- Feb 5, 2002
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There has been a great deal of study of the Providential preparation for the Christian message in the Holy Land and in Europe, but not so much in other regions. Obviously, of course, the entire Old Testament is a kind of historical, cultural and spiritual chronicle of God’s preparation for the coming of the Messiah to His chosen people. Despite Christ’s widespread rejection by the Jews, there has been tremendous reflection on and analysis of the long period of preparation. This sacred history and subsequent reflections upon it by Christians around the world have led to a keen awareness of a long preparation by God so that, in the fullness of time, His personal disclosure in Christ might be accepted and lived by those who hear the Gospel.
Moreover, this same sort of Providential analysis has been very carefully and consistently applied to the decisive rise of Christianity in the Mediterranean region as a whole (where it has not necessarily persisted) and especially in Europe, both Western and Eastern. For centuries (perhaps until our own day), the preparation for the Gospel in the civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome has been a staple of European self-awareness. The bare bones of a very solid argument is that the European ground was prepared for a kind of fulfillment in Christ of the understanding of God and virtue developed by the best of the Greek philosophers and communicated over a wide geographical area through Roman conquest, organization and law. And of course this civilizational heritage was preserved and presided over in many ways by the Church herself.
Continued below.
www.catholicculture.org
Moreover, this same sort of Providential analysis has been very carefully and consistently applied to the decisive rise of Christianity in the Mediterranean region as a whole (where it has not necessarily persisted) and especially in Europe, both Western and Eastern. For centuries (perhaps until our own day), the preparation for the Gospel in the civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome has been a staple of European self-awareness. The bare bones of a very solid argument is that the European ground was prepared for a kind of fulfillment in Christ of the understanding of God and virtue developed by the best of the Greek philosophers and communicated over a wide geographical area through Roman conquest, organization and law. And of course this civilizational heritage was preserved and presided over in many ways by the Church herself.
Continued below.
Our Lady of Guadalupe and preparing the Americas for Christ
When word spread of the miracle of the flowers cascading out of Juan Diego’s tilma in the middle of Winter, everything suddenly clicked into place.
www.catholicculture.org
