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The Divine Mystery Let's talk about mystery. Today, to a good degree, we want to have control of everything, to understand everything. But we come to frustration because we can't. First, in the physical world. We understand our physical world more and more, but there are still many things we don't understand. There are millions and millions of stars and so many theories about them, nothing but theories. I remember the first time that Armstrong went to the moon. Many scientists thought that there would be ten feet of dust on the moon, and that the men would be buried when they stepped on the moon. Well, when Armstrong stepped on the moon he wasn't buried in dust, because the moon was solid rock. The moon was a mystery for us. So many theories about how the stars are formed. But they're all only theories. We don't know exactly; they're still a mystery for us. A deeper mystery for us is the human mind. How much we are a mystery to ourselves. How much we don't know about ourselves. We can say, "Oh I know everything about myself." Oh really? Until one day everything collapses - a car accident, a mental breakdown, an emotional shake-up. And we don't know what is up or what is down. We don't know the beginning or the end. We just don't know anything about ourselves. I know a fellow who used to say, "I do the things i don't want to do, and i don't do the things I want to do." He was stuck in the same situation that we are in. We are a mystery to ourselves, a deep mystery. This mystery helps us to throw ourselves into the hands of God and say, 'Well, God, here i am. You know how i am because i sure don't.' When i think i have the whole thing figured out and i really have perfect control of my life, then something happens and i lose perfect control of my life. I'm a mystery to myself. The most important mystery is the mystery of God. Of course He has to be a mystery. This brings us precisely to the Holy Mysteries. The word 'sacrament' is a Greek word, and it means 'mystery'. In the Divine Liturgy and the Holy Mass we're dealing with the Divine Mysteries. These are mysteries of God - the wonderful, the awesome, the profound, the infinite, the inconceivable, the incomprehensible. As we say in the Divine Liturgy, 'the mysteries of God'. We live in the mystery of God. All these external ceremonies we are doing are important because they help us in our senses, in our imagination, to go into the depths of God in the soul. But we are now dealing with the mysteries. How many things happen in our souls when we attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Divine Liturgy? Only God knows. So many things happen in our souls. They are very real things that happen, and we are unaware of them. The modern and superficial man tries to measure things by feelings. "Whatever i feel is real." Dr. Low, a famous Jewish psychiatrist from Chicago used to say, 'Feelings are not facts.' Sometimes we can feel something very strongly, and it is not true. It is unreal. Other times we don't feel something else, but it is true. Let's celebrate this sense of mystery, immerse ourselves in the mystery of God. In the Divine Liturgy it says that thousands of angels and archangels are around the altar worshiping God. We cannot see angels with our physical eyes, but they do exist. Like we don't see the soul, but the soul exists. |