Our part of The Creation Program may be visualized as a huge, world-wide casino. People spend decades, wandering from table to table in The Big Casino. They make bets on the thousands of different games.
The Big Casino is so huge that some fly through in private jets, looking for good wagers. The poor walk barefooted as they, too, look for smart bets.
Rumors abound. “The Builder of The Big Casino left secret plans on how to be a Big Winner!”
“Well”, many conclude, “the most I can win here is a few million, or maybe a few billion dollars. Then, I will die and have nothing. If there’s more to be won by getting out of The Big Casino, I’m going for it!”
There are whispers about buildings with + signs on them. “If you go through those doors and up those stairs, you will hit the Jackpot!”
Then, some become aware of The Trap! There are two kinds of buildings with + signs! One was kind was designed and built by the Son of The Builder. Others were thrown together by cheap contractors who cut corners. We can tell the fake buildings because their billboards promise “Everyone who wants to get to Heaven gets there!”
Others are not distracted by the noise and glitz of The Giant Casino. “I heard that the Builder of The Giant Casino had a Son. He came down to show people how to be winners. He was killed, but not before providing the plans for the only way to beat the house.”
Guides explain they must wash one kind of sin away in Baptism. They must confess other sins to authorized gatekeepers, and receive Absolution. They must be Confirmed. They must, incredibly, receive The Body and Blood of a Person said to be the Son of God. They have to abandon what it thought to be sanity to get into Heaven.
Many reasonably conclude, “The only way I can be surer of getting into Heaven is by being an obedient Catholic. They are overwhelmed by what that might cost. “I will lose my friends, my income, and a lot of things that are near and dear to me.
Those who choose to make the wrong bet in The Big Casino all say the same thing: “I’d rather die than be Catholic.”
