Give Peace a Chance - Christmas Column

Give Peace a Chance – Christmas 2012

As we stand in the wake of yet another tragedy of gun violence, in the wake of yet another build up to war, in the wake of violence against persons in the womb and in every land – we cannot but ask the question:  what difference has Jesus made in our world?  Throughout Advent we have heard the Messianic promises of peace:

Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.  (1^st reading; Second Sunday of Advent) 

The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives and release to prisoners, to announce a year of favor from the Lord and a day of vindication by our God.  (1^st reading; Third Sunday of Advent)

I will fix a place for my people Israel; I will plant them so that they may dwell in their place without further disturbance.  Neither shall the wicked continue to afflict them as they did of old, since the time I first appointed judges over my people Israel.  I will give you rest from all your enemies.  (1^st reading; Fourth Sunday of Advent)

These are the Messianic promises that the Messiah will bring forth peace throughout the earth; the poor will be relieved of their woe; prisoners will be set free; and all nations will see this redemption and share in the blessings of the Messiah. 

We believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the one sent by God to fulfill every one of these promises.  We know that half the planet professes faith in Jesus as Messiah.  Why, then, are these promises unfulfilled?  Why are there still wars, senseless acts of violence, poverty, exploitation, and continued oppression of peoples?  We are tempted to ask as John the Baptist had while in prison, “Are you the one, or shall we look for another?”  Is Jesus not sufficient?

The answer lies on the other side of the equation, for Jesus is sufficient.  As we look at the infant Jesus in the crib we see all that we need to know in order to live our lives:  helplessness, defenselessness, poor and humble, and completely trusting.  Jesus lives his entire life in this manner from the very first moment of his existence on earth to his very last.  Every word he preached and every act he performed contained within it the fulfillment of the promise:  Jesus lived and preached peace, generosity, complete trust in God, total love of neighbor, and the complete rejection of violence, exploitation, and greed. 

Why, then, does the world suffer still from its ancient curses?  The answer is simple:  we have failed to live as Jesus lived, and we have failed to live as Jesus taught us to live.  We have failed just as the first audience of Jesus failed.  They expected a political Messiah who would conquer Rome and restore Israel.  They cast Jesus into the same mold that Satan himself tried to mold Jesus during the temptations in the desert.  They wanted the Messiah to use his baby Jesus powers, wave his hand, and all would be well.  We want those same things.  We want a political Messiah formed in our own image and likeness.  We expect Jesus to snap his fingers and make it all better – without any effort on our part.

And yet the challenge of Christmas is the challenge we face throughout the public ministry of Jesus.  In order to receive the Messianic promises, we must live them ourselves.  We must become other Christs and live as Jesus lived and taught.  If we want peace, then we must reject violence.  If we want an end to poverty, then we must give of ourselves and share with others.  If we want release from oppression, then we must stop oppressing others.  We must become the helpless infant in the crib, the peaceful doer of good, and the selfless soul who offers himself for others.  That is the only way.  And we can realize these Messianic promises in our lifetime and enjoy them perfectly in the fullness of the kingdom.  Only the soul that has rejected violence entirely, embraced the simplicity of Jesus, and completely detaches oneself in order to give oneself to others in service will realize peace in this life and fully in the life to come.

Such a life is difficult to achieve, but not impossible.  Jesus showed us the way in his life and teaching.  All things are possible with God, as the angel said to Mary.  Let us implore the infant Jesus to bless us with his peace this Christmas season and throughout the remainder of our lives:  “Let us pray for the peace that comes from the Prince of Peace.  Almighty God and Father of light, a child is born for us and a son is given to us.  Your eternal Word leaped down from heaven in the silent watches of the night, and now your Church is filled with wonder at the nearness of her God.  Open our hearts to receive his life and increase our vision with the rising of dawn, that our lives may be filled with his glory and his peace, who lives and reigns forever and ever.  Amen.”

The Future Church

A lot of attention has been paid to prognostications about the future of the Catholic Church.  John Allen wrote a book titled The Future Church in which he provides his ten predications on what the future holds for the Church.  Many others have made their own predications - all of these coming from an ideological perspective that carries a certain agenda and set of pet issues.  Many of these predictors seem unaware that the topic of the Church's future is not new, and that more thoughtful people have looked at the matter from a theological and spiritual perspective.

Back in the 1960's two German theologians wrote frequently about this topic.  Karl Rahner S.J. analyzed the present state of the Church in relation to its past.  Rahner noted the many threats to Catholic life and faith, indicating that the present state of the Church could be aptly described as diaspora Christianity.  Society no longer was Christian in any appreciable sense, and religious life in general has been marginalized.  This phenomenon has only grown more pronounced since that time, leading Jeff Mirus to write a thoughtful piece on the end of pro-life politics, arguing that the Church has really a great deal more problems than merely the political realm, and that politics is merely a symptom of a much deeper problem in society.

The reasons for diaspora Christianity are many, but Rahner notes two fundamental contributors:  the radical separation between modern philosophy and the life of faith.  In previous times philosophy remained open and amenable to God and the realm of the spirit.  In modern philosophy no such room exists, due in large part to the move toward positivism, the idea that there is no objective truth but rather conventions that are agreed upon but subject to change at will by society.  The other major contribution to diaspora Christianity is the scandal caused by Christians themselves:  the justification and crass use of violence to support the Church and subdue its opponents; the extravagance of the wealth and opulence of churchmen.  Both of these stand in contradiction to the Lord Jesus, who rejected violence and lived a poor, simple existence on earth.  Rahner did not live to see the modern scandals of the sexual abuse crisis globally in the Church, but we can certainly add that reality to the list.

Rahner saw the Church coming into a new age in which she had to deal with the reality of living a diaspora existence.  In many ways the Second Vatican Council recognized this reality in encouraging the Church to recognize her true reality as a pilgrim people - nomads with no permanent home on earth journeying to the fully realized kingdom of God in the heavenly Jerusalem. 

The other great German theologian who wrote about the future of the Church with great eloquence is Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI.  In 1970 Ratzinger wrote a short book titled "Faith and the Future" in which he explicates far better than the modern prognosticators just what the future of the Church entails.  The following are excerpts from that book.  Keep in mind the date of these words - 1970 - and see just how accurate and yet hopeful these words are:

the future of the Church can and will issue from those whose roots are deep and who live from the pure fullness of their faith.  It will not issue from those who accommodate themselves merely to the passing moment or from those who criticize others and assume that they themselves are infallible measuring rods; nor will it issue from those who take the easier road, who sidestep the passion of faith, declaring false and obsolete, tyrranous and legalistic, all that makes demands upon men, that hurts them and compels them to sacrifice themselves.  To put this more positively:  the future of the Church, once again as always, will be reshaped by saints, by men, that is, who see more than others see, because their lives embrace a wider reality.

the big talk of those who prophecy a Church without God and without faith is all empty chatter.  We have no need of a Church that celebrates the cult of action in political prayers.  It is utterly superfluous.  Therefore, it will destroy itself.  What will remain is the Church of Jesus Christ, the Church that believes in the God who has become man and promises us life beyond death.  The kind of priest who is no more than a social worker can be replaced by the psychotherapist and other specialists; but the priest who is no specialist, who does not stand on the sidelines, watching the game, giving official advice, but in the name of God places himself at the disposal of men, who is beside them in their sorrows, in their joys, in their hope and in their fear, such a priest will certainly be needed in the future.

From the crisis of today the Church of tomorrow will emerge - a Church that has lost much.  She will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning.  She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices she built in prosperity.  As the number of her adherents diminishes, so will she lose many of her social privileges.  In contrast to an earlier age, she will be seen much more as a voluntary society, entered only be free decision.  As a small society, she will make much bigger demands on the initiative of her individual members.

But in all of the changes at which one might guess, the Church will find her essence afresh and with full conviction in that which was always at her center:  faith in the triune God, in Jesus Christ, the Son of God made man, in the presence of the Spirit until the end of the world.  In faith and prayer she will again recognize her true center and experience the sacraments again as the worship of God and not as a subject for liturgical scholarship.

The Church will be a more spiritual Church, not presuming upon a political mandate, flirting as little with the Left as with the Right...It will make her poor and cause her to become the Church of the meek.  The process will be all the more arduous, for sectarian narrow-mindedness as well as pompous self-will will have to be shed...But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church.  Men in a totally planned world will find themselves unspeakably lonely.  It they have completely lost sight of God, they will feel the whole horror of their poverty.  Then they will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new.  They will discover it as a hope that is meant for them, an answer for which they have always been searching in secret.

And so it seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times.  The real crisis has scarcely begun.  We will have to count on terrific upheavals.  But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end:  not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already...but the Church of faith.  She may well no longer be the dominant social power to the extent that she was until recently; but she will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man's home, where he will find life and hope beyond death.  (p. 114-118)