Can Religious Life be Fun?

Many people complain having too much work to do and not enough time to get everything done. Others would like to be busy with work, but having none are wondering what to do with all their free time. Some find their work boring, always fretting, while others who have worked don't know how to use leisure time when it comes. With this kind of thinking it is not difficult to see how the happiness of our citizens is affected. A seminary professor, in the Kyeongyang magazine, writes about the problems that come when there is no joy in what we do.

Even though the workweek has been reduced  to a five-day, forty-hour week, Korea is still known as a country addicted to work. A Korean psychologist is quoted as saying we have more leisure time than in the past, but many do not know how to use their leisure in a constructive way, such as learning to know themselves, being creative and communicating with others. The increase of leisure in society often results, the professor believes, in creating more disorder in our lives. 

Married couples in their middle years, once too busy working to find time for dialogue, now with the increase of leisure are faced with conflict and divorce. Young people also have more leisure to enjoy the single life; marriage is put off as the partners easily accept living together, without any interest in having children. This type of logic, he says,  is not improving the quality of life. More leisure time is an opportunity for consumer enterprises to reach more people with their pleasure-based commodities, giving us even less true joy in life.

This kind of thinking has also come into the religious life. The young children attending Mass do not know what is going on and the expression on their faces shows that they are not interested in knowing. If it's not fun, they're not interested. Adults have also been infected with this same spirit. The cultural code of society has changed our appreciation of holiness and the sacred. The repeated Masses and sermons and the problems with members of the community take their toll on the faith life of the Christians. Men at work and throughout society are bombarded with the ever-present commercialization of sex, making temptation ever present, and the accepted moral teachings a burden.

The professor asks if it's possible to make the religious life fun.  Or is it rather more like adding a necessary duty to our life?  To the secularized individual of our society, the religious life is a hindrance to enjoying the freedom of human existence. And to merely stress its necessity for a fulfilling life, lacks persuasive power. What is needed, says the professor, is a way to show the attractiveness of the religious life.

Examples of those who enjoy their life as Christians are easily found, and should be the examples presented  to our Christians, he says. The spiritual life is one of great joy and this has to be expressed in sermons and programs, with priests and pastoral workers obviously in the forefront, showing this joy in the way they relate with the Christians. If we are filled with the Holy Spirit this should be shown by the joy we experience in our daily lives. And the more familiar we become with the way God works in us, the deeper will be our experience of this joy. It may very well be necessary, the professor believes, to teach the various methods of finding joy in our religious life as society is in explaining their techniques in finding happiness in the secular life.                                                                                       

Maturing in the Faith

Levels of religious faith are many. First, it is with the legs, then with the head, and finally with the heart. With these words a novelist begins her article in the Kyeongyang magazine, discussing a book that gave her a deeper appreciation of her faith.

One can be a faithful church-goer, she says, and suddenly be filled with doubt and troubling questions such as What is it that I believe?  Does God really exist? Questions usually followed by a decision to stop going to church. Looking over her religious life, she muses whether that wasn't partially true with her. She became acquainted with God and Jesus at an early age, and became close to the Catholic Church. She read many books, read the Scriptures and memorized favorite lines, made frequent retreats, and felt great peace.

Remembering those days she feels personal pride might have been present. Talking to  parishioners and hearing what they said God did for them--how  they were blessed with money and material things--religion suddenly seemed to her more like a search for material blessings, then it did about God and Jesus, so she began to have doubts.

Why wasn't God answering her prayers? Was her faith weak?  Did she have only a superficial acquaintance with the Scriptures? These were the questions that she was asking herself. Is asking for blessings what religion is all about? The God she believed in and loved unconditionally, was, she was sure, just and bountiful with his blessings. But the reality she saw was quite different. She came to the conclusion, much later in life, that the way she believed was tainted with pride.

One day, she happened to come across a book in her possession that she had read many years before. The book, written by the first Swedish woman to receive the Nobel prize, Selma Largerlof, was titled The girl from the Marsh Croft.  She began to read the short story  again; the plot follows:

There was a young girl, Helga, who was very poor and living in a marsh area of the country.  Her father was  sick. The girl found work in the landowner's house as a servant. The owner found the girl attractive and one night forced himself on her and she had a child. The wife of the landowner noticed she was pregnant, and chased her away. She went back to her home and had the baby boy. 

Now back to her life of poverty and with a child, everything got worse for Helga, and so she went to the landowner and asked him to support the child. When he denied all knowledge of the affair, she began legal proceedings against him. On the day the judge was to give the verdict, the court room was filled with spectators.  When the judge asked the landowner to put his hand on the bible and swear that what he was about to say was the truth, Helga cried out from her seat:  "Your honor, I can't bear to see the father of my child lie to God, I withdraw my case."  And she quickly left the court room. 

The court room quickly filled with commotion, and the judge, an old man, quieted the crowd and said: "I have worked for many years in deciding what is right and what is wrong. But this is the first time I have felt so great a happiness. "  You could see tears in the eyes of the silvered-haired judge, and the court room became extremely quiet. 

The feeling the novelist had during her second reading was different from the first reading. Religious faith, she realized, is not of the head but of the heart. Her faith had gone from her feet to her head, and now gropingly arrived at the heart.  When she prayed in the morning, she felt a shiver in her body, realizing that God was within her. Both when she prayed or did some good work, she was confident that it was God that was acting. And overcome with this knowledge she wept with joy. She remembered that God chose the weak, the sick and the deficient--the thought brought her peace.

                                                                                                                                                           

Abbassador In Chains

History helps us to understand our present reality and the reasons for social change and development. The head of the Korean Bishops Conference, writing in the Kyeongyang magazine, reveals that the Vatican was the first official connection with the new Korean government after liberation from the colonial rule of the Japanese.

The connection with the Vatican, the smallest country in the world, says the bishop, actually began before the setting up of the new republic of Korea. Mutel, the bishop of Korea at the time, felt that the work required in Korea was too much for the Paris Foreign Mission Society and asked the Vatican for permission to invite the American Missionary Society of Maryknoll to take care of the work in the Pyongan Province in northwest Korea.

Pyongan Province, in 1920, had a population of 2,441,000, with 41,000 Protestants and only 4,800 Catholics. The Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith gave permission for the area to be handed over, in 1922, to Maryknoll, at which time Patrick J. Byrne was named the first superior. Fathers Cleary and Morris followed, and shortly after, in 1924, six Maryknoll sisters and other priests entered the country. Fr. Byrne was elected as Vicar General of the whole Society and returned to the States, with Fr. Morris taking his place as apostolic prefect.  At that time, the bishop points out, there were 36 missioners, 19  parishes, 134 mission stations and 17,738. Catholics.  A big difference from what it was 10 years before.

In order to help the Maryknollers, Bishop Mutel sent some of the young devout Catholics to the States to study.  Chang Myun (John) and five others were sent  to the Maryknoll Seminary. Fr. Walsh, the Maryknoll superior, helped them to get into college. And John Chang was sent to learn English at the Venard, a high school seminary where Fr. Byrne was the principal. He helped the young man with his growth in spirituality, and was an important influence as John Chang continued his studies, finally graduating from Manhattan College in 1925. He attended the beatification of the 79  Korean martyrs, as the representative of the young people of Korea. Although he was offered many openings in Seoul to teach, he decided to work with the Maryknoll Fathers as their language teacher, where he remained until 1931.

After liberation in 1947, at the request of the Korean Church, Fr. Byrne was selected by Pope Pius 12th to be his representative and first ambassador to Korea. In June Fr. Byrne was made a bishop and officially appointed the apostolic delegate to Korea. Although the bishop goes into some detail on the Korean War, he devotes the last section of the article to Bishop Byrne's last days in Seoul.

As a bishop during these difficult times, Bishop Byrne was, he says, a significant figure amidst the surrounding turmoil. So much so that he was told it would be best to leave but he said his place was with the Korean Christians, and refused to leave.  On July 17th the bishop and his secretary Fr. Booth, a Maryknoll priest, were arrested by the communists. They were tried by the peoples' kangaroo court, sentenced to death, and transferred to Pyongyang. In September they were made to walk the  "Death March" to the Yalu, during which he died of pneumonia. Before dying he said,  “After the privilege of my priesthood, I regard this privilege of having suffered for Christ with all of you as the greatest of my life.”  He was a good example of being with his people even at the price of death.

Facing Death Without Regret

"Brother, there were two magpies in my front yard this morning." These words begin an article in With Bible, by a priest reminiscing about a friend who died this past Easter.  The words were part of a telephone conversation he had with him, on his arrival on assignment to his country parish some years ago. In  Korea, the magpie is seen as a symbol of  good fortune.

The priest was wondering what his friend would do in such a small parish with so few interested in religion. The area itself was not large but his friend told him he happened to talk to one of the Christians who was raising chrysanthemums, and he got the idea of making his parish a mecca for chrysanthemum enthusiasts. And in a few years, the parish did become a thriving center for the flower, each year hosting a chrysanthemum festival that was hugely popular and well-attended. 

However,  the writer received word that the liver aliment from which his friend suffered had developed into cancer, and he was suddenly taken to the emergency room of a hospital. He was told  there was little to be done, and facing death he  began his fight living with the disease. All his friends and Christians received the news with great sadness.

Because his friend required complete rest and visitors were not allowed, the writer wasn't able to visit for sometime. When he did go to see him, they talked for some time about their life together. His friend had only one small wish: If he had two months more to live and had enough energy left, he would like to travel watching people at work, to finish off his wild flower garden and prepare his chrysanthemums for the fall flowering. There was no regret for the life he was given to live. He only wanted to see people at work and to finish the work he had started.

The writer asked him what was it he feared the most.  The priest answered it was not fear of death but  whether he would be able to accept the pain of his disease without resentment and the betrayal of  God. He was  fearful that in his pain he would betray the Lord that he had tried to serve faithfully.

His friend's words reminded the writer of a memorable passage by a novelist describing how tragedy is seen differently by a farmer and by a poet:  How, he writes, are we to face the emptiness of death that awaits? The poet sings about the foundational tragedy that awaits; the farmer looks at the earth filled with weeds and spreads the seeds to overcome the weeds. To the farmer the seeding is the pledge for the future and  strong proof of his existence. His friend  not wanting to forget God and the emptiness and pain that was awaiting, by his battle and resoluteness was giving proof to his existence.
 
A plant has within itself a beautiful secret which it makes present in a flower, says the writer. Practically all flowers have a language, and the chrysanthemum, the flower his friend loved the most, spoke the language of loyalty, purity, nobility, sincerity.
 
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

Falling Away From Relgious Faith

"Why do we live a life of faith? Without concern for an answer to this question the possibility of becoming tepid [falling away from the faith] is always present.   A priest, with these words, begins his article in the Catholic Times on those who have left the Church.

Many Catholics consider health and family their primary interests, but without having the faith as the primary interest, leaving the faith will always be there, he says. When following Jesus is not the primary objective, but rather peace of mind and looking for material blessings, leaving the believing community is a strong possibility. Without efforts to solve this basic problem, we will, the priest says, not lessen the number of those who are tepid; the numbers will continue to  increase.
 
At present the opportunities of experiencing Jesus and the meaning of what it means to be a follower of Jesus are few. A very fuzzy idea of what it means to have a faith life is common. He reminds us of the need to examine thoroughly the depth of our faith-life. Without doing so, he says, may be like taking a stone from the top of a pile and fitting it below, and taking the stone from the bottom and putting it on top--a very temporary expedient.

Fortunately, Korean Catholics are zealous. They not only participate in the work of the Church but are interested in the evangelizing endeavors throughout the world. Even if limited by time, it is necessary to teach the catechism at a slower pace, taking pains to be careful in how the teaching is presented, if we want to see a change.

From the 1990s, there has been a decrease in the number of catechumens and an increase in the number of those who have left the church. We are conscious of the problem but have done little to remedy the situation. Getting those who have left the Church to return, he admits, is a difficult task.

Those who have given the subject much thought have come to the conclusion that we are going around in circles, if we concentrate only on those who have left the church and not give our attention to those in the pews  who have a very weak faith life. Attention has to be addressed to those with a lukewarm attachment to Jesus. We are interested in those who are registered as tepids, who have not gone to the sacraments for three years, but are forgetting those in the pews who might still be going to the sacraments but are not far from  absenting themselves from the community.

Finding Reasons for Hope

Themes have a tendency to repeat themselves in history, music, literature and in life. Scripture is no different, with its many recurrent themes, expressed in many different ways. One of the most frequent and important is dying to live. A great paradox and yet easily understood when explained in the simplest of  ways; religious beliefs aside: without suffering we do not have progress.

A successful professional writing in the Diocesan Catholic Bulletin confesses that when he looks back on his life he often finds it difficult to raise his head, because of the many embarrassing thoughts he's had and the embarrassing things he's done. Growing up, his environment was not all that bad, he says, but poverty, sickness and a weak body made life difficult for him. He did work hard and was able to overcome much to be where he is. But there was a price that came with it, he said, for he was unyielding and coarse, blew up often and acted rudely.  When he looks back and remembers these situations, he would like to erase them all. But he knows they are a part of him.

His prayer life, he admits, was not very good, with no attempts to seek an attachment to God. Lament was his only response.  He should have been looking for God dwelling in himself, but only looked away at a distant God. His conscience gave him trouble, he points out, so he did not have the confidence necessary to look within.

One of our previous presidents wrote, "If what is inside me is put on a movie screen, I would be so embarrassed I would not be able to hold my head up." A college professor who has made a study of forgiveness said: "We have faults which make us human."

"A contrite, humble heart you will not spurn" (Psalm 51:19) is one of the writer's favorite lines, as well as the remembered lines from a sermon he once heard: God desires us to acknowledge our failings so that he can show mercy. And those who believe in the mercy of God are people of faith.  

A powerful example of God's mercy appears in the parable of the prodigal son who was returned to a position higher than the one he left. What the writer says in the article doesn't mean to imply, he says, that the prodigal son has returned totally transformed from what he had been in the past, for he is still beset with many faults and makes many mistakes. The difference now, however, is that although embarrassed at his condition, he trusts in God's mercy. And with his broken and beaten spirit continues with courage and trust in the love and mercy of God.                               

Theology of the Body

A  Catholic Times article reports on the first Korean international academic meetings on the the "Theology of the Body," the name given to Pope John Paul's reflections and vision of the human person, with particular attention focused on the proper relationship of body and soul. They were delivered in 129 Wednesday audiences, between the years 1979 and 1984, and are of great interest for scholarly discussions of marriage, celibacy and sex--topics which have not always been treated correctly. One of the journalists of the paper expresses her ideas on what she picked up from the academic meeting.

There have always been biased views on the subject of the human body. The Church, a strong advocate for a right understanding of the human body, has over the years also enabled a distorted thinking of the body, which has been evident, she reminds us, in the teachings of the past.
 
The body, for example, was denigrated by the way the Church expressed the three enemies of the soul: the world, the flesh and the devil. Of course, this can be understood correctly and has been so understood over the years, but there is also the possibility of pushing the idea to a point where the body is seen in opposition to the spirit, a dualism which can distort the teaching.  She also mentions that there were priests who would say that women were the way the devil would tempt us, and there were times in the past when women were told not to receive communion during their monthly periods. This is not the teaching in modern history, but shows how this would engender fear in women.

Another side of this negative understanding of the body is the worship of the body, its outer appearance considered our greatest asset, extolling youth and the beauty of  the body, which today is ever present because of the electronic media. The likely consequences are the disorders of sex, the increase of divorce, and the destruction of families--all deriving from a misunderstanding of sex and its gift to humankind.

Pope John Paul II wanted us to get back to the teachings from Genesis on what marriage is. This requires a change in how we see sex. A change from seeing the soul in opposition to the body and recovering the sacramental reality of the body.

The academic meeting on the "Theology of the Body" will renew the pastoral thinking about the subject of marriage and sexuality within the Korean Church, and will make possible, she says, a new look at marriage and its meaning. Many of the old ways of viewing marriage will be revisited, discussed and improved upon, and will no doubt enter the teaching in the seminary programs of the future.