"You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."
For many of us, the continuing efforts to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind may not be that difficult. But to love our neighbor as we love ourselves – that’s the toughest law of all. For "neighbor" here is not exclusive. It is not limited to one’s spouse, children, parents, relatives and friends that we happen to like. No. By "neighbor," Christ means anyone and everyone whom God sends our way – including our so-called enemies. This is precisely where Christ calls each one of us.
Universal love. This is contained in the teachings of all major religions of the world – Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Christian, and others. The ultimate, unifying law of them all, beyond dogmatic, doctrinal, and ritualistic differences. "The radical breakthrough will come when I love God enough to love his every image on earth, when I see in every broken body, in all starved flesh, in every anguished person, the crucified Christ. Only then will I do what Thomas Merton saw must be done: ‘Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.’" (Henri Nouwen.)
Less than a month ago, the well-known psycho-spiritual guru, Dr. M. Scott Peck, passed away. But his memory will live on in the hearts and lives of numerous people. One of his precious legacies is his experience-based, wisdom-filled synthesis on the Stages of Spiritual Growth, which serves as a challenge to all of us, because, as he says, the most salient feature of our human nature is our God-given capacity for ongoing change and transformation. Here are the stages in summary form:
Stage One. "Chaotic-Antisocial" (ca. 20 percent of the population?). No real spirituality. Unprincipled lifestyle. Relationships are self-serving and manipulative. But vulnerable to conversion.
Stage Two. "Formal-Institutional." Dependent upon an institution for their governance. This could be a prison, the military, or the church. Majority of churchgoers fall under this category. They are attached to strict forms, rituals, rules and regulations. They become very upset when the forms of their religion are changed, because it’s precisely these forms that they depend upon to liberate them from chaos. The letter of the law is more important than the spirit of the law, and God is like a giant, benevolent cop in the heavens up there.
Stage Three. "Sceptic-Individual" (especially in adolescence). They are not "religious" in the ordinary sense, like those in Stage Two. But often, many of them are deeply involved in society, social issues like justice, ecology, and others. As adults, many of them are scientists, truth-seekers, doubting or searching believers – ready to convert to Stage Four.
Stage Four. "Mystical-Communal." The people in this stage begin to experience their interconnectedness with the rest of creation, other cultures and religions, under the one and the same Creator of the whole universe. They are able to live with "mystery," "uncertainties," and grey areas. And yet they "see" a kind of cohesion beneath the surface of things. Unity and community is the ultimate stage of transformation.
Our realistic challenge is to integrate Stage Two within Stage Four, as a growing number are already doing. This is today’s Gospel teaching.
In this volatile situation of our very own country under crisis, Archbishop Fernando Capalla, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, is precisely appealing to all warring parties concerned. Reconciliation and collaboration. "We should now move forward and address the more important and urgent problem of grinding poverty of our people, which is caused by excessive politicking."