Augustine says that a philosopher is not a man who is wise
but a man who loves wisdom.
Ambrose says that we believe fishermen, not dialecticians.
The fishermen whom we believe are philosophers in the truest
sense of the word, because they loved wisdom, and they recognized it when they
saw it, or rather when they saw Him.
The problem with so many philosophers today is that they
become dialecticians, in love with their own arguments and ideas. They no longer have the humility to love
wisdom itself, because love of wisdom entails the acknowledgement that there
are things you will never understand.
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What is the value of fasting? I think of the female medieval mystics, who
were known both for their great charity, and for their great fasts. How do they fit together?
Our Church teaches that we are all “in this” together. We rejoice when others rejoice; we mourn when
others mourn. As part of one Body, if
one member suffers we all suffer.
Members of our body are hungry now. They are poor, naked, homeless, sick,
cold. When we fast – whether from food
or from other material comforts – we manifest in our own lives the truth that the hunger and the suffering of the
poor are also our hunger and our
suffering. This is the meaning of
solidarity.
When I suffer the hunger and deprivation of the fast that I
have chosen, I should be remembering the ones who have no choice but to suffer
hunger and deprivation. The pang in my
flesh should make present to me the obligations I have to those who suffer out
of necessity.
As long as other members of Christ’s body are suffering, so
too am I suffering, whether I realize it or not. The choice to fast is my choice to realize it
and to live out this realization.
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When we confront suffering, we have a choice. We can choose to turn inward, towards
selfishness, towards hopelessness, towards hatred. Or we can choose to confront it with an
attitude of love, hope, faith. We can
choose to make it into something that transforms us into a gift given up for
others.
God has made this choice possible by offering Himself on the
Cross. But He does not excuse us from
the responsibility of choosing.
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I read this recently: “We are always receiving God’s mercies. Many of them we don’t understand – some are
painful, some are unbearable – but they are all God’s mercies. We just ask that He please give us a few more
of the tender ones.”
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Cardinal Carlos Maria Martini, S.J., writes that Peter’s
problem was that he wanted to be the Lord’s savior. How much insight does that give into Peter’s
personality throughout the Gospels! He
was a man of action, and he wanted very much to be doing something for the Lord.
Build a tent, wash feet, fight, die.
We find Christ throughout gently rebuking him. It is
my job to serve you, Christ says. It is my job to save you. Let me save you, for you cannot save
yourself, and you certainly cannot save me.
Peter becomes wise only when he acknowledges that his ability to serve
the Lord comes not from himself, but in fact from the Lord he wishes to serve.
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Thus the fisherman attains wisdom through suffering. First, suffering the wounds to his pride: realizing he cannot save Christ, realizing that all the ways he had thought to fight for what was right had failed, and realizing that he could not even trust himself to be loyal to his dearest friend. Then, suffering on account of love: enduring hardship for the sake of the One who saved him. The first kind of suffering brings grief; the second brings joy.
I think Christ acknowledges the grief that accompanies death to self, and I think He understands our need to mourn this death. When Peter heard the cock crow, he wept. There is no escaping the wounding of our ego, the recognition of our dependence on others, the acknowledgment that we cannot control our circumstances or even wholly understand ourselves.
But then Christ calls us to transform this death to self into self-gift of love. Don't languish in the mourning of your own incompetency. Christ has taken your inadequacy and transformed it into Himself. He has saved you, and if you give your wounded pride to Him He can restore you. Die to self, and Christ can live in you, and in Christ's life in you you will find joy.
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