The Christian attitude is
rooted not in a way of life, or in a philosophy, or in an idea, or in psychology, but
in a person: Jesus Christ. The Christian identity or anthropology flows out of
Him. The greatest statement by the Church about Christian anthropology is found
in the Council’s document “Gaudium et Spes” paragraph 22: “Christ, the final
Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and his love, fully
reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear.” The truth
about our humanity does not then, lie in our own resourcefulness but in Christ, who is
fully human and who makes a gift of himself, his life, to us. My real life
then, is not what I make it to be, but is the fact that I exist in relationship
with inner life of the Holy Trinity.
The Christian attitude then,
flows out of the transformation of my life when I open myself to Christ. Human
fullness, human flourishing, takes place exclusively through a relationship of friendship
with Jesus Christ; that I allow myself to be transformed by the person who He
is.
There is no dualism here;
body and spirit are a unity, and what takes place in the Christian life is a
passing from a fallen humanity to a redeemed one – my whole person is redeemed
by Christ.
Neither is there anything
Gnostic here. Indeed, Christianity is radically different from secularism;
Christianity is not about seeking of a better way, it is being given a new
life!
The radicality of the
Christian life is precisely that its possibility and its realisation does not
lie within me and my human resourcefulness, but lies in grace – it is the gift
of a new life.
The essential element of the
Christian life then, is the encounter with the person of Jesus Christ. Out of
this encounter, uniquely, flows the possibility of the fullness of human life.
Take away Christ, which
secular culture endeavours to do, and all that you are left with is frail and
vulnerable humanity, subjected to its own pride. And when the Christian life is
viewed through the lens of the secular ascetic it can indeed seem pointless; why
should we not make the best we can out of such a state of affairs. The secular
ascetic is precisely the failure to acknowledge Christ, whose riches are
transformative of humanity, and whose fullness, peace and joy are not man-made.
Undoing the secular mind, especially when it has entered into Christians, is
the great work of the Holy Spirit; a shining of true light on that false light
within. This work is the interior work of the New Evangelisation – the rebuilding
of Christian personality, so that the Christian attitude can be formed anew.
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