(Lk 12:49-59)

 

A functional Church? Discernment of the Fire

 

Flame and Peace, Immersion and division. Not tactical quietism

(Lk 12:49-53)

 

«I have come to cast fire upon the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!» (Lk 12:49)

 

The difference between religiosity and Faith becomes clear when comparing the mentality that identifies the biblical Fire with punishment, and that of a sacred Flame poured out with passionate love (v. 49) that evokes the Gift in our favour.

Francis proclaimed: "Praised be you, my Lord, through my brother fire, through whom you give light to the night: and he is beautiful and playful and strong."

For the Poor Man of Assisi, fire was a "noble and useful element among the creatures of the Most High" [Legenda antiqua].

He had a disconcerting relationship of courtesy with "brother fire". Of course, it did not chase away the night in the same way as the sun, but it brought light.

The disciples' fervour, on the other hand, was not much to write home about: James and John wanted it to incinerate their adversaries or the unfortunate (Luke 9:54).

Before Jesus, John the Baptist was still waiting for a Messiah who would immerse everyone in a devouring and avenging bonfire (Luke 3:17).

In the passage in Matthew 19:13-15, for example, the same theme is confused with the purist and fundamentalist zeal of the apostles who wanted at all costs to separate Jesus from his beloved children, who had no intention of submitting themselves.

 

The fire of Faith announced by the Person and activity of the Son does not consume or corrode; on the contrary, it is like food: full of energy for a complete life, not a destructive or divisive element.

All this brings about the rebirth of people, relationships and the surrounding reality. It changes our relationship with God, with ourselves and with our neighbour. Such is the division proclaimed (v. 51): the dividing line of our calling.

In common devotion, error of judgement or weakness is considered an infirmity, to be pointed out, corrected and punished.

Doctrine and discipline constitute the outer armour of consciences, and worship celebrates and inculcates them [not infrequently in a conformist and poor manner, albeit pretentious].

'Impurities' should not be 'melted' in the divine and providential Fire: only normalised according to atavistic prescriptions or sophisticated ideas à la page.

For life in the Spirit, on the other hand, the focus is elsewhere: personal fluctuations become possibilities; discouragement becomes a new strength.

Feelings of inadequacy, failure and impediments give rise to intensity, exchange, dialogue, new elaborations, the search for other processes; even anger and indignation flare up and stimulate redemption.

Faith is kindled wave upon wave, in welcoming and responding to God who reveals himself, calls and continues to propose - even cross-cultural mixtures that entangle abstract purisms.

 

"Let us dream as one humanity," emphasises the encyclical Fratelli Tutti (n. 8), rejoicing "in the diversity" that dwells within us (cf. n. 10).

In the imperfection of critical situations, the Father does not throw stones at us, but Bread [not stale - as in ancient ideologies].

Our unsatisfactory situations are also Food and Flame: the boulders that seemed to crush us and made us negative are taken up and become fuel that propels us forward; jubilation that, instead of 'settling us down', makes us grow even more.

Called to collaborate, we participate in the same creative, gratuitous and joyful action of the Lord.

He directs us towards the unprecedented Peace of completeness in the making, of all-round humanisation yet to be acquired.

 

The Plan of Love evolves and strengthens through concrete events, not excluding the engaging dynamics that spring from the awareness of one's own limits - which should not be swept away.

Faith does not create divisive idols that equate eccentricity with sin, but only looks at them in order to understand, allowing them to melt and blossom from that malleable energetic magma, transfiguring us.

For ancient beliefs, it was unimaginable that the Most High would not feel repugnance for our condition - and that it was precisely on the folds of carnal precariousness that he wanted to build a history of salvation.

Instead, the Son is our accomplice. He even winks at those aspects that the conformist gaze dismisses as imbalances, disorders, illnesses.

He wants to make each of us not a censor or a do-gooder, but a unique masterpiece - not built in a test tube, but unexpected.

The Lord does not standardise or sterilise, demanding unnatural performances or climaxes. It is He who humanises Himself - even in our oddities.

He recognises Himself in that which is mixed with expectations and sweat, even though it is considered unseemly for man [even the devout, or vice versa, the sophisticated] who longs to rise above himself.

Do we feel settled and 'arrived'? Only here is there no 'fire', passion, discovery, genesis, or therapy - and we are not even at the threshold of Faith.

 

'Incarnation' is the recovery of opposite sides: imperfection becomes a springboard, with its Treasures that we cannot see, hidden behind dark sides.

It is these sides that will then dominate our Desire.

This is the whole game: we start from where we are, and attention to the opportunities of the imperfect present - which we must not rush to disinfect - will make us startle at the unexpected life that rises again there.

The Flame of the Spirit that is building God's Newness lurks in the embers and in the sides considered inconclusive or opposed - it does not place itself in the shop window to immediately stifle instinct.

So it is with the Church: not 'functional', but capable of giving life. Kingdom and territory not marked by tactical pacifism, which anaesthetises.

In this way, Baptism is not a rubric or a coat of grey and common opinion, nor a device that brands, immediately cornering personalities and tensions - but rather an Immersion (v. 50 Greek text).

 

"Now, why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?" (v. 57).

In Christ, we have the capacity to think and we are made autonomous, for a solid fraternity with ourselves, which has 'stopped' - and which unfolds, revitalising Uniqueness.

By caring for the neglected parts and merging the foreign or dissimilar sides, we are brought back from the exteriority of things to the Origin of what happens.

 

 

Signs of the times and present motive (Person)

 

The room of Happiness, on the decisive Horizon

(Lk 12:54-59)

 

"Now, why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?" (v. 57).

We must learn lessons from nature and events - even for the horizon of Mystery.

In Christ, we have the capacity to think and we are made autonomous: from the exteriority of things, we are brought back to the Origin of what is happening.

Jesus' appeal on the Signs of the Times was the text that inspired Pope John to convene the Second Vatican Council, so that the Church might finally question itself, paying greater attention to God's calls in history and to the hopes of humanity.

Self-congratulatory security and the pomp of grand forms had dampened the ardent feeling and liberating enthusiasm of the Risen One.

Predictability did not change the spiritual pace; in each person, their predictions did not allow the soul to see far ahead.

The certainties of the codes dampened enthusiasm and caused the faithful to be overwhelmed by routine and petty problems.

Even today, the certainties of structure and circumstance - all established - weaken the blossoming of the present; they do not allow us to perceive and experience what is happening.

 

Clichés are capable of shifting Vocation from the magical territory where it arises (and knocks within), turning it into a sacramental everyday life that is entirely predictable - approved by the social or ecclesial context consolidated in the territory.

Instead, our founding Eros must be spent now and outwardly, because it lives on passion, not stagnation; it rests on desire and complicity with the Spirit, who with his Fire renews the face of the earth.

But it dies out if we allow ourselves to be carried away by pondered assessments of the forces at play: give-and-take calculations, opportunistic situationalism... even the intentions of others, or purists, and those of circumstance.

Convinced and personal enthusiasm pales in the face of coercion, planning, obsessions with control and verification, without decisive turning points - as if we were in kindergarten.

Love, in fact, is never based on expectations or linked beliefs, normal, without new, astonishing satisfactions - nor does it follow the ideas of a distracted mass, distracted by the usual conformist thoughts that dry up the gaze.

Beliefs that have never been examined or tested place character impulses on dead tracks.

 

Inculcated certainties generate paths that go round in circles, suspend awareness, and weaken any ability to perceive the possibilities of the inner world, as well as opportunities for communion.

It is the heart that sees the slightest possibilities. It grasps them in perennial questions in a reciprocal relationship with the meaning of the present life.

And Jesus wants our plant to sprout new leaves, all green (not withered). 

No mould: what we believe belongs to us is already lost.

So the invitation to Conversion - instead of grounding the soul and thought in ancient models or abstract, one-sided utopias - makes us attentive to the multifaceted nature of Friendship with ourselves, with our brothers and sisters, even those far away, and with all things, now.

A world of relationships that considers nothing irrelevant and can enrich us (unlock us) with adventurous, fresh, lively differences, which emerge from free energies that do not want a standard life, nor too much attachment to memories, but rather radical change, together.

As the encyclical Fratelli Tutti emphasises: 'This implies the habitual capacity to recognise in others the right to be themselves and to be different' (n. 218).

 

Radical change is... not thinking only of quick consensus, of our own immediate (even trivial) gain, which deep down we do not really want - and we know does not work: it would not change anything.

This intimate and social appeal must be grasped immediately, here and now, while the human time of grace lasts - God's moment in our favour.

The moment to discover the contents and not let ourselves be bewildered, the present opportunity, the spirit of the pilgrim, the recognition of cultures... are decisive for the evolution of life in the Spirit.

It does not rest on codified, enlisted protagonism, which already knows where it is going - and thus runs aground, adapts, loses sight of us, leaves us perplexed; it reaps victims of illusions and external friction, poisoning the path with muscular approaches and thoughts.

These are fleeting things, such as the fixed and unattractive idol that often enslaves souls: 'what we have achieved' - with its conformist goals, hard-won promotions, the gaze of others...

External compliments do not bring the 'I' and the 'you' back to the Roots, nor do they explode into the true future, the one to be lived intensely, the one that will make us vibrate.

The 'present moment' is simply the door to open to enter the room of happy energy, which remains magmatic - an incessant gift, 'anointing' and Vision that we do not know.

Amazement that invites and leads far beyond the conformist, one-sided, tail-wagging aspect - of noise, clichés, tactical manoeuvring, or the age of others to be reproduced.

 

'Theatre people! You know how to discern the appearance of the earth and the sky, but how is it that you do not know how to discern this time?

 

 

To internalise and live the message:

 

How do you experience the tension between the vision of the genius of the time and the present moment?

What relationship do you see between God's promise and our hopes?

 

 

Faith and Signs of the times

 

Faith is not a kind of object or ideology (which one may or may not have), but a relationship.

It proceeds from a God who reveals himself, challenges us and calls us by name.

His varied and rich face does not coincide with common thinking, but intercepts our desire for fullness of life, and in this way corresponds to us and conquers us.

It is not a one-off event, but something that springs forth and proceeds in waves throughout our existence – with all the surprises that time brings [which sometimes challenge us, sabotage us or astonish us].

In this relationship, the Faith that arises from listening is kindled when the initiative of the Father, who manifests and reveals himself in a proposal that comes to us, is accepted and not rejected.

In evolution, this dynamic establishes an invisible Presence in the hidden Self, the unquenchable fire of our founding Eros; a perceptible Echo – even in the genius of the times, in the furrows of personal history, in the folds of events and relationships, advice, opposing evaluations and even fractures.

 

The Relationship of Faith has different approaches. A first stage is that of Faith Assent: the person recognises themselves in a world of knowledge that corresponds to them. It is a very dignified level, but common to all religions and philosophies.

Scrutinising the Word, we understand that what is specific to biblical Faith concerns concrete existence much more than thought or discipline: it has a different character from codes, it is Spousal.

Already in the First Testament, faith is typically that trust of the Bride [in Hebrew, Israel is a feminine term] who has complete trust in the Bridegroom.

She knows that by relying on God-With, she will flourish authentically and enjoy the fullness of life, even when going through unpleasant events.

Faith lived in the Spirit of the Risen One enjoys other facets, which are decisive in giving colour to our journey in the world and to our full maturation and joy of living.

[In everything, it is essential both to listen to Sacred Scripture and to move from the whirlwind of thoughts that fragment our inner eye to perception, that is, to a contemplative gaze that knows how to rest on ourselves and on things].

 

The third step of Christological faith is precisely a kind of appropriation: the subject identifies himself and, secure in the friendly reciprocity experienced in the Gifts, takes possession of the meek and strong heart of the Lord with a stroke of the hand and without any prescribed merit.

Quoting St. Bernard, Alphonsus Maria de' Liguori states: "That merit which I lack to enter Paradise, I usurp from the merits of Jesus Christ." No arcane procedures or discipline.

Please note: this is not a "proof" of vicarious substitution, as if Jesus had to pay off a debt of sins because the Father needed blood and at least one person to pay dearly for it.

The person becomes intimate with Christ not simply through common belief, but through personal inner action.

God redeems us by educating us.

It is true that by sending a lamb among wolves, its end is sealed. But it is also the only way to teach men – still in a pre-human condition – that competition is not the life of people, but of ferocious beasts.

The lamb is the meek being that makes even wolves reflect: only by appropriating it completely do the beasts realise that they are such.

Thus we can begin to say, 'I' as human beings instead of beasts. 

Of course, only people who are reconciled with their own story do good. But the authentic and full best is beyond our reach; it is not our own production. We are not omnipotent.

 

A further stage in the journey of life in Christ and in the Spirit is that of Faith-Magnet.

This too takes the form of an Action, because the soul-bride reads the signs of the times, interprets the surrounding reality and her own inclinations. And by grasping the significance of the Future, she anticipates and actualises it.

In this way, we avoid wasting our lives supporting dead branches.

 

But the final and perhaps even more perfect stage (I would say the summit) of this Faith-Trigger is that of Faith-Wonder.

This is the specific belief in the Incarnation, because it recognises the Treasures hidden behind our dark sides.

These Pearls will come into play during the course of existence [they will do what they must when necessary] and it will be a wonder to discover them.

The broken cocoon will generate our Butterfly, which is not a construction homologated to prototypes, but Amazement.