My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.
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What the heck is going on, anyway?
Everywhere we look in our world, in our life - in the dynamics among nations, in the political arena, in the drama lived out in marriages and families, in churches and faith communities, in our own lives - everywhere human beings are to be found; we see situations and experiences that describe endless permutations of the human condition after the original sin. In Genesis chapter 3 is related the temptation and the fall of Eve and Adam. There we find related that moment when God described to the man and the woman the results, the consequences of their sin, their rebellion, their decision to stop trusting in God. When you hammer a nail, it goes into the wood. When you pour water on a thing, it becomes wet. When you drop a crystal glass on a marble floor, it shatters into pieces. The human condition is very much like what we all experience of trouble and dissatisfaction. Here is what Genesis 3 relates.
The man would lose the life of ease he had until
then known in the garden provided by God his Creator. From now on,
in order to live, he would have to obtain his food by the sweat of
his brow. He would have to make constant efforts to cultivate the
earth, but it would resist him and produce thorns and thistles
instead of the good fruits of the earth. In contemporary terms,
man tries to do his work, but the work constantly resists him and
demands more of him, depleting him until there is nothing left of
him; no energy, no time, no life, no spouse, no family, nothing...
but only death. It is a slavery that, unlike the chains of the
past, is cleverly devised to get the man to voluntarily go into
slavery by his own choice. This is the contemporary situation in
most of the Earth, where there is no longer the slavery in chains,
which still exists in other parts of the world.
The woman, perhaps because her entire design centres around her capacity to conceive and nurture life, she is closer to her body than is the man. Also, she is more acutely sensitive to all that pertains to relations with others; also a feature of her capacity to give and nurture life. She is more aware of and more sensitive to her own self as well as to others in what and how they are. Now, Eve also decided to stop trusting in God; so, for her the consequences were inevitably going to be that her natural desire for her husband would become exaggerated, causing her to "cling" to him. However, he would perceive this and react, in a kind of survival reflex, by dominating her, to protect himself from this clinging, or "nagging". In addition, her distrust in God would also alienate her from her own self, her own body; such that her labour pains would become intensified.
We human beings have a specific design with "room for God" inside
Our human condition now, due to the original sin which becomes actualized in us the moment we are conceived in our mother's womb, is basically alienation from God and insecurity. Human knowledge and efforts can never resolve completely or perfectly this human condition. The man is never satisfied with his work, with the world as he finds it, and the woman is never satisfied with her husband and her life as she finds it. It is a vicious circle out of which there is no escape, but only one solution. That solution is to restore the lost trust in God, our Creator. This is why Jesus Christ called people to follow Him and learn from Him certain disciplines enabling them to accept to live differently, to live the new life He offers those who accept Him and believe in Him.
These Christian disciplines are merely the ways we need in order to take back into our own hands responsibility for our own life, for cultivating our own life, and for reconnecting ourselves with trust in God our Creator; who is ever present, ever offering to pour into us the "divine vitality" which is designed and intended to be the "breath" and "blood" of our life.
Yes, we need to be loved, but first and foremost, by God our
Creator, and at every moment of the day and of the night;
constantly. To turn aside and expect to be loved by anyone else
can only end in failure, because all human beings are contingent,
imperfect, and incapable of fulfilling our infinite capacity and
need for life and love. Disconnected from God, we are like a
beautiful chandelier without electricity. Only God, the Most Holy
Trinity, is worthy of our trust, because God is our origin and our
eternal destiny. We have been designed to receive into ourselves
the indwelling Presence of the Most Holy Trinity, without whom we
remain empty and cold.
Who or what is God?
God is already complete and has always been complete and
sufficient from all eternity. There was never any need for growth
or testing in God. Jesus of Nazareth, a Jew of Galilee in Palestine two millennia ago, revealed that God is a trinity, a community and communion of divine Persons. From all eternity the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Spirit have been a completely fulfilled and vital community
of love. They are love; they don't have or give love, they ARE
LOVE. We, on the other hand, are contingent beings. We begin as
nothing and slowly grow and develop. We need to be constantly
tested in order for the tests to shake us from the impulse to
relax our efforts and try to be "just carried" by someone else,
like the baby we once were.
Living a human life is work, requires deliverate effort freely made
Only by our constant efforts to live, to strive, to create, to
give, and to love are we able to take responsibility for our life
and live it more fully. The only effective "fuel" for these
constant efforts to live and love is the divine life and vitality
of love which is God. God is our fuel, our food, our life, our
love. No one else. To expect any other human being to love us,
give us life, fulfill us, make us happy, is both unfair and
impossible. No one can possibly ever meet our unlimited need and
infinite capacity for life and love; no one except God. To expect
this of any human being is to do them violence.
Eve is no more to blame than Adam
Why did the tempter approach Eve and not Adam? We think it was because Adam heard directly from God not to touch the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" or he would die. Eve had not yet been created. Adam later told Eve about this, but she did not hear it from God himself. The tempter considered her position a little weaker because of this; so, he probed that weakness.
When I focus on myself, how I feel, what I have and don't have; I remain isolated within myself. When I turn my focus away from myself to the other, I can see who and what the other is, what he is trying to do, what are her fears, hopes, struggles, aspirations, weaknesses, and strengths. If I study the other, I can discover in what ways the other needs to be loved; then, I can apply myself to love him or her in this way, putting myself at the service of the other out of love, pouring my vitality out in a flow of love.
Love cannot be kept; it can only be given
Love's satisfaction is in the very act of love, of
giving itself, of pouring itself out. Trying to get love, to have
love, to hold onto love is like trying to hold water with a sieve.
It's impossible. The only way to be full of love and never run out
of love is to love, to give love away. That is impossible unless I
am constantly connected to the River of Love, which is God.
You already know that as a mother or father, knowing how obviously
dependent and helpless your child is from the moment of conception
and birth. That poverty pulls love and caring out of you, and you
find great satisfaction and pleasure loving your child; even to
the point of exhaustion. Slowly, the child is developing a
capacity to emerge as an individual, independent, and
enterprising. This process will take at least 18 years or more
before their autonomy is sufficient for them to go out on their
own. The challenge then is to trust them and let them go as the
new way to love them.
The human person is constantly changing; relationships never quite "catch up"
Along the way your manner of relating them is constantly
changing, because they are constantly changing, and you never seem
to quite catch up to the "new them", because the one you think
they are today is actually the one you thought they were yesterday
or last week or last month or last year. Today, they are quite
different yet again... fetus, baby, toddler, little child, child,
older child, pre-teen, pubescent child, young teen, older teen,
transitional adult, young adult, adult, midlife adult, etc....
If you are a parent with young children, it would not be surprising that at the end of a day of pouring yourself
out to your little children, that you would feel a need for someone
else to take care of you. As a priest, I get to feel like that
too. That's why I can say this, which may be difficult for you to
hear or read, dear reader, but this is a "child's reflex", not a position of
adult autonomy; it is a "passive reflex", not an "active reflex".
It is always "up to me" to decide to "care for myself"
Look at it this way. My life - body, mind, heart / psyche, and spirit / soul - is like the baby I once was. Then, it was Maman who took me up and cared for me in all my needs, more or less perfectly. Providing the care was sufficient, I would smile back at her, and she was content. (This relationship of care provider to infant is also the "theoretical model" adopted by Psychotherapist Dr. Jeannine Guindon, Ph.D., foundress of the Institut de Formation Humaine Intégrale in Montreal QC Canada. She founded a new helping profession called "psycho-education" or "psycho-educator".)
But now, I am no longer that baby, but my organism, my life, is
as it were like that baby, because someone needs to take care of
it. That someone is me. Once I became independent of Maman and
Papa, it fell to me to care for myself in at least as good a
manner as the care I had received from them. My "life" will only
look back at me and smile when my care for my life is sufficient
for it to be content. No one else can provide that for me; it is
up to me to provide that for myself, somehow.
Self care is most effective and satisfying when it does not deprive anyone else
I need to care for my life on my own time, and in a way that does
not put a burden on anyone else. Mostly, I need to care for myself
between my two ears, in the way I choose to think about all these
things and about my life and caring for my life. Even in the very
midst of caring for another, a child or children for instance,
within myself I can maintain a "sanctuary" of space in which I am
selecting my attitudes and interior dispositions in such a way as
to be "kind to myself" without depriving others of any good thing.
I am not a victim of my attitudes, but rather a "surfer of life"
The biggest most dramatic difference I can make for myself is,
for example, when I notice anxiety rising within me, to
acknowledge it, recognize it, understand where it's coming from,
know that I can handle it, and put it aside; replacing it with
deliberately connecting with God... welcoming God's love and
vitality like exposing myself to the warmth and light of the
sun.... This is only one example, but there are countless ways in
which I can manage my life better by noticing, acknowledging,
resolving now or putting aside to resolve later, and turning to
God to be replenished here and now.
To employ a different analogy, it is true to say that I am not a "victim" of my attitudes, but rather a "surfer of life". My surf board is the meaning and purpose I wish to "give to my life", and with both feet firmly planted on this surf board, I see waves coming, position myself, keep my balance, and "ride each wave" for all the vitality, pleasure, and satisfaction it can afford; as I make my way along the beach.
Turning to God, opening myself up to God who is ever here, welcoming and receiving from God are so many elements of a way of living which is a kind of skill or practice, which can be learned easily enough because God is ever here and eager to fill me, refresh me, renew me, and love me.
Needless to say, it has been a life long challenge to learn to care well for my life, because that life is constantly changing with the times, as I age, with each new challenge, in each new situation, and also with the grinding routine of the repetitious demands of each repeated day and each repeated night.
© 2004-2022 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal QC
© 2004-2022 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC
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