Let them know we are Christians by our Love

If the world were asked to describe Christianity in one word, what might it choose? Some of the possibilities sting our ears. It might describe Christianity as intolerant, outdated, hypocritical, or any other number of unflattering things. While this cannot surprise us, for we were never promised the esteem of the world, it is cause for some concern. Ideally, the one word would be love.

The current era has pitted us between the world in numerous ways. Morality itself is at stake as Christian values struggle against today’s culture of freedom, where all manner of behavior is excused by claiming it is one’s “right” to do whatever they wish. The Christian counters with the morality by which God has commissioned us to live. Yet so often we allow it to be a political and social struggle as the world compels us to fight it with its own rules. If instead, we could show the world the love which leads us to believe as we do, the evangelism of our values would carry much greater weight. A victory is much more valuable if won in the heart of man, than if won in the courts and legislature. If we can convert the hearts of society. There will no longer be a need to fight in the courts and legislature.

If we wish to change the hearts of men and women in our time, we must appeal to their most basic desire, and humanity has no greater desire than love. So much of what we do is aimed toward achieving love. Even many common sins of today’s culture of freedom are geared toward a perverted view of love. If the world could see an answer to this desire, and witness the example of those who had found it, what further need would people have to chase their selfish and depraved goals?

Is love not the only reason we are Christians? God’s love created us. Jesus’ love was our example. Our love for one another leads us on. Everything within Christianity boils down to love. The expected reward of God’s love is so great that we willingly follow the way of the cross in hopes of his everlasting embrace. By opening our hearts in love toward our neighbors, we feel God’s embrace even now. The world needs to see this. There should be a discernible difference between an interaction with a Christian and an interaction with a non-Christian. They must know we are Christians by our love, our compassion and our charity. Then perhaps they might wonder why we believe what we do, and be intrigued to learn more. Our social and political activism will carry much more weight once the world recognizes us by our love.

At present, the world views us as intolerant. While we rightly fight against injustice in our society, if we do it not in love, we will be seen as nothing more than another political lobby. We have often fallen into this trap. Thus, the world has come to perceive Christian views on social issues such as sexual liberation and abortion as a dogmatic restriction of freedom. In reality, we believe such things because of love. Our opposition to full sexual liberation rises out of our reverence for the love of marriage, not out of a hatred for those who do not desire it. Our opposition to abortion comes from a respect and love for all human life, not a dishonor for the rights of women. To a Christian, abortion is not an issue of women’s rights, but an issue of our love for the unborn. If love is complete, it is inconceivable to kill a helpless life to avoid taking responsibility for one’s actions. It is not a dogmatic decree, but a natural extension of the love of Christ. If the world understood the love at the root of our views, it would be much more receptive to hearing them. St. Augustine reminds us that all of God’s commandments are embraced in love. (Enchiridion. 121) If the world could see us living this truth in our lives, it might be more attracted by the commandments. The world should be made to wonder at us? It should surprise them that we choose to follow Christ when a creed of freedom and personal satisfaction seems much more enticing. Why have we chosen the harder path despite all the pressure that tries to pry us away? The reason is that we know God’s love satisfies in a way which nothing else can. The companionship of Jesus is steadfast, through our suffering and our joy. We are motivated to follow his commandments because they are embraced by love.

Jesus is the proof of God’s love. By becoming one of us, God shows us that he is more than the omnipotent creator, the master and judge of the universe. He is also our friend, our companion, and the sharer of our suffering. By laying aside the glory and power of heaven, emptying himself into the helpless embryo of a yet-unborn baby, and then experiencing the joys and sorrows of life from the vulnerable perspective of humanity, including its very lowest moments, Divine Love not only shows itself, but proves itself, in the person of Jesus. As Christians we believe in a God who loves us so much that he would come down to show us the way to salvation by example, not just by law. This is the remarkable and unique aspect of Christianity. The world hears us trumpeting the law. But love fulfills the law.

Life is hard. We are all acquainted with suffering. Some of us have suffered physically, others emotionally, and some of us suffer from afflictions we have created and brought on ourselves, but we have all suffered in some way. Humanity has this in common. Our suffering is tempered by love. Nothing is as precious to us, or as worth the suffering, as love. The world’s misguided quest for love is often the cause of its greatest suffering, because the world seeks love through selfishness. If love is selfish then it is not truly love and gives more pain than joy. Love must first be given if it is to be received with its full beauty and power. This is not an intuitive concept for our selfish society, built on the idea of immediate gratification. The failure to understand this basic way in which love operates is the cause for much of the world’s misery. It is also the simple answer given by the Christian message.

God desires love just as badly as we do. Does scripture not tell us that God was lonely? Because of tremendous love, and tremendous desire for love, God emptied himself into a man and died upon a cross to show his solidarity with us. Jesus’ life was a life of love. He loved everyone with whom he came in contact, and he never asked for reciprocation, yet two thousand years of thankful hearts have reciprocated his love.

This is the way to love. We must give ourselves if we are ever to receive. Like Jesus, we must give without expectation of receiving anything in return. Only once we love that much, will we find the contentment we seek, and show the world the truth of what we preach. Everyone you meet presents you with the opportunity to spread the message of Christ. Love everyone with your whole heart, despite their faults, deformities, arrogance, and sin. Commit your heart to true compassion for the suffering of those around you, and be generous in charity. If the world sees you living a life of love, compassion and charity, they will wonder about the source of your hope. When they see the truth of Christ’s love in your life, only then will they listen to your creed. But if they do not see you love, they will never listen. Love is the beauty of Christianity, and the reason we follow it despite whatever persecutions may come our way. Jesus gave the purest example of love the world has ever known, and continues to sooth us with a love more comforting than anything else we know.

We are capable of loving only because God first created us out of love. When we love, we are acting as the love of God toward others, and when we receive love, it is God’s love, working through others. “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.” (1 John: 4:16). The Beloved Disciple’s first letter encapsulates the reason why we follow all the laws and the difficult paths of Christianity. The promise of love which John describes, is so sublime that it is worth all the sacrifice, all the ridicule, all the pain. It is worth even death. In another place Paul tells Timothy that the reason for the law and instruction is love (1 Tim: 1:5). The reason, even, for all of creation, is simply love!

“Beloved, God is Love. Since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another.” (1 John: 4:11). This is the reason we are Christians. This love is the reward for which we hope. The world despises Christianity because it only looks at the rules, not at the reward promised for following those rules. The fault is on us, the Christians who preach the rules instead of the promise, and follow the rules just enough to feel assured of our heavenly reward, when if we followed them completely, our reward would be ours already. God’s promised reward is so sublime. We should be eager to show it to the world.

Our eternal life does not begin at death. Our eternal life has already begun! We show it by living to share the love God has poured out on us. Let us approach the world with the motivation that someday when our secular society is asked to describe Christianity in one word, that word will be love.

Stand Up and Follow Christ

The following is a reprint of my article published in the March/April edition of the Social Justice Review. http://www.socialjusticereview.org. Vol 98, St. Louis, MO.

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Is the church in crisis? That is what the secular media would have us believe as it daily reminds us of our terrible scandals and labels us as intolerant, out of date, and morally hypocritical. Reformists within the church echo a similar cry, claiming that we are out of step with the world we live in and, while not calling for us to sacrifice our moral standing, wish for the church to embrace more of contemporary cultural norms. Yet the conservatives of the church, led by the Pope himself, view this attempted embrace of modernity and culture as the very root of the crisis.

The reality of living as a Christian in today’s world is an unending challenge. This culture, and my young generation, prides itself in its tolerance for all lifestyles and all creeds, but has NO tolerance for one which claims to be true. Its only intolerance is for what it considers to be intolerant—for acceptance of natural law and our common moral tradition. In many ways, the church is now attempting to meet this challenge, opening itself up as a more truly “catholic” place.

I have heard claims, both from the secular media, and from within the church, that if the church does not begin to spread a wider umbrella of tolerant acceptance, it will render itself an insignificant vestige of the past. Well, the church does accept everyone, but it does not accept actions which are against its foundational law. Once it does, then the church will become insignificant. If the church offers nothing that is different from the modern world, then what is its draw? What is its reason for existing? The danger in this acceptance, admirable as it is, would be to lose sight of our claim of truth: Jesus is the Son of God, and we serve him through works of love and charity. If we bow to contemporary culture to the point at which we no longer make this claim, then we will have lost the essence of Christianity. Christianity offers a truth that must stand separate from the world. If it stops being separate, it will stop being true.

The most valued moral in today’s world is called freedom. Freedom is good, but if freedom becomes religion, we enter a dangerous place wherein morality becomes relative to the individual. Any moral code that attempts to limit the individual’s freedom is considered intolerant. We, as a culture, have become so besotted with the idea of freedom that truth and morality are thought to be only a personal judgement. People behave in depraved and sinful ways, claiming it is their “right” and that they have the “freedom” to do whatever makes them happy. But in reality, the freedom of an individual within a society cannot be separated from the freedom of others. The alternative is a primitive chaos, where the strong exercise their freedom at the expense of the weak. Humanity’s freedom must be a shared freedom. Pope Benedict XVI says that freedom must be linked “to a yardstick of truth,” and that individual freedoms, untethered by the order of the natural law, merely cancel each other out: the absence of law is the absence of freedom. (J. Card. Ratzinger: Communio 23, 1996.) Christianity offers us this law, which to modern culture may appear as a limitation to freedom, but whose goal is a shared freedom of all, strong and weak, rich and poor, for the betterment of the human race as a whole.

What does Christianity have to say about freedom? It remains mute. Christianity offers no freedom, only sacrifice. Jesus commands the slave to work diligently for his master, and the captive nation of Israel to submit to the rule of Rome. These are hardly the values of modern culture!

How then can the church balance the competing pressures of the culture of tolerance, and the “religion of freedom” with what we believe is true? We should be tolerant to other lifestyles, even other religions, but not to a point where we give up our Christian morality–the law which provides this shared freedom. Once we come to that point, we do a disservice both to ourselves, and to those from this modern world who have sought the church as a haven of love. The moral principal of Christianity may be the cause of its rift with the modern world, but it is precisely that which keeps the church relevant in today’s world.

What about the moral shortcomings of both church leaders and the church itself, which the secular world is constantly reminding us about, both with our current scandals and our history of violence and persecution? How dare we preach morality? The short answer is that if we were not capable of sinning, we would not need a savior at all. The continuation of the Catholic Church, even through all its errors is the proof of God’s grace. Does the fact that we are sinners make us hypocrites for condemning sin?

As culture (and the church) were revolutionized in the 1960s, the cult of “freedom” was becoming the way of a new generation. Popular culture no longer valued sacrifice and vocation, but rather an unfettered individualism. As a result, the seminaries became empty, and so many of the priests who remained fell into a pattern of abuse. Due to this changed cultural value set, the life of a priest over the last forty years, particularly in America and Europe, has arguably been harder than at any other time in history. But a generation has now past since Vatican II and there is a new crop of Catholics ready to propel the church forward.

Now back to the challenges of the Christian in today’s world. When I tell people I am Catholic, they seem to find it “quaint,” but their assumptions and their judgements are in place and they have no interest in hearing about the hope and love which is my faith. They assume that I must be intolerant, judgmental and sexist. Catholics are the butt of jokes, rather than the acknowledge bearers of truth. The reaction of many Catholics seems to be to retreat into the safety of the mass and individual prayer. Yet this is the time to be proud of our faith. The world thinks it has us in retreat, that we are the rear-guard defenders of a fading, archaic religion.

Christianity is under a new kind of persecution. We are not being burned at the stake, or thrown to the lions, as Christians were persecuted in the past. But we are under an ideological persecution today which is equally strong and potentially more dangerous. The world is not interested in the message of Jesus, and does not want us to speak it, lest we should infringe upon their freedom with a message of sacrifice. This persecution threatens to become more and more acute as not only freedoms, but tolerance of freedom begins to be legislated. If the law requires what Christian morals do not allow, what choice has the church but to stand firm? Already, such political pressure has endangered the tax-exempt status of some Christian charitable organizations, and these are only the beginnings of what we will face if we stand by our morals as the world changes. The consequences could be dire, threatening the basic structure of the church, both ideologically and financially. Loss of tax exempt status, coupled with potential lawsuits could bankrupt the church. Current culture, while priding itself on tolerance and freedom, has the capacity to threaten this religion simply because it does make a claim of truth and absolute morality.

The future may be grim, but should we be surprised? Jesus painted a grim picture for his followers. What hope could they take from his words when he said, “The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him.” (Matthew 17: 22,23) All is not roses in following Christ. The time may soon come when the church as a whole must take up its cross and follow. But surely, only in persecution can the church find the unity it has lost. This challenge of modern culture against the church’s very foundation may indeed be God’s purpose to bring the varying schisms within his flock back into the same fold. Under persecution we will be united. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven… Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven.” (Matthew 5:10,11).

Now more than ever is the time to take pride in our faith. Our persecution, ideological now instead of physical, was promised to us just as surely as our joy. Keep on proclaiming our hope, despite the pressures against it, for the world’s religion of freedom offers no such hope. “If you suffer as a Christian, do not consider it a disgrace, but glorify God because you bear this name.” (1 Peter 4:16). We have a great hope: that death will bring us to a life of everlasting beauty and love. This promise comes only through sacrifice, but as Christians we believe the sacrifice, even if it be death on a cross, is worth the reward. This hope, held even through suffering, is the light that will show the world the truth of our words.

So rejoice when the world laughs at you. Rejoice, young men, when the world scorns you for taking the vows of the priesthood. God did not call us to seek freedom, pleasure, and personal fulfillment, but to minister to his flock, which is the poor and lowly of the world. If we continue to live with love, even through persecution, we will prove the truth of Christ.

This truth, the confidence of the Holy Spirit, will allow us to take pride in our faith even through the worst persecution the world can muster against us. When the Spirit of Truth came upon the disciples at Pentecost they went pouring out into the streets, proclaiming their joy, and only stopped proclaiming it when they were killed! If the hope of Christianity is worth proclaiming, even in the face of death, why not proclaim it now when only faced with the scorn of our peers. How best is it proclaimed? Not through words alone, but through acts of love, charity, and compassion. These are the demands of Christ, that we love our neighbor as ourselves, and give to those in need. If the world sees us doing this, they will no longer dare to call us hypocrites. If we call ourselves Christians but do not aid those in need, then the world can rightly call us hypocrites. “Faith by itself, if it has no works is dead. But… by my works I will show you my faith.” (James 2:17,18). No matter what the world does to us, if we continue to love, we prove our faith.

So be proud to be a Christian. Be proud to proclaim your hope to the world even if they call you a fool. Be proud to follow the way of Jesus, which is the way of the cross. And through charity, compassion and love, we can still show the world what it means to be a Christian.