From the Book of Genesis we learned about Creation:

From the Book of Genesis we learned about Creation:

Reading the Book of John we were told who Jesus is, the second person of the Holy Trinity.  Reading the prologue from the Gospel of John there is no question of his mission to bring redemption for each human by becoming one like us.  

As we delve into these two Scriptures the premise of what God has in mind for his creatures who would live, love, and become eternal with him have a mysterious proclamation to their meaning.

In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless wasteland and darkness covered the abyss, while a mighty wind swept over the waters.  Then God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.  And God saw how good the light was.

(Gn 1: 1 - 4).

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was in the beginning with God.  All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be.  What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race. (Jn 1: 1 - 4).

The whole of Jesus Christ is found in the Creation of mankind, the Sacrifice that the Son of Man would take upon himself, and the Resurrection of the Paschal Lamb that represents a human Lamb that is in need of total forgiveness.  

Being bathed in the Light, which is Christ, is written in the annals of Sacred Scripture which is the Son of God, Jesus Christ.  From the very beginning of creation the Son of God, in the Holy Trinity, a life of and for mankind is written about him.

Among all the Scriptural texts about creation, the first three chapters of Genesis occupy a unique place.  From a literary standpoint these texts may have had diverse sources.  The inspired authors have placed them at the beginning of Scripture to express in their solemn language the truths of creation - its origin and its end in God, its order and goodness, the vocation of man, and finally the drama of sin and the hope of salvation.  Read in the light of Christ, within the unity of Sacred Scripture and in the living Tradition of the Church, these texts remain the principal source for catechesis on the mysteries of the “beginning” : creation, fall, and promise of salvation.  (CCC 289).

Though already present in his Church, Christ’s reign is nevertheless yet to be fulfilled “with power and great glory” by the king’s return to earth.  This reign is still under attack by tne evil powers, even though they have been defeated definitively by Christ’s Passover.  Until everything is subject to him, “until there be realized new heavens and a new earth in which justice dwells, the pilgrim Church, in her sacraments and institutions, which belong to this present age, carries the mark of this world which will pass, and she herself takes her place among the creatures which groan and travail yet and await the revelation of the sons of God.”  That is why Christians pray, above all in the Eucharist, to hasten Christ’s return by saying to him: Marana tha! “Our Lord, come!”  (CCC 671).

Before Christ’s second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers.  The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the “mystery of iniquity” in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth.   The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.  (CCC 675).

This Lenten season must prevail on our hearts to see what is happening and this period of witnessing the Passion of Christ requires our most ardent attention to what we are preparing ourselves for; the final return of Christ: “Then I saw the heavens opened, and there was a white horse; its rider was called “Faithful and True.”  He judges and wages war in righteousness.  He has a name written on his cloak and on his thigh, “King of kings and Lord of lords.”   (Rv 19: 11, 16).

Ralph B. Hathaway