The LORD God gave the man this order: You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. From that tree you shall not eat; when you eat from it you shall die. Genesis 2:17
I have spent a lot of time reflecting over the past year on the Fall of Man and the chaos it brought into God’s ordered world.
As written about before, there were four commands God gave in the garden;
- Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. Genesis 1:28
- Have dominion over the earth. Genesis 1:28
- Don’t eat the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Genesis 2:16-17 (Eve received this command through Adam)
- Cleave to one another. Genesis 2:24
In looking at the 4 command’s it seems only one of them is a “don’t,” a negative command. The other three are positive and Adam and Eve are receiving great gifts from them. They receive Dominion or Authority over the earth, they receive each other, and they receive children. The only command where they seemingly didn’t receive something is the one where they were told don’t eat from the tree. What was death? They knew nothing of it. Little did they know that if they eat from this tree, the death God spoke of, what they would receive, was evil.
Why? Why did God give this command in the first place? This is the command where we see God trying to teach us what True Love is. This command required their total free will’s consent, and required what would be considered a sacrifice for a reason unknown to them. They could not foresee what would come from obeying or not obeying this command in a way that they could see the fruit of the other commands. By God allowing them to choose, He was teaching them true love. Because love isn’t really love if it isn’t made with total consent of the will.
And they chose to sin. They did not make the small sacrifice for love of God, the bearer of true love. They ushered the evil they could not foresee into the world by disobeying. But God did not leave us bereft. He sent us His Son to restore all of the things God had given us, most especially to show us the restoration of true love, by giving us the ultimate sacrifice.
And I started to wonder, why did God send Christ as a child? He could have just sent Christ the way he sent Adam, as an adult, and formed Him any way He wanted. Why send a babe? And it was as if in that moment God whispered to me, “because I wanted to restore innocence and I wanted your cooperation. Free will’s cooperation with true love.”
And then the Lord showed me just some of the verses that speak of children;
Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate. Psalm 127:3-5
And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 18:3
If anyone causes one of these little ones–those who believe in me–to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea. Matthew 18:6
God sent His own son as an innocent child. God shows us here what a gift children are by sending his only son as a vulnerable child. And in this case, this innocent child who grows to a man that sacrifices his life brings the Salvific Grace to save His own earthly parents, one even before she was conceived. And from the free cooperation of her will and the pure womb of Mary our Salvation came.
Pope Benedict XVI wrote;
“The mystery of God’s maternal love is expressed with particular power in the Hebrew word, rahamim. Etymologically, this word means “womb” but was later used to mean divine compassion for man, God’s mercy.” – Jesus of Nazareth: Part I Pope Benedict XVI
The womb is mercy. Mary’s womb brought forth the Innocent Child Jesus, who is MERCY. Could it be that children teach us true love and mercy? What a shame that as a culture we have made it legal to murder what the true love of God brings forth. It is we who corrupt and even murder our children, when all God wants to call us to is purity and true love.
And in this reflection on the Innocent Child Jesus we can also reflect on the Eucharist. The child Jesus reminds us of the Eucharist. The humility of God becoming man in the Incarnation and the vulnerability of the child Jesus. He had to rely on his earthly parents to protect Him in this world. The same is true for the Eucharist. The humility of God to present himself to us in the form of bread and wine. He places Himself in the protection of the Priest, and in our hands as well as granted through the authority of the church. This always makes Him vulnerable. What a responsibility we have, particularly the Priests, to protect Him, to not abuse Him. Do we know who it is we are receiving?
God continues to be vulnerable to us by promising to be truly present in the Eucharist until the end of time, even though he knows abuses will happen. When we present ourselves to God at Mass, we must rid ourselves of all pride, humbly standing before Him, open and ready to receive this great gift. This exchange deserves our utmost respect and gratitude as the King of the Universe humbles himself, giving us his flesh and blood, in order to heal and save us from our sins. It is when we humbly bow before him and receive him with a pure and contrite heart, like a child, that we are blessed beyond measure.
So we must become humble like little children, innocent and pure, and through our Savior in the Eucharist we are to become living sanctuaries of God bringing his light into the darkness of this world. Though we cannot see God except in the accidents of bread and wine, we can foresee the fruits of His goodness when we receive in humility; we have seen it in the Saints. Conversely, when we receive in a state of grave sin we also have seen the fruits, for it was after he received that Judas had a demon enter him. But for the contrite heart, the humble heart that seeks purity and seeks love, God in his omniscience places Himself in our hands ensuring that His heavenly hand has a presence in this world; guiding and protecting where we are lacking in a way that is unseen by the human eye. We must remember there is great hope and trust in the Lord.
Veil of Veronica 
Susan said above : “God continues to be VULNERABLE to us by promising to be truly present in the Eucharist until the end of time, even though he knows abuses will happen.” Contemplating this word , VULNERABLE , really pulls everything together from your last few entries. In Latin, VULNERA are wounds. We think of the word “vulnerable” in English to mean : weak, meek, small, humble, fragile, tender and innocent. A child is vulnerable. A lamb is vulnerable. But in fact, when take at its latin root meaning, we find something far deeper and more fruitful working here: a wound bleeds when it is fresh. The deeper it is, the more and the longer it bleeds. Blood is the source of Life, which is why it is used in making solemn vows of Covenant. The Heart of Jesus was and is pierced and wounded by our infidelities and transgressions. How does He respond? By pouring forth more Life upon us, by taking us deep inside the wound of His Sacred Heart, the wellspring of Living Waters and Blood. Blood and Water are the quintessential signs of the Paschal Mystery , something which all biological mothers can attest are abundantly present also at every birth. By His Wounds we are healed. We seal ourselves , our loved ones and those we pray for under the protection of His Precious Blood. We place those in need of Mercy, in the abyss of His Sacred Wounds. We beg Him to hide us from the Wrath and Justice of the Father…in His Wounds. At every Eucharistic Miracle recorded by the Church and analyzed by modern “science”, it is found that the Sacred Host is bleeding fresh blood, and that it comes from a male heart muscle, one that is wounded and experiencing great stress and trauma. Now of course we do not see these things with our human eyes, but rather with our spiritual eyes. And we desire to believe it is so, by Faith. Jesus is renewing the Covenant of Love with us in His Suffering Heart at every Mass. Yes. He is quite literally making Himself VULNERABLE, as the Lamb who is slain. It is not by chance that Our Lord gave Saint Bridget of Sweden the Magnificent Prayers to assist us in adoring his sacred wounds! As we see our priests take Him in their anointed hands,we might now see the Sacred Host being broken in two, and we might hear the breaking of the bread itself , if the sanctuary is quiet enough. Luke 24 : And he said to them, ‘ Oh , how foolish you are ! How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke !’ ….Then they said to each other, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the scriptures to us ? ‘ … (and they recounted)…. ‘ how he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread’. ….Then he said to them, ‘Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see…’ . Then he showed them his hands and his feet. Indeed, the Messiah suffers still. He is fully vulnerable. He shows us the wound of his Sacred Heart at every Mass, and says to us : “Behold…I am sending the promise of my Father upon you….stay….until you are clothed with power from on high”. Amen! Let us stay with him at the end of every Mass, and let him clothe us in the nuptial garment of love, our robes made pure white by the Blood of the Lamb and gloriously bright by the Power of the Holy Spirit.
Beautiful