 | Father Richard James Cleary was born and reared in Wichita. After graduation from Cathedral High School in 1947, he attended the seminary operated by the Benedictine monks of Conception Abbey in Northwestern Missouri. There he came to appreciate the life of the monks and, having obtained the permission of Bishop Mark Carroll of Wichita, he became a monk of that monastery. After being ordained a priest in 1955, his superiors sent him to get his master’s degree at the University of Ottawa, Canada, then to study in Athens, Greece, and then in Rome, Italy, where he obtained his doctor’s degree in Theology. Finally, he spent a year of study at Harvard University. Later, Fr. Cleary was assigned to teach for many years in Rome. In 1998, he returned to Wichita, where he served in parish ministry at St. Mary’s Cathedral and at Blessed Sacrament parishes. In 2001, his abbot (superior) transferred him to Arkansas, where he served as chaplain of the Benedictine Sisters of Holy Angels Convent in Jonesboro, and helped in the parishes of northeast Arkansas. In March 2010, he was re-assigned to his monastery, Conception Abbey, Conception, in Missouri 64433. He can be contacted there at, 660-944-2877, or by email: rjcleary@juno.com. |
Religion
2002-03-01 15:09:00
How many worlds have there been?
Question: How many worlds have there been? Was the fall of the angels, which apparently preceded our world, a world unto itself? Have there been any others? Will there be any more?"
Answer: To each of these questions the the most honest answer is: I don't know.And nobody else does either. These questions pertain to the realm of speculation. The only one who does know is God, and He has said very little about such speculation. His written word in the Bible has a couple of references to the fall of the angels, which serve as fuel for our curiosity. But there is really no way of our knowing about other worlds, unless the Creator deigns to inform us. Human science has discovered in outer space an almost infinite number of galaxies of stars and planets, many of them larger than our galaxy, which includes millions of stars and planets. We can only guess about their age in creation, and it is impossible for our limited minds to ascertain how many there are, or have been, or will be.In the New Testament epistle of St. Jude, who was Jesus' relative, there is an obscure reference to the fall of the angels: "The angels too, who did not keep to their own domain but deserted their proper dwelling, he (God) has kept in eternal chains, in gloom, for the judgment of the great day.Likewise, Sodom, Gomorrah, and the surrounding towns, which, in the same manner as they, indulged in sexual promiscuity and practiced unnatural vice, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire." St. Jude is referring to Genesis 19:4-11, where the townsmen of Sodom violated both hospitality and morality, by demanding that Lot's two visitors be handed over to them so that they could abuse them sexually. In reality the two visitors were messengers of God (the word for messenger in Greek is angelos or angel). St. Jude's term "unnatural vice" refers to the desires for intimacies by human beings with angels.The book of Apocalypse or Revelation, chapter 12, verses 7-8, says: "Then war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels battled against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they did not prevail; and there was no longer any place for them in heaven." That text goes on to identify the dragon (verse 9): "The huge dragon, the ancient serpent, who is called the devil and satan, who deceived the whole world, was thrown down to earth, and its angels were thrown down with it." Since the fall of the angels preceded God's action of creating this universe, those texts relate to events, which are outside the order of time and occurring in other worlds, as are both heaven and hell.
