WE have to be
wary of this possibility. In fact, given how
we are, we have a strong tendency to hijack what is to be
human and
what is to be a Christian. In so many ways, we impose our
own ideas of
what is to be a man and what is to be another Christ.
It is not that
we have no correct understanding of these
subjects. Thanks to God, we cannot deny that we have
reached a good
level of what is to be human and what is to be a
Christian. The
problem starts when we think that we already know all
about them and
begin to impose our ideas on others.
We have
forgotten that humanity and Christianity, no
matter how well studied, known and understood, will
always remain a
mystery. St. Augustine said something in this regard.
“Who can map
out the various forces at play in one soul?”
he asked. “Man is a great depth, O Lord. The hairs of his
head are
easier by far to count than his feeling, the movements of
his heart.”
Of course, St.
Paul in his preaching dared not to talk
about what is to be man and what is to be a Christian by
using only
human wisdom. These are is words:
“When I came to
you, I did not come with eloquence or
human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about
God. For I
resolved to know nothing while I was with you except
Jesus Christ and
him crucified...My message and my preaching were not with
wise and
persuasive words but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s
power, so
that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on
God’s power.”
(1 Cor 2,1-5)
Let us continue with what he
said further, since his words
describe very well this possibility of us hijacking
humanity and
Christianity with our own cultures, ideologies, social
trends,
political categories, etc.
“Who knows a
person’s thoughts except their own spirit
within them?” he asked. “In the same way no one knows the
thoughts of
God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is
not the spirit
of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we
may
understand what God has freely given us.
“This is what
we speak, not in words taught us by human
wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining
spiritual
realities with Spirit-taught words. The person without
the Spirit does
not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God
but considers
them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they
are
discerned only through the Spirit.
“The person
with the Spirit makes judgments about all
things, but such a person is not subject to merely human
judgments,
for ‘Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct
him?’ But we
have the mind of Christ.” (10-16)
So the ideal
condition for us to really know what is to be
a man and what is to be a Christian is to have the very
mind of
Christ, just like St. Paul. It’s not that we don’t
anymore need to
study the doctrine of our faith as taught by the Church
that is in
fact regarded as the “expert in humanity.” We should, and
in fact, we
also should study the relevant sciences of philosophy and
theology,
but all these as a function of our vital identification
with Christ.
We need to
follow the example of St. Paul who taught about
humanity and Christianity in a very humble way, always
referring
himself to the Spirit so as to have the very mind of
Christ. In fact,
at one point he said: “Be imitators of me as I am of
Christ.” (1 Cor
11,1)
This way we
avoid hijacking the whole dynamic truth about
what is to be human and what is to be Christian.
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