Frustrated

Blogging my readings is extremely frustrating!  For the 2nd time I spent 40 minutes typing comments about my readings only to have the entire write-up lost in blogger space.  Pen and notebook are so trustworthy.  I spend more time figuring out technology instead of reflecting on my readings.  It is a good thing that I am reading and reflecting on God's revelation.  I am far more patient with the technology "challenges" (polite term) then I normally would be.
Enough of venting.  I truly love the article A between-the-lines look at Jesus!  For years I have been hearing about Raymond Brown from husband.  He took a course from him at Loyola Marymount years ago.  Now I get it.  He articulates feelings that I have had concerning Jesus and the Gospels.  He states that "Jesus does not set up clear religious structures."  That is man's doing.  It is amazing how we get caught up in the details that "we" created!  We must focus on Jesus' example of putting God first in our life.
The Gospel is all about intimacy.  Brown provides clear cut examples of God's call for intimate relationship with us.  I have always loved how the father runs out and embraces his "Prodigal Son" before the son has the chance to say "I'm sorry."  What a beautiful example of intimate relationship.  We must have a relationship to apologize and we must have a relationship to be forgiven.
I am challenged by Brown's statement that God "never had an idea."  Difficult concept for me.  I discussed this with my husband.  God's intellect and will are one.  Weren't humans - the world and idea?  I am struggling with this one.
What I am not struggling with is Jesus' humanity.  Evidently there is a struggle among others with Jesus' humanity while being the son of God.  We need Jesus' struggle in the garden of Gethsemane.  It is God's communication of faith.  "To wrestle with death is the ultimate act of faith"  Without fear or doubt there is no freedom to follow God's plan.  We become the image of God when we make the struggle and rise above human nature to submit to God's will.  Otherwise we would just blindly follow without critical thought.  We would be God's playthings. There would be no relationship.
The big "a ha" from the article  came from Mark's perspective of Jesus's death.  Jesus had no human sujpport.  The Twelve fell asleep, Pilate refused to help, and people mocked him.  Jesus demonstrated the ultimate need to rely on God

Human Nature

I was very intrigued by Father Jack Brennan's statement that we have a tendancy not to appreciate our own and others' humanity.  Maybe so, but, it is Christ's humanity and our humanity that emphasizes our greatness - our potential for being with Christ.  If we did not have fear, disappointment, anger or mistrust then our actions would be automatic with no real struggle and no free will.  Our faith is made more holy by our struggle to believe.  Our divinity comes from how we deal with our mortality - our human nature.  We struggle to rise above our human nature to have compassion, to love the unlovable, to face dangers with fear throbbing in our throat.  Jesus went through all these emotions and showed us how to live, how to love, how to die and ultimately to have faith in our love and in God's love.  How can we not embrace our humanity?

Just Starting

I never thought that by going for my Master Catechist certification that I would be advancing my knowlege in technology.  This is my first "Blog."  Rather exciting.  Who knew - Jesus is nudging me out my box into the blogger world.  Definitely looking forward to what else I will learn in this two year journey!

I just had to add to this last post.  Figuring out this blog thing has almost been more of a learning experience than the class itself.  It has taken a month for me to figure out how to get back on to this blog.  My daughter laughs at my late night calls venting my frustration over passwords, URL's, and links.  I miss my old fashioned notebook and pen.  However, I am on now and hopefully it won't be another month between posts.