Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit - what difference it makes

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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The "ways of the Lord"

God is constantly at work in his Creation and in the lives of his human creatures. The Creator has revealed his intentions through inspired words and writings we call the Sacred Scriptures of the Holy Bible. God's intention manifestly is that human beings should come to know God as their Creator, as their origin and destiny, because He offers human beings a relationship of friendship based in freedom and love.

Regardless of whether a human person has any religion or no religion, God our Creator is at work and "speaks" to the depths of spirit which exist in each and every human being. For this reason it is possible for any human being to notice the "inner promptings" of the living God within them, and paying attention to these inspirations, to discern a "word" or "call" from God.

The story of Adam and Eve in the Book of Genesis is an inspired story showing how from the very beginning human beings enjoyed a close friendship with God but how it was lost when they turned away from God in preference of unsubstantiated "words from a stranger" and of their own "opinions". The story of Noah tells how God began to call human beings back to friendship with him. The story of Abraham tells how God began to form a family or tribe for himself of people who would put their faith in him. The story of Moses tells how God developed this tribe into a whole people, a whole nation of people who would believe in him and follow his ways.

Our Father and Creator God sent his Son into the world

Jesus was fully human, but being also the Son of God, He transcends time and has come to call humanity into a much closer relationship with God, far surpassing even what human beings first enjoyed with God on the morning of their creation. To be very specific, Jesus offers to every human being who would believe in him, to be baptized by water and the Holy Spirit and then to come and follow him. All those who accepted Jesus' offer and were baptized were joined to him in the love of God the Father, forming a new and living "corporate body" of all the baptized with Jesus at their head in the power of the Holy Spirit.

What Jesus has accomplished for humanity

At this point it will be useful to review briefly what God has been doing in his Church and for humanity on Earth since the time of Jesus. This reply may a little longer than you expected, but I hope that it will bring light to dark places and help you to understand what God is doing in your life and to discern what the Lord is asking of you.

Jesus Christ revealed to humanity who God really is. Jesus confirmed what God had previously revealed to Adam and Eve, to Noah and his family, to Abraham and his family, and then to the people of Israel through Moses, namely, that God is one and there is no other god.

God is a Holy Trinity

Jesus further revealed that God is not only One, but God is a divine being who is a community of 3 divine persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father sent his divine Son to Earth to take flesh by the Holy Spirit in the virgin Mary of Nazareth. After she gave him birth in Bethlehem with the assistance of her husband Joseph, his parents protected and raised Jesus until the day when He began his public ministry, which after only a few years, led to his passion, death, and resurrection, which He freely accepted to endure in order to reveal fully to humanity for all time the full depth, meaning, and purpose of God's loving will for us.

God respects and works with the freedom He has given to each of us

When a human being believes in Jesus, that He is the Son of God sent to save us, and in faith accepts Jesus as the Saviour of all but also as my personal Saviour and Lord; then my faith as it were gives God permission to pour his divine life, the life of the Trinity, into me, and the life of God flowing in me transforms me. Because I still have my free will, this divine transformation will proceed more quickly or more slowly as I open up entirely to God with complete trust every part of my life.

God is Love, the Source of all life and love

God has always wanted his human children to share his divine life in eternity beginning even now while we are still living and breathing on Earth. The Holy Trinity - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - have from the beginning created the universe so that human beings might have a home from which we could come to know God and would freely choose to give to God and to our neighbors a "return of love". God is our Creator and knows that our life will only achieve its full purpose, meaning, truth, goodness, beauty, fruitfulness, and fulfillment in a life of love that is lived freely and deliberately in the image of God, the Holy Trinity, which is a divine community of love - one divine being in three divine persons perfectly united in an eternal communion of love. It is God's will that our life on Earth should reflect the life that is in God.

The Spirit of the living God, the Holy Spirit, manifests the power of the Holy Trinity to create and give life, and the action of the Holy Spirit takes place when the Father utters a Word to manifest his holy will, and the Son is that living Word of the Father. The Father has a will for us, the Son expresses that will in himself in a living Word, and the Holy Spirit brings about the effect intended by that will of the Father and word of the Son.

What happens to us when we hear God speak in our soul and we respond

The Holy Trinity finds us and touches at any time and wherever we may be. As soon as we respond, the Holy Spirit already begins to pour the life, vitality, peace, love, and joy of the Holy Trinity into our life, our body, mind, heart, and soul....

Water Baptism in the will of God for his work of salvation within humanity

Water baptism is a further step in our response to almighty God speaking to us and calling us to enter more deeply into the life of the Holy Trinity. Jesus revealed the will of the Father to his disciples just before his ascension into heaven, as recorded by the evangelist Matthew in chapter 28 verses 16-20.

The Commissioning of the Disciples

16 "Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age."

Since that very day, the apostles and other disciples went out and did as Jesus commanded them to do: Go - make disciples - baptizing them - teaching them to obey.

The result is all the Christian churches and traditions on the Earth today.

A brief history of how the Holy Spirit developed the Church which Jesus founded

Initially there were only 5 great churches differentiated by the language and culture of each: the Jerusalem Church spoke Hebrew - the Rome Church spoke Latin - the Constantinople Church spoke Greek - the Alexandria Church in Egypt spoke Coptic - the Antioch Church in Turkey spoke Aramaic, the language of Jesus and his family.

Now the life, growth, and development of the Church Jesus founded has always been and will always be a kind of "dance" or relationship between the Holy Trinity and the living human members of the Church and her pastors, leaders, and members. God has given us free will and He fully respects our free will, which means that God gives us plenty of room to make mistakes and to learn from them. Only in this way can our response to God's advances and invitations and calls be true and authentic, and done in complete freedom and generosity in faith, in hope, and in love.

For these reasons, the history of Jesus' Church on Earth looks rather "messy" with lots of divisions, restorations, reforms, and all the problems we come to recognize as all too human.

From these original 5 churches we developed into the Western and Eastern Christian Churches. By the year 1000 AD there was the Roman or Latin Church which we call Roman Catholic today. It is the oldest continually existing Christian Church in the West, along with the Greek Orthodox Church and the Churches of Constantinople and Alexandria or Coptic in the East. Sadly, misunderstanding and conflict caused the Roman Catholic Church and Orthodox Church of Constantinople to condemn each other in 1054 A.D. and break the unity given by the Holy Spirit. 

In the Eastern World, the Churches were more specifically national or ethnic, with the language of worship being the language proper to that Church and nation: Greek in the Greek Orthodox Church in Greece and some neighboring countries, Aramaic in the Chaldean Orthodox Church in what is now Iraq, Coptic in the Coptic Orthodox Church in Egypt, Ukrainian in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, Russian in the Russian Orthodox Church in Russia, Maronite in the Maronite Orthodox Church in Lebanon where the common language now is Lebanese, Melkite in the Melkite Orthodox Church in Palestine where the common language now is Arabic, and so on.

Due to human frailty and sin, much violence was done to each other, which is in part what makes it difficult and is taking time for these churches to reconcile and work towards reunification in Our Lord Jesus Christ, the One Saviour of the world. The separation between East and West, between Constantinople and Rome, is in our day being slowly healed and unity is slowly being restored. Some of the Orthodox local churches led by their bishop didn't want to wait; so they independently sought to reunite with Rome and they came to be known as no longer Orthodox but Eastern Rite Churches, such as Ukrainian Catholic, Melkite Catholic, Coptic Catholic and so on.

The Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter Reformation

In the 16th century, there was need of reform - in every generation the Church of Jesus is in need of reform because it is composed of human beings who are never finished living a life of conversion and repentance in order to more perfectly follow Jesus - and some people wanting reform found it wasn't happening fast enough; so they initiated reforms on their own, which came to be known as the Protestant Reformation, which produced the Anglican Church in England, Presbyterian Church in Scotland, Calvinist Church in Switzerland, Lutheran Church in Germany, which in their turn led to the forming of more and more "denominations". These are the Christian Churches of the Western World.

Water Baptism in the all the Christian Churches

In all these Christian Churches and traditions, Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit has always been practiced and continues to be practiced today; for the simple reason that Jesus commanded us to do it and the Apostles and other disciples did so and taught others to do so.

They soon learned, as they were taught by the Holy Spirit, to remember Jesus' teaching that Baptism is given by God through water and the words Jesus gave for Baptism "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" and also through the powerful action of the Holy Spirit who confers the life of the Holy Trinity to the baptized soul.

What difference does Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit make?

Before Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit, the soul is capable of perceiving within itself the "voice" of God whispering within it by the Holy Spirit, guiding the soul to Jesus Christ who alone reveals the Father to us; as Jesus taught.

Jesus commanded us to go and make disciples, and once people hear the Good News and respond to it by beginning to follow Jesus as his disciples; then the Lord wants them to be baptized by water and the Holy Spirit so that they can be joined and united to Christ as our Head in the mystical body of all the baptized who become one with Jesus in the love of the Father.

The Baptism by water - whether by immersion in water completely or in part or by simple aspersion or sprinkling - is a saving action by almighty God the Holy Trinity when it is accompanied by the words given by Jesus: "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" with the intention of doing what Jesus commanded us to do.

The moment of Baptism is a beginning of the action God is taking to save the baptized soul by removing it from the empire of the enemy of God and humanity, the rebellious angel the devil (which means "adversary") - Satan (which means "accuser") and Lucifer (which means "light bearer") - and bringing the soul under the lordship and saving grace of Jesus (which means "God saves") Christ (which means "anointed one").

The Holy Spirit

The moment of Baptism is a timeless and eternal moment of God's presence and saving action in the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit brings about the will of the Father in us through the Lordship of Jesus, Son of God. When the Holy Spirit knows that a soul is completely innocent and open, then full communion in the Most Holy Trinity can be given. Some souls are saints from birth or infancy. When the Holy Spirit sees some resistance, then to respect the soul's freedom, the work will proceed more slowly; in order to raise up that soul's free will. 

The Holy Spirit frees the soul from the influence of the devil, cleanses the soul of all personal sin from the past until the present moment, repairs in the soul the damaging effects of the original sin and rebellion of the first human beings represented by Adam and Eve, unites the soul to the life and love and union of the Holy Trinity and to all the other baptized souls of all time. The Holy Spirit gives the soul strength to undertake its life long journey of faith in the steps of Jesus who lived a life of faithful obedience to his Father's holy will; in order for the soul in communion with Jesus to make of its life on Earth a gift of love for others - even enemies - and an offering of worship to God. While Baptism integrates a soul into Christ, the soul remains free to turn away from God, to rebel, to fall into sin, but also to repent, to come back to God, to welcome God's grace, and to commit itself to living and dying as Jesus lived and died and then rose again and ascended into heaven.

How to go about preparing for Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit

Because God has willed for the Church of Jesus to be very human, Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit not only makes one Christian, but it also makes one a Christian belonging to a particular Church tradition. I was baptized in a Roman Catholic Church and so I became a Roman Catholic Christian and learned to follow Jesus Christ from all the riches of teaching and practice God has given to the Roman Catholic Church and Tradition.

One who is baptized in a Greek Orthodox Church becomes a Greek Orthodox Christian, and so on with each and every Christian Church and Tradition.

So a soul must listen to the Holy Spirit and discern to which Church and Tradition the Holy Spirit is prompting, inviting, calling that soul to go. So a person seeks and finds a Church locally within that Christian Tradition and asks about Baptism.

Christian Initiation in the Roman Catholic Tradition

In the Roman Catholic Church, one is initiated into the faith in 3 steps: Baptism, Confirmation, and Holy Eucharist and Communion.

In Baptism by water and the Holy Spirit God introduces the soul into the life of the most Holy Trinity with all the benefits and effects described above.

In Confirmation by Holy Chrism - a perfumed pure olive oil consecrated by the Bishop the week before Easter each year - God fills the soul with the power of the Holy Spirit and the life and love of the Holy Trinity to strengthen the soul and enrich it with supernatural gifts to enable the soul to truly begin to live the life of a disciple of Jesus in the midst of the world which is for the most part trapped in error and darkness and sin under the dominion of the evil one.

In Holy Communion at the Holy Eucharist - which is the ritual celebration of Jesus' Last Supper - Jesus nourishes the soul of the baptized and confirmed soul with his own "Body and Blood" which is a share in his own divine life which He as divine Son has with the Father and the Holy Spirit. Much as a mother gives of her own life to her baby nourishing at her breasts; so does Jesus give of his own divine life to those who receive with faith his Body and Blood in the Eucharist.

An adult who is initiated into the Roman Catholic faith, Church, and Tradition receives all three mysterious divine actions or sacraments at the same celebration and is baptized by water and the Holy Spirit, then confirmed in the Holy Spirit, and then receives Jesus' Body and Blood in Holy Communion. One is baptized only once in a lifetime, and one is confirmed only once, but one is called by Jesus to eat his Body and drink his Blood every Sunday at Sunday worship at Holy Mass.

Infants, youth, or adults, the newly baptized are called to grow in holiness

When children, youth, or adults are baptized, confirmed, and begin to receive Jesus in Holy Communion, they are called to grow day by day in communion with the Most Holy Trinity and with all of the baptized throughout the world; as well as with all those who have gone before us and are now in Heaven or in Purgatory, waiting to be purified and ready to enter into Heaven. When parents have their infants baptized, these must grow and learn and prepare for Confirmation and Holy Communion. For example, I was baptized the day after I was born, and then I was confirmed on day and received Jesus in Holy Communion the next day when I was 8 years old.

Jesus knew that we are weak; so He provided opportunity for us to come back to Him if we sin after we have been baptized. This sacramental action of Jesus in his Church is called the Sacrament of Penance or Reconciliation or Confession.

We journey in faith, walking in the steps of Jesus as his missionary disciples

The Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation through a personal confession: (1) Penance - a grace God gives to strengthen the soul to repent, to turn away from sin and to turn back to God, and live more fully as Jesus' missionary disciples in the world. 

(2) Reconciliation - the grace God gives to reconcile to Himself and to his Church the soul that has separated itself from God and his Church through sin and rebellion

(3) Confession - this is the action whereby a sinner, one who is baptized, confesses his sins to a priest who gives him absolution - through the words of the priest it is Jesus himself who forgives the penitent and reconciles him to himself and to the Father and to the Church.

Dear Brother or Sister in our common humanity, I will be happy to enter into dialogue with you and do my best to answer any questions you may have.

God's peace to you and your family, in the Name of + Jesus Christ, the Son of God and our Lord, in the saving power of the Holy Spirit.

                Pax + Caritas, Fr. Gilles

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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A girl (boy) wants to be a boy (girl) - What do you say?

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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I'm delighted to be able to share below what one woman said to a prepubescent girl who loudly declared that when she grew up she wanted to have a sex change to become a boy.

Our times are certainly not boring when new situations seem to frequently come along that are not only unexpected but even surprising; when they are not shocking or disturbing! What we are looking at here is gender dysphoria as a serious condition, but also general confusion regarding thoughts, feelings, and issues around gender identity that often have nothing at all to do with dysphoric states or medical or psychiatric conditions.

It appears that human beings have always experienced confusion about many things, as well as different types of dysphoria, such as those relating to hormonal conditions or to emotional states or mood. Who would have guessed or predicted decades ago, though, that today some people would experience gender dysphoria or confusion regarding their gender?

Gender dysphoria as a medical or psychiatric condition

We owe great sympathy, and all the understanding and compassion we can muster, to anyone who suffers from a genuine condition of dysphoria regarding their gender. Such a condition would have caused a person to suffer real symptoms in their mind, body, psyche (thoughts and emotions), heart, yes, and even in their soul, because we human beings are all together one complete and whole being, with every part connected to every other part. As a human person we breathe, feel, think, decide, act, and behave as one single living entity called human of the "Homo Sapiens Sapiens" kind.

A truly serious condition simply won't go away and will generally be diagnosed and confirmed by one or more competent medical and psychiatric doctors. It is not our intention here to discuss the merits of the various approaches or treatments available to those who suffer such conditions.

The one true God, the Creator, is truly innocent, i.e. incapable of harm, capable only of good

As a Christian, though, I would like to indicate our strong conviction that God our Creator never stops caring for us, loving us, watching over us, guiding us, or leading us, in every situation and under every condition in which we may find ourselves at any given time. God does have a plan and design for our collective and individual lives, and it is always for our welfare and not our woe.

"11 For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. 12 Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. 13 When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, 14 I will let you find me, says the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile." Jeremiah 29:11-14

Anyone can come to a personal knowledge and experience of the living God through faith, which is our capacity to accept on trust something as true that we cannot personally verify or prove to be true. We fly in planes on faith, trusting that there is a pilot flying the plane and further that he or she will fly us safely to our destination and land us safely there. We make hundreds of big or small acts of ordinary commonplace faith and trust every day; otherwise we would be unable to leave home.

We can live a fully human life only if we accept both pleasure and pain

Also, as human beings we have an amazing capacity for pleasure, satisfaction, excitement, and joy, but those capacities have their reverse side of pain, frustration, indifference, and misery. We cannot find peace or give lasting meaning and purpose to our lives without a willingness to accept both sets of feelings and emotions. They help us connect more directly and intensely to the reality at hand.

God works for good in our life through both pleasure and pain

Whenever we suffer any serious condition or situation, God knows all about it and allows it to happen because He knows that every situation in which we find ourselves becomes an occasion for us to put all our trust in Him and to look to Him for guidance, strength, and whatever else we may need. All things work for good for those who know, trust, and love the Lord. In addition, God knows that we are not yet ready today for some of the gifts and blessings He has in mind for us... we need to make room or be stretched or purified or in some other way to be made ready in order to be able to take receipt of whatever that might be that He desires for us, for our growth and improvement, or for our correction and perfection....

The God in whom we believe is sovereign over all of his Creation, over the visible universe and all the invisible realm in his eternity. All power and authority are his, and all wisdom and love; so He doesn't need our counsel or opinion, nor does He need our consent or permission; even though most of the time He does wait for us to say yes, because what God seeks is a true relationship of love and not any kind of subservience. "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." Matthew 9:13

Here is what one woman said to a girl who declared she wanted to become a boy

Just last week I hear a brilliant reply from a woman who told about having just such a conversation with a prepubescent girl who reported and declared loudly that she felt she was a boy and one day would go out and get herself a medical gender change.

The woman said to her something along these lines. She completely understood the girl because when she was her age she felt exactly the same. Then she gave that experience a name: she said

"We call that being a "tomboy'. That's when a girl doesn't feel 'girly' like those other girls who look all sweet and pretty and gentle and love to get together in a circle with their dolls. I was more at ease hanging around with the boys and joining them in boys' games." 

Then she continued to tell the girl that being a human female, being a girl and later a woman, isn't only being one way or style or category of girl or woman, because there are many kinds or styles or ways of being a girl or a woman, and they're all okay, as long as you are doing the best to become the person you are meant to be, as long as you live as fully as you can - trying to decide, say, and do what is good, and trying to avoid deciding, saying, or doing what is bad or harmful.

Then she went on to talk to the little girl about what is really special and amazing about being a girl or a woman, that is, a female human being. You have within you all that you need in order to give life. If you get married, you and your husband can love each other and you, as a woman, can conceive a whole new human person within you, and carry that life within you like in a nest or cradle, and love that little life for 9 months until it is time to bring it into the world to live its own life by giving it birth. That is what our mom did for us and you, as a girl, have the capacity to do it yourself and give life to one or more children of your own.

The woman reported that the girl was so grateful to hear these things - because no one had ever said anything like that to her before - and she felt very relieved to hear that there was nothing wrong with her because she felt more comfortable hanging out with boys rather than with girls. She said that she was beginning to realize that she could calm down about her feelings and that it was possible to find ways to better understand how she felt.

Technology helps us understand things but we need wisdom to understand human beings

The current trend to jump to the hasty conclusion that a person needs a sex change just because they "feel more like" a member of the other gender is, I am coming to understand, an error in thinking that comes from simply living in such a technological age. We have become so familiar with technology that we tend to "think tech" even when we focus on and discuss non technical things.

For a boy to think he needs to be changed into a girl just because inside he "feels more like" a girl or for a girl to think she needs to be changed into a boy just because inside she "feels more like a boy is to treat ourselves, our lives, our beings as though we were just one more piece of technology. So if there's a "problem", the thinking goes, all we have to do is "fix it".

A car is a car is a car... and a computer is a computer is a computer... they and so many other things we find convenient are pieces of technology. They are what they are and they don't stop being what they are. A car doesn't become a PC and a PC doesn't go off flying into the stratosphere. When they break down, the problem has to be diagnosed and the solution has to be specific to the exact problem.

A human being is a complex living being, a person engaged in a lifelong process of development

Each and every human being is a very complex living being, a human person engaged in a lifelong process of development, which has been mapped out in all of its complexity, but even then, remains partly mysterious and ever changing. This is true of every human being, whether or not they have any faith in a Creator God. It is unwise, if not downright stupid, to jump to hasty conclusions about what a person may be feeling or thinking or going through at any given time.

Unlike other living beings, we human beings have an incredible capacity for self-awareness and for self-understanding. More than that, we don't need to try to figure ourselves out only on our own, but we can learn a lot about ourselves from listening to the experience and acquired wisdom of others.

In addition to that, those who do believe in the Creator God can also benefit from what God has said to people in the past and what He has revealed to us about Himself and also about us, our life, our world, and what is happening in our lives and in our world.

Here is just a partial glimpse of how complex we human beings really are

Our human life could be divided into 7 great stages:

1. Our time in the womb - from conception to birth
2. Our "second birth" - Baptism - when God gives us a share in the divine life of the Trinity
3. Our initial stage of human development from birth to adulthood - around 18 years of age
4. Adulthood - from around 18 to the end of our mortal life at the moment of death
5. Our "first death" - the period, long or short, leading to the dying of our body
6. The "second death" (Rev 21:8) to be avoided - where one chooses eternal rejection of God
7. Eternal life - (Rev 21:1-7) - where the elect, the just, enter in with God after the trials of Earth

Here is a brief glimpse of the many complex developments that happen within each of us from birth until around 18 years of age, when, in our western culture, we approach the threshold of adulthood. In other cultures, the timing of this roughly 18-year process could vary a little, but keep in mind that much of these stages are natural developments that keep pace with our overall development in body, mind, psyche / heart, will, conscience, and soul.

1. 0 - 1 year - the BODY IDENTITY - we learn to connect to the world through our skin - all over our body - and our mouth. We naturally develop an "organ mode" around our mouth, simply "preferring" one which remains our preference for life; which means we need to make an effort to use the "other mode" whenever it is needed. The two modes are : (1) active / captative or (2) passive / receptive. The active person spontaneously "goes out to get" what they want or need; while the passive person "simply waits for what they need to come to them". You can see how we need both in order to get by in life, but it is useful to know what our preference is; that way we know we need to make efforts to do it the other way.
2. 1 - 2.5 years - IDENTITY of the DOER - A lot happens between the first year and the mysterious period around 2 and a half. We start to move around - crawling, moving on our bum, and in time we learn to walk - we learn to talk and communicate, we learn potty training, we learn how things are done in our family, we learn about rules and respecting others, but mostly, we learn to manipulate things and how do do things, not very well at first, but we can't get enough of trying to do things. Once again, we naturally develop a second "organ mode", only this time it is around our anal sphincter, that circular muscle that acts like a valve to keep in or to release the stool. Just like last time, we come to "prefer" one which will remain our preference for life. Once again, this means we need to make an effort to use the "other mode" whenever it is needed. The two modes are : (1) eliminative or (2) retentive. What is really fascinating is how this later develops and spreads to everything in our life: money, things, relationships... just about everything... so we would prefer to "hold onto" those things, or we would prefer to "let them go". For example, some people find it easy to spend money but hard to save, or vice versa, easy to save but hard to spend. You get the idea.
3. 2.5 - 3 years - INDIVIDUAL IDENTITY - This is the truly fascinating and mysterious moment when we suddenly developed an awareness of being "me" and "I". The little boy or girl starts saying "Me do it." "I want to do it." It doesn't matter whether or not they can actually do it, because what is going on here is the emergence of an "I", a "Me", a unique individual who is now conscious of being an autonomous individual. That is why it is so precious for parents to realize that this is really a wonderful thing, though at times frustrating, when the little child flexes its "individuality power" to say "No." Parents have to find creative ways to continue to socialize their child, to "win their consent" to do what they need to do in order to be part of this family and in order to continue to learn the things they need to do and the behaviours they need to learn in order to function and develop well. By now, children develop a knack for asking "embarrassing" or difficult questions. Parents can be reassured simply by asking their child to say more about their question and what it is they really want to know. One simple example: "Where do I come from?" This may simply mean what country our family comes from due to a question put in kindergarten or at church, and may not be at all about sex. 
4. 3 - 6 years - PSYCHOSEXUAL IDENTITY (GENDER IDENTITY) - Reliable research which has been confirmed time and again in peer reviewed literature has mapped out what goes on during all of these six stages of human development. Current new "designer trends" are causing a lot of confusion around these developments, but mostly what people are talking about are "how they feel" or "how they think they feel" about themselves or about these things. What follows is what we can reliably understand about what is naturally going on at this stage of human development over a period of around 3 years. The child, who is now an autonomous person, an "I", begins to develop greater complexity and depth in their interior sense of who they are. They are now more capable (brain development) and more motivated (psyche) of more complex connections with the world around them. They notice for the first time (this is not really conscious, but rather subconscious, but nevertheless very real and powerful) that they have two parents, one each of two distinct genders or kinds (this is the optimal situation). So what happens is that the child develops a desire to "shine" in the eyes of their opposite gender parent, because it is the difference which attracts them, which would seem to make them more "complete". At the same time, they notice that the other parent is of their same gender, and sort of "in the way" - as in "2 is good but 3 is a crowd". The same gender parent becomes an enemy or competitor, which is the classic cause of nightmares. Psychotherapy has discovered that what helps parents quickly resolve the nightmares is for the same gender parent to bring the nightmare troubled child back to their own bed. That way, a greater connection and intimacy of friendship develops with the same gender parent and the "monster goes away". It is important for both parents to affirm the child to understand and embrace its own natural gender as it is inscribed in their body, that is, in accord with their genitals. This is the third "organ mode" that is actually inscribed in our body. For believers, we understand this to be the Creator's way of putting "order" in our nature. The "Institut de Formation Humaine Intégrale de Montréal" teaches that the organ mode for males is "Instrusive" and for females is "Inclusive" which is very much the way the genitals themselves are designed to funtion. This is why males are therefore "naturally" intrusive and females inclusive; when the person is comfortable with and embraces their own gender mode. For the rest of our lives it is then easier to approach life in this mode and requires effort to employ the "other" mode whenever it is useful or desirable to do so. Those who don't embrace their gender mode but "prefer" the other mode find it never quite fits the way their own would. When children below six years of age "explore" each other's body, nakedness, or intimate parts, it is more about curiosity and perhaps imitation of what they see in the adult world, but it cannot be about sex, which won't become a reality for them until puberty. It is a grave wrong for adults to meddle and intrude in the innocence of young children to impose their adult sex ideologies. When little children are adversely affected or disturbed by the intimate behavior of adults - which they should not normally witness - then care must be taken to help them preserve their innocence. They will have plenty of time to examine these things once they are older and more capable. If by the age of 3 parents have not yet begun to help their children understand their emotions, then it would be high time to do this. It will be much easier for them to explore the complex issues around gender, sexuality, fertility, dating, marriage, chastity, and so on, if we begin by helping them to understand their own emotions, those of others, and all about friendship and civil relations in society.
5. 6-12 years - PSYCHOSOCIAL IDENTITY - When life unfolds simply and naturally without undue interference of distortion from the environment or society, little boys congregate with other boys, and little girls with other girls. Yes, the "tomboy girls" will want to hang out with boys and the "girly boys" will want to hang out with girls, which simply indicates preferences of temperament, and is no indication of a rejection of their own gender as such.  During these six years, boys and girls learn to relate to others of their gender and to accept many variations of preference and style or ways of being a boy or girl. They learn to cooperate, to lead, to follow, to contribute, to argue, to make up, and many other dimensions of human relations. They learn to share what they know, what they can do, and to learn from others. The sky is literally the limit. Regarding any kind of intimacy - whether emotional or sexual - children at this stage normally react with an emphatic "Yuck!" which is for them quite normal. They are no interested in those things. However, when children during this period are adversely affected or disturbed by the intimate behavior of adults - which they should not normally witness - then care must be taken to help them preserve their innocence. They will have plenty of time to examine these things once they are older and more capable. By the age of 6 is a very good and interesting time for parents to help their children understand their emotions, and what will help parents best is all the work they are willing to do to understand their own emotions as well as those of their spouse. It will be much easier for them to explore the complex issues around gender, sexuality, fertility, dating, marriage, chastity, all the new issues around social and gender "engineering" and so on, if we begin by helping them to understand their own emotions, those of others, and all about friendship and civil relations in society.
6. 12-18 years - the IDENTITY OF SELF - These final six years are a time of great change, including the upheaval of puberty with all the changes that come about, a time of greater socializing, of socializing with members of the other gender - at first generally in groups and after a few years in smaller groups and, in time, in couples. This period is also a time that begins the integration of all the developments at the previous five stages of development into the beginnings of a cohesive sense of the SELF. All the work that parents will have done earlier to help their children understand their own emotions and those of others will now help these young adolescents to know themselves, to be at greater peace within themselves, to have a good sense of who they are and be able to withstand the undue and at times aggressive attitudes and influences of others, including the bullies. Children who have learned young that pain is as normal a part of life as pleasure are more likely to go through these difficult and challenging times with greater personal clarity, stability, and serenity. They will even attract their peers who will find them to be a source of strength and encouragement. 

Preliminary Conclusions 

Perhaps by now you can begin to see the sheer complexity and fluidity in the development of the human person, and just how many years it actually takes (minimum of 18) to go through all the profound processes of emergence and development of the interior dimensions of a human being.

To go off drawing hasty conclusions and slapping "labels" (homosexual, lesbian, wrong gender, or any other such artificial category unrelated to the uniqueness of this individual at this particular point in their development) prematurely on young people who have not yet gone through their initial period of human development is to do them violence, and perhaps the worst form of violence at that.

God our Creator has such profound respect for us, for our unique individuality, for our free will, for our fragile sense of self; that He does not interfere or intrude rudely into our lives, but leaves us free to find our own way. We should have enough respect for others to try to treat them with the same respect and kindness with which God treats us.

Above all, we must resist all the "social engineers", all those people pushing ideologies of all sorts, trying to impose labels and categories on people that do violence to them by convincing them to abandon or ignore their great complexity, their great depth, their great fluidity as human beings on a journey of life-long development into the best person that we can possibly become....

Peace to you and your families....

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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Why does losing a loved one hurt so much?

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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A loved one dies and we are suddenly plunged into depths of pain and suffering we had no idea existed.... Why does this happen to us? Why does our loving God allow us to endure such agony? How long will it last? Will any good come of it?

Such questions only scratch the surface of all that goes on in our lives when we experience serious losses. What it all means varies considerably, but we can catch clues from just a few key reference points: myself - the other who has died - our relationship to each other - our openness or not to God's presence, action, and love.

Who am I and what has been going on in my life?

Who was this person who has just died and what was happening in their life?

How were we towards one another and what does their death mean to me?

Did either of us make room for God in our own life and in this relationship or not?

BITTER SORROW

When such pain of loss tastes rather bitter, it is often an indication that our God is allowing us to catch a glimpse of something not quite right in this situation, and the bitterness is coming from that matter or issue that was or is wrong.

If in any of the key questions above there has been any selfishness, any sinful or unholy desires, anything evil, or unjust motives or manipulation, or anything at all that was evil, unholy, or selfish; then these realities are quite likely to manifest themselves through a bitter quality in the sense of loss.

As a simple example to illustrate this point, let us say that I cared for an elderly rich person, but because I was in dire financial straits myself, my motivation in caring for this elderly person was tainted by my survival instinct and secret desire for some monetary gain in return for my help. Fear of not receiving anything or not enough could generate a bitterness in my sense of loss.

If this elderly rich person for whom I cared was not a nice person but nasty, angry, even cruel, and by the grace of God I still loved them; then all through the time of my care for them, I could have accumulated a taint of bitterness affecting even what might have been in me a pure motivation to care for them.

If upon the death of the one I had cared for and loved their immediate family were to step in and unceremoniously cast me aside - as though what I had done was irrelevant to them - then this too could render bitter my sense of loss.

As you can see, at any point, any factor of impure motives, or evil intentions, or sinfulness, on the part of any of the parties involved could turn bitter any sense of loss which I might experience after having cared for a person whom I loved and who has now died.

Such bitterness is the kind of experience and feeling that almighty God wants to use in order to draw my attention to those dark factors; so that I might repent of any sin of which I may be guilty, that I might dissociate myself from any dark factor in the motivations of others and pray for them as I would pray even for enemies, and that I might allow the Lord to purify my intentions and my soul in order to become freer to love with a pure heart.

SWEET SORROW

Perhaps one of the sweetest kinds of loss might take place when a beloved elderly person dies - one who had become a pure soul - and you who have been caring for him or her out of love experience deep and intense pain of loss.

In such a case we can easily understand how you, the care givers, would be in pain because the great love you exchanged with that elderly pure soul has come to a temporary end, temporary because one day, in the Lord's good time, you shall be reunited with him or her in the Father's House. The pain may give you pause or bring confusion and doubt, temporarily, but make no mistake. Now you are tasting a glimpse of Heaven... the only difference is that when it is our proper time to enter into the presence of the most Holy Trinity - the Father and Jesus his Son and the Holy Spirit - on that day we will be fully purified of human imperfection, sinfulness, and woundedness - and we will be able to endure the full intensity of the love of God without any pain.

That will be then, but for now, whenever God's love touches us, there can be pain, but it is like the pain caused by a doctor in the process of healing us. The cure often hurts for a while until the infection is completely cleansed and health returns. Remember when you were a girl or boy and you fell and deeply scraped knees and elbows and it hurt like hell? Then the medicine burned like crazy and bandages were applied. They continued to hurt, the wounds, until you got closer to healing. The first sign of healing was that the scabs began to tickle; so you began to pick at them even though your Mom told you not to. If you picked hard enough a scab came off and the wound hurt all over again, and you learned your lesson.

You are right. Your elderly charge was a pure soul. She / He lived long enough and was humble enough to allow God to purify her / him from all life's hurts, faults, and sins, and all that was left was a child-like soul in love with God and with people. She / He accepted to receive love, and did so with such a pure heart, that God's love radiated out from her / him to anyone who came close to her / him with pure intentions.

These wounds which you now suffer are glorious wounds... witnesses of God's forgiving, purifying, and healing love at work in you. All that God expects of you is to be docile, to trust, and to gently accept these sufferings as proof that the Holy Spirit is at work within you, distilling the pure life-giving love of the Father into the deepest recesses of your souls, cleaning out any gunk that may be lurking in those deep dark corners and admitting the pure light of eternity to make everything into light and love.

This is the most perfect form of patience - accepting to endure the pain caused by the purifying love of God, as in this case right now - or accepting to endure the pain which accompanies pure intentions and good actions, or accepting to endure what others cause us to suffer in order to love them. This is the example Jesus gave us when He accepted to endure the suffering we caused Him, and He did so in order to reveal to us the true nature of the pure love that God has for us.

All of this is the manifest action of the lordship of Jesus within you because you have been putting your trust in Him, you have been believing in Him, you have been accepting his call to follow Him and serve Him in others, like the elderly pure soul who just died, and now you are becoming more like Him, the One who wept over ancient Jerusalem because she would not receive his love. You have been giving the Lord Jesus permission to do his work with the Holy Spirit within you - which most of the time goes unnoticed - but on this occasion you feel pain at what the Lord is doing within you, purifying and cleansing. Rejoice and be glad, because this pain is not the kind that comes from hell, but rather the kind that prepares you for Heaven; in fact, it is even now a glimpse of Heaven which is so intense and wonderful that, for now, it hurts, but the hurt will not endure... while the love itself will endure without end.

Please feel free to share these words with whomever you will....

Peace to you and your family.

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

----------------------------------------------------------------

© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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