Chastity and Homosexuality

Chastity and Homosexuality
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,141 tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered."142 They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.

"Divine Mercy comes as a New Pentecost"

To answer a friend's questions about the impact Divine Mercy has on me:

1.How did you receive the Divine Mercy chaplet as your daily devotion?

· First it took me time to embrace Mary as my Mother. I came with a lot of resistance because of the warnings taught me being raised and schooled by Pentecostalism. I was taught speaking in tongues is the most important part of my prayer life. Being taught that the experiences I was receiving “from the Holy Spirit” during the times of manifestations is more important then the Truth of the Gospel and how we have received the Truth. Please understand I am not saying speaking in tongues are wrong or over. Thank God by His grace He still allows me to pray in the Spirit, and with understanding. This "Truth","Divine Mercy","Jesus Christ Himself"; is marked in His-Story and pasted down to us from the actual Apostles and early Church Fathers. Study for yourself and see, that the Virgin Mary, spouse of the Holy Spirit, Mother of the Truth, is totally interwoven in their writings of the Gospel story past down to us. Man has so commercialized the Christmas story of the Jesus birth and Virgin Mary by limiting her to the “Christmas only Mary” making God’s love to the world out to be tawdry.
·Conversion is a process and every born again Christian who knows the message of the Gospel is in the midst of ongoing change in life as a transformation, and planted in the death, burial, resurrection and ascension of our Lord Jesus through baptism. The fact is our Mother Mary who gave birth to Jesus was on the earth as a witness during each event of his journey. She is not the only witness, but in all reality, she is his Mother, with all her emotions and memories attached to Him as any God fearing, loving mother would. Are you born again in the same Christ Jesus? When the Holy Spirit asked me that question I had to answer yes, from my heart. I believe that started the beginning to the uprooting of false doctrine taught me over the years that kept me away from hearing the gospel from Mary’s perspective. To begin a journey were letting go of doctrines that have hardened my heart from a closer relationship with Jesus Christ through His Mother, and now my Mother Mary. Thanks be to God! No wonder the Holy Spirit wants to speak in us about those events and make them real in our lives today. He can revile those events to us through the experiences that Mary encountered as the Mother of Christ Jesus and the birth of His Church at Pentecost.
· The Franciscan Crown became a vocal point for me during prayer. While meditating on each seven joys of Mary I experienced the Holy Spirit teach me through our Holy Mother to say “YES” when God speaks to me, because she obeyed the Word of God and He became flesh in her. We too are called “Blessed” by Jesus for obeying His word in us. Luke 11:27-28. This is how the whole Church is birthed into existence “Word made Flesh” through her son Jesus.
· That same day I found the seven joys of Mary online, I found the Franciscan crown rosary on John Michael Talbot’s website with the seven decades to pray the seven joys as devotion. The rosary has the same San Damiano crucifix that Saint Francis received his call from the Holy Spirit to restore Christ Church in a dark period in time when he was on earth. This all happened about the same time I went back to the Charismatic Episcopal Church in the winter of 2006.
· When I came across the Divine Mercy on a prayer card I just ordered it because the Image of Christ as our Divine Mercy caught my eye. I ordered a dozen cards not knowing the devotion was going to be used to receive Divine Mercy to break open my hardened heart. The Holy Spirit asked me to receive this devotion of Divine Mercy after praying the Franciscan Crown, and having Him teach me a new way of hearing the Word of the Gospel in the eyes of Mary. Just an added note, I hope to explain in an upcoming article my journey that brought me to start praying the Franciscan Crown thanks to Saint Francis of Assisi.
· This humbles me to not rely on my own eyes in front of a crucifix or Icon but that now reflections come to my heart by the Holy Spirit in connection to my family in heaven when I am willing to listen to the heart of God through their experiences as pilgrims on this earth. Learning from the Saints in heaven was a teaching pass down from the Apostles themselves written clearly directed to the church's through the early Church documents found in the "Didache"."

1. My child, him that speaks to you the word of God remember night and day; and you shall honor him as the Lord; for in the place whence lordly rule is uttered, there is the Lord. 2. And you shall seek out day by day the faces of the saints, in order that you may rest upon their words."

2.Why did the Divine Mercy Chaplet play such and important role in bringing you back to God?
· It is changing my heart of knowing the “Love of God” is not tawdry meaning cheap and gaudy in appearance or quality.
· Dietrich Bonhoeffer a German Minister who was imprisoned during the Holocaust in one of the killing camps talked about warned about the gospel being preached as a cheap grace. The true gospel of Christ Jesus is costly he reminded his students in his text "The Cost of Discipleship".

"Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like cheap jacks' wares. The sacraments, the forgiveness of sin, and the consolations of religion are thrown away at cut prices. Grace is represented as the Church's inexhaustible treasury, from which she showers blessings with generous hands, without asking questions or fixing limits. Grace without price; grace without cost! The essence of grace, we suppose, is that the account has been paid in advance; and, because it has been paid, everything can be had for nothing. Since the cost was infinite, the possibilities of using and spending it are infinite. What would grace be if it were not cheap?"
"Cheap grace means grace as a doctrine, a principle, a system. It means forgiveness of sins proclaimed as a general truth, the love of God taught as the Christian "conception" of God. An intellectual assent to that idea is held to be of itself sufficient to secure remission of sins. The Church which holds the correct doctrine of grace has, it is supposed, ipso facto a part in that grace. In such a Church the world finds a cheap covering for its sins; no contrition is required, still less any real desire to be delivered from sin. Cheap grace therefore amounts to a denial of the living Word of God, in fact, a denial of the Incarnation of the Word of God."

I would go to even say it is beyond human reasoning yet it is reasonable as the Holy Spirit communicates the mystery of that costly Love of God that will risk everything to win us back to Himself. This beyond all comparative reasoning by the expense of all creation or monetary wealth: man can never win that favor of Love that is lavished on the Whole world inclusive of all that is created and ever will be. Yet the cost is opening our heart to a radical change from a life giving source not of this world!
· I n asking the Lord for His direction He showed me I needed discipline (not to earn favor with Him) but, to quiet myself so I could hear His heart of Costly Love that exposes my pride. He humbles me and I respond Thank you Father!
· The Chaplet of Divine Mercy asks me to Pray to the “Eternal Father” I was fine with that part of it until the prayer goes on and states “ I offer to You the “Body and Blood” That’s what a priest would say during mass. Arguing in my head, Wow, wait a minute, this is a Catholic thing why are you having me pray this? The answer was, you want to stay in your darkness and suffering? I said No. The answer was, keep praying until you get it! Wow, God always wins arguments with me if I don’t ignore Him.
· A costly Love that is Divine Mercy is for the whole of humanity not just me.
We all learned as kids John 3:16. I have to say this but it’s like Kleenex is to facial tissue. This is the most advertise scripture on earth, so much so you see the address during Football games but not the Words. When the Saint John wrote those inspired words in his letter, do we presuppose we know what he meant? Do those words from God recorded inspire us to hear with our hearts today? Do I really believe God’s Love in the simplicity and depth is found in Jesus? Am I agreeing with those who have twisted or distorted God's Love to reinvent a gospel palatable to embrace disordered lifestyle or of the context for someone’s personal agenda or ego? I have been there and done that, Lord have Mercy on us for grieving your precious Holy Spirit by believing lies that perpetuates apostasy. Divine Mercy is here to bring and end to this deadly cheap and tawdry love that leads to apostasy. Lord Jesus You can begin with me!
· “For the atonement of our sins and those of the whole world” so I reasoned with this perspective that Universal atonement doctrine that as a Protestant I was told was wrong. So after studying the Early Church Apostles and the Scriptures them self’s teach us Jesus being all God and all Man is the Seed of Abraham, the New Adam, the Lamb of God who takes away the Sins of the World. End of argument. It is what it is no reasoning out that fact could ever change that reality of a Universal atonement."The apostles further appointed: At the conclusion of all the Scriptures other let the Gospel be read, as being the seal of all the Scriptures; and let the people listen to it standing upon their feet: because it is the Gospel of the redemption of all men."
.The very posture of standing when the Gospel is read declares my agreement with the Apostles teaching that this is "the seal of all Scriptures..and the redemption of all men." I hear the Lord speak to us all, "Do you believe in My costly Love passed down to you in the Gospel? If not, why are you standing?
· But even knowing the facts won’t change me. Even demons know those facts and they continue in spreading their lies to keep man in darkness.
· Jesus Christ Himself comes as the Divine Mercy breaking into the darkness of my heart and quietly asks me to let myself inflected punishment go and that relational punishment of bitterness I have dumped on others through gossip or accusations end.
· Brother Vance a Sunday school teacher at Open Bible Church told me way before I headed to Bible School that the strongest weapon of our warfare is the “Blood of Christ”. He meant it in a way of speaking it as a confession of faith, which is true but only in part.
Jesus specifically put His Blood in the Face of all His disciples that night of celebrating Passover with them.
“Tell the whole community of Israel: On the tenth of this month every one of your families must procure for itself a lamb, one apiece for each household.
If a family is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join the nearest household in procuring one and shall share in the lamb in proportion to the number of persons who partake of it. The lamb must be a year-old male and without blemish. You may take it from either the sheep or the goats. You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and then, with the whole assembly of Israel present, it shall be slaughtered during the evening twilight. They shall take some of its blood and apply it to the two door posts and the lintel of every house in which they partake of the lamb. That same night they shall eat its roasted flesh with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. It shall not be eaten raw or boiled, but roasted whole, with its head and shanks and inner organs. None of it must be kept beyond the next morning; whatever is left over in the morning shall be burned up.
"This is how you are to eat it: with your loins girt, sandals on your feet and your staff in hand, you shall eat like those who are in flight. It is the Passover of the LORD. For on this same night I will go through Egypt, striking down every first--born of the land, both man and beast, and executing judgment on all the gods of Egypt-I, the LORD! But the blood will mark the houses where you are. Seeing the blood, I will pass over you; thus, when I strike the land of Egypt, no destructive blow will come upon you. "This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate with pilgrimage to the LORD, as a perpetual institution. Exodus 12:3-14 New American Bible

· Wow now that connects you all the way back to The deliverance of the Children of Israel the night when the Angel of Death came upon the households without the Blood put upon the Mantle and Door post outside as the protection from the curse.
· Jesus said this is "My Blood" of the New Covenant we understand “New” as not meaning that the old has passed away but that it is fulfilled by His resurrection Life this makes the Covenant ever-living meaning more than just sacrifice but a partaking of the Divine One,"as a perpetual institution"!
The Real Presence! The Word Become Flesh! Sharing in the Life of God as a Human Being. Father Joesph makes this point clear. The Holy Spirit being the breath of God. So much so that “Jesus is my Brother” and I too am called a son of God. Saint Ambrose of Milan says;"62. The Holy Spirit is not, then, of the substance of things corporeal, for He sheds incorporeal grace on corporeal things; nor, again, is He of the substance of invisible creatures, for they receive His sanctification, and through Him are superior to the other works of the universe. Whether you speak of Angels, or Dominions, or Powers, every creature waits for the grace of the Holy Spirit. For as we are children through the Spirit, because "God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts crying, Abba, Father; so that you are now not a servant but a son;" Galatians 4:6-7 in like manner, also, every creature is waiting for the revelation of the sons of God, whom in truth the grace of the Holy Spirit made sons of God. Therefore, also, every creature itself shall be changed by the revelation of the grace of the Spirit, "and shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God." Then comes the other part of the Divine Mercy Prayer offered to the Father,"soul and divinity"of your dearly beloved Son for the atonement of our sins and those of the whole world. This prayer brings me to call on this present moment my baptismal covenant from the soul and divinity of Jesus Christ who is Love and Mercy.
· My deliverance today is to have mercy toward my brother and all who I come into contact with throughout my day as Christ Himself in me displaying His mercy through me to the glory of God the Father.