“… And now faith, hope and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is LOVE.”
THIS Holy Week when the churches are empty because of mandatory shelter-in-place isolation and forced social distancing caused by the Wuhan China coronavirus pandemic that has affected more than 150 countries, it is a good idea to tune out cold turkey from the media-driven hysteria and go deep into the silence. Turn off your TV. Shut down all electronic devices. In a word —UNPLUG. Instead, dig into the roots of our Christian faith. There, we shall find the courage, the peace and the quiet assurance that THIS TOO SHALL PASS.
Consider the life of Saint Paul.
Paul, aka Saul of Tarsus, lived more than two thousand years ago. He had something to say about what does matter in life. He spoke about a special kind of love that in Greek is called Agape (ah-gah-pay).
Agape is unconditional love, a kind of love that has no agenda or motivations, a kind of love that is exemplified in God sending His only Son, a kind of love that if emulated by humans, sets us apart from all of God’s creatures, makes us a little closer to the angels and truly created in God’s own image and likeness.
But Paul didn’t start out as a defender of the Christian faith. He was, in fact, an avid persecutor feared by early Christians. As a Jew and a Pharisee who was also an educated man and a class above because he was a Roman citizen, he used everything in his power and position to quash the growth of the church persecuting the members of the then budding Christian church.
Saul was his Jewish name. Paul was his Roman name. Paul stood by watching the cloaks of the stone throwers, tacitly approving the stoning to death of Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr.
Paul was a young, rising brilliant star of his time eager to make his mark in the Judaic tradition. At first, Paul was hot and bothered by the intensity of the love and fervency of the Apostles and early believers.
This start-up movement was a threat to his career track and his Judaic core belief system. Paul thought he was going to make it his life’s work to eliminate Christ’s early followers and eradicate what Christ himself has started. If murder and mayhem were the tools to get it done, he was going to use them.
But God had other plans for Paul. On his way to Damascus on a mission to arrest and persecute Christians, a blinding light shone on him. He fell off his horse while Jesus’ voice is heard asking him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” This dramatic, miraculous conversion when he temporarily became blind was a critical juncture for the Christian church.
Inspired by the Holy Spirit who suffused his entire being when the scales of his blindness fell off his eyes, Paul’s teachings and writings have an eternal shelf life – true today, as it was then, and will be for much of human history.
In the quiet of your soul during this holy season amid these troubled times, read the gospels. Also, you just might discover the exquisite beauty, range and depth of human emotions made known to God, contained in the Psalms, all 150 of them. And then read Paul. You’ll be surprised at the clarity and current relevance of many of his writings to today’s unfolding story. He has a wealth of wisdom to share with anyone seeking meaning in a confusing world seemingly hell bent on self-immolation.
In a swirling fast-paced technological world full of self–love, vanity, illusions and artifice that only tend to distort and act as centrifugal forces pushing God away as the center of our lives, Paul’s directives make absolute sense. His words have the power to keep us all centered, as they were intended to be, not on ourselves, but on God. Ironically, it’s like being in the eye of the storm where there is peace while swirling forces rage about in the periphery.
This one below, if etched in many hearts and minds and lived out in our daily rounds through thoughts and more specifically in even the tiniest of actions, particularly in couples, already married or planning marriage in the foreseeable future, could remarkably bring down the alarming rate of break-ups and a whole universe of heartaches among couples. This has the power to preserve FAMILIES, the last best hope of humanity on steroids.
These days, the very structure and integrity of the family unit are heavily assaulted from many fronts with popular culture, insane power hungry globalists, Hollyweird, media and the internet leading the charge at a time when the church has been rendered weak by internal abuses and scandals in the not so distant past.
Thankfully, the persecutions of Christians around the world which was at a terrifying, alarming rate and intensity is coming down with the ascent of conservative leaders among Christian countries. With unceasing prayer and fasting among millions on bended knees, good people will bring forth a strong and fervent resurgence of a stronger Christian faith in most parts of the world.
FEAR NOT. Let not our hearts be troubled. As history will bear and as written in the song, “Canticle of the Turning,” which is based on the Blessed Mother Mary’s “Magnificat,” it is when the church is at its most vulnerable, when the forces of heaven align to defend itself and go on the offensive in subtle yet dramatic ways. The blood of early Christians spawned the rise of the early Church. Now as then, the pattern remains the same. History does repeat itself.
Marriage as a bedrock institution between man and a woman is in serious danger, as man-made laws masquerading as civil liberties, are enacted to challenge it, all in the name of political correctness.
There is a growing pushback against political correctness and the often times wanton moral depravity the lies of political correctness seek to promote. With courageous, right leaning Christian leaders who will defend the Christian faith, more and more people are emboldened to call a spade, a spade and think and act accordingly. The courage to confront the evil in our time is getting stronger as people quietly humble themselves before God and ask for His grace and mercy not only this Lenten season but through all seasons.
Strong family units built on LOVE are so essential in creating strong societies from the ground up. Each generation builds upon and learns from the ones that came before it.
The passage below is a favorite among couples and wedding planners and for good reason. These words are more than the pretty, superficial veneer of rituals in weddings.
Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians 13, are words to live by telling us what really matters as he did then to members of the early church who were probably just as lost, confused and disconcerted as most of us probably are.
Set your hearts on the greater gifts. I will show you the way which surpasses all the others. If I speak with human tongues and angelic as well, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong, a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and, with full knowledge, comprehend all mysteries, if I have faith great enough to move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give everything I have to feed the poor and hand over my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind. Love is not jealous, it does not put on airs, it is not snobbish. Love is never rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not prone to anger; neither does it brood over injuries. Love does not rejoice in what is wrong but rejoices with the truth. There is no limit to love’s forbearance, to its trust, its hope, its power to endure.
Love never fails.
… And now faith, hope and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is LOVE.
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Nota Bene: Monette Adeva Maglaya is SVP of Asian Journal Publications, Inc. To send comments, e-mail [email protected]
