tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853204965986587589.post6804250801820253849..comments2024-03-17T22:48:00.427+08:00Comments on Reflections and Ruminations: Success does not always lead to contentment, but so many still hope for it in life.Fr Luke Fonghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03079016104331055895noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853204965986587589.post-33431968387287466862018-06-13T09:30:55.250+08:002018-06-13T09:30:55.250+08:00Dear Viv
Thank you for your courage in writing th...Dear Viv<br /><br />Thank you for your courage in writing this response. I am sure your sentiments are not unique to you, as suicide is getting to be more and more common these days. It is never an easy issue to deal with, and probably never will be. <br /><br />I have written on this before in this blog of mine and from different angles. I have written on it from the angle of a, as you alluded to, compassionate God. My point of departure was from the fact that Jesus descended to the dead after his death. It teased out the theological and spiritual significance of what this deliberate action of Jesus means for all of us, including those who have chosen to take their own lives, because this meant that there is no place that one goes to that God’s love is out of reach. There are many such reflections on death by unnatural means, and I suppose they do offer the needed ‘succour’ that you seek.<br /><br />But this particular blog of mine this week comes from yet another angle, which doesn’t so much seek to give ‘succour’ to those who seek a healing balm because they have lost either friends, relations or loved ones through suicide. Instead, if you read it differently, it serves more to give the confidence and boost the failing faith of those who are still alive and are struggling with finding purpose in life. The bottom line of those of us who have been baptized in Christ is precisely this – that if you think that there is nothing to live for, and feel so invalidated, purposeless and find life meaningless, think again! Your very baptism has had God calling you his beloved, and that gives you the greatest validation anyone can give, and any material success can bestow. Don’t overlook this great grace. Its tremendousness is so easily lost of so many who hardly pause long enough to let its truth have a deep impact on their life direction and life goals.<br /><br />When this truth is lost amidst the sea of other ‘successes’ or ‘loss’, despair can then easily set in. This is what I was trying to prevent. I am sorry if this sounded at all self-validating and self-righteous. In fact, it was meant to be just the other way around – God-validating, and being so grateful for God’s righteousness. <br /><br />Maybe Viv, you are still at that stage where you are nursing a raw wound – caused by loss and grief. Nowhere in my blog did I even suggest that people who chose to take their lives are not the beloved sons and daughters of God (not ‘of Christ’, as you said, because that is a theological error – none of us are children of Christ). Even people who sin terribly are not ‘disowned’ by God because he never disowns his own self, as scripture says. More likely, it is that at the very point of suicide, they somehow overlooked that truth and instead of listening to their conscience, were overwhelmed by their issues, pains, hurts, and anguish. This is the tragedy that I am hoping to prevent by my writing.<br /><br />It is understandable that the loss of these two friends of yours colours and affects negatively the way you approach things and read things, especially when it is related to this difficult issue. Give God space and time to heal those wounds and in his time, I pray the colour of God’s love will return. You have my prayers.<br /><br />Fr Luke<br /><br />Fr Luke Fonghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03079016104331055895noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853204965986587589.post-66500646447062636722018-06-13T00:11:12.521+08:002018-06-13T00:11:12.521+08:00I think this sharing, while all true and wonderful...I think this sharing, while all true and wonderful, lacks compassion. I feel it's more a a self-validating piece. <br /><br />You've fitted, Father, the facts so nicely into God's truth, but I'm not sure how all of what you say makes sense if I frame it against another truth, specifically the two people I've known in my youth, parishioners at St. Ignatius, who had taken their lives. What then? Are they not beloved son and daughter of Christ? <br /><br />"Living our lives in response to this great privilege is our ultimate success," you say, but tragedies do happen, because the ways of the world are so difficult, so stressful, so incomprehensible. <br /><br />We would all have had the privilege to listen to a priest tell us something more meaningful and enduring, something that gives us succor and hope, rather that this almost self-righteous bit of preaching. I wish I hadn't been sent this by a friend, who thought, out of kindness, I would have gotten something out of it. All I got was a dissonance that gnawed at me that I felt compelled to write this,Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04857029490164514400noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7853204965986587589.post-82119149873049891942018-06-12T21:36:18.912+08:002018-06-12T21:36:18.912+08:00“It isn’t any surprise at all that Jesus’ first be...“It isn’t any surprise at all that Jesus’ first beatitude is one which declared for the poor a certain privilege of happiness……”<br /><br /><br />I was told that a certain Theology Professor was in danger of losing his tenure at the varsity because of the sparse enrolment in his class. To rectify that, he advertised his course as - “ A Course to Happiness” and in a wink, every young college student was clambering to enrol and when asked for the reason, the common reply was - “I want to know the secret to happiness !” The Professor defended his action saying that God has basically created us with a desire to come to perfect knowledge of him.....which we can’t fully achieve here and now but true happiness can only be found in Perfection ie God.( Aquinas)<br />So it’s everyone’s goal in life to strive for happiness.<br /><br /><br />As you have mentioned in your example of Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade - in the eyes of the world, they were icons of Success, rich and famous and so should be happy, yet their untimely end at their own hands refuted this. The frantic acquisitiveness of the wife of an ex-Prime Minister who owned multiple branded watches and handbags came to mind- why did she do it? - all things and pleasures of this world seemed hollow once they have been possessed. Why did happiness elude them? Could it be that now their possessions possessed them? <br /><br /><br />Reflecting on this, I was grateful to know Christ and felt comforted by the wisdom of the first beatitude (as you have said above) It is good, useful and even necessary to have for one’s use and convenience the goods of the world to uplift one’s living conditions and to help others but one must remember not to be too overly attached to them, for this would weigh one down and the fear of losing them becomes a nightmare. I feel that detachment 9applies not only to things or material goods but also to people, relationships, work and even to our obsessive thoughts. In this way, one becomes poor. It purifies one’s intentions and makes way for God’s presence in one’s life.<br /><br /><br />Thank you Fr. God bless you.<br /><br />TessaTessahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04211998984286520369noreply@blogger.com