Hope: Demanding the divine words

Just what we LI Pax Christi-ites need to hear. I'll share the message.

Christian hope, which is, rather, active, virile. It stands up in the midst of chaos and calls forth order...

THIS is what the so-called Christian United States is missing...an active hope, a virile hope...the hope that does not succumb to fear (and those who use fear as their weapon against the people)...the hope that sees there is a way out of our problems if we work together, respect each other, & truly treat each other as brother & sister, not as an enemy who wants to take what we (in our disillusionment) see as "ours".

Where will we find leaders who have true hope, not repetitive words of fear, not tricky economic concepts that hoodwink, not the laziness of "we've always done it this way"...WHERE??

Should not our churches be leading us in and to hope?

This is a most interesting column which gives rise to much reflection. However, I have one disagreement to start with. Bill wrote: The hope spoken of so often in our culture and by the poets seems empty of substance. Emily Dickinson called hope “the thing with feathers,” and Shakespeare wrote that “The miserable have no other medicine,/But only hope.”
That does not describe Christian hope,which is, rather, active, virile."

WAIT A DARNED MINUTE: He is quoting Dickinson only partially. "Hope is the thing with feathers/that perches in the soul/and sings the tune without the word/and never stops at all."

In my nearly 80 years of experience "never stops at all" certainly is active and virile. I think of her hope promoting an active verb. So there, Bill. I'm working on TRUSTING GOD as well as looking at evidence of God's working in the world. I wonder if I'm too old to start arguing with Him, or DEMANDING evidence. I'll have to reflect on this. Dang, I'll have to break down and THINK.

CHUCK LORRE PRODUCTIONS, VANITY CARD #7

I believe that the very act of believing in something causes us to distance ourselves from that thing, thus a duality is created: oneself and the thing in which one believes. Now since we all know that in order to fully understand a thing one must be that thing -- walk a mile in its shoes so to speak -- it seems obvious that the state of believing in something inevitably causes us to not truly understand that thing in which we believe. This noncomprehension leads to all sorts of difficulties. "I believe in love" has a better than even chance of leading to divorce, while "I believe in God" seems to end in variations on the Spanish Inquisition. But -- and it's a big but -- if one were love, one couldn't help but be affectionate and caring towards oneself and others. If one were God, one would act toward all beings and all things as if they were one's own creations. And that, my friends, is the secret of life in a two-second vanity card. Of course, the secret could also be "Sit, Ubu, sit." We have to keep an open mind.

Thanks, Bill, for stating these interesting thoughts of Ellul!

"So our resolution for this new year should be that we learn again how to hope."
May I suggest a way in which "we learn again how to hope"?
A "preferential option for the poor" should be maintained in our Catholic
Schools. If we find that we cannot afford to keep our schools open to the
poor, the schools should be closed and the resources used for something else
which can be kept open to the poor. We cannot allow our Church to become a
church primarily for the middle-class and rich while throwing a bone to the
poor. The priority should be given to the poor even if we have to let the
middle-class and rich fend for themselves.
Practically speaking, the Catholic Schools must close and the resources
used for "Confraternity of Christian Doctrine" and other programs which can
be kept open to the poor. Remember, the Church managed without Catholic
Schools for centuries. We can get along without them today. The essential
factor is to cultivate enough Faith to act in the Gospel Tradition, namely,
THE POOR GET PRIORITY. The rich and middle-class are welcome too. But the
poor come first.

Heartening to find the commentary on the work of Jacques Ellul (Doctor of Law, Bordeaux University). As a young student I struggled to understand his profound points of view on several topics. To this day, when I'm visiting the megalopolis of Toronto and start feeling tiny, insignificant and more than a bit afraid, I remember reading Ellul's comments on the banishment from Eden and how that can be related to our building of cities that are foundationally an attempt to escape the purview of the Living God. This made sense to me, here we are babbling away and creating the world in our own image. The vision must come from a correct orientation to the Creator. Apparently G-d's not talking. I would concur.The times are desperate.Yet even this Christmas I found hope as our 'broken' family came together to share food and love. I stayed away from Mass and yet the 'narrative' of love and hope were present in my life. Let me tell you how much gratitude I feel. A lot! Until I can figure out what my Creator is waiting for in terms of bringing in the garbage trucks and cleaning things up, I will wait with, and in, hope. For hope is a part of G-d's personhood. It's new year's eve and I will light some wonderful colored candles and reflect on the light of His throne in the centre of glory and in the centre of my broken heart. Thanks to Jacques Ellul for his brilliant and disciplined mind!

"And the poor are not 'more deserving' or morally superior to the rich. Each may be greedy or lustful, hateful and proud."

Well said. It reminds me of an event from my college days. Myself and other volunteers were devestated when we discovered that some immigrants were uhmm... "mis representing" themselves at our parish's social justice programs and taking recesources from others.

We then made excuses: they were just confused, we must be mistaken, they were really "Robin hoods" etc. Our priest just laughed and said "Poverty does not automatically make anyone a saint". We then made some common sense changes.

Thanks for this very good article at the beginning of yet another new year. Thanks too for introducing me to the thought of Jacques Ellul.

For most of my life I have had difficulty having hope or even faith. The difficulty stems from having lived through World War II as a child, dealing with much suffering from the loss of life, homes, belongings, financial security, and dealing with cold and hunger. Add to that the death of a 5 year old sister, the poverty of both my parents resulting from the death of a parent in each of their lives and other very difficult life experiences of my own mother. That's my own personal history. However, I'm sure I am not alone, that most people have a story to tell. Then I came to this country and learned about the Holocaust. In my life I had great difficulty finding a God who I could believe in. I learned the most from the Holocaust survivors...some now famous names like Elie Wiesel and Viktor Frankl and much from not so famous survivors. Hope against hope comes from the depths of despair of having to deal with the consequences of man's inhumanity to man. We need to be the voice and hands of God in our life times, that is what I learned. God doesn't magically fix the big problems that are caused by us humans....our greed, our lack of self esteem or our own narcissistic injuries...our misguided religious beliefs, our intolerance of others who are of a different tribe, ethnic, national, religous, socio-economic, gender or sexual orientation...Yes, I sound like a bleeding heart liberal and I'm not ashamed of that. I am also a Social Worker and am grateful to have learned something about human behavior. It has helped me to see the woundedness out in the world. My difficult life experiences have made me more compassionate and tolerant, but not without having hurt others as well as myself. The God I was taught about in my church, through religious instruction, and from my parents is not the God that I have come to know. Hope is not optimism, at least not for me. Coming to hope often requires struggling with despair and depression. Hope is about learning to trust that God will somehow, mostly through our voices and hands write straight with crooked lines. And then there is also that experience of grace....That's as best as I can do to express what sustains me.