Eco-Connect'20
OBEDIENCE IN TIME OF C-19
Once the word obedience is pronounced, it sends many mixed stimuli to many, and what rings out like a big beng sound in our minds, the sense of tyrannical authority of power abused, of service and groveling submission by people with no self-respect or sense of their own worth.
But supposing we changed the word obedience and replaced it with love, what reaction awakens in us? Smiles break out immediately, because we know, love is what we need, what we are looking for continually. Rarely do connect obedience with love together. Sometimes we think of obedience as being a negation of love.
We only obey people when we have to, out of fear, out of respect for superior strength. It'snt something we want to do, given the choices we would prefer not to do it.
Love on the other hand springs from free will and desire. Any element of fear or compulsion would corrode and undermine it. We love freely and willingly, and we wouldn't like to do otherwise.
Obedience is love in action, availability. The essence of love is in giving, and sometimes, we have to go beyond our usual natural feelings.
You may not feel like giving but you have to give anyway. If you can put off everything you are doing and attend to that person who knocks at your door to be attended to, then that is obedience. You have to put others before yourself.
This now means you have to obey everyone, not only superiors, but everyone placed in authority over us. The mother obeys her daughter, waking up in the middle to the night to quieten her, a father obeys his children, by waking up every morning to go and work for their survival.
Obedience to superiors and authority is simply extension of principles we have mentioned above.
St. Benedict says:
"monks should not obey the abbot, but should also obey each other".
It's obedience that bides monastic community life together, it's love in action. We too need to emulate this example in our everyday life experience as religious and laity in our homes and workplaces.
The situation changes when we have to obey the superiors, people invested with authority over us. It is not easy to see this kind of obedience as an expression of love. Obedience is never genuine when it emanates from fear or compulsion.
We need to sentimentalise our obedience. Our superiors need to be loved more than feared. Of course there is some fear in a relationship but shouldn't be predominate.
We obey our superiors, out of the the love for God, and they too we know that they obey God. The will of God is expressed through our superiors.
Obedience should produce a motive that is entirely spiritual, founded on faith because our superiors too are human vessels, weak and with their personal character and understanding. At times, they too are bound to make mistakes, they often will make errors of judgement and order things which are not quite right, at any rate in the short term.
You are not compelled to obey your superior, but you have freely chosen to do so. As one lives in a given community, you are subject to the superior, because that power comes from God, anything else vitiates the law and robs it of all spiritual value.
To many who are in the modern world all these sound strange and frightening. Today, we have a great sense of human dignity and we cannot see any serious reason by anyone to order anyone else around, many have a great sense of human rights. To many these human rights and dignity are undermined by obedience.
This is what Nietzsche felt and despised Christianity for advocating slave virtues? Of course religious virtues are not based on these ideas but it's about me doing my duties to God and to each other.
There will be no competition, conflict, aggression and no one will be neglected, if each one will be thinking not for his or needs but the needs of the other.
Even our superiors should realise that, they can't be despots, but their governance too is restrained and conditioned in all sorts of ways. They ought to be responsible for those they rule, held accountable for any harm that comes to their subjects.
If the superior is harsh and tyrannical to his community then the brothers / sisters will become unhappy, hence making life difficult for the superior himself, he should not stir up unnecessary ill-feelings.
Obedience is something reciprocal, the superior should serves others and others too serve him. This goes in line with whomever wants to persue the Christian spiritual path with with any degree of seriousness. Everything has to be done without murmuring or grumbling.
The channels of dialogue have to be opened. We all obey trusting in the grace and providence of God, putting in mind that the superior's word is final, the last word and once that is uttered, it has to be obeyed.
St. Paul reminds us to "have the mind of Christ". It'snt a small thing he is asking. He wants us to think, feel and act in the way that Jesus did in his earthily life. This means that we can't think only in our thoughts, but God's. We may be appearing to live our ordinary lives, but really it's God who is living, thinking and acting in us, and through us. "I live, but not but Christ who lives in me". For Paul says our lives is hidden with Christ in God.
Our natural will and mind will have to be broken, if the light and power of God are to take over. This will involve our intelligence and will. We must renounce our will so as to obey the will of God, putting in mind that God can't be known by the natural human intellect, which can neither prove that He exists at all nor explain what He is.
We have to bend the mind, humble it, deny some of its normal operations, if we are to know God. This is the obedience of intellect.
There should be a radical change in our motivation. We can't stop willing, we can't stop wanting, or desiring things. We can't stop loving, what we will is what we love. The human heart is often devious.
The superficial desires are usually cut off and this is usually done through obedience, where we do not follow our natural desires at all but simply do what we are given to do, accepting that it's a will of God mediated through our religious superior, we do it as an act of service.
We have to be free from internal compulsions, or anything that springs from our intellectual blindness, moral weakness, and psychological hang-ups. Once we are liberated from those, we are truly free, even though we may be outwardly living under an unjust and repressive political regime.
Jesus told Nicodemus that those who are reborn in this way are like wind which blows freely, coming from no-one knows where. They are untrammelled, governed by the Holy Spirit like a harp, provided we are ready to let go of our own thoughts and desires so that God alone moves us. This is the essence of spiritual obedience.
© Don J.B Nyamunga
Girimori Catholic Parish - Kericho
Www.nyamusus.blogspot.com
OBEDIENCE IN TIME OF C-19
Once the word obedience is pronounced, it sends many mixed stimuli to many, and what rings out like a big beng sound in our minds, the sense of tyrannical authority of power abused, of service and groveling submission by people with no self-respect or sense of their own worth.
But supposing we changed the word obedience and replaced it with love, what reaction awakens in us? Smiles break out immediately, because we know, love is what we need, what we are looking for continually. Rarely do connect obedience with love together. Sometimes we think of obedience as being a negation of love.
We only obey people when we have to, out of fear, out of respect for superior strength. It'snt something we want to do, given the choices we would prefer not to do it.
Love on the other hand springs from free will and desire. Any element of fear or compulsion would corrode and undermine it. We love freely and willingly, and we wouldn't like to do otherwise.
Obedience is love in action, availability. The essence of love is in giving, and sometimes, we have to go beyond our usual natural feelings.
You may not feel like giving but you have to give anyway. If you can put off everything you are doing and attend to that person who knocks at your door to be attended to, then that is obedience. You have to put others before yourself.
This now means you have to obey everyone, not only superiors, but everyone placed in authority over us. The mother obeys her daughter, waking up in the middle to the night to quieten her, a father obeys his children, by waking up every morning to go and work for their survival.
Obedience to superiors and authority is simply extension of principles we have mentioned above.
St. Benedict says:
"monks should not obey the abbot, but should also obey each other".
It's obedience that bides monastic community life together, it's love in action. We too need to emulate this example in our everyday life experience as religious and laity in our homes and workplaces.
The situation changes when we have to obey the superiors, people invested with authority over us. It is not easy to see this kind of obedience as an expression of love. Obedience is never genuine when it emanates from fear or compulsion.
We need to sentimentalise our obedience. Our superiors need to be loved more than feared. Of course there is some fear in a relationship but shouldn't be predominate.
We obey our superiors, out of the the love for God, and they too we know that they obey God. The will of God is expressed through our superiors.
Obedience should produce a motive that is entirely spiritual, founded on faith because our superiors too are human vessels, weak and with their personal character and understanding. At times, they too are bound to make mistakes, they often will make errors of judgement and order things which are not quite right, at any rate in the short term.
You are not compelled to obey your superior, but you have freely chosen to do so. As one lives in a given community, you are subject to the superior, because that power comes from God, anything else vitiates the law and robs it of all spiritual value.
To many who are in the modern world all these sound strange and frightening. Today, we have a great sense of human dignity and we cannot see any serious reason by anyone to order anyone else around, many have a great sense of human rights. To many these human rights and dignity are undermined by obedience.
This is what Nietzsche felt and despised Christianity for advocating slave virtues? Of course religious virtues are not based on these ideas but it's about me doing my duties to God and to each other.
There will be no competition, conflict, aggression and no one will be neglected, if each one will be thinking not for his or needs but the needs of the other.
Even our superiors should realise that, they can't be despots, but their governance too is restrained and conditioned in all sorts of ways. They ought to be responsible for those they rule, held accountable for any harm that comes to their subjects.
If the superior is harsh and tyrannical to his community then the brothers / sisters will become unhappy, hence making life difficult for the superior himself, he should not stir up unnecessary ill-feelings.
Obedience is something reciprocal, the superior should serves others and others too serve him. This goes in line with whomever wants to persue the Christian spiritual path with with any degree of seriousness. Everything has to be done without murmuring or grumbling.
The channels of dialogue have to be opened. We all obey trusting in the grace and providence of God, putting in mind that the superior's word is final, the last word and once that is uttered, it has to be obeyed.
St. Paul reminds us to "have the mind of Christ". It'snt a small thing he is asking. He wants us to think, feel and act in the way that Jesus did in his earthily life. This means that we can't think only in our thoughts, but God's. We may be appearing to live our ordinary lives, but really it's God who is living, thinking and acting in us, and through us. "I live, but not but Christ who lives in me". For Paul says our lives is hidden with Christ in God.
Our natural will and mind will have to be broken, if the light and power of God are to take over. This will involve our intelligence and will. We must renounce our will so as to obey the will of God, putting in mind that God can't be known by the natural human intellect, which can neither prove that He exists at all nor explain what He is.
We have to bend the mind, humble it, deny some of its normal operations, if we are to know God. This is the obedience of intellect.
There should be a radical change in our motivation. We can't stop willing, we can't stop wanting, or desiring things. We can't stop loving, what we will is what we love. The human heart is often devious.
The superficial desires are usually cut off and this is usually done through obedience, where we do not follow our natural desires at all but simply do what we are given to do, accepting that it's a will of God mediated through our religious superior, we do it as an act of service.
We have to be free from internal compulsions, or anything that springs from our intellectual blindness, moral weakness, and psychological hang-ups. Once we are liberated from those, we are truly free, even though we may be outwardly living under an unjust and repressive political regime.
Jesus told Nicodemus that those who are reborn in this way are like wind which blows freely, coming from no-one knows where. They are untrammelled, governed by the Holy Spirit like a harp, provided we are ready to let go of our own thoughts and desires so that God alone moves us. This is the essence of spiritual obedience.
© Don J.B Nyamunga
Girimori Catholic Parish - Kericho
Www.nyamusus.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment