Spiritual means over human means

IN all our earthly and temporal affairs, we have to

realize that the spiritual and supernatural means always have priority

over whatever smart human means we can use. They should always be

resorted to before, during and after the pursuit of these affairs.

            These spiritual and supernatural means, whose effects may

not be immediately felt and may even differ from what we expect or

like to happen, actually enter into the very core of whatever issues,

challenges and difficulties involved in these worldly affairs of ours.

            And that’s simply because through them we directly involve

God himself in our activities as he should. Let’s remember that

there’s nothing in our life where God is not be involved. He, in fact,

should be the first one to be involved. It is also he to whom

everything should be oriented. Woe to us if we set him aside or leave

him behind.

            With God guiding us in these matters, we can hope to be

properly enlightened and thus act with a lot of prudence, fairness and

charity. First of all, the morality of our acts would be assured. We

would develop a certain sensitivity that enables us to relate our

earthly affairs to our ultimate and eternal goal.

            The human means are meant only to be tools to be used at

the instance of the light shed as a result of our intimacy with God.

They on their own are never enough to cope with the intricacies of our

worldly concerns.  They are always in need of a divine inspiration to

be truly helpful to us.

            Without God, these human means would be fully at the mercy

of our own designs which, as we all know, may not be entirely good and

fair. We don’t have to look far to find proof of this phenomenon. A

lot of ulterior motives and manipulative moves can be observed.

            We know very well that our intentions very often become

too subjective as to miss, at least in part, the requirements of what

is good for everyone. Many of us can hardly go beyond our

self-interest. We need to be truly identified with Christ to be able

to be truly men for God and for others and to act properly, whatever

the sacrifices involved.

            In this regard, we can never exaggerate the importance of

prayers, sacrifices, recourse to the sacraments, study of the doctrine

of our faith, development of virtues, living a life of genuine piety,

etc.

            These are the spiritual and supernatural means that should

always be used even as we make full use also of the human means. We

have to learn how to blend them organically to our ways of pursuing

our temporal concerns, be it in business or politics or whatever.

            These spiritual and supernatural means may require time,

effort and even money, but we can be sure they are all worthwhile.

Without them, we would be like birds without wings—yes, we can feel

lighter but completely unable to fly.

            We just have to learn how to discipline ourselves so as to

give due importance, attention, time and effort to these indispensable

spiritual and supernatural means.

            We should learn how to go on with the mysterious ways of

the spiritual and the supernatural means. Faith, hope and charity

should lead the way, not simply our reason, and much less, our

feelings.