Modern or post-modern man (i.e., the human person, m/f) is characterized  by and attached to ambiguity and relativity. Truth, the very notion of it, is suspect.

As a human being, I am obliged to truly encounter my world, my times. It has engaged me. I am now 70 years old. I have engaged it. And I am not done … yet. (Phil. 2:12)

As human beings we are distinguished from the mere animal by our capacity to transcend ourselves. As soon as we ask ‘why?’, as soon as we find ourselves astonished that anything is, as soon as we become aware of the shock of being and death, we transcend ourselves.

We are capable of looking at ourselves from the outside, as it were. This as-it-were-from-outside aspect is our transcendence. ‘Man’ (m/f) is both subject and object. ‘His’ existence is a question, an intuited project. From the moment of conception, existence is a journey, a going forth and a going toward. It is also a dilemma. We stumble towards a climax, a goal, beyond all tomfoolery and sin. We have wounds to show.

The human person today however, if our culture is any indication, seems to have opted for ambiguity and relativism. But is he reflective in so being? Reflection takes great effort and forces us toward choices. I am afraid that ambiguity and relativism are attractive to modern man precisely because he has strayed from his Origin. He is not always a reluctant agnostic. His agnosticism vey often justifies a self chosen lifestyle which he puts first and makes ultimate. This is to miss the Goal; it is drop into the abyss.

St. Paul says that everyone has an innate knowledge of God and His law (Rom.1) and Jesus Christ is the “light who enlightens every person who comes into the world (Jn. 1:15). He has not left man to grope and stumble blindly towards death in the dark. He comes to us and enlightens us with his grace and follows us all the days of our lives.

The darkness is in us, battling with the Light. We must not play the fool any longer.

“He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world knew him not. He came to his own home, and his own people received him not. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God;who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”  (Jn. 1: 10-13).

So what is this relativism, this agnostic attachment to moral relativism or ambiguity? Are we innocent in this regard?  The gospel of John tells:

“And this is the verdict, that light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil.” (Jn 3:19)

So we must not be too naive when it comes to assessing the nature and integrity of modern or post-modern agnosticism. Sometimes, if it is not cynical, it is real, sometimes a pose, oftentimes an evil excuse.

I don’t mean to preach. I am no preacher or authoritative leader of some confused remnant. I am not even a writer. I am a contingent stumbling human person on a shocking journey. And there is a destination to face where, if we do not seek forgiveness for our sins and do penance,  we miss the light and life of being.

SH

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Mary’s Faith

“The Blessed Virgin teaches us to believe in our vocation to sanctity, to divine intimacy. We did believe in it when God revealed it to us in the brightness of interior light, and the words of His minister confirmed it; but we should also believe in it when we find ourselves alone, in darkness, amid difficulties that tend to disturb and discourage us. God is faithful, and He does not do things by halves: He will finish His work in us, provided we have complete confidence in Him.

It would be very far from the truth to think that the divine mysteries were so revealed to Mary, and the divinity of Jesus was so evident to her that she had no need of faith. Excepting the Annunciation and the events surrouning the birth of Jesus, we do not find any extraordinary Faith manifestations of the supernatural in her life.

Mary lived by pure faith, trusting in God’s word even as we must. The divine mysteries which took place in her and around her remained habitually hidden under the veil of faith, assuming an outward appearance common to the various circumstances of ordinary daily life. Hence, they were often concealed under obscure, disconcerting aspects such as the extreme poverty in which Jesus was born, the necessity of fleeing into exile in order to save Him, the King of heaven, from the wrath of an earthly king, the toil undergone to
procure for Him the strict necessities, and the lack of even these, perhaps.

Yet Mary never doubted that this weak, helpless Child, who needed her maternal care and protection just like any other child, was the Son of God. She always believed, even when she did not understand.” 

— Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene, Divine Intimacy, Mary’s Faith.

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