Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - “Everyone who listens to these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a stupid man who built his house on sand. 2Rain came down, floods rose, gales blew and struck that house, and it fell; and what a fall it had!' ” (Mt 7, 26-27). We can say we are following the Lord Jesus, only if we heed His word and put it into practice. It is not enough to listen to the Word we must live it. If our eloquent speaking about Jesus is not supported by life lived in keeping with our words, then the Gospel says we have built our life on sand and that everything, sooner or later will collapse.
Self-realisation is precisely building on the sand of our poor “I”, who thinks I can build my life on my own, my life belongs to me and therefore I can run it as I think best. When a life lets itself be gripped by this conviction and then suddenly realises this is wrong, that authentic conversion means not only changing a few habits - in being a little kinder and more honest -, it will see that the only building that resists is a person: the Lord Jesus .
When Jesus called the first apostles to follow him, the Gospel tells us “they immediately left their nets and followed him ” (cfr Mk 1, 18). Had they really left the nets which tied them to self, to self advantage? In fact as they go along they realise the sad reality which surrounds the old man, they recognise the many nets lie still hidden in the sand of their own I ”, from which the Lord, with infinite patience but without compromise with truth, frees them according to their sincerity and trust in Him, the sole rock of our human existence!
Some of Jesus' disciples failed, enthusiastic at first they began to change but only superficially, they misled themselves to think that was enough, forgetting that this was all based on the wrong foundation: self-realisation. Perhaps they wanted to follow Christ but not to imitate Him, not to lose themselves in Him! When life, apparently new, began to tremble in the face of the demands of real “discipleship”, they lacked the courage to start again.
We too like the disciples, followers of Christ, sometimes fear we are losing our certainties, our advantages; we are taken in by appearances and prefer to remain tied up in our nets, in our little world, rather than cry out to the Lord to make us new creatures: “in my anguish I cried to the Lord, he answered, the Lord saved me ” (Ps 117, 5). Those who have the courage to do this, who love the Lord more than their own life and in Him find the strength to forget self, certainly experience the freedom Jesus promises: “you will know the truth and the truth will make you free” (Jn 8, 36). Day after day, month after month, they will savour ever more deeply the freedom of the children of God and dedicate themselves wholeheartedly not only to winning it for themselves but to showing others the way to find it. The way has a name: the Lord Jesus, “the way, the life, the truth” (Jn 14, 6).
The only programme the Lord gives us for sin, nets, is to rid ourselves of it. As we learn from mystical theology, one vice is enough to stop any growth in virtues, the development of our inward freedom and conformation to Jesus Christ. One reef is enough to make a ship run aground! We are only free to think of God, to think in God when there is no fixation in our lives, no dependence on power, money, pleasure, superiority, sadness, fear, ostentation… In other words we are only free if we are dependent, not on the logic of sin and selfishness, but on God's sanctifying grace, which transforms us into new creatures again and again, as Gregory of Nyssa says so well: “When a soul is converted, it hates sin, it dedicates itself entirely to doing good, welcoming the grace of the Holy Spirit and becoming a completely new being. Then the words of Scripture will come true: ‘Throw out the old yeast so that you can be the fresh dough, unleavened as you are.’ (1 Cor 5, 7) and also these words: ‘Celebrate the feast not with the old leaven but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth (1 Cor 5, 8).”
Only those who are free from all that can hold them chained to the world is truly capable of virtue, that is of Christ! “This is the will of God - St Paul says - your sanctification” (1 Ts 4, 3)!
This path of freedom has fascinated countless people in these 20 centuries of Christianity, it has elevated to heaven all those humble hearts and minds willing to open to the most beautiful adventure on earth, to believe in God in His Son Jesus born of the Virgin Mary, who offers Him to us, as she offered Him to Joseph, to Elizabeth to John the Baptist, to the wedding couple at Cana, and to the disciples who continue to gather around her, at the foot of the Cross, in the Upper Room to welcome the transforming Love of God. (Agenzia Fides 10/10/2007; righe 56, parole 879)
