In Part 2 of our series Who Are You? Lessons From Our First Parents & John Paul II, return guest Josie Duke continues to draw us back through time to contemplate the Garden of Eden, offering us a taste of:

What it was like for Adam & Eve in the Garden of Eve before the Fall - and after - to help us think more about our understanding of Who God is, revealing more about who we are as man and woman created for and in unimaginable loveThe roots of our suffering in this lifeSome of the wounds that we have been left with from the fall of mankind which are made manifest multi-dimensionally as we move about in our daily lives

Tragically, we learn today that satan offered our first parents what they already had.

And he does the same to us as we bear the consequences of those wounds, and repeat the drama of Adam & Eve each and every day in our own lives in many, many ways--which I look forward to breaking apart more specifically in time.

And as awesome as Josie is....we only scratch the surface of these beautiful, healing mysteries! We are ever aware that we are both simply "pencils in His hand", trying our best in grace to share what is truly an inexhaustible gift from God our loving Father Who has redeemed us through Christ.

It is utterly striking just how vast this discussion is ...and how absolutely essential it is for us as human persons to begin ever anew to understand ourselves, each other, and our Creator if we are to ever truly see one another as gift - and cease allowing our differences to divide us in the infinite ways that we see around us and that cause us so much pain.

For indeed, we were created with these very differences that were originally intended by our loving Father to draw us into unity.

Our differences....should draw us into...unity?  How can that possibly be?  Stay tuned for more Faith & Good Counsel on that in time....

Kinda sad, isn't, that what we simply knew in our beings before the fall, we now have to effort so hard to comprehend as we struggle to see the dignity of others whom we view as "different" and to try to understand what is truly loving as gift of self to everyone, transcending time and space.

Lots to ponder on....

So, what spoke to your heart today?What questions were inspired deep in your soul?

I hope you'll take pen to paper again in your journal and prayerfully explore these and other big questions as we move forward with the series, and other offerings coming soon to Faith & Good Counsel.  

LINKS & RESOURCES:

Letter to Women

Mulieris Dignitatem

Message of the Vatican Council to Women, December 8, 1965

Nine Days that Changed the World

Gaudium et Spes, 22:1

The truth is that only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light. For Adam, the first man, was a figure of Him Who was to come,(20) namely Christ the Lord. Christ, the final Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear. It is not surprising, then, that in Him all the aforementioned truths find their root and attain their crown.

He Who is "the image of the invisible God" (Col. 1:15),(21) is Himself the perfect man. To the sons of Adam He restores the divine likeness which had been disfigured from the first sin onward. Since human nature as He assumed it was not annulled,(22) by that very fact it has been raised up to a divine dignity in our respect too. For by His incarnation the Son of God has united Himself in some fashion with every man. He worked with human hands, He thought with a human mind, acted by human choice(23) and loved with a human heart. Born of the Virgin Mary, He has truly been made one of us, like us in all things except sin.(24)

As an innocent lamb He merited for us life by the free shedding of His own blood. In Him God reconciled us(25) to Himself and among ourselves; from bondage to the devil and sin He delivered us,