Setting our Eyes on the Ideal

Reflection: 27th Sunday in OT

We find ourselves living in a time where societies and communities become fragmented, where institutions become divided, where relationships are broken up. We say that the family is the basic unit of a society, and within that basic unit, there we find the paradoxical unity of husband and wife; two persons united in matrimony, united in life, and united in their aspirations for their children. However, nowadays, we are noticing certain trends in thinking that break up the very core, the very identity of what we take as the basic unit of society. There is the growing phenomenon of single-parenthood; the phenomenon of co-habitation especially among the young adults; the dwindling population of the younger generation; the so-called “gay rights movement” that demand for equal opportunity in the society, not just in the work place, but also in the institution of married life. And what’s going to be next? Gay couples seeking adoption of children to somehow realize in their partnership the least semblance of a family.

The gospel and the first reading point directly to the issue of marriage and divorce, a thorny issue both at the time of Jesus and even in our times. Decisions have been made, compromises have been upheld, and sometimes made standard. In effect, the face of the reality of married life has been a sea of change, yet despite the makeovers to please a certain segment of the society, if not conform to prevailing ideologies, the ideals remain the same. This is the point of Jesus’ discourse. The Pharisees were intent to pit the teachings of Jesus against the prescriptions handed down by Moses. They raised a prickly question, and Christ responded. Not to contradict the Mosaic prescription, but to point to the Pharisees where their eyes should be gazing: the ideal to which rules and codes of conduct are mere humble stewards that accomplish and err at the same time.

We no longer live in a society where the teachings of the Church hold certain predominance, particularly those that fall short of the immediate concerns of religion. Despite this shortfall, one can still aim at what is morally good, if not religiously good. We need to be conscious of the law of gradation. The prescription of divorce by Moses was good considering the circumstances of the people themselves: it was because of their “hardness of heart” that such a prescription was made. That was a good solution, perhaps even the best considering the characters of the persons involved during that time. However, such a prescription remains a servant to the ideal to which we need to set our eyes on. The Pharisees erred not because they were obedient to the precepts of Moses. Being leaders of their religion, their error was the failure to point to people, to lay bare to the people the ideals which are God’s ordinances. They have fallen into the pitfall of lazy contentment, the entropy of idealism, the sedimentation of aspirations. Christ wasn’t happy with the realities that confronted him during his time, nor should we be content with the compromises of own time. Following Christ, we need to lay bare to other people the divine destiny that God has personally shaped for each of us; we need point to them the ideals that nudge us continuously lest we fall into the lethargy of contentment. We have to help others set their eyes on the ideals, at least from time to time.

Prayer Reflection: Fidelity is Fecundity

Today in Rome, we are celebrating the beatification of Charles de Foucauld (1858-1916). A solitary man who sought God, replied to the voice of God calling him to be in the wilderness. His life was transformed by His grace. My Jesus, allow me your grace to transform my life also. Let me hear your voice more clearly amidst the noises I hear, day in and day out. Just a while ago, before I went here in the chapel of St. Emerentienne, as I was leaving my room, I noticed that the lights in the toilet were turned on. I felt that pull in me that, to conserve energy I should turn them off, but this bad habit of rationalizing to excuse myself started again. I started thinking that probably someone was inside. But your voice told me to better check it because if there's no one, it's a huge waste of electricity. Plus, it definitely won't cost me much time to check. And so I did. I checked and found that none was there. Lord Jesus, even in small things I see clearly how you always make an effort to guide me. If such be your designs in small things, there is nothing by which I could even think that in big responsibilities, you do not guide my life. The problem really is that I fail to turn an attentive ear to your voice. And even if sometimes I hear your voice, this habitual mechanism of rationalizing to excuse myself commences. And so, another opportunity to conform my will to yours passes unproductively. Allow me not only the grace to hear your voice, but likewise, transform my heart so that it will only seek that which you wish. Allow my pleasure to be your pleasure. Transform me inwardly, from within, by your presence within me.

Today's gospel reading (Mt 25, 14-30) is about the time of reckoning, that at the close of the day, we present ourselves before our friend Jesus and offer to him the fruits of our labors. And he desires that at the end of the day, we have become productive. Not simply for the sake of being productive, but that whatever God had given us, we have made good use of them, and everything put to good use multiplies abundantly. God calls us to be faithful to him, be vigilant for his coming, but it is not a passive vigilance, or a barren fidelity. To be attached to Jesus is to be attached to a trunk of profound productivity; that as a branch to this tree, we cannot but bear fruit, for this trunk is teeming with the natality of grace that exceeds passivity and inaction. Fidelity is fecundity. We cannot remain barren in Jesus who is life. Blessed Charles de Foucauld stove to remain faithful to God, and behold, we are reaping the bountiful fruit of his fidelity--by the hundred fold.

Universal Need for Solitude

I've just started with this blog to start sharing reflections on contemporary people's increasing need for solitude. It is not so much a form of simply being alone from the sometimes imposing and constricting presence of other people, be they be friends or foe, but something much deeper than a simple sense of wanting to be a alone. The solitude of which Bethel speaks is not an escape, but a response to a singular call to be with someone--God. The solitude that Christian tradition speaks of is precisely this, that God lovingly calls us to be with him, to be alone with him.

The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all they had done and taught. And he said to them, "Come away to some lonely place all by yourselves and rest for a while" (Mk. 6: 30-31a).

The practice of spending moments of prayer and silence has been part of the tradition in the Church since her very beginning. From the time when Jesus welcomed back his disciples after sending them on a mission; to the time when St. Anthony of Egypt (c. 251- 356 AD) received the divine call to go to the desert, initiating the hermitic tradition in Christianity; to the formation of monasteries and secluded convents (c. 6th century); up to the present generation, solitude has been the backbone of the spiritual legacy of the Church. The Old Testament narrates of countless instances of “going to the desert” to pray and encounter Yahweh. But the singular model for us remains the solitary figure of Jesus who goes “to the mountain to pray, spending the night in communion with God” (Lk. 6: 12).

To enter into solitude is not a thing that we make when we are already tired and we wish only to rest and be left alone. To enter into solitude is to respond to a call of God who loves us and wants to be with us: “I will lead her into the wilderness: and I will speak to her heart” (Hosea 2: 14).