When we fail to practice what we preach

WE should not be too surprised and bothered by this phenomenon. Given our human limitations and weaknesses, this predicament can take place anytime and often. What we need to do is to go immediately to God, ask for pardon and the grace to begin again. Our failures should not alienate us from God and from the others. Rather, it should humble us and urge us to go to God and to begin again. 

 It’s true that we should try our best to be very consistent with what we preach. But given our wounded human condition, we cannot expect that everything will be consistent in our life. There are just too many things to contend with in our life that to be consistent all the time is next to impossible. 

 In trying, for example, to uphold and defend our Christian faith, we may have to refrain from insisting on it if, out of charity and prudence, those with whom we are dealing are not yet ready to hear about our Christian faith. We can appear to be inconsistent with our faith, at least, for a period of time. But we purposely do it if only to gradually lead others to our Christian faith. 

 But there are also times when out of human weakness, we fail to practice what we preach. This may be due to our laziness or a mistaken notion of prudence, etc., but we should not get stuck feeling bad for long or, worse, discouraged. 

 Failures and inconsistencies do happen in our lives. They can happen everyday, and even many times during the day. They may not be big failures. They are usually small ones. But they are somehow like a constant feature of our life. We should not anymore be surprised by this fact of life, and much less, held captive by them. 

 We should know how to handle them. Not only that, we should know how we can derive some good from them. That’s because our failures can actually channel great things for us. They can be a blessing in disguise. 

 In this life, we are supposed to be clever as serpents while remaining simple as doves. (cfr. Mt 10,16) That’s the advice Christ gave his disciples in dealing with the drama of life. And this advice can be more concretely specified by developing in us that skill of knowing how to let go and to move on when we suffer failures. 

 We should not forget that there are many other more pleasant possibilities than getting stuck with our failures. As one saint would put it, when one door closes, another door opens. In life, there are actually many doors that we can open. God provides us with countless possibilities to recover. 

 If we have the proper attitude, if we are with God, we would know that our life possesses an infinity of possibilities. We always have to remember that God is always on top of things. Nothing happens outside of his providence no matter how messy things can get in our life. There’s a time for everything, we are told. (cfr. Ecclesiastes 3,1-8) This should always be in our mind so that we do not overreact when failures come. 

 What we ought to do is to go immediately to God and to refer things to him. He will be the one to reassure us that everything will just be fine. Nothing happens without him knowing and allowing it to happen. And if he allows it to happen, it is because there is a greater good that can be derived from it. In God’s math, the gains far outweigh the losses.

Always listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit

WE have to continually listen to the promptings of the Holy Spirit who always intervenes in our life. And that’s because it is actually the Holy Spirit, more than us, who shapes and directs our life, who deepens, widens, if not purifies and corrects our understanding of things. 

 This truth of our Christian faith is brought out in that episode in the Acts of the Apostles where St. Peter was made to understand that he was not only meant to work on the Jews, but also on the Gentiles. (cfr. Acts 11,1-18) 

 We have to be wary that we already know everything and that we are already doing things right because we have studied our faith and have been religiously following a plan of life consisting of many practices of piety, like daily prayers, recourse to the sacraments, etc. That would easily make us fall into a certain state of self-righteousness that would blind us from what God in the Holy Spirit would actually show us. 

 Let’s always remember that authentic Christian life never puts limits in our concern and love for the others. No matter how undeserving the others may be, we should be willing to bear their errors, sins and offenses, even going to the extent, like Christ, to offer our lives. 

 For this, we always need the help of the Holy Spirit who actually is constantly intervening in our lives. We just have to train ourselves how to recognize his voice and follow it as promptly as possible. 

 Christ himself said it very clearly. “The Advocate, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you.” (Jn 14,26) 

 We have to understand that the Holy Spirit perpetuates the presence and redemptive action of Christ all throughout time, with all the drama, vagaries, ups and downs that we men make in our earthly sojourn. 

 It has been prophesied that God will pour out his Spirit upon all men. The Holy Spirit is intended for all of us. We are all meant to be filled with the Holy Spirit. But this divine will obviously has to contend with the way we receive and do things, and that is, that we take to this reality in stages involving a whole range of human means of teaching, evangelizing, etc. 

 We need the Holy Spirit because only in him can we truly recognize Christ. Only in him will we be able to have Christ in our life, to remember all his words and even to develop them to adapt them to our current needs and situations. 

 Only in him can we see things properly. Especially these days when truth, justice and charity have become very slippery, and people are left confounded and vulnerable to fall into scepticism and cynicism, we need to be in the Holy Spirit to be able to sort things out properly and avoid the mess. 

 I am amused to note that in today’s political debates, a growing awareness is felt by more and more people that myths and lies, with shreds of truths and facts cleverly inserted, are exchanged. They talk about a surge of fake news. It’s not anymore about what the truth is. It’s more about who is followed more. 

 This is what happens when we are not in the Holy Spirit and we rely only on our human resources that sooner or later will be twisted and exploited to suit personal or partisan interests, and not anymore the common good.

To be truly Christian

TO be truly Christian, we should really have the very heart of Christ. We should have his attitude toward all possible conditions our life can find itself in, irrespective of whether these conditions are favorable to us or not. 

 This can mean that in spite of doing a lot of good, we can still be misunderstood, unappreciated, contradicted and rejected. And yet we should never succumb to hatred and condemning people. Like Christ we should be willing to offer our life even to those who do us evil, even offering forgiveness to them. We have to go that extent. 

 Like Christ, we should have the desire to save rather than to condemn those who are wrong morally and spiritually. Obviously, we can only have this kind of attitude when we truly identify ourselves with Christ. Absent this and relying solely on our human powers, we can only go so far. 

 In the readings of the Mass of the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year B (cfr. Acts 4,8-12; 1 Jn 3,1-2; Jn 10,11-18) we are told about our tendency to rely only on our own powers, on our estimation of what is good, true and just. We forget what is said in the Responsorial Psalm of the Mass: “The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone.” (Ps 118,22) 

 We need to see to it that our primordial duty as a person and as a child of God is to identify ourselves with Christ, who is the pattern of our humanity, the savior of our damaged humanity, the very “way, truth and life” that is proper to us. We need to carry out this duty in everything that we do and that can happen to us. 

 That is why it indispensable that we really know Christ. Not only that. We have to love him, following his teachings and example. Let’s keep in mind these words of Christ: “Whoever is not with me is against me. Whoever does not gather with me scatters.” (Lk 11,23) With these words of Christ, it’s very clear that we are supposed to be so united with Christ, so identified with him, that he and us can be considered simply as one. 

 We need to process this truth of our faith about ourselves very slowly, because it will obviously astound us to think that we are supposed to be one with Christ. Who, me, one with Christ? We most likely would be tempted to say, tell it to the Marines! 

 But that’s just the naked truth about us, whether we like it or not. We cannot be any other if we just bother also to know why it is so. An expression that is relevant to this matter is ‘alter Christus,’ another Christ. And it’s worthwhile to know what it is all about. 

 We are supposed to be ‘alter Christus,’ the goal and ideal that is meant for us, though we need also to do our part, free beings as we are, to achieve that status. God, our Creator and Father, wants us to be that way, though he does not impose it on us without our consent that should also be shown with deeds and not just with intentions or words. 

 We are supposed to be ‘alter Christus’ simply because, if we have been created in the image and likeness of God, and Christ is the Son of God who is the perfect image and likeness that God has of himself, then we can only conclude that we have to be like Christ who is the very essence of love that is meant for us.