September 3, 2022

A famous playwright once observed that “all the world’s a stage” and we are “merely players.”  If you have ever worked for a corporation, taught in a school, held public office, or been a member of a family, you understand exactly what he meant, namely, that unwritten rules cause much of our lives to feel like a show.  Such assumptions include: profit is the most important thing, kids just naturally misbehave, image is everything, we’re better than other families, etc.  While our first instinct when we become aware of the fakeness of it all might be cynicism (Ecc 1:1), we should be careful not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.  Indeed, the complex web that constitutes society and culture is a necessary apparatus for the Kingdom of God to be realized and for us to enter into our full human potential.  To live in a state of renunciation and isolation serves no one!  The key is to practice humility, to go low and to live as authentic persons in the midst of the drama, actors whose script is the one written on the human heart from the beginning of time (Rom 2:15).  May these various venues, therefore, become liturgical spaces where we are constantly re-presenting the Christic pattern until all people are gathered onto that one true stage which no longer imitates but confers life (Rev 19:1-10). Ave Crux, Spes Unica!