In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus preached a message of love and acceptance. He called everyone to a new way of being, which would be true to God’s will. As the narrative account continues from chapter eight through nine, we see Jesus putting into practice the lessons he has taught. Jesus accepts lepers, foreigners, women, the sick, the possessed, paralytics, the unclean, and now a tax collector [ … ]
In this Sunday’s Gospel reading we are reminded particularly of the devotion we offer to Mary and of the saving grace the Mother of God brings to our relationship with Jesus. We are reminded once again to think of Mary as the greatest intercessor to whom we may pray. We think as well of how through our relationship with Mary we help enable our knowledge of God within our hearts: it is as if through our love of the Mother of God, Christ may be continually born within us; we seek to become akin to Mary, to emulate her example, so that through the Mother we may the better know the Son [ … ]
In his discourse, Saint Athanasius explores how divine Wisdom—identified with the eternal Word, the Son—imprints itself within creation. Saint Athanasius’s argument responds to Arian claims that the Son was a created being. For Athanasius, the phrase ‘The Lord created me in his works’ cannot mean that the eternal Wisdom itself was made; rather, it refers to the reflection or imprint of Wisdom in the created order [ … ]
