Returning to the Penny Catechism
WHO MADE YOU? God Made Me,
WHY DID GOD MAKE YOU? God made me to know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world and to be happy with Him forever in the next.
My wife and I had a handicapped child with what is called challenging behaviour. He would shout, scream, and go into temper tantrums almost on a daily basis. One night my wife was so exhausted she cried out "God why did you make Him?" She cried then repeated the Penny Catechism answer - "To know him, love him,and serve him in this world and to be happy with him forever in the next" Somehow the answer was put on her lips. Suddenly we saw he had a future. I worked with many adults with challenging behaviour and what kept me going was the knowledge that God loved them as much as anyone else and whatever the world saw on the outside God saw the person within. They all had a future.
I find it sad that so many young people today look on life with despair and try to escape into drugs, sex, and alcohol. There are social reasons perhaps for this feeling of worthlessness, of being no use to anyone. What they need to know is that they have a future where they will be loved in a way the world can never love them. They need to know there is a God. They need to feel His love, and they need to respond to that love. The First Commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, with all your strength and all your might, is the First because all other things are possible only through this Commandment. We can hide from ourselves in human activity, yes giving to charities, and giving to the poor, but if it is only to help ourselves then even in such work we can find disappointment. "The SECOND is like unto this Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself"
Notice that this came second. The reason is that in loving God we have a reason to love others. The reason is that in seeing the dignity and worth of ourselves as children of God we also see the worth of everyone else. Blessed Mother Teresa was teaching in a private school and could have remained there giving her money to charity but she loved God too much and changed her life to give herself to the dead, dying,and diseased in the streets of Calcutta. St Francis realised the trimmings of the world stopped him serving God and even through away his clothing. Father Damian decided to go to a leper colony and give his priesthood to the lepers, knowing his chances were hight that he would catch the disease. They were first in love with God.
That is the charity we need in the Church today. A realisation that once we leave Church then everyone we meet needs to know and love God. And first we must teach our own children to love God by teaching what Jesus said was the TRUTH. To deny there is a truth which Jesus taught is to move away not only from Hin but from God Himself.
WHY DID GOD MAKE YOU? God made me to know Him, love Him, and serve Him in this world and to be happy with Him forever in the next.
My wife and I had a handicapped child with what is called challenging behaviour. He would shout, scream, and go into temper tantrums almost on a daily basis. One night my wife was so exhausted she cried out "God why did you make Him?" She cried then repeated the Penny Catechism answer - "To know him, love him,and serve him in this world and to be happy with him forever in the next" Somehow the answer was put on her lips. Suddenly we saw he had a future. I worked with many adults with challenging behaviour and what kept me going was the knowledge that God loved them as much as anyone else and whatever the world saw on the outside God saw the person within. They all had a future.
I find it sad that so many young people today look on life with despair and try to escape into drugs, sex, and alcohol. There are social reasons perhaps for this feeling of worthlessness, of being no use to anyone. What they need to know is that they have a future where they will be loved in a way the world can never love them. They need to know there is a God. They need to feel His love, and they need to respond to that love. The First Commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, with all your strength and all your might, is the First because all other things are possible only through this Commandment. We can hide from ourselves in human activity, yes giving to charities, and giving to the poor, but if it is only to help ourselves then even in such work we can find disappointment. "The SECOND is like unto this Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself"
Notice that this came second. The reason is that in loving God we have a reason to love others. The reason is that in seeing the dignity and worth of ourselves as children of God we also see the worth of everyone else. Blessed Mother Teresa was teaching in a private school and could have remained there giving her money to charity but she loved God too much and changed her life to give herself to the dead, dying,and diseased in the streets of Calcutta. St Francis realised the trimmings of the world stopped him serving God and even through away his clothing. Father Damian decided to go to a leper colony and give his priesthood to the lepers, knowing his chances were hight that he would catch the disease. They were first in love with God.
That is the charity we need in the Church today. A realisation that once we leave Church then everyone we meet needs to know and love God. And first we must teach our own children to love God by teaching what Jesus said was the TRUTH. To deny there is a truth which Jesus taught is to move away not only from Hin but from God Himself.
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