Dear Todd:

When God created angels and men he gave them free will. One reason these creatures were given free will is so they could love each other and love God. Remember, God is love. God desired to give these creatures. angels and men, the gift of his fellowship. Since God is love, any fellowship with God must be by love. Thus, free will was given to angels and men so that they can choose love or not. Love cannot be forced, it must be freely chosen and given.

Since these creatures were given free will, that ability to choose must be tested. A choice is not a choice unless one has at least two things to choose from. Thus, God gave the angels and men the ability to choose love and truth, or not.

In eternity past, we do not know when, the angels were tested. They were given the choice between Himself or Lucifer who rebelled and became Satan. One third of the angels chose Satan, the rest chose God. Since the angels made that choice in perfect knowledge their choice is permanent.

For man a test must also be made so that men could make a true choice. That test was done by allowing Satan to attempt to seduce man into sin.

Adam and Eve did not have to choose they way they did. They had perfect ability to choose not to sin. Sin was not inevitable, but it was a choice. Adam and Eve freely choose to sin, and thus brought the curse of Original Sin into the human family. We all suffer from their choice both in the material evil that we experience in life (tornadoes, illness, death, etc.) and from moral evil to which we tend to choose because of concupiscence. Only our Blessed Mother was free from Original Sin, thus had no concupiscence, and therefore was able to not sin. This is called the Immaculate Conception.

Mary was tested when we made her fiat, her submission to be the Mother of God. For each of us the test is are lives; did we love. If we die rejecting God, then we will spend eternity without Him. That is our choice. However, God gives us all we need to avoid hell and to spend eternity with Him.

God's grace is not only sufficient, but without it we would not exist, we could not do anything good, we could not be redeemed and saved from Original Sin and Actual Sin. We would be lost. It is only by God's grace that the universe is not poofed out of existence right this minute.

God did not create a "messy" situation. God created perfection. It was man that made it messy. That is not God's fault.

God loved us so much that he wanted to give us a bit of himself, the capacity to love. As mentioned love cannot be forced, but must be freely chosen. In giving us this great gift, God had to risk that some would reject love. But, it was worth it, because of the billions who would choose love and to be in his friendship forever.

Into the mess that man made for himself, God still loves us and has given us everything we need to remain in love and in his friendship.

The Church calls the Fall of Adam and Eve the "happy fault." It was a fault, because Adam and Eve sinned and brought Original Sin into the world; but it is happy because their sin brought us the wonderful gift of the Incarnation, God becoming man. This gave us the wonderful gift of being able to touch God. One little boy once said of the Eucharist, "Sometimes we need a God with skin on." Our Lord gave us that gift, a gift that would not have happened had Adam and Eve not sinned.

Life would have been very different had Adam and Eve not sinned. We would be living in Paradise, but we would not have had Jesus in the flesh. This is the happy fault.

God hardly leaves us "twisting and lost in eternal fire". Where do you get that idea? The only people who go to hell are those who wish to go to hell. That is, those who reject God's love. Going to heaven is profoundly simple — accept God's love.

(Romans 5:8) But God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.

(John 3:16-18)  For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.  He who believes in him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

This is the good news. This is the Gospel.

Now, accepting that love means to follow his teachings. One who says he loves God but deliberately violates His teachings is lying, he does not love God.

(John 14:15) Jesus said,  "If you love me, you will keep my commandments."

Now God knows that we are not to good in keeping our promises and that we will sin. That is why he has given us the Church and Her Sacraments. Through those Sacraments we have the best chance of not sinning, but when we do sin, God has given us the Sacrament of Confession to cleanse us of sin and restore us to Him. What a Great God we have!

God never, but never abandons us. In fact, he makes these promises, and since God does not lie, we can count on him to keep his promises:

(Romans 8:28, 35-39) We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called according to his purpose.... Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, "For thy sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God even promises us that no temptation will come into our lives, that is, God will not allow a temptation to come into your life that you cannot handle. He promises that He will always give you a way to escape the temptation.

(1 Corinthians 10:13)  No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your strength, but with the temptation will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

God, of course, will not force you to take the "way of escape", but He offers it to you. If you fall into the temptation, it is your own fault.

Still, even then, God loves us and will forgive us.

(1 John 1:9)  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

What a wonderful God. Even when we abuse the freedom He has given us, even when we spit in His face, even when we turn our back on Him, He never abandons us and He stands ready to forgive us no matter what we have done.

No, God did not create this mess, but He will clean-up the mess of our lives if we let Him. Just ask. Trust in Him and do not be afraid.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary