The Art of Simplicity

A priest of the Seoul diocese, in a pastoral bulletin, mentions two books that argue forcefully that the current understanding of many that money makes for happiness is all wrong. Simplicity is the key to happiness, according to The Art of Simplicity by Dominique Loreau and How Much  Is Enough? by Robert Skidelsky and his son.

The books give us much more than a theoretical understanding of simplicity. Dominique Loreau, who lived the simple life, reflected on its meaning and it was her personal experience which gives strength and ongoing value to her words.  The words: "Blessed are the poor," used by our Lord,  seem to have a special meaning in today's world for some of our contemporaries.

Dominique Loreau, born in France, is an essayist who graduated from the Sorbonne in English Studies and has taught in England, the United States, Japan and in other parts of the world. She learned that the simpler she lived the more abundance she had. The memos she kept during those years became part of her book, which has sold over a million copies.

When we try to satisfy our greed, we lose the meaning of life.The priest gives us the table of contents, with  comments.

Articles: When we have more than what we need we are carrying a burden. Having  too much we become attached and do not advance.Isn't life a preparation to move us ahead?

House: Is not a place we store our unmovable objects, but a place to be refreshed.To be inspired and healed. A place where we return for  the essentials.

Time:  Is something we can truly make our own. We need not fear the future but only that we may lose the present.

Body: To eat little and keep our bodies agile is wisdom in action. To take care of the health of the body is equivalent to the value of a work of art.

Our consumer society is bidding us to have more, but the more we have the more twisted our life becomes; it is the paradox we have to face. The reason we are not happy is that we have too much. Let us, he says, put in order our possessions, our bodies and spirit. A simple life is able enjoy everything, being content to know the joy of the ordinary and the insignificant.

The book, How much is enough? confronts us with the fact that we are much better off materially than in the past but asks, Why is it that we are not happier? The book is a counter argument to our craving for more.

According to Keynes the demonic properties of greed and competition have to be restricted. The followers of neo-liberablism, however, have considered these the keys for a vibrant  economy.  For a good life, he concludes, we have to reduce the stress of work and to search for ways in which  incomes will  provide for a decent living for all.

Words to Ponder

Words of wisdom appearing on the front page of a bulletin for priests: 

Prayer is not like a spare tire we use when we have a problem,
but the steering wheel that steers us to where we should be going.

What is the reason the front window of a car is large but the rear-view mirror is small?
The past is not as important as the future, so we look ahead and move forward.

How is friendship like a book?
We can destroy it by fire in a few minutes, but it takes years to write.

All earthly things come to an end. When circumstances are favorable enjoy them, they will not always be so.
When circumstances are not favorable, don't worry they will not always be so.

An old friend is like gold, a new friend like a diamond. When the diamond appears don't forget the gold.
The diamond always needs a pedestal.

We often lose hope and think it's the end, but God speaks to us from above:
"Be at peace, it is only a  bend and not the end."

Have trust in God's power when your problems have been solved.
When they are not, God trusts in your capabilities.

A blind person asked St. Anthony: "Is there anything worse than being blind?"
"Losing your vision," he answered. 

When we pray for others, God listens to our prayer and gives blessings. Often when we are at peace, free of mishaps and happy, let us think of those praying for us.

Resentment: Serious Problem

There is a word in Korean often used when we direct our anger to another person or object without any reason: kicking a stone or some other 'innocent' object would be a familiar example. Recently, there have been reports of crimes causing harm to persons without any apparent motive on the part of the criminal. They appear to be random acts of anger perpetrated on someone for no reason, which has led many to fear simply walking the streets or being out at any time of the day or night. A priest, in a bulletin for priests, reflects on how this illusive but increasingly pervasive feeling is invading our lives, and a bit more often, he says, than we would like to believe.
 
A person at work, he relates, was scolded for doing something he shouldn't have done. It was a minor matter, but he was roundly reprimanded. Feeling gloomy and depressed, he left to take the bus to go home. It was raining and by the time the bus came he was soaking wet. On the bus, someone stepped on his foot, and when he arrived home, he found his two children fighting with each other, and looking around at their room all he could see was a mess. He blew up at them and, crying, they went to their room. In the kitchen his wife was preparing the dinner and, still filled with anger, he spoke angrily with his wife. Needless to say there was no peace in that family that night.  
 
He went to his room and reflected on the events of the day. He saw that his resentment toward his boss had carried over to his family, destroying the harmony that was present before he arrived; even the fighting of his children was a normal occurrence that would not have bothered him at other times. He quickly vowed to do something to fix the situation, and before long he was able to see himself honestly, which was God's grace working within him, as we Christians would like to express it.

Many of us have hurt others, but thankfully have realized it and made up for our insensitivity and the hurt we have given. Understanding what we have done is not difficult, but overcoming our self-centeredness and making amends is not so easy, and often requires an extraordinary act of grace, said the priest.

Everyone has the choice of following either our egotistical instincts or the voice of God, the choice often resulting in conflicting emotions. Our natural instincts may tend to move us in one direction and the voice of God in another. At times, what we call the voice of conscience leading us to do the good is not readily apparent.  Its influence on us, he says, will often depend on the disposition we have nurtured over the years.

Blocking out the voice of conscience, if we listen carefully, he says, will be the voice of our selfishness. Those who treasure material things and guide their lives without concern for others are going to have difficulty hearing the voice of conscience, and even if it is heard, he says, it will have little influence on their actions.
 
He concludes the article by saying that the tendency to be concerned about ones self is not bad; it is necessary for survival and for progress. But when that is the only voice one  hears then we are likely to have a serious problem, which often results in a life that is being interrupted continually by lack of peace and joy.

I am the Happiest Person in the World

In a diocesan bulletin, a priest writes that he made a trip to Panama, Central America, early this year because he read it was the happiest country in the world. After the visit, he said he could now be considered one of the happiest persons in the world, after meeting the "happiest people in the world."
 
The index used for determining happiness in this case he learned has nothing to do with possessions or finances. This realization brought to mind a poem by Sister Hae-in Lee- A Happy Face. (She has been struggling with cancer for many years.)
 
"Because I say I am having difficulty doesn't mean I am not happy. And because I say I am happy doesn't mean that I am not in pain, for sure. When I open wide my heart happiness comes with a  thousand faces--no, it comes with numberless faces, and I'm able to experience the joy of happiness. Where it hides I don't know, but with beautiful wings, furtively, the happiness appears. I am playing hide and seek with it as it pulls at my  heart strings, and today I am again happy." Poor as the translation must be, the meaning is clear: no matter the circumstances, happiness can be found.
 
The key to happiness, the poet is saying, is to open wide the door to our hearts.  When that is done the eyes naturally open and our thinking changes, and we can see the world and ourselves differently. I can then cry out truly, the priest writes, "I am the happiest priest in the world!" Just as we all can cry out, he says, "I am the happiest person in the world!"
 
However, there are many people who have closed the doors to their hearts. Our 'apartment culture', which tends to move us toward individualism and egotism, is influencing us, beginning, he says, by living with the doors to our homes being locked. When our doors are locked, our hearts also tend to get locked, he says. This is one of the reasons that many do not want people to come to their homes, and a reason there is so much difficulty in building small Christian communities. Helping to break this down is one reason we use parishioner's homes to hold small community meetings.  When we refuse to have others come to our house, we are refusing Jesus, he says. 

Christianity is a religion of revelation. In Korean, 'revelation' means open and seen. God so loved us that he opened himself to us; he gave us all of himself. This is what he wants from us. Our life, likewise, following God's example, should be open.  We don't want to refuse him entrance and have him "go to the stable."

If we open the doors to our homes we will be opening our hearts and opening ourselves to happiness. We will begin to live, the Church will begin to live, and the world will live. Happiness will be the natural result, and all of us will be able to cry out, 'I am the happiest person in the world'.

Punishment And Rehabilitation

A priest who heads a rehabilitation home for the young discusses, in the diocesan bulletin, a serious problem which was highlighted recently when a video, widely circulated on the internet, showed high-school students, on a visit to a home for the aged, treating them abusively. The images went viral, generating a lot of comment, mostly critical of the students, and often quite angry. Their high-school also became the focus of a great deal of the criticism, and the school responded with a letter of apology, and expelled the students.

In the article the priest expresses three reasons why he was astonished by the incident.  First of all, by the thoughtless actions of the students, by the immediate comments made following the viewing of the video, and by the subsequent response of the school.

There is no question, of course, that what the students did was wrong; they should have been rebuked and punished. However, there was no reference to the responsibility of the society that had created the conditions contributing to the incident. There was no concern, the priest said, for the problems the children had in growing up, the difficulties they had in the home and school, and no criticism for the supervisors who were supposed to look after the students. The comments, he said, were only attacks on the students.

Though the school did send out an apology and the students were expelled, there was no attempt made to help them rejoin the human family.  The priest couldn't rid himself of the idea that the school was only interested in protecting its image by punishing the students. Disciplining  the students was the proper action, he said, but by neglecting to help them correct their behavior, the punishment could only be seen as punishment for the sake of punishment.

He refers to the time when Jesus said to those who dragged the woman caught in adultery before him, "Let the man among you who has no sin be the first to cast a stone at her" (John 8:7). Jesus brought her to where she had sorrow for what was done, the priest explained. Though this incident appears to be quite different, the love and concern Jesus displayed for the woman was what the priest felt should have guided the response of everyone, when the abusive conduct of the students became known. 
 
Recently, there has been a great deal of concern for the problems of the young, with many TV programs talking about the crisis. The priest hopes that we will be able to learn how to move forward from this crisis of the young, resolving many of its most pressing issues by having the kind of heart Jesus has revealed to us.     

Light of Faith

The encyclical Light of Faith was written up in the two Catholic Papers, both considering it important enough to editorialize on the subject. An accompanying article in the Catholic Times, quoting a Vatican official, mentioned that the teaching on faith is a means to help heal the wounds of our society. The Peace Weekly expressed the hope that it will be translated into Korean as soon as possible, as the Year of Faith will be ending with the close of this  liturgical year.

Most of the Catholics would not be readers of the encyclical, but they will be getting snippets  from their reading, from sermons,  and from religious educational  programs that many will attend. The Catholic understanding of faith is quite different from many other Christians, for it does not see faith separated from the community of the Church, from our brothers and sisters in the faith. We do not baptize ourselves but are led to the faith by others. It is a gift of God from the past into the present, and it grows within community. The apostolic succession and the first community of faith cannot be separated from our faith life.

Consequently, the Catholic approach will not be popular to many. We have accepted, in many cases, the primacy of individual initiative, to an extent that finds little place for the help we get from others and the community. A sign, perhaps, that the Church is in need of public relations help. Jesus left us a believing community, and it was this community that gave us the Scriptures, and the community into which we are born as Christians. But, unfortunately, It is not something we think about too deeply.

We are shown how our faith can lead humanity to unity, how it fosters solidarity with others, and how it brings us peace in living with others. This is not the understanding of many;  religion is often seen as a cause of division but this is not the understanding we have of faith. Faith is not a private matter. We believe in order to understand, which gives us great freedom and teaches us that we should be open to dialogue with everybody, for we are also in search of truth, and faith needs truth. Faith is linked to truth and love. Love and truth are inseparable.

"Clearly, then, faith is not intransigent, but grows in respectful coexistence with others. One who believes may not be presumptuous; on the contrary, truth leads to humility. Since believers know that, rather than ourselves possessing truth, it is truth which embraces and possesses us. Far from making us inflexible, the security of faith sets us on a journey; it enables, witnesses and dialogues with all" (#34 of the Encyclical Light of Faith).

Since the encyclical is, in the words of Pope Francis, the work of four hands, it will be examined to see who wrote what, but it is the signature of Francis that comes at the end. Benedict wrote an encyclical on love and hope. This one on faith will complete the commentary on the three supernatural virtues we are so familiar with.

The encyclical makes clear that faith does not get rid of our problems, our pains, but we are enabled to share our pains with the knowledge of God's love, and to find new meaning and hope.

The Teaching of Taizé

Why are the young people leaving the churches? is a question many are now beginning to ask. The problem being addressed is not solely a Catholic or a Protestant concern but one common to all beliefs. The young are obviously not finding what they are looking for among the present religious establishments. The desk column of the Catholic Times attempts to find an answer by introducing us to the Taizé Movement.

Taizé, a little village in France, is home to a community of brothers who hold everything in common and live a simple life as celibates. Brother Roger, born in Switzerland, founded the community in 1940. Three times a day they gather together for prayer, which is the center of their communal life. Each Sunday thousands of young people come for prayer, reflection and sharing; and each year over 100 thousand visitors, mostly young people, make the trip to Taizé from all over the world.

When the young join the community for short periods of time, they do what the brothers do: pray three times a day and join in the work of the community. It's a very simple life and yet visitors from all over the world are motivated to leave home and share this simple lifestyle. 

To those who leave the churches in Korea  this kind of thinking is foreign to them, says columnist, and she wonders why this is the  case. She found the reason by reading the book The Community Called Taizé. The author asked many of those at Taizé why they came. Most said they had the feeling of being accepted by the community of brothers. Race and religion had nothing to do with being accepted; it was the first time they had experienced this kind of acceptance. Moreover, the brothers of the community showed great trust in them, they said, allowing them to make their own plans for service and work, which gave them an unexpected sense of freedom.

The columnist quotes from a news account from a State-side newspaper on the results of a questionnaire that asked the young why they had left their churches. The answers were not what we would have expected. Many of them explained that it was the inability of the churches to satisfy their thirst for the spiritual. The messages given by the churches were not clear, they said, and their answers to the problems of life were superficial. "The young are looking for faith and are offered only entertainment" was a typical view of the problem. Another put it this way, "If you really believe that the church can change for the better the behavior of others, why is this not more readily seen in the behavior of Christians?"

She concludes with the observation that the questionnaire was for the young in the United States, but that it also had a great deal to teach us. Those who have authority in the Church and the older generation should take a hint from what has been accomplished at Taizé, she advised, and from the thinking of many of the young who have left the churches.