Exploiting our limitations

WHENEVER we come face to face with our limitations or our

defects, mistakes, falls, etc., something that we could expect to be a

usual occurrence in our life, given our weakened human condition,

let’s be quick to assume the attitude once expressed by St. Paul.

Let’s not waste time lamenting or feeling sad because of them.

  

            “Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it (what

St. Paul termed as a thorn in the flesh) should leave me. But he said

to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect

in weakness,’” he said.

  

            Then he concluded: “I will all the more gladly boast of my

weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of

Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships,

persecutions and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2

Cor 12 ,8-10)

  

            Our weaknesses, our limitations and mistakes should not

hold us hostage for long, keeping us in the state of sadness,

depression and even despair. They can be very good occasions to

attract the attention, the mercy and the help of God.

  

            Let’s remember Christ telling us that “those who are well

have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to

call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mk 2,17) What consoling words of

Christ which he acted out a number of times!

  

            He fraternized with tax collectors and others considered

as public sinners of his time. He was merciful with the woman caught

in adultery. He chose as his apostles people who were clearly with

defects though they also had good qualities.

  

            As to men’s limitations, he reassures us not to worry

about them. What we cannot do, he can always do. This was shown in

that miraculous catch of fish, when Peter at first said, upon being

told to go to the deep and lower the nets for a catch, that he was

fishing the whole night before and caught nothing.

  

            The same when Christ told the apostles to feed the crowd

with a few loaves of bread and fish. What could such amount of bread

and fish do with so many people, they asked. But in the end, not only

were the crowd fully satisfied. There was an excess of the few that

was given out.

  

            We should not worry so much about limitations. We have to

train our feelings and our emotions to remain calm and hopeful when we

experience the burden of our incapacities. And let’s be quick to

assume that Pauline advice about how to handle our limitations and

weaknesses.

  

            In fact, we can take advantage of our weaknesses and

limitations to attract God’s attention, mercy and tremendous help that

would really astound us. If we are humble enough to acknowledge our

limitations and just go to Christ as soon as we can, we can always be

sure that God helps us beyond our expectation and imagination.

   

            This does not mean that we have to take our limitations,

weaknesses, failures and sins lightly. We have to try to avoid them as

much as we can, fight them and atone for them. But we should not

forget the other side that would make all these a magnet for God’s

mercy and grace. “Where sin has abounded, his grace has abounded even

more.” (Rom 5,20)

Make war to gain peace

WE have to understand the proper relationship between war

and peace. Christ himself who is the prince of peace recommended a

kind of warfare that we have to undertake all the time. This can be

gleaned from the following words of his:

  

            “Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the

earth. I have come to bring not peace but the sword…Whoever loves

father or mother more than me is not worthy of me…” (Mt 10,34 ff)

  

            In another part of the gospel, he also said: “From the

days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers

violence, and the violent bear it away.” (Mt 11,12)

             We have to understand though that to be violent in this

sense does not mean to be destructive but rather constructive, driven

by love and the desire to be united with God and with the others in a

way proper to us as children of God and brothers and sisters among

ourselves.

  

            Our life here on earth cannot but be in some form of

struggle. Aside from our innate urge to grow and develop that requires

some effort, we also have to contend with enemies whose sole intent is

precisely to bring us down, to divert us from our proper path toward

holiness.

  

            We are not simply ranged against natural difficulties,

challenges and trials in life, but rather with very powerful and

subtle nemeses. The natural enemies alone are already formidable.

  

            But we still have enemies tougher than these. As St. Paul

said, “Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against

principalities and power, against the rulers of the world of darkness,

against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.” (Eph 6,12)

  

            Truth is many people—in fact, I would say all of us one

way or another—are looking for effective ways to develop our spiritual

life and to be skillful in the unavoidable spiritual warfare in this

life.

              People, including the young ones whose stirring for the

spiritual can be sharp and intense if hidden, want to know, for

example, how to pray, or how to keep it going amid the many concerns

in life. Getting engaged with God all throughout the day eludes them.

  

            They actually want to know how to grow in the virtues but

do not have ample support to pursue the goals. For example, to remain

chaste, if the interest still flickers, remains an impossible dream.

             They see glimpses of the need for the cross, for

sacrifices in this life, but they get stalled if not hostaged by

worldly distractions. Many want to get out of their self-absorption,

but no one helps them, giving them ideas or simply encouraging them.

           We need to find ways of how to wage war to gain the peace

that is proper to us. We have to do a lot of personal apostolate based

on friendship and confidence. We should teach our friends in personal

direction and confidential chats how to wage this spiritual struggle

in the concrete environment they are in.

  

            One clear principle to follow here is to motivate them to

truly fall in love with God and with everybody else. That love has

creative ways of waging war against the enemies of God and of our

soul.

Both idealistic and realistic

AD astra per aspera. That’s the motto of a school where I

was assigned once as its chaplain. It means “To the stars through

hardships.” It’s a way to encourage the students to aspire for the

best without fear of the sacrifices involved.

  

            The motto certainly injects optimism in the students,

motivating them to do their best, but always giving due consideration

to their capabilities and other personal circumstances.

  

            It’s also a good reminder to all of us that we have to be

both idealistic and realistic. Yes, we should reach for the stars but

fully aware of what it takes and of what possibilities we have, given

the conditions around.

  

            There definitely will be some tension involved here, but

it is a healthy tension that serves only to prod and spur us to

action, but does not compromise our physical, mental or emotional

well-being.

            We however should understand being idealistic properly.

It’s not about pursuing fantastic and quixotic dreams. It’s not about

running after whims and caprices. These dreams, whims and caprices are

largely false and unrealizable. They exist only in our mind.

  

            To be truly idealistic is to go after what is most

important to us—our sanctification, our relation with God and others,

our capacity to love as we should. It is to aim at nothing less than

heaven, the real heaven as distinct from the false heavens and utopias

marketed by some ideologies.

  

            But we have to be realistic in pursuing this ideal. And

that means, first of all, that God is actually providing us already

with everything that we need to achieve our ultimate end. There’s his

grace, both the sanctifying and the actual ones. There’s his Church

and everything that is in it—his word, sacraments, etc.

  

            To be realistic also means that we really have to know

ourselves inside out. We have to have a good inventory of our

strengths and weaknesses, our assets and liabilities. We should keep a

good running balance of this personal inventory and start making plans

of how we can use it optimally.

            That is why a thorough daily examination of conscience is

always advisable. There we can see the movements of the different

elements of our daily life, noting the shifts and changes, the ups and

downs, the state and direction of our thoughts, reactions, desires,

feelings, etc.

  

            To be realistic is also about knowing the concrete

conditions around. That’s why we should always be observant,

broadening our perspectives and deepening our insights. With all the

new technologies now made available, this should not be a difficult

task. We just have to be very open-minded, receptive and perceptive.

   

            Toward this end, it may be good to give due attention to

our continuing intellectual and cultural formation so that we can

better read the signs of the times and act accordingly.

              To be sure, to be both idealistic and realistic will lead

us to an exciting lifestyle. It can be full of fun and dynamism. It

can lead us to know and to learn more and more things. And most

importantly, it can lead us to where we should be at the end of our

life. And that is heaven!

Faith and the emotions

WE are told that our faith should be materialized. It

should be enfleshed. It should not remain purely spiritual and

intellectual because that faith would not be operative given our human

nature that is made of body and soul.

  

            We have to overcome that rupture between our spiritual and

material dimensions caused by sin. Let’s remember these words from the

gospel that describe the severity of this rupture.

  

            One is Christ saying: “The spirit is willing, but the

flesh is weak.” (Mt 26,41) And the other is St. Paul saying: “I see in

my members another law at war with the law of my mind and making me

captive to the law of sin which dwells in my members.” (Rom 7,19.23)

   

            We have to see to it that our faith is truly enfleshed.

Once that is done, we can say that that faith would truly be sealed in

our life. We would be establishing in the basic level of our life the

unity and consistency that is expected of it.

  

            And how do we enflesh the faith? By working on our

emotions and passions. As defined by our Catechism, passions are

“natural components of the human psyche; they form the passageway and

ensure the connection between the life of the senses and the life of

the mind.”

             In other words, it is working on our heart, because as the

same Catechism tells us, “Our Lord called man’s heart the source from

which the passions spring.” (CCC 1764) Besides, passions and emotions

are “movements of the sensitive appetite that incline us to act or not

to act in regard to something felt or imagined to be good or evil.”

(CCC 1763) They definitely play an important role in our life.

  

            We have to see to it that the truths of our faith get to

settle down all the way to our emotions and passions, and then to our

senses and instincts. We have to be wary when we get too doctrinal or

too theoretical and too idealistic without seeing these truths really

inspiring our emotions and senses and those of the others with whom we

are doing some spiritual direction.

  

            Otherwise, we can get alluded to by what Christ said of

some leading Jews of his time: “Practice and observe whatever they

tell you, but not what they do; for they preach, but do not practice.”

(Mt 23,3)

  

            If we look at the lives of saints, what we can readily

observe is how their piety and religiosity is immediately perceptible

even in their external behavior and appearance. There is a certain

aura that they exude, somehow indicating that their faith is lived and

not simply professed.

  

            That’s why we need to exert continuing effort so that,

among other things, these truths of our faith get internalized,

assimilated and lived in our emotions and passions. And if we want

this faith to get so internalized, assimilated and lived in the

emotions and passions of others, we need to present it in such a way

as to be respectful always of the emotions and passions of others.

  

            This is simply to follow what St. Paul once said about

being all things to all men. We have to be most mindful of the

sensibilities of the others and try our best to convey the faith

according to how they are without, of course, compromising the essence

of our faith.

Pope leads us to heaven

“I WILL give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. And whatever you

loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” (Mt 16,19)

  

            It is quite clear from these words of Christ that the

Pope, whoever he is, since he is the successor of Peter to whom these

words were first addressed, holds the keys to heaven and can lead us

to heaven himself.

  

            In other words, we cannot enter heaven without passing

through Peter and his successors, the Popes. How true then is that

aspiration coined by some holy men, “Omnes cum Petro ad Iesum per

Mariam!” (All with Peter to Jesus through Mary!)

  

            We need to meditate on these words more often if only to

understand them better, fathoming its depth and scope, discerning its

implications and consequences. More importantly, we need to meditate

on them to strengthen our belief that they have to be accepted in

faith.

   

            There is no other way. If we take them only with our

reason alone, supported only by our human and worldly criteria, we

have every reason not believe them. Peter, though he was the head of

the apostles, also had major defects that would surely nullify the

veracity of the words of Christ!

   

            But the fact is that these words were spoken by Christ

who, if we believe in him, cannot delude us nor can he be deluded. We

just have to have some allowance of abandonment from the usual doubts

and questioning brought about by our reason in order to accept

Christ’s words at face value.

  

            With these words, the Pope can rightly be called as the

Vicar of Christ here on earth, or as St. Catherine of Siena would have

it, he is the Sweet Christ on earth!

  

            Nowadays the status of Pope Francis is somehow put to

question by no less than some high ecclesiastics, because of certain

pronouncements he made. Most of these questions revolve around his

“Amoris laetitia” that, they claim, contain assertions that, to these

ecclesiastics, can be considered at least as dubious and even

reckless, inviting danger.

  

            This has caused some consternation, dismay and even

disbelief in many sectors. The situation is actually very delicate,

and I would not like to worsen things by coming up with drastic or

radical comments. I would rather appeal to everyone to pray and offer

sacrifices, and practice restraint and moderation in reacting to this

particular development.

  

            But what I can say is that Pope Francis is leading us to a

new frontier, a new territory in Church teaching that is not

necessarily disruptive of past and present Magisterium. It is the new

territory that can be considered as an organic extension of the status

quo.

             This organic evolution of Church teaching brought about by

Pope Francis is now more sensitive to the finer points of the

spiritual and moral lives of people that can hardly be captured by

legal and doctrinal categories.

  

            It’s an evolution that is doctrinally faithful to Christ’s

teaching, releasing us from a certain grip of legalism and

doctrinalism. It invites us to be more discerning of the promptings of

the Holy Spirit that go beyond what the doctrines so far could

formulate.

  

            To me, what he has taught in Amoris laetitia is an

expression of what is known as the “law of gradualness,” as opposed to

the “gradualness of the law” which is unacceptable as a moral

principle.

  

            Obviously, the distinction between these two principles

can be confusing, and thus can create tension. But it’s a distinction

that cannot be avoided, and we just have to face it, relying on the

goodwill of people concerned and the competent supervisory attention

of the appropriate Church offices.

  

            Yes, there is a possibility of an anti-Pope and an

anti-Christ. But unless these are clearly revealed, we just have to

trust in Christ’s words to St. Peter: “I will give you the keys to the

kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in

heaven. And whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

Patience and self-forgetfulness

I BELIEVE that the practice of patience is unavoidable in

our life. We have problems, difficulties and all sorts of negative

things that can happen everyday, and one way or another we are forced

to bear them, even if we don’t quite like bearing them.

  

            Of course, the ideal is to develop patience as a virtue,

something that we should willingly and lovingly do, based on our faith

in God who knows what to do with every predicament we may get into. We

should also willingly and lovingly do it, fully aware that a lot of

good can be derived from practicing this virtue in the spirit of

Christ.

            Patience is first of all a grace of God that we should

constantly ask for. But it is also a virtue that we need to develop

ourselves. And as a virtue, a good part of it consists in simply

forgetting ourselves.

  

            We have to discipline ourselves so that we can develop the

attitude of readily doing the will of God no matter what it costs.

God’s will is expressed in his commandments and implied in the events

of our day that we have to learn to relate to God.

  

            With self-forgetfulness, many of the difficulties that we

have would actually just disappear, since these difficulties usually

arise due to the exaggerated consideration our egos give them. When we

manage to forget ourselves, that is, when we try to slay our egos,

life is cleared of many of its problems and difficulties.

  

            To slay our egos, we have to learn not to take ourselves

too seriously. In fact, we should regard ourselves as nothing but

servants, always thinking of God and of the others, ever eager to

serve them. In this way we follow what St. Paul suggested:

  

            “In humility count others better than yourselves. Let each

of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests

of others…” (Phil 2,3-4) From there, St. Paul talked about imitating

Christ in his self-emptying.

   

            Our self-forgetfulness should reflect this self-emptying

of Christ. It may take the form of not getting over-sensitive,

especially when we are insulted and mocked. In fact, it may be a good

idea to expose ourselves as early as possible to insults and

mockeries, so we can develop a certain immunity towards them.

   

            We have to learn the art of holy indifference and the

practice of dismissing certain stray thoughts and reactions that are

not helpful at all to us nor pleasing to God. We have to learn not to

worry and, instead, develop that healthy sense of abandonment in the

hands of God.

  

            Somehow we have to learn to be sport in the sense that

whatever happens in our game of life, we continue to be of good

spirit, to be calm and cool. We have to learn to be quick to forgive

and to forget, not allowing resentments to settle in our hearts.

  

            We should be cheerful all the time, positive in our

outlook and encouraging in our words. In this way, we would actually

be identifying ourselves in a very concrete way with Christ who went

through his passion and death with serenity.

  

            Let’s empty ourselves so as to be filled only with the

things of God and of the others.

Both sheep and shepherd

IT’S good that we develop a sense of the pastoral. And

that’s simply because our earthly condition can be likened to pastoral

life. Truth is we are all both sheep and shepherd, both to be taken

care of and to be nourished, on the one hand, and also to take care

and to nourish each other, on the other hand.

            That is why Christ frequently made use of the pastoral

imagery in his preaching. “I am the good shepherd,” he said once, “I

know my own and my own know me.” (Jn 10,14)

            In other parts of the gospel, he is also described as a

sheep, or to be more precise, as a lamb. “Behold the Lamb of God who

takes away the sins of the world,” St. John the Baptist said. (Jn

1,29) He is, of course, the sacrificial lamb par excellence.

            But he is a lamb that is also a shepherd in the sense

that, as expressed in the Book of Revelation, 144,000 others were with

him. (cfr 14,1)

            Conformed to Christ, we have to be both sheep and

shepherd, both to be guided and to guide, following the same process

of receiving and giving that characterizes our whole earthly life.

            As good shepherd, Christ lays down his life for his sheep.

He contrasts himself to the hireling. The latter “sees the wolf coming

and leaves the sheep and flees.”

            As members of the Church founded by Christ, we form one

sheepfold whose door is Christ himself. We are a flock taken care of

by Christ as the good shepherd, and we also take care of one another.

Yes, we are also a shepherd to each other, being so in the name of

Christ.

            We have to understand that we ought to develop a keen

sense of the pastoral. We both have to learn and to teach, to be led

and to lead, to be offered like the sacrificial lamb and to be the

offerer himself.

            We have to understand that this sense of the pastoral

involves all of us, and not just the priests and bishops. It’s for the

clergy, the laity and the religious. We all take part in the

continuing mission of the Christ and of the Church, which is the

salvation of man, though in different ways.

            As sheep and lamb, we have to try our best to learn

everything about our faith and to live it to the full. Christ has

given us everything already that we need to know. He has given us all

the means we need to be who we ought to be—nothing less than another

Christ.

            Like the sheep and the lamb, we have to be docile and

meek. We have to be willing to be sacrificed too, because with all the

sins of men, we cannot avoid having to suffer, and we have to suffer

willingly.

            As shepherd, we have to learn how to help others get

closer to God. We do it by all means—by word or example. We have to

learn how to give spiritual direction to others, starting with those

close to us.

Let’s pray always

ST. Paul tells us to pray without ceasing and we have to

take his words seriously. (cfr 1 Thes 5,17) We are meant to pray

continuously, because we need to be always in touch with God and

prayer is our basic way of doing that. And as a necessary corollary to

that, prayer also enables us to get in touch with everybody else which

we also need to do.

            Without God who is our creator and source of all good

things, we can only do evil. We would be like a branch cut off from

the vine. We may manage to give an appearance of life and goodness,

but without Him, we actually have and are nothing.

            We have to be constantly aware that we cannot be simply on

our own. We need God and we need to be with everybody and everything

else. We have to overcome our tendency that we can afford to be

isolated. We should never forget that we are always in communion and

we need to make that communion alive and healthy.

            Communication, which is primarily done through prayer, is

indispensable to keep our communion with God and with others alive.

When we would just keep quiet, there’s no other thing that can happen,

except, first of all, to be indifferent to God and to the others, and

eventually to go against them.

            That is why in the context of marriage and family life,

for example, communication is essential and should always be done.

When for one reason or another, communication is frustrated in these

areas, problems will always arise. They become unavoidable.

            Thus, when we notice that someone in the family is quiet

or is isolating himself, it should give us a warning that something is

wrong. And everything has to be done so that the flow of communication

continues and greater communion in love and understanding is kept.

            And what would give us the idea and material, the reason

and the impulse to communicate is when we first of all communicate

with God through our personal prayer. That is why prayer is so

indispensable in our life.

            Let’s see to it that our prayer is truly a living

encounter with God, a loving conversation with him, an intimate

sharing of love. That is always possible and doable because God is our

Father who is not only everywhere but is always in love with us,

irrespective of how we are. In fact, his love for us becomes more

special if we get into some difficult moment.

            It’s God who takes the initiative to come into our lives,

into our mind and heart. It’s up to us to correspond to God’s

initiative. That’s why we need to have some time to pray, to pause and

reflect, and to assume a recollected lifestyle. With today’s noise and

hustle and bustle, a time of prayer and silence is truly needed.

            Sometimes, because of our weakened and wounded condition,

we find it hard to correspond, but God tells us to just apply some

force on ourselves. “Ask,” Christ said, “and it will be given to you.

Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened to you.” (Mt

7,7)

Weeding out

WEEDS are a fact of life, and we just have to learn how to

deal with them. Not only are they in our gardens. They are practically

everywhere. They, in fact, appear in all aspects of our life—personal,

social, economic, political, etc.

            Where we have to be most careful about them is in our

spiritual life. That’s because a spiritual life full of weeds is the

seedbed of all the weeds we can have in all the other aspects of life.

The condition of our spiritual life determines the condition of all

the other areas in our life.

            We have to see to it, for example, that our prayer is a

real dialogue with God and not just a soliloquy, our sanctity not

sanctimony, our piety not pietism. We have to see to it that

everything in our spiritual life is genuine and authentic, not fake.

And to think that nowadays we are practically swimming in an ocean of

fake things!

            We have to flee from any signs of pretension and

hypocrisy. We have to strengthen our unity of life, always making an

effort to fix our often fractured life. We have to know how to

dominate the many distractions we are having nowadays in our prayer

life, and these can be very irresistible and, worse, addicting.

            This, of course, will require constant effort at

vigilance, discernment and weeding out. But first, we need to know how

to distinguish between the true and the false.

            This can be very tricky, because weeds can also have the

quality of looking like the genuine plants. But thanks to God, we also

have the means to be able to identify which is which.

            We already have well-defined doctrine of our faith, a good

variety of spiritualities to choose from, a rich body of testimonies

of saints who can serve as guides, and other means like recourse to

the sacraments, to spiritual direction, etc.

            We just have to do our part. Much like what we usually do

with our gardens, we also have to see to it that there is a regular

pruning and weeding out done in our acts of piety. This should be a

habit for us, something we do quite automatically.

            Christ himself referred to this when he said: “He cuts off

every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does

bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” (Jn 15,2)

            In our daily examination of conscience, we should be able

to make some cutting off and pruning. We cannot let some days pass

without doing this very important thing of cutting off, weeding out

and pruning. Especially days when we are confronted with a lot of

distractions, we should be quite active in doing this.

            This is the way we can manage to create an air of goodness

wherever we may be, edifying people around, which is what we should be

doing all the time. The end result should be a certain surge of

eagerness to do good always. We can notice a certain sense of

driven-ness in our life, and that’s simply because we are fit and

lean, cleansed from unnecessary burden.