Publisher's Synopsis
A Lay Cistercian reflects on reality: Discussions on the Mystery of Faith and Eucharistic Adoration.I always enjoy reading anything from Space.com, especially about distant worlds, dark matter, black holes, and scientific discoveries. Visible reality is challenging for the human mind, but invisible reality is even more fascinating. In the Creed, said at Eucharist each Sunday, we profess to believe in what is visible and what is invisible. I think that the visible/invisible paradigm is at the heart of the debate about what reality is. Science tells us physical reality is what we can measure and prove by scientific means. That is correct. More elusive is the invisible reality of meaning, love, purpose, and the mind into one reality. God seems to be in that undefinable, unmeasurable, and seemingly unrealistic category for many thinkers. Spirituality doesn't make sense.I aspire to be a Lay Cistercian at Our Lady of the Holy Spirit Monastery (Trappist) in Conyers, Georgia. My journey from self to God is slow but unrelenting, one that involves both visible and invisible realities. This book is the result of my Lectio Divina contemplations about three subjects, all inter-connected, all central to visible/invisible reality. There is but one reality, composed of physical, mental and spiritual universes and these three are one. The Mystery of Faith, Mysterium Fidei, is at the heart of making the invisible visible. It is the real presence of Christ for those disciples who live NOW so that they can give glory to the Father through the Son in union with the Holy Spirit in each age. What sounds like a mouthful of marbles is actually at the core of loving God with all our hearts. Our hearts are heated up and nourished by the heart of a living person, the Son of God, Our Lord. All of this is invisible, but it is part of one reality. Contemplation, using silence and solitude, helps us to enter into this invisible reality.Adoration of the Eucharist means I place myself in the real presence of the same Jesus who gave his disciples the charge, "...my flesh is real food, my blood is real drink." It is the same Lord who walked the earth over 2000 years ago, body and blood, soul and divinity. It is the Real Presence of Christ under the appearance of simple bread. It doesn't make sense. Some think of it as a representation, but it is more than that. Some don't believe that Christ has the power to be as present now. We can only remember what he did. That in all things, God be glorified. -St. Benedict
