Beyond Lent
It is the climax of a special season in the Christian belief framework. The energy of sadness, betrayal, and corruption had been building up over the last several weeks. The natural ending is grotesque – the crucifixion of an innocent man. It just happened to be the man who Christians believe is also God, but who chose to walk the human path.
Agony may have started in a garden but continued to take on other forms at higher intensity. He was sold for a few pieces of silver by a trusted friend, then denied when another friend allowed fear over loyalty. He was mocked in prison, judged wrongly when those in high places cornered the decision-maker to betray justice, then sentenced to die.
Death was not easy, or quick. Walking up a hill carrying the very cross on which he would be nailed to was adding salt to an open wound. But he did his best anyway, with no anger at what was being done to him, even asking forgiveness for his enemies. He was crucified, and the heavens wept.
Because his whole public life saw Jesus favor the poor and the ordinary, he chose a death that was reserved also for the poor and the ordinary. Many accept the suffering of Jesus as his way of trying to take on the mistakes and pain that we all make in our lives – as an extraordinary mediator to a father who cannot deny him. Because Jesus transformed his pain and suffering to a noble sacrifice, he brought his humanity completely to the divine dimension. He found favor from his father who granted his wish.
The story of Jesus, though, is not my only focus here. I believe that since Jesus was on a mission, and the focus of his mission was you and me, or mankind. He must have used his own situations in his public life to give us public lessons. It may be that we had so focused on Jesus being divine that we glossed over his humanity. Yet, if we are to relate intimately with him as ordinary people, he must have been addressing us as such.
We may forget that the lives of great persons are meaningful to us because they show what you and I are capable of. If great lives are there only to be idolized and regarded as way more than ours, then we would have little connection. Personalities we admire and respect become even more valuable when they inspire us, when they can awaken in us our own noble or heroic potential. These great personalities are also very few, yet we ordinary ones are in the billions.
In the billions yet all created equal in worth and dignity, all loved in the same way. Just like citizens of our republic. Over a hundred million yet all equal under the law, all sons and daughters of one motherland. Sadly, the purpose and potential are all we begin with. The Christian path, like democracy, says we pick it up from there and do our own walk all the way.
We earn our ticket to heaven by our good deeds, especially helping others. We earn our success as a democracy by doing our share, producing things and services, contributing some to the collective treasury and enjoying the rest. And when enemies try to harm us, we stand and fight, protect the young, the women, the elderly.
We work hard, diligently, honestly. Give and take what is just, be generous when we can, be firm in the face of corruption or abuse of power. The laws of God are reflected in the laws of man; the ones that do not, we must change them. The reward of our fidelity to the common good is peace and prosperity. The consequence for laziness, for dishonesty, is a confused society that will turn divided, and ultimately violent.
Daily life on the right path has many joyous moments. The way of bayanihan had been forged by our ancestors over time with such consistency and passion that its DNA lives in us still. Our motherland is so rich that the sense of being blessed by creation is so alive with our land’s fertility, with the abundance of our seas, with the beauty of our mountains and seashores.
There was once a saying that was coined by a leader of a lay community. He said that there should be less for self, more for others, and enough for all. A wonderful thought. But Filipinos began with abundance from a motherland that is one of the richest in biodiversity – biodiversity meaning the various forms of life. There did not have to be less for oneself because there was more than enough for all.
Unfortunately, even the greatest material wealth in the world cannot satisfy greed that will not restrain itself. Wanton greed can own the whole world and yet thirst for more. That same greed in the hearts of a small minority have controlled most of the world’s wealth. Worse, greed with power, or power becoming greedy, can and has impoverished most of mankind.
It has come to be that pain and suffering have been a curse to mankind. If only for that, churches could not have been able to teach about religion. Reality is stronger than speculation, day-to-day living trumps a narrative of an unknown heaven. Religions cannot claim the greatness of teachers and teachings. But who and what they teach about, if that supreme being is great, opens the human heart to human words.
Pain and suffering are endured because an inner bond to something greater keeps the human heart hopeful. And the power we see from those, like Jesus, who can offer pain and suffering for something greater, convicts our hearts to the potential beyond the present reality. Many of us, with age and experience, with pain and suffering, can taste joy and gratitude. We, then, know that there is a coming Easter to our Lent.
