Is My Life Beautiful?

Is My life Beautiful?, a new book by a Korean Benedictine Sister, has been reviewed in the Catholic Times.  So Heui-suk has lived the religious life for over 40 years and now has written her first book. She laments that the word 'wonder' is rarely heard. She feels that most of us don't see and thus don't experience the beauty that is all around us. She wanted to answer the question she posed for herself in her book: is the life we are now living beautiful?

All life is a mystery, she says. A crystallization of love, as she described the mystery--a mass of beauty and holiness. It's not our job to rid ourselves of this beauty, she says, but to enjoy it. And the I that I am, she tells herself, should be, first of all, the one who should be living this beautiful life.

Her experiences have been many; much of it becoming the basis for her book, including her missionary work in Africa and India. She is now responsible for a center for refugees from North Korea.

Sister would like all of us to see the beauty of life as our calling, as a vocation. The society we live in today has much distortion and perversity, which is the reason she concentrates on nature. Even though we have done, because of greed, much damage to nature, it renews itself and by self-cleansing has much to teach us about our own renewal.

Humanity of course is part of nature. But we can misunderstand our rightful role by treating nature in any way we please, forgetting that our bodies will return to nature, becoming food for the tiny creatures inhabiting the earth.  My life on this earth is just the briefest moment in time, she reminds us, compared to the age of the universe. Our lives on this earth should be, she says, a dance to life, and we should be enjoying each moment of the dance.

To live the beautiful life, the sister believes that pain is necessary, that experiencing pain helps all of us to achieve this kind of life. Living the beautiful life means we have to practice love of our neighbor, and when we see what is wrong in ourselves and the world, we should want to correct it and do what is right. We should, she says, be living in the center of the world and doing all that is possible to have all enjoy the beautiful earth that we have been given.

She feels that when we have the right relationship with nature and see our place in the totality of life, we will have the proper relationship with all our brothers and sisters. We are called to live a  life of sharing.  And especially those with faith are called to this life of sharing, there should be no hesitation on our part to run right to the center of the world,  where we are to live this life of love.

A New Beginning for a New Evangelization

Attempts at self-improvement are always valuable and welcomed. Our Catholic bishops have set their sights on life-long educational programs for clergy. An article and an editorial  in the Peace Weekly report that these programs have been in effect in many dioceses for years in the form of retreats, seminars, and sabbaticals, but that the bishops wanted to establish the programs nationally to give them more importance.

An e-mail recently received contained the well-known  poem "Desiderata," written by the American Max Ehrmann, and introduced as being on the wall of the Pope's studio. A good preamble to the programs would be one of the following lines from the poem:

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.

Do not distress yourself with imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.

A national program will allow for variety, a more systematic approach to renewal, and a decrease in the expenses and use of personnel in the dioceses. It will also facilitate the fellowship of the clergy beyond diocesan borders. Programs will begin this year with retreats and seminars; the number of programs for the future will be determined by the attendance this year.

Blessed John Paul II, in the Apostolic Exhortation on the Formation of Priests, expressed the need for providing our priests life-long educational opportunities, citing as reasons the rapid changes in society, the difficulties of accommodating our methods to the culture of the times, and assuring that the call to the priesthood is based on human maturity. 

Others who have worked in this area in the many research centers of the dioceses have expressed themselves similarly, especially pointing out the need to understand postmodernism, and how to deal with it and the growing secularization of culture, a vibrant atheism, and priests not acting as servants to the community but with an  authoritarian attitude. With overwork, priests can act like mere functionaries or misguided activists. Without a deep spirituality, anyone can become a victim of loneliness and listlessness; even disease, laziness, and burn-out can appear, and habitual behaviors can easily take over.

The contents of the programs will concentrate on humaneness, spirituality, knowledge, and pastoral sensitivity. The article, quoting Blessed John Paul II, said that unless the human element is present in any educational program then all the rest will be going into a  a pot without a bottom.

The editorial hopes that this new effort will be a way of recharging the priests as they begin the new evangelization here in Korea.    

Learning from Modern Dance

Modern Dance, begun in the early 20th century, is a dance style that allows for the dancer to express feelings through movement.  It does not have the structure of  traditional ballet dancing and is not limited in its movements. A priest writing for the Catholic Times discusses his congregation's dance academy, and his own attempts to acquire some ease with the dance movements, a new and challenging pursuit for him.

He admits that his interest in the beginning was to lose weight but this quickly changed into wanting to get rid of blocked feelings that had built  up over the years. Classes began with 40 minutes of stretching exercises which he found difficult, using muscles he had never used before. However, at the end of the stretching his body felt so light it seemed that he could fly if he tried. The stress on the body and mind was gone; he was becoming acquainted again with his body in a new way.

Jumping, stretching, moving in circles with the elasticity of the body, he learned the fundamental moves. Moving the lower body and the  upper body, and shortly it seems the body knows what to do on its own. The columnist is reminded again of the truth that there are basic ways of doing practically everything.

The teacher reminds the students often: "Do the movements to the best of your ability." He feels that someday he will be able to give expression to his feelings with the body.

One day the teacher asked the class to use the length and width of the hall and just walk with ease, comfortably and freely. Hearing these words he became perplexed and his body tightened up. He had always wanted to live with internal freedom and with ease, but the words of the teacher made him freeze. There was no textbook, and she was not telling them exactly how to do the walking, leaving it up to the students to do it as best they could. Not knowing what to do, he felt lost.

He looked around to see what the teacher was doing and tried to imitate her movements, drawing a laugh from the teacher. He was looking for the proper moves; how far to bend the knees, what to do with the arms and hands, what should be the proper facial expression, and so forth. Many of us like to believe we have the right answers not only concerning how to move on a dance floor, but concerning most of life's questions.  But the older we get the more likely we are to realize that the correct answers to most of our questions are not always there.

There are times we have to go beyond the proper answers, and look to what is more human and improve the values that we have. The Pharisees and lawyers at the time of Jesus thought that they had the correct answers, and Jesus had the wrong ones, which allowed them to put him to death. The columnist hopes that he will rid himself of the heavy baggage, personality impediments and attitudes, that prevent him from being free and transparent in his life.

Essence of Character is Relationships

Being sensitive to the feelings of others, being concerned not to offend, is generally considered good advice.  At times, however, some of us do not always find it easy to follow. Pastoral workers especially find it difficult when commenting on the Scriptures and the teachings of the Church in areas that can be upsetting to many. Furthermore, speaking the truth found in sociological and other scientific studies to those who see that truth differently is often seen as a lack of compassion, sensitivity and understanding, as not being the charitable thing to do.

An article in the  Peace Weekly, headlined "Happy Parents Make for Happy Children," considers the words of a religious sister, a member of  a family research center, that would be upsetting to many.

A strong, mature relationship between husband and wife, the sister says, will determine the character of the children. The way children relate with their classmates at school will be greatly influenced by what they see in the  home. When the relationship with others is a problem, she says it is, for the most part, because the relationship between the parents is not good.

The sister, a professional counselor, has found during her years of counseling that when communication between the parents is good, the relationships of their children with others is likely to result. The problem is no different, the sister insists, whether the child is a victim or a perpetrator of bullying in school. Both are victims of parental disharmony in the home, and what was learned at home is what the children will act out in school.

The essence of character, sister maintains, is molded by our personal relationships,  To have a good relationship with others, a person must first understand their  own preciousness and dignity. All of us have a desire to be loved and recognized; without this we are lonely and easily traumatized.  

Parents, it must be kept in mind, she says, should be sensitive to what the children really want, but this does not mean doing whatever the children ask for. If they desire a famous brand name item, it's good to remember that it's because they want to be recognized as special and accepted by their classmates.

Children, from grammar school to college, generally form their relationships around some aspect of play. Recognizing this, parents need to engender a sense of responsibility that involves other aspects of life; without doing so, a mature sense of responsibility is likely to be missing. When parents tell their children to go to church, for example, but there is no time for prayer in the home or a lack of love, there are bound to be problems. When the parents are living a happy life, this will likely be what is passed on to the children.

Sister reminds us that the home is the first community, the first church, and it is there that children learn the values of love, respect and service to others.

         

Preparing for the Future

On the opinion page of the Catholic Times, the priest-columnist expresses his surprise on hearing that the Kodak Company declared bankruptcy. He reminds us that the main reason for the collapse was the company's inability to keep up with the digital camera boom, despite having developed the digital camera in 1975. Because the new camera did not require film, its best-selling product, they let others take the lead and were not prepared to respond effectively when the public left the conventional for digital.

The columnist uses this example of unpreparedness for something that will also come to pass when the names of the beloved hometowns of many will disappear from the map. The government is planning to change the local administrative system because of duplication in finances, to gain more efficiency and prepare for unification of the North and South. This plan has been on the books for many years and is seen as needed by both government parties.

This will also mean combining territorial areas under different names. It will be not only a vertical reorganization but a horizontal merging of territories. Currently, there is a great deal of discussion and disagreement concerning how to go about implementing the plan, but some day soon it will be a reality.

He hopes the Church is now preparing for the eventual territorial changes, for there will be changes in diocesan lines, necessitating name changes that without  preparation will prove very disconcerting for many.

Whenever we have changes, there is always a danger of preparing for the new and discounting the old in a way that causes confusion and misunderstanding, and not only with the territorial changes being discussed here. The hope of the priest is that this will not be the case within the Church, following the proposed territorial changes. He gives us the words that Patriot Ahn Joong-gun wrote three days before his death, taken from  the writings of Confucius: "if one does not plan for the future, one will face many present worries."  He hopes these words of Patriot Ahn will be taken to heart by the leadership in the Church.

What Gives Meaning to Life?

"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" are the words that begin the Beatitudes, and which the columnist of the "Half Transparent Notes on Life" in the Korean Times finds reason for great joy. They bring consolation to him and a reason for avoiding the unruly enticements of life.

This one verse of the Beatitudes sums up, he says without fear of exaggeration, the meaning of his life. And if he could possibly achieve the goal it describes for us, he would, he says with all the sincerity he can muster, give up his life for it..

The columnist has expressed this same feeling in his other writings. He recalls a novelist appearing on a TV panel show who mentioned that someone had said that "knowing the poor can be happy gives meaning to life."  The novelist went on to say that she couldn't understand how anybody could say that. What is so good about being poor? she asked. The columnist laughed on hearing this, knowing that she had read what he had written.

Her words, he says, are understandable. Who in the world, including himself, would say that poverty is good? Everybody is striving to do away with poverty. However, despite the good intentions of many to achieve equality the poor still greatly outnumber the rich. 

He goes on to tell us the reasons this verse from the Beatitudes is so important in his life. He understands it as giving voice to those who are without power, in a world that is ruled by those who have power--financial, social, political and military power.

In the past, he had favored the thinking and goals of the powerful, but early on gave them up; not only because he was not gifted with the capabilities of the powerful. But realizing that this was not in line with the truth, he decided to side with the powerless, and came to understand that, paradoxically, it is the powerless that have true power--truth is on the side of the powerless

Lao-tzu wrote that "the greatest virtue is to be like water." The columnist sees this as similar to what Jesus expressed in the Beatitudes. When water comes up against some obstacle, it doesn't expend effort in struggle but silently and in time overcomes the temporary hindrance. Water takes the posture of the weak and overcomes the strong.

But no matter how much one tries, the columnist insists, it is impossible to say all that is included in the phrase: "Blessed are the poor in spirit." The fascination it holds for him can't be captured by simple paraphrases, he says, and wonders if its profound meaning somehow comes from our knowing its divine source rather than believing it came from human thought.


      

Lent and Lectio Divina

During Lent many desire to deepen their prayer life. A Benedictine priest who has written on prayer was interviewed by the Peace Weekly on its proper place in living a Christian life. His wise words: "We have to learn how to pray and work at it continually until, unknowingly, prayer will come to us naturally."

For over 20 years he has made a study of Lectio Divina (Divine Reading) in  the early days of monasticism, and has written and lectured on the subject, enabling many to enter this world of prayer.

Asked what would be his definition of prayer, out of the many that we have, he said it would be dialogue, the interaction between God and ourselves, a lifting up of our hearts to God, completely, and preparing ourselves to hear the response. Solitude and silence, he says, are necessary for this encounter.

The interviewer mentioned that since there are steps and levels of prayer, how do we develop our prayer life? Many, the priest said, use a prayer book for their prayers and are at the level of asking for blessings. How can we go deeper? In the books on spirituality,he noted that nine steps are usually mentioned;  the journey begins with vocal prayer and ends with the prayer of transformitive union.  The higher the ascent the more God's activity is seen, and the more passive we become. God does the leading.

Contemplation, he says, is not reserved for a few but is for all. If we stay with the reading of Scripture and meditating, God will lead us to the higher levels.  Lectio Divina is reading the Scriptures with  our whole being, having it  become part of us. As St. Jerome said, if we do not know the Scriptures, we will not know Jesus.

If we divide life, as we usually do, into daily life and faith life, the interviewer asked, will prayer bring them together? The priest answered that life should not be compartmentalized into prayer life, service to others and everyday life.  It is all one. If we take the readings of Scripture that the Church gives us daily, and have them accompany us in our lives, our spiritual life will benefit greatly. We will have harmony, and all  will tend to unity.