Music and the art of singing has been deeply tied to the practice of religion and the worship of God since the very beginning of humanity’s expression of our relationship with God. Even the Psalms, which are the quintessential embodiment of authentic and effective prayer, were set to music when they were composed. Every time we go to Mass, there is going to be some form of singing or music that we participate in; in fact, high masses are entirely sung or chanted. There is a reason why Saint Augustine once said, “those who sing pray twice” - music unites our human capacity for beauty and art with our communication with our Creator, the One who gave us the power to create beautiful things in the first place.

Since music is so intrinsic to the practice of our faith, we must understand just how significant it is then to be the patron saint of music. The saint with this honor, Cecilia, was an early Christian in the city of Rome; there is no indication that she herself was an actual musician, but she was given this title because it is tradition that she “sang in her heart to God” when she was forced to be married to a Roman nobleman. Cecilia is venerated as both a virgin and a martyr; the man she married ultimately respected her desire to remain pure in body, though at her marriage, she would have been under the impression that she was being led to have that purity taken away from her. In her suffering, she sang in her heart to God. This is precisely what we do at Mass. Mass is a re-presentation of the sacrifice that Christ offered on the cross, and our participation in this moment is very solemn. However, we sing in our hearts because we know that Christ did this for us, and that itself is worthy of both celebration of victory over sin and death and glorification of God. Music at Mass changes from church to church, but the sentiment behind utilizing music and singing is always the same: the choirs of angels in Heaven sing. The voices of the saints are lifted up in the presence of God on his throne. What must that sound like? Could we ever comprehend or put into words the beauty of the sound of Heaven? This was the same sound that must have rung out in every corner of creation at the moment of Christ’s death because Heaven knew that his victory and offering was consummated.

The moment of the elevation of the Eucharist at Mass is done in silence. However, this exact same moment is perpetually presented in Heaven, when the Lamb stands before all the souls who bow down and worship Him. In Heaven, the elevation of the body of Christ must be accompanied with unspeakably beautiful singing and music; in this life and on earth, we sing to God in our hearts at this solemn moment just like Cecilia did because there is still much work that needs to be done on our behalf in order to show God our willingness to take on suffering for His sake. But in Heaven, the presence of God and His holy saints become one - the relationship is fully consummated. It is a moment of celebration, a moment of glorification, and a moment of adoration. Wherever God is glorified and adored, there is Heavenly music. It might simply be sung in our hearts, or it might be sung at full strength by the choirs of angels. Regardless, the sound of Heaven is something we should be looking forward to experiencing. Sometimes, we might even hear reflections of this sound here on earth, particularly when it is attached to the expression of our faith.

Why do we go through suffering? We know in our innermost being that suffering is something we want to avoid. When we show love to someone, the last thing we want to do is cause any type of suffering for them; on the other hand, in anger or resentment, our immediate reaction is to bring about suffering to those who elicit painful emotions within us. The suffering we experience in our lives comes to us in two distinct ways: either it is brought about at the hands of others, or it is caused by circumstances outside of our control or anyone else.  In both scenarios, it is easiest to blame God. If our suffering is not brought about by the free action of another person, then it must have been God who caused it or at the very least allowed it. But even when it does occur at the hands of another person, it seems God has permitted evil to win by allowing us to suffer.

The truth is not as simple as saying that God does not cause our suffering. It is true that God does not want us to suffer or to be in pain, especially at the hands of other human beings, but God does want us to be reunited with Him in perfection. In our state of sin, we have tarnished our state of grace and we must purify ourselves completely if we desire to be with Him again. This is necessary because God invites us to a life in which we intimately reside within His presence; any imperfections within ourselves would therefore need to be purged before entering into that state of perfection in God. But what does it take to purify and to perfect? We should know the answer to this question by looking at our own lives. To strive towards perfection means passing through trials that are demanding and challenge us to be better. If the path was easy, we simply would not grow. We are unfortunately in a state of sin, and there is not much we can do about that now besides actively seeking a way out of it. Those trials in life that present themselves to us and make living the Christian life incredibly difficult are actually ways in which we can grow and learn in order to be perfect. We may see it as suffering in the moment, but it has the potential to become good. 

Does God deliberately put us through these trials to test us? No. God values our free will and allows us to choose how to treat our neighbors. But God is omnipotent and has the power to conform anything to His will. He does this by orienting the evil and suffering of this world that acts against Him towards a greater goal - by serving as an opportunity for us to get to Heaven. Our suffering can become our key to renounce sin and to be reunited with God in fullness. It is not an easy path, and it is even more difficult to remember this while battling life’s greatest pains, but if God is able to bring the greatest good out of our pain, then we must remember that the cause of our suffering is insignificant compared to how we respond to our suffering. 

Every summer, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, a celebration of the Source and Summit of our Christian faith and the sole reason why we are a liturgical people - God is real, Christ is tangible, and we have the opportunity to receive him physically. The feast day came about in the Middle Ages at the insistence of St. Thomas Aquinas, and reportedly Pope Urban IV established the feast shortly after a eucharistic miracle occurred in Bolsena, Italy. According to the tradition of this miracle, a host began to bleed at the words of the consecration, dripping down onto the corporal below. To this day, you can still see the blood-stained corporal at the Cathedral in Orvieto, and recent tests have confirmed its status as human blood. 

Eucharistic miracles are a fascinating topic in Catholicism, and with the recent Eucharistic Revival within the United States and the growing devotion to Blessed Carlo Acutis (who compiled a list of these miracles), it appears that God desires we hold on dearly to the belief in the Real Presence as more and more people reject it. Perhaps the most famous Eucharistic miracle, and perhaps the first one of which we are aware, is the miracle at Lanciano sometime in the 8th century. An unbelieving priest uttered the words of consecration, after which the bread turned into visible flesh and the wine turned into visible blood. All these centuries later, we still have these relics of the miracle at Lanciano, which are guarded at the church of St. Francis in Italy. Under the approval of the Vatican, the Franciscan friars who were entrusted to the care of the Host and blood globules sent them to a lab to have them scientifically analyzed. The results were astonishing: the Host was found to be human flesh, specifically the heart muscle tissue, known as myocardium. The Eucharist is not possible without Christ uttering the words through the priest, “This is my body, this is my blood.” Every Eucharistic miracle only occurs after these words of total love and total self-giving are said. When we hear these words, we are meant to understand that Christ is giving us his entire self - his body, blood, soul, and divinity out of complete and undying love for us. From the miracle at Lanciano, we become witnesses to an extraordinary idea: Christ’s fullness which we receive in the Eucharist can be symbolized and represented totally through the flesh of his heart.

Every summer the Church also celebrates the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Sacred Heart is often depicted in art in a very specific way, which orients our concept of the Sacred Heart as understanding that as the way it looks. But the Sacred Heart we honor today is not just an artistic symbol of a perfectly symmetrical and aflame heart illustration surrounded by the crown of thorns, blood spilling forth from its side, and a cross at its top. The Sacred Heart we honor is the real and tangible organ of the body of the man who offered his life for us 2,000 years ago. This artistic depiction is crucial, though, because it embodies the love of Christ, just as the myocardium of Christ embodies his entire flesh and blood: the heart was the core of a person’s inner-self, their true being. Everything that a person put out into the world was a reflection of what originated in their heart - pain, passion, courage, morality, love. Christ’s Sacred Heart reveals his entire self: he is so passionately and madly in love with us, that he offers his entire self to us, even in the face of trauma, torture, and death. If you ever doubt this, remember that at any moment, you yourself can go see his heart tissue in person, not as a piece of art, but as a piece of his real flesh. 

In these reflections, we often address the difference between God’s mercy and God’s justice. This is a crucial topic; for hundreds, if not thousands of years, the faithful of the world focused far too exclusively on the wrath of God, ignoring his mercy and allowing scrupulosity to build up. In our lifetimes, though, the faithful and especially those who may believe in God but do not hold to any religion have focused far too exclusively on His mercy; when we ignore the justice that is so perfectly part of the identity of God, we excuse our sins and refuse to grow or get better because we believe God will always turn a blind eye to our shortcomings. Those who might read these reflections are probably in a stable position in their faith; these reflections are merely supplementary, and anything supplementary to the faith life is only worth pursuing when we challenge ourselves to go beyond the bare minimum required of us as followers of God.

The following is an important message for every single person who wants to follow God faithfully: in order for us to grow in our holiness, we must be challenged. This means that, when we are faced with reflecting on one of two complementary facets of God like justice and mercy, we ought to first focus on that with which we struggle most. If you are suffering with scruples, focus on God’s mercy. If you are struggling with overcoming sin or are becoming increasingly apathetic to its consequences, focus on God’s justice. For those who may be agitated by their own iniquities and sinfulness, this in and of itself might be an indication that you ought to focus on the ultimate fruit of being a disciple of Christ and a beloved member of the family of God: that there is immense joy in faithfulness and holiness, and that joy is a consequence of hope in God’s mercy. As a penitential season, Lent certainly strengthens us in our commitment to remember our own sinfulness, but we are always reminded that at the end of this journey to return to God from a life of sinfulness, joy and mercy ultimately awaits us. In this passage, we begin to hear those familiar words of the prophets, specifically that Israel is being called to turn away from sin and turn back to God, or else they will suffer the natural consequences of their own actions. But this specific reading from Hosea is amazing in its hope in God’s mercy; the moment we turn back to God, He welcomes us with joy, love, excitement, and passion, as if we never left Him. He will love us freely, His wrath will become hidden, and we are brought back into the loving embrace of God.

In the life of Christ, there was hardly anyone who embodied the sinfulness of Israel more than the scribes and Pharisees. Their hypocrisy, injustice, and vengeance angered Christ to the point where he challenged them seemingly every time he encountered them. But when challenged and asked by one of these men as to what the greatest commandment was, and Christ responded with the Shema (the greatest prayer in Judaism) and the addition of loving one’s neighbor, the scribe agreed, saying that these two things (love of God and love of neighbor) were worth more than any burnt offerings or sacrifices. In a moment, Christ comforts this man with the message that he was not far from Heaven. To hear Christ say this to a scribe is almost completely out of character considering all of his other interactions. This ought to tell us that God does not care about who we are, where we are, or how we get there, as long as we return to Him if and when we have strayed too far. If you see yourself as a great sinner, be comforted by the fully undeserved, yet entirely complete mercy of God.