#delineation in the divinity of angels/Devil and humans

[witchcraftingboop]

Another Theory Segment

This was prompted by a discord discussion and specific question, but I am just gathering my thoughts for a later cohesive, longer piece. I'm thinking of doing a single document covering all of the points in this post plus a few supporting bits and bobs.

So I know angels can be incorporated in fire, but I don't think they're made of it. My understanding has always been that they were made of "substance," incorruptible matter, and immense creations taken of the universe/system God had made. Humans, on the other hand, were made in God's image, blessed by/with the Holy Spirit (depending on which strand you follow), and created ignorant. So they lack the knowledge of all things - which God was said to have given to the angels.

Right off the bat, angels are beings of spirit who can take form, who possess all earthly knowledge, and are assigned individual roles according to the will of God - i.e. God's Strength, God's Light, etc. Whereas humans are flesh and blood and divine breath/spirit, tasked with taking dominion over the earth but given none of the knowledge or powers allotted to angels. And through God having to identify and single out specific humans as being holy or close to his divine/connection, it could be argued that humans are closer to the dirt from which they were built - even before Eve ate the apple, as neither were called as such - than to having a true divine nature, or tangible divine connection, within themselves.

Another supporting nugget would be that angels regard humans as lowly and undeserving of God's high esteem, let alone love, very few sought to mingle with humans outside of carrying out God's plan, and those that did weren't exactly looked upon favorably for it. From my perspective, angels, due to their creation directly from the universe's matter, are already considerably closer to the divine, even just given that that was one of God's first creations.

But anyways! Humans have to be singled out and given a task/prophecy. Angels are created, existing, and working under the divine's direct guidance and influence. I think humans could be argued to be divine in only sofar as they 1) were made in the divine's image and 2) contain the breath/spirit of God.

Note: Later, we'll (I) have to comb through my resources for supporting source links and files to be made available in the overarching document as well.

[pamphletstoinspire]

The Motherhood of The Blessed Virgin Mary (also called the Maternity of the Blessed Virgin Mary) - October 11th - Latin Calendar

"May the maternal intercession of Mary, the Mother of the Redeemer and of love, be the star that guides with certainty the steps that Christians take in their encounter with the Lord" - (cf. Tertio Millennio Adveniente, no 59).

The Motherhood of the Blessed Virgin Mary

When Did Her Maternity Begin?

From the moment of the Annunciation, when the Blessed Virgin received the call to be the Mother of the Redeemer, Her call to be the Mother of all mankind also began in an implicit and hidden manner. The Mother of the Head ought also to be the Mother of the Body. The Mother of the Redeemer is to be the Mother of the redeemed. The physical Mother of Christ will be the spiritual Mother of the Mystical Body of Christ. The Blessed Virgin, by engendering Christ physically and naturally, also engenders spiritually and supernaturally all of the members of the Mystical Body of Christ - the entire human race. The Head as well as its mystical members are the fruit of the same womb - that of Mary. Therefore, She is the Mother of the total Christ - the Head and the Body; She is Mother physically of the Head and spiritually of its members, as Pope Pius X explained to us in his encyclical, Ad diem illum. The spiritual maternity of Mary is the complement of Her divine maternity. "Because of the redemptive Incarnation, Mary became not only the Mother of God in the physical order of nature, but also in the supernatural order of grace she became the Mother of all men" (cf. Pius XII, Message to the Marian Congress of Ottawa, Canada, June 19, 1947).

Her Maternity in the Gospels

We see some signs of the spiritual maternity of the Blessed Virgin over man (in its two facets: intercession and dispensation of graces) in the Gospels.

We see this in the Visitation, when Her presence brought saving graces to John the Baptist and the grace of the Holy Spirit upon Elizabeth, bringing about the first miracle in the supernatural order. We also see it in Cana, where Her maternal intercession and mediation brought about the first miracle in the order of nature.

These two signs of Her Spiritual maternity reach their full realization on Calvary when, in an explicit manner according to the Gospel of St. John, Christ from the Cross directed Himself to the Beloved disciple (and in him to each one of us) and gave Her to us as Mother. "behold, your Mother...Mother, behold, your Son" (cf. John 19: 26-27). If the spiritual maternity of Mary in respect to man had been delineated since the Annunciation, on the Cross it is clearly established.

During that solemn moment, the words of Christ officially proclaimed and confirmed the spiritual maternity of Mary that existed since the Annunciation, but was formally consummated and completed through Her most sorrowful association and participation in the redemptive sacrifice. In Nazareth, the Blessed Virgin Mary conceived us and on Calvary, she gave birth.

She Gave Birth to Us in Pain

This spiritual maternity upon man, confirmed and completed on the Cross, cost our Mother great sufferings, and She gave birth to us in intense pain; Her Heart was pierced. She gave birth to us while watching Her Son die; Her maternity towards us is the fruit of pain. With the same fiat with which She responded to the Annunciation of the Angel that brought about Her divine maternity, She embraced the annunciation of Christ on the Cross that brought Her spiritual maternity. From that moment on, She received John, and in him, every human person as sons and daughters. Her Heart was spiritually pierced and opened to man for all times.

When the Angel told Her, "Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son" (Lk. 1: 31), She opened her Immaculate Heart to receive, with faith the obedience, the invitation to divine maternity. The second announcement of maternity came at the foot of the Cross. "The words of Jesus, 'Woman, behold your Son,' opened the Heart of the Mother in a new way. A few moments later, the soldier pierced the Heart of Christ. With those words, the Heart of Mary opened to receive those whom the Pierced Heart of Jesus was to reach with His redemptive power" (cf. John Paul II, Homily, May 13, 1982, no.8).

Just as the Heart of Christ remained eternally opened on the Cross to pour graces of salvation upon humanity, the Heart of Mary has remained eternally open to receive as Mother those who accept the redemption of Her Son.

The Maternity of Mary According to Pope John Paul II

According to His Holiness John Paul II, the maternity of Mary over the whole of humanity is the express desire of Christ, His final testament. This maternity is universal and personal; She is the Mother of the Church and the Mother of each member. Each one of us ought to enter into a personal relationship with Her, a relationship of Mother and child. She desires that we are Her children, that we have an intimate relationship with Her as Christ had with Her, and that this relationship is an extension of the love Christ had for His Mother. He desires that we love Her as He loved Her.

Furthermore, Her maternity is a gift of Christ to each one of us. Each disciple ought to have a Marian dimension in his or her life (for example, one’s prayer groups begins with the recitation of the Rosary).

As well, the maternal mission of Mary ought to be received by each person. This is the profound meaning of the Holy Father John Paul II’s papal coat of arms. "The disciple took Her into his home" (Jn 19: 27)… In other words, he took Her into his heart, responding to the gift of Christ. He made Her a part of his life, his problems, his spiritual life, his decisions and his physical life. And as Mary was given as Mother personally to him, the disciples responded with a "self-offering." Self-offering is the response of love of a person, and concretely, it is the response to the love of a mother. "Entrusting himself to Mary in a filial manner, the Christian, like the Apostle John, 'welcomes' the Mother of Christ 'into his own home' and brings her into everything that makes up his inner life, that is to say into his human and Christian 'I'" (RM, 45).

Christ entrusts and gives us His Mother. He consecrated us to the maternal care of His Mother because He knew that we need Her to grow in the life of perfection and to defend ourselves in the spiritual battle against the devil.

This maternity has real effects in our lives: it leads to the transmission of spiritual life, to the restoration of souls. It has the mission of guiding us, protecting us, educating us, forming us, and watching out for our needs. Because She is our Mother, she is the powerful intercessor and Mediatrix of all graces. - Pope John Paul II

[kabane52]

Sacrifice and Cosmos

The other day I described how God has freely co-constituted the world with man in a real and mysterious way. Man is not only God’s partner in continuing the work of creation and glorification. The ongoing existence of the world is actually joined with the life of mankind so that the gathering up of all the logoi of creation into the Memory of God through the work of the Church is the way in which God brings all things to glory. This reality helps to illumine ancient conceptions of sacrifice and its presence in the Bible. Among various nations of the world, sacrifice is conceived of as the way in which the cosmos’ existence is guaranteed. We tend to instinctively dismiss this as a mere superstition, but is it possible there is more to this idea than meets the eye? I believe that there is.

The text I would point to is Genesis 4-9. This story features sacrifice at crucial points. Genesis 4 begins by describing how Adam’s family offered Tribute at “the cutting off of the year”, likely harvest. We know from the rest of the Torah that the tribute offering is described as the “memorial” offering. Man goes out into the world and labors in it, creatively shaping it through his mind and hand. The tribute is the consecration of a portion of the product to God. In doing so, man liturgically recognizes that the precondition for his shaping of the world and receipt of its gifts is the ongoing and gracious will of God sustaining it in existence. In making the consecration of tribute, man gives thanks for this gracious gift and completes the circuit of God’s outwards gift and His inwards gathering of the glorified world to His Heart. Man is the instrument through which the world is gathered into the divine Heart and the Tribute is thus a “Memorial.” God “remembers” the World and thereby keeps it in existence.

When Cain sheds the blood of Abel he goes and builds a city. Symbolically, the blood of his murdered brother is the threshold sacrifice upon which the city is built: compare the rebuilding of Jericho by Hiel. The cosmos is wounded by the murder and cries out against this blood. A fundamental disjunction has emerged between the activity being carried out in the world and the activity which sustains the world in existence. When man begins to reject his mission, the cosmos suffers as a result. At the end of Genesis 4, however, we are told that Seth replaces Abel and “calls upon the Name of the LORD.” This phrase is consistently used in ritual and especially sacrificial contexts. For example, when Abram comes out of Mesopotamia and passes through the land of promise in Genesis 12, he builds an altar and “calls upon the Name of the LORD.” The Name of the LORD is an expression of His character in relation to the world. He is gracious, faithful, forgiving, and righteous. He forgives sin but does not clear the guilty. When one “calls upon the Name of the LORD”, one is formally asking God to act in a manner consistent with His divine character. Thus, Seth’s liturgical role in “calling upon the Name of the LORD” is essential in sustaining the life of the world: the existence of the world hangs on the continued presence of people who call on God to remember His covenant and graciously sustain its life.

The bloodline of Seth is the priestly line. It is holy, set apart to the LORD’s service. A crisis arises in Genesis 6:1-4. Here we are told that the B’Nei Elohim take as many as they choose from the “Daughters of Adam” and bring forth their seed through them. The “Daughters of Adam” is a reference to Genesis 5:1-2 and specifically delineates these women as members of the holy, consecrated family rather than the Cainite kingdoms. From this unholy union the “Nephilim” are born, giants who are “mighty men, men of a Name.” Elsewhere I have argued that this passage describes a diabolical ritual whereby the Sethite royal and noble families covenanted with rebellious heavenly beings in a marriage alliance. Ancient rituals where noble women are married to the gods are known from the Near East and elsewhere. 

The motive is twofold. In Genesis 3, Adam sins because he desires to seize control and dominion over the world before God gives it to him. Satan tempts Adam to follow his will because the world is innately subject to Man. To take control of the world, the devil and his angels must utilize man as an instrument. The result of this arrangement is deformed, giant beings whom I take to be embodiments of the preexistent heavenly beings. Heavenly beings in view of their nature cannot interact with the material world in the same way or with the same precision that we can. Their attempts to do so are usually rather crude: tossing things around, throwing something on the floor, and so on. Our nature is made so that we have the natural powers of engagement with the world. In taking on flesh through this covenant, the devil and his angels were enabled to terrorize the world directly. 

They are called “mighty men, men of a Name.” The word for “mighty men” is “gibborim” and usually denotes military prowess. They were conquerors, marching into the world and taking direct control of its territories, corrupting or annihilating the people present. Thus we are told that the world was “full of violence” by the era of Noah. The bloodshed that occurred with Cain had been magnified by many orders of magnitude. The sacrality of this ritual calls our attention to another key point: as this rebellion took hold in the human family, sacrifice declined to the point of near-extinction. The Nephilim were “men of a Name.” They exalted themselves instead of “calling upon the Name of the LORD.” Seth’s liturgical work for the creation and mankind was replaced with demonic intrusion. 

And here we see the role that sacrifice played until the coming of Christ. The Flood was not a judgment merely imposed from the “outside in.” The rains from Heaven coincided with the bursting open of the “fountains of the great deep.” This is meant to teach us that the cosmic catastrophe of the Flood occurred through the innate essence of creation. The cosmos cried unto God because of the blood that had poured into it. The children of Adam in the priestly line made purification and restitution for this bloodshed and brought the world into the Memory of God, perpetuating its existence. But with the decline and near-extinction of sacrifice, the bloodshed was not purified. Without sacrifice, the creation careened towards destruction so that the world approached dissolution. The ground rose up and consumed those who had shed human blood on it.

The only reason it continued to exist was through the grace of God operative in the family of Noah. Noah gathered the world into the ark, a holy and consecrated environment. When the cosmos dissolved, “God remembered Noah” and he re-sanctified and consecrated the world after the flood in the ascension offering of all clean beasts. Through the commandments given to Noah, man is given the ability to restrain the spread of evil. The prophetic curse on Canaan is a corporate implementation of the Noahic death penalty: the culture of the antediluvian world at the crossroads of the world must be removed and replaced with God’s vine. [Righteous Canaanites are made heirs of their homeland when they join the people of Abraham and come under the covenant of circumcision: note the intent with the Shechemites in Genesis 34.]

With the means of restraint implemented, the cosmos was sustained in its being by the regular presence of sacrifice offered to the God of Heaven. Though many nations fell into idolatry, there were countless Gentiles who continued to offer sacrifice to the one God (i.e. the annual Border Sacrifice in ancient China). Moreover, priestly intercession was made for the whole world at the Tabernacle and Temple. Through the priestly work of mankind and especially Israel as a kingdom of priests and holy nation, the world was brought to God’s Mind and perpetuated in existence and life. The planting of Israel at the crossroads of the world meant that the nations were seeded with divine wisdom rather than evil.

The reason that mankind can simply never return to the old order of things is because it is an objective reality that the Holy Temple has been destroyed and ritual sacrifice ended among many of the world’s nations. And yet the world continues to exist. The Incarnation of the Word of God brings the cosmos into God’s own perfect existence. The devil was jealous of God’s ultimate intent for the human family and intensely desired to carry out creation’s destruction. When Balaam and Balak failed to curse Israel directly, their strategy changed: by corrupting Israel into apostasy, they would force God’s hand so that God would destroy the people of Israel. This is what happens at the end of Numbers. By the same token, the devil sought to dissolve the creation by polluting it so profoundly that God would be forced to dissolve it. He wished to break so many holes in the ship of creation that it would sink. 

In response to this plan, the God of Abraham did what the enemy could not foresee: He tied Himself to the mast of the ship. The Infinite One was joined to world irrevocably by clothing Himself in a body and the stuff of the world. Because Christ our God is the “Existent One”, His comprehensive sharing in the life of the world has permanently joined the World to the memory of God. His self-offering on the Cross and Resurrection in a Glorious Body has transformed the mode by which the world is sustained, permanently ending blood sacrifice and facilitating mankind’s fulfillment of its destiny.