Christ wants to be born in us

YES, Christ wants to be born in us. That, in a nutshell,
is the meaning of Christmas. All the festivities and merrymaking
associated with this day should point us to this truth. We have to
correspond to it and act on it as best as we can.

            Let’s hope that the beautiful decorations we have
everywhere, especially the Christmas crèche, Christmas tree, lanterns,
the Santa Clauses, etc., lead us to this realization, instead of being
distractions or, worse, a sweet poison to our soul.

            Let’s hope that when we look at the Child Jesus in the
belen, we get moved to thank him for wanting to be born in us, and to
promise him that we will do our part to welcome and receive him in the
best way we can.

            Christ wants to be born in us because he is our savior who
comes to re-make us after we have fallen into sin. Let’s remember that
we are children of God, made in his image and likeness.

            Christ is the Son of God, the second person of the Blessed
Trinity, who is the very pattern of our humanity. What we are supposed
to be can only be known if we closely look at him and follow him. It’s
no exaggeration to say that how he is, is also how we ought to be.

            Since we fell into sin, leaving our nature deformed and
wounded, this Son of God had to “re-do” us. For this, the Son of God
had to become man to identify himself with each one of us, assuming
all our sinfulness and dying to them only to win over sin and death
with his resurrection.

            Christ wants to be born in us so he can start and continue
with his work of redemption which takes place in the whole span of our
earthly life. He wants to grow and live with us, experience what we
experience so he can guide us.

            But do we welcome him? Are we willing to have Christ in
us, to work in us and with us? Do we actively cooperate in his
redemptive work in us? Are we willing to be another Christ, “alter
Christus,” as we ought to be, so we can recover and enrich the dignity
God intended for us?

            We should consider these questions very seriously and
deploy all our resources to come up with the appropriate answers,
roadmaps, and action plans.

            We have to convince ourselves that it is very doable for
us to allow Christ to be born in us. This is no fantasy. On the part
of God, he is already giving us everything that we need for this
wonderful divine will for us to be carried out.

            On our part, it is also very doable, because all we have
to do is to be open to this divine will and act on it as best as we
can. Christ can be born in us by allowing him to enter first into our
mind and heart which are the proper places for him to be with us.

            Let us get our mind and heart to be engaged with him,
knowing him more, increasingly developing the ability to know his will
and ways, being docile to his promptings that we can discern in our
consciences.

            When we acquire a certain intimacy with him, we can start
to feel his love, his goodness and affections, his mercy and
compassion that will always fill us with joy and a deep sense of
confidence proper of the conviction that we are truly children of God.

            When we see Christ as a child, let us also feel loved by
God as the infant Jesus is loved by the Father, and by Mary and
Joseph, and the hosts of angels, the shepherds, the magi, etc.

            We need to feel loved by God and by others because only
then can we be able to love God and others in return, especially when
we will be experiencing different trials, difficulties, crises, etc.
in the later part of our life.

            We cannot give what we do not have. And we cannot have
anything that we have not received from the ultimate source and giver
of all good things—God in Christ through the Holy Spirit.

            And so we just have to receive Christ, allowing him no
less than to be born in us, because that is what he wants. And let’s
follow him, without fear, all the way to his death and resurrection.
Yes, there’s suffering, but there’s also victory.

            Merry Christmas to one and all!

The “no-perfect” excuse

ALL of a sudden, we are nowadays hearing a lot of people
invoking the “no-perfect” alibi to rationalize their views. There’s no
perfect father, no perfect mother, no perfect child, no perfect
family, no perfect etcetera.

            And now that we are getting into the usually hot political
season, we are also hearing such excuses as no perfect politician, no
perfect candidate. And from there, people pontificate or dogmatize
their political preferences and opinions.

            While that excuse has a certain validity, we have to
remember that it comes with a lot of other things that need also to be
considered seriously, like instructions, contraindications,
alternative options, and many other opinions.

            While it’s true that we have to make do with whatever we
have or whatever is available, that is, a wonderful call for patience
and understanding, it does not mean that we won’t make the effort to
look for better options or some improvement of the situation.

            In other words, that excuse should not be made to stop in
itself, making one fully contented with a certain status quo. It has
to contend with what are the views of others, let alone, the standard
and criteria of what is considered as the ideal. We need to keep on
trying to polish our understanding of things and improve on our
performance.

            What can worsen this “no-perfect” excuse is when people
use it to dogmatize their positions and demonize those of the others
who disagree with them. Sad to say, this is what is happening these
days in the political scene.

            We hear reasonings like “better a killer than a criminal,”
“better a curser than a robber,” etc. At the very least, these
reasonings make the gravity of the different evils subject only to the
opinions and consensus of people, a product of the I’m-ok-you’re-ok
mentality. There’s no more objective basis.

            Murder can have equal weight as stealing, or can even be
considered as the lesser evil, when in fact the former does not admit
of parvity of matter, (meaning it is always grave), while the latter
does, (meaning it may or may not be grave).

            I know that in heated political discussions where passions
run high and a lot of bashings and mudslingings are done,
considerations like this get lost. But it’s important that we give due
attention to these important points, otherwise we will be setting
ourselves for a graver problem and crisis later on.

            Knowing how political systems work, what is usually done
at the top, whether right or wrong, moral or immoral, somehow filters
down to the lower rungs until it becomes part of the system. If the
leader is honest, most likely, the followers will also be honest. If
the leader is a murderer and flaunts it, most likely the followers
will also be the same.

            Thus, we have to consider whether murders and illegal
executions of perceived wrongdoers that become part of our system are
a lesser evil compared to some systematized corruption. Of course, we
have bad options to choose from, but just the same we have to be
careful that we don’t jump from the frying pan into the fire.

            This is where we have to use the “no-perfect” excuse
prudently. We cannot help but to make do with some forms of evil. But
we have to make sure which evil is lesser and more tolerable. And in
an unavoidable evil, we also have to make sure that our cooperation in
it would at least be passive, not active, and with firm intention to
correct it.

            We have to distinguish between what is already a formal
and active cooperation of an evil, which means that one knowingly and
freely participates in the evil, and what is mere material and passive
toleration of evil, since he cannot avoid it, at least, for the
moment.

            Formal cooperation is always sinful and should be avoided.
Material cooperation may be tolerated, but under certain conditions
and precautions. Among these conditions are:

(1)  The cooperating act must be, in itself, good or at least
indifferent morally. 

(2) The intention of the one cooperating should be good. (3) There must be
a just cause. (4) And the good effect desired in that cooperation
should not be the consequence of the bad effect.

            To be realistic with the way our political life is, we
need to be clear and firm with these moral principles. For this, we
need to intensify our prayers, have recourse to the sacraments, deepen
our doctrinal formation and develop virtues.

            We should always try, in whatever way we can, to transform
evil into good.

Hooking up

I KNOW that the expression, “to hook up,” now has acquired
a bad connotation. The all too liberal and permissive atmosphere of
many Western countries has turned what otherwise is a good expression
into something bad and awful.

            But I would like to recover its original dignity and refer
it more to that delicate task we, priests, do, especially when we hear
confessions and give spiritual direction. For us, to hook up is to
know how to enter into the mind and heart of the persons concerned so
we can guide them properly.

            It’s a very challenging duty. There are many things to
consider and to contend with. In the first place, all kinds of people
come. There are those the priest can have some easy, natural affinity.
But there are those who are so different and difficult for one reason
or another.

            A priest truly has to learn how to listen well, how to
empathize, how to win the person’s confidence. Yes, one has to be a
friend and even a father to the penitent. But he should also be a
judge and a doctor, since there obviously will be judgments and
decisions to make, as well as illnesses to cure and unhealthy
conditions to take care of.

            For all this to happen, a lot of things have to be done.
One really has to be genuinely interested in others. He has to learn
to discipline his own biases and preferences if only to accommodate
everyone.

            He should learn the art of quickly and correctly reading
the minds and hearts of the people. This will take a lot of training.
He has to know where people are coming from spiritually and morally in
order to put his pieces of advice in context. So, the gift of
discernment is very much needed here. He should be very sensitive and
attentive to the different nuances of people’s spiritual and moral
conditions.

            More than all these, he has to love them truly, which can
only mean that he has to burn with the love of God which is the only
genuine kind of love that can handle everything and everyone.

            It’s the love that can make one be all things to all men,
as shown by God himself who became man and ultimately assumed all the
sinfulness of men by dying on the cross. He is the very standard of
empathy and compassion, justice and mercy.

            As St. Paul said, Christ himself was even made like sin to
save all of us. “For our sake he (God) made him (Christ) to be sin who
knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
(2 Cor 5,21)

            In other words, the priest should be willing to get dirty
with the people without getting dirty in what really matters. He
should not be scandalized by anything that will be presented to him.
Of course, this is only possible if one is truly identified with the
suffering Christ.

            From here we can deduce that the priest has to wage a
continuing and severe ascetical struggle himself, knowing that he also
has to his weaknesses and other issues that he has to resolve himself.
He also has to feel the need for repentance and forgiveness.

            To the extent that he sincerely struggles in his own
spiritual and moral life would he be effective in helping others in
their own spiritual and moral struggles. He will understand them and
know how to help them, in the tenor expressed by the Letter to the
Hebrews: “He can deal gently with the ignorant and the wayward, since
he himself is beset with weakness.” (5,2)

            But all these considerations about mercy and charity
should not detract from our need to meet all the requirements of truth
and justice. A priest should know also how to inspire people truly
repent their sins, recognizing the gravity of their sins and the need
for atonement and reparation.

            A priest would be distorting the true face of divine mercy
if he neglects the importance of truth and divine justice. As
mentioned earlier, a priest is not only a friend and a father, ever
gentle and compassionate, slow to anger and quick to forgive. He
should be a judge that renders good judgments and also a doctor who
has to perform sometimes painful interventions.

            So, a priest has to be an expert in the doctrinal side of
the spiritual and moral life of people. This should be a permanent
object of the priest’s ongoing formation.

            It is in these that the priest can truly hook up with the people.