Inventive, creative, versatile

THESE are some characteristics of that elusive love and charity that ought to fill and define our life. We have a great challenge before us! But if we by faith are convinced that God always gives us all the grace we need, and if we are game with the adventure this whole business entails, then we can face that challenge well.

 

Yes, we have to be inventive, creative and versatile in our dealings with everyone, just like God is with all of us. In this department, his capacity is of course infinite. And if we strive to be close to him, to follow him and conform ourselves to him, we have good reason to achieve the same qualities, at least to some degree.

We have to re-ignite our faith in the abiding providence of God who gives us everything we need to attain the goal that he himself has set for us. And that is, that we be true image and likeness of his, adopted children of his who can love the way he loves.

For this, a lot of prayer is needed. A good study of the doctrine of our faith which, thank God, is already given quite clearly and completely to us, should also be done in a continuing and deepening way.

We have to continue humbling ourselves to be able to acknowledge this need, then to go through a continuing process of conversion and renewal. Only then can we expect some spiritual growth in ourselves.

Our love should be all at once inventive, creative and versatile in the sense that we should never get stuck at a certain level of loving, no matter how successful we already are at that level.

Life continues to demand more things from us, and we cannot afford to be contented at any point. Love requires more always. There will always be new challenges, new openings, new needs, given the changing temper of the times and of people.

The other day, someone made an intriguing comment to me regarding the general educational thrust in our country. He said that in the past and even up to now in many schools, the education of children in schools is too focused on rote memorization of things and on conforming children to tradition. There’s hardly any effort to prepare them for the new developments, much less, to encourage them to open new frontiers in whatever field.

I at first thought such observation as a sweeping generalization, but I also realize that there’s a lot of truth to what he said. Yes, there are things that are essential and should not change, but there are also things that can change and in fact are changing.

We need to have the proper attitude toward this development, and obviously the perfect model for this is God himself who, while maintaining the essence of all things, is open to anything that our freedom, with all the good and bad things that it can generate, can make.

At the moment, I can say the many wonderful developments we are having in the fields of science and technology are a pity since they are driven more by practical purposes if not by greed and the raw lust for power, than by love and charity for God and for others. The proper connection is not yet there.

For our love to be inventive, creative and versatile, we have to look at God and identify ourselves more and more with him. Even the charisms and the different schools of spirituality that God gives to the Church and the world have to cope with the reality of change in the world, of some new things which actually may be old but dressed up in some new garments, etc.

We should not be afraid to be inventive, creative and versatile in our love for God and for one another. Many good things and advantages can be derived with such attitude, even as we also need to be aware of the many dangers and abuses that can arise.

We obviously need to be careful and discerning, but all these acts of prudence and caution should not dampen, but rather should enhance our inventiveness, creativity and versatility in our loving.

We should welcome problems, hot issues and controversies, situations when we encounter what we call difficult people, since they are the very opportunities to develop and expand these qualities of our love and charity.

Let’s remember St. Paul telling us to be all things to all men, which is what Christ himself epitomized.