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Beauty & Passion

Galatians 2:20
"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me."

We are continuing to study GOD'S Garden. The center of it all is the Gospel events. We are blessed beyond measure by GOD through His Son. We KNOW all of because of the Holy Bible, the most epic Valentine letter ever written! It can be boiled down to the one verse; John 3:16! While this Valentine is written to you and to me, it is also written to "WHOSOEVER." It's true GOD loves His creation. He sends His blessings to the just and the unjust. God's Son was sacrificed for ALL of US. This amazing LOVE is something we will marvel at for all eternity. This needs to draw us closer to GOD everyday. 

We can see God's plan symbolized in His creation! This week's produce from the Garden is the Passion Fruit. God's LOVE is not only witnessed on the cross, it's also seen in this beautiful flower where this delicious fruit grows. From the Tradition In Action website; "When the Spanish and Portuguese missionaries and explorers came to the Americas in the 16th century, they were charmed by the exuberant BEAUTY and features of this PERFUMED flower and immediately associated it with elements of Christ's Calvary. The Jesuits named the flower Flos Passionis or Flor de las Cinco Llagas, Flower of the Five Wounds. They brought it back with them to Spain and later the fruit found its way to other parts of Europe and the world.

In the flower of this purple-colored fruit one can find many of the symbols of the Passion. For this reason the early Catholic missionaries saw it as a gift of God to help them in their work of teaching the Indians to understand the PASSION of CHRIST and the Crucifixion. Even the flower color – mostly purple in hue – was remindful of the liturgical color of Lent. Let us look at the many symbols found in the Passion Flower:

• Its central pillar represents the column where Our Lord was so brutally flogged, and the many slender tendrils surrounding its base were likened to the cords and whips used in the Scourging.

• The three top stigma, each with a roughly rounded head, symbolize the three nails used to drive the spikes into Our Lord's flesh.

• The five anthers are symbolic of the five Sacred Wounds and the circle of filaments that compose the dramatic center of this flower represent the Crown of Thorns.

• The rays within the flower form a nimbus, representing Our Lord's divine glory.

• The leaves on many of these plants are shaped like the spear that pierced His Heart.

• The 10 petals represent the 10 apostles who forsook their Master and fled, omitting Judas, the traitor, and St. John, who remained with Our Lady under the Cross.

A symbolic meaning was found even for the often round shape of the passion fruit itself: it represents the sinful world that Christ came to save by the supreme Sacrifice of His life.

Read more at...
https://www.traditioninaction.org/religious/f038_PassionFlor.htm
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