WE are now a world of extremely increasing fluidity. We are now a dizzying, warp-speed flux of intergenerational and intercultural tension. The latest and random sign, as far as I am concerned, is that we have such phenomenon as Justin Bieber, a piece of boy whose singing prowess has mesmerized the kids, which I understand but cannot explain why.
There are far more serious cases of gaps and divides among different age groups, social classes, etc., elsewhere. Niches are multiplying with such velocity and classification that, frankly, I believe we are losing our sense of unity and solidarity among ourselves.
It seems that now we are left on our own with hardly any sense of common good that we should all pursue together. That maybe an exaggerated statement. Yes, we can have an idea of common good, but it´s an idea that is increasingly individualistic.
And that´s the reason why I think it is necessary to revisit basic truths about ourselves. Among these fundamentals is that we are creatures. We did not come to exist simply on our own, in a spontaenous way, from nowhere. We have been created, and there is a Creator, who is God.
Alas, this truth about our creation, while supported by science, is more a truth of faith than of pure human reasoning. This only shows that our life and existence embrace not only the material dimension, but also the spiritual and, in fact, the supernatural dimension. Our human sciences and reason cannot enter this level without the help of faith.
It is our Christian faith that teaches us that everything is created by God. Everything comes from him and belongs to him. Everything has been created out of love, that is, to share in the goodness of God. This is a crucial truth because, as a corollary, we need to develop the awareness that everything we are, have and do has to be related to God.
Also, that creation means there´s an order, law and purpose in everything. Things just don´t happen without a meaning, even if we have to factor in our human freedom that can go anywhere.
God´s creation of the whole universe, including us especially, is not a one-shot deal, but ends with the creatures starting to exist. It´s an ongoing, never-ending affair between God and the creatures, because what is involved in existence itself. For as long as something exists, God is always in that creature, shaping it according to the nature given it.
In our case, since we have been made in the image and likeness of God, and thus, we are persons not just something, creatures who can think and will and love, God deals with us not in an automatic way like he does with purely material creatures, but rather respecting the way we are, with our intelligence and free will.
We are supposed to correspond knowingly and willingly to God´s love for us, to his will and plans. This is how we ought to behave with God. We just cannot ignore him, nor consider him as an optional item in our life. There is a certain necessity for us to deal with him, but a necessity that is infused thoroughly with freedom and love, because we want to.
We have to arrive at that conviction, and not remain just floating around and drifting wherever the wind of passion and fashion may blow us. We have to deepen and strengthen our knowledge about the truth of our creation so we can act properly on its endless consequences.
Away with the attitude that this concern about the truth of our creation affects only a few. It affects all. It has an abiding relevance. It can never fall obsolete. In fact, we need everyday to renew our appreciation of this truth. Let´s be wary of the ideological spins distorting the truth of our creation.
Thus, discussion about this truth, especially mining its practical implications, should not be confined to specialized journals. It should be done openly, making use of the media, so that the media also can be a real tool for true human development. Otherwise, the media will just be swallowed up by prosaic, shallow realities, a danger the media faces today.
Another valuable insight is that since we are intelligent and free beings, we are therefore a moral creature capable of both good and bad things. Thus, the moral evil in this world is not outside of God´s original design for us. It´s part, and God knows how to handle it, but always with our cooperation.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
The apostles and our faith
CHRISTIAN faith is first of all a divine, supernatural gift that comes to us with God’s grace. But since it is meant for us, then it is adapted to our human condition. In fact, it also has to be humanized, to be freely taken up by us to be our own, and cared for, developed and cultivated just like anything else in our life.
And so as a divine and human affair, it is at once spiritual and moral, eternal and historical, complete and yet needing to grow, mystical and down-to-earth. We need to learn how to cruise in this kind of fluidity that characterizes our faith. We need to take up the challenge, and develop the appropriate attitudes and skills.
This is not an easy thing to do. But neither is it impossible. It’s good that precisely because of our faith, we know that the Church itself guides us on how to take care of our faith. We are not just on our own, left to our own devices. As our Catechism says, “No one can believe alone, just as no one can live alone.” (166)
And within the Church, we can find not only the Pope, the bishops and priests, who preach the faith to us, but also an array of experts in the different fields that can help us understand and live our faith better. Let´s be more aware of this reality and take advantage of it.
Part of that human and historical aspect of our faith is that it has to be apostolic. That simply means that our Christian faith has to abide by the faith of the apostles, who were the direct witnesses and first recipients of Christ’s teaching.
More than that, the apostles proved to have the right understanding of faith, as can be gleaned in that gospel episode when our Lord asked his apostles who do people think the Son of Man was.
Let’s reprise the dialogue. From Matthew 16, we have this dramatic scene, “And you,” Jesus asked the apostles, “who do you say that I am?” “You are the Messiah,” Simon Peter answered, “the Son of the living God!”
Jesus replied, “Blest are you, Simon son of John! No mere man has revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. I for my part declare to you, you are ‘Rock,’ and on this rock I will build my church, and the jaws of death shall not prevail against it.
“I will entrust to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you declare bound on earth shall be bound in heaven; whatever you declare loosed on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
It’s good that we bring to the secular press some words of the gospel, because the secular world which focuses more on our mundane, earthly and temporal affairs is always in need of God and his word.
We have to distinguish between the secular and the secularized. The latter thinks God has no place in the secular world of business, politics, etc. It considers the world as totally on its own, to be governed entirely by men with no reference to God at all. This is dangerous to us.
If we look closely at the words of the gospel quoted above, we can see that Peter’s affirmation of who Christ was, was a fruit of grace. “No mere man has revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.” The faith of Peter is the faith given by God and correctly received and affirmed by Peter.
This is the faith that is shared with the apostles and transmitted to the successors of Peter and the apostles, namely, the Popes and the bishops. This is the faith of the Church. Our personal faith has to embody the faith of the Church. Again we need to be aware of this, and the practical consequences that flow from it.
We have to study the doctrine now taught by the Church, making it flesh of our flesh so that our faith does not remain ideas and words alone but turned into life itself. We have to understand that the doctrine of our faith has the capacity to infuse in us the life of God. Let´s allow it to effect its real purpose in life.
So, we should not remain hearers only of the doctrine, but doers also, always looking first at the example of the apostles who, being very simple people, became great men and saints precisely because of their faith!
And so as a divine and human affair, it is at once spiritual and moral, eternal and historical, complete and yet needing to grow, mystical and down-to-earth. We need to learn how to cruise in this kind of fluidity that characterizes our faith. We need to take up the challenge, and develop the appropriate attitudes and skills.
This is not an easy thing to do. But neither is it impossible. It’s good that precisely because of our faith, we know that the Church itself guides us on how to take care of our faith. We are not just on our own, left to our own devices. As our Catechism says, “No one can believe alone, just as no one can live alone.” (166)
And within the Church, we can find not only the Pope, the bishops and priests, who preach the faith to us, but also an array of experts in the different fields that can help us understand and live our faith better. Let´s be more aware of this reality and take advantage of it.
Part of that human and historical aspect of our faith is that it has to be apostolic. That simply means that our Christian faith has to abide by the faith of the apostles, who were the direct witnesses and first recipients of Christ’s teaching.
More than that, the apostles proved to have the right understanding of faith, as can be gleaned in that gospel episode when our Lord asked his apostles who do people think the Son of Man was.
Let’s reprise the dialogue. From Matthew 16, we have this dramatic scene, “And you,” Jesus asked the apostles, “who do you say that I am?” “You are the Messiah,” Simon Peter answered, “the Son of the living God!”
Jesus replied, “Blest are you, Simon son of John! No mere man has revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. I for my part declare to you, you are ‘Rock,’ and on this rock I will build my church, and the jaws of death shall not prevail against it.
“I will entrust to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you declare bound on earth shall be bound in heaven; whatever you declare loosed on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
It’s good that we bring to the secular press some words of the gospel, because the secular world which focuses more on our mundane, earthly and temporal affairs is always in need of God and his word.
We have to distinguish between the secular and the secularized. The latter thinks God has no place in the secular world of business, politics, etc. It considers the world as totally on its own, to be governed entirely by men with no reference to God at all. This is dangerous to us.
If we look closely at the words of the gospel quoted above, we can see that Peter’s affirmation of who Christ was, was a fruit of grace. “No mere man has revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.” The faith of Peter is the faith given by God and correctly received and affirmed by Peter.
This is the faith that is shared with the apostles and transmitted to the successors of Peter and the apostles, namely, the Popes and the bishops. This is the faith of the Church. Our personal faith has to embody the faith of the Church. Again we need to be aware of this, and the practical consequences that flow from it.
We have to study the doctrine now taught by the Church, making it flesh of our flesh so that our faith does not remain ideas and words alone but turned into life itself. We have to understand that the doctrine of our faith has the capacity to infuse in us the life of God. Let´s allow it to effect its real purpose in life.
So, we should not remain hearers only of the doctrine, but doers also, always looking first at the example of the apostles who, being very simple people, became great men and saints precisely because of their faith!
Monday, February 21, 2011
God, sincerity and hypocrisy
IT’S about time we review this crucial relationship between God and our capacity to stick to the truth or to distort it.
Nowadays, with the plethora of data and information, we have to remind ourselves constantly that truthfulness is not a matter of simply conforming these data and pieces of information to our own designs. We need to process these raw data to leaven them with the love of God and submit them to God’s will.
To put it bluntly, we can only be in the truth when we are with God. Outside of him, let’s wish ourselves sheer luck, because the most likely thing to happen is to slip from the truth. It´s like chasing the wind. For all the excitement and advantages a Godless pursuit of truth gives, everything will just turn out to be vanity.
And so, prayer is a must. It’s what vitally, existentially unites us with God. Without it, we will just be on our own, an easy prey to our own weaknesses, let alone, the temptations around.
Very vulnerable to the temptation to distort the truth and to fall into the tricks of hypocrisy and pretension are persons endowed and favored with all sorts of talents, intelligence, position, power and who may already have attained a good level of sanctity. That’s because their situation attracts all sorts of temptations.
We have to be more aware of this phenomenon and able to handle it. Even Christ himself was tempted by the devil to deviate from his Father’s will. And the devil employed the subtlest of tricks, even quoting Scripture, to bend Christ to the devil’s will. The devil will always reserve the worst strategy to those who dare to get close to God.
Thus, those of us who try our best to follow God should not be surprised when the most “irresistible” temptations come to us not only from time to time, but even persistently. We somehow should expect this thing to happen, and be ready for it.
Cases of the most rotten clerical abuses that have emerged in recent years only lend credence to this assertion. Even among the apostles, one betrayed Christ, because in the end he was not sincere. He pursued his own game plan, not God’s will.
Let’s remember that the devil can appear to us as an angel of light. We need to be extremely discerning, a skill that is first of all a fruit of grace, then honed up by a consistent personal effort to deal with God, and to avail of all the means, like spiritual direction and confession, to put us firmly within the sphere of truth.
We should avoid giving an inch to the temptation to be insincere, because that inch in no time becomes a foot, and from there it can only grow cancerous unless drastically stopped. We really need to be savagely and brutally sincere with God, with ourselves and with others.
For this, a lot of sacrifice is needed, a lot of effort to grapple with our pride is a must. I am moved to read in the gospel about that father of the boy possessed by the deaf and dumb devil. When Christ asked him whether he had faith, he readily cried out, “I believe, Lord, but help my unbelief.” (Mk 9)
The father of the possessed boy knew he had faith, but that faith needed to grow more, for which he confessed his inability. It’s a predicament that can easily be ours, since it is common. Faith is a dynamic thing. It needs to grow. Our problem is that at a certain point we tend to say, enough.
We should always acknowledge our limitations, weakness, faults and mistakes. Recognizing them is the first step in the journey to reach the truth about ourselves and about others.
May we never be proud as to turn a blind eye to the negative elements in our life. We would lose the chance to ask for forgiveness and for grace, and to spur us to action. Sincerity requires action. It just cannot be a kind of blissful idleness in the thought we are not doing anything wrong. To be sincere always involves struggle, battle, warfare.
Let´s learn to be identify the things we need to give up in order to identify ourselves more and more with Christ, the very foundation and measure of truth and reality.
Sincerity in the end and always is a religious affair, and not just a personal, social or political concern. We need to realize this deeply.
Nowadays, with the plethora of data and information, we have to remind ourselves constantly that truthfulness is not a matter of simply conforming these data and pieces of information to our own designs. We need to process these raw data to leaven them with the love of God and submit them to God’s will.
To put it bluntly, we can only be in the truth when we are with God. Outside of him, let’s wish ourselves sheer luck, because the most likely thing to happen is to slip from the truth. It´s like chasing the wind. For all the excitement and advantages a Godless pursuit of truth gives, everything will just turn out to be vanity.
And so, prayer is a must. It’s what vitally, existentially unites us with God. Without it, we will just be on our own, an easy prey to our own weaknesses, let alone, the temptations around.
Very vulnerable to the temptation to distort the truth and to fall into the tricks of hypocrisy and pretension are persons endowed and favored with all sorts of talents, intelligence, position, power and who may already have attained a good level of sanctity. That’s because their situation attracts all sorts of temptations.
We have to be more aware of this phenomenon and able to handle it. Even Christ himself was tempted by the devil to deviate from his Father’s will. And the devil employed the subtlest of tricks, even quoting Scripture, to bend Christ to the devil’s will. The devil will always reserve the worst strategy to those who dare to get close to God.
Thus, those of us who try our best to follow God should not be surprised when the most “irresistible” temptations come to us not only from time to time, but even persistently. We somehow should expect this thing to happen, and be ready for it.
Cases of the most rotten clerical abuses that have emerged in recent years only lend credence to this assertion. Even among the apostles, one betrayed Christ, because in the end he was not sincere. He pursued his own game plan, not God’s will.
Let’s remember that the devil can appear to us as an angel of light. We need to be extremely discerning, a skill that is first of all a fruit of grace, then honed up by a consistent personal effort to deal with God, and to avail of all the means, like spiritual direction and confession, to put us firmly within the sphere of truth.
We should avoid giving an inch to the temptation to be insincere, because that inch in no time becomes a foot, and from there it can only grow cancerous unless drastically stopped. We really need to be savagely and brutally sincere with God, with ourselves and with others.
For this, a lot of sacrifice is needed, a lot of effort to grapple with our pride is a must. I am moved to read in the gospel about that father of the boy possessed by the deaf and dumb devil. When Christ asked him whether he had faith, he readily cried out, “I believe, Lord, but help my unbelief.” (Mk 9)
The father of the possessed boy knew he had faith, but that faith needed to grow more, for which he confessed his inability. It’s a predicament that can easily be ours, since it is common. Faith is a dynamic thing. It needs to grow. Our problem is that at a certain point we tend to say, enough.
We should always acknowledge our limitations, weakness, faults and mistakes. Recognizing them is the first step in the journey to reach the truth about ourselves and about others.
May we never be proud as to turn a blind eye to the negative elements in our life. We would lose the chance to ask for forgiveness and for grace, and to spur us to action. Sincerity requires action. It just cannot be a kind of blissful idleness in the thought we are not doing anything wrong. To be sincere always involves struggle, battle, warfare.
Let´s learn to be identify the things we need to give up in order to identify ourselves more and more with Christ, the very foundation and measure of truth and reality.
Sincerity in the end and always is a religious affair, and not just a personal, social or political concern. We need to realize this deeply.
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