Learning the art of sifting and discerning

 

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

Chaplain

Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE)

Talamban, Cebu City

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com

WITH the way the world us currently developing, with so many things coming out that can easily grab our attention and interest, we really would need to hone our skills at sifting and discerning, since these developments can easily give us a lot of dangers even if initially they can offer, or at least, promise to give us a lot of good.

These are skills that are urgently needed these days. With so many things competing for our attention, we need to know which ones we ought to give priority or which ones are truly God’s will for us. We cannot deny that there are many things that can look like they come from God but are not.

For this, the first thing to do is always to be guarded, and not just allow ourselves to be easily held captive by the many charms these new developments offer. We need to be clear about what the real and ultimate purpose of our life is, that is, to be properly anchored and focused, so that no matter how things go, we would not get lost or confused.

To be properly anchored and focused means to have God as the be-all and end-all in all our human activities and affairs. More specifically, to have love for God and for everybody else as the motivating principle of our life.

That’s when we would be able to distinguish what is essential from what is non-essential, what has absolute value from what only has relative value. We would have a proper sense of priority that would guard us from falling into self-indulgence which is actually the very opposite of true love.

Let’s never forget that we have a very strong tendency toward self-indulgence. That is why Christ clearly told us that for us to follow him, which is what is proper to us, we need to deny ourselves and to carry the cross. (cfr. Mt 16,24)

We should not ignore this clear indication Christ gave his disciples. We have to strongly convince ourselves that such indication never undermines our humanity. What it would rather do is to purify our humanity, put it on the right path in pursuit of our ultimate goal, and eventually elevate it to the very life and nature of God himself as we are meant to have.

This habit of self-denial would enable us to do God’s work, which is actually meant for us as his children, sharers of his life and nature, while being easily flexible and adaptive to the varying challenges and circumstances of the times. We have to be wary of our tendency to be trapped into some closed system of routine, if not to be imprisoned in our comfort-zone.

Self-denial will obviously involve certain detachment from things. That is why we should intensify our union with Christ as we immerse ourselves in the things of this world. We can do that if we know how to pray always, converting everything into a form of prayer, a form of engaging ourselves with God.

For this, we certainly need to train ourselves and to acquire a certain discipline, so that our union with Christ would be kept alive. We have to realize that our life is supposed to be always a life with Christ and for Christ.

Only then can we learn how to bear all things to achieve the fruitfulness of Christ who gained our salvation through his passion, death and resurrection. The paradox of dying in order to be fruitful would become a reality in our life.