“DON’T – JUST DON’T!”
It is one of the great failings of the teachers and catechists of the
Church that much of our teaching is conveyed via negativa. In this way it
seems much more like we are a faith of limiting, stifling, of making life
boring. What a tragic and huge
mistake! The purpose of the faith is to
do exactly the opposite! As these last
two paragraphs of Lumen Gentium make
clear that we are “constituted to live in royal liberty and, by self abnegation
of a holy life, overcome the reign of sin in (our)selves.” Where most of the world desires license to do
as one wants, the faith desires that you have the liberty to thrive,
physically, mentally, and spiritually in joy – now and for all eternity – in the
way that you were created to be!
I went to the doctor and he gave me a long list of foods
that he said I had to give up. It was
the most depressing meeting. And fish,
of course, was not his negative menu.
What would have been better was a course on great food and encouragement
on how great it would be for me. Instead
it was, “Olives will kill you. Do not
eat olives.” I’ll get right on that.”
Summing up this section, every Catholic lay person is anointed
priest, prophet, and king and is responsible for the spreading of the
kingdom. As you do this, bear in mind
the goal: to bring people to life, joy, and true freedom. This is a much better line than, “Stop that
or you’re going to hell.” It may be
true, but does living with such negative people sound any more appealing?
To this end, the laity has the right to ask from the Church
what it needs to accomplish these goals.
The laity also has the right to express their opinions to the
institutional Church as it pertains toward these goals. There is a certain amount of obedience that
is called for then. Not a happy
topic. But somehow a decision must be
made concerning which direction we will head because until that is done, we can’t
really move forward. So pray for those
acting on behalf of the institutional Church that they may be wise, active, and
full of the Holy Spirit that we may accomplish all of these lofty goals.
Pastors must recognize the rights of the laity and foster their
works. Not everything can be or should
be done by the ordained or even necessarily controlled by the ordained. Go!
Spread the Good News without me!
There is more than enough work for everybody!
Next time: Call to
Holiness
4 comments:
my father-in-law had a saying . . . "everyone has to take his own hide to market" . . . do you understand that saying? I do and I act accordingly
The most important question after all that, is Will the doctor still let you eat Valu Time Cheese Curls? They merit a respectable D+ rating on "Fooducate.
(As for me, the fact that I actually took the time to look this up on Google indicates that a good doctor would prescribe that I give up Google!)
Oh wait, the news is worse than I thought. I wouldn't want to give a false sense that what you are eating is healthier than it is. If you prefer Baked Valu Time Cheese Curls, they get just plain old D rating Fooducate.
When one of our children would misbehave, and my husband would want to dole out a "write it 100 times" punishment, I would never let him choose the sentence. He would opt for "I should not punch my brother in the face," whereas I would state "I should treat my brother with respect." I believe writing a negative behavior repeatedly would only serve to reinforce just that.
I believe stressing what you are being denied contributes to the way we think about that behavior/food, making it somehow more desirable.
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