Refining our spirit of penance

By Fr. Roy Cimagala Chaplain Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE) Talamban, Cebu City Email: roycimagala@gmail.com WE have to be wary of the conditions nowadays that would tend to desensitize us from our constant need for penance and conversion. This, I believe, is the message Christ wanted to impart to us when he said, “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty deeds done in your midst had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have repented, sitting in sackcloth and ashes.” (Lk 10,13) 

 We cannot deny that there now are many elements that would lead us to be self-absorbed and self-centered, to be just concerned about the here and now and forget about the hereafter, to be stuck with the material and temporal and ignore the spiritual and eternal. Even worse, there are now moves toward outright irreligiosity, directly contradicting God’s laws by legalizing immoral actions like abortion, etc. 

 We need to have a drastic revival of our spirit of penance and conversion. Our spirit of penance and conversion is in crisis nowadays because our idea of what is good and evil is now reduced to our personal preferences, or at best to what can be termed as our social, political, cultural or even ideological consensus. 

 In short, we are not anymore referring things to God but to ourselves. This is what is called the post-modern thinking which views “realities as plural and subjective and dependent on the individual’s worldview.” 

 It proclaims that there can be diverse interpretations of truth. It rejects sharp distinctions and global, absolute and universal truths. It sees truth as highly individualistic and subjective, as absolutely bound by culture, time, place and all sorts of conditionings. 

 We need to go back to God by first acknowledging our sinfulness. That we are all sinners and in need of conversion should come as no surprise to us. We just have to be realistic in handling this lifetime predicament of ours, making use of all the means that, thanks to God, have also been made available in abundance. 

 There’s confession, for one, and the Holy Eucharist, spiritual direction, regular examinations of conscience, indulgences, etc. 

 There’s just one interesting thing that, I believe, is worth bringing up at this point in time. And that is that conversion should not just be a matter of a moment, but should rather be a stable state of mind and heart. 

 St. John Paul II’s encyclical, “Dives in misericordia” (Rich in mercy), has some relevant words about this point. “Authentic knowledge of the God of mercy, the God of tender love,” the saintly Pope said, “is a constant and inexhaustible source of conversion, not only as a momentary interior act but also as a permanent attitude, as a state of mind.” 

 He continues: “Those who come to know God in this way, who ‘see’ Him in this way, can live only in a state of being continually converted to Him. They live, therefore in ‘status conversionis;’ and it is this state of conversion which marks out the most profound element of the pilgrimage of every man and woman on earth in ‘status viatoris.’” (13) 

 It would be good to go slowly on these words if only to feel at home with this wonderful truth of divine mercy as well as our lifetime need for it. Let’s hope and pray that we can manage to conform our attitudes and core beliefs along these lines expressed by St. John Paul.

Continuing Christ’s redemptive mission

CHRIST’S redemptive mission is very much an ongoing affair, and he involves all of us actually in this business. Those words that he addressed to his apostles, giving them their mission, can be considered as addressed to us also. 

 “The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few,” he said, “so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.” (Lk 10,2) The task, of course, is overwhelming and we are asked to give our all. But we should not worry because Christ will always be with us. It’s his work, after all, before it is ours. We should just cooperate with him. 

 In this regard, we have to give special attention to what may be considered as the new mission lands nowadays where we do not have to go far to carry out this duty. This can be done right where we are. 

 Yes, there is no doubt we are all meant to be apostles of Christ, to be his ambassadors. That’s simply because we are meant to be like Christ, to be ‘another Christ,’ and so we share also in his redemptive mission which is a continuing affair as long as we are still in this world. 

 No wonder then that Christ would just choose his apostles seemingly at random. He would just pass by a certain place, and upon seeing someone, he would just say, “Come, follow me.” And wonder of wonders also, the person called would just follow him without question. In fact, it is said that the person called would leave everything behind (“relictic omnibus”). 

 We are all meant to be apostles of Christ with the lifelong concern for doing apostolate, taking advantage of all the occasions and situations in life. Vatican II spells it out very clearly. “The Christian vocation is by its very nature a vocation to the apostolate.” (Apostolicam actuositatem, 2) So, anyone who wants to be truly consistent to his Christian identity and calling should realize ever deeply that he is called to help others get closer to God. This is what apostolate is all about. 

 We need to be familiar with this Christian duty. We have to do apostolate, and we need to see to it that the zeal for it is always nourished, stoked and fanned to its most intense degree. 

 We have to understand though that in doing apostolate, we should rely only on Christ’s power. Thus, Christ in commissioning his apostles, told them to “take nothing for the journey, neither walking stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money…” (cfr. Lk 9,1-6) He will provide for everything that we need. 

 And nowadays, we seem to get more convinced that the new mission lands are not anymore those places and people who are far away from the mainstream, those who still are kind of primitive in their culture and deprived even of the basic material necessities, or who are still into their own pagan ways. Of course, due attention and evangelization should continue for them. These should never stop. 

 But we are more convinced that the new mission lands are the more developed countries that are in the middle of the mainstream world but are very far in their faith. More than far from the faith and from God, they look more like resistant and even against God and anything that has to do with religion. They are more challenging since the attention and evangelization to be given to them require a more complex strategy. 

 We have to give special attention to these new mission lands!

Angels are real

ON the Feast of the Archangels Michael, Gabriel and Raphael (September 29), we are presented with that amusing gospel episode about the calling of Nathanael. (cfr. Jn 1,47-51) We might be wondering how Nathanael’s vocation is related to the existence of angels. 

 My personal take on this question is that Nathanael, whom Christ described as a man without guile, must have been enabled to recognize Christ as the Son of God, the King of Israel, through the help of the angels. 

 When Christ told him, in response to Nathanael’s question about how Christ knew him, that Christ saw him under the fig tree before Philip came, some angels must have been involved in that event. 

 We can somehow support that speculation by referring to the fact that at the end of gospel episode, Christ told Nathanael, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” What Nathanael was doing under the fig tree must have something to do about who the Son of Man is, and about heaven and angels. 

 In any event, our faith tells us that angels are real and that they are our great ally, helping us in all our needs, from the most trivial to the most important. Yes, angels exist. They are real. We need to say this now since angels, if they are ever referred to nowadays, are often considered as mere figments of our imagination that at best can be used as literary and sentimental devices. 

 Obviously, faith is needed to believe in angels. They are creatures whose presence goes beyond what our senses can perceive. They can however assume bodily forms as mentioned several times in the Bible. But essentially, they are pure spirits. As such, they are readily available to help us, since they are not limited by time and space. 

 We have to develop and popularize a devotion to angels, especially to the archangels. They are great allies that we can count on especially during our difficult moments. They are so close and so identified with God that we can refer to them as God’s organic or vital extensions of his own self, if we may describe them that. 

 Remember what Christ said about angels in general? It was when he talked about the angels of little children whom the disciples wanted to shoo away from Christ for being a disturbance. “See that you do not despise one of these little ones,” he said. “For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.” (Mt 18,10) 

 Our guardian angels, for example, are very helpful to us in our task of navigating the most tricky spiritual and supernatural realities. When there are strong temptations, or when some unknown evil spirits seem to bother us, or when we are undertaking a spiritual and supernatural project like coming up with an apostolic initiative, our guardian angels make themselves available to help us in any way. 

 It’s important that we be aware of the existence of these very powerful angels who, for sure, would be most willing and most happy to help us in their own way. We just have to enliven our faith in them and develop the appropriate devotion. 

 Many great saints have benefited from the help of the angels. It would be good if we train ourselves to develop an intimate relationship with them. To be sure, only good things can come out of such relationship!

Be wary of bitter zeal

YES, we have to be most careful with our tendency to fall into bitter zeal. It’s that zeal that was rebuked by Christ in that gospel episode where his disciples suggested that fire rains on those who did not welcome them while they entered a Samaritan village. (cfr. Lk 9,51-56) 

 While it’s true that we should try to be always zealous in our life, we have to make sure that our zeal is righteous, holy and charitable, not bitter, with a clear and proper sense of purpose, not just aimless. 

 Righteous zeal is always respectful of legal, juridical and most importantly of moral standards, especially that of charity and mercy. Bitter zeal wants instant results while ignoring legal and moral requirements, let alone the requirements of charity and mercy. It may pursue a valid cause, working for truth and justice, but without taking care of the appropriate means. 

 Bitter zeal makes a person hasty and reckless in his assessment of things. It fails to consider all angles, to listen to both sides, so to speak. He is prone to imprudence. In the end, it’s animated by the evil spirit of self-righteousness. 

 Inflammatory, incendiary words are its main weapons. Being belligerent is its style. It relishes in rousing controversies and sowing intrigues. It’s actually not as interested in looking for the objective truth and justice as carrying out his own personal agenda. 

 Especially when we engage ourselves in matters of opinion, we have to learn to practice restraint and moderation since no one has the exclusive ownership of what is right and fair. Opinions are views that are hardly based on absolute truths of faith and dogmas. They are more expressions of one’s preferences and tastes, and therefore we should expect a wide spectrum of differences, since things depend on people’s different temperaments, backgrounds, cultures, etc. 

 Yes, we can have some exchanges and try to sort out these different and even conflicting opinions if only to clarify things and perhaps to eke out a most fair view with respect to a particular issue. We can attempt to have a kind of consensus. 

 But all these should be done in an atmosphere of mutual respect and utmost charity and delicacy. We have to avoid bitter zeal, sarcasm, irony, insults, ad hominems, mockery, vulgarity, nitpicking, fault-finding, one-upmanship, the crab mentality and the like. 

 If we are truly animated by Christian charity, there would be zero bitterness in our exchanges of views, opinions, and even of beliefs. True love, as St. Paul describes it, “takes no pleasure in evil, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.” (1 Cor 13,6-7) 

 We just have to learn to be patient in handling whatever contradicting reactions we get from all the goodness that we may be doing. We just have to look for an alternative way in resolving issues and situations like this. 

 This was the case of Christ when his apostles suggested that fire rain down on a Samaritan village that did not welcome them since they were heading to Jerusalem. (cfr Lk 9,51-56) As the gospel puts it, Christ rebuked the apostles and they journeyed instead to another village. 

 We have to make sure that we are always burning with the zeal of love. We need to fill our mind and heart with love, and all that love brings—goodness, patience, understanding and compassion, mercy, gratuitous acts of service, generosity and magnanimity, etc.

The great value of spiritual childhood

THE gospel of St. Luke 9,46-50, shows us how being childlike in spirit would enable us to accept Christ as he is as well as to accept everybody else irrespective of how they are. It’s a great lesson we have to learn if we want to be truly Christian. 

 In that gospel, Christ clarified how being simple and humble like a little child would enable one to accept Christ. “Whoever receives this child in my name receives me,” he said. “And whoever receives me receives the one who sent me. For the one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest.” 

 This clarification of Christ came as a consequence of the apostles talking among themselves about who among them was the greatest. It can be supposed that they must be feeling important since they realized they had the fortune of knowing and being with Christ. 

 But that was not enough. The gospel somehow links being simple, humble and childlike with the capacity to be accepting and to be able to have a good working relationship with everyone irrespective of who and how they are, despite the unavoidable differences and conflicts among them. This point Christ established when he said, “Whoever is not against you is for you.” 

 We have to realize that if we want to be with God always and to know the fine points of his mysterious will and ways, we need to be always simple and childlike. Christ may have told us also to be clever and shrewd like serpents, but that quality which is also a necessity in our life here on earth should never compromise our simplicity. In fact, that cleverness should also spring from our simplicity. 

 Christ is quite clear about this point. “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,” he said, “for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike.” (Mt 11,25) 

 Christ reiterated this necessity of being childlike a number of times during his preaching. “Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” (Mt 18,3) “Let the children come to me. Do not prevent them, for the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” (Mk 10,15) St. James, in his letter, made the same affirmation. “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble.” (4,6) 

 We need to devise an interior mechanism, more spiritual than material, to keep ourselves like children even as we grow in worldly knowledge and skills, and prone to thinking that we can already live by ourselves, independently of God. 

 To be childlike would also enable us to be accepting of everyone and to be able to work with everyone, irrespective of who and how they are. The mere fact that everyone can be presumed to be looking always for what is true and good, even if they are wrong in their pursuit, can signify that we have a common bond. Those who differ with us cannot really be against us. And so, we can always find ways of how to deal with them in a charitable way. 

 If we follow the example of Christ, we would know how to live the truth in charity and charity in the truth. Somehow the exclusivity of truth blends with the inclusivity of charity! How important therefore to grow in spiritual childhood in our life!

Truth in charity and universal outlook

“Whoever is not against us is for us.” (Mk 9,40) With these words, Christ told his apostles, and is telling us now, that we should have a universal regard for everyone, irrespective of the unavoidable differences and conflicts we can have among ourselves. 

 Especially when these differences and conflicts are just a matter of personal preferences and opinion, we should not sacrifice our good relations with others because of them. 

 And even if these differences and conflicts concern serious matters like our core beliefs and religion, we should see to it that we don’t cut ourselves from the others. There will always be some good and positive elements that we can see in these differences and conflicts, and no matter how insignificant they are, we should take advantage of them to maintain friendship. 

 This is how truth is lived in charity, or the other way around, how we can live charity in the truth. This point was illustrated in that gospel episode where an apostle told Christ that he forbade someone who was driving out demons in Christ’s name because that someone did not follow them, the apostles. (cfr Mk 9,38) 

 That’s when Christ told them, “Do not prevent him. There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name who can at the same time speak ill of me. For whoever is not against us is for us.” (Mk 9,38-40) 

 We have to be wary of our tendency to fall into some kind of exclusivistic mentality or lifestyle. We should be open to everyone. As long as we can see that one has an earnest desire to know and uphold the truth and what is good, no matter how different from our way of knowing and upholding them or even how wrong, we should try our best to maintain good relations, since only then can we be following Christ’s example. 

 This kind of attitude is most relevant in our effort at ecumenism and the apostolate “ad fidem.” We have to learn how to be open-minded, flexible, tolerant in the manner Christ spelled out for us when he said, “Whoever is not against us is for us.” 

 In this regard, we have to take extreme care in avoiding causing scandal to others. This point was again highlighted by Christ in the same gospel episode. He was quite strong in this regard. 

 “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,” he said, “it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.” 

 Scandal is when we lead others to sin. This can start with our attitude itself and can worsen with our behavior. We have to see to it that even in our internal forum, in the way we think, judge, assess, reason, conclude, etc., the good things like charity, compassion, understanding should be deliberately pursued. 

 Then we can expect good actions to follow, for our thoughts, desires and intentions are the mother of our actions. How important therefore it is to keep our thoughts clean, our desires pure, and our intentions full of love and compassion toward others! Our actions are just expressions of our thoughts, desires and intentions. 

 This is how we can live the truth in charity following the teaching and example of Christ, and thereby attain a universal outlook amid the complicated drama of our life here on earth.

When our death can lead to our resurrection

THE secret, of course, of having our death as a way to our resurrection is to die with Christ. Only with him can our resurrection, our victory over sin and death, take place after our death. St. Paul encapsulated this most wonderful truth of our faith when he said, “For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his.” (Rom 6,5) 

 No wonder then that Christ culminated his redemptive work with his passion and death on the cross. Only then would his own resurrection take place. Christ made this point clear when after being rightly identified by Peter as ‘the Christ of God,’ he proceeded to talk about his passion, death and resurrection. 

 “The Son of Man must suffer greatly,” he said, “and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised.” (Lk 9,22) 

 We have to deepen our belief that with Christ’s resurrection, sin and death have been definitively conquered, and a new life in God is given to us. We are now a new creation, with the power of Christ to conquer sin and death and everything else that stands in the way of our becoming true children of God. 

 And so we have every reason to think that we can live forever in Christ over whom death no longer has dominion. In spite of whatever, we have every reason to be happy and confident, as long as we are faithful to Christ. 

 We just need to realize more deeply that Christ is alive and wants to live his life with us, because we are patterned after him. Let us not miss this most golden opportunity. 

 We therefore have to learn how to keep him alive in our minds and hearts. We have to learn to feel in an abiding way the new life, the new creation he has won for us through the cross. 

 And this can mean that we have to go through the daily process of dying and rising with Christ. In other words, our earthly day-to-day life should be the precious time of rehearsal for the final and crucial moment of our death. Our death should be a dying with Christ so that we too can rise with him. 

 We need to be aware of this very important significance and purpose of our life here on earth, and to act on it accordingly. Everything that happens in our life can and should be related to this significance and purpose of our life. Nothing in our life, whether humanly good or bad, right or wrong, is irrelevant to our life’s purpose. 

 We should be wary of our tendency to degrade our life’s true and ultimate meaning and purpose. That happens when our understanding of our life’s purpose and our reactions to the different events of our life are derived simply from our human estimations of things, as from our senses and emotions alone, or from some sciences or philosophies or ideologies or superstitions. 

 With these attitudes and frame of mind, we put ourselves vulnerable to despair and helplessness, since we would not be able to cope with all the trials and challenges of life. We would be tying the hands of God who knows how to resolve even our most unsolvable predicaments. We should go through our earthly suffering and death, so that we can resurrect with Christ!

When misunderstood and hated

THAT gospel episode where Herod the tetrarch was perplexed about Christ and was more disturbed than simply curious about him, (cfr. Lk 9,7-9) reminds us that if we are to be like Christ, we should be ready to be misunderstood and even hated. 

 Like Christ, we can be a sign of contradiction to some people. We should therefore learn how to handle that condition the way Christ handled his. It’s going to be an unavoidable feature in our life, especially nowadays when there are many powerful and influential people straying away from God’s will and ways. 

 In this life, in this world, we just have to be ready to get dirty without compromising what is truly essential in our spiritual life. Evil is unavoidable in this world, and we just have to know how to deal with it, always focused on going toward our eternal destiny with God in heaven. 

 We should not worry too much about the misunderstanding and even hatred against us that we can provoke in others, because we have been given all the assurances that if we are with God, everything would just turn our right. The challenge now is how to handle the many evil things that will always get mixed up with the essential good of this life and of this world that all come from God. 

 Evil does not have the last word, unless we let it. It is the good that will have the last word. And so we just have to learn how to go through such things even to the extent of cooperating with evil materially, not formally, if only to change things for the better. 

 In this, we should look at Christ not only as the model but also and most especially as the power to enable us to derive good from evil regardless of all the dirt involved in the process. 

 St. Paul has something relevant to say in this regard. “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us,” he said, “so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor 5,21) 

 That is why Christ allowed himself to take on all the suffering so unjustly inflicted on him and ultimately to offer his life on the cross to bear all the evil of our sins in order to conquer sin and death itself with his resurrection. 

 We have to understand then that our life here on earth, if patterned after that of Christ, cannot but get involved with the dirt of evil. It would be naïve on our part if we think that Christian life is pure clean living pursued in a sterilized environment as if in some controlled laboratory. 

 In this, we have been amply warned by Christ himself. “In this world,” he said, “you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (Jn 16,33) More graphically, he said: 

 “If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire.” (Mt 18,8) 

 We just have to learn how to suffer, how to let go even of some legitimate things if only to get what is truly essential. In other words, we have to learn how to get dirty and how to suffer with Christ.

Christ wants us to be apostles

THERE is no doubt we are all meant to be apostles of Christ, to be his ambassadors. That’s simply because we are meant to be like Christ, to be ‘another Christ,’ and so we share also in his redemptive mission which is a continuing affair as long as we are still in this world. 

 No wonder then that Christ would just choose his apostles seemingly at random. He would just pass by a certain place, and upon seeing someone, he would just say, “Come, follow me.” And wonder of wonders also, the person called would just follow him without question. In fact, it is said that the person called would leave everything behind (“relictic omnibus”). 

 We are all meant to be apostles of Christ with the lifelong concern for doing apostolate, taking advantage of all the occasions and situations in life. Vatican II spells it out very clearly. “The Christian vocation is by its very nature a vocation to the apostolate.” (Apostolicam actuositatem, 2) So, anyone who wants to be truly consistent to his Christian identity and calling should realize ever deeply that he is called to help others get closer to God. This is what apostolate is all about. 

 This duty actually springs first of all from our nature. We are not only individual persons. We are also a social being. Our sociability is not an optional feature. It is part of our essence, violating which would be equivalent to violating our very own nature. 

 We can never live alone. We need to be with others. And more, we need to care for one another. We have to be responsible for one another. And while this caring and loving starts with the most immediate material human needs like food, clothing, etc., it has to go all the way to the spiritual and most important and ultimate need of ours. 

 That’s why we need to practice affection, compassion, understanding, patience and mercy on everyone. We have to understand though that all these can only take place if they spring and tend towards God, “the source of all good things” for us. 

 We need to be familiar with this Christian duty. We have to do apostolate, and we need to see to it that the zeal for it is always nourished, stoked and fanned to its most intense degree. 

 We have to understand though that in doing apostolate, we should rely only on Christ’s power. Thus, Christ in commissioning his apostles, told them to “take nothing for the journey, neither walking stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money…” (cfr. Lk 9,1-6) He will provide for everything that we need. 

 On our part, we should just be as generous as we can be in carrying out that responsibility. “Without cost you have received. Without cost you are to give.” (Mt 10,8) For sure, with these words of Christ, we are strongly reminded to be generous, to give ourselves completely to God and to others, sparing and keeping nothing for ourselves, because God has been generous with us. 

 We need to develop a keen sense of generosity and self-giving that is also a result of detachment. Let’s never forget that whatever we have comes from God who wants us to work for the common good. Thus, we hear St. Paul saying, “What do you have that you did not receive?” (1 Cor 4,7)

God can call us in a surprise

THAT’S true! God can call us in a surprise. But that’s not because of God who wants to surprise us. Rather, it is because of us. To be sure, everyone is called by God because we are supposed to be like him and to be with him, sharing in his life and in his work. 

 Insofar as God is concerned, our calling or vocation has already been made from all eternity. But insofar as we are concerned, yes, our vocation can come as a surprise, because we have been ignoring this basic aspect of our life and may have been living a rather colorful life until God’s irrepressible intervention jolts us. 

 We all need to remind ourselves of this basic truth. All of us have a vocation. We have to sharpen that sense and make it the directing and shaping principle of our life. 

 Vocation is not only for a few, and for some special part of our life. It is for all of us, since as creatures and children of God, our relation with him is never broken. Our life will always be a life with him, whether we are aware of it or not. 

 God continues to be with us, and while respecting our freedom always, he calls us to him, for it is him, more than us, who directs and shapes our life. This is the essence of vocation—God calling us to share his life and activity with us, since we are his image and likeness. 

 Let’s always remember that God created us for a purpose. He did not create us just to leave us on our own. He created us to participate in his life and in his love which is the essence of God. 

 God can manifest this vocation to us in some dramatic way, often involving drastic changes in the recipients. God can enter into our lives and make his will more felt by us in some special way. Though we cannot help it, we should try our best not to be surprised by these possibilities. 

 Consider St. Paul, St. Augustine, the apostles themselves, and the patriarchs and prophets like Abraham, Moses, Jonas, Jeremiah, etc. Consider St. Edith Stein, and our very own St. Lorenzo Ruiz and St. Pedro Calungsod. 

 Their stories are full of drama and suspense. St. Paul received his vocation while on a mad campaign to arrest the early Christians. St. Augustine, though gifted intellectually, had a colourful past. The apostles were mainly simple people, mostly fishermen. 

 St. Edith was an intelligent Jewish agnostic before her conversion. And our own Filipino saints were catechists doing some domestic work for some priests. All had their defects, and sins, and yet they became and are great saints. 

 Nothing is impossible with God, and with our trust and faith in him, we can also do what is impossible with God. 

 We have to feel at home with the idea, nay, the truth that all of us have a vocation. Let’s not play blind and deaf. God’s call is actually quite loud enough. And when we are given a special vocation, let’s not be afraid, but rather go for it at full throttle. 

 Ok, we may hesitate at first, we can have doubts, but if we are honest, we will soon see there’s nothing to be afraid about. God takes care of everything. All he needs is that we trust him, that we have faith in him, and that we try our best to cooperate.

We are meant to be the world’s light

TO be truly Christian, we should be what Christ wants us to be—light of the world. As such we have to learn how to give good example to others, obviously with the proper motive and purpose. Christ pointed this out when he said, “No one who lights a lamp conceals it with a vessel or sets it under a bed; rather, he places it on a lampstand so that those who enter may see the light.” (Lk 8,16) 

 Yes, if we go by our Christian faith, we are meant to be the light of the world. We are supposed to be a light to the others, to guide them to our proper and ultimate end who is God. We are supposed to be eager to give good examples to the others. 

 All this is based on what Christ said once. “You are the light of the world…Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” (Mt 5,14-16) It’s a light that we ought to produce even with our mere presence, or with our words and deeds. 

It’s a light that we are supposed to produce all the time and everywhere, and not just intermittently and in some places. Even in our sleep, it has to radiate. More, even in our absence, it can continue to shine in the memory of others, in their minds and hearts. 

 It’s actually the most real, ultimate and necessary light we have on earth. All the other lights will come and go, in varying ways and lengths of time. This one can last forever. It will never wane nor fade away. It goes beyond time and space. 

 As such, we need to realize that it is a duty of ours, as Christians, to always give good example to others. Not that we have to flaunt whatever good thing we have or do, for Christ clearly said also that we should not show off our good deeds before men, to be seen by them, lest we lose our reward in heaven. (cfr. Mt 6,1) 

 We have to be aware that we always have to give good example to others for the sole purpose of leading others to God. It is to edify others, to encourage them to be holy and to pursue the path of sanctity in an abiding way. 

 This duty, therefore, should be carried out deliberately. It should somehow be planned and aimed at. It should not just be something incidental or something optional. Of course, this duty should not be done out of pride or vanity, but out of obedience to the will of God who wants to save all men. (cfr. 1 Tim 2,4) 

 We can be this light, and thus give good example to others, if we strive to identify ourselves increasingly with the source of the Eternal Light, God himself, through Christ in the Holy Spirit. 

 This light can come about if we truly desire to know more about God and to grow in a more intimate relationship with him, praying to him in adoration, thanksgiving, expiation and petition, and receiving the sacraments. 

 We can have this light if we earnestly study the doctrine of our faith, making it flesh of our flesh, such that we can arrive at the awareness we are living with God and not simply by ourselves. Also, when we always strive to grow in the virtues.

Christ’s cross clarifies our human condition

I FIND it amusing if it were not a disturbing and sad story. While Christ was already predicting his passion, death and resurrection, all that his apostles did was to discuss who among them was the greatest. (cfr. 9,30-37) This, to me, is the example par excellence of what is termed as impertinence. 

 That’s when Christ told them to be as humble as a little child. “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.” 

 Of course, receiving a child in Christ’s name means receiving Christ and everything that he has done for the salvation of man, and this would include suffering and loving the cross. The cross is necessary in our life. It plays a big role in clarifying our true condition in our earthly life which is marked by sinfulness and thus, in great need of redemption. 

 We need to know the purpose of the cross because the cross, through Christ’s passion, death and resurrection, is where everything in our life is resolved. Christ’s passion, death and resurrection is the culmination of Christ’s redemptive mission on earth. 

 Yes, Christ preached. He performed miracles. But in the end, he had to offer his life on the cross because no matter what he did, our sins are such that they simply cannot be undone and forgiven through the preaching of the truths of our faith and the tremendous effects of the miracles. Christ has to offer his life on the cross! 

 We might ask, if Christ is God, why did he have to go through all that suffering and death? Why not just say, “Everything is now all right, guys.” As God, nothing is impossible with him. With the movement of his will, with a flick of his hand, everything would be as it should be. 

 I must say, it is a good question to ask. Indeed, nothing is impossible with God. He does not have to do anything spectacular to repair what was damaged. A word from him, and everything would be as he wants it to be. 

 Be that as it may, the fact is that Christ chose the way the Father wanted it. “Not my will, but yours be done,” Christ said. (Lk 22,42) And I imagine the reason behind this is because God respects our human nature as it is, as it has been created by him, capable of loving and hating, and also capable of being faithful and unfaithful and faithful again after some conversion, and some consequences follow. 

 The return to fidelity, given our nature, will unavoidably involve suffering and death which Christ took to himself, showing us the way of how to go about these consequences of our sins. 

 In other words, the cross and all the suffering it involves are the consequences of our sins which need to be forgiven and undone. And that can only happen when with Christ, we go through the consequences of our sin by suffering them with Christ on the cross. Thus the cross of our sins has been converted by Christ into the cross of our salvation. That’s how we have to understand the cross and all the suffering it involves. 

 We should not be afraid of the cross. In fact, we should be looking forward to have it if only to help in Christ’s continuing work of our redemption.

Our duty to spread God’s word

IN the gospel, we can notice that Christ was going from one place to another, busy preaching and proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom of God. (cfr. Lk 8,1-3) We need to realize that since we have to be like Christ, we should also deeply feel the duty to preach and proclaim this good news, especially these days when we are flooded with all sorts of bad news. 

 We really need to internalize this duty, making it a strong and driving conviction by doing everything to make it so, studying, meditating, writing, talking, using all the available means to spread the living and saving word of God. 

 We have to realize that preaching the Word of God is a task entrusted to Christ’s apostles and shared by all of us in different ways. The clergy, of course, takes a leading role in this affair. It’s a serious business that involves our whole being, and not just our talents and powers. 

 First we need to examine our understanding and attitude toward God’s word, especially the Gospel. On this basic understanding would depend what we do with the Gospel and how we should handle it. 

 Do we really know the true nature of the Gospel? Or do we take it as just one more book, perhaps with certain importance, but definitely not as the living word of God, in spite of its human dimensions? 

 The Gospel is actually the proclamation of Christ as the Emmanuel, that is, God with us. This is an on-going affair that did not stop with the death of Christ. Christ lives with us up to now, and continues to do things with us. 

 All these affirmations are captured in the last lines of the Gospel of St. Matthew where our Lord said: 

 “Go, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them…. And behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.” (28,19-20) 

 Our Catechism tells us that “We must continue to accomplish in ourselves the stages of Jesus’ life and his mysteries and often to beg him to perfect and realize them in us and in his whole Church” (521) 

 Obviously, to carry out this mission, we need to know our Lord and his teachings. We have to go to him and read the Gospel. Reading and meditating on it should be a regular practice for us, a habit meant to keep us in touch with him. 

 Thus, every time we read the Gospel, we have to understand by our faith that we are engaging with our Lord in an actual and living way. We are listening to him, and somehow seeing him. We can use our imagination to make ourselves as one more character in any scene depicted in any episode of the Gospel. 

 For this, we need to look for the appropriate time and place. We have to be wary of our tendency to be dominated by a lifestyle of activism and pragmatism that would blunt our need for recollection and immersion in the life of Christ. 

 The drama of Christ’s life here on earth has to continue in our own life. Thus, we need to continually conform our mind and heart to the Gospel, an affair that demands everything from us. 

 Preaching should reflect the condition of our heart as it grapples with the living word of God. It should not just be a matter of declaiming or orating, reduced to the art of public speaking and stage performing, a mere play of our talents.

Charity to all without condoning evil

THAT gospel episode about a sinful woman barging into a party where Christ was and proceeding to wash Christ’s feet with ointment (cfr. Lk 7,36-50) shows us that Christ loves everyone, including those who are in very sinful situations, without of course condoning what is evil and sinful. 

 That woman provoked some critical thoughts on the part of the host against Christ. “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” 

 Christ, of course, who could read people’s mind responded by teaching him—and us—that precious lesson that we have to care and love everyone, irrespective of who and how they are, without blurring the distinction between good and evil, moral and immoral. 

 In fact, like Christ we should have some kind of preferential concern for those who are in error or are lost spiritually and morally. This Christian attitude can be adduced from the parables of the lost coin and the lost sheep. Christ fraternized more with the sinners, precisely because he came not to condemn the world but to save. 

 Fraternizing with sinners is what we all have to cultivate in ourselves also. We have to replicate Christ’s attitude towards sinners, who actually are all of us—of course, in varying degrees. We have to give special attention to the lost sheep and to the lost coin. We have to open all possible avenues to be in touch with all sinners. 

 This capacity to fraternize with sinners is first of all a gift from God which we have to take care of and develop. It’s meant to mature us and to involve us in the continuing work of redemption of Christ. It’s not meant, of course, to dilute the teachings of Christ and the very essence of goodness and true holiness. 

 We need to train ourselves in this department because we obviously have to contend with tremendous difficulties that we have to learn to surmount. We will always have our biases and preferences and other natural and human conditionings that, if not handled well, can be divisive elements in our life. 

 But if we closely follow Christ, if we pray and let ourselves be led by our faith more than by our feelings, we can manage to consider everyone worthy of our attention, concern and love. Even those who, from under different criteria and standards, we consider as sinners, enemies, unlovable, etc., can command our care. 

 So, we just have to learn how to be sport and game with everyone without compromising the rules of the game, so to speak. Foul is foul, cheating is cheating, and the appropriate penalties should be given, but the game has to go on. 

 To be realistic about the concrete conditions of our life here on earth, we need to know how to be tolerant of certain unavoidable evils without condoning them. The distinction may be difficult to make, but we simply have to learn it if we want to survive the drama of our earthly life. I believe this is a basic skill we all have to acquire, given the way we and the world are. 

 We have to learn to be tough and be ready to get dirty somehow without surrendering the essential. And we should not lose the hope of overcoming evil, fighting it out till the end of our life, if needed.

Taking advantage of our sorrows

SINCE sorrows are unavoidable in our life, we should know how to deal with it properly, even taking advantage of it, for it indeed can help us attain our ultimate goal in life, which is our own salvation, our own redemption. 

 In this we have to look closely at Christ who shows us the way of how to handle our sorrows. And greatly helping us in this regard is the Blessed Virgin who is our Mother and who is regarded also as Our Lady of Sorrows, whose memorial we celebrate on September 15. She shows us how to grieve and to deal with all sorts of suffering in our life. 

 We have to learn how to handle these predicaments. And the first thing to do is to develop a spiritual attitude and supernatural outlook in life, based on our faith in God that has to grow stronger everyday. That faith, of course, has to give rise to hope and be nourished by charity. 

 These are the most important aspects or dimensions in our life, and we should try our best that we become adept in handling them. They are the ones that give life and meaning to all the other aspects in our life—personal, family, social, professional, etc. 

 The celebration of the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows again brings to our mind the phenomenon of our suffering, pains and sorrows in life. What’s distinctive of this celebration is that it reminds us that all these worldly sorrows have a religious foundation, have a relation to God. 

 Our predicament today is that our attitude towards this unavoidable element in our life is taken out of its fundamental context of faith and religion. We just look at it in a purely human and natural way. We just look for the human and natural causes as well as for their human and natural solutions or remedies. 

 I think this is wrong, or at least, is quite handicapped. We would not be fathoming enough the enormity and richness of the nature and purpose of our sorrows in life if we fail to bring in the basic inputs of our Christian faith. 

 Thus, we often exaggerate or worsen our sufferings, as we fail to know their ultimate whys and wherefores. Thus, we often would not know how to suffer them, since we merely rely on our physical, emotional or psychological stamina, or some external material resources like drugs. The spiritual and supernatural way is not resorted to. 

 Worse, we often don’t realize that our pains and sorrows in life, irrespective of their causes and effects, are a rich material for our final redemption. In fact, many people’s idea of redemption is strictly earth and time-bound. Nothing spiritual or supernatural about it! Hardly any reference to our sin is done. 

 It would be good if we adapt the attitude of our Lady of Sorrows towards our problems in life. Certainly, meditating on the passion and death of Christ in a regular way would help a lot in developing that attitude. 

 That attitude brings our understanding and experience of sorrow to another level—deeper, more comprehensive, more integrated. For example, it helps us mediate the complicated interplay of the requirements of truth and freedom, and of charity, patience, mercy on the one hand, and as strict a justice on the other, etc. 

 With faith and with our Lady of Sorrows we can take advantage of sorrows so that through them we can gain eternal life.

Why we exalt the cross

THE Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross of Christ (September 14) gives us the occasion to consider once again the importance of the cross in our life. Let’s savor some words of the readings used on that feast’s Mass. (cfr Jn 3,13-17) 

 “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life…For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.” 

 These words certainly tell us how the Cross of Christ embodies God’s love and mercy for us in spite of our undeniable wretchedness. It’s where we can deal properly with our wounded, sinful condition here on earth. 

 Yes, Christ preached. He performed miracles. But in the end, he had to offer his life on the cross because no matter what he did, our sins are such that they simply cannot be undone and forgiven through the preaching of the truths of our faith and the tremendous effects of the miracles. Christ has to offer his life on the cross! 

 We might ask, if Christ is God, why did he have to go through all that suffering and death? Why not just say, “Everything is now all right, guys.” As God, nothing is impossible with him. With the movement of his will, with a flick of his hand, everything would be as it should be. 

 Be that as it may, the fact is that Christ chose the way the Father wanted it. “Not my will, but yours be done,” Christ said. (Lk 22,42) And I imagine the reason behind this is because God respects our human nature as it is, as it has been created by him, capable of loving and hating, and also capable of being faithful and unfaithful and faithful again after some conversion. 

 The return to fidelity, given our nature, will unavoidably involve suffering and death which Christ took to himself. It shows us the way of how to go about these consequences of our sins. 

 That is why, it’s always recommendable to meditate often on the passion, death and resurrection of Christ, so we would learn to have some healthy abhorrence against sin and temptations, as well as to develop the capacity to suffer calmly with Christ to make up for our unavoidable sins. 

 This is the purpose of the cross in our life. It is to instil in us the proper attitude and virtues with respect to our sin, before it is committed and also after it is committed. It’s in the Cross of Christ where we can find divine mercy and the fullness of our redemption. 

 It might be useful to repeat in our mind, heart and lips that reassuring psalm of God’s mercy and the fullness of our redemption (Ps 130,7), so that we would always be motivated by God’s love in all our earthly affairs, especially when we encounter difficulties, setbacks, failures, and even temptations and sin. 

 That would surely enliven our faith and keep us united with God in all the events of our day. We should have no doubt whatsoever that on the part of God, everything is already given to us so we can be what we ought to be—children of God, sharers of God’s life. Any doubt in this regard can only come from the devil.

Taking care of our faith

“When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him and, turning, said to the crowd following him, ‘I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.’” 

 This was the reaction of Christ when a centurion who asked for a cure of his sick servant told him not to bother to go to his house. It was enough for him to say the word, and he believed that his servant would be cured. (cfr. Lk 7,1-10) 

 The centurion explained that he himself has authority over his men, and whatever he told them, his word would always be followed. He applied this understanding of the power of authority, based on his faith in Christ, to his request to Christ for the cure of his servant. 

 This gospel episode clearly reminds us that we truly have to take care of our faith, because if that faith is strong and vibrant, nothing would be impossible, as Christ himself has assured us. 

 We need to understand that as the very beginning of our life with God, our life in the Spirit which is a supernatural life more than just a natural life, our Christian faith has to be taken care of, nourished and developed to full maturity. 

 We need to be more aware of this duty and develop the appropriate attitude and skill to carry out this responsibility effectively. We have to go beyond mere good intentions or being merely theoretical in order to be truly practical and vitally engaged with this obligation. 

 Faith is a tremendous gift from God who starts to share with us what he has, what he knows about himself and about ourselves. It gives us the global picture of reality, covering both the temporal and the eternal, the material and the spiritual, the natural and supernatural dimensions of our life. 

 It is what gives permanent value to our passing concerns, the ultimate, constant and unifying standard to all the variables of our life. The perishable things of life can attain an imperishable quality when infused with faith. What is merely earthly and mundane can have a sanctifying effect when done with faith. 

 By its very dynamics, it fuels our hope and prepares us for a life of charity which is how our life ought to be. It is also nourished and is the effect of charity, indicating to us that faith is organically united to charity, the very essence of God in whose image and likeness we are. 

 It is faith that lets us enter into the spiritual and supernatural world. It brings us to share in God’s wisdom and power. Remember those stirring words of Christ: “If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, Remove from there, and it shall remove, and nothing shall be impossible to you.” ((Mt 17,20) 

 Without faith, in spite of our keenest intelligence, we will miss much of the more important aspects of our life as we would only be restricted to the here and now, the material and the temporal. 

 Especially in our special needs and persistent human miseries, we need to follow the example of the centurion, and the many men and women, the blind, the lame, the deaf, the sick, etc., who did all to get close to Christ and to beg. Some even had to climb to the roof and cut a portion there to be able to be near Christ. 

 Let’s take care of our Christian faith! It’s on its wings that we can soar to heaven.

What becoming Christ-like ultimately involves

TO be truly Christian, we have to see to it that we are becoming more and more “alter Christus,” another Christ. That may sound impossible, and, indeed, it is, if we are to rely only on our human powers. But Christ has given us all the means that would make that condition possible and effectively achievable. 

 We just have to do our part, always activating our faith, which means that we should try our best to know Christ more and more, meditating on his life, teachings and example, and availing of all the means that the Church are providing us these days. 

 We also just have to realize that to be “alter Christus” would ultimately involve having to go through, or at least to have a share in some form, in the very passion and death of Christ, so that we can also share in his resurrection, in his victory over sin and death. 

 The connection between becoming Christ-like and suffering and death is somehow illustrated in that gospel episode where Christ asked his disciples who did the people think he was. Later on, when the correct answer was given by St. Peter, he proceeded to tell them about his impending passion and death. (cfr. Mk 8,27-35) 

 We should get what Christ was trying to tell us in this gospel episode. If we want to follow him and to become like him, sharing his very spirit that is intended for us by God, our Creator, we have to learn and even to welcome and love suffering. It’s in suffering that the fullness of love which is the very spirit of Christ is attained. 

 We have to understand this very well. Unless we love the cross, we can never say that we are loving enough. Of course, we have to qualify that assertion. It’s when we love the cross the way God wills it—the way Christ loves it—that we can really say that we are loving as we should, or loving with the fullness of love. 

 We have to be wary of our tendency to limit our loving to ways and forms that give us some benefits alone, be it material, moral or spiritual. While they are also a form of love, they are not yet the fullness of love. 

 They somehow are forms of love that have traces of self-interest. They are not total self-giving, completely rid of self-interest, which is what true love is. And if they are not corrected, if they are not oriented towards the fullness of love, they can occasion a lot of danger and worse anomalies. 

 Loving the cross the way Christ loved it is the ultimate of love. It is the love that is completely deprived of selfishness. It is total self-giving, full of self-abnegation. St. Paul described this kind of love in Christ when he said: 

 “Though he was in the form of God, Jesus did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” (Phil 2,6-8) 

 The cross, which is the symbol of all our sinfulness and the death that is the consequence of our sin, has not led God to hate us and to condemn us forever. Rather, it has moved God to love us with a love greater than that of creating us to be his image and likeness.

Seeing through the eyes of Christ

WE need to realize that we can only see things properly and understand them properly as well when we know how to see things through the eyes of Christ. This can be lesson we can derive from that gospel episode where Christ said, “Can a blind person guide a blind person? Will not both fall into a pit?” (cfr. Lk 6,39-42) 

 And indicating how not to be a blind guide, he said, “No disciple is superior to the teacher, but when fully trained, every disciple will be like his teacher.” These words obviously tell us that we have to refer to Christ, our ultimate teacher, to be able to see and understand things properly. 

 Unless we see things through Christ who said that he is the light of the world (cfr Jn 9), we actually cannot see things as they ought to be seen. If we simply rely on our senses and even on our intelligence, but without Christ through the exercise of our faith, we actually are blind. This we have to acknowledge. 

 We need to be more aware of this predicament of ours and start to develop and use the appropriate means to correct, if not avoid, that delicate situation. We need to be humble and to always feel the need to be with God even in our most intimate thoughts, let alone, our words, deeds and public interventions. 

 There is actually no other way to correctly and properly understand and react to things and events in our life. We have to be wary of our tendency to rely solely on our human estimations of things, quite independent, if not contrary to the way God understands them. 

 In fact, not only should we be guarded against this tendency. Rather, we should also actively fight it, converting it into what is our proper way of thinking, judging and reasoning. And that is to do all these spiritual operations with God as the main guide and inspiration. The story of the man born blind (cfr. Jn 9) validates this point. 

 We have to be most careful when because perhaps of our education, our experience, our position, among other things, we feel that we would already have enough reason to make ourselves our own standard of what is true, good and beautiful. 

 We always need to be like the man born blind, and resist the attitude of the Pharisees mentioned in the gospel. That’s simply because it’s when we acknowledge our blindness, deficiency and inadequacy to tackle our temporal affairs that we attract God’s grace, his light, his wisdom, his strength. 

 We need to be more aware that nowadays there is a strong tendency to base our knowledge of things mainly on the material and sensible realities alone, let alone, the many social phenomena that can be interpreted in any which way, depending on one’s spirit. That’s why we have these disturbing phenomena of materialism, commercialism and socialism comprising our mainstream world of knowledge and understanding. 

 We have to correct this tendency because that simply is not the whole of reality. Our senses can only have a limited view of things. And what is worse, that limited condition is aggravated by the effects and consequences of our sins that not only limit but also distort reality. 

 We need to do everything to acquire the spirit of Christ so that we can see things the way he sees them.

Want to be truly like Christ?

IT’S a question we have to ask ourselves constantly, because after all is said and done, to be like Christ is the ultimate purpose of our existence, which is not only a matter of our life here on earth but also and most importantly, of our life hereafter. 

 We should try to find the right answer to that question. And one idea, one truth that can provide us with that right answer is to be able to love our enemies as Christ himself told us, nay, commanded us so. (cfr. Lk 6,27-38) To me, this is the ultimate proof of our being truly like Christ. 

 We need to prepare ourselves to follow this commandment expressly articulated by Christ. We have to have a strong faith to trust his words, so that we would not consider them as a mere bluff, an empty puffy rhetoric, but rather as what is true, proper and ideal for us. 

 We have to have a strong faith to trust his words, so that we would readily understand that they are meant for all of us, and not just for some, and that they are necessary and obligatory, and not merely optional, though they have to be taken up freely, and not coercively. 

 Let’s listen again to what he said: (Lk 6,27-38) 

 “To you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic.” 

 He continued: “Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you. For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them.” 

 If we are God’s image and likeness, if we are his children through Christ in the Holy Spirit, and therefore meant to adopt his mind, his will and his ways, and ultimately to enter into the very life of God, then we have no other alternative but to make this explicit injunction second nature to us. 

 Obviously we cannot follow this principle on our own, relying solely on our own powers. We need God himself to enable us to do so. And he has given us that power through his grace which he gives us in abundance through his living word, through his sacraments, through his Church, and in many other mysterious ways unknown to us. 

 With our enemies, our attitude should be to offer clarification, help and ultimately forgiveness. Christ offered clarification as to what is right and wrong, good and evil. He also offered help by being willing to make sacrifices for them all the way to offering his life on the cross. Ultimately, he offered forgiveness. 

 Christ wants us to be forgiving always as he himself has been and will always be forgiving to all of us. Even if some offenders of ours have not yet asked forgiveness from us, like Christ just before he died on the cross, we should offer forgiveness to them. We have to remember that we can only be forgiven of our sins if we also forgive others of theirs.

Let’s be close to Mary and Joseph

THE feast of the Nativity of Our Lady (September 8) reminds us that we should be close to both Mary and Joseph since they can serve as the surest guide for us to be with Christ. And to be with Christ is, in the end, what is most important in our life. 

 In the gospel of that feast (cfr. Mt 1,18-23), we are reminded of how both Mary and Joseph handled their divine vocation, something that if looked upon only with human eyes, can never be understood. Both show us how to correspond to the supernatural interventions that God continues to make on us, making use even of dreams to relay his messages to us. 

 We have to find a way to be intimately close to Our Lady, our Mother. We need to learn how to read her mind and catch the slightest insinuations she makes, because all these are a tremendous help in our spiritual life. 

 That’s precisely because with all the bombardment of things we are subjected to these days, Mary, the Mother of Christ who gave her to us to be our mother too, shows us how to be spiritual and supernatural in the midst of our glutting human affairs. 

 Let’s remember that the present mad race to technological progress can stimulate us wrongly, pressuring us to succumb to mindless activism and to drift to uncharted territory guided only by ignorance, confusion if not outright error. 

 In this way, she shows us how to live our life to the full, not reduced to the purely earthly and material levels. She shows us how to fall in love properly, since love is why we have been created, the principle that gives meaning and direction to our life. And to think that there are endless bogus versions of love! 

 Let’s also be close to Joseph who knew how to give priority to the supernatural interventions in his life over his natural and human understanding of things. Even if those divine interventions were communicated to him in dreams, he knew how to correspond to them properly, that is, with deep faith in God that enabled him to correspond with dispatch and wisdom. 

 If we are truly close to God, dreams can be an effective vehicle to know God’s will and ways. Yes, it is possible that God, angels and saints can enter into our dreams. We can be divinely inspired. Everything is possible with God. 

 But let’s remember that what we usually dream about are what we have in our mind and heart, in our spiritual life, whether there is faith or unbelief, whether we tend more to our rationality or to our animality, whether we are more open to the supernatural or to the infranatural. In short, our dreams reflect the kind of life we have, the kind of person we are. 

 The dreams these trying times of the Covid pandemic are occasioning, can serve as some kind of catalyst to show the kind of life we have and the kind of person we are. 

 And mind you, it is not only the state of mental health or psychological condition that is reflected in these dreams. It is also the kind of spiritual and supernatural life one is having. Thus, our dreams can show whether we are dominated more by fear or by hope. 

 Let’s be close to Mary and Joseph to know how to deal with God’s interventions in our life.

How our attitude toward prayer should be

OF course, our attitude toward prayer should be patterned after the example of Christ who, in spite of the very hectic schedule he had to follow, always found time and the proper place to do his prayer. 

 This point can be illustrated in that gospel episode where Christ “departed to the mountain to pray and spent the night in prayer to God.” It was only after praying that Christ chose 12 apostles from among his disciples and went down to continue with his work of preaching and healing. (cfr. Lk 6,12-19) 

 This gospel episode should somehow tell us that we too should always give priority to prayer no matter how busy we are with our earthly concerns, because only then can we make truly important decisions in our life and follow the will and ways of God, and even share his very own powers. 

 We have to understand that it’s when we pray, that is, when we truly pray and not just going through the motions of praying, that we would be engaging and uniting ourselves with the most important person in our life, God himself. He is absolutely our everything, without whom nothing and no one has any importance. 

 It’s when we pray that we manage to relate who we are, what we have, what we do, etc. to our ultimate end which, to be sure, is not something only natural but is also supernatural. Nothing therefore can rival the importance of prayer. In other words, prayer is irreplaceable, unsubstitutable, indispensable. It’s never optional, though it has to be done freely if we want our prayer to be real prayer. 

 When we pray, we are actually assuming the very mind and heart of Christ who is the personification of prayer himself. His life was fully offered to the Father, spending it entirely in obeying the will of the Father who wants us to return to him, since we are his image and likeness that was damaged by our sin. 

 In other words, we can say that we are truly praying when we would have the same sentiments of Christ. His desires, his mission, his ways of doing things, especially in loving everyone, including the enemies, his willingness to bear all our sins through his suffering and death, would also be ours. 

 So, if we want to be truly in love and to keep that love burning, we need to be authentic persons of prayer. We need to be like Christ, to be “alter Christus” (another Christ) if not “ipse Christus” (Christ himself). And that is not a fantastic, baseless assertion, because that is what is truly meant for us. There is no other formula for love. 

 If we really have a good prayer, one where we truly have an intimate encounter with God, we for sure would come out of it burning with zeal for love and concern for the others. Somehow we would catch the fire behind these words of Christ: “I have come to bring fire on the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!” (Lk 12,49) 

 Yes, real prayer has that effect. If, on the contrary, we come out of it just thinking of our own selves, or worse, feeling low and dry, then we are not actually praying. Prayer will always sharpen our mindfulness and thoughtfulness of the others.

Oh, those fault-finders, negative thinkers, etc.

LET’S be wary of our tendency to be fault-finders, negative thinkers, incorrigible critics, etc. This tendency usually springs from a brand of righteousness that is not properly rooted on the real source of righteousness who can only be God, as shown to us by Christ and inspired in us by the Holy Spirit. It is more self-righteousness. 

 This tendency was graphically illustrated in that gospel episode where some Jews went to watch Christ preaching, more to find something to accuse him of. (cfr. Lk 6,6-11) Christ, of course, knowing their intentions, asked a man with a withered hand to stand up and asked, “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” 

 Well, we know what happened next. And these Jews still scrambled to find ways of how to trap Christ. Their self-righteousness was so strong and deep that in spite of the obvious divine power shown by Christ, they still could not believe him. They even became more intense in their suspicions of Christ. 

 We have to be most wary of this spiritual anomaly that can come to us anytime. It usually takes advantage of our natural inclination to seek the truth, the good and the beautiful in life—in short, what is right—and corrupts that inclination because it is not properly rooted on the ultimate source of righteousness who is God himself. It’s so blinding that it can even assume the appearance of holiness. 

 Most prone to this illness are those with some special endowments in life, be it intelligence, talents, wealth, fame, power, health, beauty, etc. When all these gifts are not clearly grounded and oriented toward God, the source of all righteousness, the problem starts. 

 This is the irony of ironies because one can earnestly pursue the path of holiness and does practically everything to be good and holy, and yet ends up the opposite of what is intended. That’s when one practically has the trappings of goodness and holiness and yet misses the real root of righteousness who is God. 

 To deal with this tendency properly, we have to see to it that in whatever we do, we should always have purity of intention. And that can only happen when everything we do, from our thoughts, desires to our words and deeds, is done for the glory of God and for none other. 

 We need to actively purify our intentions, since we have to contend with many spoilers in this regard these days. In fact, we just have to look around and see how openly opposed many people are of directing their intentions to God. 

 Our intentions should only have at their core the love of God, the giving glory to God. As St. Paul once indicated, “Whether you eat or drink, or whatsoever else you do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Cor 10,31) That’s how our acts become good, or moral. Otherwise, they are bad, or at least dangerous. 

 This is so, since God, being the Creator, is the standard for everything. And more than the standard, he is, in fact, the very substance of what is good, true and beautiful, what is fair and just, what is perfection itself. 

 Christ himself said it quite clearly: “Where your treasure is, there is your heart also.” (Mt 6,21) We need to ground our heart firmly on God, filling it with love and goodness even if heroic efforts are needed.