The Gospel of Jesus Christ is not a private opinion, a remote spiritual ideal, or a mere program for personal growth. The Gospel is the power which can transform the world! The Gospel is no abstraction: it is the living person of Jesus Christ, the Word of God, the reflection of the Father’s glory (Cf. Hebr. 1: 2), the Incarnate Son who reveals the deepest meaning of our humanity and the noble destiny to which the whole human family is called (Cf. Gaudium et Spes, 22). Christ has commanded us to let the light of the Gospel shine forth in our service to society. How can we profess faith in God’s word, and then refuse to let it inspire and direct our thinking, our activity, our decisions, and our responsibilities towards one another?
--John Paul II, Baltimore, 8 October 1995
The Gospel is not a private opinion
THE WORD GIVES ORDER, DIRECTION AND UNITY TO CREATION
By his own wisdom and Word, who is our Lord and Saviour Christ, the all-holy Father (whose excellence far exceeds that of any creature), like a skilful steersman guides to safety all creation, regulating and keeping it in being, as he judges right. It is right that creation should exist as he has made it and as we see it happening, because this is his will, which no one would deny. For if the movement of the universe were irrational, and the world rolled on in random fashion, one would be justified in disbelieving what we say. But if the world is founded on reason, wisdom and science, and is filled with orderly beauty, then it must owe its origin and order to none other than the Word of God.
He is God, the living and creative God of the universe, the word of the good God, who is God in his own right. The Word is different from all created things: he is the unique Word belonging only to the good Father. This is the Word that created this whole world and enlightens it by his loving wisdom. He who is the good Word of the good Father produced the order in all creation, joining opposites together, and forming from them one harmonious sound. He is God, one and only-begotten, who proceeds in goodness from the Father as from the fountain of goodness, and gives order, direction and unity to creation.
By his eternal Word the Father created all things and implanted a nature in his creatures. He did not want to see them tossed about at the mercy of their own natures, and so be reduced to nothingness. But in his goodness he governs and sustains the whole of nature by his Word (who is himself also God), so that under the guidance, providence and ordering of that Word, the whole of nature might remain stable and coherent in his light. Nature was to share in the Father’s Word, whose reality is true, and be helped by him to exist, for without him it would cease to be. For unless the Word, who is the very “image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation,” kept it in existence it could not exist. For whatever exists, whether visible or invisible, remains in existence through him and in him, and he is also the head of the Church, as we are taught by the ministers of truth in their sacred writings.
The almighty and most holy Word of the Father pervades the whole of reality, everywhere unfolding his power and shining on all things visible and invisible. He sustains it all and binds it all together in himself. He leaves nothing devoid of his power but gives life and keeps it in being throughout all of creation and in each individual creature.
--Saint Athanasius, Discourse Against the Pagans
THE WORD CREATES A DIVINE HARMONY IN CREATION
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through him, and without him nothing was made. In these words John the theologian teaches that nothing exists or remains in being except in and through the Word.
Think of a musician tuning his lyre. By his skill he adjusts high notes to low and intermediate notes to the rest, and produces a series of harmonies. So too the wisdom of God holds the world like a lyre and joins things in the air to those on earth, and things in heaven to those in the air, and brings each part into harmony with the whole. By his decree and will he regulates them all to produce the beauty and harmony of a single, well-ordered universe. While remaining unchanged with his Father, he moves all creation by his unchanging nature, according to the Father’s will. To everything he gives existence and life in accordance with its nature, and so creates a wonderful and truly divine harmony.
To illustrate this profound mystery, let us take the example of a choir of many singers. A choir is composed of a variety of men, women and children, of both old and young. Under the direction of one conductor, each sings in the way that is natural for him: men with men’s voices, boys with boys’ voices, old people with old voices, young people with young voices. Yet all of them produce a single harmony. Or consider the example of our soul. It moves our senses according to their several functions so that in the presence of a single object they all act simultaneously: the eye sees, the ear hears, the hand touches, the nose smells, the tongue tastes, and often the other parts of the body act as well as, for example, the feet may walk.
Although this is only a poor comparison, it gives some idea of how the whole universe is governed. The Word of God has but to give a gesture of command and everything falls into place; each creature performs its own proper function, and all together constitute one single harmonious order.
--St Athanasius, Discourse Against the Pagans
Listening to God's word first
"I have always been convinced that if I am to satisfy the people's hunger for the Word of God, I must follow the example of Mary and first listen to it myself and ponder it in my heart (Luke 2:19). I have also come to realise that a bishop must be able to listen to the people to whom he preaches the Good News. Amid today's flood of words, images, and sounds, it is important that a bishop not be thrown off course. He must listen attentively to God and to those around him, convinced that we are all united in the one mystery of God's saving Word."
(John Paul II, Rise, Let Us Be On Our Way, p 43)
Q: Holy Father, I am Fr. Gulliermo M. Cassone, of the Community of Schoenstatt Fathers in Rome, and pastoral vicar in the parish of the Patron Saints of Italy, St. Francis and St. Catherine, in Trastevere. After the Synod on the Word of God, reflecting on proposition 55, ‘Mary Mother of God and Mother of Faith,’ I asked myself how to improve the relationship between the Word of God and Marian piety, both in the spiritual life of the priest and also in pastoral activity. Two images helped me: the Annunciation for hearing, and the Visitation for proclamation. I would like to ask, Holiness, that you illuminate us with your teaching on this theme. Thank you for this gift.
Benedict XVI:
It seems to me that you’ve already given the answer to your question. Really, Mary is the gift of hearing: we see it in the encounter with the Angel, and we see it again in all the scenes of her life, from the wedding at Cana, all the way to the Cross and to the day of Pentecost, when she is among the Apostles to welcome the Spirit. She is the symbol of opening, of the Church which awaits the coming of the Holy Spirit.
In the moment of the Annunciation, we can already glean the attitude of hearing – a true hearing, a hearing of interiorization, which does not simply say ‘yes,’ but assimilates the Word, takes the Word – and then follows it with true obedience, as if it were an interiorized Word, that is, it has become Word in me and for me, almost as the form of my life. This seems to me very beautiful: To see this active hearing, a hearing which attracts the Word in such a way that it enters in me and becomes Word in me, reflecting on it and accepting to the depths of the heart. Thus the Word becomes incarnation.
We see the same thing in the Magnificat. We know that it’s a fabric woven from the words of the Old Testament. We see that Mary truly is a woman of hearing, who conserves the Scripture in her heart. She not only knows the words of certain texts, but she was so identified with the Word that the words of the Old Testament become, in synthetic form, a song in her heart and on her lips. We see that her life was truly penetrated by the Word: she entered into the Word, she assimilated it and it became life in her, transforming itself anew in a Word of praise and of proclaiming the greatness of God.
It seems to me that St. Luke, referring to Mary, says at least three times, perhaps four times, that she assimilated and conserved the Words in her heart. She was, for the Fathers, the model of the Church, the model of the believer who conserves the Word, who carries in herself the Word; who not only reads it, interpreted with the intellect for knowing what it meant in that time and what the philological problems are and so on. All this is interesting and important, but it’s more important to hear the Word that must be conserved and that becomes Word in me, life in me, and the presence of the Lord. Thus, to me the connection seems important between Mariology and theology of the Word, regarding which the synodal fathers spoke, and about which we too will speak in the post-synodal document.
It’s obvious: ‘Madonna’ is a word of hearing, a word of silence, but also a word of praise, or proclamation, so that the Word of hearing becomes flesh anew and becomes the presence of the greatness of God.
(Benedict XVI, Q&A With Priests of Rome, 26 Feb 2009)
16 Omnis Scriptura divinitus inspirata est
et utilis ad docendum, ad arguendum, ad corrigendum, ad erudiendum in iustitia,
17 ut perfectus sit homo Dei, ad omne opus bonum instructus.
16 All scripture is inspired by God
and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
(II Timothy 3:16)
10 Et quomodo descendit imber et nix de caelo
et illuc ultra non revertitur,
sed inebriat terram et infundit eam
et germinare eam facit
et dat semen serenti et panem comedenti,
11 sic erit verbum meum, quod egredietur de ore meo:
non revertetur ad me vacuum,
sed faciet, quaecumque volui,
et prosperabitur in his, ad quae misi illud.
10* "For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and return not thither but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
11 so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and prosper in the thing for which I sent it.
(Isaias 55:10-11)