Newspaper Page Text
October 15,1981
PAGE 5
Discovering Our Connections
BY DOLORES LECKEY
An Anglican monk named Father A.M.
Allchin has lived a rather solitary life in the
shadow of England’s Canterbury Cathedral.
For a long time he has pondered how it is that
the human and divine are bounded together in
this world -- how they are wedded.
Recently he published a book of his
thoughts titled, “The World Is a Wedding.”
Is it still possible -- in this world with its
great difficulties -- to speak of a wedding of
heaven and earth? If you look for the sacred in
this world, will you discover it?
/
Hunger still stalks about. The planet’s
southern half faces starvation while the
northern part wastes resources.
Greed, violence, terrorism and war are not
hard to come by.
The question is, what happens if one
develops a disturbing sense of the world’s
darkness? What if one is engulfed by fear or
anger because of the shape of what is
happening?
Does one grow numb, paralyzed by a sense
that “there is nothing we can do that will
matter?”
\
KNOW
YOUR FAITH
(All Articles On This Page Copyrighted 1981 By N.C. News Service)
V
Looking to history, it is easy to think that
in other times and places God’s presence was
easier to find. To a degree this was true. But,
to a degree, it offers a romantic view of the
past.
Earlier periods were not without
destructive forces. Nations went to war as a
matter of course. Slavery was an accepted fact
of life. Autocratic monarchs could inflict
reigns of terror on whole populations.
The world was not clothed in innocence.
On the other hand, people lived near mystery.
People who live close to the earth seem
instinctively to turn toward God and the
saints who are signs of the sacredness of space
and time.
In this age of machines and technology,
people tend to be separated from nature. The
occasions when one feels confident that the
human and divine are wedded in this world
may be more difficult to come by than once
was the case. Difficult - but not impossible.
Our times have their own gifts. I look at the
world “so loved by God” and see many signs
of divine presence.
First, in medicine, there is enormous
progress in healing. Victims of cardiovascular
disease are given new rivers of life in bypass
surgery. Forty percent of cancer victims claim
complete cure. Was not healing one sign of
Jesus’ mission?
Second, I see God’s Holy Spirit present in
various liberation movements. The civil rights
movement is an example. Another is the
appeal for just dealings between rich nations
and poor nations. Didn’t Jesus say that he
came to set at liberty the oppressed?”
A third sign is the search for the unity of
Christians and for a new era in relations
between Christians and Jews.
But there is also darkness in the world.
S
- How can I, one Christian person, respond
to the sin that keeps half the world near
starvation?
- How can I protect the world from the
forces of violence?
When I think about this I recall the law of
physics which says: “Everything is
connected.”
And I recall my belief that when I change,
positive forces are set in motion.
Finally I recall that Jesus, who healed,
reconciled and liberated, did something else:
He asked us to change our selves.
That’s when I sense that, confronted by
violence, I should look for the violence in me.
Witnessing greed or terrorism, I ought to ask:
Have I ever acted as though my own needs
were the world’s most important needs?
I think this attention to my own greed or
violence is among the ways for me to have
some affect on the sin in the world - because
we are all connected in the world of the here
and now. As Theodore Roszak has written,
“The fate of the soul is the fate of the social
order.”
When one asks, “What in me blocks
grace?” It is a way of restoring hope in the
world -- of seeing that the divine is meant to be
wedded to the human. Through us, God can
make his presence felt in this world where
selfishness and sin and grace mingle.
The transfiguration of the world is
underway.
In fact, the wedding of the human and
divine is something like what happens when
two people marry, They bring to their union a
collection of strengths and weaknesses, of
narrowness and generosity.
But out of that improbable mixture, new
life can be born. The transformation of the
partners gradually happens.
Viewing Ourselves In Mirror
BY DAVID GIBSON
What hopes and fears do Americans share?
According to a recent survey conducted by
Psychology Today magazine, Americans,
speaking of their personal lives, fear more
than anything else that their standard of living
will be lowered. Second, they fear ill health
for themselves. And, in third place is the fear
of war.
It follows, as the magazine reported, that
in terms of their personal lives, Americans
hope most for a higher standard of living. In
terms of the nation, however, Americans most
fear war, while they hope most strongly for
economic stability.
Americans are being polled. They are asked
their views on political candidates, personal
lifestyles, national issues, television programs,
reading preferences, family size, and many
other matters.
The pollsters are trying to find out what we
are like: that is, what we are as a national
group, or perhaps as a group in a given region.
There is a sort of passion in society to
discover how we are thinking and what we
want. What makes Americans happy? What
makes them sad?
This is an interesting exercise because we
are part of society. And the way society
develops profoundly influences the ways our
personal lives are structured.
Society is somewhat like a mirror. If we
look into the habits of society, we find out
something about our habits.
We are the way we are -- partly - because
society is the way it is.
Thus, since society is much different now
than 50 years ago, our personal lives are much
different too.
Discussion
Points And Questions
1. Take a few moments and think of five ways society influences you.
Now choose the one which, in your opinion, has influenced you the most.
How do you feel about the way it has influenced you?
2. Dolores Leckey says people a few centuries ago lived in close
harmony with nature. How does she indicate this has changed today?
3. What does Mrs. Leckey recommend to people as one way of
counteracting some of the darkenss of evil observed in the world?
4. Mrs. Leckey suggests that one way God makes his presence known in
the world is through people. Do you agree?
5. What does David Gibson mean by observing that society is
something like a mirror in which we can view ourselves?
6. According to Gibson, what do pollsters tell people about
themselves?
7. Why does Jesus come to John the Baptizer to be baptized, accord
ing to Father John Castelot?
dialogue with the various streams of culture in world society
and pointed out that grace is not limited to the boundaries of
church as we usually think of it. (NC Photo by C. E. Pefley)
ONE OF THE GREATEST INSIGHTS of the Second
Vatican Council was its description of the church in the
modern world. Council fathers spoke of their desire to be in
One More Powerful To Come
BY FATHER JOHN J. CASTELOT
John the Baptizer announced that
someone more powerful than he was to come.
And Mark’s Gospel does not leave the reader
waiting to find out who that someone will be.
Mark says immediately: “During that time,
Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was
baptized by John in the Jordan.”
John was preaching “a baptism of
repentance which leads to the forgiveness of
sins.” Why then is Jesus joining the crowds
flocking to John? To do penance?
A later generation of Christians found this
embarrassing. For instance, the evangelist
Of Society
- We are television watchers, for example.
Americans spend hours each day watching
television. This means that the way people
spend their leisure time has changed. Perhaps
it also means people have more leisure time.
- We travel further distances in less time.
This means we have begun to think of our
world as smaller than it used to be. It means we
are more mobile; because of their jobs, many
adults live far from their parents.
- Computers and other forms of
technology (even robots) are part of more and
more jobs. A still-growing number of society’s
people work with information, in one way or
another.
- Because of the ease of mobility, the
higher divorce rate and other factors, we view
our neighborhoods differently than was once
the case. People know that their nieghbors
may move away. As a result the neighborhood
is not the dependable source of stability it
once was.
- Finally, smaller family size, changing
uses of leisure time, neighborhood instability,
the divorce rate, pressures of the consumer
mentality, and other factors mean that there
is no relatively fixed definition of the word
“family” that children in society at large will
grow up with.
Those are just a few examples of how
society has changed. Our lives are shaped by
such changes in at least two general ways:
1. The very structures of our lives are
changed. We travel further, have different
jobs, watch television, etc.
2. Our concerns are changed. We are
concerned that children gain some sound idea
of what a family is, of what worthwhile work
is, of how to form personal values.
Probably most people want a fuller
understanding of who they are. The Christian
journey of belief is a journey toward a fuller
awareness of what we want and what the
meaning of this life can be.
In our society, many forces are at work
telling what we should look like, what those
we are connected with in society want, and
what is considered a good way to live.
If the society around us functions
somewhat like a mirror, however, the image
we see of ourselves in it is incomplete. We are
what we are because society is what it is. But,
there is (literally) more to each of us than
meets the eye.
If the full story of who we are is to be told,
that “something more” needs to be accounted
for.
Who are we? What do our lives mean?
Matthew felt constrained to have John protest
at seeing Jesus coming to him for baptism.
But a main point of Mark’s theology is
precisely the fact that Jesus achieved victory
through humiliation, by identifying himself
with weak, sinful humanity. Mark makes the
point right at the beginning of his Gospel by
stating without qualification that Jesus was
baptized in the Jordan by John.
But then he balances this emphasis on the
abasement of Jesus by making a dramatic
profession of faith in Jesus as the Son of God.
In a highly symbolic scene in which a voice
speaks and a dove comes down through the
clouds, Mark describes what, for him, was a
personal experience of Jesus.
Actually this scene is designed to tell the
reader in unmistabable terms just who this
Jesus of Nazareth is. Mark achieves this not
just by the description itself, but by a clever
use of allusions to the Old Testament which
suggest even more than the story itself.
The reference to Jesus’ seeing the sky rent
in two brings to mind the moving prayer of
Isaiah in the Old Testament: “Oh, that you
would rend the heavens and come down! ”
This prayer was a plea that God would
enter once more into the history of his people
to save them from the forces of evil. Subtly
but clearly, therefore, Mark is saying that the
prayer has now been answered.
God has entered human history definitely
in the person of Jesus, upon whom he sends
his Spirit. Jesus is given power to do battle
with evil and to conquer it.
LOOKING INTO A MIRROR one
might see part of oneself or perhaps a
distorted image. Society is a bit like a
mirror with its fast pace, its pressures,
its success stories and its hostilities. We
Why the Spirit is said to descend on him
like a dove no one really knows. The
symbolism here is hard to track down.
In the gospel story, the voice is heard only
by Jesus, whose identity remains hidden from
his contemporaries. However, Mark wants it
to be heard by his readers.
Here, too, Mark has drawn on Old
Testament passages, especially Psalm 2, a
favorite with early Christians: “The Lord said
to me, ‘You are my son; this day I have
begotten you.”
This psalm was recited at the installation of
the king. Its use means Jesus is declared the
king, the Son of God in a unique sense.
The words suggest also the words of God to
his servent, “Here is my servent whom I
uphold, my chosen one with whom I am
pleased, upon whom I have put my Spirit” ~
words from Isaiah.
The Son will accomplish his mission by
following the path of the suffering servant,
the Son of Man who “has come not to be
served but to serve - to give his life in ransom”
(Mark 10:45).
Empowered by the Spirit, then, Jesus will
be driven to confront evil in its conventional
habitat, the desert. The conflict with the
personification of evil, Satan, will continue
throughout his life, with the issue decided
only on Calvary.
Thus, in the desert, Mark dramatizes in
advance an essential feature in the portrait he
will draw of Jesus.
see parts of our lives reflected but
society, as a mirror, does not give us the
complete picture of who we are. (NC
Sketch by Chris McDonough)