Being! Or Nothingness

That Where I Am, You May Also Be

"That Where I Am, There You May Also Be," is part of a song I remember from somewhere in my childhood.  I am not sure how the rest of it goes, but this little part has been running through my head today along with the companion line, "In the World you will have trouble, but I'll give you my peace."  I think I remember Dolly Parton singing it . . .

So, in the World there is trouble.  I seem to know this aspect of the Christian re ality rather well.  It seems that everywhere I go I find this.  Usually, I find it pretty quickly.  I'm sure 99% of it is the simple fact that my fallen humanity gets in the way of everything I try to do.  I think more and more, however, that there is another component that I did not account for enough in my history.  "The devil is prowling around you like a roaring lion, ready to devour you.  Resist him, steady in your faith."  St. Peter writes this in his letter to the Church evangelized by Paul.  He's encouraging the communities to be faithful and "sober and alert."  It's this alert sobriety that I seem to lack most often.  The "alert sobriety" in front of the Evil One . . . because he seeks to destroy us, not necessarily by killing us, but by destroying our effectiveness, the place where we can be free and freely move, and therefore, where we can be freely Christian.

And the enemies are not only external, but internal as well.  As I'm teaching my Sophomores right now, the Church has always been plagued by enemies from within and without.  On the one hand, the external persecutions of the Jewish Authority and the Romans and on the other, the heretics. The devil is prowling around us like a roaring lion, ready to devour us.

I don't want to seem too paranoid, but it's not paranoia if they're really out to get you . . . right?

All this is to say, that the more I read the scriptures, the more I live life, the more I do the work that Carron has encouraged us to do, the work of the heart that leads to judgment, the more I understand that the reality that the early Christians lived, I am also living.  And where I am, He is too.

Claimed by Christ

I started a School of Community (SoC) in my school last semester when one of my students, John, asked how he could become more certain in life.  School of Community is the primary educative method of Communion and Liberation, the ecclesial movement to which I belong.  I was provoked by what happened there today. 

One of my most faithful students did not come.  He's never missed.  But not only did he not come, he did not let anyone know that he was not coming, nor why he wasn't coming.  We sent him a text message, to which he did not respond.  The guys (because only guys come to my SoC) told me that he was in the hallway talking to girls, so we began without him and I sent him a message to not come, since he was late.

School of Community was beautiful, but I missed not having this student there.  After SoC, I went to find him, since I knew he would be at basketball practice.  He came over to talk to me and made some excuse for why he did not come.  It was fine, it seemed reasonable, and I had no reason to doubt him, but the problem wasn't that he did not come, but that he didn't tell us that he wasn't coming.  We were expecting him, and he left us hanging.

In the course of the brief exchange I sensed that there was something else at play as well.  Zack didn't come by after he finished what he was doing because he was afraid.  He was afraid of my disappointment, and afraid of my reaction because he wasn't there.  When I asked him if he was afraid, he quickly admitted it, to which I responded, "Zack, I love you whether you can come or not, don't be afraid."  He relaxed and asked if he and I could do SoC tomorrow.  I told him that it would be fine, but he needed to come find me, I was not going to go looking for him.

All of this happened, and I was moved by a fact that ran through this whole event:  Christ has claimed us!  I was moved that Zack was so bothered by the fact that he missed that he would become afraid.  How can this simple, usually arduous, often tedious little School of Community cause someone to be afraid?  Because in not going he recognized, even if not completely aware, that he was going against himself, that he was committing a sin in the way that Giussani describes it.  And in the end, he could not bring himself to show his face because he does not trust the mercy that is present in this companionship. 

How was he going against himself?  Christ is present among us!  His presence places a claim on our life that we cannot ignore.  Either we adhere or we go way.  If we go away, we become sad or afraid.

I began to think about myself and recognized that I have the same tendency when I do not participate to that which gives me life.  When I skip something, or miss School of Community, or don't go to the Spiritual Exercises (for a million "good" reasons, usually) I become afraid to face my friends, afraid that they will ask me why I was not there.  I too have a hard time trusting the mercy that is present in the companionship.

So I was in awe, again.  I was in awe that this moment of "forgetting" became a moment of memory, that it became a moment to recognize Christ.  I was in awe of Christ, of who he is, the Mystery of his presence which places a claim on life.  I became more grateful for the presence of Christ in my life, my esteem for him grew because I recognized that he is among us.  In this familiar way, I became more cognizant of the Mystery of Christ.  Who are you, Jesus?

The Mystery of a Classroom

Welcome to my study hall.  As you enter you can see on the board, in large handwriting, today's instruction (it is everyday's instruction) that reads:  "Silence:  Again, I remind you, it's hell until we can learn to get along."

Over the course of last semester, I earned a reputation that is probably well deserved, as a "lenient" study hall monitor.  I'm not sure that it was that way from the beginning, but over time those students and I developed a certain relationship that made it possible for us to have a rather loose environment.  They were juniors and worked as they needed to, and then made up for it when they didn't.

Things change, and so did my study hall.  They were all dispersed into other study halls and I was given an entirely new group (a rather large one) to deal with.  Having heard of my laxity they came in on day one with the tired air of privilege that characterizes their age and socio-economic status.  And thus began that slow and arduous path I like to call "Project Iron Fist."

All of this has raised an interesting question, in them, and in me.  Am I just a draconian despot who wages a war of wills against them?  Am I mean?  What is at stake?

First, some observations:  My students seem completely incapable of asking for a reason for my actions, or an explanation.  Finally, yesterday, one of them did.  This has been the practice now for 3 weeks, yet no one has asked me, "Why are you doing this?"  Yesterday, the question came not so much as a question but the response to a question I asked when one student said "He hates us!"  To which I replied "How can I hate you?  I don't even know you."

And there in lies the rub.  I don't know them.  They don't know me.  Yet, they treat me as if they did know me, or better, they treat me as if I'm supposed to react a certain way because of what they have heard.  I want them to understand that a relationship involves a mutual interest.  They arrived with no interest in me, just an expectation that I give them what they want:  unrestrained, unmitigated permissiveness.

And so, the education begins.  If you aren't interested in beginning, I can't help you.  Come in, do your work, and let's not bother each other.  It's simple.  But, if you are interested, then move.

And yet, they won't move.  What paralysis affects us so powerfully in this culture that in front of what I am interested in, in front of what I want, I won't move.  I'll ignore it.  Yet, I'll get angry if it doesn't move toward me.

I guess angry is some sort of a movement.