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A Word From Our Associate&
PERPETUAL ADORATION
St. Augustine, that keen observer of the ways of the human heart, had a favorite phrase: "Tell me what you love," he would say, "and I'll tell you who you are." And so it always is. We are creatures still being formed, still under construction so to speak, and what we get formed into, what we become, is to some degree in our power: we will become what we love. We will take on the characteristics of whatever we set the gaze of our hearts upon, whatever we train ourselves to long for, to pursue, to fill our vision. And this will go on until finally, when the construction job is completed, we will have become either a creature worthy of the light and joy of heaven, or a creature who has trained him or herself to love the darkness and for whom heaven is a place of horror and fear. This is the whole point of the Last Judgment. As C. S. Lewis once put it, if we don't say to God in this life "Thy will be done," the time will come when God will say to us, "Very well, thy will be done." What we decide to love determines our destiny.
This is the way St. Paul describes it in the second letter to the Corinthians: "And we, with unveiled faces beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed from one degree of glory to another by the Lord, who is the Spirit." Notice the way Paul speaks of this: we gaze upon the Lord (Christ), and as we set the gaze of our hearts upon him, we are transformed into him, we go from "one degree of glory to another," which is another way of saying, we participate in the Divine nature. Here is a simple way of putting this very profound truth: By gazing upon Christ we become part of him. By setting the eyes of our hearts upon Love Himself, we become part of that love.
This is the great drama of life: day by day, by our decisions, by our actions, by how we direct our hearts and set our desires, we are participating in the creation of ourselves. And here we see one of the reasons prayer is so important. A great deal of prayer is simply putting ourselves into the presence of Christ and gazing upon him. There in his presence, in ways that are mysterious and often not felt, we are being changed, transformed, made more like Christ, made more true and holy and beautiful. We don't always see the effects of this now, but the day is coming when all that is hidden will come to light, and it will become clear who we truly are.
What a blessing to be able to place ourselves in the special presence of Christ in eucharistic adoration, and there to be with him. And how good it is that we have in the parish a perpetual gaze upon Christ going forward at all hours of day and night. The entire community, represented before the throne of God by our brother or sister, is being transformed mysteriously by that loving prayer from one degree of glory to another.
Come to the Adoration Chapel. Come and be transformed into Christ.
Fr. Michael
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