Father Martin's Monthly Newsletter

Volume 1, No. 9	July Message	July 9, 1998

Consolation: The Emmaus Factor

This is a very strange time for believing Catholics. In the middle of a booming economy and almost universal travel, there seems to be a wide spread desire to level any difference between the way Catholics live and the rest of the world lives. This is in short a very difficult time for a truly earnest Roman Catholic, and the reason for it being especially difficult springs from the crisis that is affecting the Roman Catholic Church. We have a very ailing pope, isolated, on the defensive, surrounded mainly by prelates and Vatican officials who really wish that they were done with this papacy. One close observer of the Vatican court of John Paul II will speak quite freely and sincerely about a sensation of hatred or at least dislike to be noticed in a majority of those who work around the present Holy Father.

On top of all this, the statistical report from the field is very discouraging about the condition of the practice of Catholicism. Low birthrates, wide spread practice of contraception and abortion, increasing divorce rate (apparently softened by calling many divorces "annulments") very low attendance at Sunday mass and a general feeling that the practice of the Church is out of date with the practice of our technological society.

In this situation, fervent and sincere Catholics need consolation. The prime consolation offered by their religion is enshrined in the name of a village that once existed about 6 miles outside of Jerusalem, in the time of Jesus. And the story of Emmaus -- that was it's name -- is told in the gospel. It was the morning after the Crucifixion. Two of Christ's disciples decided that since their leader, Jesus, was dead and their local government was making threatening noises about His followers, they should leave the city. Once outside the city and on their way to Emmaus, they fell into step with a stranger. No sooner had they greeted Him and He them than He asked them why they were so sad. They apparently rounded on Him and asked Him why He was so happy. Then they went on, as men do when full of their own pain, and explained to him in pithy language that a short time ago they were the fervent followers of a man called Jesus, because they believed He would have saved the Jewish people from the ugly Romans who occupied Jerusalem and the land of Israel, and that He would restore the glorious kingdom of David. But, they explained bitterly, the chief priests and the Roman authorities had assassinated this Jesus, and thus ruined their hopes.

Apparently the next thing that happened to them was that they found themselves listening to somebody with a smiling shining face asking them gently but strongly if they had read the prophets and Moses. And if they had read these sacred books, did they not know that the Messiah, the expected restorer of Israel's glory, would have to die a bloody death. Then He proceeded without further ado, to explain to them what they had already read years ago, but had never understood. Namely: that the Messiah had to undergo violent death, had to be suppressed by the authorities, had to suffer terribly and thus enter into His glory.

By this time, apparently, they had come to pass the town of Emmaus and the Bible says that this stranger pretended to them that He wanted to go on further. They were tired and hungry, but chiefly they did not want to loose Him because, as they said later, their hearts were burning with joy as they spoke to them. So they said "Look, the day is almost spent, the sun is declining, come into the inn and have some wine and food with us."

This He did. When they were seated and bread and wine had been served, He broke the loaf in three pieces, and, at that moment, they were given the grace by God to recognize their beloved Jesus. At that moment, too, He disappeared. But, they had understood, and they stood up, paid their bill and rushed back to Jerusalem to tell the other disciples and apostles that Jesus was alive and well and resurrected from the dead.

The lesson taught here by our Lord Jesus is that the solution God has chosen for men's salvation has nothing to do with prosperity, riches, success of business or in love, or the assemblage of all those things for which men and women receive brilliant reputations and acclaim. The consolation for us is that no matter how much more difficult it is to practice our religion, no matter how much suffering is involved, inherent to the message of Our Lord Jesus is the basic lesson that God's solution for mankind's dilemma lies in suffering, and through the portals of death they enter into life eternal.

This basic consolation goes dead against one regnant spirit among prelates and clergy and many Catholics, namely, that we must labor to build a paradise on Earth, a human habitat,
that we must join with all men in building a material civilization of comfort and ease and good health and riches. The Church of Jesus has nothing against well-being and happiness and well-nourished lives. But that is not the aim of Catholicism and Christianity. The only victory the Church can claim justly as victory is when a man or woman dies, and their soul passes into the Hands of God, and not into the pit of Hell.

When Jesus had shown Himself to Peter and two other apostles on Mount Tabor, being transfigured in Divine Brilliance before their eyes, as He walked down the mountain with His disciples, He surprisingly said to them; "Now we go to Jerusalem and I will be crucified." Peter immediately objected, saying in effect, that this could not be. Jesus
turned on Peter "Get behind me Satan! You do not understand the things of God! Did you not know that the Son of Man -- meaning Himself -- must die by crucifixion and thus enter into His glory?"

This is the basic lesson of Catholicism: that no glory, no completely humanistic happiness in this life is guaranteed to us Catholics, or even to Christians in general. What is promised us is Eternal Life by means of the grace of Christ. At the present moment, in the Church, there are terrible troubles, terrible divisions and squabbles and fights. We are breaking up into separate entities. And no man alive can predict what the Church will look like in l0 year's time. But, for all those who wish to find the truth and are willing to search for it, there will never be any doubt as to what they should do. The Emmaus Factor is the key factor of our religion.

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