The two natures that every priest possesses

Theologically we say that Christ has two natures in one person, the divine nature of God, and the human nature as man.  The ordained priest too, has two “natures”, though not in same understanding.  Bishop Fulton Sheen in a book on the Priesthood had an insight when he said that like Peter, every priest also has two “natures” – a human nature which links him to any other man, and a priestly nature, which makes him another Christ. 

This is highly and significantly symbolized in Christ’s choice of Simon as a Christian priest, given the new name of Peter to represent his new character.  But he wasn’t called to leave his old name behind.  Simon now had a double-barreled name of Simon Peter.  “Peter” came with his new vocation; his new calling.  Simon would always be Simon bar Jona (son of Jona), whilst the addition of Peter gave him the reminder that he was also the priest chosen by the Son of God.  Did this mean that he no longer was Simon, and that he was no longer ‘human’?  Not at all.  One name did not negate the other, just as one ‘nature’ did not overshadow or displace the other.  But the truth in the unfolding of the life of Simon Peter from that day on was that like many of us priests, sometimes Simon (or the human part of him) ruled, and at times, Peter (the priestly dimension) ruled.

At each point of time in our lives as priests, either Simon or Peter has mastery.  It was after the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in the lives of the Apostles at the Pentecost event that there was less evidence of Simon.  What can be surmised about this is that with the Holy Spirit’s influence and energy, Simon who had so many times in the past been so impetuous, compromising and cowardly is now given the strength to become steadfast and courageous. 

One of the most telling examples of the classic struggle between the two natures of a priest is seen in the conversation that Jesus had with Simon at Caesarea Philippi, the gospel passage that was encountered in last Sunday’s liturgy.  There was an almost divine illumination in Simon when he proclaimed Christ as the Messiah, but the very next moment when Jesus also mentioned about the imperative of his impending crucifixion, we see him remonstrating with this seeming inconceivable idea, causing him to be called Satan.  From being a rock to a stumbling stone in almost a blink of an eye.  Any priest who is honest enough about his human foibles will be able to commiserate with Peter how he too, has seen this scene played out in his own life, where at one moment he was Christ, and when he was unthinking and worldly, also became Satan (a deceiver)?

When we priests have a certain unwillingness and reluctance to imitate our Lord in accepting his ways of being crucified, and prefer to go the way of comfort, the elevated ego and maybe the preference of comfort at the expense of sacrifice for others and suffering souls, we also fail to imitate Christ as we should.  But the pattern does seem to have a certain wave of similarity in many vocation stories of the priesthood.  On our day of ordination, it seems so beautiful and rosy to want to go all out to become another Christ for the world.  Like many married couples have such rosy ideals at the Altar when they exchange their vows for life, the priest too, whether they like to admit it or not, have their ‘rosy’ pictures of the priesthood and how holy their lives can be.

Yet we also know that many of us priests have in our lives fallen short of these ideals.  Somewhere along the way of our living out our priesthood, this ideal and these rosy images began to take on a more sepia tone.  Why do priests fall?  Why do some of us become jaded?  How did our lustre for souls become tarnished and dull?  Some of us seem to have reduced the priesthood to one of ‘coasting’ along and the fires of devotion are hardly even embers that can give off any heat, let alone light other lives that need to see the Light of Christ and experience the flame of his love.

There are many possible reasons for this, and I tend to concur with Bishop Sheen’s observation that one of most common reasons for this is when the priest abandons his personal time with the Lord in the daily Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament. 

It’s not talked about often, but perhaps it is something that we need to.  We tell people of the need to pray but if we don’t commit to a dedicated prayer life ourselves, when we only pray when it is our ‘duty’ to celebrate the parish mass, or when it is our ‘turn’ to preside over the parish monthly Holy Hour or to lead the Rosary during the Marian months, we easily turn our lifeline to holiness into an entangled mess, and we slowly let go of what enables us to strive to be holy priests. 

In Luke 22:40, Jesus reminds them to “pray that you may not enter into temptation”.  Isn’t it significant that when Jesus saw his disciples sleeping in the garden of Gethsamane on the night prior to his passion, that he addressed Peter as Simon?  Simon was not willing to pray, and somehow lost the battle.  St Theresa of Avila said of prayer so significantly that he who omits prayer needs no devil to cast him into hell; he casts himself into it. 

We priests can give all sorts of apparently valid reasons why we don’t offer up an hour of our day before the Eucharistic Lord.  Our work is our prayer.  We have to visit the sick, prepare for talks, and go for endless meetings.  These all sound so valid, but deep inside, any priest will know that if it is not the Lord’s grace and energy that enables us to do all that, we are merely running on our own steam, and this steam will cool down sooner or later.  Our palate for the things spiritual soon become jaded and in an ironic twist, even the presence and talk of saintly priests can become annoying. 

In my convalescence since my transplant, I had a long period of about five months where I had absolutely no appetite nor desire to eat.  I lost quite a lot of weight as a result, but I knew that the only way to gain weight was to try to eat, difficult though it was.  I had to literally force myself to swallow food that was just not a simple task.  Part of what enabled me to do this was that I knew that it was good and beneficial for me. 

The same attitude perhaps needs to be taken on by us priests who seem to be jaded, and have somehow lost our appetite for prayer and being in the presence of the Eucharistic Lord.  We must know that what benefits us in the end is good not just for our souls and our priesthood, but also for the flock that we are entrusted with.  Our “Peter” vocation has to take on a more prominent role than our “Simon” nature.   We can be sure that as our Lord promised that he will be with us till the end of time, his grace and mercy will be strengthening us as we struggle between the natures.

Putting our gratitude into action for a truly life-saving act.

Much as I would like to make this weekly entry of my blog page one that has a topic or teaching point that is not about me or one that is mainly revelatory about myself, causing this to be mistaken as a blog with an exhibitionistic nature, I do find that there are times and events of my own life that when revealed and shared on a relevant platform, could hopefully end up benefitting my readers than if I were to merely keep them to myself.  This is perhaps one such entry, and I beg the pardon of those who think this may be a bit over indulgent on my part. 

Our journeys in life invariably involve quite often, the meeting or encounter with another significant human being which affects one’s life either positively or negatively.  The social media is replete with acrimonious examples and stories of people who have caused anguish, melancholy, anxiety and grief in the lives of others.  By putting such stories on ‘grand display’, many bear the secret hope that those reading will sympathize with them and feel their seething anger.  The other hope would be that they would also garner some supporters along the way, making them fellow ‘haters’ of a now shared common ‘enemy’.  It often further promotes the false security of our side being the ‘right’ or ‘good’ side, and our interlocutors being the ‘wrong’ or ‘bad’ one. 

I do believe that part of our task in this world as Christ’s light bearers is to do just the opposite when we have the opportunity to, especially when our stories and encounters bring much needed hope to a suffering humanity, which sometimes seems so devoid of true stories of charity, generosity, patience, hope and selfless love.  My blog entry this week will highlight that these wonderfully Christ-like values have been encountered by me in one such person, and that his act of valour and courage needs to be recorded for various reasons.  He has a name, and his name (yes, his real name) is Peter.

After more than a year since my life-saving stem cell transplant, the rules protecting the anonymity of donor and recipient become abrogated.  The donor and the recipient can sign forms that formally allow our contact details to be released to each other, giving them the freedom and opportunity to contact one another if they so wish.  I signed this form after July 25 this year, and was waiting to see if my donor would do the same.  It was with great delight that I received a lengthy email just two days ago from this significant human being who God had placed in my life, as Randy Goodrum wrote in his song “You needed me”, to “give me hope when life was at the end”. 

I shall not reveal much about Peter and his personal details here, to protect and preserve his privacy.  But his act of remarkable selflessness deserves, I believe, a public act of gratitude simply because mere thanks coming from me doesn’t quite show the impact that such a wonderful gesture of kindness creates in the world of the recipient of such Christ-like altruism.  These ripples of love and waves of life that have emitted from a seeming small act of giving something so needed by another human being spread far and wide, and it is through his act of kindness that many of you, my readers have seen grace working powerfully in my life.  This act of kindness has been instrumental in giving my life a much hoped-for extension, and for giving me back to my family, my community and to those I serve.

To save a friend’s life is wonderful and noble.  I have no doubt that anyone seeing a friend or relative needing something of his or her own (like a stem cell donation) would go through the discomfort and inconvenience of such a procedure.  When I needed the perfect match for my cancer-filled marrow to be replaced by a healthy one, many parishioners wanted to be that match, but nature doesn’t allow us to make the decisions.  Many seemed to have the ‘condition’ that if they did this, they wanted to choose who it was that would be the beneficiary of their giving.  But stem cells do not work this way. 

In God’s ‘inscrutable’ ways, this can only be possible if donor and recipient’s Human Leukocyte Antigen (HLA) markers match perfectly.  In short, it is what we have inherently given by nature (like our DNA) that determines if we have what it takes to save the life of another person.  There are altogether about 2,500 HLA markers that make up a person’s HLA type.  To be a suitable (or perfect) match, only 10 of the most important markers need to match, risking great rejection issues for the recipient if just one of these fail to match.  My search for a suitable match was brought to an international level when the local register failed to find this match.  It was finally found half a world away in Peter, who became significantly, my lifesaver. 

To do this for a total stranger whom one may never know is a grand gesture of benevolence, which literally means ‘good willingness’ of another human being.  Receiving thanks from me alone would be expected, as I often say that gratitude has to form the very basis of our being able to live in any state of grace, as both gratitude and grace stem from the same root, linguistically and fundamentally. 

Peter’s story is remarkable for various reasons, one of which is that it is living proof that just because one has done a good and kind deed, that it does not mean that all things in life henceforth would be without challenges and further trials.  Not long after he had donated his stem cells to me, his family suffered a crisis of sorts, where his own child became sick, and his doctors simply could not find out what it was that was plaguing the child.  The family entered into a time of darkness and agony but they knew that they had to depend on the mercy and love of God to see them through.  Thankfully, after about two months, this child of his has since made a full recovery. 

There are many different motives for people to do the things that they do.  What touched me very much about Peter's story is that he revealed to me how he lost his childhood friend to Leukaemia in their teenage years.  The two of them had run in relay races, and passed the baton to one another as part of their routine.  When Peter received notice that there was a stem cell donation needed from someone for whom he was a possible match, memories of his friend came to mind.  While it must have been terrible and tragic to have lost a friend when one was in one's formative years, it does seem that even an event as dark and bleak as this does have an unexpected bright side.  It motivated and moved Peter to put aside any discomfort or inconvenience on his part in the harvesting and donation process, and put the needs of another human being in front of his.  In his saving act, Peter has also handed me the baton to allow me to continue my run in life.  

I have written much and reflected upon the challenges of living a Christ-like life since I began this weekly blog five years ago.  I do not ask much of my readers, and haven’t made personal requests.  I appreciate and treasure each comment that is written as it shows that you are not merely passive readers.  You are participating in my life.  But I make an exception this week.  For those of you who are as grateful as I am for having my life given back, to receive another chance at living life, to continue to walk in the love and grace of God, please write something that expresses this gratitude to Peter.  My words of thanks may show my personal gratitude, but I believe he and his family, and many other potential lifesavers would benefit from seeing a similar gratitude to Peter.  His act of compassion and magnanimity has given me back to you, and you will never know how far your words of gratitude will touch his life and the life of others.  His community will definitely benefit from this gesture of affirmation coming from strangers who he has touched with his giving.

There is too much wastage of good ice and water being thrown over peoples’ heads these days to show support for a good cause.  Perhaps it is time to cover now a total stranger with something far better and more loving – take a moment and please make that effort to cover Peter and his loving family with some words of thanks together with me. 

Peter, from the bottom of my heart, I want to thank you and have you know that you are greatly loved not just by me, but my many others because of your act of kindness and selfless generosity.  Thank you for being Christ to one who was on the cross. 

Perhaps listening to this song reminds us of how we do need one another in life.

Jesus descended into hell. Why the hell?

Much has been written, talked, tweeted and blogged about the topic of suicide in the past few days.  This comes especially strong in the wake of the apparent suicide of comedian and actor Robin Williams who was found asphyxiated in his home.  Word has it that he had suffered from depression, and that he facing the fact that he had to live life with Parkinson’s Disease.  The world has since been mourning the loss of a comedic genius, and this has sparked off much thought and discussion about suicide. 

I believe that this is indeed a very important topic that needs periodic reflection and thought, especially in a blog that speaks of things that concern the spiritual life.  It may surprise some to know that of all the 250 blog entries since I began writing a weekly reflection in this blog site, one which featured suicide quite a long while ago and how a Church should respond to it, garnered one of the top readership numbers.  It does seem to be something that is of deep concern for many out there who are facing uncertainties in life, and would like to have some understanding of how to handle some of life’s unanswered questions regarding this seemingly taboo topic. 

The Church has indeed grown and matured in her way of handling deaths of her children who have succumbed to this illness.  And it is precisely because it is largely seen to be an illness that has changed the way the Church journeys with the person in his or her death when this appears to be the cause of the end of life as we know it on this earth. 

Suicide, to be truly labeled a suicide (derived from the Latin “sui cadere” or to kill oneself) and for it to be a mortal sin has to fulfill the basic three conditions of a true sin.  It has to be a grave or serious matter.  It has to be committed with a full knowledge of the gravity of the offence.  It has to be committed with a deliberate and complete consent of the fact that it is in opposition to God’s law. 

With this in mind, not only is it thus rather ‘difficult’ to truly commit a mortal sin, but more importantly, for those who succumb to death through apparent suicides and who have their freedom or knowledge impaired or diminished due to illness (mental or otherwise) are not closed to the saving and mercy of God.  It is because of this that the Church still continues, thankfully, to give the deceased who have died through seeming suicides, the dignity of the full Catholic funeral rites accorded to every one of her baptized. 

Where can we find solace when someone close to us has ended his or her life in this tragic way?  There seem to be two places, one from Scripture and the other from Tradition, which gives us great hope. 

Firstly, it helps for us to read the biblical accounts of Jesus appearing before his apostles after his resurrection from the dead.  He is able to walk through locked doors and into rooms that are shut.  An apparent little detail that Luke just put there?  I’m sure there is much more to it than that.  Luke is trying to tell us that the resurrection of Jesus has an amazing power to overcome and enter into places of our lives, which we think we cannot let anyone or anything else in.  Mental illnesses and depression often gives the sufferer reason to block out so many people – and often it is their nearest and dearest that are left out in the silence.  The power of the resurrection gives us all hope that Our Lord does and is able to enter into those locked doors of our lives so that we still have hope amidst the darkness that seem to bind and tie the infirm.  And he can do that precisely because he enters it with love, and not judgement, and bears us his saving wounds seen in his hands and his side.  These wounds are the doorways through which divine light can enter into the darkened and lonely worlds of those who are suffering in loneliness. 

Secondly, Tradition as seen in the Apostle’s Creed has a rather alarming phrase, telling us that Jesus “descended into hell”.  That God is willing to descend into hell must give those of us who are the hells of our own a lot of hope.  He need not have done that.  Yet, his Divine Mercy and love propels him to do the unthinkable so that perhaps even the unsave-able can be offered salvation.  The Church Fathers say that Jesus went into Hades to free those who had died before Christ’s salvific death and resurrection opened the gates of Paradise, freeing personalities like Moses, Abraham and of course Adam to bring them to heaven.  But the definition of hell has a much broader aspect.  Many who are confined to themselves in their inability to hold on to their sanity are also living in hells into which Jesus also wants to descend into and give hope. 

All said, it is ultimately the divine generosity and charity of God and his mercy that makes salvation and forgiveness possible.  In the incarnation, God not only lived for thirty over years in our world and in our human flesh, but he also witnessed often the vicissitudes of human living in meeting the broken, the sick, the possessed and the dying.  The compassion of Jesus didn’t end with his resurrection.  He does continue to be the one who has the unique ability to judge with compassion because he also sees the world from the side of the one being judged.  This will be Divine Mercy at work, and Jesus is Divine Mercy, writ large.

Finally, we must never forget the words of the Hail Mary, especially where we pray that she will pray for us “and at the hour of our death”.  Much of suicide not only is taboo, it is also something that we cannot understand.  Mary at the foot of the Cross of Jesus on Calvary gives us something to hold on to in our moments of apparent despair and unclear seeing.  She chose to stand under the cross instead of demanding to understand the cross.  When we make that choice to stand with Mary there, we too may not have all the answers, but in our action of faith and love just standing there with her, we too will open ourselves up to the mercy of God that is nailed to that cross, and take shelter in the shadow of the cross. 

The treasure that is found in poverty

The Beatitudes or Sermon on the Mount give different people different things.  To those who are in fact weeping, hungry and impoverished, it gives lots of hope.  Yet, to those who use logical thinking to analyse and clarify using the mind only, it gives mainly headaches.  Perhaps that is the real beauty of Jesus’ teachings – we know that many of them are heart teachings that require of us much more of an expansion of the heart than the workings of the mind alone.  Take the strange yet challenging teaching that ‘blessed are the poor’ which is found in a more succinct way in Luke’s Gospel than in Matthew, where there seems to be a tapering of intensity when he adds “in spirit”.  Whether we are physically poor, or come to God with a poverty of spirit, there is undoubtedly an extolling of poverty, which makes many of us uncomfortable.  I believe that Pope Francis’ desire for a ‘poor church’ does stem from an undiluted and clear understanding of the preference for poverty over riches, no matter how one chooses to define ‘riches’. 

Each year on August 10, the world celebrates the feast day of St Laurence the Martyr, one of the seven deacons of Rome who were in charge of the poor and needy in the city.  He served under Pope St. Sixtus who was killed for his faith in the early part of the second century.  The prefect of Rome at that time was a covetous pagan who demanded that the Church hand over their riches to him.  When St Laurence heard of his demand, he gathered the poor and the sick people whom the Church had been helping and supporting all along.  When confronted by the Prefect of Rome to fulfill his demands, St Laurence is said to have gestured to his poor and sick entourage declaring, “here – these are the riches treasures of the Church”.  Needless to say, this infuriated the Prefect and he ordered the execution of St Laurence by having him barbequed alive over a burning pit of coals. 

What this grisly story imparts is also a very real teaching of Jesus, of the Church and of what we know to be true despite what our constantly reasoning mind tells us.  There is something in poverty that teaches us and forms us from within, which riches and accumulation and being surrounded by great comforts simply cannot and will not.  Poverty, like experiencing major failures in life, seems to be able to open what I would call our ‘heart space’ where we truly begin to have our heartbeats beating in tandem with the heart of God, but only if we allow it to form us. 

I am thankful for a Church that is prophetic enough to put in her yearly liturgical calendar this feast of St Lawrence.  It serves many positive purposes as well as, valuable teaching to our generation, which seems to only see purpose and value in the healthy, fit, able-bodied and strong.  That the sick and the poor are seen in a totally different spectrum of values gives those of us who do not fall into that category much hope that God and his Church does not discard the marginalised, but instead, holds them in high regard – high enough to be called ‘treasures’.

Perhaps that could be the problem and the answer as well.  We have thus a need to constantly re-evaluate how we define what are real treasures in our lives, and separate them from the trinkets that dazzle and bewilder us.  Working with the poor and making them a regular feature in our ministerial outreach helps us to look anew at the ways we assess our values.  As in the parable that Jesus told, we have to be like the man who finds a treasure hidden in the field.  We will be fooling ourselves if we say that we have already found it and stop searching.  The Kingdom of God does not allow us to say with any finality that we have ‘found’ it because it is akin to saying that we have God figured out.  The wonder of this treasure is that it allows for a constant finding, because like God, his Kingdom is a constantly unfolding, wonderful mystery.