THE YEAR OF THE PERSON HAS ARRIVED

 

Here's some super weekend reading for ya: a reflection from the great Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete.

An excerpt:

I was once accused of heresy, which made me very happy because I thought my books would sell more. And the heresy that I apparently had given birth to, and I kept hoping, again, that it would be known by the name “Albacetism,” was that I was told to have said at a priest’s retreat, not here, someplace else, that I did not believe God was everywhere. Now, I don’t know very much about that. Never mind. I said to the inquisition, to the judges, “No, if you want I will sign any statement that affirms that I believe that God is everywhere.” I have no problem with that. My problem is that everybody that I know, everybody that I care about, I have found is always somewhere in some place at some time. I can say, “Here.” If they are everywhere, I don’t know how to handle it. If you know exactly where they are and at what time…I used to carry two watches; one was a time someplace else, one was the current time here in New York because there are times at which I don’t even know how to add or subtract, but it doesn’t matter. Whenever I wanted to know where so-and-so was at that moment, what they were doing, (I would sometimes think about Fr. Giussani himself), I didn’t have to calculate anything—not that this was a major calculation, okay? But I would just look, and my watch would have the same time as his watch. And that made me happy. Little things like that make you happy. When you’re in love with someone, the same thing. So these people have always been someplace, and that’s the way I like it. I don’t like people who are everywhere!...

We read again and again the manifestation of Jesus’ reality to his disciples even before His death and resurrection. What kind of effect did His Presence have? His look? His gestures? Amazement. Amazement that such a thing is possible. Profound curiosity begins to appear: “Tell me more”…or… “I don’t understand, but this is interesting.”

You see, part of the success of the dominant secularist culture is to try to succeed in hiding how interesting the Christian claim is, how beautiful, but above all, how interesting. And how does it do it? By killing anything that’s interesting, by deciding itself what is interesting, by diminishing the reality of interesting, especially in our youth...

[T]his is our redemption, salvation. This is what Christ has come to do—to revive, to give life to our interest so that we can recognize His victory, and therefore our victory, over those forces that diminish us, that reduce the experience of our dignity, that reduce even the range of our reason and of our desires. The only thing that can break through that shell constructed around our inner selves, our heart, by this culture of death, the only way to break through is with the power of the interesting...

In my sixteen years as a convert, that has always been my experience. The road gets deeper, richer, more paradoxical, more unpredictable, more interesting...and I get more grateful.

Check out the rest! And as always, thank you, Monsignor...