TIME, SPACE, ENTROPY AND OUR SALVATION

During the Fall of Man, space and time seized becoming a unity , hence ‘time waits for no man’ and ‘time is not our friend’, but this ‘time, also heals all hurts’.  With time, Time gets tired of its speed and acceleration’, for those who know how to wait. Suurulere.

The model of this waiting is Mary. Hence, when time got tired and became spent, ‘at the fullness of time’, God was born of a woman. This is the genesis of authentic serendipity which happens to the meek and humble. 

How can we sinners, who leave amidst the conflict of time and space presume to do without Mary? Time, as we know it today, has become a big illusion in Mary, by her faith. ‘Be still and know that I am God’. It all happens with the faith and surrender of a woman. 

In our age, the strategic disposition of the Church is to station Mary as the Mother of God within the genesis of time illusion, (January the 1st) and ultimately defeat this entropy that exist in the mind of man as a result of faithlessness. ‘He who does not gather with me scatters’ so says the Lord. 

A popular Scientist, in describing the hopelessness of correcting entropy said the issue is like a scrambled omelette which can never become a hatched egg 🍳 🥚 . That ‘impossibility’ is precisely what Christ has come to correct through the faithfulness and humility of Mary.

TEACHING: A SUPERIOR ACT OF CHARITY

The manner this has been deeply impressed on me now makes the difference . There is a saying: ‘It is not so much giving men fish but teaching them how to fish that counts’. When we give men fish (which we should rightly do) we have only practised a non sustaining, ephemeral, and risky action ( love is a risk anyway) , which would probably come back to haunt in this plane of existence. Christ’s efforts at miracles often hardened their hearts, because man is corrupted.  The better strategy is to teach and perform the principal task of a teacher: letting go, even to the point of death. 

The moment Mary introduced Jesus into open miracle was the commencement of His passion. He had always constantly performed miracles beforehand but was so disinterested that no one knew the source of goodness in there lives. Only deepest faith like Mary can perceive that miracles happen continuously , but His self manifestation at Canaan only pointed to Calvary. Mary, for the love of humanity, you showed your Son the pathway to Calvary. Oore ni’won. But, God does not know how to measure gifts, it is in His nature to give over abundantly. Ko dun, ko po, ko pe, Oluwa lo n fun ni I se.

Back to our point. Teaching is very far superior to material giving. That is why Christ is the ultimate Teacher who sets Himself towards teaching others. Material miracles often comes only after He has set himself to teach them. 

The loftiest vocation is that of a teacher. This purpose informed why the Apostles devoted themselves to teaching and left the lower tasks to Deacons. But 99.99% of us are more interested in the latter because of its immediate gratification. 

The burden of application of what has been taught, weighs upon the learner. If we can apply successfully, it yields what Economists call ‘compound interest ’, that is life . Christ said: not everyone who call me Lord Lord will be with Me, but those who do the will of My Father 

The application of Christ teaching often involves letting go, skinning ourselves (detachment) to arrive at the point of ‘compound interest ’. The reason why Christ admonished us not to call any man a teacher is the fact that others can only point the way. When we trust Him, He not only points the way , but follow through the way with us because He is the Way. This is what grace does. This is why He only is ‘O-ran-mo-nise-faya-ti’.

As in heaven, so on earth. The bulk of problems most Students face is not in the area of knowledge or critical analysis, but in the area of Application. That is why the Application aspect of study is left until the final year when the student has been sufficiently taught and supposedly mature. Few people can apply in the face of worldly catastrophes. That is why many graduates 🎓 go seeking the safe harbour of employment which is a partial risk of application. Entrepreneurship,  a tasking and risky endeavour is what really pushes knowledge to the utmost test, it really opens us up to the path of application and unlearning the learnt. Aye le, eniyan soro...

The bulk of this ‘do what I tell you’ winner that Christ hints is why Application is the key and why without His grace, Application is useless, and why without faith and trust in Him it is impossible to receive this grace. Faith comes first. The bulk of our Spiritual works should be geared towards this work and manner of seeing. Without Him we can do nothing.

The basis is not to stop giving, it is to understand that the superior work lies in teaching, especially in a teaching that involves letting go, in being detached, because every teacher is also a learner, and the bulk of this learning consists in detachment. A teacher should not force, he must respect the learner’s free will. Forcing plays according to rules and laws, and there is a karma with a teaching that uses force. You might have a sufficient broadened heart to cope with its boomerang, just as Christ did after He drove out His point by driving the traders from the temple, but we cannot arrive at the point of abundance without ‘poverty’. Steve Jobs counseled His Students to be foolish, to be hungry.. ‘Eni ti o se bi alaaru l’Oyingbo, ko le se bi Adegboro l’Oja Oba’ . But this detachment should not be forced (only on ourselves) ,  the learner should be allowed to arrive at experience in freedom.

Giving has to lead to teaching, teaching is useless without acquiring knowledge, knowledge is useless without application of what is learnt, Application is useless without cultivating a detached spirit , detachment is useless without grace, grace is impossible without faith in Christ the only authentic Teacher! And this faith will be unnecessary without a burning fire 🔥 of ❤️ love!

THE STATIONS OF THE CROSS : INTRODUCTION

Assume briefly, that you have heard nothing -or very little- about the Christian message and have entered a Church. What do you see?  

All that  imposes on you will be visible signs of sufferings and death. For instance, right ahead inside the Church you see the sculpture of a dead man on a cross. On her walls are lined portraits and paintings of vivid suffering, and in some you have actual graves of men literally buried. Without looking hard and far, the Church is simply a personification of sorrow and death.

Look hard and far enough, and by grace you can discover at the other end of the Church, across to the periphery, something upon which the Church, the world and the entire Civilisation is sustained: It is a Living Bread! This Bread is not made cheap, it comes from the Mass, which itself is an experiential death. It takes the death of God to be sustained in the Tabernacle.

True life can be discovered through the mystery of death, as personified by the Church. The story of suffering and death lining the Church’s interiors is an unwritten message about the mystery of love and life, and the paradox of death and life, where death is a transition to the eternal life of the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the true life of the Church! That is why it is described as the source and summit of the Christian life by the Church (CCC 1324).

To reverse the Fall at Eden, we need to eat of the fruit of the tree of life, which is the Eucharist. But effort is required if we are to pass through the gate of Eden where this fruit is grown, because fiery angels with blazing swords have been stationed (Gen 3:24).  Without faith in Jesus the Christ, one can be consumed by the death personified within the Church, a necessary path to the tree of life. This path is the Way of the Cross!

The one lesson to be learnt about life is that without the cross, there can be no crown. One cannot separate love from suffering, freedom from toil, life from death. This is the great life’s Paradox.

How then can a modern person, filled with doubt, pleasure and sloth, come to term with this difficult rationale of the cross? This shall be my task during this Lenten Season: to journey in writing through the 14 Stations of the Passion of Our Lord from a modern-man perspective, and (hopefully) show the fact that, even in our modern age, the greatest means to freedom is the loving acceptance of Our Lord’s cross.

He invites us not to shoulder any cross but His’ (Mt 11:28-30), because His yoke is easy, and His burden is light. He will help us, He is Love and when we love, there is no suffering because, pain disappears.