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Letters Seventeenth
Sunday in Ordinary Time |
The Catholic Telegraph
July 27, 2001In this series of readings from Colossians, we have heard Paul’s lyrical proclamation of the cosmic Christ, Lord of creation and redemption. We have seen him presenting his ministerial credentials to the Colossians and calling for their attention to his teaching. In this Sunday’s reading from chapter two he is teasing out some of the implications of God’s mystery of salvation, "Christ in you."
In verses 9-10, he offers a general statement: in Christ you share the fulness of divinity. Then comes a series of images, each of which casts light on an aspect of Christ’s being in us. In verse 11, immediately before our reading, he says that being in Christ constitutes the equivalent of circumcision, making us members of God’s people.
Our reading presents three further images. First of all, Christ’s life in us is like being buried with Him and rising from the dead with Him. This association with Christ requires the power of God, but also our faith in that power, i.e., our openness to accept what God offers us.
Secondly, Christ’s being in us involves the forgiveness of our sins. Our human sinfulness constituted a state of death. When the Father made us live with and in Christ, we began a new life that included the forgiveness of our sins.
Thirdly, Christ’s life in us means that we are freed of the burdens and formalities of the old Jewish ritual observance. Here Paul uses the image of "the bond against us with its legal claims." He envisions the old law as a kind of document that God destroys by nailing it to the cross, thus freeing us from its demands.
In verse 15, immediately after our reading, there is still another image: God leading away "the principalities and powers" (i.e., the forces opposed to Christ) in a kind of triumphal procession.
Christian existence, life in Christ, is such a rich and complex reality that no one image can convey it all. That’s why Paul uses a whole series of images when he wants to explain to the Colossians what God’s mystery, "Christ in you," implies. Of course, these implications that Paul lays out for the Colossians are also applicable to us. Because of the fullness of godliness in Christ, Christ’s being in us involves membership in His people, participation in His risen life, freedom from sin, liberation from useless religious observances, and release from the demands of any other cosmic forces.
It’s important for us to be aware of all this because, if we aren’t, we run the risk of looking on our Christian faith and Christian life as something other than what it really is.
To begin with, Christian life is not a series of obligations. Sometimes people look on it that way. You have to go to Mass on Sunday. You have to get married in the Church. You can’t practice birth control. You have to be against abortion. Granted, each of these statements is true. There are obligations and expectations connected with being a member of the Church. But these obligations and expectations are not the primary and basic thing. The primary and basic thing is Christ in us. Everything else is a consequence of that, and if we just look at the consequences without knowing where they come from we are going to get a false idea about Christian faith.
Likewise, being a member of the Church is not a matter of cultural inheritance. "Of course I’m Catholic. All my family is Catholic and that’s what I was brought up to be." People sometimes give similar reasons for being Democrats or Republicans. They’ve never really thought about it. They simply conform to the people around them. Their religious faith (or political affiliation) is a kind of protective coloring that keeps them from standing out from the crowd. Whatever one might think appropriate as a process for choosing a political position, just going with the flow is not an appropriate way of professing religious faith. Religious faith demands awareness and commitment: awareness of God’s love for us and commitment to the implications of that love. It may very well be that lots of people who consider themselves Catholics have never really made an act of faith, of self-giving in response to God’s generosity.
Real Catholic Christian faith involves the acceptance of Christ in us. It is a reply to God’s initiative, to God’s mystery of love for our salvation. It’s not a burdensome series of obligations, not a semi-automatic involvement of ourselves in the cultural inheritance of our family and friends. Real Christian faith is consciously joyful about and deliberately attentive to God’s gift of Himself to us. It is an intentional gift of ourselves to the Lord who gives each and all of us community with Himself, participation in His life, forgiveness of our sins, liberation from irrelevant religious demands, and the security of knowing that Our Lord is the Lord of all. What a shame to reduce all that to burdensome rules and cultural conformity!
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Conversation Questions
Do I find joy in Christ’s life in me?
Which of Paul’s images of salvation do I find most appealing?
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