THE LOCAL AND THE GLOBAL

The Local and the Global

            Across the vast expanse of time and history the great Jubilee confronts us with the brevity of individual lives, the little space we have for deciding what we want for ourselves and for others. Every priest and trainee priest is interested here in terms of the best use of time that he has for making a difference. Alertness and perception are imperative in this endeavour, instead of waiting for the wind of fortune to blow at our backs. Measured  against those thousands of years of history and of the unlived days of the future, the duration of our lives may seem pitifully short. But Christ’s life was also short  -  and shorter still his public ministry.  Yet despite having lived in an era that could not boast of TV and Email, he dominates two thousand years of history.  Why is this ?  The secret lies in his ability to convey to the men and women of all ages the integrity of his message that truly sustains, transforms and elevates. And no matter how much his name was abused to justify futile expeditions and evil wars, nothing could obliterate his one simple truth, that we are loved by God who personally invests himself in his creation and that we must love one another for him.

            The task of today’s priest is continuous with this secret, or call it “mystery”, in the criss-crossing of cultures and that awesome phenomenon called globalization with which he must engage if his reading of the signs of the times is correct.  In the 1970s and 1980s we were increasingly occupied with the notions of culture and inculturation, realising how different local cultures were from one another and how that affects the Church and the practice of theology. But concomitant with the resurgence and revaluing of cultures long suppressed by colonialism and imperialism has been the phenomenon of increased global interdependence and cultural interlacing, giving rise to something akin to a global culture in art and theology. How much this is to be resisted and how much domesticated will be the dialectic, hopefully fruitful, in which the bishops, priests and proactive lay persons must engage if they desire to keep the sustaining mystery of Christ within the world process. The dialectic of the local and the global, the particular in the ensemble, is a basic hermeneutic of the Christian mystery today.

Freedom and Theology

When one sees more deeply into Christ, is one looking into a mirror merely reflecting one's own deepest feelings? The answer must be that the Church has the mission of determining what is only the projection of subjective feelings and what is an authentic response to Christ as revealed. Yet it would be preposterous to imagine that all these profound changes occured simply by the acquiring of deeper insights into Christ. Human beings do not reach moral conclusions in a vacuum, apart from the whole web of language, custom and social structure surrounding them. A society composed entirely of free human beings was unknown in the Mediterranean world of the first centuries; a society where the state did not support religion was equally unknown. Only as social structures changed did moral mutation become possible, even if change in social structures, as it might reasonably be argued, was owed at least in part to the perception that structures fostering liberty were more congruent with deeper insights into Christ.

                                            

THE UNBAPTISED AND THE PASCHAL MYSTERY

 The Paschal Mystery and the unbaptised

 “Thus by baptism men are grafted into the paschal mystery of Christ; they die with him, and buried with him, and rise with him (Rom 6, 4; Eph 2, 6; Col 3, 1)” (Sacrosanctum Concilium 4). This statement of the Vatican Council brings out the incomparably privileged condition of the baptized Christian. He is immersed in Christ at the moment he (Christ) became saviour. The process of saviourhood is an enduring one, and operates through the whole community of the baptized. The community and the individual are united in one dynamic existential and enduring simultaneity of savedness and saviourhood. Each splendid event of baptism goes back to the combined event of the kenosis of Gethsemane, the death of the cross and the ascent of the Resurrection. Every baptized personality is suspended between the moments of this paschal event so that the whole community reverberates with the tension of self-realisation in self-emptying, of rising by abasement, of victory in defeat. The baptized individual absorbs this tension, co-extensive with time itself, since he is in the community that stretches uniformly from the day of the Cross to the end of days.

What about the unbaptised? The Vatican Council answers with a most felicitous statement: “All this holds true not for Christian only but also for all men of goodwill in whose hearts grace is active invisibly. For since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and  same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partners, in a way known to God, in the paschal mystery” (G S 27).  This is an incarnational approach to the explicitly unbaptised. By virtue of the assumption of total human nature, the grace of the Incarnation of Christ is the patrimony of every being claiming the name of human. Every man bears the mysteries of Christ in his heart. This is what constitutes his call to holiness within his historical situation, which he answers by a life of self-effacing charity and justice, whereby he in turn becomes a member of the community of Jesus Christ. “He (the Word of God) assures those who trust in the charity of God that the way of love is open to all men and that the effort to establish a universal brotherhood will not be in vain” (GS 38). The death of Christ is renewed in each man in terms of the struggle against sin and injustice. “Christ’s example in dying for us sinners ( cfr. Jn 3 16; Rom 4, 1 -8) teaches us that we must carry the cross, which the flesh and the world inflict on the shoulders of all who seek after peace and justice” (ibid.).  Heb 11, 6: “And without faith, it is impossible to please God, for whoever would approach him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”  From God’s side a line from Vatican II says it all, “God does not deny help necessary for salvation” (LG 16).

“Christ is now at work in the hearts of men…”(ibid.). There is a power in certain past events that no amount of temporal passage can erase. The energy released from such events continues to activate the human community and to influence the orientation of human decisions. This power is gathered up and personalised in Jesus Christ, its source and sustainer. His own event is the résumé of all events, before and after.  From now on temporal life has a meaning only because it draws its significance from what is timeless, viz., the submission of the slaughtered Lamb reigning in power: his power is always now and yet coming. Those who submit with him leave their mark on the course of history and have their names writ indelible in the scroll of the Lamb!

CONVERGING ON “KENOSIS”

CONVERGING ON “KENOSIS”       

All religions seem to be concerned with what we call “the sacred” and “the holy.” Most contain an imagery of transcendence or “the beyond”; it seems that the goal of immemorial religious practice is to strive after what is “above”, leaving behind what is “below.” For instance, Vedantic Hinduism states that all things of the world below are “maya” or illusion. The religious quest necessitates rising above “maya” to the pure consciousness or Brahman. The Jaina strives to rise above the effects of “karma”, eventually reaching the pinnacle of purity and sublime detachment. For Buddhism the world of “samsara” or endless rebirth driven by ignorance is overcome by the cessation of desire (“tangha”) leading to “nirvana.” Within the Confucian tradition, the human person is said to balance out heaven and earth. Confucius  (551-479 B.C.) advocated the attitude of human-heartedness (“ren”), and that a strict hierarchy of persons be established; for example, the obedience of children, wives, servants, etc.. Self-regulation holds the key to harmony, a process that requires careful attention and effort. Each person is expected to play his/her part in maintaining and enhancing the social order.    For the Taoist, the “way” is found in the balance of the above and below, the “yin” and the “yan”. Rather than striving to be virtuous, Lao Tzu advocated doing nothing at all (“wu wei”), letting things follow their own course, non-interference like the “Great Feminine”, water, the valley, the infant, and the uncarved block. For Lao Tzu, the weak ultimately prevail. In both Confucian and Taoist traditions the intent is to enter into the way or Tao, a place for harmony that for Confucius is obtained through rigour. For Taoists this harmony is always present, though persons generally fail to avail themselves of it precisely because of their activity. By establishing oneself in harmony through either approach one becomes a sage, worthy of veneration and a source of inspiration to others.                                                                                         

Each of these systems speaks to us in its own way.                                                                              

The Vedic dream to fulfil one’s desires has virtually universal appeal, as does the urgency of the Upanishads for one to abandon concern with ephemerals and marshal his faculties for seeking out one’s true self. Jainism’s definition of life challenges us more acutely to consider the impact and implications of our daily actions upon other life forms. The Buddhist emphasis of the transitory nature of what meets the eye serves as a reminder to all people not to search for absolutes in the realm of change. The Confucian quest for propriety holds an undeniable appeal, particularly for societies rocked by uncertainties and upheaval. And the Taoist abandonment of ambition and self-concern seem like good medicine, especially with those obsessed with activity aimed at their self-image and aggrandizement.

            Looking at these religious systems and ways of thought, one is tempted to exclaim, “How very Christian!” and he would not be entirely wrong, since one cannot help arriving at the conclusion that every religious persuasion calls for the minimizing of arrogance or “hubris” in order that a higher value can emerge to which one can attach oneself, and which guarantees stability, permanence, and harmony. And this is precisely the imperative of Christianity.

During the season of Lent our focus is on the Paschal Mystery of Jesus. In the Paschal Mystery of Jesus one can discern the self-emptying of the Incarnate Son as the basis of the virtues of all the religions and the indispensable condition of acceptance by God who takes over our life to make it into something beautiful. Surrender to God through self-divestiture is the key, and this was achieved pre-eminently by Jesus Christ “who, being in the form of God…emptied (“kenosis”) himself” (Phil 2, 6-7).

Let this Lent be a period of steady assault on the prideful self.           

FREEDOM AND THEOLOGY

Freedom and Theology

When one sees more deeply into Christ, is one looking into a mirror merely reflecting one's own deepest feelings? The answer must be that the Church has the mission of determining what is only the projection of subjective feelings and what is an authentic response to Christ as revealed. Yet it would be preposterous to imagine that all these profound changes occured simply by the acquiring of deeper insights into Christ. Human beings do not reach moral conclusions in a vacuum, apart from the whole web of language, custom and social structure surrounding them. A society composed entirely of free human beings was unknown in the Mediterranean world of the first centuries; a society where the state did not support religion was equally unknown. Only as social structures changed did moral mutation become possible, even if change in social structures, as it might reasonably be argued, was owed at least in part to the perception that structures fostering liberty were more congruent with deeper insights into Christ.