Celebrate and live your Faith

So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.  Matthew 5:23-24

Someone once said that the Christian life unfolds between the Church and the marketplace. "Ite missa est”, the priest would say in Latin as he dismisses the Christians after the Sunday Eucharist. This expression not only means that the Mass has ended but also that we are now on a mission. The Christian is either in Mass, celebrating his faith, or on mission, living out his faith. Celebration and life are inseparable. We celebrate what we live and live what we celebrate.

It is impossible to be a Christian without having a personal relationship with Christ, which is expressed in prayer, and without celebrating that same Christ in the Eucharist, in communion with others who share the same faith. If prayer and penance are the individual celebration of Christ, the Eucharist is the communal celebration of Christ with the community to which we belong, for one cannot be a Christian alone.

Celebrate What You Live, Live What You Celebrate
We deceive ourselves in thinking that even without any public or private manifestation of our faith, we are still Catholics. But this is not true. Those who cannot live according to what they believe will, sooner or later, begin to believe according to how they live.

Everything valuable in life can only be achieved with effort; passivity, the “dolce fare niente”, leads to nowhere, for in life what is good either costs money, effort, or both.

The engines of an airplane not only propel it forward but also keep it in the air. In fact, when the pilot wants the plane to descend, the first thing he does is reduce the engine power, and thus the plane gradually descends. However, if the speed is reduced below 200 km/h, the plane will fall. In this world, due to gravity, what does not have the strength to rise, falls.

Our fallen nature and our instincts already exert a gravitational pull toward evil; to overcome evil and grow as people, we must strive and counteract this pull. Prayer, confrontation with the Word of God, and all religious practices are essential aids. Without them, we are at the mercy of our instincts and the values society promotes. “Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial; the spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak” (Matthew 26:41). 

Jesus himself experienced that the weakness of human nature requires the help of prayer as an exercise in self-awareness, to keep us in a constant state of alertness, and as a request for divine assistance, for, as Jesus said, “(…) apart from me, you can do nothing” (John 15:5).

To say that someone is a "non-practicing Catholic" is a contradiction, a fallacy. There are no "non-practicing" pianists, singers, or footballers. The gifts, talents, or skills we have, if we do not use them, we lose them. Faith is one of these gifts that only last as long as it is lived and exercised. “What is not used, atrophies,” as the saying goes.

“Love is like the moon: when it doesn’t grow, it wanes”. Faith is the same; it is either growing and strengthening, or it is waning and weakening. The liturgy of faith consists of the sacraments, especially the Eucharist, prayer, and listening to the Word of God.

Love also has its liturgies: if it is not expressed in words, poetry, songs, caresses, and intimacy, it begins to fade. Faith leads to the practice of good works, and these make faith grow. Love is the same; to love is to want the good of the other and to put yourself at the service of that good.

Eucharist and Charity
The Eucharistic bread being broken is an image or a symbolic act that reminds us that to be Christians, other Christs, we must share our bread with those in need. In this sense, the Eucharist, beyond being the celebration of the passion, death, and resurrection of the Lord, is also a sacrament of remembrance.

Not only of historical facts but also a symbolic act that reminds us of other gestures of Christ (such as riding a donkey into Jerusalem, washing the disciples’ feet, or driving the peddlers out of the temple). All this shows us that the ritual celebration of the Eucharist only has value for those who also celebrate the existential Eucharist, that is, those who share the bread with the poor.

The authentic Christian, the 100% Christian, is the one who not only celebrates the memory of the Lord with the community in the Church, but also individually in his or her life, who gives alms, helps, and puts into practice the words of Matthew 25: "I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat…". Those who only break bread in the Church but do not do so in life are half Christians, just as those who break bread in life but not in the Church.

Christ is in the bread that is given as food; thus, we too must become bread for others. We must share our time, energies, and resources, to the point of giving even ourselves. Christ is bread, bread is Christ, and the bread we share is Christ given to others. In this way, Christian practice merges with Christian praxis. The Eucharist extends throughout life. "Ite missa est": the ritual ends, and the existential begins. When we share the physical bread after the spiritual one, we recognize Christ in others.

Conclusion – Faith is an attitude toward life that is celebrated in the sacraments, especially in the Eucharist, and is lived out in charity toward others. Life cannot be divorced from celebration, nor can celebration be divorced from life. Those who do not celebrate what they live do not live what they celebrate.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Faith, the Currency of Humn Relationships

For we walk by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5:7

Human beings are not only autonomous, free, and independent beings but also profoundly relational. We are born from a relationship of love, and we grow as human beings if we are loved unconditionally. We may have everything in life, but without love, we have nothing. We may reach the top of society, but if we do not love and are not loved, we will not be happy. More important than knowing why we live is understanding who we live for.

Human life is born and develops in relationships with others. These relationships can be analyzed by the sciences, especially by the human sciences, but they possess something that goes beyond the scientific realm. Science serves to know things, but it is not enough to know people. Faith and love are the foundations of human relationships, and neither can be the object of scientific study.

Knowing and Loving
Knowing something implies mastery and control. If I know the principle that regulates the rain, I can manipulate it, as the Chinese did before the Olympic Games to ensure it would not rain during the ceremony. However, God is not known in that way. God is known as people are known through intimacy and relationship.

A person only reveals and makes himself or herself known when he or she is loved. Conversely, when an enemy knows us, we become vulnerable. Just like a person, God only reveals Himself to those who love Him. We cannot know God or another person without getting personally involved. God and human persons cannot be reduced to laboratory objects. Loving implies commitment; knowledge without love becomes manipulation.

Faith: The Basis of Trust in Human Relationships
Faith is a reasonable leap, supported by reason. It is like someone walking along a path and, upon reaching a precipice, needs to jump to the other side. Faith is moving towards the future or seeing the present from the perspective of a reality that has yet to be materialized. It’s like sailing without a visible route or like a child leaping into his parent’s arms, trusting that he will be safely caught by his parent.

In terms of knowledge, faith does not fit into logical deductive analysis. It is more related to synthesis and intuitive knowledge. Having faith is intuiting that something is right, even without absolute guarantees; it is like writing a blank cheque, lending money or a book, trusting that it will be returned. Faith is taking a risk and betting on the uncertain.

Einstein’s general theory of relativity was, for a long time, an act of faith, born from Einstein’s own intuition, and only recently have we obtained proof of its validity.

When I accept a cheque for a service rendered, I believe it has funds. It would be offensive, and I could lose a friend if I refused it and asked for cash instead. When boarding a plane, I trust that the authorities have done their work to prevent any danger and that the pilots are prepared and well-intentioned. When eating in a restaurant, I trust the food’s quality without demanding it be analyzed beforehand. In some cultures, like in Ethiopia, the cook tastes the food in front of the guests to ensure safety, showing how trust is at the center of all human interactions.

In marriage, I believe the union will be for life. Even with a bank loan, the bank, after properly checking, grants loan based on the belief that the client will repay the amount. Even credit cards operate on faith. We speak of "faith in the markets" like we speak of "faith in God”.

Even self-esteem is related to faith in ourselves. We may or may not believe in our abilities, and this belief influences how we set out in life. Often, we take risks without being sure, hoping that success will confirm our talents.

If God does not exist, human life lacks meaning
If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile (…) Then those who have died in Christ have perished. If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. 1 Corinthians 15:17-19

The enigma of human existence is deeply connected to the existence of God. If God does not exist, then human being, in a way, also ceases to exist as a person, and his or her life loses its meaning. Philosophers who followed the idea of the "death of God" — Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus, and Søren Kierkegaard — stated that without the existence of a higher being, life becomes absurd. For life to have meaning, there must be criteria to guide our existence that are not the result of human creation — principles that transcend our origin and have authority over us.

Sartre stated that "Hell is other people”. Just as the soldiers of the high priest arrested Christ, God was imprisoned by Feuerbach, judged by Marx and Freud — who, ironically, like Annas and Caiaphas, were also Jewish — and finally sentenced to death and executed by the Nietzsche’s “Pilate”.

Ironically, with the death of God, humanity also died, because life lost its meaning. After Nietzsche, philosophers became thinkers of the absurd and nausea, like Sartre, not so much in response to the "corpse of God”, who has no body, but to the corpse of Man.

However, after recognizing that human existence is intrinsically linked to the existence of God, and even though God pre-exists and exists independently of man, human beings are the creatures for whom God exists. Only a creature conscious of itself can attain consciousness of the existence of God.

As we mentioned when talking about animism, it was the realization of the death of our physical body that gave rise to our spiritual "self"; it was the recognition of death as an end that shaped our understanding of existence as a "being”. Existence is temporal, but "being" is eternal. The desire for eternity, contrasted with the reality of our temporality, made us believe in the existence of God, the creator of all things, and fueled our thirst to know Him.

Another irony of fate: now the other, my fellow human being, with whom I used to live in harmony in society, as Sartre states, has become hell for me. And according to him, the only way out of this hell would be to eliminate it.

At the height of their absurdity, these thinkers even came to deny the trinitarian nature of human beings. A human being does not exist in isolation, but in coexistence with two others — the father and the mother. Either three exist, or none exist. How can others be hell? It is love for one’s neighbor, as for oneself, that guarantees equality, a fundamental principle for society and for human beings as social beings and members of society.

Without love for one’s neighbour, life in society would be impossible, and without society, individual life itself would cease to exist. If everyone thought like Sartre, this world would truly be a living hell.

On the other hand, it is the love of God above all things and people that guarantees us true freedom, an essential principle for the dignity of the human person. Without freedom, there is no full human life, no individual. We are only freed from things and people when we give our heart to God and accept His lordship.

If we do not submit to God, who makes us free, we end up submitting to other human and worldly realities — power, pleasure, wealth, popularity, physical beauty — becoming slaves to these realities and, consequently, idolaters, that is, worshippers of idols.

Conclusion – Without Faith, human life is not possible. To live as a free, autonomous and independent individual, a human being needs to trust in himself or herself. To live in society, in the family, in the community, in society at large, it is essential to trust others and be trustworthy.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Quantum Physics and Faith

“If quantum mechanics has not profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet. Everything we call real is made up of things that cannot truly be understood as real.” — Niels Bohr

Physics is the mother of science
Physics is, in itself, a worldview, in other words, a matrix of our thinking. It is not the same to observe the world from Newton's mechanistic and materialistic perspective as it is to see it through the lens of quantum physics.

Contemporary thinking no longer explains reality based on Newton’s mechanistic physics, but on the theory of relativity and quantum physics. However, most thinkers, scientists, and even theologians still have their minds shaped by Newtonian physics.

The world of politics, universities, the media, and the economy is a world of cause and effect, where a cause always produces the same effect; thus, it is an atheistic, materialistic, and mechanistic world. Quantum physics, being new, will still need time to establish itself as the new worldview, and when it does, it will make belief much easier.

Universities, politics, and intellectuals are therefore outdated, behind the times and out of sync with the new reality. They live in an obsolete worldview. To update themselves, they must divorce Newton and marry Heisenberg. The world does not look nor work the way they believe it does.

Talking about the miracles of Jesus in the light of Newtonian mechanics, where reality works like a perfect machine in the unalterable routine of a clock, is more difficult than approaching the same topics from the perspective of relativity theory and quantum physics, where fixed and absolute laws of nature no longer exist, but is replaced by statistical probabilities.

Heisenberg’s principle goes even further by suggesting that reality, far from being fixed and predictable, has a high degree of uncertainty and unpredictability. Quantum physics challenges even common sense.

For Einstein, matter is a form of energy and energy is a form of matter; 95% of the universe is made up of dark matter, which is invisible. How much easier it is to talk about the resurrection of Christ’s glorious body and the spiritual body we will have after death!

Quantum Mechanics
Quantum mechanics profoundly alters our paradigms, challenging the logic that has governed science and our lives, breaking down boundaries that once seemed insurmountable, and putting an end to dualisms that opposed realities that we thought were opposites, such as:

Matter and energy
Static and dynamic
Visible and invisible
Tangible and intangible
Predictable and unpredictable
Material and spiritual
Scientific and philosophical

Let us examine some of these oppositions in more detail:
Matter/Energy – The heart of matter is as intangible as energy. The world of atoms and subatomic particles is essentially energy. Although we can measure and weigh atoms, the particles that compose them are made up of electric charges and are in motion, thus exhibiting the properties of energy. In essence, matter is describable and quantifiable, but in existence, it is energy, as it reacts, creates waves, and manifests an electric potential.

Visible and solid matter is composed of invisible elements, and the deeper we penetrate into the center of matter, the less mass and more empty space we encounter. Subatomic particles are, in fact, manifestations of energy. Therefore, what once seemed solid and visible is now reduced to electromagnetic waves. Thus, our body and everything that exists materially are nothing more than condensed vibrating energy.

Matter/Spirit – Materialism loses its rationale, since matter consists of invisible, almost spiritual elements. The atom, which is the "soul" of matter, is as invisible as the human soul within the body. Therefore, it is not only human beings who have a soul; matter, somehow, also possesses it.

Inert/Alive – It is no longer evident that only organic matter has life. Subatomic particles show us that life can also exist at the level of quarks, although distinct from the life we know.

Visible/Invisible – The boundary between the visible and the invisible is also blurring. The mass of an atom accounts for less than 1% of its total volume; the rest is empty space, i.e. the distance between the nucleus and the electron.

Static/Dynamic – The matter that makes up objects appears static, but this is an illusion. In reality, everything is in motion. The electron orbits the nucleus of an atom at 2,200 kilometers per second.

In quantum mechanics, visible matter is composed of invisible elements; it appears static when, in fact, it is in motion, and although it seems different from energy, it is merely one form of it.

The Dignity of the Human Person
"You have made us for Yourself, Lord, and our hearts will be restless until they rest in You." — Saint Augustine

Atheism is an intellectual conjecture, while agnosticism is an intellectual laziness, typical of a small minority that lives comfortably in the consumerism of an affluent society. The majority of the world’s population are religious, and this has been the case throughout history and in all cultures.

The evolution of species has resulted in a thinking human being, who either opposes or stands above the rest of Creation, just as the thumb opposes the other fingers of the hand. This fact indicates that humans have a destiny distinct from that of other living beings.

Only humans yearn for eternity and thirst for God. If there is thirst, there must be water to quench it. Therefore, the desire for God, present in every human being, is proof of His existence.

Belief is a Free Choice
Despite all the efforts of scientists to understand the mysteries of the universe and reduce the domain of religion, they have never found an unequivocal proof that compels people to believe or not to believe. Science studies the "how”, but not the "why”. Answers to the latter questions are found in the realm of faith and religion.

This being so, scientists will have to admit that the faith in a God creator of the Universe and the creation of human beings at His own image and likeness is a more plausible and logic position than the one of atheists and agnostics, that we and the Universe comes from nothing. Can nothing create something?

In Nature we do not see anything that creates itself, there is always a creator outside the creature, so how can the Universe create itself. That the Universe always existed is a position that science itself has abandoned since the discover of the BIG Bang and the Universe in expansion.

Conclusion - As long as our minds remain confined to Newton's outdated mechanistic physics, atheism seems obvious. But embracing quantum physics reveals a fluid, unpredictable reality where the boundaries between material and spiritual, visible and invisible, blur. This challenges atheism and opens new paths to deeper faith.

Visitation

In the Second Joyful Mystery, we contemplate the visit of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her cousin, Saint Elizabeth.

From the Gospel of Luke (1:39-42, 45):
In those days, Mary set out and with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the child leapt in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed with a loud cry, ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! (...) Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.’

Commentary by Saint Ambrose
“Blessed are you who have believed," says Elizabeth. But you too are blessed because you have heard and believed: every soul that believes and does the will of God conceives and brings forth the Word of God, recognizing His works.

Meditation 1
If in the Annunciation, Mary is in prayer, in the Visitation, Mary is in action; if in the Annunciation, Mary listens to the word of God, in the Visitation, she puts that word into practice, as her Son often suggests; if in the Annunciation, Mary loves God above all things, in the Visitation, she loves her neighbor as herself.

If in the Annunciation, Mary has a personal experience with God as a disciple, in the Visitation, as she sings her Magnificat and bears witness to her experience of God, she acts as a missionary, sharing and testifying to all that God has worked in her.

In these two Joyful Mysteries, we find the path of the entire Christian life. For this reason, Mary is for us a model of both disciple and missionary. All the virtues that a Christian should cultivate are concentrated in her. Mary is, therefore, not only the Mother of Jesus and our Mother but also an example of how to follow Christ.

Meditation 2
"Blessed are you because you believed," were the words of Elizabeth to Mary. These words remind us that faith is a choice, a commitment, a decision we make freely after exhausting our reason. Faith is a leap into the unknown, and only after we take this leap will we know if we were right. Mary found happiness in her faith in the Word of God spoken by the angel. We too will be happy if we believe and unhappy if we do not.

Mary traveled from Nazareth to Ein Kerem, covering about 150 km to help her cousin. However, Elizabeth recognizes something more in her than just her cousin Mary, as she was already pregnant with the Son of God. In response to Elizabeth's words, Mary, through her Magnificat, demonstrates what it means to be a missionary. It is not exactly about preaching doctrines; doctrine comes second.

Like Mary in the Magnificat, the missionary must testify to the great works that God has done in their life. Just as history is divided into before and after Christ, our lives change when we encounter Christ, as happened with Paul.

In the Magnificat, Mary recounts the great things the Almighty has done in her life. In the same way, Jesus’ project is not just individual but also social, calling us to make this world the Kingdom of God.

The missionary, as Mary describes in her Magnificat, is the one who helps to bring down the mighty from their thrones and lift up the humble; the one who faces the injustices of this world, striving to establish the Kingdom of God here in a more just, peaceful, and fraternal society.

Prayer
Lord our God,
just as Mary rose in haste
to serve and bring Your presence to Elizabeth's house,
we too, moved by Your Spirit,
wish to respond promptly to Your call.

Make us faithful disciples
who listen to Your Word with open hearts,
and generous missionaries
who put it into practice through service and love for others.

May we, like Mary,
recognize and bear witness
to the great wonders You work in our lives,
and announce with joy Your Kingdom of justice, peace, and brotherhood.

Lord, help us tear down the barriers that separate us from others,
exalt the humble, and combat the injustices
that prevent Your peace from reigning in the world.
May our faith be firm and trusting in You, as Mary's was,
and may we find true happiness
in believing in Your promises.

As Mary sang her Magnificat,
we praise and bless You,
for You are faithful and merciful,
and in You, we place all our trust.

Amen.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC