Become Who You Are
What’s the meaning and purpose of my life? What is my true identity? Why were we created male and female? How do I find happiness, joy and peace? How do I find love that lasts, forever? These are the timeless questions of the human heart. Join Jack Rigert and his guests for lively insights, reading the signs of our times through the lens of Catholic Teaching and the insights of Saint John Paul ll to guide us.
Saint Catherine of Siena said "Become who you are and you would set the world on fire".
Become Who You Are
#520 The Mockery of Jesus Christ at the Last Supper in Paris Is a Mockery of All Of Us
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Is the sanctity of marriage under siege? Join us as we tackle the furor sparked by the mockery of Jesus at the Last Supper during the Paris Olympics' opening games.
From societal shifts like drag performances to controversial sports decisions, we explore how these trends reflect a deeper erosion of cultural values. By connecting these issues to the biblical narrative, we underscore the timeless importance of marriage and divine love as laid out from Genesis to Revelation and highlight Jesus's mission to restore unity and divine love.
We also reflect on the profound link between divine life and human sexuality, emphasizing the spiritual battle against sacred institutions attempting to destroy the imago Dei. Delving into Christ's sacrifice and the Eucharist, we discuss how they restore divine grace and unity. Drawing inspiration from St. Paul's teachings in Ephesians 5, we emphasize love's power to counter today's prevalent hatred and division.
Additionally, we celebrate athletes like a courageous Brazilian surfer finding alternative ways to express their faith amidst cultural challenges. Tune in for a call to return to the core biblical principles of love, unity, and faith.
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Good to be with you. I'm Jack Rigger with the John Paul II Renewal Center. This is the Become who you Are podcast. As you know, many people were outraged by the mockery of Jesus at the Last Supper at the opening games in the Paris Olympics, and I've heard now that many American companies are pulling out of advertising there. So that's a good thing, right. People are outraged. I think that if nobody was outraged, they would have thought well, that's it, they're done, we've got them now right.
Speaker 1:But the mockery of the Last Supper is more than that. It's a mockery of all of us, and I just want to dive into that a little bit. An example that you have from the opening scene. One example is the drag queens. You have these drag queens, and then afterwards too, dancing on stage, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 1:What Marxists would call the queering of a society wanted to make this all normal to all of us. Well, it's not normal, of course, mocking Jesus Christ, but also all that's true, good and beautiful about marriage and about our human sexuality in general. You have a man dressed in drag, with a beard, dancing and singing like a woman. This is a mockery of not only what it means to be a man. It's a mockery of what it means to be a woman. You have now and I'm not watching this, but I saw a picture or two a boxer that was allowed to compete in the Olympics, a man with women beating up women in a ring. I saw a picture of one of the girls that he had beat up. And you just go. You know what kind of civilization and culture allows men at Olympic game? No, no, no less, to walk into a ring and beat up on women. Well, no civilized culture or civilization does that. This is a culture, and not only in France, but in Western civilization in general probably in decline, nation in decline. And so what was happening then? And what does that got to do with the Last Supper? Well, because Jesus, then, is the eternal bridegroom who came into the story to redeem us, to save us, to unite himself with his bride, the church. He's the eternal bridegroom. He came in to unite himself with us and restore us right what original sin had decimated and the sins afterwards decimate. You see this on the culture around us. So, in essence, who's the church that Jesus wants to unite with Us? You know, the church is not a building. You know the church are the organic people within that building. We are the church, right, we're the body of Christ. Jesus came to restore us like a marriage, and that's what marriage is all about.
Speaker 1:If you want to think about the Bible from the beginning to the end, what are the two book covers? It's all about marriage and, all in between, spousal language. If you wanted to describe the whole book, I could describe it in five words God wants to marry us. God wants to marry us. Five words, think about it. In the book of Genesis, it starts with the marriage of Adam and Eve. In the last book of it In the book of Genesis, it starts with the marriage of Adam and Eve. In the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation, it ends with the marriage of Christ and the church with their spousal language all throughout this.
Speaker 1:So what happens? You know there was a disconnect in the very beginning and original sin came in. We became like cut flowers. You know what cut flowers? You see that on the stage, in that reenactment, that mockery at the Last Supper, a bunch of cut flowers. Huh, you come in and you look good behind the table for just a little while.
Speaker 1:And then what happens? To cut flowers if you put them in the vase, they start to wilt, and this is what happens to your lives when you're cut off from the source of divine love and life itself. Well, jesus comes to restore that, to give us roots again, to put the branch back on the vine, to fill us with divine life and love so that we can go out and love our neighbor. Love one another this is a love story. It's the two great commandments. It's not brain surgery. Love one another. You know this is a love story. You know it's the two great commandments. It's not brain surgery.
Speaker 1:Be filled with life and love of God himself and then give that away, express that in the created world, and we see that right away in Genesis. So I want to take you back to the very beginning, because this is what Jesus said. He says in the beginning. It was not so. So look, just for economy of time, think about the first five days of creation from the Bible. God's got this all set up. He adds the plants and the animals, he's got the stars, he's got the sun, the ocean, light from darkness, and he's got it all set up. It's beautiful. It's the Garden of Eden and it's beautiful. It's getting ready for a wedding feast. And this is what happens. You'll see.
Speaker 1:I'm just going to read you a little bit from Genesis, chapter one, verses 26 through 28. And the essence of this God draws up in essence into himself. It's like he takes a selfie. He takes a selfie of the inner life of the Trinity, which is his love, and he's going to flip that selfie, bring his divine life and love into the created world that he created. And how is he going to do that? Here's how he's going to do it. He's got the selfie, he's going to flip it.
Speaker 1:Let us make man in our image, our image. He's not alone up there, right After our likeness. Let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air and the cattle, over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground. So God created man in his image, in the divine image. He created them. How Male and female he created them. God blessed them, saying to them be fertile, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Be fertile, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. What's the first commandment that God ever gave us? Don't forget we don't have the 10 commandments yet, because there's no sin in the world, right? So what's the first commandment there? Join a marital union, right? God blessed them, saying to them be fertile and multiply, have children, form families and then go out into the world. So that's how the whole thing starts and it's organically united.
Speaker 1:We're filled with divine life and love, adam and Eve, and then they express that to one another. Think about this the Father pours his love out to the Son. The Son receives that love and it's so beautiful and profound. It comes out in the form of a person, the Holy Spirit. God is a spiritual being. He's not a sexual being, but he created our sexuality to express the inner life of love, of the inner life of the Trinity itself. How does he do that? A man offers his love to his wife. His wife receives that love. It's so beautiful and profound. Sometimes it comes out in the form of a person. We call that person a child, a baby. Can you see the importance of children, the importance of not taking life, because that's the love between a man and a woman. It's a tiny reflection, a created reflection of the inner life of the Trinity itself.
Speaker 1:We are to be filled with that divine life and love and then express it with one another and the family, but then to our neighbor and into the whole world, right. So this is why they attack on marriage and the family and human sexuality. See, satan cannot destroy God whole world, right. So this is why they attack on marriage and the family and human sexuality. See, satan cannot destroy God. So he seeks to destroy the imago dei, the image and likeness of God that male and female express in the world. This is the whole battle that you see all around us.
Speaker 1:Why did they go after and mock Christ at the Last Supper? Because Christ is the eternal bridegroom who comes to restore that image right, to fill us again with divine life and love. And don't forget, we're destined for that exchange. You know, in reality we're all going to die. I hate to be I hope I'm not the first person who never told you that, but this is the state of where we are, with sin and death into the world, huh. But our destiny is is to be taken up into eternal life, isn't it? We're eternal beings, but because we're no longer born linked to God as in the beginning because of our original sin, christ came to what? To restore us, to redeem us, to be the bridge or the link, to restore that grace, that participation in the life of God, that was driven out of the human heart. Our hearts have become hardened. Our minds, which are filled with reason and free will, our hearts have become hardened. Our minds, which are filled with reason and free will. Our reason has become unreasonable. You see this again, this mockery going on in the stage. We've become unreasonable.
Speaker 1:Procreation out, huh, destroy the life in the womb. Gender ideologies, all these things. Right, the unitive aspect of our human sexuality, boom, pushed out. Now we just use one another. Right, we're a bunch of hedonistic lusters. You know, that's amazing. Right, that was supposed to express the inner life of the Trinity, huh, well, it was darkened and that started in original sin. It didn't start yesterday, but we continue to accelerate this as the further we get away from God and Jesus Christ and the church.
Speaker 1:Right, we know that that image was wrecked, because what happened to Adam and Eve when they sinned? What did they do? They put something on. They put loincloths on. Did they put them on their eyes, their ears? No, they put them on their private parts, right, when our sexuality is, why we saw something was damaged there. Huh, when they rejected God, that link, that divine source and love, they become cut flowers and something went wrong with them. Huh, instead of being people of fully of love, lust had entered and they start to use one another. And that's the link. And what else did they do? They hid. They hid from God. This is what we're doing today. We're hiding from God. So, yeah, we have a distortion of marriage in the family.
Speaker 1:Jesus comes into what? To restore that link, to put the branch back on the vine, to give roots back to the cut flowers. And how does he do that? And where does he do that? He does it on the cross. But where does he initiate that? The day before he was crucified, at the last supper.
Speaker 1:This is the mockery of the last supperpper, because this is where Jesus institutes the Mass and the Eucharist. This is my body, he says to the apostles. This is my body given for you. This is my blood to the last drop. I love you, given for you, and I'm going to pour this out to you.
Speaker 1:Well, where does he consummate this marriage, this union with humanity? First of all, he takes our humanity, in a sense, into his body, right, he unites humanity with divinity, right in his own body. Then what happens? He climbs the marriage bed of the cross to pour this out to us, right? Remember, he got hit in the heart with the lance and what poured out? Water and blood. What was water? Water is baptism.
Speaker 1:Get us ready for the marriage, get us ready for the nuptial. We take a nuptial bath and we get washed from our sins. To do what? To receive? The blood, the Eucharist. And so think about this Our great desire to love and to be loved, to form families, to be persons of love, to raise children, that's a sacrifice. That's hard work. Well, when all the smoke and fog clears that great desire to love and be loved, to form families, to be persons of love, to raise children, that's a sacrifice. That's hard work. Well, when all the smoke and fog clears, that great desire to love and be loved and form marriages and families and change the culture points directly to Jesus Christ and his sacrifice of the mass and his desire to become one flesh with us. And where's the most intimate place? We become one flesh with Jesus In the Eucharist. We become one body with him. See, we unite ourselves to him so that we can become persons of love again. We're relinked again. This is what they want to take out. And so, as I wrap up here.
Speaker 1:I want to read St Paul in Ephesians 5. St Paul in Ephesians 5 links these two bookends together and this is for all of us. This is how we get relinked again, how we become persons of love in the world. We need love in the world, don't we? You see the vitriol and the hatred, and we're called to love everybody. We're called to love every single person. On that stage that mocked Jesus Christ. Right, jesus said even love your enemies. Not easy to do, but this is the difference between Christians and people that have rejected God and the vitriol and they become like cut flowers and they feel this in their heart and they just lash out. Right, we have to take that. We have to go to our knees in prayer and we have to become persons of love. But we have to stand up. We have to stand up right. We stand up in prayer, we stand up in witness and this is the beauty of what we're starting to see around us. We'll see if it's too late to save our culture now, but this is Ephesians 5. It's so beautiful. Bring in these two bookends again together. I'm going to start at verse 25 to maybe 33. Ends again together. I'm going to start at verse 25 to maybe 33.
Speaker 1:Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water, with the word that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she us might be holy without blemish. Even so, husband husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself, for no man ever hates his own flesh but nourishes it and cherishes it as christ does the church, because we're members of his body. And here's the finality. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh, unite in marital union. Well, why should we do that? And what has that got to do with Jesus? Ah, this is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the church. For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two become one flesh. This is a great mystery again, and I mean in reference to Christ and the church. It's Jesus who left his heavenly father and his earthly mother to become one flesh with us, and this is what they want to take out and mock, of course. So I'll leave you with this, john Paul II, his favorite phrase and the phrase that's said the most in the Bible be not afraid, be not afraid, do not be afraid.
Speaker 1:Watch some of the pictures coming out of the Olympics. I'm not watching the Olympics, but some pictures coming out of the Olympics. And these athletes, these young athletes, making the sign of the cross, declaring Jesus Christ as their savior. There was a Brazilian, a young Brazilian woman, who won a medal that signed Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. Beautiful American Olympic swimmer, I think. He got a silver and he said the same thing, you know, as he was receiving his medal, et cetera.
Speaker 1:We had a Brazilian surfer who was not allowed to, who had Jesus proclaimed on his surfboards. He wasn't allowed to bring that in and they're not allowing religious symbols. That's why these athletes are declaring it through their bodies right, making the sign of the cross, declaring scripture, proclaiming their belief in Jesus Christ as their savior. And not only the savior, but intimacy, the big heart that Jesus has for all of us, drawing us back into the love story. These are our heroes today. So this Brazilian surfer same thing, reciting, I think, the Proverbs or one of the Psalms, something like that these are our heroes today, aren't they? These young people standing up, these are today's heroes. We need to keep those young people in our prayers, keep all young people in our prayers, because they're all being attacked by this culture. Hey, god bless you. Thanks for being with me. Everyone, talk to you again soon. Bye-bye.