Koinonia

Chrys,

You write that "In the end, the first person we must lie to when we seek to defend the position which Newman indicts is ourselves. The result is that arrogance abounds and those who assume a posture of humility are deemed somehow defective." Yeah, this is painfully true. The lie I tell, I tell to myself about myself and I tell this lie again and again to any who will listen in the hope that they will affirm the falsehood with me.

And yet, and again as you write, we have the witness of "the ascetics" who in their own flesh "know and show, it takes real determination to bear the cross of humility and stand the stench of exposing our self-inflicted corruption in order to be able to open our ears so they might hear and our eyes so they might see." While this sounds rather grim, and it is if we take it no further, the other part of the Gospel is that while the "path to truth is always cruciform" it is never a path we walk alone since "Love" waits to meet "us on the Way."

It seems to me that not so long ago, the rank and file Christians lost sight of the latter--that Love is always there to met us--even as today they have lost sight of the former--that our life is a cruciform life or it is no life at all. The difference between the saint and, well, me, is that the saint holds both of these two truths together in her own life while I spend my time trying to separate them. I want Love without the Cross or the Cross without Love, the latter for you, the former for me.

But it just ain't possible to have one without the other. And just as I can't have Love without the Cross, I can't have either apart from my neighbor and my willingness to bear the Cross of Love for his sake.

Thanks for the comments Chrys!

In Christ,

+FrG
.-= Fr Gregory´s last blog ..Site News =-.

All people in a democracy do indeed assume and assert the right to their own views, however poorly grounded. It probably can not be otherwise in a social system that makes simple legal competency (and sometimes not even that) the basis for participating in the great issues of the day. This is based on a widely unchallenged set of assumptions. Given the vested interest we have in broadening the various interest groups that make up each side's political base, this won't change any time soon.
Yet a few careful questions from those with more insight than I might expose the arrogance behind the assumptions.
Undoubtedly most people would also assert that they know their spouses quite well - even when they have and acknowledge discord in their homes. (Indeed, in the midst of discord, there is a marked tendency by most to "dig in" and assume near certainty in their views - even though misunderstanding abounds.) The same people - that is, most of us - are no less blind to the inner passions and self-serving distortions that cloud our understanding of ourselves.
So then, if we do not understand ourselves - whom we have no excuse NOT to know - nor our spouse (whom we claim to know), how can we possibly claim to know much at all about God?
Had we learned about such limits and challenges to our self-perception, we might be more humble in our approach to the Create of the cosmos. Unfortunately, our educational system is no less invested in promoting the fiction of self-serving "understanding" than is our political system. In the end, the first person we must lie to when we seek to defend the position which Newman indicts is ourselves. The result is that arrogance abounds and those who assume a posture of humility are deemed somehow defective.
As the ascetics know and show, it takes real determination to bear the cross of humility and stand the stench of exposing our self-inflicted corruption in order to be able to open our ears so they might hear and our eyes so they might see. The path to truth is always cruciform; fortunately, it is Love that meets us on the Way.