Thursday, June 26, 2008

Gal 4, 8-9 Do you want to be slaves again?

(Gal 4, 8-9) Do you want to be slaves again?
[8] At a time when you did not know God, you became slaves to things that by nature are not gods; [9] but now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and destitute elemental powers? Do you want to be slaves to them all over again?
(CCC 2114) Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God" (Origen, Contra Celsum 2, 40: PG 11, 861). (CCC 2129) The divine injunction included the prohibition of every representation of God by the hand of man. Deuteronomy explains: "Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, beware lest you act corruptly by making a graven image for yourselves, in the form of any figure...." (Deut 4:15-16). It is the absolutely transcendent God who revealed himself to Israel. "He is the all," but at the same time "he is greater than all his works" (Sir 43:27-28). He is "the author of beauty" (Wis 13:3).

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