A Leader of the Church did not Include God in the Conversation

Here is my comment to an article by David Mills entitled "The Catholic Church's Painful, Joyful Hope dated 12/31/2015 in Aleteia (Link)

This article epitomizes all that is wrong with the leaders of Christianity. It is all about the Church. It says nothing about God. Is it possible to devote a modicum of the conversation to God? Say 25%.  

God is not dead. Indeed, God is very much alive. However, the conversation about God is dead. Killing the conversation about God is tantamount to killing God. The enemies of the Church know this. The leaders of the Church do not. Because the leaders of the Church exclude God from the conversation, God has become a stranger to us. Nobody follows a stranger. Because God is a stranger to us, fewer and fewer go to Mass to worship him. Nobody goes to Confession. Churches are withering and dying. 

To reverse the trend, the leaders of the Church must sing a new song. They must sing a song about God. They must put away the songs they sing about the lesser aspects of Christianity. They must put away the songs they sing about the Church.

The vision of the Church is out of focus. It is blurry. Now is the time to refocus it. More God. Less everything else.

We tortured and killed him. He suffered and died. Yet, he did not stay dead and he did not stop loving us. That he did not stay dead is the proof that Jesus is God. That he did not stop loving us is the proof of so much more. It is the proof that Divinity is love. 

How do we let them know that we love them? We let them torture and kill us. We suffer and die. We then rise from the dead and continue to love them nonetheless. If this does not convince them that we love them dearly, nothing can or will. 

There is so much to say about God even in small spaces. Let's get cracking.

Below is a further reply that I made to a comment that said "This is a false dichotomy. God is inseparable from the Church."

Indeed.  The Church is the escape. It is the new exodus making its escape through the hostile desert of godlessness from slavery under the yoke of Pharaoh to freedom with God and his holy family in the promised land. The Church is the servant / leader of the escape. God built the escape route, defined the escape route with holy places, made a map of them, established a Church and entrusted the map to the Church. The job of the Church is to facilitate the escape - not to frustrate it, not to filter it and not to foul it up. The job of the Church is to be grease for the wheels of the escape not an obstacle in its way. Rational people seek the sweetness of paradise and flee the sourness of godlessness. To do otherwise is crazy. Jesus is the sweetness of paradise. Indeed, the Church and God are inseparable. However, they are not the same thing. To understand the difference between God and the Church, you must dive deeper into its role in the Big Picture of Christianity.  The Church is not doing its job when it is not wielding the sledgehammer of truth against the illusions conjured up by the serpent that camouflage the sweetness of paradise and sugarcoat the sourness of godlessness.  It has been said that the truth sets us free. Much is true. However, much truth is irrelevant. The truth that sets us free is the truth that shatters the two illusions. When the Church does not include God in the conversation, it does nothing to shatter the illusion that camouflages the sweetness of paradise. It does not do its job.  Do you not agree with me that a more than two thousand year old Church knows a song or two about God? Therefore, lets hear it sung! Let's hear the Church sing the songs about God.

Here is a similar comment that I made to an article in Crux (Link)

This article epitomizes all that is wrong with the leaders of Christianity. Nothing is said about God. Is it possible to devote a modicum of the conversation to God? Say 25%.

Isn't God news anymore? When did the bloody wounds we opened in the body of Christ stop being news? A.D. 100? A.D. 1492? A.D. 2014?

We lit the fuse of the bomb. We tortured and killed him. This ought to have, at the very least, pissed him off. This ought to have triggered his reflex for revenge, retaliation and retribution. The normal pattern of cause and effect ought to have held true. The bomb ought to have exploded. However, it did not. The bomb did not explode. Our God was a dud. Thanks be to God (Isaiah 55:8-9).

When we look through the bloody wounds we opened in the body of Christ as we would look through a telescope, we catch a glimpse of heaven from right here on earth. The bloody wounds pierce the veil to reveal the nature of God. The very purpose of the exercise was to reveal to us the nature of God.

What do you see?

We killed him (Proof that Jesus is human) but He did not stay dead (Proof that Jesus is God) But more importantly, we tortured and killed him but he did not stop loving us (Proof that Divinity is love).

Wow!

God is not dead. Indeed, God is very much alive. However, the conversation about God is dead. Killing the conversation about God is tantamount to killing God. The enemies of the Church know this. The leaders of the Church do not. Because the leaders of the Church exclude God from the conversation, God has become a stranger to us. Nobody follows a stranger. Because God is a stranger to us, fewer and fewer go to Mass to worship him. Nobody goes to Confession. Churches are withering and dying.

To reverse the trend, the leaders of the Church must sing a new song. They must sing a song about God. They must put away the songs they sing about the lesser aspects of Christianity. They must put away the songs they sing about the Church. Surely a more than two thousand year old Church knows a song or two about God?

Indeed.  The Church is the escape. It is the new exodus making its escape through the hostile desert of godlessness from slavery under the yoke of Pharaoh to freedom with God and his holy family in the promised land. The Church is the servant / leader of the escape. God built the escape route, defined the escape route with holy places, made a map of them, established a Church and entrusted the map to the Church. The job of the Church is to facilitate the escape - not to frustrate it, not to filter it and not to foul it up. The job of the Church is to be grease for the wheels of the escape not an obstacle in its way. Rational people seek the sweetness of paradise and flee the sourness of godlessness. To do otherwise is crazy. Jesus is the sweetness of paradise. Indeed, the Church and God are inseparable. However, they are not the same thing. To understand the difference between God and the Church, you must dive deeper into its role in the Big Picture of Christianity.  The Church is not doing its job when it is not wielding the sledgehammer of truth against the illusions conjured up by the serpent that camouflage the sweetness of paradise and sugarcoat the sourness of godlessness.  It has been said that the truth sets us free. Much is true. However, much truth is irrelevant. The truth that sets us free is the truth that shatters the two illusions. When the Church does not include God in the conversation, it does nothing to shatter the illusion that camouflages the sweetness of paradise. It does not do its job.  Do you not agree with me that a more than two thousand year old Church knows a song or two about God? Therefore, lets hear it sung! Let's hear the Church sing the songs about God.