which all your generations shall celebrate
with pilgrimage to the LORD, as a perpetual institution.”
When disasters are
followed by funerals which are followed by the news media – and it seems to be
a daily occurrence – we hear people saying of their beloved dead, “We will
never forget them.”
It’s a heartfelt,
sincere expression but never and forever are very long times. How do we
intend to keep that vow? When President Kennedy was assassinated, a sorrowing
nation lit an eternal flame over his grave in Arlington Cemetery. Monuments,
usually of granite, have been built to honor the dead of the Vietnam, Korean
and both World Wars. We use granite or brass to mark the graves of our dead because
stones don’t move themselves and brass doesn’t corrode. These monuments will
last a very long time. But forever is
even longer.
In today’s first reading
we hear God’s command through Moses that the Jews should maintain “a perpetual
institution” to commemorate their deliverance from Egypt. Through Jesus the Church
inherited that memory and its obligation; we keep it with our Eucharist. We believe
that the Word of God and our response, which is faith, outlast even stone
monuments like pyramids and Stonehenge. We believe this despite the resistance
of our human nature, or perhaps because of it.
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Our faith goes further:
it teach us this “perpetual institution” exists already in eternity. It is that “heavenly
temple” of Hebrews 9:11-12
But when Christ came as high priest of the good things
that have come to be, passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle
not made by hands, that is, not belonging to this creation he entered once for
all into the sanctuary, not with the blood of goats and calves but with his own
blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.
The Son of God, his
sacrifice, the Mass and the Church are perpetual institutions because they
exist in God in the Eternally Present Now. We do not create them. Rather, they are
revealed to us when we gather in prayer.
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I love to write. This blog helps me to meditate on the Word of God, and I hope to make some contribution to our contemplations of God's Mighty Works.
Ordinarily, I write these reflections two or three weeks in advance of their publication. I do not intend to comment on current events.
I understand many people prefer gender-neutral references to "God." I don't disagree with them but find that language impersonal, unappealing and tasteless. When I refer to "God" I think of the One whom Jesus called "Abba" and "Father", and I would not attempt to improve on Jesus' language.
You're welcome to add a thought or raise a question.