Beware of legalism, formalism and political correctness

By Fr. Roy Cimagala *

          WE have to be wary of this common tendency of ours. We are

always prone to show externally what we actually are not internally.

We easily fall into some kind of political or social correctness

without the proper spirit animating it.

          We easily fall into forms of legalism and formalism. Often,

we just want to see things around out of idle curiosity and be seen

and appreciated by others out of vanity. We fail to connect the

material to the spirit, the little things with the big, essential

things, etc.

          All these were somehow bewailed by Christ. “Woe to you

Pharisees! You pay tithes of mint and of rue and of every garden herb,

but you pay no attention to judgment and to love for God. These you

should have done, without overlooking the others. Woe to you

Pharisees! You love the seat of honor in synagogues and greetings in

marketplaces. Woe to you! You are like unseen graves over which people

unknowingly walk.” (Lk 11,42-44)

          We should always be on guard against all these forms of

inconsistency, always rectifying our intentions and also regularly

editing our life, much like what writers do with their work before

they are submitted for publication. That way, we can monitor how

things are going and can have the chance to make appropriate

corrections, improvements, revisions, etc.

          In anything that we do, let’s see to it that our intentions

are pure. That is to say, that we have to be motivated always by love

for God and neighbor. And by love, we mean that we follow God’s

commandments as clearly articulated by Christ himself: “If you love

me, keep my commandments.” (Jn 14,15)

          And the epitome of this obedience to God’s commandments is

Christ himself, who said: “I have come down from heaven, not to do my

own will, but to do the will of him who sent me.” (Jn 6,38) The secret

therefore of love, which is obeying God’s will, is to have the mind

and heart of Christ. That is to say, to be ‘another Christ’ which we

can always attain because Christ himself has given us all the means.

          We should be most careful nowadays because it is now easy to

stray from God’s commandments and feel convinced that we are still ok.

With our man-made laws that are supposed to reflect the spirit of

God’s will and ways but often fail, at least partially if not

completely, it is now easy for us to hide and justify such anomalies

as greed, pride, vanity, envy, corruption, etc.

          We have to learn how to do a lot of good while passing

unnoticed. Also, while it’s true that we have to take care of the

little things in our life, we should not forget that we are not meant

to get detained there. We should always relate the little ordinary

things in our life to the big and ultimate purpose of our life.

          Christ himself somehow referred to this point when he said,

“Whoever is faithful with very little will also be faithful with much,

and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with

much.” (Lk 16,10)

          With those words, Christ somehow was relating and connecting

the little with the big things in life. That is what we should always

do. We should avoid getting entangled and lost in the little things

and forgetting the big and more important things in our life.

* Chaplain Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), Talamban, Cebu City

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com