The LORD is able to exist as a burning bush that is not consumed, “God said: Do not come near! Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.” (Exodus 3:5). Likewise, God instructed the building of the Tabernacle and His glory dwelt in it, “Moses could not enter the tent of meeting, because the cloud settled down upon it and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.” (Exodus 40:35). Therefore, it does not matter what the symbol is made of or whether the symbol is stationary or moving. The LORD and the spiritual world can dwell in it and that makes it Holy. “Uzzah stretched out his hand to the Ark of God and steadied it,...God struck him on that spot, and he died there in God’s presence.” (2 Samuel 6: 6-7). Therefore, when the LORD gave us His Mother at the feet of His Holy Cross to become our Mother, she became not just symbolically our Mother, but she became our true Mother, “Woman, behold, your son.”...“Behold Your Mother.” (John 19: 26-27). Understanding that symbols possess the Spirit they represent, the Apostle John acted on the Holy Church’s behalf, “And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.” (John 19:17).
Adam understood how a symbol truly possesses what it represents and that is reflected in his vivid symbolic description of “the husband and wife become one flesh,” “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and clings to his wife, and the two of them become one body” (Genesis 2:24). Thus, the symbol defies what we perceive with our senses when we encounter a husband who appears to be separate but who in reality became one with his wife. The Archangel Gabriel could see what even Mary did not see and acknowledged that Mary is “Favored One” because “The LORD is with Thee.” (Luke 1:28). Therefore, Mary became not a symbol of a Holy Mother of a child, but truly, “The Power of the Most High will overshadow you.” (Luke 1:35). Thus Mary became not a symbol, but the Mother of the total Christ in His humanity and also His divinity as Elizabeth and the children of the one family proclaim, “The mother of my LORD.” (Luke 1:43). Therefore, the educated scribes rightly judged that unless Jesus is one and the same as God, He is committing blasphemy in forgiving sins because using such a symbol possesses real power making Jesus either God or a blasphemer, “Why does this man speak that way? He is blaspheming. Who but God alone can forgive sins?” (Mark 2:7). Christ did not state 'May God forgive your sins', but stated, “Child, your sins are forgiven.” (Mark 2:5). As such it is blasphemy to misuse symbols to represent the spiritual world, such as making a statue to represent something that is not the True one Creator. Regardless of what the symbol is made of, when validly blessed it possesses some of the power of what it represents. For example, the bronze serpent that Moses made represented the Crucified Christ and helped those bitten by the serpent to live, as explained in Numbers 21:9 and Christ explained, “And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.” (John 3:14).
When Christ used the symbol of Heavenly Bread as coming down from Heaven, the Jews understood the magnitude and importance of such a life-giving Heavenly Bread that becomes eternal Life itself and they asked Christ to give this Bread to them always, “For the Bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” So they said to him, “Sir, give us this Bread always.” (John 6: 33-34). In other words, the Jews asked for the real Bread knowing that even if it is a symbol, the symbol in their understanding becomes the real thing of what it represents – meaning it becomes the eternal life itself. But the Eternal Life itself is Christ, as He emphasized, “I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life.” (John 14:6). Therefore, for Jesus to say that, I AM the Life, I AM the Truth and “Jesus said to them, “I AM the Bread of Life” (John 6:35) is basically symbolizing that the LORD and “I am Heavenly food” are one and the same. If He is the Heavenly Bread, then the question is how to eat and drink Jesus not just one time but always, as the people requested, “The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” (John 6: 52). Jesus meant that His Flesh is the Bread of the Eternal Life; therefore, the Jews are right to wonder how to eat His Flesh which God called blasphemy. However, Christ continued and insisted that unless a believer always consumed His Eternal Life Blood and His Eternal Life Flesh, the person is dead even though the person appears to be alive. Christ insisted that unless a believer always consumed His Eternal Life Blood and His Eternal Life Flesh, the person is dead even though the person appears to be alive. “Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you.” (John 6:53). In other words, there is an empty symbol of matter that represents the Divine, but the symbol becomes the real thing. And thus eating the True Flesh and drinking the True Blood of Christ in the same manner we eat bread is vitally important. Bread and blood alone as physical matter do not give Eternal Life, but they do when they become the symbol of the spirit they represent – one and the same with Christ in His soul and divinity, “It is the spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail. The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and Life.” (John 6: 63). Since the Bread and Drink are the utmost treasure because they are the True Christ of the Eternal Life, how to prepare them and who is authorized to prepare them were not revealed except to His Apostles. That information was revealed in an intimate Last Supper meal and this bequeathed Treasure became official the next day after Christ's death.
Likewise, the symbol of Christ’s authority, the keys of Heaven and of earth, was handed to Peter who became Christ on Earth – the symbol of the divine Christ who is in Heaven as stated in Matthew 16: 19. Therefore, the Church that Peter shall head becomes the symbol of Our Mother just like our Mother Mary in Heaven.
Therefore, the Commandment against making any image (Exodus 20:4) specifically prohibits images and symbols of worship that are not representative of the LORD or where the LORD dwells. The prohibition against calling anyone father, “Call no one on earth your father; you have but one Father in Heaven” (Matthew 23:9) does not contradict calling priests father. The successor of Peter can be called Father and the priests authorized to act as Christ on earth can be called Father because by their authorized office they become not just the symbol, but they truly become Christ – as the Church explains, “In Persona Christi, and the Pope as the Vicar of Christ.” In fact, we can and perhaps should bow down not only to the Pope, but also to the priest because we are offering a form of worship and homage. Although it is not the same as what we offer to Christ and God, we offer homage because we understand that the Pope and priest become truly Christ in their authorized function. This is why a blessed statue of a saint is not just a static symbol but it becomes united in what it represents – the saint represents a total unity and representation of uniting with Christ forming one flesh. And that is our ultimate aim as well if we remain faithful to Christ and His one Body, the Catholic Church.
We use physical symbols in our worship to unite us with the spirit of our Heavenly Father and heavenly family because the physical symbols aid our senses to immerse ourselves in the Spirit in our worship of our Heavenly Father. We also use beautiful hymns, candles, and incense to move our souls to our Heavenly Father in worship. We also use body gestures such as bowing, kneeling, prostrating, silence, and the sign of the Cross as physical symbols that communicate to our Heavenly Father and Heavenly Family our love and union with one another and our Heavenly Father to form one Holy Catholic Family Church.
It is not the material the symbol is made of that determines the value of the symbol, but what it represents. The bronze serpent made by the Jews in the desert is made of a less valuable substance than the golden calf they made to represent the Egyptian goddesses. Furthermore, the Jews offered burned sacrifices to the molten calf which is the highest form of worship and should only be reserved to the LORD and that constitutes apostasy. God became angry at the golden molten calf because it represents gods outside of the one Family of God making the symbol as one unit with lesser spiritual gods in competition with the Creator God. God described the people who make symbols for worship outside of the one family as stiff-necked, “how stiff-necked they are,...Let me alone, then, that my anger may burn against them to consume them.” (Exodus 32: 9-10). Likewise, although a valid spouse maybe be poorer, uglier, older, less prestigious, or less talented, the spouse may yet be much more valuable than a lover outside the marriage covenant, because the valid spouse symbolizes one union and reflects the Holy Trinity. Thus, it is not the value of the symbols that we perceive with our senses that determines their worth and spiritual union, but how the symbols are blessed and used. Money can become an iconic symbol that complies with Christ's teachings when it is given to the mother Church to be used for our worship needs, to help us meet our needs, and to help others. However, money can become an iconic symbol of evil when it is used to entice breaking of marriages and lure others into fornication, adulteries, and corruptions.
The symbols of our unity with our one family Catholic Church and Christ are not just confession of our one Faith, but also consuming the consecrated Bread and Wine makes us one Family union. We share not just the same birth, but the same Blood and Flesh that runs through our veins is the True Blood of Christ and our food is His True Flesh. Thus we are a true living symbol of Tabernacle of Christ, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” (1 Corinthians 3:16).
It is easier for us to understand that the symbols that we use for saints, the Holy Mother Mary, Christ, the Cross, and the Consecrated Eucharist to be treated as Holy, but we find it difficult to treat ourselves as a symbol of unity with Christ. Although we are living iconic Tabernacles of Christ, we get distracted and focus on the visual perception of the symbols and end up sinning. Therefore, it is great to surround ourselves with blessed symbols of our one Holy Family; we surround ourselves with holiness to help us imitate holiness and strive to seek the grace of Christ to, “Be Perfect.” (Matthew 5:48).
But we must understand that symbols unite with the spirits they bless and thus defy our visual sense. Therefore, to understand symbols deeply, we must rely on the teachings of authorized eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses who were eyewitnesses of those who were taught and authorized by Christ. Therefore, those outside the one Holy Catholic Church struggle to have faith in the Catholic symbols and icons and rely on explanation of Scripture by non-authorized eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses, meaning they rely on explanation from outside the Catholic Church and its depository of faith. Within the one family the spiritual hidden side of symbols is understood more easily than merely being read to or looked on by outsiders. While we find it unoffensive to display statues of a calf that depict a physical calf, we do not use the golden molten calf to represent goddesses as an aid to our worship, because the dedicated spiritual hidden union of goddesses is outside our Creator’s one holy family union.
Thus, the unborn children are also iconic symbols of created human beings. Killing unborn children is murder, even if the unborn do not speak yet or do not yet look like born children, because their spiritual symbolism is the spirit of a human being. Killing humans mercilessly and selfishly unites the killer with the spirit of evil. Likewise, a sexual relationship is a life-giving symbolic spiritual union inherited within the design of the act, and thus should be limited to the valid conjugal relationship. Valid spouses that live in love are iconic symbols united with the spirit of the Creator. If a sexual relationship did not have a spiritual element inherited within its design by the Creator, we may evaluate that sexual relationship as being similar to playing with any calf statue. However, a sexual relationship is designed by the Creator with a specific purpose; therefore, when we disobey the Creator's design, we anger the Creator just as we anger the Creator with the molten calf, promiscuity, fornication, and adultery. Things have spiritual meanings and we cannot engage in them just because the law permits or society accepts or because we may not get caught or the act appears harmless. We should look into the spiritual dedication, design, and meaning of the symbols and choose wisely; for we are the Temple of Christ.
We believe it is very pleasing to Christ for us to bow down, ask for help or a favor (meaning to pray) or place candles and flowers in front of statues of Christ or the Virgin Mary or Saints or archangels because we are expressing our love and seek help and graces from and to Christ who unites with His Mother and the saints to form one flesh. And since Christ unites even more perfectly with the saints and His Holy Mother's Spirit (even more so after they departed from Earth), thus His Mother and the Saints are permanently alive because they unite more perfectly and permanently with “the Eternal Life” (Himself) and are thus permanently alive.
Most of us do not know for certain how long we will live. It is not always possible to understand and discover the various physical symbols that we observe with our senses, and that makes it much harder to understand the spiritual union of the physical symbols. Therefore, we have to depend on authorized and reliable eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses to teach us and build our knowledge of many of the physical iconic symbols, and especially their invisible Spiritual union. Most of the observed physical symbols require explanations of eyewitnesses, just like operating old farm machinery or understanding the meaning of Sacred Scripture that is from a culture from thousands of years ago. That is especially true for understanding of symbolism. Even if we can understand on our own the physical symbolism (whether written or observed) and its spiritual union, we still need an authorized eyewitness to assure that our understanding is accurate or to adjust our understanding as the LORD reminds us, “on your own intelligence do not rely.” (Proverbs 3:5). Thereafter we have faith and proper understanding by relying on the authorized eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses of our one holy Church family. It is foolishness and pride to fall away and turn back our faith from genuine Truth to rely on our own understanding that contradicts the authorized eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses, “If a blind person leads a blind person, both will fall into a pit.” (Matthew 15:14). We should choose to be an iconic symbol of Christ and that requires us to understand and be taught by authorized eyewitnesses of eyewitnesses, “For we are the aroma of Christ for God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing” (2 Corinthians 2: 15). We are the risen Jonah, we are Christ!
This is my daily prayer on rising, before retiring, before leaving the Eucharistic Adoration, and after receiving Holy Communion:
LORD! Help me to think in Your mind.
Help me to desire in Your will.
Help me to work in Your design.
Help me to see in Your eyes.
Help me to hear in Your ears.
Help me to breathe in Your spirit.
Help me to speak in Your tongue.
Help me to nourish in Your mouth.
Help me to reach in Your arms.
Help me to hold in Your hands.
Help me to walk in your feet.
Help me to love in Your heart.
Help me to grow in Your faith.
And help me to live in Your life.