He Came as a Thief in the Night

Thinking about the role of suffering in the overall production line whereby we regenerate and come to practice the love of God and in the neighbor in truth, one came to a parable of the Lord's which has not much been under our crosshairs here: Matthew 13:44-46 - King James Version (KJV) <44> Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field. <45> Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: <46> Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it. Arcana Coelestia says of this passage the following: "'The kingdom of heaven' stands for the good and truth present with a person, and so for heaven present with him. 'Field' stands for good and 'pearl' for truth, while 'buying' stands for acquiring these and making them ...

  Part 1 One would like to begin this lecture with an apology for its shortcomings, because of all the lectures in this course this one, perhaps, has been the most challenging to think about and otherwise prepare. Nonetheless, one hopes that this effort, despite its shortcomings, will help you to see the inspired architecture of the world's religions; and to see the ways in which these sit at the Divine Human's feet and either eat His bread and drink His wine or perish.  Last year, marveling at what the Latin Word says about Islam and world religions in their relation to the Lord, one felt an inner push to read the Quran for oneself accompanied with the assurance that one would find what one sought. Well, one read their Book and found what one sought, a foundation for accepting our Muslim neighbors and teaching acceptance of the same. People in the West and in historically Christians lands are, of course, troubled by the mass immigration by other peoples and strange religions ...