Welcome to another week of class where we are studying God's Word through stories from the Bible!
The evening started with mass at 6:30pm, celebrating the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows. The Gospel reading was from John 19:25-27, where Jesus gives his mother to the disciple John and to us. Father Jason in his homily discussed the 7 sorrows of the Virgin Mary. In tonights reading from John, Jesus dies on the cross. [one of those sorrows] In class, I discussed this feast of Mary and gave the students a handout with all the 7 Sorrows described. I told them about a special rosary prayer called the Rosary of the 7 sorrows. For your information the 7 sorrows are: 1. The Prophecy of Simeon [Luke 2:22-35], 2. The Flight into Egypt [Matthew 2:13-15], 3. The loss of Jesus in the Temple [Luke 2:41-52], 4. Mary meets Jesus on the Way to Calvary [Luke 23:27-31] 5. Mary stands at the foot of the cross [John 19: 25-27] 6. Mary receives the dead body of Jesus [John 19:41-42] 7. Jesus is placed in the tomb [John 19:41-42]
This week's class started with a prayer to the Holy Spirit.[Look at last weeks blog where I wrote out the prayer for you.] We discussed future prayers and decided to learn the Our Father in Spanish, starting next week. We then had a review quiz from last weeks introductory Bible movie. The quiz went very well! The students listened and remembered what they learned! Good job!
We then watched the second part of the teen timeline bible study. The students were reminded again that when reading the Bible they are not reading a documentary. They are to look at the stories and most importantly think of the WHY. Why is that story in the Bible and what is God trying to tell ME, through that story. Tonight's episode was about the book of Genesis chapters1-11. It started when God created the World. We learned that man [and beasts] was created on the 6th day, Genesis 1:26-27. Man was made in the image of God, given the capacity to love, with intellect and free will. God made a covenant with Adam with the sign of that covenant being the Sabbath, a day of rest and communion with God. But because of man's pride[exercise of will for self] and selfishness[wanting more] man failed. Adam and Eve did not completely Trust God! Adam and Eve were One Holy Couple, as they were called, but through sin broke the covenant with God. From Genesis 3:14-15 we learned because of their sin, God banned them out of the garden of Eden, "I will intensify the pangs of your childbearing: in pain shall you bring forth children." Man would learn that with love would come suffering. He was to learn that his will must be secondary to an other's. Forever more a part of love would be suffering. This was to teach man that in loving he was to loose his pride and sometimes suffer for the good of another.
The next covenant was made with Noah who was the picture of faith. He built an Ark, and together with his wife and children became One Holy Family. God gave Noah a sign of that covenant, the rainbow, saying that he would never again flood the world. But the Bible tells how man again failed. Because of his pride, to make his name great, he built the Tower of Babel. This again angered God so He confused man's language.
In Genesis we learn that God is LOVE. Love is about giving and not about pride[exercise of will for self]. When we sin we are takers and not givers of love. In the Bible we will see that again man must suffer till he learns to give of himself and not take from others.
We ended the night quickly because the video was long. We could have had a long discussion but will hold that for another night. Next week we will be discussing prayer. Father Jason will be our guest speaker for the evening. I hope all the students will make it a point to attend.
A little word of business, we are compiling our service, prayer and activity lists. Hopefully that will be done in 1-2 weeks. For our parish picnic on October 3rd we are raffling a basket. Please bring a kitchen item to put in our basket next week.
See everyone next Wednesday.
You are in my prayers, please keep me in yours,
Joyce Hughes
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