The sermon for March 10th 2019 is now available on the New Life web site.
In this sermon, which is based on Luke 9:28-36, I talk about the Christian Worldview.
Click here to listen on your browser, here to download the mp3
Author: newlifenarrabri
MAKING SENSE OF HELL by Dan Hitchens
From First Things
Eternal damnation has never been a wildly popular doctrine, but it seems to be coming under particular pressure at the moment. Public intellectuals like Stephen Greenblatt shake their heads at the teaching; eccentric theologians think up arguments against it; when Church leaders are asked about it, they often respond with ambiguity and embarrassment. No wonder the New Yorker’s Vinson Cunningham was recently moved to ask Catholics: “What modern believer wouldn’t want to cast off this old, sadistic barrier to faith in a loving God? What kind of deity draws such a hard line between his friends and his enemies, and holds an eternal grudge? Surely the loss of hell—even the idea of such a loss—should come as a bit of a relief.”
My gut reaction is sympathetic to Cunningham’s point, and such reactions shouldn’t be simply dismissed. But they should be tested. When an emotional response can’t be given a logical foundation; when it relates to something about which we are, necessarily, very ignorant; and when its implications are untenable—then it’s safe to conclude that the emotion is misleading.
Start with the logical foundation. Sin deserves punishment; in life we can always turn back toward God’s mercy, but the philosophers tell us that at death, the soul can no longer change its ways. Before death we can be swayed this way and that by our feelings and habits. But when the soul is separated from the body, this changeability ends and we are left with a single orientation. If we have turned toward God before death, we will find happiness; if we have chosen something else instead, we are in mortal sin, and our just punishment will continue for as long as we reject God—that is, forever. The inhabitants of hell go on choosing their fate: “The damned are so obstinate in their sins,” writes St. Alphonsus Liguori, “that even if God offered pardon, their hatred for him would make them refuse it.”
The attempts to pick holes in this argument are not, as far as I can see, successful: Interested readers can find a useful series of refutations here. The real objection, I think, is less logical than intuitive: Even if some punishment is necessary, isn’t hell excessive?
But here we are reduced to saying, “Surely…” about things we have not begun to grasp: the hideousness of sin, for example. Most of us, if asked to estimate how bad our sins are without the benefit of revelation, would say that although we hadn’t always conducted ourselves very honorably, we didn’t hurt anyone that much, and after all we’ve had a tough life and we’re pretty decent people overall. We would not guess, if we did not already know, that God came to earth and was humiliated and tortured to death for our sins. Do we really have a clue about the gravity of our offenses? Similarly, none of us have seen what a soul in mortal sin looks like after death, when its good impulses have fallen away and nothing remains but the desire for evil. I could opine on what strikes me as a fair punishment for unrepented mortal sin, just as I could opine, without googling, on the Olympic hopes of Azerbaijan’s national basketball team. But as it happens I know nothing about basketball, and I suspect most of our intuitions about the gravity of sin are worth even less.
Fortunately, we are not totally ignorant, because we have the guidance of the Church. Not just the authoritative teaching statements, though that is enough, but all the expressions of the Church’s wisdom through 2000 years: the standard interpretation of many, many verses in the Old and New Testaments; the sermons of the saints, with their terrible warnings about the next life; the ancient prayer of the Mass that we be “delivered from eternal damnation”; the mystics, including those of the last century, who saw things that nearly made them die of fright; Dante’s Inferno and Michelangelo’s Last Judgment.
And then there is St. Thomas More at his trial, saying that if he was not telling the truth “then pray I that I may never see God in the face”; the little children of Fatima doing their penances to help imperiled sinners, and in the process launching one of the great devotions of the twentieth century; the testimony of exorcists who, in the course of their liberating work, have spoken with demons about the next life; the countless holy men and women who have gone out to preach and care for the sick and spend themselves in love—not mostly, but partly, because they feared what they might hear on Judgment Day; the countless ordinary men and women who have forced themselves into the confessional—not wholly, but perhaps, on that day, mostly, because they believed they needed urgent rescuing. If Catholicism is the work of the Holy Spirit, then it looks like this is one of the truths He wants to lead us to.
Even non-Catholics will have to contend with Jesus’s words on this subject, which seem designed to make impossible the sort of creative rereading of which modern scholars are fond. He speaks, repeatedly, of the unquenchable fire. It is hard to downplay this and call it the fire of God’s love, because he also promises to tell the damned: “I never knew you.” He employs vivid images, like the narrow gate, but you cannot say his teaching is all metaphorical, because he describes literally the desperation of hell: “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Our Lord does not sound like he is referring to some process of difficult but healthy purification. He sounds like he is warning of a fate worse than death. Get rid of the doctrine of hell, and you will ultimately have to treat Jesus as though he does not know what he is talking about. For any Christian, that is an untenable conclusion.
Is belief in hell a barrier to faith in a loving God? Apparently not, because the saints, whose lives were filled with the love of God and neighbor, saw the reality of hell more clearly than anyone. Perhaps this is not so surprising: It makes sense that those who truly understand the mercy of God also understand the consequences of rejecting it.
Dan Hitchens is deputy editor of the Catholic Herald.
Today’s Sermon
Consecrated Virgins
From the ABC:
What is ‘consecrated virginity’ and why are modern women marrying Jesus?
RN By Siobhan Hegarty for Soul Search
Posted about an hour ago
Zara Tai didn’t wear white on her wedding day, but then again, it wasn’t a conventional ceremony.
She wasn’t marrying a long-term boyfriend or even a high school sweetheart — this Parramatta-based town planner was saying “I do” to Jesus.
Ms Tai is one of nine women in Australia known as a “consecrated virgin”.
It’s a title bestowed to virgin women who promise to remain physical virgins, as brides of Christ, for the sake of the kingdom of God.
Consecrated virgins dedicate their life in prayer and service to the Church, but unlike nuns and sisters, they live and work in the secular world.
“Consecrated virginity, as a concept, developed in the early Church at the time where Christians were being persecuted,” Ms Tai says.
“They were women who consecrated themselves to Christ in lieu of getting married [to men].”
Many of them, she explains, were martyred for their beliefs.
The rise of monasticism in the third and fourth centuries enabled women to join religious groups as nuns or sisters.
Some adopted the “rite of consecration of virginity”, as well their vows of poverty, chastity and obedience.
But gradually this became the only option for single, virgin women wanting to serve the church — as it had become difficult for women to live in the community without being married.
That was until 1970, when Pope Paul VI revised and reintroduced the rite and allowed it to be used for virgin women living in the secular world.
A modern way
Today, it’s estimated there are 5,000 consecrated virgins worldwide. Only nine are in Australia; the majority live in Europe, the US and South America.
A growing number of religious women are choosing this pathway over nunhood and Ms Tai isn’t surprised.
“In a religious order you might have some say in what you do, but you are under a vow of obedience, so if [the church diocese] wants you to be a teacher, a nurse or something else, you go off and do it,” she explains.
“But [consecrated virgins] have professions, we have careers … we have lives, basically, that are outside the structure of the church.
“It’s a modern way; it gives a lot of freedom to do whatever you like to do.”
More than ‘permanently single’
Ms Tai’s journey towards becoming a consecrated virgin hasn’t always been easy.
It took 15 years from when she raised the idea with her local church to the day of her consecration.
One of the greatest roadblocks was the lack of historical religious knowledge.
“There was not much known about the vocation … some felt I ought to become a nun,” she recalls.
Even after her consecration, Ms Tai wasn’t embraced by all members of the clergy.
“Some priests have said, ‘Oh, so you’re a permanent single person?'” she says.
“That’s clearly not the case, I am married to Christ.
“They’re still fitting me into a box that is not [correct]. They obviously don’t know the history of the church.”
‘Secret service of the church’
Ms Tai’s decision also drew questions from her family.
Born to a Chinese-Malaysian father and a mother of Maltese origin, she was baptised Catholic, but didn’t practise the faith in her childhood.
“I grew up with two brothers and was a typical tomboy, so going to church was the last thing on our minds,” she reflects.
“We were always at the beach, playing cricket or going on adventures — being religious doesn’t meld with any of that.”
Upon turning 15, Ms Tai felt “a big call to God” and began pursing a religious life.
But her tomboy traits remained. When she’s not working or studying theology, Ms Tai can be found kayaking, hiking or “bodysurfing with the boys”.
She says her greatest contribution is being where the church is not.
“A lot of people come to me for different questions, but they may not go anywhere near a church or a church official,” Ms Tai says.
“In fact, Rome has often called us the ‘secret service of the church’ because we are in all walks of life.”
In a time where religious institutions are criticised for female exclusion and male privilege, Ms Tai say consecrated virginity is “one for the women”.
“Sometimes I get asked: ‘Oh, you’re part of the hierarchy of the church — do you feel put down or submissive?’
“Absolutely not. In my experience, the diocese has given me scope to do almost anything I like.
“I belong to Christ and I’m totally happy with it.”
He’s Talking About You Gillette
The Joys of Electricity
They say it pays to shop around. They don’t tell you it will drive you insane.
For some reason, the standard electricity contract in Australia is the most expensive option. If you don’t negotiate a contract you can end up paying lots more than you need to. But the electricity companies don’t make it easy to compare prices, offering percentage discounts off their “standard” rates, which vary a little. Even someone like me who can cope with numbers finds it mind-bogglingly complex.
Last year, for the church, I took up an offer from Company A which offered a 12 month contract with a 24% discount. When the contract expires next month, they would only offer a 12% discount.
So I consulted the meerkat people who aggregate offers from different companies and they came up with an offer from Company B which offered a 24% discount and 11c solar feed in. I signed up for that contract, thinking I was done and dusted for two years.
This morning, just after I got home from my bike ride, a representative from Company A rang me and asked why we were transferring to Company B. I explained how I was able to do better with Company A. His counter offer was a 32% discount, but just 8c for solar. He would backdate the offer to January 17th. So I thought, “This is even better.” so I accepted his new offer. He even helped me by transferring me direct to Company B’s cancellation number.
Now Company B decided to match the offer but with 11c feed-in, if I complete the transfer to them.
I hope that’s the end of the ping-pong! I really don’t like this business of working your way down to a lower price, especially when that price was always available but they just don’t want to tell you about it up front.
In the old days, where the electricity market was a Government-controlled monopoly, you just got a price and that was it. Competition has to be better for everyone, but sometimes it is hard work to save a few bucks!
Today’s Sermon
The Cost of Political Activism
From “Men Of The West”
MARTIN LUTHER KING MURDERED SELMA, ALABAMA
Economics teaches us that nothing in this broken world is free but God’s Grace. Everything has a cost. Not matter how universally good you think a thing is, there is always some price to it. Sometimes that price is obvious and well worth it. Other times that price is not so obvious. Often the costliest decisions we make are the ones with the least obvious prices.
You’ve all been indoctrinated, so I know I don’t need to recount the story of the Civil Rights Movement to you. Blah blah blah… fire hoses… marches… evil whitey being evil… noble black man being noble. What I want to point out is one small look at the price that was paid, and who paid it.
Now before we get to deep into this, I have to explain some methodology here. Any research you do on Selma is going to focus almost entirely on the Civil Rights Movement. Period. Wikipedia? The whole article is written through the context of the movement. To get the real story of Selma, you have to talk to the people that lived there, which is exactly what we’ve done.
Rewind past all that, back to 1950. Selma, Alabama in 1950 is something close to idyllic. Its population of almost 23,000 was booming. It had grown 15% in just a few years before. Businesses were opening, new factories were being built, and folks were working and living in what was one of the prettiest little towns in the United States. At the time, the population of Selma was about half white and about half black. Crime was low to non-existent, and jobs were plentiful. The town had extremely high marriage rates and high birth rates.
By 1960 the population of Selma has blown up to over 28,000. The demographics are still pretty much the same, and the town is still in boom mode. More factories are showing up. More businesses are opening. Churches and shops are thriving in a gorgeous down town. The United Methodist Church has build a large children’s home that is something akin to a large orphanage, except it is a lot less like all the negative stereotypes you associate with orphanages, and a lot more like a bunch of kids living at summer camp year round. The adults around today who spent time there still get emotional when they talk about their time there. And they still get emotional when they talk about what a beautiful place Selma was back then. Before Martin Luther King came and killed their town.
Read the rest of the story here
Breaking Christian News: Most Marriages Do Survive
From “Breaking Christian News” comes this great encouragement. Obviously the stats are for the U.S. but the situation here is probably comparable.
DIVORCE STAT SHOCKER IS “GAME-CHANGING”: MOST MARRIAGES DO MAKE IT
Paul Strand : Feb 15, 2019 : CBN News
“We need to change the paradigm of how we talk about marriage—from marriage being in trouble and all this discouraging stuff to saying, ‘No, wait. Most marriages are strong and happy for a lifetime. That makes a total difference to a couple who can now say, ‘You know what? Most people get through this and we can, too.'” -Shaunti Feldhahn
(Atlanta, GA)—[CBN News] Most people believe only half of US marriages make it. But a leading researcher is announcing the true divorce rate is much lower and always has been. (Photo: Pixabay)
Shaunti Feldhahn received her research training at Harvard. She and her husband Jeff help people with their marriages and relationships through best-selling books like, For Women Only and For Men Only.
This Atlanta-based couple often quoted in their writings and at conferences what they thought was accurate research: that most marriages are unhappy and 50 percent of them end in divorce, even in the Church.
“I didn’t know,” Feldhahn told CBN News. “I’ve stood up on stage and said every one of these wrong statistics.”
More than ten years ago, she asked assistant Tally Whitehead for specific research on divorce for an article she was writing. After much digging, neither of them could find any real numbers.
That kicked off a personal, years-long crusade to dig through the tremendously complicated, sometimes contradictory research to find the truth. The surprising revelations are revealed in her new book, The Good News About Marriage.
The Real Divorce Rate
“First-time marriages: probably 20 to 25 percent have ended in divorce on average,” Feldhahn revealed. “Now, okay, that’s still too high, but it’s a whole lot better than what people think it is.”
Shaunti and Jeff point out the 50 percent figure came from projections of what researchers thought the divorce rate would become as they watched the divorce numbers rising in the 1970s and early 1980s when states around the nation were passing no-fault divorce laws.
“But the divorce rate has been dropping,” Feldhahn said. “We’ve never hit those numbers. We’ve never gotten close.”
And it’s even lower among churchgoers, where a couple’s chance of divorcing is more likely in the single digits or teens.
Hopelessness = Divorce
As the truth about these much lower divorce rates begins to spread, Feldhahn said she believes it will give people hope, which is often a key ingredient to making marriage last. She said hopelessness itself can actually lead to divorce.
“That sense of futility itself pulls down marriages,” Feldhahn said. “And the problem is we have this culture-wide feeling of futility about marriage. It’s based on all these discouraging beliefs and many of them just aren’t true.”
Christian psychotherapist Angel Davis has also written about marriage in her book, The Perfecting Storm. The Athens, Georgia-based therapist agreed with Shaunti Feldhahn’s warnings about hopelessness.
“The Bible says hope deferred, it makes a heart sick,” Davis said. “And we are so influenced by numbers and by culture.”
Jeff Feldhahn said anytime he tells people about his wife’s findings about how incorrect the 50 percent divorce rate actually is, they’re stunned.
“Their mouth drops open and they’re just shocked,” he said. “They go, ‘I can’t believe I believed this all these years. And I’ve heard it so many times. And I’ve heard it from the pulpit so many times.'”
Shaunti added, “This is a great chance to stand up and say. ‘We were all fooled. Not anymore.'”
Spreading the Good News
To that end, Feldhahn has been working to spread the news to pastors and other leaders as fast as she can. The news is changing Pastor Daniel Floyd’s counseling because he had bought into fictional research, he admitted to Feldhahn.
“I told her, ‘I’ve said this. I’ve taught this,'” the pastor at Lifepoint Church in Fredericksburg, Virginia, recalled.
Floyd said he’s sure this news will change a generation of marriage counseling.
“I think it’s significant,” he said. “And it could change the conversation from one that is ‘Wow, it’s just the way it is, and half of you are going to make it, half of you are not,’ and change the conversation to know historically, an overwhelming majority have made it and you can make it.”
Psychotherapist Davis said this belief can change lives and marriages.
“We know in psychology that what you believe affects how you feel, and then it leads to action,” Davis stated. “So, when other people are accomplishing something we think is hopeless, it gives us hope. And then we start feeling different and start acting different.”
Feldhahn has more shocking research: four out of five marriages are happy. That number flies in the face of the popular belief that only about 30 percent of marriages are happy.
“Most people think most marriages are just kind of ‘eeh’—just kind of rolling along,” she said. “And they’re shocked when I tell them that the actual average is 80 percent: 80 percent of marriages are happy.”
Not knowing the true statistics often leads couples to avoid marriage and just shack up instead.
A Game-Changer?
Feldhahn said that couples who avoid marriage do so based on wrong assumptions.
“Like, ‘if I’m just going to get divorced and I’m not going to be happy, why bother getting married, right?’ And it’s based on a lie,” she said. “That feeling is based on a lie.”
Pastor Floyd said these new facts can be a game-changer for married couples.
“I think it really helps people in the challenging moments to say, ‘If I’ll just stick with it, then there’s a good chance I’m going to make it the distance,'” he said.
“With hope, you feel you can make it through, even though you’re in a tough patch,” Jeff Feldhahn said.
His wife also pointed to other research that proves most of the unhappily married can turn it around.
“The studies show that if they stay married for five years, that almost 80 percent of those will be happy five years later,” she said.
The Good News About Marriage also reveals the divorce rate among those active in their church is 27 to 50 percent lower than among non-churchgoers. Feldhahn’s hope is that once people learn the truth that they will spread it far and wide.
“We need to change the paradigm of how we talk about marriage—from marriage being in trouble and all this discouraging stuff to saying, ‘No, wait. Most marriages are strong and happy for a lifetime,'” she told CBN News. “That makes a total difference to a couple who can now say, ‘You know what? Most people get through this and we can, too.’
Reflection on Psalm 37:1-11
Scripture
Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.
Observation/ Application
Sometimes we get concerned about the way the corrupt and the wicked seem to flourish. Bank executives who charge fees to dead people, rapists, and murderers seem to get away with their deeds too often.
These people will soon fade away. It is up to God to judge them, not us.
Instead we should focus on doing good and on trusting the Lord. Then we will prosper in the land He has given us.
“Delight yourself in the Lord” means to put God first. I celebrate my salvation and rejoice that God is my Father. When I seek His good will, then I know He will meet every need in my heart.
I don’t have to fret about tomorrow because He has promised to support, comfort, and prosper me.
If I obey God today, then the cares of tomorrow will be dealt with, because God is good.
“Be still in the presence of the Lord.” A life of worship and humble prayer is what God required. If I still my heart in God’s presence, then the stillness and the presence go with me.
There is no battle that God cannot be victorious in. So when I seek God’s will and His presence, I will overcome.
People who do not know Jesus have to walk in their own strength and wisdom. They strive for every little thing. But in God I know peace because the battle is His.
Prayer
Hallelujah! The battle belongs to the Lord. Please help me to delight in you and to trust you in all things. Amen.
