Papers - 

The Light of the World.

Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life. (John 8:12)

Author Edward P. Sri writes, "The way of the kingdom was the way of peace, and it involved gathering all peoples, even the Jewish oppressors.  Rome and Herod were not enemies to be conquered, but brethren to be gathered back into God’s covenant family.”[i]  This notion is the overall theme or concept that I try to answer within these words and by the Grace of God do so in a manner that is in complete conjunction with the Catholic Church's Sacred Scripture, Apostolic Traditions, and Living Magisterium.

Within the many teachings of the Catholic Church and Scripture, God the Father, Christ the Son, and the Holy Spirit are described or portrayed as lights, and one can reason that we are products of that perception.[ii]  We are taught that the brilliant light of the Father is so intense and pure that no one can see past, through, or into it.  When we look at the Transfiguration, Christ’s garment is shown as a glowing, brilliant light, such that no one[iii] on earth could bleach it (Mark 9:3).  We are seeing a mere glimpse of the Father through the prism of the Word made flesh. Finally, we see the Holy Spirit portrayed as a tongue of flame (Acts 2:3), a burning light for all to see at Pentecost, potentially turning all into lamps on a table, lights for the world to see (Matthew 5:15).

With this realization, the Light of God is revealed to us in threefold aspects in Christ. Thus, within the reality of our existence, we are composed of three distinct and unique parts or aspects that make up the whole: our consciousness, our flesh, and the breath of God, the elemental aspects of physicality, psychology, and spirituality. Christ portrays this notion in John 3:5-7:

“Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.  What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.” 

A realism of the distinct parts that make us whole; a truth that cannot be denied. The physical and psychological aspects unite, making people precisely who they are as unique individuals. The breath or Spirit of God makes us children of God; his essence was instilled within the framework that makes up our humanity. Any distortion seen upon one affects the other. Instability or darkness of the consciousness portion, disease, some malady on the physical portion, or the sin that creates darkness in the essence of God, will inevitably contribute to the distortion of one's being.

I reflected upon the notion that, as we are so created in the image of God, we too can be seen as ‘lights.’  In Genesis 1:1-2, we read

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters. ”

The earth was void and lifeless, and the spirit hovered over the waters of the deep emptiness. The fundamental aspects of creation are water and spirit, as all life is formed out of clay, given a soul for animation, and thus exists as created. However, we were also given the breath of God for our self-awareness and reason, separating us from all other creatures,  God’s reflection on earth.

A brilliant white light, vis-à-vis Adam (Genesis 2:7), a living soul, one with God.  Unfortunately, we became wracked with imperfections upon the fall and the advent of original sin, what we call concupiscence, which is the human race’s proclivity to sin. Lights askew in relationship to the one true light, Christ, the New Adam (2 Corinthians 5:17).  In the flesh, we are askew or a mere part of the purity of the seen whiteness of Christ’s brilliant light.

We can be characterized as lights that are seen as red ones, blue ones, yellow ones, etc.. Each is unique, separate from the next, and connected as shown when white light passes through a prism. Inexhaustible in variation or hue, as one can see across the spectrum. Countless shades make up the one spectrum of visible light.  Decimal places are at the nth degree within the wavelength frequencies that make the color of perceived white light seen through a prism.

This disorderly light comes from the prism of original sin, which I perceive as a window screen—a screen of thousands of little holes that still allows the breath of God and the Light of Christ to pass. Sin fills these holes with dirt and blocks the breath and light from freely passing unobstructed. These blockages create the darkness, moving us farther away from the true light that is God, our Father, seen in Christ. The screen itself, along with the physical and psychological aspects, is what gives us our perception of the light of Christ. This perception is set askew from the pure light of the Father seen through Christ's perfect humanity, as white as bleached wool, seen through the prism of the fall.

I then postulated that we are seen within this makeup of the varying shades of light, askew, due to the original fall. Our realities become what we perceive through this imposed prism. The orange light of the anarchist, the teal light of the pacifist, and all the variations between and beyond. Our unique personalities and personas make us who we are through the prism of original sin. The flesh of the earth is made whole with the light of God. Our very essence is derived from that unique light incorporated within us by the breath of God, each unique in flesh and yet so similar within one likeness or ‘one breath’, set in disarray or scattered as the visible light scatters through a prism.

The concept of light, however, can be used against us. One must also be aware of the false lights of Lucifer,[iv] or light bearer, and his minions, who use this characteristic of our skewed perception against us to keep us looking away from the true light of Christ, planting the seeds of deceit and hatred amongst his children (Matthew 13:7).  The ability to see the deceit of the evil one is through one’s faith that the cleansing power of Christ’s forgiveness and compassionate mercy for us is an absolute cleansing power that enables all to walk in Christ’s light and become beacons to that light.

God the Father is beyond the brightest of all light. One cannot fully understand His light, peer into it, touch it, or interact with it (Exodus 3:4-5) lest our flesh be destroyed. While His Son, the Light of the world,  the Word of the Father made flesh, is of this world, with whom we can see and touch[v]. This truth was revealed in the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:2). Christ, the brilliant light of the Father expressed in Moses's ‘shining’ face (Exodus 34:30), was made flesh (John 1:1-5; 1 John 1:1-5) and all can look upon him without being blinded, burnt, or destroyed. Christ professes this notion when proclaiming,

“I am the light of the world.”(John 8:12) “As I am in the Father and the Father is in me.” (John 14:11)

One Body

Each of us is unique in our perceptions and how we are perceived. Yet within this uniqueness, we have commonality with all created life, body, and soul. But within our uniqueness of self-awareness, we tend to gravitate to those whose light is like ours. The orange light of the anarchist attracts others of the same hue. Conversely, the teal light of the pacifist also attracts those of similar lights. Both tend to form groups and share common goals, ideals, etc.[vi]

This leads to the realization that, as children of God, all lights are of Him who created us; He whose very breath gives us eternal life. Each is a variation of the true white light of the Father, skewed by sin and flesh. A realization that, as human beings, irrespective of one’s faith, beliefs, or even nonbelief, there is an undeniable reality that we all comprise the fundamental building blocks of earthly and eternal life: consciousness, self-awareness, physicality, and the soul, the spirit and flesh with which we were created to be.

It is this very notion of consciousness that, to most Christians, is the Word of God, clay made life, and is instilled with the essence of God within His breath, making us uniquely created life and thus God’s Children.[vii]  Physicality comes together with consciousness to become an individual living creature; God’s breath instills his likeness. What a non-believer sees as a culmination of a multitude of coincidences coming together perfectly to evolve over a vast length of time into what we are, homo sapiens. Allbeit denying the reality that we are unique creations amongst all the living creatures of this world, created uniquely with reason and self-awareness, the very essence of God.

As Christ explained to the Apostles, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12)  Thus, when we walk in Christ's light, is it wrong to have an orange hue, no; is it wrong to have a teal hue, no; once we realize that we all come from the same place and are all brothers and sisters of one Father through the essence He placed within us at creation. This goes beyond any perception, religion, nationality, or race; we are all part of God, our Creator’s family. All unique individuals share a fundamental truth expressed through reason.

The reality or circumstance we often find ourselves throughout human history is where God is denied.  He has been relegated to the realm of a superstition, a figment of one’s imagination, unprovable and thus not real or at a minimum not of this world, the atheistic view of God[viii] or the more agnostic[ix] view whereby there is a god, but he has nothing to do with my reality; St. Paul so warned us in Heb 3:12.  Within this scenario the very salvation we seek, we deny as being real or viable. The overall view is that one alone can determine one’s fate and by one's own hands.  Doing so in the manner one sees as the proper way, perhaps employing anarchistic principles or pacifistic approaches.

Either way, the overall point is that when we come together in the flesh without the prism of the Word Made Flesh, our perceptions are seen as the only true path, and all others are merely obstacles in achieving our goals; the resultant union is then black. I could not help but imagine grabbing that 128-count box of crayons and putting an amalgamation of all 128 on paper, and we get black. The color of nothing, or a result of no color, comprises all colors. This is true of all elements of the flesh or physical world in the context of combining equal and opposite forces; the resultant is most always zero when the unity of Christ is left out of the equation. With Christ, we have Simon the Zealot or anarchist in communion with Thadeous, the pacifist, in peace and harmony through the light of Christ.

However, one comes to a different conclusion when examining visible light as both a particle and a wave in the physical world, which is explainable and measurable. As I reflected upon this, I came to see that the physicality of light's dual nature, as evident throughout biblical and theological texts, is that light has been used to describe God or the effects of God as best as He can be described. The essence of light is so close to the truth that is ‘God’ seen in the Son of Man, which we can partially conceive the inconceivable through reason. When visible light is divided into its most basic elements, we see the rainbow; when we combine all the colored lights of that rainbow, we get white, etc. This is relative to our existence in that we are made up of individual lights derived from God, our creator, physical lights or personas seen and part of who we are, from anarchist to pacifist.

That is what the Father showed Peter, James, and John on Mt. Tabor in Christ. If we come together through the prism of Christ, we can see the Father’s bright light. Christ described this notion when He told the Apostles,

“For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”(Matthew 18:20)

This is the very thing I speak of, differing lights that come together in Christ’s name will always walk away in peace, for He is with them. The more that come together in Christ, the closer we look like God the Father, of whose image we were created; thus, when all colors of each light are brought together as one, we become more ‘like’ God, the communing that is Mother Church.

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”(Matthew 5:48)

The overall concept is seen throughout the Gospels and the writings of St. Paul, for example:

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit, we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.”(1 Corinthians 12:12-13) 

St. Paul reiterates this theme throughout his writings, as expressed in his letter to the Ephesians:

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.”(Ephesians 4:4-6)

This concept of the flesh is expressed within the reality of Christ, where all colors, humanity, come together as one bright, pure light, through all and in all. As God the Father is, as is expressed in Moses' answer of who He is, “I Am Who I Am” (Exodus 3:14). The ability for us children to express the truth of God the Father comes to us through his begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Christ tells us this succinctly in Jn 14:12,

“Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; ...” 

This conceptual aspect of humanity is somewhat evident in all world religions—bits of truth outside Christ, yet all born of Christ through the Father. Unique colors emanating from the one white light, all have aspects of the whole, God or the truth, who is, merely being perceived through the skewed ‘color’ they believe to be their truth.

The points so eloquently made some 2000 years ago are genuine and enduring. A reality that we are made up of flesh and consciousness created from something outside of ourselves, albeit God or the false notion of time, a perception based upon the color of one’s light.  This endurance of truth for all Christians is seen throughout the millennium as the Church, whereby in faith, the gates will never fall (Mt 16:18-19).  The very institution given by Christ as one with the one who sent him to all His children; ‘baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free.’  The Father's indiscrimination is throughout, in the spirit we are one with the Father, and in the flesh, we are one with Christ. Together, we are made one and complete in the Love of the Holy Spirit.

Uniquely Common

When the one spirit comes together with the one flesh, we are created, conceived, made whole, and with the breath of God made creatures of God. By this union, we develop into individual, unique personas or colors called individuals. This union of three distinct elements creates oneness, a person, a child, a son, or a daughter; each unique and yet the same. The coming together or a union that is the Love of the Father seen by all his creation, which God the Father was pleased with, for it was ‘very good’ (Genisis 1:31).  A unity of elements coming together to become one, the essence of the Trinity, the Father, the Word or breath, the beloved Son, and the Holy Spirit – their binding Love.[x]

The core of Christ’s teaching is this unity through Him, the essence of God made whole on earth, a new Jerusalem, a city on a hill for all to see (Matthew 5:14). A concept which is also the very essence of the concept of Christian marriage as put forth by Christ when describing the will of the Father;

“…and said, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” (Matthew 19:5, Genesis 2:24) 

Two unique individual parts coming together to make one. These unique parts come together as one in the flesh and of the flesh and come together in spirit, bound together by shared love to create new life. Any marriage lived in this manner will never fall, and the gates of Hades will never overcome, sound familiar, an overwhelming commonality of Christian doctrine expressed throughout all of Christendom, merely a reflection of Christ incarnate. The end game, so to speak, is that of union and harmony of one’s essence itself. 

Through Christ

We cannot see or truly begin to understand the Father, so He sent His son. Within the Son, we are given a glimpse of the Father. The Father’s Love for us, in that He sent His only begotten Son for our salvation (1 John 4:9).  Once more, this coming together or unity is the core of the Christian tradition. The orange anarchist coming together with the teal pacifist to become one in love and for love. The pacifist acts as an anarchist, and the anarchist acts as a pacifist to please the other. Born out of love for the other, achieving harmony, and doing so in love and not wanting. Each achieves their goals through the love of the other and not the selfish desires of the individuals, personas, or ‘colors.’

With the above perception in mind, it is not a capitulation or an act of acquiescence to the other, but rather the very ideal outlined in the commands of Christ for us all. We are not commanded to go out and overpower or conquer our enemies, but rather love them. Love them in a manner that does not forsake our ideals or color, but rather love them as Christ loved us. One can see the intent by looking at the ideal expressed in turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:39-42), a stance of ground, not capitulation, but rather the act of slapping back without slapping, the anarchist pacifying without being a pacifist. An evil action countered with goodness's equal and opposite reaction, a move towards peace. The key is that this reaction is based on love of the other, a desire for the good of the other simply for that good itself.

This concept is not a radical new idea or some magic trick to overpower our enemies, but it is a means to an end. A famous example concerns Bishop Tutu of South Africa, a South African Anglican and staunch opponent of Apartheid. As a young priest in Johannesburg, he made his way one day along a raised wooden sidewalk over the muddy street. He came to a narrow spot on the sidewalk and was met by a white man who was a racist. The white man said, “Get off the sidewalk, I don’t make way for gorillas.” Tutu got off the sidewalk, gestured broadly, and said, “I do.”[xi]  A pacifist acting as an anarchist without becoming one, merely acting in love towards the other.

There is a vast treasure trove of writings and teachings on the subject. In the flesh, we undeniably desire to understand ourselves, our being, and our existence. While we pursue this understanding, it will always fall short if we do not consider the essence of this being, our consciousness. As our perceptions, our color is uniquely part of who we are; this color is embedded within the makeup of the consciousness we use to perceive the understanding we seek. Thus, the teachings, writings, and proclamations that have been brought forth on the subject, many coming from a unique color or perspective.

The Catholic Church is among those whose works are presented to the world as a truth or understanding that comes from or is produced by the notions outlined in this paper. Many colors come together: a college of laity, priests, and bishops formulating or postulating answers to questions beyond our existence, the foundation of faith. These Synods and Councils[xii] are tools the Church uses in formulating beliefs and understandings for the works and ideals the Church holds as truth or Dogma—for example, many documents have been published concerning the issues of social justice and the common good.[xiii]  I am merely expressing a point of view that I believe is in conjunction with these teachings. The undeniable truth is that we cannot understand God our Father, but we can reasonably perceive Him through Christ.

This very concept of which I am speaking is infused in the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe on the tilma of St. Juan Diego.  The image preserved was immersed in iconic messages that the culture of Mexico would understand based on their beliefs at the time of the sighting.  Fr. Harold J. Rahm, S.J., in his book “Am I Not Here?”[xiv] describes in detail the imagery left on the tilma of St. Juan Diego and the relationship to the understanding of the people.  The message was from a perspective the Indigenous peoples could understand: the Blessed Mother, queen of Peace, the ultimate pacifist, speaking a message of peace in anarchy to the anarchists.

With this notion in mind, one should ask how a pacifist would address anarchists in anarchy. Are tilmas no longer available? Are we, unfortunately, left to our own devices? On the contrary, this is the very core of the proposition posed within this text; by the same grace of God, through the Holy Spirit, and in Christ, all things are possible. We have at our fingertips the Church and the teachings it provides as our guides.

[i] Edward P. Sri, Mystery of the Kingdom: On the Gospel of Matthew (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road Publishing, 1999), 61.

[ii] Robert L. Thomas, The Lockman Foundation, New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible: Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998).

[iii] Gk no fuller

[iv]  William Whitaker, Dictionary of Latin Forms (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2012).

[v] Jason A. Fout, Fully Alive: The Glory of God and the Human Creature in Karl Barth, Hans Urs von Balthasar and Theological Exegesis of Scripture (London; New Delhi; New York; Sydney: Bloomsbury T&T Clark; Bloomsbury, 2015).

[vi] Kristine Keller M.A., “Oil and Vinegar: Why Opposites Don’t Attract,” accessed February 20, 2021, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-young-and-the-restless/201210/oil-and-vinegar-why-opposites-dont-attract.

[vii] Francis Aveling, “Man,” ed. Charles G. Herbermann et al., The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church (New York: The Encyclopedia Press; The Universal Knowledge Foundation, 1907–1913).

[viii] ibid, “Atheism.”

[ix] Edmund Shanahan, “Agnosticism,” ed. Charles G. Herbermann et al., The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church (New York: The Encyclopedia Press; The Universal Knowledge Foundation, 1907–1913).

[x] Augustine of Hippo, “On the Trinity,” in St. Augustin: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. Arthur West Haddan, vol. 3, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1887).

[xi] Catholicism Series - Episode 3: 27:47 – 28:12, Fr. Robert Baron, 2012

[xii] William Whitaker, Dictionary of Latin Forms, (DLF), (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2012).

[xiii]  Compendium Of The Social Doctrine Of The Church, Pontifical Council For Justice And Peace, Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2004, ISBN 88-209-7716-8, from: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html

[xiv] Rahm, H. J. (1963).  Am I not here: Mother of the Americas our Lady of Guadalupe.  Washington, NJ: International.