I expect these truths never crossed the author’s mind. I can’t be certain about this since I know nothing about him and really didn’t read the entire article but just glanced at some of the paragraph headings and caught a few of his thoughts. For example, among his world-saving ideas was the suggestion to “Call your local politician.” Why? Because “Most people won’t be able to save the world all by themselves. Politicians, on the other hand, can’t save the world without you. They need public support to drive home legislation that can make the world a better place.” As if legislation, too often the product of political compromise, lobbyist dollars, and ideological fervor, will lead to a better world. Not!
I’m sorry, but even with your help and my help, no politician can save the world. I’ve known more than a few politicians, some quite well, and only a tiny handful would have willingly sacrificed their political futures to “make the world a better place.” Not surprisingly, none of these considered politics a life-long career. The very fact that most politicians refer to their work as a “career in public service” tells us all we need to know. Most politicians are not unlike the heretics that have plagued the Church for 2,000 years. The heretic believes he is smarter and holier than the Church founded by Jesus Christ [See Mt 16:18-19]. In much the same way, the politician believes he is wiser and far more necessary than those who elected him to office. Of course, they are both wrong. St. Paul again reminds us that “if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself” [Gal 6:3]. I hope, then, we can agree that our politicians cannot, with or without our assistance, save a world that’s already been redeemed. This knowledge is nothing new. As the Psalmist sings, reminding us:
Put not your faith in princes,in a son of man, in who, there is no help.When his breath departs he returns to his earth;on that very day his plans perish [Ps 146:3-4].
I will, however, agree with the author that we can each do our part to “make the world a better place.” But for me that means to follow the Gospel, or as Jesus said when He began His public ministry, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent, and believe in the Gospel” [Mk 1:15]. We are called to repent of our sinfulness and called to faith. Salvation, you see, is God’s work, since only He can save. Each of us, though, has been placed in a tiny slice of God’s Creation — a place, a time, a community — in which we are called to evangelize.
To me, this is the key. We must begin where we are, in our families, our community, our humanity. We are all children of a loving God, regardless of race or any other characteristic we humans decide separates us. We are all, every single one of us, in God’s family, children of the Father, brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ. That’s the reason He became one of us, to show us the Father’s love for all whom He created. The humanity of Jesus should bring us together. We must all learn to rejoice in the very fact of our creation, to accept that God loves each of us in a remarkably personal way.
Sadly, far too much of the world today acts as if there is no God. To deny God is to slide into despair and fear. What’s left? Nothing. The only human solution is to see yourself, or humanity, as a God replacement, and so, we create our own little gods that signify nothing. Soon enough we come to focus solely on our own convenience. This leads to hatred — hatred of others and, ultimately, self-hatred — a self-focused attitude that sees little need for the existence of others. We then easily accept the murder of the innocent child in the womb, the infanticide of the newborn but imperfect child, and the willingness to eliminate the seriously ill, the elderly, and any others whose lives just cost the rest of us too much.
You can recognize the haters because they always accuse others of their own sins. It began with Adam and Eve and hasn’t stopped. We are called to love others, even our enemies, but that doesn’t mean we have to like them. Loving another is not an emotion; it’s a decision, one in which we desire the good of another. We must want what God wants for the other since His will is the only will that truly counts. This, of course, demands that we must accept and repent of our own sinfulness, that which separates us from God and from each other.
The other day, on the feast of our parish patron, St. Vincent de Paul, I remarked that perhaps the central theme of the Gospel is John’s declaration:
“For God so loved the world that he gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” [Jn 3:16].
Yes, God loves the world, all of the world, the world He created: “And God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good” [Gen 1:31]. From this, then, we realize that we must love our God in return, for how could we not love the God who created each one of us in a unique act of love.
So that’s my thinking about making the world better. If we all accepted our role as evangelists, if we all accepted the commission that Jesus extended to every Christian, God would change the world in the most remarkable way. It was a pretty straightforward command, not a complicated thing:
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” [Mt 28:19-20].
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