By Fr. Roy Cimagala
WE cannot deny that all of us can have some doubts about who Christ is and
what he is to us. These days in the world in general, we can see strong evidence of a
culture of skepticism, agnosticism, religious indifferentism, if not, outright atheism.
This should come as no surprise to us because even during the time of Christ,
many of the supposedly religious leaders were skeptical of him and were often
suspicious of him, always trying to find fault in him.
The quick reason for that phenomenon is that the person of Christ is largely
shrouded by mysteries that are difficult if not impossible for us to understand. That he is
both God and man, that he was brought to earth through a virgin birth, are just some of
the mysteries many people do not even bother to consider.
There are, of course, many other reasons. Many people are lazy and do not
bother to know Christ, let alone, study the gospels. And even the Bible is considered by
many people as a mere collection of myths and legends. And we can go on and on with
reasons for the lack of interest in Christ.
But what we can do is first of all really to pray, to humble ourselves, realizing that
the question about Christ is a matter of faith which is a supernatural gift that can only be
appreciated by us if we are humble enough to accept and correspond to that gift. Of
course, Christ can strike a most powerful grace to convert a person instantly into a man
of faith, much like what happened to St. Paul.
But there definitely is also a need to evangelize, to give faithful and consistent
witness to our belief in Christ, making ourselves effectively “another Christ” as we ought
to be, since that is the only human way we can convince people of the reality of Christ.
What is clear that we have to be guided and live by faith always. More, we have
to incarnate that faith. It should not just be a theoretical or intellectual affair.
We need to keep our faith alive and burning. We should never allow it to cool
down. That’s why we should strive to develop a vibrant life of piety that is supported by
a concrete plan for which we should not be sparing in our efforts and sacrifices. It
cannot be denied that a plan to support our life of faith and piety will always involve a lot
of effort and sacrifice.
Things should come to the point when we somehow can see Christ in all the
situations of our life, and discern his will for us at any moment. In other words, that we
practically make ourselves contemplative souls even in the midst of the world.
This is not falling into fantasies. This is, in fact, making ourselves most realistic,
because in spite of our limitations, we cannot deny that Christ is in everything and is
actually intervening in our life always. This is because being God, Christ is the very
foundation of all reality. He is everywhere.
Let us hope that we can have a vivid awareness of the presence of Christ all
throughout the day, 24/7, and that we can be drawn always to correspond to his loving
and merciful will. We should feel as much as possible God’s continuous love for us, and
we should try to repay that love with our love. Let’s never set him aside.
