Author’s Preface

When Alice asked, “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here,” the Cheshire Cat replied, “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.”

This book is addressed to all who seek Christ. Atheists will find in it their lost childhood faith. Protestants will find the presence of Christ that their forebears abandoned four centuries ago. But it is particularly focused on Jews because the Jew in search of Christ walks a longer path to the cross. Protestant converts already know Jesus and the New Testament. They have much to learn about the complete deposit of faith but they are more than halfway there. Jews have to find God as Blessed Trinity in the Gospels, Acts, Epistles and Revelation. Accustomed to the Mosaic Law with its emphasis on rules of conduct, Jews need time and reflection to see God as a Father who loves His children, and sin as rejection of the Father’s guidance.

The Catholic Church is the Synagogue transformed by the Messiah. God instituted His priesthood through Aaron and continued it through the hereditary succession of priests to Jesus the High Priest and Final Sacrifice, after which the Aaronic sacrifices were replaced by Christ’s apostolic succession of priests re-presenting the one Final Sacrifice until the end of time. There is a straight line from Moses, who said, Ex 24:8 “Behold the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you,” to Jesus, who said, Mt 26:28 “This is My blood of the covenant.”

The first words spoken by the risen Christ to His apostles were, Shalom alechem, “Peace be with you.” Shalom means peace, but also whole or complete. He was saying, “My completion I give to you.” Catholics are completed Jews, proclaiming the Messiah in the new and true Israel until He comes again in glory.
During my journey of completion I had thousands of questions. I wrote Second Exodus to answer as many as I could, to be a Star of Bethlehem guiding the reader toward a magnificent dawn of eternal life.

Introducing a newcomer to any religious faith involves teaching three things: what we believe, how it illuminates our lives, and how we connect with it. This book covers all three. It explains what Catholics accept as true, how these precepts illuminate and change our everyday lives, and how we worship, particularly in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

Before we proceed further, let us recite what Jesus told us is the most important commandment of all, the one that Jews consider the heart and soul of Torah, the Shema: Dt 6:4-9

Hear, oh Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord alone! Therefore you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. Take to heart these words which I enjoin on you today. Drill them into your children. Speak of them at home and abroad, whether you are busy or at rest. Bind them at your wrist as a sign and let them be as a pendant on your forehead. Write them on the doorposts of your houses and on your gates.

If something is missing from your life, and God could provide it, walk with me toward the cross.

Marty Barrack
January, 1999