VIEWS FROM THE BELFRY

Once upon a time, somewhere far back in ancient human history, where personal survival was the only concern, a dramatic event must have taken place. Somebody didn’t eat what he found when he found it, but decided to take it back to his cave to share with others.

There must have been a first time. A first act of communion, in the most basic form, and it was the first sincere communal celebration that happened in the cave.

Perhaps the reason for his act was not only for those close to him but for the old, the sick, the least, and those who were too weak to care for themselves. The responsibility, the love, the sharing, the joy, and the communion of those people inside the cave, if frozen through eternity, is a foretaste of heaven. There must have been time when they felt that each one was part of the many.

If each of us is son of God, created by Him, loved by Him, and to be basically equal, why is there social injustice? This started when we forgot that there are people who are in dire needs while we owned most of the blessings. This aggravated when we forgot that God gave these blessings, and we started to idolize these blessings instead. And this will bring us to the brink of damnation.

Then God sent us His prophets to remind us of our responsibilities to our brothers. He sent to us the POOR, so many of them, that their presence cannot be ignored. They do not even have to speak. Their situation is the voice of God in our times. The presence of the poor is a prophetic pronouncement of God about what is very wrong in our society. We need the poor to remind that blessings are meant to be shared to all. We can avoid our damnation if we can remember and know why, for what, and for whom these blessings should be, and act on it.

Those blessed people are cursed if they neglect the true essence of these blessings. And even the poor, too, will miss to reach the portal of heaven if they neglect to accept the will of God on their poverty. The way of the gospel is total dependence to God for those blessed and for those who are not. For the rich, the “I am what I have” is not the true measure of wealth but rather the “what you gave away” is. For the poor, “to desire no more, and to need less” is to be blessed.

We need a change in our societal spirituality to raise us up in this quagmire of damnation. Let us go back to the simplest form of communal celebration of our lives, giving without asking back, sharing without counting, and loving because it is our true nature to love.

We are many but one. Let us edify each other.

And by doing so, we can become truly sons of the Almighty.

“If you give what you do not need, it isn’t giving.”

Mother Theresa