Jesus and Guns Parts 3 and 4

Here are Part 3 and Part 4. Read it all, don't be lazy.

Jesus & Guns Part 3

Posted by Ann Barnhardt - December 29, AD 2012 8:23 PM MST

"And they that were about Him, seeing what would follow, said to Him: Lord, shall we strike with the sword? And one of them struck the servant of the high priest and cut off his right ear." So just to make certain that we are all appreciating this, Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, is carrying a side arm and knows what to do with it. Now this next verse is the one that really surprised me: "But Jesus answering, said: Suffer ye thus far. And when He had touched his ear, He healed him." Huh? What does "Suffer ye thus far" mean? Hmmm.

Let's look at some contemporary translations and see what they say: "Stop! No more of this." (New American Standard) "Let them be. Even in this." (The Message) "No more of this!" (Holman Christian Standard) Uh-oh. Facepalm. This is not good. These modern translations aren't anywhere close to the Douay-Rheims. The words "stop" and "no" were obviously part of the English lexicon when the Douay-Rheims was made, and they are not used in this verse. Something is wrong here. In order to figure this out, let's go to the Latin. "Sinite usque huc." Sinite: second person plural active imperative of "sino"

Sino: let, permit Okay, so sinite means "you all let" or "you all permit" in the imperative case, which means a command.

(That makes sense! Like "suffer the little children to come unto Me" means "permit the little children . . . ") Usque: adverb meaning "all the way" Huc: adverb meaning here, hence, to this place, to this point You all permit + all the way + here. Our Lord isn't scolding them. Our Lord isn't saying "no more of this" and barking at them to stop. Our Lord is giving them the command to hold and stand down. "You all permit all the way here." This is a HUGE distinction. If a military commander gives his men the order to hold fire and stand down, is he criticizing them? Is he attacking and rebuking their use of weaponry? Is he communicating that they should be pacifists? Is he rejecting their vocations as soldiers? No! He is simply telling them to hold their fire and stand down because there is, at the moment, a tactical reason to do so.

That is EXACTLY what is going on here. Our Lord isn't rebuking the apostles because they are doing exactly what they should do - they are defending their Beloved Friend. If your spouse, or your child, or your best friend, or whoever you love most in this world was being physically attacked and seized, what would you do? What would every fiber of your being be screaming out for you to do? Come to their defense and aid. This is called the Natural Law. God MADE us this way. God made us with the instinctual drive to physically fight to defend those we love. Failure to do so is the sin of cowardice.

Cowardice is a violation of both of the Great Commandments: to love God above all else, and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. Cowardice places the self above both neighbor and God. And in the case of the apostles, they were engaging both commandments (God and neighbor) directly in the person of Jesus.

Jesus & Guns Part 4

Posted by Ann Barnhardt - December 29, AD 2012 8:09 PM MST

This is why Our Lord had to give the order to hold and stand down. He had to specifically release them from the Great Commandments in that moment. Why? Two reasons: Obviously, it was the will of the Triune Godhead that Jesus be arrested and crucified. These things had to happen. The apostles couldn't be expected to understand this at the time, so there was no expectation for them to quietly sit and watch as Jesus was arrested.

Remember who Jesus is. Jesus is God. He knows everything and everyone. Jesus knew every one of the men who came to arrest Him. Not only did He know them, He loved them all infinitely. He MADE every one of them. He wove them together in their mothers' wombs. He knew every detail of their lives, every thought, every deed. And He loved them. Every single one of them. He also had a plan for every one of them. Like, oh I dunno, CONVERSION? Can you imagine the amount of grace those guards were exposed to? They got to TOUCH Him. They got to look right at Him, and speak to Him. He probably locked eyes with every one of them at some point. Don't discount that. Even though they were absolutely horrible to Him, they were primed for conversion. We know that Malchus, the guy who got his ear cut off, and then was healed by Our Lord, converted. We don't know about the other guards, but we do know that thousands and thousands of Jews were converted in the first years after the Resurrection.

We also know who the first Gentile convert was. It was the Roman Centurion Longinus. Longinus was the Roman soldier who drove the spear into Jesus' side to make certain He was dead, instead of breaking His legs. When the spear went in, it burst the cardiac edema, or the water that had built up around Our Lord's Sacred Heart as He died of asphyxia and heart failure. Longinus, standing beside and below Jesus, was sprayed with that water. Baptism. When the all of the water had come out, Our Lord's Precious Blood sprayed out. Eucharist.

Calvary IS the Mass. The Mass IS Calvary. The Last Supper was an ANTICIPATORY MASS that instituted the Sacrament of the Eucharist AND ratified and elevated all of the previous licit, yet woefully inadequate sacrifices of mankind which were in accordance with the Natural Law. Calvary, and thus the Mass, reaches out through time in BOTH DIRECTIONS, like the crossbeam of the Cross itself, pulling all of time, both before and after, THROUGH the temporal centerpoint of Calvary.

And so, the first Gentile convert was a man who had just spent the past nine hours participating in the torture and execution of Jesus. Grace. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that some of the Jewish guards in the garden were converted too. So we can see an additional reason, beyond the obvious, why Jesus told the apostles to stand down. It was His will that some or all of the guards survive and convert, not die in battle in that moment.

Finally, some might reference Jesus' words in Matthew's gospel:

"Then Jesus saith to him: Put up again thy sword into its place: for all that take the sword shall perish with the sword."

Do you know what I think Jesus is doing here, in part? I think this may be a veiled prophecy about islam. Islam teaches that the way to convert people to the islamic political system is to put a sword to their neck and give them a choice: convert or die. This is referred to as "the Sword of islam". This is how all other evil, satanic political systems operate as well. Marxism leaps to mind. In Marxist tyranny, people are arrested and imprisoned, given the choice to "learn the new system" and be "re-educated" or die.

In addition to a veiled prophecy, Jesus is telling Peter that Christianity does not and will not convert with the sword. It converts only with love. AND, He is telling Peter and us that Christians do not and will not punish apostates (people who leave the faith, like Judas) with the sword. Both islam and Marxism execute apostates. But the second phrase, "shall perish with the sword" is very telling. Jesus is saying that those who "take the sword" and try to convert people to, and hold people in their evil systems by force will in the end be killed WITH THE SWORD. Who will be wielding that sword? Christ will be victorious, so doesn't it stand to reason that the Army of Christ will be the one wielding the sword in the second phrase? Boy, this sure sounds like a ratification of self-defense and just war, doesn't it?

So there you go. Like I said, I'm no authority. I'm just a chick with a Douay-Rheims/Vulgate Bible and a Latin dictionary. I hope you find this interesting, and I hope it spurs thought and discussion. I also hope it drives home the point that the translation of the Bible that we use is utterly critical. It isn't a mere "detail". It is the difference between the Truth and a lie. I think my exegesis is rooted in Scripture, logic and love. I don't think I'm simply fabricating things that aren't there in order to support my own personal philosophical leanings, but then, I'm not a "theologian". I guess we'll all find out, someday.

The Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin (May 31st)

Sometimes less fully catechized Catholics confuse the Annunciation with the Visitation. They are two separate events. During the Annunciation the Archangel Gabriel came to Mary and announced that she would become the mother of Jesus Christ--Gabriel came to "announce". During the visitation, Mary came to help her older cousin Elizabeth during the later part of her pregnancy--Mary came to "visit"

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The Holy Gospel according to Luke 1: 39-55

During those days Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah,

where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.  

When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, "Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.  

And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord ¹⁴ should come to me?  

For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy.  

Blessed are you who believed ¹⁵ that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled."  

And Mary said: ¹⁶ "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord;  

my spirit rejoices in God my savior.  

For he has looked upon his handmaid's lowliness; behold, from now on will all ages call me blessed.

The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.  

His mercy is from age to age to those who fear him.  

He has shown might with his arm, dispersed the arrogant of mind and heart.

He has thrown down the rulers from their thrones but lifted up the lowly.  

The hungry he has filled with good things; the rich he has sent away empty.

He has helped Israel his servant, remembering his mercy,  

according to his promise to our fathers, to Abraham and to his descendants forever."

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You know what is really cool? In that section of the gospel is where Catholics derive two of my very favorite Catholic prayers, the Hail Mary and the Magnificat.

Look:

"Hail Mary, full of grace the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus..." See? That is nothing more than what Elizabeth said to her younger cousin when the child within her womb leapt for joy, as John recognized his Savior, Jesus Christ. The Hail Mary is one of the prayers Catholics pray during our Rosary--it is not a spell or incantation, it is a prayer. 

Greg Erlandson says this about the Magnificat

"The Visitation is also the occasion for Mary’s great prayer, the Magnificat. This prayer is treasured by a wide variety of Catholics because it is an eloquent articulation of the Catholic belief in the dignity of all people and the Gospel injunction to help the weakest among us, uniting the pro-life and social-justice wings of our sometimes divided Church.
This May 31, pray for all women who are struggling with pregnancies. Pray that God gives them strength to protect the life they bear in their wombs. And while you are at it, make a donation to an aid organization that provides assistance to unwed mothers."

Two women, both of them endangered by the tiny lives they carried within their wombs, Elizabeth who was advanced in years and Mary, unwed in a society who stoned women for adultery. Courage. Faith. Love.