Posted on 10/29/2015 7:51:30 AM PDT by Salvation
When we think of the word “adoration,†we think of a high form of love, perhaps the highest. Theologically, we equate adoration with latria, the worship and love due to God alone. In the vernacular, to say “I adore you†is to indicate an intense and high form of love.
Liturgically, adoration of the Lord in the Blessed Sacrament indicates a period during which one enters into the experience of loving God and gazing upon Him in that love. The Lord, too, extends a gaze of love to us, as is beautifully stated in the Song of Songs: Behold, he is standing behind our wall, He is looking through the window, peering through the lattice (Song 2:9).
In all these examples there is a sort of intense, yet resting love expressed; a love that is tender and deep, quiet and fixed.
However, the greatest act of adoration the world has ever known exhibits little of this quietude or restfulness. Indeed, one might call this act of adoration quite stormy; though intense, it was not restful. In fact, you might not consider it adoration at all. But consider this reflection by Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P.:
Adoration of infinite value was offered to God by Christ in Gethsemane when he prostrated himself saying, “My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will, but as though wilt.†Christ’s adoration of the Father recognized in a practical and profound manner the sovereign excellence of God … The Savior’s adoration continued on the cross (The Three Ages of the Interior Life, Vol 2, p. 251).
At the heart of this most perfect act of adoration was obedience, a heart that not only loved God but out of that love wanted only what He wanted. True adoration of God includes both a loving acknowledgment of His excellence and a submission of our will to His in loving obedience. Out of love we offer our whole life to God.
Thus adoration is more than mere feeling, no matter how intense; it is sacrifice; it is the willing offering of one’s very self as an act of love to God, who has so loved us. No greater love is there than to lay down one’s life for God and for those we love in Him.
Is obedience and sacrifice what you and I mean when we say that we are going to Eucharistic adoration or when we say that we adore God? The most perfect act of adoration was love expressed as obedience and sacrifice.
Thank-you and God Bless.
Just differences in opinon.
You are welcome.
http://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/Glorifying-God
http://www.bible-topics.com/Glorifying-God.html
Awesome book!
Obedience and sacrifice are not love, but they flow naturally from out of that love as do kindness, peace, all the fruit of the spirit.
For some people loving God does not come naturally, as he seems distant, theoretical, something we accept on faith alone. But as you experience God as real and alive in and around you, loving him is the most natural thing in the world. Worship and adoration then go from being mechanical to being a way of life.
Good post.
???
I met him once. My parish priest had him as his confessor. He truly was short!
LOL, really? Short ....
Short in height only. Otherwise, he was a saint from my perspective.
I knew what you meant. So hard to tell on TV whether one is short or not.
So what? It's an argument from silence --- an empty argument. Thousands of things we do all our lives that are good, holy and God-pleasing are not mentioned specifically in Scripture. For instance, there's no mention of anybody putting flowers on a grave, praying before a football game, asking God to bless the United States, or getting married in church. So?
People who make this argument-from-silence never subject their own practices to the same scrutiny. Do you sing anysongs other than Psalms and verbatim Biblical canticles? Do you use any instruments other than lyre and harp, reed-pipe, cymbals and tambourine?
Do you celebrate Christmas or Easter? I'll be you do. And I'll bet you don't celebrate the three pilgrimage festivals (Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot) and the two High Holy Days (Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur)--- no working on those days, either! --- or the 8 days of Hanukkah.
Did you give your wife a wedding ring? Un-Biblical!
The "argument from silence" means nothing. Who wrote the Books of Genesis and Exodus? No book of the Bible, in its text, indicted Moses as it author. None of the four Gospels were signed. Much of what you think you know about the Bible, you know from extra-Biblical sources. Including, significantly, which books are in the Bible!
Mrs. DO,
Your argument falls flat by trying to equate two different categories. As such, it is a category mistake.
No church I know teaches organs, keyboards or violins are Biblical instruments. They simply use them to fulfil the Biblical admonition to “make a joyful noise unto the Lord.”
I know of no church teaching that elevates an argument from silence into a doctrinal statement, like the sinlessness of Mary.
You end up arguing that “God could have done whatever He wanted, so since we want it, it must be true.”
I don’t find arguments from silence to be meaningful, except as an opportunity for grace.
All the best
I don’t think Tired&Retired was saying that “Adoration of Jesus is poison.”
Read again what he wrote: “If we allow others to raise us up we often forget to hold on above.”
His is a warning to us not to hold others up to the adoration we render to Jesus and His Father.
see my post 34 for my comment.
I assumed TiredandRetired misread the article with that comment. Was just engaging him.
google biblegateway nkjv adoration
Results: nothing.
I did find the word “worship”. Do these two words have different connotations?
Ah, thank you.
“Just differences in opinion.”
Actually, I thought it was malicious, hate-filled, bloody minded bigotry, deliberately and unnecessarily insulting.
I don’t go on threads where protestants are discussing some protestant issue and drop a plopper in the punch bowl.
You are forgiven for saying what you have posted. Remember this is still a free country.
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