The Lamp To My Feet And Light To My Path

In our last Year of Faith reflection, we touched on the revelation of Jesus Christ entrusted to us in Sacred Scripture. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) explains that in “order to reveal himself to men, in the condescension of his goodness God speaks to them in human words…” (101). Scripture is a gift to men and women, for otherwise we would not understand what God so mercifully wants to tell us.

The Church venerates Sacred Scripture as one utterance, one Word from God the Father who speaks lovingly to His children. Although this one Word was written by human authors, all parts of the Old and New Testaments are believed to be inspired by the Holy Spirit:

"God chose men and while employed by Him they made use of their powers and abilities, so that with Him acting in them and through them, they, as true authors, consigned to writing everything and only those things which He wanted" (Dei Verbum, 11).

Now the Christian Church does not take all parts of the Scripture word for word, but understands that, “Christianity is the religion of the ‘Word,’ of God, a word which is ‘not a written and mute word, but the Word which is incarnate and living’” (CCC, 108):

The Bible is not meant to convey precise historical information or scientific findings to us. Moreover, the authors were children of their time. They shared the cultural ideas of the world around them and often were also dominated by its errors. Nevertheless, everything that man must know about God and the way of his salvation is found with infallible certainty in Sacred Scripture (YOUCAT, 15).

This is why the faithful must look to the Holy Spirit, the interpreter of Scripture, and recognize that there are literal and spiritual senses to what we read. We must pay attention to what the sacred author’s intention is, first being “attentive ‘to the content and unity of the whole Scripture’” (CCC, 112). Second, the Scriptures should be read within the Tradition of the Church, within “the faith that gave rise to them” (YOUCAT, 16). Third, pay attention to the “analogy of faith,” or the “coherence of the truths of faith among themselves” (CCC, 112-114).

Loving Revelation

All that is said about God presupposes something said by God.

       -St. Edith Stein (1891-1942)

In our last reflection on the Catechism of the Catholic Church, we affirmed the possibility of knowing God through natural reason. Movements in creation and in our souls can lead us to a certainty in the existence of God.  

Reason isn’t the only thing He leaves us with, though. Out of love for His creation, God revealed Himself to man by opening Himself and voluntarily speaking to the world. God freely showed Himself to man so that we may know Him: 

Just as in human love one can know something about the beloved person only if he opens his heart to us, so too we know something about God’s inmost thoughts only because the eternal and mysterious God has opened himself to us out of love (YouCat, 17).

God first made Himself known to Adam and Eve, when “he invited them to intimate communion with himself and clothed them with resplendent grace and justice” (CCC, 54).

God continued to reveal Himself after the Fall, when men were scattered and divided by sin. He first did this in the covenant with Noah and then when He selcted Abraham as patriarch of the chosen people, who were specially called “to prepare for that day when God would gather all his children into the unity of the Church” (60).

The Fifth Glorious Mystery: The Coronation

Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death (CCC, 966).

What should we envision when we think of Mary, “Queen over all things?” One might look to the book of Revelation for help: “And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (12:1). Mary said “yes” to the will of God, and for her part in the history of salvation she was fully honored and glorified in heaven. She became our Queen, our Mother in Heaven, our Guardian in all things, and our Star of the New Evangelization.

While meditating on the crowning of Our Lady Queen of Heaven, say one Our Father, 10 Hail Mary’s, and a Glory Be.

It is the end of Mary’s month of May, and we have now come to the end of our Rosary. Conclude by reciting the Hail Holy Queen and by making a Sign of the Cross:
 
Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope.  To you we cry, poor banished children of Eve. To you we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.  Turn then, O most gracious advocate, your eyes of mercy toward us, and after this our exile, show unto us the blessed fruit of your womb, Jesus. O clement! O loving! O sweet Virgin Mary!

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God. That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.