Anger is something we are all familiar with and often guilty in both small and big ways. The rector of a Catholic college whose field is psychology focuses our attention on the capital sin of anger and gives us some examples of it in his article in the Kyeongyang magazine.
A young man in his early 30s in meetings gets excited and has the habit of getting angry. He pushes his ideas to an extreme degree and when someone expresses a contrary opinion he gets angry. He is embarrassed but repeats it. He hates himself when it happens, becomes despondent, has problems with those he works, and critically affects his spiritual life.
Reasons for anger are many: self-respect, excessive self-consciousness, excessive confidence in one's opinion, guilt conscious, can all be in the mix making for a vicious circle which ends up with sadness and alienation. The person may be considered as a straight shooter, a leader but at the same time seen by many as one who is not open and feel sorry for the person for the difficulties he brings to life.
Those who frequently get angry and are overcome with passion should examine themselves for pride and self-centeredness. They have to look deeply into this area of their personality.
First looking into the element of pride. When others express their opinion does this upset one? Is attacking what I consider important seen as an attack on me? When this happens frequently and the response is excessive we have a problem. This is a question of hypersensitivity. One needs to work on separating oneself from the ideas expressed healthily. Otherwise one can find the ideas in a meeting that are different as an attack and one needs to deal with these internal feelings.
Secondly, the problem may be self-centeredness. From an early age, we hear that a person with a forceful position wins. Some accept this and find themselves not winning the acceptance and respect of others. A healthy person has concern for the views of another which will result in harmony and joy and recommends a short prayer precisely to enable one to do this. This will allow one to practice some of the virtues.
He concludes the article with another example of a man in his 50s who has a habit of talking about others behind their back and they are usually those in authority. This appears in the workplace and in his daily life.
We all have feelings of anger that show we have ideals and desires. When they are attacked a very natural reaction is anger. We are still very much alive but when expressed we need to remember that we'll meet with both small and large negative results.
Anger can be distinguished in two ways. Anger toward a person followed by abusive language or demanding an explanation. The other response is to talk behind the person's back or not to listen, it is passive anger, also called passive-aggressive behavior. It will often find those with similar feelings and bring about division within a community
He reminds us that with such persons we are dealing with a troubled child within and it often shows facially but few understand this. A person who is confronted with such a situation needs to determine what is desired? At times it is crying out for love. If one doesn't find the reason one will take joy away from those with whom one relates. Such a person should spend serious efforts in determining what is truly wanted.
A priest writing in a pastoral bulletin gives us some thoughts on how to deal with what we consider evil.
He has 8 siblings who relate well with each other but recently he did quarrel, used some words that hurt and lost control of the situation. Thankfully all recently has returned to normal.
Because of what he experienced in the family his thoughts became clearer on the need for respect and courtesy in society and the many problems we face. Each person has their own solution.
We can't say we are always right. Maturity is needed. I am right and you are wrong and refuse to hear the other's opinion closes the conversation before it starts.
Koreans have a lot of passion and want to do the right thing so when they see injustice there is no compromise and mercy. As a result, overcome with emotion, we hear: "I die and you die" and are faced with a catastrophe.
We see this presently with the Japanese and Korean situation. We are far from united on the way to address the situation. This is true of the North-South problem also. We should be able to solve the problems between us but see flags of other countries in demonstrations.
Political strife between political parties is not a fight to the death. It is not a battle to annihilate the opponent. The same is true with the South's problems with North Korea. The situation of confrontation is correct, but it is a brother to be reconciled. Of course, a military is necessary. This is to prepare for the worst possible consequences of the opponent's misunderstanding of the situation.
It is necessary to take the time and not to react immediately to the criticism of the opponent. When Jesus quickly dismisses a gentile woman's request for help for a daughter and calls her a little dog and tells her it is not right to throw the children's bread to a dog, she makes light of the seeming abuse: "Yes. Lord, but even the dogs under the table eat the children's leftovers." A woman who knows humor. Jesus is amazed and revises what he previously said. Reprimands, accusations, and attacks do not change a person. For the truth to be heard by another, goodwill needs to be shown.
Nowadays we hear a lot of talk about taking legal action with opponents. Politics is the art of the possible. Instead of doing one's best it may be better to do the second-best thing. The other side also needs to breathe and use strength if we are going to have a healthy relationship.
If you call you opponents: idiots or stupid, Jesus says that you will be dragged to the central court and dropped into hell fire, so the best thing is to compromise quickly on the way to court. Extreme expressions, rude or abusive language, should be avoided. It's frightening to see the comments throw at the other camp. It's so easy to label the opposing faction with 'leftist' 'extreme right', 'bone pain', 'aborigines' and the like. Once you label others, you lose the power to think otherwise. Even with evil one needs to be gentle.
We need to learn how the profiler's technique opened the mouth of a serial killer. (A recent case where a prisoner who was in prison confessed to other murders which he had committed). They treated the prisoner warmly. "Did you have a meal?" They met with him nine times, he stared at the female investigator's hand and said, "Can I hold your hand?" The investigator then said, "Let's shake hands after the investigation." From then on, he began to open his mouth.
Jesus also talked to the devil. If we can only have warm conversations, we will be able to walk along with anyone and journey together toward the common good. We confess God as our Father. 'Our Party', 'Our Opposition', 'Our Neighbor Japan' and 'Our North Korean Brothers' all are possible. We need to embrace the heart of the Lord who embraces all in unity.
A missionary priest working in Korea writes in the pastoral bulletin for priests on the concept of function.
He recalls a visit home and seeing the album of his sister-in-law that was published in commemoration of their 50th anniversary of graduation. They were asked to answer for the 50th anniversary yearbook whether they realized the expectations they had 50 years before at graduation.
He spent some time reflecting on the expectation that he had for life. Our expectations are the seasoning of life. When we are young, we dream and think a lot about what we will do in the future. But these days young people are worried. Finding a job is not easy. The playing field in which they will enter is far from level and they know it. They will have a more difficult time than their parents, understandable but sad.
But those who live by faith know that God did not call us to succeed but to do our best and live faithfully. Even if it's not what's desired you find another way and have the courage to challenge yourself. Attitude is important. Living the virtuous life, searching for wisdom, and living the life of a disciple are not the values of society and we get contrary messages of other ways. Society values functionality and encourages and seduces us in the need to succeed.
A few decades ago, there were priests in American society who viewed the priesthood as functional only. This was easy to believe since many priests have many other positions in the Church besides pastoral activity. In English, they are seen as 'hyphenated priests'. Priests work fulltime in many fields, as teachers, administrators, researchers, authors, the arts, etc. Of course, the Church clearly teaches that the life of a priest is not functional but ontological. The right orientation in all things and the desire to do God's will, make all fit easily into the mission of a priest. Protestant pastors, for the most part, see their work as functional but this is not what it should be for priests.
It is easy to see why many laypeople have the same idea on their roll in the church as one of function. The laity also participates in the universal priesthood. The priesthood is a mission given to a baptized person. However, we need teaching to emphasize that this priesthood is not the same as the ministerial priesthood but at the same time not just functional. This mission of the laity is not only participating in Masses, praying, serving, and helping to support the church. They are full-time disciples, not part-time disciples. Religious, clergy, and laypeople are the same in this respect.
The day-to-day daily activities of the laypeople, at home, working, shopping, at play, relating with others, can all be related to their mission as disciples. The laity, like the priests, do everything that comes from their being as disciples and the universal priesthood of the laity.
Of course, this is not making us superior in any way or considering us better than anybody else but an understanding of our calling to mission of all disciples. We are all one in Christ. The priesthood of the priest and the universal priesthood of the laity are both ontological, using a philosophical word. If this became the understanding of the laity would this not make a tremendous difference in the way they saw their calling?
"Hence the laity, dedicated as they are to Christ and anointed by the Holy Spirit are marvelously called and prepared so that even richer fruits of the Spirit may be produced in them. For all their works, prayers, and apostolic undertakings, family and married life, daily work, relaxation of mind and body, if they are accomplished in the Spirit —indeed even the hardships of life if patiently born—all these become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (Cathechism #901).
"When anyone is joined to Christ, he is a new being; the old is gone, the new has come"(2 Cor 5:17).
In the Eyes of the Believer column of the Catholic Times a Jesuit professor of sociology gives us a meditation on a fish tank and asks the readers: Have you ever raised fish? You have water, various fish, plants and food. How do you keep the fish from getting sick? He gives us three things to do.
First, fish in the tank should be given the right amount of food regularly. If you have a variety of fish, large and small, and food is scarce, only the big and strong ones will eat, and sometimes the big ones will eat the small ones. Secondly, there are other things in the tank such as plants, sand, gravel, motors, lights, and so on, and how used is important. Thirdly the water above all must be good. If there is a lot of excrement and moss in the water the beneficial bacteria will be less and ammonia will be generated and the water murky.
For these fishes to live well, one has to have concern for the whole fish tank. It's not enough to be concerned only with the fish. Our human society is similar to the fish in the tank! For each person to live healthily and happily, we must consider and improve the overall social environment of society.
First, to become a human society, we do not follow the law of the jungle where the weak become the food of the strong but a society where nourishment, proper food, goods, jobs, and opportunities are provided fairly. Today, the neoliberal economic system, as Karl Polanyi points out, gives primacy to the market and profit to an extreme, rather than "human society," justifying the survival of the fittest and polarizing society. Pope Francis stresses frequently, precisely because of this, we need to be wary of the neoliberal dictatorship.
Second, the social system like the devices in the fish tank must work together. If some laws and institutions are only beneficial to some and harmful to the powerless and marginated these laws and institutions must constantly be evaluated and reformed based on universal human rights and the common good.
Third, just as the water in the fish tank has to be fit for the fish to live so also in our personal lives the environment in which we live has to promote a healthy daily life. In a culture that benefits greed, domination, comparisons, competition, discrimination, and aversion, it is difficult to seek understanding, consideration, cooperation with others. Persons who are hurt in this culture are left to survive and find healing and are easily caught in the trap of individualism.
Our church has confessed that the stressing in the past salvation of one's own soul, we were forgetting the community and the mission of evangelizing. Those who wanted to see a change in society and worked towards that end were seen as communists.
However, what God wants to save is not only myself but all of us. "God loved this world so much that He sent His only Son," says John (3:16). A merciful Creator takes care of the entire fishbowl and wants all the fish to be healthy. The Second Vatican Council also emphasizes the fact that God offers holiness and salvation to God's people (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church # 9).
Christ, symbolized by the fish since the early church, sacrificed himself for the purification of the world and the salvation of all human beings. Our church must follow Jesus and be faithful in our mission of evangelization. We Christians pray not only for the salvation and success of ourselves and families, but we must pray that this society, where everyone lives together as the Creator desires, will be purified and become a more just and peaceful world.
"I can't remember making my mom happy. Not once… So sad."
Not long ago, Mrs. M, who lost her mother, with a trembling voice crying like a baby, uttered these words. Her sadness was so deep that the religious sister writing in her weekly Catholic Times' column remarks how she couldn't help but be deeply moved by the sadness of the woman and it brought to mind that she also could not remember incidents in her life where she brought joy to her mother.
The sister grabbed the woman by the hand and they cried together. At the same time, trying to think of a moment of happiness that she gave her mother. "There were such moments."
When the sister's mother received a lung diagnosis she had the same feeling as Mrs.M. "Ah, there's nothing I did for my mother. What should I do?" She was in a hurry to get home for a month's vacation. Looking back, all she remembered was the feeling of guilt in failure to please her mother.
She urged her mother to go out in the sun even though she was sick and hard to move. To help in her recovery, she forced her mother to eat the food she didn't like. Hearing her cough during the night she would go to her room and embrace her and say: "How difficult it is?" She restrained herself from crying before her mother not wanting to add to the suffering. Thinking of her mother there was no time to think of the gratitude she had for being with her mother during those last days. In retrospect, she did recall the feelings of gratitude.
Why do we keep bringing up bad memories? Do we have more painful memories? Is it not that we expect happiness to be enormously magnificent, and consequently coop up all the joys of life deep in our imagination? In addition, the pain that hurts us, big or small, strong or weak are bugaboos that seem to cover over all the joys we have. Is that not the reason pain is remembered more than happiness?
Sometimes the memory of pain hurts more than the pain itself. The memory of the suffering of the past prevents us from enjoying the joys of the present. Sometimes seeing the small dark clouds in the sky we worry about the future and forget the shining sun in the present sky. Even under the bright sunshine, the memory of the dark clouds of the past prevents us from basking in today's sun. If we deny the present, our fears will increase and multiply the pain.
Even if there's an enormous amount of happiness, "Isn't this a dream? Can this be happening to me…" Bewildered one can miss the very moment of joy. In our daily lives, everything seems to be routine and no different from the day before: 'that's life' and we don't notice the small moments of joy.
Every day should be filled with joy—writing, meeting people, eating, talking. All of this should be moments of joy. Isn't this the daily life of most? All want to enjoy life, we need to carefully give ourselves to what we are doing as completely as possible and with thanks in our hearts.
The end of the past is the present. We greet the present with memories of the past. So what I remember and live tells me what I will do today. The memory of the past will be helping to make my present and the future.
God has allowed me to come to this moment in time and I am thankful and also tonight, even tomorrow morning. Of course, at some point, this will not be the case the chances are good that we will fall and be hurt. It will hurt a lot. It is then that we return to the past and remember the moments of joy in life and ask for the strength to endure the pain of the present.
The seeds of the Gospel were brought to Japan in 1549, 250 years earlier than Korea. The zeal for the Gospel was present in Japan for some time but was quenched by severe persecution, but even during the persecution, the hidden Christians kept the fire of faith for 250 years without a priest. At present, there are just under 0.5% of the population Catholic. The Catholic Times has an article by a Korean Jesuit missioner working in Japan that gives the readers an idea of Christianity through his eyes.
'Zainichi' is a word that refers to Koreans in Japan. In Japanese society, even if they are naturalized and acquire Japanese nationality, they continue to be called 'Zainichi' and treated as foreigners.
Japanese immigrants in the United States and South America are called Japanese Americans or Japanese-Brazilians. Then why doesn't Japan, likewise, call Koreans who have moved to Japan and acquired citizenship "Korean-Japanese"? You don't want to call them Japanese, there is a certain social distance you want to keep, this is understandable to a point but you go beyond that. Using the word 'Zainichi' casually is horrible discrimination.
Whenever the writer has a chance he wants the Christians in the community to use the word Korean Japanese or Philippine Japanese when addressing the other national groups but without results. Is it that the time is not right or that he doesn't understand the situation?
The Japanese Church will celebrate the feast day of the 26 martyrs of Nagasaki on February 6th. They were a group of Catholics who were executed by crucifixion on February 5, 1597, at Nagasaki. Their martyrdom is especially significant in the history of the Catholic Church in Japan. The persecution against Catholics continued. Another day on September 10, they remember those who were martyred in other parts of Japan from 1617 to 1632. Their nationalities include seven countries, besides the Japanese and Koreans.
Japan is a country that cannot be reached without crossing the sea. Nevertheless, this diversity of nationalities of the martyrs is intertwined with the circumstances of the times. Japan opened its ports to these countries and traded with them but forbade Catholicism. They came to preach the Gospel and were martyred.
This shows that the 'Japanese Early Church' was a church formed with a multinational culture. No nationality is involved in the construction of the kingdom of God. This grace continues even after 400 years.
The parish in which the writer has pastoral duties is one of the largest in Japan. The church near Shinjuku in Tokyo attracts more than 5,000 believers at Sunday Mass. Japanese language (5 times, 2296), English (1120), Spanish (173). Mass, biweekly or once a month Vietnamese (1092), Indonesian (80), Polish (78), and Portuguese (61).
On October 6, the total number of pilgrims attending Sunday was 4740. According to statistics, more than half are foreigners. Currently, the Catholic Church of Japan is overwhelmingly foreign more so than any other denomination. As a result, the Tokyo Archdiocese has experienced the cultural differences and unity of heart, and since last year, has established and practiced "consensus within diversity" as a pastoral guideline.
The Japanese church is now trying to respond to other ethnic and multicultural realities. When more than half of the church's believers are foreigners, the Japanese do not feel the church is being taken away from them, but a chance to build the current Japanese church together.
On the lawns of the church, children from different countries, different hair, skin colors, and languages are seen speaking in Japanese and playing together.
One day, an elementary school student asked his father what nationality was the child with whom he was playing. The father replied: "Yes, his name is Thomas." Before distinguishing, the father, a mature Christian, was teaching his son that the person comes first. The Church of Japan as well as the Jesuit parish in one sense, is already living in the kingdom of God. If they are conscious of this fact and learn to pass it on to the next generation, the Japanese church can be said to be heading in the right direction.
There are many international religious groups in the Japanese Church, dedicated to evangelization and missionary activities with strong resources and manpower. The Jesuits were at the beginning in charge of the Hiroshima Diocese; they are still present (Busan is the Sister Diocese). They have a College of Music, Secondary Schools, Retreat Houses, Labor Education Center, 20 parishes and kindergartens.
Thirty years ago they realized that they would lack vocations so they divided the dioceses into districts. It was late but the Order moved ten years ago. The biggest difficulty in the process of change was the uncooperative attitude of the older members. They thought that the work they had carefully prepared during the last 60 years would all end. At this time, the leadership of the Diocesan and Provincial Directors was important. You should be able to celebrate failures.
From November 23, Pope Francis comes to Japan from Thailand. Is it a coincidence that both countries have a small number of believers and the church is operating in less than ideal conditions. They are waiting for the warm touch of Pope Francis.
