On this feast day of Archangel Michael, and all the bodiless hosts, I thought I
would write a little bit about the angels. This is not by any means a complete
treatment, but just so semi-random ideas that I think are important or
interesting.
The angels were created as part of the Á-°heavensÁ-?, above. They are part of the invisible
(for the most part), spiritual world. They were all created before God proceeded refine
His creation of the earth.
Angels are free, intelligent beings.
They have a will, and are able to choose to follow God or disobey Him. It seems that
because of their nature, once they choose, they do not change their way of life. All angels
chose to follow of not follow Lucifer when he revolted against God. From that point on,
their personality vis-ö=-vis God is fixed Á-? they either obey God or do not obey Him. I have
always tried to explain this by an analogy about jumping off a cliff. Before you jump, you
may choose to jump or not jump, but once you have jumped, your fate is fixed Á-? you will
fall.
Demons are angels that hate God.
revolted against God. The Archangel Michael led the resistance against Lucifer to
cast him out of heaven. This is an instructive story, If anybody reminds me, we
can discuss it Sunday.
Á-°AngelÁ-? means Á-°MESSENGERÁ-?
God tasks them with delivering news to all mankind, individually and collectively.
How they communicate with us is a mystery, but since we are also part spirit, we
can communicate with them.
Angels are not, in the strictest sense of the word, Á-°bodilessÁ-?.
Only God is pure Spirit. Angels were created, and according to the Fathers, have a
very fine body, which we cannot perceive with our eyes of flesh.
All Christians have a guardian angel.
In the prayers for the making of a catechumen, we pray Á-°Yoke unto his/her life a
radiant angelÁ-¬Á-? From this point onwards, we certainly have a guardian angel
who protects us in ways we cannot fully understand.