By Fr. Sergius Nezhbort
People
have a hard time trying to let others into their hearts. More often than not,
God becomes “my personal God” instead of “our God”, and therefore attempts by
other people to enter this “sacred” union are perceived as spiritual
aggression. It is vital for a person to have the experience that my God is also
your God, and your sin, regardless of how abominable I may find it, is also my
sin in a sense. I cannot push you off and say, “You’re a bad person, go away.”
I have to understand that you’re so bad because I’m bad, too: if I were
different, you would also be different.
It is
often the case that a person who apparently leads a more or less pious life (at
least, visibly) thinks that he is superior to other people, as if they were
lower class because they live differently. In fact, we have to realise that God
does not treat us like lower class. He loves us all. He does so not because He
is so magnanimous but because He sees each person as a unique personality. We
can’t be more misled than when we start to divide people into castes and
classes, even unwittingly!
We’re so
messed up. We are touched by grace and our hearts soften; we want peace and
tranquillity; but then we see a child running around the church and
misbehaving, and we catch ourselves reacting with “righteous” anger: What’s
that? Why don’t his parents look after him? Take that boy away! On the one hand,
it’s excusable but we forget that the child and his mother might also be having
a very important moment.
A man
told me that he has two adopted children, and he has a lot of trouble with
them. He goes through various times with them, sometimes even becoming
desperate. That’s why he seeks God’s support and comes to church with these
kids. Unfortunately, these children can’t stay still in the church even for a
brief period of time. Other people in the church start complaining and demand
that he either “teaches his kids to behave” or “leaves”… People just don’t care
to know why these children act like that. If only they stopped to think what
kind of life these children had had, what traumas they had endured, and why
they had been left without their parents. We don’t know the full story and we
are hardly capable of digesting it. We prefer to focus on our own stories and
feelings.
Here I am
with my prayer, my fasting, my righteousness. Okay, I admit it’s not as perfect
as I would like it to be, but everything else is rubbish.
It would
be great if, before commenting or complaining with someone, we could pause to
think that I might have a stake in that person whom I dislike and whom I prefer
not to see or hear. Maybe it’s me who is responsible?
Therefore,
when we come to church, we should lay all earthly cares aside but remain
thoughtful towards the people around us. God sometimes acts through these
people. It is through them that He can tell us something, warn us, or stop us
from doing something wrong. If we become sensitive and compassionate, we will
really abide in God.
May 14, 2018
St.
Elisabeth Convent
CONVERSATION