Mystery
religions tend to a cyclical eschaton realized in nothingness. Westerners tend to a linear eschaton
culminating in Christ’s return. This
linear view is often perceived to be orthodox.
I
believe in a spherical eschaton, a cloud, as it were.
The eschaton
is without time (eternal). Only creation
is in time (temporal). Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven/God is at hand.”[1]
In the Incarnation,
and previously in the Decalogue, as well as in Eden, Jesus brings the timeless eschaton
into tangency with time bound creation.
This tangency is proved by the Transfiguration, empowered by the
Crucifixion, verified by Ascension, conducted by His enthronement, and finally sealed
by His Return.
Nevertheless,
I am already sealed by the Holy Ghost in baptism. When I take communion, I expect to receive
the whole of the eschaton in my mouth in a mystery. Augustine teaches that the omnipresence of
God does not speak of the distribution of God throughout and even beyond the
Universe. Rather, all of God is present
in every place: as when the same sound is heard by different hearers in
different locations, yet the exact same sound is heard. Consequently, I receive all of God in baptism
and communion: not part of heaven, all of it.
So for a few seconds in time, I have the beatific vision without seeing
it. My feet are on earth, but my head is
in the clouds.
These
things can only be true if the eschaton, cloudlike, is all around us, all the
time. Wherever Jesus is, the eschaton is
there also. This does play out in linear
time, but we have it already. This is
why the Mass is not a new sacrifice, but our entering into an old ageless, eternal
sacrifice. It is true now, true for
Adam, and true for the last person born.
This is why we repeatedly sing the refrain, “As it is now, was in the
beginning, and ever shall be. Amen. Amen.”
[1] Matthew
3:2; 6:33; 10:7; 12:28; 19:24; 21:31, 43; Mark 1:15; 4:11, 26, 30; 9:1, 47;
10:14, 15, 23-25; 12:34; 14:25; 15:43; Luke 4:43; 6:20; 7:28;8:1, 10; 9:2, 11,
27, 60, 62; and many other such passages.
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