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TRANSFORMED refers to the consequence of God’s indwelling of us. The nature of our relationship with the Father in the Son through the Spirit is the ongoing transformation of us which restores us to the Imago Dei in which we were created (Gen. 1. 26-28). The early Fathers of the Church referred to this work of God in us as theosis or divination, which St. Athanasius defined as “becoming by grace what God is by nature” (De Incarnatione, I). Being in a faithful relationship with God means to be open to becoming who God has created us to be by giving ourselves into the hands of God so that God may work in us that which is needful. It means always to be changing, growing, developing. It means to be open-ended in mind, heart, and soul, so that we, like St. Paul, know that we have not yet completed the race, but stretch forward toward the goal, which we shall with God’s help reach. |
GOD’S PROJECT is a phrase that does two things: first, it reminds us of Whose project we are doing; second, it tells us that it is something we can do, with God’s help. The work we do in the world as the Baptized in Christ is God’s work. The Project is participating, as transformed people, in God’s redemption of the world. We can on do this by grace, or in the language of Baptism “with God’s help.” God’s Project affirms that our life and what we do is of God, by God, and in God. “Project” speaks to the unfathomable love and patience of God. We are invited to do a little at a time — pieces we can do, in the sure and certain hope that in God’s good time, the kingdom is coming. |
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GRACE is Gods absolutely free self-gift to us in love (agape). Grace is not deserved, cannot be earned and is not owed to us. God gives us God’s self because that is the way God has freely chosen to constitute God’s self as giver and us as receiver of this holy mystery of love. It is love because is it a gift of God’s self — not something about God, by God. It is agape because there is no expectation of mutuality or payment or even return of this love/gift. It is limitless. It is not a quantity of which there is or is not “enough.” It is the stuff of holy relationship sealed in Baptism and lived daily. |
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TO PARTICIPATE by grace is to accept and enjoy God’s invitation into God’s life through the Risen Christ. To participate is to live in active, creative relationship with God from the very center of who we are. To participate in response to grace means to embody in our daily lives who God is creating us to become and to do what God gives us to do with the gifts in us and the resources around us. Participation moves in cycles of great intensity and activity followed by times of rest and renewal. God only ever asks us to participate at the level of what we can do. God does not ask of us the impossible. Sometimes we can do much. Sometimes we can only be present. Both are equally valuable and important for us and to God. All of us, all of the time, everywhere, are invited by God and empowered by the Spirit to participate in God’s life in ourselves, in the Church, and in the world. All of us always and everywhere have something to contribute. |
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| Map of the Diocese |
Description of the Diocese |
Mission Statement of the Diocese | |
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| The Diocese
| Diocesan Office | The Bishop |
Bishop's Message || |
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