union. St. John of the Cross gives the following reasons as to why we should reject such experiences:

• They cause a decrease of faith, because our trust comes from something that is based upon what is tangible.
• If they are not rejected, we may rest in them and not strive to something greater.
• We can become attached to such things and not advance to true resignation and a detachment of the spirit;
• We begin to lose the spiritual advantage of them because they involve the senses, from which we are trying to detach ourselves.
• We might lose grace from a “sense of entitlement” and believe the experiences “belong” to us.
• Accepting the experiences opens the door to the devil who may deceive us with similar things, which he can disguise so that they may appear to be good.

As we pass through the dark night the first gifts that we receive from God are usually unpretentious and don’t involve the senses.

In summary, no knowledge that can be comprehended by “natural” understanding and reasoning can serve as a means of Divine union with God. Such reasoning and understanding is actually an impediment.

According to St. John of the Cross, if the soul conquers the devil upon the first step, it will pass to the second; and if upon the second likewise, it will pass to the third; and so forth.

First we must first deny ourselves the sensual things of the world. Secondly, we must pass out of the state of meditation that relies upon the senses. Thirdly we enter into purity of the spirit.  

Each step is difficult as it takes us out of our comfort zones. Also, results don’t come overnight. We need to “abide attentively and wait lovingly upon God in a state of quiet.” 

Religious Ecstasy - Pt. 2

To read the first post of this series, click here.


The next three or four posts of this series will be a summary and commentary on St. John of the Cross’ book, Ascent of Mount Carmel, which is a “how-to” book for achieving mystical union/religious ecstasy. If you are interested in this subject, I strongly encourage you to read the original source material itself. It is a fairly easy read.

The According to Pope Pius XI, St. John of the Cross “points out to souls the way of perfection as though illumined by light from on high, in his limpidly clear analysis of mystical experience. And although [his works] deal with difficult and hidden matters, they are nevertheless replete with such lofty spiritual doctrine and are so well adapted to the understanding of those who study them that they can rightly be called a guide and handbook for the man of faith who proposes to embrace a life of perfection.”

St. John of the Cross calls the process of achieving mystical union as passing through the dark night. The night is dark because we are not fully illuminated by the truth of God. As I stated in my original post on this subject, achieving mystical union is not common. According to Ascent of Mount Carmel, however, the reason for that is because most of us lack the will to follow through. St. John of the Cross reassures us that all the things that he lays out in his book are “quite sufficient for entrance into the night of sense.” However, the path he describes is extremely difficult and would likely be unsettling since it requires us to strip away our conceits, pleasures, and habits.

According to St. John of the Cross, the reasons most people don’t achieve religious ecstasy are as follows:

·        Most people don’t have any desire to enter the dark night or to allow themselves to be led into it;

·        Most people lack competent and alert spiritual directors who can guide them;

·        Some spiritual advisors might not understand that novices passing through the dark night should be left in the state of purgation and even desire it until God decides otherwise; and

·        While passing through the dark night dark an individual will be contemplative and he will probably feel darkness, trials, and constraints. His friends will diagnose it as depression and encourage him to cheer up and go out and have some fun. Such comforters will certainly derail the novice from his journey.

Book One – The Senses

The journey through the dark night has three parts. It begins with a denial of the senses. The first book of Ascent of Mount Carmel can be summarized in this way – We must make ourselves a vacuum so that God can then fill us.

Desires, when they are acted upon, seem sweet and often appear to be good, but they leave a bitter after-taste.

An individual needs to gradually to deprive himself of the desire for all the worldly things he possesses. “Things” and pleasures distract us. All of creation, compared with the infinite Being of God, is nothing. And therefore the soul that sets its affection upon the distractions of creation restricts what he sees.

The more our souls are filled with desire for “things,” the less capacity we have for God. According to St. John of the Cross, a soul that is clothed in pleasure has no capacity for enlightenment or possession of the pure and simple light of God. Once we purge ourselves of those “creatures,” our souls are like a smooth, blank board upon which nothing is painted, with nothing distracting it. This is the first step.

The soul that loves many other things becomes incapable of pure union with God and transformation in Him. To make progress toward mystical union we must concentrate less on giving up things and instead working on giving up desiring things.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

2015 The way of perfection passes by way of the Cross. There is no holiness without renunciation and spiritual battle. Spiritual progress entails the ascesis and mortification that gradually lead to living in the peace and joy of the Beatitudes.

In my previous post I wrote about my return to the Church. My first two Lents were amazing. Through fasting and prayer I gained much better understanding of God’s plan. As a result, Lent became my favorite time of the year. However, the next few Lents were less remarkable despite the fact that I was giving up more and more “things.” After reading Accent of Mount Carmel I now realize that it was because each Lent I would take two steps forward and two steps back. I would give up distractions for 40 days, only to return to them immediately after Lent.

According to St. John of the Cross, the first thing that we must do on our journey through the dark night is to abandon our pride. For most people, this is probably their biggest distraction, the hardest to recognize in themselves, and the most difficult to strip away.

There is a difference between pride and self-confidence and self-respect. St. John of the Cross says that “those who consider themselves to be persons with a certain amount of knowledge are very ignorant, so that the Apostle, writing to the Romans, says of them: Dicentes enim se esse sapientes, stulti facti sunt. That is: Professing themselves to be wise, they became foolish. And those alone acquire wisdom of God who are like ignorant children, and, laying aside their knowledge, walk in His service with love.” When stripped of the defense shield of pride, the dark night might become very dark and foreboding. However, we must work through it because these feeling will pass.

St. John of the Cross says that we should not seek honors before other men because this is also pride. All the wealth and glory of all creation, in comparison with the wealth which is God, is supreme poverty and wretchedness.

We do not gain grace when we don’t raise our desires above “childish” things. In simple spiritual food we could find sweetness, but when we have worldly desires we instead taste things that are only frivolous in fleeting.

Before ascending to the summit, we need to do two things perfectly:

1. We must cast away all strange gods -- namely, all strange affections and attachments; and
2. We must purify ourselves of the remnants of those desires left in the soul, by habitually denying them.

Through the observance of these two things, God will change us, from old to new, by giving us a new understanding of Him, and we will attain the state of union.

As noted in a previous post, St. John of the Cross says, “Wherefore, as in natural generation no form can be introduced unless the preceding, contrary form is first expelled from the subject, which form, while present, is an impediment to the other by reason of the contrariety which the two have between each other; even so, for as long as the soul is subjected to the sensual spirit, the spirit which is pure and spiritual cannot enter it.”

There are five “positive” evils that come from desires. They are as follows:

·        The first evil is a resistance to the Spirit of God.

·        The second effect is that distractions weary the soul by tormenting, defiling, and weakening it. Desires weary the soul because it is never satisfied. After the temporary pleasures of hedonism wear off, we are left with an even greater emptiness and hunger. The more intense the desire, the greater is the torment that it causes the soul.

·        The third evil is blindness and darkening of the soul. When the soul is darkened in understanding, the understanding has no capacity for receiving enlightenment from the wisdom of God.

·        The fourth evil is the staining and defilement of the soul.

·        The fifth evil is making the soul lukewarm and weak. If are many and dispersed, the attention to things of God is dispersed and the soul is weaker in virtue. The soul is set upon various trifles and becomes like water which, having a place below to empty itself, never rises. Desires are like leeches, which are forever sucking the blood from our veins,

For most of us, our blindness is so extreme that we stumble “at midday as though it was in the darkness. For he that is blinded by desire has this property, that, when he is set in the midst of truth and of that which is good for him, he can no more see them than if he were in darkness.”

All desires are not equally harmful.

There are also natural desires such as hope, fear and grief. The natural desires “hinder the soul little, if at all, from attaining to union.”

It is the voluntary desires that are grave and those must all be driven away no matter how slight they may be.

St. John of the Cross says “a garment, a book, a cell, a particular kind of food, tittle-tattle, fancies for tasting, knowing or hearing certain things, and suchlike. Any one of these imperfections, if the soul has become attached and habituated to it, is of as great harm to its growth and progress in virtue.”

It is difficult to cast-aside things that are important to us - the same things that we use to define ourselves – our passions and hobbies. These things are different for everyone. They might be:

·        Listening to sports-talk radio;

·        Going out to dinner;

·        Movies;

·        Fine wine;

·        Television (other than EWTN);

·        Reading novels;

·        Home brewing;

·        Fantasy football;

·        Crossword puzzles;

·        Online poker;

·        Golf;

·        Vacations;

·        …and many more.

All of these things may seem harmless. However, they allow subtle evils to enter our lives. Even a love of scripture can be a distraction if we become prideful and use it like a club to bully others on Internet forums.


The problem with letting a single distraction remain can be illustrated by this example: Have you ever done a single thing or task throughout the entire day? That night there was a good chance that you dreamed about it. Therefore if we strip ourselves of all distractions except one, there is a good chance that that single distraction will have an inordinate amount of power over our souls.

Of course we can’t purge ourselves of everything. Family may be a pleasure but it is also our obligation to take care of them and spend time with them. Exercise is also important because our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit. Even money isn’t always a distraction. St. John of the Cross said, “David says these words: Pauper sum ego, et in laboribus a indenture mea. Which signifies: I am poor and in labors from my youth. He calls himself poor, although it is clear that he was rich, because his will was not set upon riches, and thus it was as though he were really poor.”

To achieve religious ecstasy, the first step is that virtually everything that that lives in our souls must die; both little and great, and the soul must be detached from desires.

In addition to the five “positive” evils stemming from desires that are listed above, there is also the “privative” evil, which comes from depriving the soul of the grace of God. The privative evil can only be wrought by voluntary desires for things relating to mortal sin. Mortal sins produce total blindness, torment, impurity, and weakness.

All “unnatural” desires produce evils. According to St. John of the Cross, “Although one avaricious desire produces them all, its principal and direct result is to produce misery. One vainglorious desire produces them all; its principal and direct result is to produce darkness and blindness. And, although one gluttonous desire produces them all, its principal result is to produce luke-warmness in virtue.”

All the virtues grow through the practice of any one of them, and all the vices grow through the practice of any one of them.

A person needs to develop a habitual desire to imitate Christ in everything that he does. In to do this well, every pleasure that presents itself to the senses, if it does not add to the honor and glory of God, must be rejected.

In this detachment the spiritual soul finds its repose. Since it covets nothing, nothing wearies it when it is lifted up, and nothing oppresses it when it is cast down, because it is in the center of its humility. But when it covets anything, at that very moment it becomes wearied.

Strive to do the following:

·        To prefer, not that which is easiest, but that which is most difficult;

·        To desire nothing;

·        To enter into complete detachment, emptiness, and poverty with respect to everything that is in the world; and

·        To think humbly of yourself.

It will take “courage to remain in darkness as to all things, depriving itself of desire for them all.”


We could, perhaps, accomplish some of what is described above by going into a sensory deprivation tank. However, if we did so without first going to confession, learning humility, and learning obedience, our emptied souls would still be blinded by the sins, which we have not purged. We would be more open to demonic forces rather than to the grace of God. 

The next post in this series will summarize Book Two, which deals with Faith – which is midnight during “the dark night.”

Click here to see the next post in this series.