As it was in the beginning...

I'm learning something important, one of those little rules of life or bits of wisdom that God passes to us which we can probably only receive if we are open to it and the time is right for our development to allow that opening.

The beginning and ending are the transitions we have in everything. Check, I knew that from before my faith formed and now I just happened to see how to apply that fact.

We live, and we die, both inevitable. We, in the faith, know we live again. That is one application of the beginning of one and the ending of another.

Another application of this flipping it, of switching tasks and stepping on to the next, on our changing in this world of inevitable changes...

We sacrifice before the altar in order to become One with Christ. This is both a simple and complex idea. I was given a blessing by witnessing Father Ramon talk on this subject at the event tonight at a local parish, a half hour covering the essence of what the Eucharist is in passing what he could of the six semesters of the course the seminaries take on that subject. Let me see if I can paraphrase or convey my take on it, without straying from the liturgical interpretations if I can and passing on this wisdom to all environments out there.

The sacrifice is the ending of our worldly concern. We do this in many forms but this always includes the giving over of trust/faith to Christ in an open heart so humbly compliant that one does not question, does not worry, does not wish for more, does not doubt the grand plan in which our suffering is bringing us together and closer to Christ. Through this is the beginning of our spiritual Grace, and how long we can maintain it through the opening in each moment and in each opportunity to give of ourselves and anything that is of our own expectations and wishes over to Christ in utter dependence, for He is the Creator that designed us to do His will.

I was not always of the faith and it may be a bit much for those in earlier stages of their development to not question automatically out of the things they have in their worldly environments and habitual thought patterns, but I know that once one does this act of opening the "leap of faith" without reservation, that one begins that journey from any state of disgrace into a metanoia of new-found Grace.

This means that there is a sychronicity, the word the band The Police used in their album years ago, or a harmony to use a more common word, or a synonym to use a literary word, or a metaphor to use a poetic word, between several concepts that are all coming together for me in this paradigm I'm seeing the world in tonight.

The similarities are between our commitment sacrifice (we suffer our ideas and possessions and will over to Christ for His good will), called palanca, and our altar sacrifice that evolved from animal sacrifices to our living sacrifice of God's only son for us together with us to unify with us in the Eucharist.

The similarities are also between our peace of mind when in that state of Grace of closeness when we have complete faith, and when we take the Eucharist, and when we are to pass into heaven itself.

The similarities, furthermore, are between how God, through the continuance of the Eucharist in the present, and the sacrifice that is timeless and passes for all generations, is in fact a connection to a timeless heaven in which we are already, when we taking the Eucharist, passing out of our worldly constructs of time and become one with the future afterlife in which all is at peace and unity with God.