Contemplatives in action

CONTEMPLATIVES IN ACTION
Cl. Mario D’Couto sdb

            Quite often in the priestly and religious life, there is always the danger that the work takes the upper hand. However, there is also a positive side to it. While there is no doubt a danger in activism, the phenomenon of human action has its place. If we are just going to sit around and expect things to happen, we will not achieve anything. Miracles just don’t happen!
            Action is indeed an act of creation. Through it, the human person transcends himself and produces something new in the concrete world, something similar to his internal vision and desire. When active, the human person imitates God who is the Creator. After all, the human person was made in the image of God which means he was destined to be a creator – in his own humble way. Not only is there nothing wrong with action; there would be something missing in the human person who is not active – he would not be the image of his Creator.
            Thus, in order to understand a contemplative in action more vividly, we shall now compare it with a dreamer and an activist. The dreamer is not a contemplative person or if he ever was one, his development has been arrested. He is not in touch with the real world; consequently, his contemplative action is out of harmony with it. He never adjusted himself to this creation. He could not take its stark reality; therefore he constructed another world for himself with all the amenities desired. Either he locks himself up in his dream and stands still there and then the good seed in him cannot bear good fruit or he moves to action according to his real fantasies and then he becomes a menace to all living things around him. He is not an integrated person on several counts: contemplation does not lead to action in him and he lives out of touch with reality.
            The extremist on the other hand is a total opposite of the dreamer. He certainly moves into action but his deeds spring from some superficial consciousness. They were never subject to critical screening. At the worst, they come from emotions; at best, from a mere human understanding. The activist usually makes a dramatic impression but his deeds are out of tune with the universe because his being was never in tune with God’s grace. There is a lack of integrity in him because there is a lack of depth; the resources of nature and grace are not used.

            A contemplative in action is one with the external world because he has adjusted himself to reality. He loves facts and real possibilities. He intends to contribute to God’s Kingdom in the material universe because there is simply no other place to do so. He is one with himself because his actions are shaped by sound critical judgment and tempered above all by sensitivity to experiences; they spring from a depth where the law of God’s Spirit prevails. He is one who receives God’s grace in his whole being and in whom grace brings fruit for the enrichment of the world around him. There is integrity in such a person because his beliefs are followed by good deeds and those deeds do not spring from an emotional reaction not even from mere human reasoning but from a depth that is known to the Spirit of God. Such a person has a unity in his being; he is whole, he is made of once piece; through his creative activity he proclaims the image of the Creator. Thus John XXIII would say, “the universally valid truth applicable even to Religious who lead mainly an active life, the interior life alone is the soul of the apostolate ….. do not forget that a false idea of being energetic could cause you to fall into that ‘heresy of action’ which our predecessors (previous popes) have condemned.”

Popular posts from this blog

In the world yet not of the world

Image
  IN THE WORLD YET NOT OF THE WORLD MARIO D’COUTO           Being in the world and yet not of it is something that can be a struggle, at least for me and what I mean by that is in as much as we desire to be good and to do good, God is not going to put a glass jar over us and say that just because we choose to love Him and follow Him more closely, that He is going to shield us from the temptations of this world. To make things clear though, this is not to say that the world in itself is bad or evil nor are the things found in the world either but how we deal with it is what will make us or break us. We all have responsibilities and important things that need our attention. If we are not careful though, our hearts and minds can be consumed with the task of keeping them afloat. Rather than centering ourselves in Christ and letting the other elements of our lives take their rightful place around that center, we can end up shifting our attention fr...
Read more

The Gift of Life

  THE GIFT OF LIFE  Mario D’Couto  The above video may seem to put human existence in a rather pessimistic way as if to say that our lives did not really matter and while no doubt there is some element of truth in it, I still feel that if lived well, there is meaning and purpose to our lives and that none of our lives is some sort of haphazard creation.  As I celebrate my gift of life tomorrow, I suddenly began to think that if we compare ourselves to the vastness of the universe and everything else that exists in it, we may perhaps be nothing more than a tiny dot floating on the surface of the earth and yet in as much as such a thing may appear insignificant, the One who created everything chooses to have a personal relationship with that tiny dot, that is, ourselves. This is something truly uplifting, which gives meaning and purpose to our lives and our existence. At the same time, it is also a reminder for us to stay grounded especially in those moments when w...
Read more

Are you creative?

Image
  ARE YOU CREATIVE? Mario D’Couto                         Can you imagine a world without creativity? What would the world look like if there was no creativity? Well, for all we can expect, it would be pretty boring and dull. There would be no speech, no songs, no tools, no ideas such as love, freedom or democracy. It would be an existence so mechanical and impoverished that none of us would want to be a part of.             To achieve the kind of world we consider human, some people had to dare to break the thrall of tradition. Next, they had to find ways of recording those new ideas or procedures that improved on what went on before. Finally, they had to find ways of transmitting the new knowledge to the generation to come. Those who were involved in this process we call creative. What we call culture or those parts of our selves that we internalized from the social...
Read more