reality

Want to know something really cool?

The Old Testament is the time of Shadow.

The New Testament is the time of Image.

Heaven is the true Reality.

We live in the thin space between the time of Image and the time of Reality.

We enter into Reality each time we actively participate in the Mass*.

The complete experience is to be one of an eternal, joyful exchange between Lover and the beloved. An experience that transports us out of this world and into the next.

How does this happen? By grace, through Sacrament and the Holy Spirit. We come into contact with Beauty and touch the Sacred.

I have just returned from an intensive time of studying The Liturgy. Surprisingly, “Liturgy” is composed of far more than just the written words stated at Mass. The Liturgy is the ENTIRE MASS from the Introductory Rite all the way to the Concluding Rite. (Want to know more? Click here and find out--it’s BEAUTIFUL! Or click here to read SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM the Church's spectacular teaching on the Source and Summit of our faith.) And through it, as we correspond back and forth with Christ, we get a taste of heaven, not just in the Eucharist, but from start to finish.

Pope Benedict XVI in The Spirit of the Liturgy states that the Mass can be understood in terms of “play”. “The point of the analogy was that a game has its own rules, sets up its own world, which is in force from the start of play but then, of course, is suspended at the close of play...Play takes us out of the world of daily goals and their pleasures and into a sphere free of purpose and achievement, releasing us for a time from all the burdens of our daily world of work. Play is a kind of other world, an oasis of freedom, where for a moment we can let life flow freely. We need such moments of retreat from the pressure of daily life if its burden is to be bearable…”

Are you relieved from your earthly burdens and elevated to heaven at Mass? Have you been refreshed by the "oasis of freedom"--even for a few moments? Are you experiencing the True Reality?

Ask God for the grace to enable you to deeply experience Him, to open up your mind, heart and spirit to “play” and be transported joyfully out of this world and into His. And then for this little trip to heaven to so transform you that you naturally share Him with the world.

“Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom does not belong to this world... ’” John 18:36

Dear Lord,

Thank You that You give Yourself to me in the Mass as You long for me to experience You there. Transport me into Your world by Your grace, even just for a few moments. I want this experiences of Reality to equip me to better serve You here on this earth. Please increase my capacity to receive You and Your love for me.

I ask this in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

*Traveling and need to find a Mass near you? Check out www.Masstimes.org and never miss Mass again!