\u201cOne of the difficulties with the proclamation of the Word is that it collapses too easily inside. We\u2019re incurable insiders. Everything collapses inside. Sometimes I think that instead of talking about the\u00a0\u2018upward\u2019 fall, I should talk about the fall\u00a0\u2018inward.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat do I mean by that? Well, of course, what happens in the preaching very often is that the preacher will say something like: \u2018Now, if you folks really, I mean, REALLY believe\u2026\u2019 then such and such would happen. What occurs? Well, I suppose if you REALLY heard, you\u2019d begin to ask yourself:\u00a0Do I really believe, am I really a Christian? Am I not really a fake? It collapses inward upon the self. And the inner self becomes the last bastion of hope, but really the last advent of despair.\u00a0Do I really believe?<\/p>\n
\u201cThe self is like what the astronomers call today a black hole, infinitely sucking everything within itself, and gaining incredible density thereby; not even light can escape. The self becomes the center of the self, and everything depends upon the self. And what is needed is finally something that comes from the outside. That is what makes the sacraments so important, the word: This is my body given for you. This is my blood….\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cOne of the difficulties with the proclamation of the Word is that it collapses too easily inside. We\u2019re incurable insiders. Everything collapses inside. Sometimes I think that instead of talking about the\u00a0\u2018upward\u2019 fall, I should talk about the fall\u00a0\u2018inward.\u2019 \u201cWhat do I mean by that? Well, of course, what happens in the preaching very often […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1252"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1253,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1252\/revisions\/1253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}