New wine on new wineskins

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

YES, we need to know how to flow with the times, adapting ourselves with the new developments and circumstances without losing sight of what is truly essential in our life. That’s the lesson we can learn from what Christ said about new wine to be put always on new wineskins, not old, and not to put a patch from a new garment on an old one. (cfr. Lk 5,36-38)

That is why we have to feel the necessity to continually explore the things, adapt ourselves to the changing circumstances and make the necessary innovations along the way.

But let’s always remember that innovations do not completely do away with some old practices and traditions. We may be discarding certain old things, but they should not be the essential things that should never change. We can only discard or make innovations on those things that can and should change.

Innovations can spring only from some old ground. They cannot be completely new, because only God can do that when he creates something, which means he makes something from nothing. In our case, we can only innovate from something that is already existing.

Besides, as we are reminded in the Book of Ecclesiastes, “there is nothing new under the sun.” (1,9) Everything is under God’s control and always works according to God’s laws. No matter what we do to delude ourselves by thinking that we can create something completely new, things still work under God’s laws.

Thus, again from the Book of Ecclesiastes, we read: “Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises…” (1,2-7)

It is wrong to think that things can be completely old and therefore should be discarded totally, and that there are things that can be completely new. Even the new creation ushered in by Christ with his passion, death and resurrection rises from the old, damaged creation.

And this is the main point in our understanding of what is truly new. We and things in general can only be truly new when we are renewed by Christ. That means that our spirit so vitally reconnects with the spirit of Christ such that we become another Christ. We have his mind and heart. We have his life in us.

Regarding this point, St. Paul says: “Take off your old self with its practices, and put on the new man, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.” (Col 3,9-11)

And again, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things passed away. Behold, new things have come.” (2 Cor 5,17)

While it’s true that we have to adapt ourselves with the new things as time flows, we should not worry too much about that concern. We will always be a child of our time, of our culture, of our environment. We should not be too apologetic for this condition and should just be game with the unavoidable tensions related to the condition.

As long as we are not trapped by that condition and can manage to transcend it to touch base always with what is essential, that is, to be vitally identified with Christ, then we can always manage to be new and innovative.

Remember that in order to save us, God had to become man in Christ, and had to adapt himself completely to our condition even to the point that, as said by St. Paul, he became like sin without committing sin. (cfr. 2 Cor 5,21)

***

The fullness of our humanity. We need to understand this point very well. Our humanity is not just a matter of biology, the blend of genes that gives us our unique identity. Such basis of our humanity would be no different from that of the other animals whose identity is solely based on the genes that are passed on to them from their parents. As such, animals are governed only by their instincts, and are classified simply as family, genus and species.

We, of course, are also animals. We too have instincts and are heavily influenced by them. But we are a lot more. In fact, we are qualitatively different from them. Neither is our humanity a mere matter of the play of social, economic, cultural or historical forces. Of course, in this level, we are already very different from the other animals. There is already quantum leap involved. But, no, our humanity is not just that either.

There is something in us that goes beyond genetics and that directs and shapes our reactions to the different conditionings we are subject to without getting entrapped by these conditionings. It is our intelligence and will that, though needing some organs to operate, enable us to do not merely material operations. They enable us to do spiritual operations that transcend the material conditions of our life.

It is because of this endowment of our nature that we can manage to go beyond the level of animality, though we can consider ourselves as the best among the animals. It is this endowment that would indicate that we have a spiritual soul, and not just animal soul as our principle of life.

It is this spiritual soul of ours that leads us to the world of the spiritual and supernatural world of God who, as we get to know things better, is the original source of everything. We just did not come from our parents, and the parents of our parents, etc. We come from God.

We have to realize that our humanity in our earthly life is still in the making. Yes, we are already men and women, no question about that. We are already human beings. But we are not yet in the fullness of our humanity. We still have to reach that goal. We are still a work in progress.

And to reach our fullness, we have to correspond to God’s continuing work of creation and redemption of us. This is a basic truth about ourselves that we have to be most aware of so we can act on it properly. This means we have to know and love him as much as we can. And knowing and loving him means doing his will, as Christ himself said: “If you love, you will keep my commandments.” (Jn 14,15)

We have to see to it that everyday, we somehow should be aware that we are progressing toward that goal of the fullness of our humanity, because we are consciously corresponding to God’s continuous interventions in our life.

At the end of the day as we make the examination of conscience, we should feel convinced that irrespective of how the drama of the day went, we are aware that we are approaching the fullness of our humanity.

Some people may say that this is a Christian or Catholic thing only. This should not be told, much less, imposed on others who are non-Christians. I believe that is a wrong conclusion to make. We,of course, should not force people to do what we say and teach.

But we should be allowed to explain, even as all of us should also be open to the views of others, no matter how different or in conflict their views are with ours. There has to be courteousdialogue and exchange of views. I am sure, that despite our differences and conflicts, we can still find some common ground because in the end the truth can only be one.

E-mail: roycimagala@gmail.com