ANOTHER lesson made clear to me
during the IEC is that the
Eucharist can well be the very test and proof of our catholicity and
universality. It’s in that sacrament where the universal mind and
heart is required as well as developed.
And that’s simply because the Eucharist represents the
very mind and heart of Christ who gave us the new commandment that
summarizes and perfects all the previous commandments: “You love one
another as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” (Jn
13,34)
It’s a love that covers everyone, including our enemies,
the unlovable, the sinners, offenders, those who are wrong in a human
issue and all others who are so different from us that for one reason
or another we may not be able to love or like.
These can include those who persecute us, who terrorize
us, who kill us. These can include those who attack the Church and its
teaching. We have to learn to love them the way Christ loves them, all
the way to offering our life for them, for as Christ himself said, “No
greater love has one than he who offers his life for his friend.”
In fact, one sure sign our loving is authentic is when we
are willing to adapt ourselves to them without compromising our
Christian identity. Otherwise, our love is fake, no matter how
fervently we profess it. Our love gets spoiled and deteriorates into
self-rigtheousness.
Remember what our Lord said about this point. “If you love
them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the
publicans do this?” (Mt 5,46)
Thus, our Lord explicitly said that we have to love our
enemies, to do good to them that hate us and pray for those who
persecute and calumniate us. This is how we are going to be identified
as children of God who makes his sun to rise upon the good and bad,
the rain on the just and the unjust.
Love, whose seat today is the Eucharist, involves by
definition all we have and is given without measure or calculation.
This essence of love is what breaks us loose from our limited human
condition to make our world universal, not entangled in some
parochial, partisan or isolationist grip.
Eucharistic love matures and perfects us. It checks on our
tendency to be self-seeking and self-absorbed so as to be “all things
to all men.” (1 Cor 9,22) It brings us not only to others, but rather
to God himself, identifying us with him, for “God is love.”
This love is what properly measures out our true dignity
and value as persons and children of God. It’s not just some wisdom or
knowledge or talents and any human power, though all these are
instruments and tools of love.
It’s high time that we understand the need for true love,
the love of Christ in the Eucharist, to give ourselves a universal
heart. It’s not the sciences, the philosophies and the ideologies, no
matter how good and useful they are, that can accomplish this. These
can only be at best love’s tools.
We have to disabuse ourselves from this mentality that,
sadly, is constantly nourished and reinforced by some pagan thinking
that’s dominating our world today.
We have to go beyond them. That’s why there’s a need to
develop the appropriate attitudes and virtues, all done in the context
of God’s grace, for nothing succeeds without God’s grace.
We have to learn to be patient, and to be “rich in mercy
and slow to anger.” We have to know how to take on different and even
conflicting positions in human issues without undermining our love for
one another.
This surely means we have to learn how to discipline our
feelings and passions, knowing when to talk and when not. We have to
learn how to convert difficult, humiliating moments into moments of
graciousness and magnanimity.
We have to avoid bearing grudges or worse, nurturing
animosities. Let’s remember that whatever happens, we are all men and
women, children of God, who are obliged to love one another.
We have to learn how to be positive, encouraging and
optimistic in our tack to problems instead of sinking into pessimism
and hostility. We can never overdo in our efforts to learn the finer
details of tact and diplomacy. We should try our best to understand
others well, to put ourselves in their feet, to know where they are
coming from, etc.
Given the present world’s rush to specialized knowledge
that inevitably generates divisions, we have to double up our efforts
to cultivate this universal Eucharistic heart.
Eucharist can well be the very test and proof of our catholicity and
universality. It’s in that sacrament where the universal mind and
heart is required as well as developed.
And that’s simply because the Eucharist represents the
very mind and heart of Christ who gave us the new commandment that
summarizes and perfects all the previous commandments: “You love one
another as I have loved you, that you also love one another.” (Jn
13,34)
It’s a love that covers everyone, including our enemies,
the unlovable, the sinners, offenders, those who are wrong in a human
issue and all others who are so different from us that for one reason
or another we may not be able to love or like.
These can include those who persecute us, who terrorize
us, who kill us. These can include those who attack the Church and its
teaching. We have to learn to love them the way Christ loves them, all
the way to offering our life for them, for as Christ himself said, “No
greater love has one than he who offers his life for his friend.”
In fact, one sure sign our loving is authentic is when we
are willing to adapt ourselves to them without compromising our
Christian identity. Otherwise, our love is fake, no matter how
fervently we profess it. Our love gets spoiled and deteriorates into
self-rigtheousness.
Remember what our Lord said about this point. “If you love
them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the
publicans do this?” (Mt 5,46)
Thus, our Lord explicitly said that we have to love our
enemies, to do good to them that hate us and pray for those who
persecute and calumniate us. This is how we are going to be identified
as children of God who makes his sun to rise upon the good and bad,
the rain on the just and the unjust.
Love, whose seat today is the Eucharist, involves by
definition all we have and is given without measure or calculation.
This essence of love is what breaks us loose from our limited human
condition to make our world universal, not entangled in some
parochial, partisan or isolationist grip.
Eucharistic love matures and perfects us. It checks on our
tendency to be self-seeking and self-absorbed so as to be “all things
to all men.” (1 Cor 9,22) It brings us not only to others, but rather
to God himself, identifying us with him, for “God is love.”
This love is what properly measures out our true dignity
and value as persons and children of God. It’s not just some wisdom or
knowledge or talents and any human power, though all these are
instruments and tools of love.
It’s high time that we understand the need for true love,
the love of Christ in the Eucharist, to give ourselves a universal
heart. It’s not the sciences, the philosophies and the ideologies, no
matter how good and useful they are, that can accomplish this. These
can only be at best love’s tools.
We have to disabuse ourselves from this mentality that,
sadly, is constantly nourished and reinforced by some pagan thinking
that’s dominating our world today.
We have to go beyond them. That’s why there’s a need to
develop the appropriate attitudes and virtues, all done in the context
of God’s grace, for nothing succeeds without God’s grace.
We have to learn to be patient, and to be “rich in mercy
and slow to anger.” We have to know how to take on different and even
conflicting positions in human issues without undermining our love for
one another.
This surely means we have to learn how to discipline our
feelings and passions, knowing when to talk and when not. We have to
learn how to convert difficult, humiliating moments into moments of
graciousness and magnanimity.
We have to avoid bearing grudges or worse, nurturing
animosities. Let’s remember that whatever happens, we are all men and
women, children of God, who are obliged to love one another.
We have to learn how to be positive, encouraging and
optimistic in our tack to problems instead of sinking into pessimism
and hostility. We can never overdo in our efforts to learn the finer
details of tact and diplomacy. We should try our best to understand
others well, to put ourselves in their feet, to know where they are
coming from, etc.
Given the present world’s rush to specialized knowledge
that inevitably generates divisions, we have to double up our efforts
to cultivate this universal Eucharistic heart.
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