Acquiring the mind of the Church
There are at least two passages in the Acts of the Apostles whose existence, not to mention, their strategic significance, I would like to invite all of us to be more aware of, let alone, to be more skilful in tackling.
They talk about us having one mind, one heart, one soul with Christ and with everybody else, which is actually a goal all of us have to pursue and for which we ought to help one another in attaining.
Here they are: “All these were persevering with one mind in prayer with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.” (1,14)
“And the multitude of the believers were of one heart and one soul, and not one of them said that anything he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common.” (4,32)
We need to be more conscious of this ideal that is proper to us and that represents our perfection. Though we are individuals and unique at that, our individuality and uniqueness do not erase but rather are supposed to enhance our togetherness and our unity.
Actually, if we are to examine closely the workings of our mind, heart and soul, this is the undeniable tendency these human elements and powers possess. They naturally look for others and ultimately to God to go home to and to find their fulfillment.
St. Augustine expressed this yearning when he said: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” A psalm sings the same sentiment: “My soul is thirsting for you, O Lord my God.”
Obviously, this longing comes from God who places it in our heart. It is God’s design for us. It can only be actuated by God’s grace. Thus, we have to acknowledge the priority and inalienable role of grace in effecting our perfection.
Still, we have a big role to play to convert it to reality. We just don’t perfect ourselves automatically. Things are not imposed on us by God. We have to want it. And because of that freedom, we have to be responsible for it also.
Thus, we have to know how to do our part. And in this, many things can be said, among them, the fact that we need to acquire the mind of the Church. Why so?
Simply because the Church, in spite of what we say about her many weaknesses and failures due to her human members, is none other than Christ himself who makes us members of his mystical body, people and family members of God.
As members of the Church, living members of Christ’s mystical body and God’s people, we need to enter the mind of the Church to be vitally connected to the mind of Christ.
The mind of the Church is none other than the mind of Christ, the mind of God himself, as it is lived out in minds of each one of us. The mind of the Church therefore is dynamically lived in history, with the full complement of our human condition.
The mind of the Church has to contend with the different factors that condition our human existence and our effort to live with God. There’s our culture, our physical, emotional, geographical, social and political conditions that can be as varied as can be, etc.
To acquire the mind of the Church has endless ways and possibilities, since it never means doing it in a uniform way, identical, rigid, monolithic. It simply flows and streams, open to anything, adapting to the lay of the land, yet tending toward its proper destination.
At times, the process can be rough. At others, smooth. At times, it can be temporarily stalled, but it will always find a way to get out, either by seeping into what prevents its flow, or simply evaporating into air and then condensing into rain later on.
Still, there are some basic practices that we need to master to achieve this mind of the Church. We need to pray, to study the doctrine of Christ and now of the Church and to conform our life and behavior to them, to avail of the sacraments, especially that of the Holy Eucharist, etc.
We have to live by faith, and together with it, we ought to live in hope and charity, which is the flowering of Christian life, the ultimate proof that we indeed have acquired the mind of the Church, since we now would have the mind of Christ.
(Fr. Cimagala is the Chaplain of Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), Talamban, Cebu City. Email: roycimagala@gmail.com)
