Faith and Reason

If Reason is the capacity to see, to understand and to accept the true visible material, that is physically observable which many times can be expressed or quantified mathematically, then Faith is the capacity to see, to understand and to accept truths that are not substantiated, but not any less evident, beyond being physically observable, and is not mathematically expressible or quantifiable.

Faith and reason are not two opposite and irreconcilable concepts, like the yes and the no, the white and the black, the lie and the truth.  English philosopher, Anthony Kenny, defines reason as the means between skepticism and credulity, i.e., the optimal balance between inappropriate belief and inappropriate doubt.

Like faith, for it to be humanly it needs to escape from irrationality and be reasonable; reason needs to escape from pretension of being "one size fits all", i.e., to be the only way to knowledge.  To paraphrase Pascal, faith has reasons that reasons does not know. If faith, without reason, is blind, reason, without faith, is not any less blind; both are important for knowledge.

Historically over time, reason was formed and established in science, which is the process of determining the behaviour of substance or of the universe using observation, experimentation, and reason. Historically faith was formed and established in religion, which is an organized system of beliefs, ideas or answers about cause, nature and the finality of the universe which are not, nor can they ever be the object of science.

Atheism is also a belief and les scientific
Religion contains faith that the eternal God created the matter (the universe) -- a supernatural belief, not based on direct observation, which preceded the Big Bang. Atheism contains the faith that the matter (the universe) is eternal and uncreated; a supernatural belief that, of the same form, cannot be based on direct observation because the observer, man, did not exist at that time.

Science cannot prove wrong the belief that God preceded the Big Bang and is the origin of the Universe. On the contrary the atheistic belief that the universe always existed and created itself, violate Einstein's law of the conservation of Mass/Energy (E=MC2), the first law of thermodynamic, according to which mass can be converted into energy and vice-versa, but not mass nor energy can create themselves. The atheistic belief that the universe is eternal and will always exists violates the second law of thermodynamics, called the law of degradation, according to which transformation of mass into energy is not possible without deterioration or irreversible wasting away of the first; from which we can conclude, scientifically, that the universe will end when it has spent all its energy.

Putting aside the fact that one day we will not need faith because we will see God face to face; still in this world, the scientific knowledge can increase and be one step from proving in an irrefutable way the existence of God. Whereas the atheistic faith, in a universe not created and eternal, will always remain a belief because we will never obtain the scientific knowledge of the origin of an uncreated eternal universe, since no one existed or could have been there to observe the beginning of a universe without beginning.

Faith and reason in day-to-day
Not only in religion lives the faith, not only in science lives the reason. Faith and reason belong together, and we need both in our day-to-day life. Practically all actions contain a bit of reason and a bit of faith. In our life, reason analyses, and faith decides; without reason we would decide prematurely and make more mistakes than we already do; without faith we would never arrive at a decision, take chance on a solution to our problems, because we would always think that something could have escaped our analysis and thus fall into immobility.

When I accept a cheque for a service rendered, I believe that it is fair to say that it would be indelicate, and I could lose a friend if I refused it. When I get into a plane, I believe that the police have done a good job in preventing someone from putting a bomb in the baggage and I believe that the pilots are well trained and well intentioned.

When I feel like eating, in a restaurant, I trust that the food is in good condition, and I would not insist that it is analyzed in a laboratory before I eat it; it is the lack of faith and the fear of poisoning that make the cooks in Ethiopia to always taste the food in front of guests before serving.

When I join a woman in marriage, I believe that it is going to work out, that it will be for rest of our life. When I ask for a bank loan that is more than the bank determined after analyzing my financial situation, if eventually they concede in giving me the loan it is because they have faith that one day, they will get it back with interest.

The credit card is, at the end of the day, a card of faith, and operates based on that; one speaks of faith in the markets as one speaks of faith in God. In summary, faith is not only the spare change between God and us but, it is also, the spare change between others and ourselves.

As Man is not an object of science, in the day-to-day life there are no certainties only probabilities. Like reason, faith is essential in human relations for understanding among people. It is based on trust, which people have with one another, that the promises and commitments are made and accepted.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Faith as an Option

"...choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served in the region beyond the river or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord" Joshua. 24:15.

"God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved though him. Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil" John 3:17-19

Gift versus choice
Two years ago in Loriga, Portugal, after a pilgrimage to the cemetery on November 1st and while still in the cemetery, I was chatting with a fellow countryman who said: "...you who believe feel comforted by faith, we non-believers do not have such comfort...". Later another friend also said to me:"...no matter what you do I just do not believe...".

We often refer to faith as a gift from God.  St. Paul said, it is the Spirit inside of us who cries "Abba! Father!" (Rom. 8:15) Jesus said that it was He who chose us and not us Him (Jn. 15:16). If faith is a gift from God, why some have, and others do not? Is God unfair, who to some He gives while others He does not? Then is faith a gift or a choice, or is it both?

All that is from God, the initiative is his and hence faith is a gift; but a gift has no effect without our response, without our consent, therefore faith is also a choice. We are saved freely by the grace of God, by the means of faith. Faith is our response to the salvific grace of God.

In this sense faith is a roundtrip ticket; it is like a letter that God sends us, registered and with notification of receipt, which requires that I accept the letter and sign the document that accompanies it.  Faith is like a blank cheque that God signs and sends to me; for this cheque to be of value, or serves me for something, I need to write on it a certain sum of money.

Salvation is a gift from God, the faith in this salvation is a free choice of man. Someone said that God feeds the birds in the air, but will not put the food in the nest, they must go out to get it.

On Sunday morning, the two saw the empty tomb, Mary Magdalene, and the apostle John; the first saw and thought that someone had stolen the body of the Lord, the second saw and believed that Jesus had risen from the dead.

Jesus rebuked and accused the people of his generation for their lack of faith (Matt. 17:17, Mk. 6:6, Lk. 24:25) as well as that of his disciples (Mk. 16:14). If faith were not a choice, and was just a gift from God, there would not have been any reason for such accusation from Jesus.

Jesus embittered because the Pharisees did not want to believe, not in John the Baptist, not in himself, weeps over Jerusalem and condemns the cities where many miracles were performed and yet did not believe; ultimately, he praises the little ones and the humble because unlike the wise, they believe and accept his message. (Matt. 11:16,27)

Faith is a reasonable giving in...
Reasonable not rational. If God exists, then He is the Creator of all things and of all; as created beings it is not logical that our mind can comprehend the mind of God; that the part can understand the whole. God can never be the subject of science, as matter of fact not even Man can be. On the other hand, the mystery does not only apply to God and to man, but it is also common to all areas of knowledge.

No science or area of knowledge can boast of having discovered everything there is to know in its field; the more it is known the more can be known; for this reason, the truly wise considers himself ignorant; Nicholas of Cusa called it the learned ignorance: facing the immensity of what there is to be known, I only know that I know nothing.

As is defined by the First Vatican Council, faith is a reasonable obligation; reasonable because, while the life of other living beings who inhabit this planet with us is governed by instinct, we, the descendants of Homo Sapiens govern our lives by reason; today despite, or precisely because, of the advances in science it is more logical, more plausible, more humanly believable the existence of God than his non-existence.

In addition of being reasonable faith is also an obligation because it can never be proven, can never be a scientific finding, will always be a step in the dark and in emptiness, a decision.  After barely satisfying the criteria of reason, faith is a choice; some take the step beyond that which can be known; others do not risk, excessively cautious, waiting that reason fills them with measures and answers all their questions of what never happens nor will ever happen.

(...) The rich man insisted: 'Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father's house, for I have five brothers, that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment'. Abraham replied: 'They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them'. He said, 'No, Father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead'. (Lk. 16:27-31)

No one can blame God for not having given him the gift of faith. Only do not believe who is proud and idolize reason; only do not believe who do not want to take a step into the unknown outside reason; only those who do not venture who do not gain; only do not believe who doesn't want to.

"Peter answered him, 'Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.' He said, 'Come.' So, Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came towards Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, 'Lord, save me!'  Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, 'You of little faith, why did you doubt?'" Matt. 14:28-31

Peter believed and risked and achieved...

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

From Witness to Faith: You are the light of the world

"You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hidden. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven." Matthew 5:14-16

Light is for seeing – Light reveals the truth of things because it shows them as they really are -- their true colour, texture and form. Without light, in the darkness, nothing can be seen, nothing has colour, nothing has form.  The Christian who follows his Master, who is the way, the truth and the life, also becomes the walking truth, way and life. The Christian who is truly a Christian, lives with meaning, is a point of reference and model to emulate, a finger pointing to the truth because he embodies and lives it.

Light is for being seen – A blind man was invited to a friend’s house for dinner; after dinner, as it was already dark, the friend gave him a lamp to help him on his way home, the blind man said mockingly, “Can't you see that I am blind, what good is a lamp to me?” “Take it,” his friend insisted.  And so he did. When he was still a long way from his house, someone bumped into him and he, now understanding the reason for the lamp, shouted, “Did you not see my lamp?” “No, I didn't see you, that's why I bumped into you, but now I see that in fact you are carrying a lamp, but it has gone out.”

When visibility is poor, because of rain or because it is the beginning or end of the day, many drivers do not turn on their headlights, because they say they can still see; thus, forgetting that the lights are also for being seen by others.  

No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a basket. Instead, a lamp is placed on a stand, where it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your good deeds shine out for all to see, so that everyone will praise your heavenly Father (Matthew 5: 15-16).

When, claiming to be Christians, we do not embody the word of God, we are a dimmed light that not only does not show the way, but is also a "stumbling block", which is the meaning of the word scandal in Greek.

Light exposes evil – (...) the Light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil" (John 3:19). In this sense, light has the same denouncing and anti-corruption capacity as salt. It is in the dark, in the dead of night, in secret that the worst deeds of evil of this world are done. Exposing these injustices is the Christian’s task, even if it is difficult and risky; if no one does it, darkness infests the entire society and transforms it into a mob; "where the sun doesn’t enter, enters the doctor", says the people.

Light must shine – In Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman, she asks Jesus where she should worship God, in the temple of Jerusalem or on the mountain of Samaria.  Jesus answers that God is worshipped everywhere, and because he is Spirit, he must be worshipped in spirit and truth. Without leaving the Synagogue and the Temple, most of his ministry took place in the street, in life.  The same happened in the first five centuries of the Church; the Word was preached in public squares or transmitted from person to person by his or her witness; the Eucharist was celebrated in people's homes. Worship was in life and life was in worship.

With the building of temples, after Emperor Constantine, worship and life were separated. Today we have life without worship, those who call themselves non-practicing Catholics, and worship without life, those who practice religion but only in Church, when outside they are equal to or worse than the others. Today the only light that shines is the lamp in the Blessed Sacrament, only in Church of course.

Let your light shine before men... We are called to be the light of the world, not the light of the temple; not a light that is put under a bushel, but a light that is at the top of the hill where we can see more of the world.  Like someone once said: "Faith either spreads or fades"; faith is either given or is lost; we only have faith when we give it away.

Christ is the Sun, we are the Moon – All light comes from the Sun.  Christ is the sun of our lives, the one who guides us, enlightens us and warms us.  We as disciples, or planets, revolve around him, capturing his light which we then, like the moon, reflect to illuminate the world that walks in darkness.  Christians are in fact like the moon in its different phases:

First Quarter – Those who gradually abandon prayer and the practices of the sacraments, especially the Eucharist, and see their light losing intensity and risk going out completely.

New – Those who have already set aside prayer, reading and listening to the Word of God, and practicing the sacraments, they are no longer enlightened by Christ or no longer shine themselves; they are a black hole, or the so-called non-practicing Catholics. Without the guidance of God’s Word, Catholics are easily led astray by the philosophies of this world.

Last Quarter – Those who strive to embody the Word of God and are in communion with other Christians, being part of the mystical body of Christ; they grow as people of faith and in human maturity.

Full – Those who despite still having dark areas in their lives (in reference to the large craters on the moon) fundamentally live for Christ, and as St. Paul said of himself, "it is no longer I who live but is Christ who lives in me". Their lives are a beacon for others; they are a living Christ.

"Love is like the moon, when it doesn't increase it decreases". Faith is exactly the same, it either increases or decreases, it never stays static because in this world nothing is static.  It has always been said that “what is not used, atrophies”. Faith grows when it is applied in life, when it is the driving force behind our lives; it decreases to the point of atrophy when it is not used in everyday life, when it doesn't inspire and motivate actions, and generate attitudes.

When we live out our faith in this way, we truly bear witness to Christ, we are the salt of the earth and the light of the world, and in this way, we carry out a silent evangelization, because it brings to faith many of those who see us and live with us.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

From witness to faith - You are the salt of the earth

"You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything but is thrown out and trampled under foot." Matthew 5:13

We belong to a Church that suffers from verbiage when its founder was an incarnate Word. It is symptomatic that Jesus had compared his disciples to salt and light, whose action takes place in silence. Francis of Assisi understood this when he said, "Preach the gospel at all times and when necessary, use words”.

The incarnated gospel does a better job of evangelizing than the proclaimed gospel, because works replace words; in contrast, not only do words not replace works, but they are worthless in the absence of works, or by works contrary to words; works may not need words, but words always need works.

We could unload tons of bibles in the middle of a well populated continent, and not a single person would convert to Christianity because of them. We could also preach the Word of God to the four winds and achieve little else, because "words are carried away by the wind". The Word of God itself, after being spoken by so many prophets, had to become incarnate in order to be credible.

Christianity spreads through human contact, through the witness of life. "See how they love one another", said the Romans in observing the individual and social aptitudes of the early Christians. It is said that the education of children is aerial; what is educational is not so much the advice or even the works the parents do for the children, but their daily behaviour and the environment they create at home; the way they react to situations. The same is true of evangelization, what awakens faith is the silent witness of our daily lives, which is why Jesus exhorted his disciples to be salt and light.

Salt melts snow – In cities where snow is a constant during winter, it is salt that allows the roads to remain open to traffic. The Christian who is salt helps to re-establish communication between people whose relationships have been severed; he is the peacemaker in conflicts. Let us recall the Titanic’s collision with an iceberg, the snow avalanches that buried people alive; that is to say, water in its solid state is more at the service of evil and death than of life. 

Only in its liquid state is water a source of life, because only in this state can it be absorbed by living beings and form an integral part of them. Salt melts ice that causes people to slip, and keeps water in a liquid state; the Christian, who is salt, undoes the traps, the snares, the intrigues, and the plans that the evildoers weave to bring down their fellow human beings.

Salt fixes water in the body – Water and salt go together; the sea is the great reservoir of both. Without salt our bodies would quickly become dehydrated; in fact, little sachets of rehydration salts were the first thing we gave in Africa to people who were easily dehydrated by the high fevers that malaria causes. Just as water is the principle of physical life, the water of Baptism is the principle of Christian life; a Christian who is salt stays faithful to the baptismal promises. In the ancient baptismal rite salt was used; with baptism, we become part of the redeemed, those who possess the water that gushes forth to eternal life.  Without salt, this water escapes us.

Salt conserves and preserves – Salt preserves meat and fish; in the days when there was no refrigeration, this was the way to avoid corruption. Christians, who are salt, prevent corruption in the social fabric of families, institutions, companies, organizations, governments, clubs etc. In institutions where there are authentic Christians, there are no degradation or corruption.

In biology, when a wound opens, the body can be invaded by viruses, germs and bacteria that are harmful to health; salt has the power to kill many of these harmful agents. Similarly, in the fabric of society, in institutions, companies and clubs, there are situations that can cause someone to stumble. Thieves are not born as such, as the saying goes, "the situation makes the thief". The presence of Christians in these places has the same deterrent effect as sentencing in the judicial system.

Salt gives flavour – Just as salt gives flavour to food, the Christian gives meaning to human life. Only Christ can logically answer the three questions that all human beings who come into this world would at some point ask themselves: Where do I come from, where am I going, and what is the meaning of life? Without Christ, human life is meaningless, tasteless and purposeless.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

The realism of the resurrection

"We also believe, and so we speak, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus, and will bring us with you into his presence. (...) So we do not lose heart.

Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. (...) because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen, for what can be seen is temporary but what cannot be seen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:14,16,18

Hebrew anthropology and Greek anthropology
The idea that the soul is immortal and destined for eternity and that the body, which it embodies for a time, is mortal and as such destined to disappear, has everything to do with Greek dualistic anthropology and nothing to do with biblical way of thinking.

In Hebrew and biblical anthropology, neither the soul is immortal nor the body mortal. In our being, the corporeal and the spiritual dimensions form an indivisible whole.  If during our earthly life the body has a soul that animates it, then in our afterlife, the soul has a body that gives it form, a body that is not physical but spiritual. It has the same form as the physical, but not of the same nature.

Visible matter is made up of invisible things
We have always assumed that matter is visible and spirit is invisible; in reality, this is not the case. The quantum physics of our times, which has dethroned Newton’s mechanistic and materialistic physics forever, tell us that visible reality is made up of invisible realities.

The atom, considered to be the "building block" of matter, is invisible and is made up of an electron that is always in motion, inside a nebula or cloud, the centre of which is composed of neutrons and protons; these in turn are made up of quarks, which are further made up of the most elementary particle discovered recently and dubbed "the God particle". From this we can conclude that simplistic definitions such as: the matter is visible and spirit is invisible have nothing to do with modern physics.

The water metaphor
Water, without ever ceasing to be what it is, exists in nature in three different states: solid, liquid and gas. In its gaseous state, water, without losing anything that characterizes it in its essence, exists in an intangible and invisible form.

Just like how water can exist, without ceasing to be what it is in its essence, in an invisible and untouchable form, so we as people can also exist in an invisible and intangible form in our spiritual body, which replaces our physical body after death. Our physical body is our way of being and existing in time and space; our spiritual body will be our way of being and existing beyond time and space.

Coming back to our analogy, water in its solid and gaseous state is like being in limbo because it is in a pure state. But it is only the principle of life when it exists in the liquid state, that is, not pure but drinkable. When water vapour condenses, in the form of rain or dew, it penetrates mother earth, and after acquiring a "physical body" formed by the mineral salts that make it up, it is born from the earth, which is why it is called a "water source".

Mineral salts are the physical body of water, as they transform it from pure to drinkable and fix it inside every living organism. Pure water, without the mineral salts, is not the principle of life because, unable to retain it in its pure state, living beings would dehydrate and die.

When water evaporates, it lets go of the mineral salts which were its way of being in this world and returns to its pure state. The evaporation of water is like our death; just like water, which does not need mineral salts to be water, we do not need our physical body to be what we are, children of God: it is not, therefore, our physical body that identifies us before God, but our spiritual body.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Ressurection or Reincarnation?

"So, it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness; it is raised in power. It is sown a physical body; it is raised a spiritual body. If there is a physical body, there is also a spiritual body." 1 Corinthians 15:42-44.

Reincarnation is a Hindu and Buddhist concept that the New Age has spread to the Western Christian world. The fragile and often inconsistent way of thinking of today’s man, fascinated by the possibility of having seven lives, like a cat, has uncritically assimilated this concept. It is common to find Christians who believe in both resurrection and reincarnation, without realizing that the two concepts are mutually exclusive.

Like everything that is authentically human, faith will always escape the magnifying glass of the scientific method of knowledge; man is not an object of science. However, in order not to degrade into pure superstition, faith must be married to reason. Superstition is irrational, faith, while not rational, is at least reasonable, plausible, and must make sense. Let us put both concepts to the test of reason:

Reincarnation – As in Greek philosophy, for Easterners the soul is eternal, it existed before and is independent of the body it embodies. In an ascending process towards perfection, each life, each body, that the soul incarnates is an opportunity to progress towards perfection, successively incarnating in higher and increasingly more perfect forms of life. Contrastingly, when the soul misbehaves, it regresses, or it reincarnates in the next life in a lower form of existence, which can even be an animal, a cow for example.

Astronomy – Reincarnation seems to assume that the world has always existed and will always exist; but current astronomy says that the world came into existence with a Big Bang and will cease to exist one day, when the universe has used up all of its energy.

Demographics – For reincarnation to be possible, it assumes a planet with the same population throughout time.  Demographics tells us that man began inhabiting this planet 5 million years ago; it is estimated that the world population at the time of Jesus was 300 million people, now we are at 7 billion.

Evolution of Species – Life started with a unicellular organism that diversified and progressed to ever higher and more intelligent species until it reached the human being. The science of evolution of species does not acknowledge any regression. Between us and animals, there are millions of years of evolution that cannot be reversed.

Genetics – The combination of genes in the genetic code of each living being is unique and exclusive in the life history of this planet; part of human dignity is due to this fact. It makes no sense for a soul to have a genetic code for each life it lives, nor does it make sense for several bodies of the same soul to have the same genetic code.

Regression – How then do we explain certain therapies that lead people to regress and learn what they were in another life and what type of person they were? If there is any truth to this phenomenon, it could be explained by the notion of "collective unconsciousness", proposed by Carl Jung, a follower of Freud.

People would not therefore regress to other lives they have had, but rather, through meditation and regression techniques, they would connect to psychic materials that do not come from personal experience but are found in what Jung calls the “collective unconsciousness”; this is a kind of database of the inheritance and heritage of all humanity, which contains everything that human beings are and have done throughout human history.

Resurrection – This concept owes no satisfaction or explanation to any of the sciences described above, because it is not in conflict with any of them. In the Judaeo-Christian thinking, the soul is not eternal and is intrinsically and forever united to a body; there are no bodies without souls, nor souls without bodies.

By God’s grace, every human being is naturally a candidate for eternal life, his or her entire being, body and soul transformed into an immortal form of existence, that is, the spiritual body or glorious body (1Cor 15:42-44). Those who respond negatively to God’s grace, denying it in their lives and living with their backs to God, are probably making themselves candidates for eternal death, that is, a return to the nothingness from which God created everything.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Death does not exist

Father, there's something I don't understand: when I die, my body goes to earth, my soul goes to heaven, and what about me? Where will I go?

Death shouldn't concern us because we will never coincide; as long as we exist, it won't exist; when it exists, we won't exist.   Karl Marx

As Lavoisier’s law says, in nature nothing is lost, everything is transformed. In continuous transformation, nothing stays the same. Death and life are part of the same process, there is no life without death or death without life. Death is not a state in which a living being can be found, but the passage from one form of life to another. Death is a means by which life diversifies and progresses in the evolution of the species.

The green grass in the fields grows until the day the gazelle eats it; the grass has not died, it has progressed and changed form, it has become a gazelle. The gazelle leaps and jumps through the ravines, drinks water from the streams, and wanders through the woods until the day it is eaten by the lion; it has not died, it has been absorbed and assumed by the lion’s body.

As the lion has no predators, it dies of old age or in a fight for male supremacy, its mortal remains are eaten by hyenas and vultures, and what is left is eaten by ants and worms which, in turn, when they die, fertilize the earth where the grass grows again.

On the surface, life is as good as death because neither remains, one follows the other unceasingly.  However, if we take a closer look, we realize that this is not the case.  Although they are two parts or stages of the same process, life and death are not on equal footing; on the contrary, life is on a higher plane because it does not exist for the sake of death, but death does exist for the sake of life.

Therefore, it is not true what the philosopher Heidegger says: "We are a being made for death". The grass lived for months before it died; similarly, the gazelle and the lion lived for years before they died; death was a moment, while life was for years; death was a passage while life is a constant; we are therefore a being made for life.

The same life-death-life process that happens between living beings in the food chain, happens inside every living being. Our body is made up of around 30 trillion cells; each of them behaves as if it were a living being following the rules that govern life on this planet. In other words, they are born, they grow, they reproduce, and they die (interestingly, only cancer cells refuse to die); this is how we explain the growth, transformation and ageing of our body; every 7 years we have biologically a new body.

Psychological maturity, which according to Freud takes place in the transition from the pleasure principle to the reality principle, also implies and presupposes death. The same can be said for spiritual maturity: "For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it" (Luke 9:24)

Just as the lion, which has no predators, is at the top of its food chain and is king of the jungle, Man is king of creation.  Easter means passage; our death or our Easter is like that of Christ. The passage from temporal-spatial form of life to a life in God’s eternity, in which we will not only be a soul but, like Christ, we will possess a spiritual body, a glorious body.

For this reason, we do not lose heart, because "we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens" (2 Corinthians 5:1).

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Fasting is to life what the Zero is to Maths

"But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, (...) whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret (...) when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face..." Mattew 6:3, 6, 17

If praying is our attitude towards God, it is telling him that we love him above all things, and it is the highest manifestation of our freedom; if almsgiving is our attitude towards others, loving others as we love ourselves, and it is the only guarantee of equality and social justice, then what is the point of fasting?

Just like praying and almsgiving, fasting is also more than depriving ourselves of food; it points to our attitude towards ourselves.  We have already described the two values on which human life is based: freedom, in its individual dimension, and equality, in its social dimension.  

Fasting is how zero is at the service of mathematics; it was the invention of zero that made mathematics possible; with Roman numbering system, where zero does not exist, mathematics was not possible.  Similarly, fasting makes equality and love of neighbour possible, as well as freedom and love of God.

Fasting in the broad sense – How can I acknowledge the other in my life, be it God or my peer, if I do not deny myself (Mk 8:34)? Or if I do not fast from my self-centredness and renounce the chance to exalt and swell my ego, by depriving myself of having more? What allegiance can I render to God if I consider myself as my own lord?

How can I serve God and be free if I serve money (Matthew 6:24), if I already gave my heart to riches, power and pleasure? If I do not possess myself, how can I give myself to the Other, God or my neighbour? How can I love my neighbour and feel equal to him if instead of serving him, I serve myself? And how can I share what is mine -- things, time and energy -- if I do not renounce them first? To use an expression that is very current in our crisis-ridden country, fasting is cutting back on expenditure; it is cutting down the time, energy and resources that I spend on myself, so to be able to give them, and myself, to others.

Fasting in the strict sense, that is, depriving oneself of food – Fasting, or dieting in medical language, is to health of the soul as sport is the health of the body. We do not live a life of fasting because we are not monks, nor do we live a life of sports because we are not athletes; but the practice of moderate fasting, boosts the health of the soul as the practice of moderate exercise boosts the health of the body.

Fasting and sport, understood in this way, are at the service of life because they train us for it, providing us with many benefits. Sport trains the body and mind by giving them more energy and health; fasting, as depriving ourselves of food, or abstaining from certain types of food, trains the soul in the art and ability of self-denial, self-sacrifice, self-control and willpower.

After breathing, eating is the most indispensable need we have, depriving ourselves of food takes a lot out of us; for this very reason, it is the best training to be able to fast in the broad sense, in other words, decreasing the "I" to affirm the "YOU", which is what really matters.

Fasting makes a person stronger mentally thus preparing us for bigger sacrifices and self-denials, but the opposite is also true; someone who lacks self-control in the matter of food consumption and is a glutton is very unlikely to be a person who shares, and is likely to be fickle and greedy.

Esau lost his birthright for a plate of lentils (Genesis 25:29-34); may gluttony, a sin that no one confesses to anymore in this consumer society, not lead us to lose our bodies and souls.  As the people say, "the glutton digs the grave with his teeth" and "if you are too greedy you end up with nothing".

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC
 

Freedom and Equality

"When you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, (...) Whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret (...) When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face..." Matthew 6:3, 6, 18

On Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of Lent, the Church reminds us of three acts that, more than practices of piety, have to do with our human nature and the values or attitudes that every human being should cultivate.

Almsgiving is more than just giving a few bucks to a beggar on the street; it refers to our attitude towards others. It encompasses everything we do for them, our charity, our solidarity, our service.

It also has to do with the second commandment: love your neighbor as yourself. Saint Basil used to say in this regard: "The bread you have left over and keep in your cupboard is not yours, it belongs to the hungry; the clothes you don't wear and keep in your closet aren't yours, they belong to the naked."

I must love my neighbor as myself because we are brothers and sisters, children of the same Father in heaven, and because we are brothers and sisters, we are equal. Equality and fraternity, proclaimed by the French Revolution, are in reality one value because as the proverb says: "Love is either born between equals or it makes people equal". Let us remember the principle of communicating vessels: if two vats containing an unequal volume of water communicate with each other, the water level in both will become equal.

Prayer is more than just reciting prayers; it refers to our attitude towards God. It means walking in his presence (Genesis 17:1). It expresses our gratitude for all that we have received from him; it is also an unequivocal manifestation of our indigence and dependence in the sense that without him, we are nothing and can do nothing (John 15:5).

Prayer is communicating with God; we communicate with God because we love him; if prayer is an act of love for God, it also has to do with the first commandment, which tells us that God must be loved with all our heart, with all our mind and with all our strength (Deuteronomy 6:5). That is, in our minds and hearts there must be no rival; God must be loved above all things, nothing and no one can come to be his equal.

Going back to the French Revolution, this attitude corresponds to the value of Freedom. We are only truly free when we love God above all things and all people, that is, when we do not idolize realities or people, or create dependence on things or substances. By manifesting our sole and exclusive dependence on God, by acknowledging him as the only Lord and by loving him above everything and everyone, we ascend above all creation, we do not pay allegiance to anyone or anything; in other words, we are truly free.

We conclude, then, that praying and almsgiving, as the gospel proposes, are more important than they seem at first glance. To pray is to love God above all things, the first commandment of God's law, and the most unequivocal manifestation that we are free, because by cutting ties, with everything and everyone, we serve one Lord. To give alms, to share, is to love our neighbor as ourselves, the second commandment of God's law, and the most unequivocal manifestation of equality and social justice: the other is equal to me and I am equal to the other.

Freedom and Equality are the two principles on which human life is based, both individually and socially. Freedom is the value on which the life of the individual is based as a unique, autonomous, independent and self-validated being; Equality, on the other hand, is the value on which the life of the individual as part of a community is based.

The difficult harmony between these two values can only be achieved when they are exercised or practiced in the context of love. We are free when we love God our Father above all things and people, and we are equal when we love, as ourselves, the other children of the same Father God, and therefore our brothers and sisters.

But the gospel reading for Ash Wednesday proposes yet a third act for the whole of Lent: Fasting. What is the purpose of fasting and what does it have to do with praying and giving alms?

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

Faith, Mission and Martyrdrom

In line with the Year of Faith proclaimed by Pope Benedict XVI, Faith, Mission and Martyrdom is the annual theme of reflection for the entire Consolata family. This theme runs throughout and inspires our activities, meetings and retreats for this year.

True faith is more than a worldview, that is, a way of seeing and interpreting the world and life; more than an intellectual assent to the belief in the existence of a God, Creator of Heaven and Earth and Saviour in Christ his only son; more than a feeling of love for God and neighbour; more than a fundamental choice, because it permeates everything that we are, feel and do.  Faith is all this, but it is also, and above all, a gift from God. This faith finds its natural expression in mission.  Paraphrasing the apostle James (James 2:17), faith without mission is a dead faith.

Mission and martyrdom are one and the same thing. Mission is not fundamentally about preaching the word of God or doing works of charity. Mission is about bearing witness to our intimate relationship of love with Christ, and offering it to others. No one can give what he or she does not have. If we do not have an intimate, personal and loving relationship with Christ, then we cannot and should not be missionaries.

The word witness in Greek is 'martirete'; a missionary is one who bears witness to Christ, whatever the circumstances, in season and out of season, with purpose or without purpose, as St. Paul says. This witnessing can mean a short life, like Christ's, giving one's life readily; or it can mean a long life, being faithful minute by minute, every minute of one’s life.

There are therefore two forms of martyrdom, just as there are two forms of combustion: live combustion, "putting all the meat on the grill", or slow combustion, like how charcoal is formed, the wood is slowly changed into coal, which in turn burns slowly warming those who are cold.

"For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it." Mark 8:35

Mission calls for life, martyrdom calls for death. In Christ, life and death meet in harmony: “What is not worth dying for is not worth living for”. Do not occupy your life with things that you are not willing to die for; let the reason for your life be the reason for your death, and vice-versa.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

The Christian dimention of Time

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and for ever". Hebrews 13:8
"I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end". Revelation. 22:13

Cosmic Time, the Circle – Starting from what is objectively observable, a circular understanding of time has always prevailed in Ancient Greece and the Far East: from the cosmic point of view, the 365 days it takes the earth to go around the sun; from the point of view of nature, more specifically climate change, the four seasons: winter, spring, summer, and fall.  From these facts, the myth of the "eternal return" was born for philosophy, the idea that "there is nothing new under the sun" for science, and the belief in "reincarnation" for religion.

Human Time, the Straight Line – From an existential and human point of view, each day that comes is one more day that we are going to live and one less day that we have left to live. Conceiving of time as a straight line, coming from the past, passing through the present and heading towards the future, means that what comes from the past, is replaced by the present and drives towards the future, is nothing that can be observed in nature. Time in a straight line is the time of individual and community history, the time that incorporate the idea of progress: today was better than yesterday, tomorrow will be better than today. In philosophy, Heraclitus’ maxim, "we do not bathe twice in the waters of the same river" shares this understanding of time, the same is true in cosmology and religion, which convey the same notions of the beginning and the end of the world.

This is also the Jewish understanding of time: leaving Egypt (a land of slavery), passing through the desert (a place of suffering, penance, purification, and effort) and entering the Promised land, overflowing with milk and honey (a land of freedom, rewarded effort and finished work).  This is the archetype of progress and human life advocated by Karl Marx’s theory, in which Egypt would be capitalism, the desert would be dictatorship over the proletariat and the promised land would be socialism and a classless society.

Christian Time, the Spiral - It is the synthesis between the straight line and the circle since it is a circle in continuous forward movement. The Portuguese dictionary defines a spiral as "a curved unlimited line described by a point that turns around a pole and progressively moves away from it", like a propeller, a spring, or a spiral staircase. This is Christian time and even human time (it should be noted that the DNA of our genetic code is represented in the form of a spiral). As the figure shows, each year consists of 365 days around the Sun – the Sun that is Christ, who illuminates and gives meaning to our lives, who is the beginning and the end, both Universe and of our individual lives.

Christian time, therefore, is neither a circle nor a straight line, that is, each Christmas and each Easter are different, given that the year we are in and the conditions of the situations in which we find ourselves are different. However, Christ is the constant throughout our lives, He is the axis around which we gravitate, "In Him we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28). Each year that passes we meditate on the mystery of Christ, from his Incarnation until his Death, Resurrection and Ascension into heaven. 

Ultimately, to get out of our personal "Egypt", shaping our lives more and more like His, so that one day we will reach the Promised Land and be able to say like St. Paul, "It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me" (Galatians. 2:20).

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

If only I were a man!

After leaving his family at the church for the Midnight Mass, a Canadian farmer returned home to escape from the approaching snowstorm. His wife's insistence that he attend the Mass with the family came to no avail. For him, the incarnation of God made no sense at all. As he dozed off in the warmth of the fireplace, he was startled awake by the sound of geese crashing against the door and windows.  Thrown off course by the storm from their migratory trajectory south, they were completely bewildered.

Moved with compassion, he went outside to open the gates of the large barn so the birds can seek shelter inside. But the birds did not come in. He started running, waving his arms, whistling, shouting and shooing to get them into the barn until the storm passed. However, the geese flew in circles not understanding what the open barn and the dramatic gestures of the desperate farmer meant (not even the breadcrumbs scattered towards the barn could convinced them to come in).

 Defeated in his attempt to save them, he sighed: "Ah, if only I were a goose! If only I could speak their language!" Hearing his own lament, he recalled the question he had asked his wife: "Why would God want to become a Man?" And, without meaning to, the answer suddenly struck him, "To save him!"... And that was Christmas.

"Religion" comes from the Latin word "religare", which means to relate, to establish a relationship. From the very beginning, man has always been religious and probably will always be. Knowing themselves to be precarious and needy, human beings have always sought favours from "gods". Thus, in all cultures, individuals have emerged who, considered to have a special sensitivity to relate to the divine, felt sent by God -- like the prophets in the Hebrew tradition.

These prophets never truly succeeded in establishing a bridge of communication between the divine and the human. This is because the Word of God, transmitted by them (men with their own personal characteristics living in a certain sociocultural context), ended up being influenced by many mediating variables (personality, prejudices, stereotypes, social standards), and the meaning of the original message was lost.

This continued to happen even after Christ. For example, when St. John mentioned the number of times the Risen Jesus appeared after his death, he did not consider the first apparition that was made to Mary Magdalene; similarly, St. Paul did not mention this apparition either and, on top of that, he made reference to another one that no evangelist mentions – the one made to Peter.

Throughout the history of humanity, God, despite his omnipotence, has found himself in the same situation of powerlessness as the farmer who could not communicate with the geese in order to save them; for this reason, in the fullness of time, He cried out, "Ah if only I were a man!" And God became Man and dwelt among us...

Christ, being both God and Man, is the true bridge that unites humanity and divinity, he is the meeting point, the full communication, without bias or influence. In his word, in his behaviour, in his works and in his life as a man, God has told us everything we need to know about himself and about what it means to be a human person.  Merry Christmas!

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

The Meaning of Life

Being and Nothingness
Every man and woman who comes into this world asks himself or herself: Where did I come from? Where am I going? What is the meaning of life? The atheist says that we come from nothing and return to nothing. What meaning can there be in something that begins in nothingness and ends in nothingness?

Science and technology have improved our lives in recent years, but they do not and cannot tell us what is the meaning of life. However, the need to give meaning to our existence is common to all mortals. Consciously or unconsciously, we all seek to find a purpose for our existence and, in some way, to justify it.

Those who lose or never find the meaning of life end up depressed, feeling the nausea of emptiness, and often seek to end their lives. They quickly realize that a life without meaning is not worth living.

A Wayfarer Without a Path
“Wayfarer, your footprints are the path and nothing more; Wayfarer, there is no path, the path is made by walking."  – Antonio Machado

On one hand, every man and woman who comes into this world is born with a unique genetic code that has never existed before in the five million years of human existence and will never exist again, until the end of human history.

In this sense, every human being who comes into this world begins a new path, a new life, which is his and his alone. This is the dignity of the human person and his freedom: he can live life as he wishes, finds, and follows his own path, which did not exist beforehand, as if predestined, but which is made as he walks on.

Since he is the one making the path, as the Spanish poet intuited, the only path that exists is being made by his own footprints—that is, the journey he traces. It is like the paths that appear, formed by the many people passing through the same place, made without machines and without the intention to create them.

On the other hand, no one arrives here completely isolated from what preceded them. Just as our DNA is composed of the genetic material of our father and mother, we are also heirs of everything humanity has done throughout its history. Everyone in the human species, consciously or unconsciously, accesses what Jung called the collective unconscious, which functions as a kind of database containing the idiosyncrasies of the human race.

In this sense, every human being who arrives in this world continues what came before. Like in a relay race, we receive a legacy, an inheritance, talents, and, with our life, we continue the projects that already existed, imbuing them with our personal stamp and raising them to a higher level.

It is in this continuity that our personal touch is added. Einstein received Newton’s mechanistic physics and, with the theory of relativity, elevated it to a new level. Mozart dedicated his life to music and took it to a high level; at the end of his life, he passed the baton to Beethoven, who elevated it even higher. Every athlete, in every sport, sets new records based on previous ones.

The Way, the Truth and the Life
Every human being who comes into this world has in Christ the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6); in other words, we are called to live in Christ, by Christ, and with Christ. Humanism and Christianity are one and the same; the Christian is the measure of the human, and the human is the measure of the Christian.

"Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." (Luke 11:23). There are no two humanisms, no two ways of living human life. There is no equally valid alternative to Christ; there is no other way of self-realization, of living human life in fullness and achieving happiness. Therefore, whoever is not with Him is not with someone else, because that alternative model does not exist; thus, whoever is not with Him is against Him.

However, this does not mean that, with Christ as the model for all who want to be truly human, we are transformed into clones behaving like puppets or automatons, with the same personality type, thinking, acting, and living life the same way.

When we say that Christ is truly man and truly God, we are saying that, so far in humanity, only God in Christ has managed to be authentically, fully, 100% human. Only Jesus of Nazareth has fully realized the project of humanity that God had for man when He created him. Only Jesus of Nazareth has fully realized God’s dream and made it a reality.

"God became man so that man might become God" (St. Irenaeus); this is the reason for the Incarnation. Without Christ, man has no way of knowing what is to be fully human.

Different in equality, or equal in difference
Being 100% man, Christ represents the totality of the human being; He is the standard by which we all measure ourselves, the horizon, the goal, the simultaneously achievable and unachievable objective of human life. Achievable because it is within reach of all; unachievable because no one will ever completely equal to Him.

Even Saint Francis of Assisi, called by some theologians the "alter Christus”, did not reach 100% of being like Christ. Each saint, that is, each Christian who achieves spiritual success, lives a part of Christ’s humanity, both in quantity and quality.

"And these are the ones sown on the good soil: they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty and sixty and a hundredfold." (Mark 4:20). In quantity, because, as the parable of the seed that falls on good soil suggests, some produce sixty, other thirty percent. Depending on an unlimited number of variables, vicissitudes, and circumstances, some imitate Christ by 60%, while others only by 30%. The amount does not matter, as the parable seems to suggest, but rather having Christ always as the sole reference in our life.

“(…) so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours." (Matthew 25:25). In quality, because Christ possesses the totality of talents; we receive some talents and not others. Everyone receives enough talents to make his or her life viable, but no one receives all the talents or none of the talents. The important thing is to develop and make the talents received bear fruit instead of hiding them, admiring, or envying the talents of others, trying to live their life, which is never possible.

Francis of Assisi and Francis of Xavier are both saints and even have the same name, but they are quite different in the path of holiness they followed. Francis of Assisi imitated Christ in His humility, while Francis of Xavier imitated Him in His zeal to reach out to as many as he could.

There is a psychological theory called the Enneagram, which argues that there are nine different personality types, and that each human being belongs to one of these nine types. Each of these types develops a human quality to the detriment of others. This theory suggests that Christ, being 100% man, embodies the complete realization of all these qualities.

As Jesus is the model to follow, the standard of humanity, His personality is made up of all nine types. In the incarnation, He accepted and fully lived all the forms of human personality, so He can be the model and paradigm for all personality types; the way, the truth, and the life for all to follow, each in his or her own way.

Conclusion – The meaning of life lies in finding our unique path, inspired by Christ as the model of full humanity, developing the talents we have received, and living authentically and consciously.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

The Purpose of the Itinerant Mission

"Unus Christianus, nullus Christianus," said St. Augustine. The natural habitat of a Christian is the community. We cannot be a Christian alone, and we cannot live and persevere in the faith without a community as our point of reference. In order to grow in faith, it is not enough to personally confront God and his Word; it is also necessary to confront the community and, at the same time, become a part of it, by being an integral and active member of the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church.

In most parishes because they are large, cold and unwelcoming, people do not know or relate with each other, and as a result, they are becoming less and less a reference point for growing in faith.

For this reason, many have left the Church to join smaller Protestant churches, or even sects, subjecting themselves to paying tithes in order to obtain a more personalized and less massified treatment. Still others, to cope with the feeling of "depersonalization" resulting from massification, have taken refuge in certain ecclesial movements that have emerged, in order to experience the faith in a more personal and customized way.

All these movements have as their point of reference the small Christian community of which some even see themselves as their inventors. They forget that the Church of the first centuries, before Emperor Constantine, was a church made up of small communities that met in people's homes.

The model and inspiration for the Itinerant Mission is St. Paul: a tireless evangelist, he spread the seed of the gospel by forming small Christian communities – in Corinth, in Thessalonica, in Ephesus, etc. This model was followed by us missionaries in Africa with the Small Christian Communities and in Latin America with the “Base Communities”.

This, then, is the objective of the Itinerant Mission: to help parishes, surrounded by paganism, to spread the faith to the limits of their borders. How? Through street activities, in shopping centres, in cultural centres, or two by two and from door to door with the aim of forming a small Christian community in this or that neighbourhood!

This "small Christian community" meets weekly or fortnightly, taking turn in different members’ homes. Starting with the Word of God, the members share their lives in a context of prayer and, almost, of a support/therapeutic group. On Sundays, all the small Christian communities in a parish gather in the Church to celebrate the Lord's Day. This celebration is a true celebration of life and from life because this parish is now a "Community of communities", as the Second Vatican Council envisioned 50 years ago.

Ready to help, here is an appeal: is there a parish priest who, being the Good Shepherd, wants to go out in search of the lost sheep living somewhere within the geographical space of his parish?

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

The Courtyard of the Gentiles

The Vatican has created a space for dialogue between believers and non-believers called the "Courtyard of the Gentiles". This name evokes the only place in the Temple of Jerusalem that could be frequented by non-Jews. It was, in fact, the place where sacrificial animals were bought and sold.

The Jerusalem Temple was divided into courtyards, which consisted of concentric rectangles, arranged according to "Sacredness" level: from the least sacred, the Courtyard of the Gentiles open to everyone, to the most sacred, the Sancta Sanctorum. Following this scale, the first would be open to anyone, the second to Jews only, the third to men, the fourth to priests, and the fifth, the "Holy of Holies", only to the High Priest.

Specifically, the dialogue between believers and non-believers, which took place in Guimarães and Braga on November 16 and 17, filled me with confidence; however, designating it the “Courtyard of the Gentiles" certainly makes sense in historical and metaphorical terms, but it is not immune to the possibility of a certain pejorative connotation.

"Gentiles" was the derogatory term the Jews gave to non-Jews, and there were even Pharisees who vehemently believed that God created the Gentiles to feed the fires of hell (where the "bad" Jews would also end up). From this point of view, I believe that, in this day and age, calling "non-believers" "Gentiles" is like calling them "Infidels", the term the Muslims give to all those who do not profess their faith.

When we were little, if there was one thing we hated the most, it was being called names; we should avoid the temptation to call others names based on our worldview – that is, the way we see and are in the world. For this very reason, the Inuit of Northern Canada do not like to be called Eskimos; that is the name we give to them, not the name they identify with. I doubt that non-believers in general, or those who simply do not profess our faith, like to be called "Gentiles".

On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-matured wines… Isaiah 25:6

If I had to find in the Old Testament a metaphorical term for this space of dialogue between men and women of good will, I would call it the Banquet of Isaiah. Isaiah is, without a doubt, the least nationalistic and the most universalist prophet of Judaism, an authentic "Christian" avant la letre.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC

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

Religions' Village - The Golden Rule

To promote tolerance and interreligious dialogue, with the aim of ending "holy wars" and achieving peace in the world, the second Aldeia das Religiões (Village of Religions) took place in the village of Priscos, Braga (Portugal), between the 25th and 28th of October 2012 (the first was held in Brazil in 1992).

"Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you" is the best-known version of a rule that a Canadian missionary christened as the Golden Rule because, with a few variations, it exists in every religion on our planet. I will mention a few:

Hinduism - This is the supreme duty: do not do to others what could cause pain if it were done to you. Mahabharata 5:1517

Buddhism – In dealing with others, do not use ways that would be painful to you. The Buddha, Udana-Varga 5.1

Confucianism - A word that sums up the basis of all good conduct: kindness. Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.  Confucius Analects 15:23

Judaism - What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. This is the whole Torah; everything else is commentary. Go and learn it. Rabbi Hillel Talmud, 31

Islam - Do not consider yourself a believer until you wish for others what you wish for yourself. Prophet Muhammad, 13 of Nawawi Hadiths 40

Christianity - In everything, do to others as you would have them do to you; this is the law and the prophets. Matthew 7:12

By formulating the Golden Rule in the negative, these religions only tell us what we should avoid; Christianity, on the other hand, in expressing it in its positive form tells us what we should do. Although the Islamic formulation is also positive (which may be due to the undeniable Christian influence on this religion, born 600 years after Christ), it expresses a desire and does not command an action. It therefore does not go beyond the level of good intentions...

What makes me good is not my effort to avoid evil, but my effort to do good. While negative formulations and the expression of a desire leave me in the "dolce fare niente", the Christian formulation, the commandment of Christ, takes me out of my passivity, my inertia, my laziness or my comfort zone, making me an activist for justice and peace.

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

"Land, blood and the deceased"

This is how the Bishop of Porto described the people of the north, and the Portuguese people, in general, to missionaries during a conference. Such a profound knowledge of the idiosyncrasy of the Portuguese people does not seem to have been well translated by the bishops themselves when they preferred to keep the Assumption of Our Lady as a national holiday to the detriment of All Saints' Day.

Saying this does not make me suspect of being one of those clerics who think that expressing love and gratitude to our heavenly Mother makes us less Christ-centered. I pray the Rosary every day and always at the end of Mass I invite the people to say one Hail Mary, to thank her through whom the bread from heaven and the incarnate word of God, Christ, came to us.

I have lived in and visited many countries in the Catholic world, and in nowhere have I seen a cult of the deceased like that of the Portuguese, both in Portugal and abroad, in communities scattered all over the world. Our people are so generous that, after having a Mass celebrated for their loved ones, they always add another Mass for the most abandoned souls in Purgatory - those who have no one to remember them by. In abolishing this holiday, is the Church not shooting herself in the foot?

The faithful departed and All Saints, that the holiday brought together, for the convenience of the people, are an expression of the Communion of Saints expressed in the Apostles' Creed. In my village of Loriga, and in many parts of Portugal, people express this same Communion of Saints in the community procession to the cemetery, to visit the remains of their loved ones.

The feast of All Saints is our feast... the only one in the liturgical calendar that does justice to and celebrated the efforts, not of the beatified nor the canonized, but of so many Christians who, in their daily lives, seek to become more like Christ by responding to the call to "be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48).

In the civil world, in matters of general interest, governments consult the people in a referendum -- "Voice of the people, voice of God". This year marks the 50th anniversary of the Second Vatican Council: a council that made the Church less pyramidical and more circular; less hierarchical and more of communion; less ecclesiastical and more accessible and available. Could not the people have been consulted on this matter in some way? After all, the feast of all the saints of God was our equivalent to the tomb of the unknown soldier that all countries have and proudly maintain.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC