The Beginning and the End

Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator

When we listen to St. Paul wax eloquent today as we hear parts of the hymn of Colossians 1, our minds stretch to the outer limits of our galaxy and beyond. All things were created through Jesus. All things, visible and invisible, were created for Jesus.

When this hymn was first written, the cosmology of the Middle Eastern world was far less developed. These people thought that it would be possible to bring the Gospel to the whole world in a year or two. The stars in the sky were viewed as decorations that dotted the dome of the heavens. Science and the invention of the telescope have changed both our world view as well as our view of the universe. Indeed, the Colossian hymn sounds all the more grand when we consider that we know much more about the universe than St. Paul and his contemporaries.

Yet, with St. Paul we acclaim Jesus as the beginning and the end. Even the discoveries that human beings have made in the past years can diminish what Jesus did for us. Jesus is still preeminent, still the source and summit, still the Alpha and the Omega. When we look for direction in our lives, we still look to him. With St. Paul, we proclaim Christ as the focus of our lives.