God's Love for You - Sunday 19th January 2025
Christian Hope (2)
What is our Hope based on? It is the promise of redemption by God. And we can see that after the Fall up to our present moment, God had never and has never abandon us. When you look at the Old Testament, even time after time the People of God disobeyed God and lost the friendship with Him, again and again He relented and made a covenant with them. And after Christ, we find in the Church's Sacraments the sure sign of God's forgiveness, for example, the Sacrament of Reconciliation is available for us to make peace with God and clean our souls day after day. How are they related? You see, if there isn't any forgiveness of sins, we will still be in the clutches of Satan and in darkness, thus no hope of eternal freedom or life eternal. But because there is forgiveness of sins through the Church and His Son, then there is redemption, thus we have our hope. Our Hope is also from the sacrifice of Christ on the Holy Cross, which is the source of our everlasting salvation, for all of us. Within the Church, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is celebrated day after day throughout the world - the Offering of Jesus Christ as the spotless Sacrificial Lamb to the Father for the atonement of our daily sins. Christian Hope is also based on the Resurrection of Christ, as we truly believe that Our Lord who have risen from the dead Himself will also, on the last day, raise the righteous up and live with Him forever. So our hope is not deceitful, it is not an imagination, it is not delusive. Most importantly, Hope is not disappointing. It is build on Faith, nurtured in this life by Charity, and fulfilled in the next life by God's Love.
(Reference: Catechism of the Catholic Church #55, #617, #983, #989, #1681, #2658, #2839 )
