The secret to keeping temptation and sin away

IT’S to fall in love, of course. But the true love that should fill our mind and heart with desires and concern to reach out to the others, to help and understand them, to find excuses for their shortcomings, quick to offer forgiveness just as we too should be quick to ask for forgiveness if we are the ones who fail them. 

 Let’s remember that it’s when we just think only about ourselves, or worse, when our mind and heart are practically empty that we open ourselves to our own weaknesses and the many temptations around. It would just be a matter of time before the fall occurs. When we occupy ourselves with concern for the others, we would have no time to be bothered by whatever weaknesses we have or by whatever temptation can hound us. 

 Nowadays, sad to say, what we are observing in the lives of many people is that they are just pursuing their own interests or, worse, are simply guided by their moods and their bodily condition. They are putting themselves most vulnerable to their weaknesses and temptations. 

 We have a big challenge to face here: how to teach people, starting with the young ones, how to truly love. This is, of course, a very demanding challenge, but it is all worthwhile, to be sure. Any step of success in this regard will have some multiplier effect that should be sustained. 

 The daunting part of this challenge is that, given our wounded earthly condition, to learn to love will always involve effort and sacrifices. It will contradict the common idea that love is always sweet. That is why, to learn to love will always involve fighting against our own selves who precisely have the strong tendency to be trapped in our own world, unmindful of the world outside. 

 But the question may be asked: how can we learn to truly love? What is the source, the power, purpose and scope of love? The answer to this question is none other than God who is love himself. And this love has been shown us by Christ, the Son of God who became man precisely to give us “the way, the truth and the life,” given our wounded condition here on earth. 

 Christ showed us this love not only by teaching us the truth about things, by doing great and very helpful miracles. He showed this love by ultimately offering his life if only to conquer all our sins and convert the death into a way of our own salvation. 

 To truly love, we should be ready to follow Christ, especially in that part of making great sacrifices even to the point of offering our life to God and to everybody else. Can we do this? Is it ever possible and practicable for us to have this kind of love? 

 We obviously can if we, in spite of our weaknesses, persist to relate ourselves with Christ, by getting to know him more, by praying, cultivating the virtues, availing of the sacraments, especially the Eucharist where Christ offers himself to us as the Bread of Life. 

 In other words, we can only truly love if our spiritual life is well taken care of, keeping it as vibrant as possible. With Christ, we would not be afraid to make sacrifices. In fact, with Christ, we can manage to see the wisdom and beauty of the sacrifices, of the Cross. It’s when we manage to love the Cross that we are assured to have the love that Christ himself has. 

 It’s when we love the Cross that we can fulfill what Christ commanded us: to love one another as he himself has loved us. (cfr. Jn 13,34)

Indifferent, self-indulgent, self-absorbed

THIS is the worst condition that we can find ourselves in, the very opposite of what is truly ideal for us. Instead of being connected and engaged to others, especially to God first, we choose to be on our own. Instead of reaching out to others, we prefer to pursue our own interests only. Instead of being empathetic and compassionate, we just focus on our own selves. We are supposed to be men and women for others. 

 We have to be wary and guarded against this possible scenario that unfortunately can be seen as getting common these days. Many people are trapped in their own world. If ever they go out of their own world, it’s because they are forced to do so or because doing so would actually serve their own self-interest. 

 These days, there are many people whom I consider trapped in the world of the senses, ruled mainly by their instincts and emotions, and easily vulnerable to mere impulses of the flesh and the usually improperly grounded worldly values and ways. Yes, many have fallen into all sorts of addiction and mental illnesses. 

 This is not what to be truly human is. A human being is a person, endowed with intelligence and will among many other faculties, and as such he is meant to be related to others. 

 In short, we are not only rational, but also relational. We actually cannot avoid it. This is where we have to consider more deeply certain duties that we have. We cannot be passive and indifferent to our relationships. Our growth, our maturity and perfection depend on how well we take care of this essential aspect. 

 We have to actively purify and strengthen them, enhance and defend them. We just cannot allow them to drift in any direction, blindly obeying the forces and impulses of the flesh and the world. They have to be directed. 

 We have to understand that we are made to enter into relations with others. Having relations is not a marginal or optional aspect of our life. It is essential to us. Even in our conception and birth, we need parents, we need a family, then a community, and all sorts of persons, both individually or collectively considered. 

 It is said that during the creation of man, God first made Adam. And though he already had relation with everything else in Paradise, God later thought Adam needed someone else “like him.” And so, Eve came along. 

 The story tells us of the kind of relationships we have. We have relations not only with objects, plant and animals, but also with other people, and ultimately, as well as primarily and constantly, with God. 

 In fact, the very basis of this relational character of our life is God himself. Though one, he is three persons. That’s because as God, he is never alone, nor idle and cold. Within himself and with the rest of creation, his eternal being and activity produce the three subsistent persons who are in perpetual relation with one another, precisely because of the eternal activity of knowing and loving within him and with the world. 

 This Trinitarian nature and life of God is the ultimate basis, pattern and goal of the relational character of our life. Thus, in the Catechism we are told: “The communion of the Holy Trinity is the source and criterion of truth in every relationship.” (2845) 

 And it adds something worth noting. “It (our every relationship) is lived out in prayer, above all in the Eucharist.” We need to understand then that our relational character is developed and lived first of all in prayer and in the Eucharist. Without prayer and the Eucharist, that relational character of our life is negated.

“Made partakers of the divine nature”

THAT’S from the Second Letter of St. Peter. (1,4) The complete verse says: “All things of his divine power which appertain to life and godliness, are given us, through the knowledge of him who has called us by his own proper glory and virtue. By whom he has given us most great and precious promises: that by these you may be made partakers of the divine nature: flying the corruption of that concupiscence which is in the world.” 

 While this foundational truth might stun us, our calling is to move from passive acceptance to active, lived application. This monumental truth certainly leaves us breathless, challenging us to not just contemplate it, but to truly walk it out. 

 That is why, St. Peter recommended the following steps to follow: “And you, employing all care, minister in your faith, virtue; and in virtue, knowledge; and in knowledge, abstinence; and in abstinence, patience; and in patience, godliness; and in godliness, love of brotherhood; and in love of brotherhood, charity.” (2 Peter 1,5-7) 

 To be partakers of the divine nature means to participate or share in the divine nature. We do not become God by our own nature; rather, God gives us a share in what he is living and giving. 

 The purpose of this participation is for moral renewal, enabling us to escape the corruption in the world. This participation in the divine nature is about being healed and transformed by escaping sin and living a new life. 

 This is the reason why God became man in Christ and made constantly present in the world through the Holy Spirit. In this way, we can truly become God’s children. 

 But for this truth of faith to take place in us, we need to humble ourselves so that the light of faith can guide us rather than we just keeping to ourselves in our own estimations and ways. Let’s remember that God is ever willing and eager to share his life and nature with us. Our sharing in God’s life starts with our faith in God, but for that faith to take root in us, we need to be humble. 

 We should spend time meditating on this truth of our faith, and we should try to overcome whatever awkwardness and disbelief we have about it. Truth is, given the way the world is developing today, with so much drifting away if not rebellion against God, we need some divine powers to put ourselves afloat in our true dignity as children of God. 

 To be sure, if we have the right intention to share God’s life, we would always remain humble and ever eager to help others. Otherwise, we would be playing the game of the devil! 

 With humility, we would be able to give our all to God. We can be generous and magnanimous just as God is overwhelmingly generous and magnanimous to all of us. There has to be that mutual dynamic of love and self-giving that has been initiated by God himself. God loves us first, and we have to learn to love him in return, a love that is also expressed in loving everybody just as God loves everybody irrespective of how they are! 

 Let’s not be afraid of the effort and the sacrifices involved in this process. It will all be worthwhile. If we truly try to identify ourselves with Christ, we would be confident that Christ himself would give us the same peace and joy that he had as he went through his own passion and death on the cross to recover our true dignity as children of God.