Following the Lead of Pope Benedict XVI, It is Time for Christians to Engage with the World

12/23/2012

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A time for Christians to engage with the world
Pope Benedict XVI

"'Render unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God,' was the response of Jesus when asked about paying taxes. His questioners, of course, were laying a trap for him. They wanted to force Him to take sides in the highly-charged political debate about Roman rule in the land of Israel. Yet there was more at stake here: if Jesus really was the long-awaited Messiah, then surely He would oppose the Roman overlords. So the question was calculated to expose Him either as a threat to the regime, or a fraud.

"Jesus' answer deftly moves the argument to a higher plane, gently cautioning against both the politicization of religion and the deification of temporal power, along with the relentless pursuit of wealth. His audience needed to be reminded that the Messiah was not Caesar, and Caesar was not God. The kingdom that Jesus came to establish was of an altogether higher order. As He told Pontius Pilate, 'My kingship is not of this world.'

"The Christmas stories in the New Testament are intended to convey a similar message. Jesus was born during a "census of the whole world" taken by Caesar Augustus, the Emperor renowned for bringing the Pax Romana to all the lands under Roman rule. Yet this infant, born in an obscure and far-flung corner of the Empire, was to offer the world a far greater peace, truly universal in scope and transcending all limitations of space and time.

"Jesus is presented to us as King David's heir, but the liberation He brought to His people was not about holding hostile armies at bay; it was about conquering sin and death forever.

"The birth of Christ challenges us to reassess our priorities, our values, our very way of life. While Christmas is undoubtedly a time of great joy, it is also an occasion for deep reflection, even an examination of conscience. At the end of a year that has meant economic hardship for many, what can we learn from the humility, the poverty, the simplicity of the crib scene?

"Christmas can be the time in which we learn to read the Gospel, to get to know Jesus not only as the Child in the manger, but as the one in Whom we recognize God made Man.

"It is in the Gospel that Christians find inspiration for their daily lives and their involvement in worldly affairs - be it in the Houses of Parliament or the Stock Exchange. Christians shouldn't shun the world; they should engage with it. But their involvement in politics and economics should transcend every form of ideology.

"Christians fight poverty out of a recognition of the supreme dignity of every human being created in God's image and destined for eternal life. Christians work for more equitable sharing of the earth's resources out of a belief that, as stewards of God's creation, we have a duty to care for the weakest and most vulnerable. Christians oppose greed and exploitation out of a conviction that generosity and selfless love, as taught and lived by Jesus of Nazareth, are the way that leads to fullness of life. Christian belief in the transcendent destiny of every human being gives urgency to the task of promoting peace and justice for all.

"Because these goals are shared by so many, much fruitful cooperation is possible between Christians and others. Yet Christians render to Caesar only what belongs to Caesar, not what belongs to God. Christians have at times throughout history been unable to comply with demands made by Caesar. From the Emperor cult of ancient Rome to the totalitarian regimes of the last century, Caesar has tried to take the place of God. When Christians refuse to bow down before the false gods proposed today, it is not because of an antiquated world-view. Rather, it is because they are free from the constraints of ideology and inspired by such a noble vision of human destiny that they cannot collude with anything that undermines it.

"In Italy, many crib scenes feature the ruins of ancient Roman buildings in the background. This shows that the birth of the child Jesus marks the end of the old order, the pagan world, in which Caesar's claims went virtually unchallenged. Now there is a new king, who relies not on the force of arms, but on the power of love. He brings hope to all those who, like himself, live on the margins of society. He brings hope to all who are vulnerable to the changing fortunes of a precarious world. From the manger, Christ calls us to live as citizens of his heavenly kingdom, a kingdom that all people of good will can help to build here on earth".

- - -

Pope Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2013
General Intention: The Faith of Christians. That in this Year of Faith Christians may deepen their knowledge of the mystery of Christ and witness joyfully to the gift of faith in him.
Missionary Intention: Middle Eastern Christians. That the Christian communities of the Middle East, often discriminated against, may receive from the Holy Spirit the strength of fidelity and perseverance.

Keywords: Pope Benedict XVI, Financial Times. Christian hope, culture, A time for Christians to engage with the world, apologetics, evangelization, new Evangelization, Deacon Keith Fournier

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1 - 3 of 3 Comments

Bill Sr.
4 months ago
The Lord hears your cry.....LEO
When the current folks in their seventies and beyond were kids there was always talk of war and it was common belief the final war was to be a Religious War. These were for the most part people with Christian backgrounds who lived by the Word of God. The problem at the time in the 1930's most of them simply surmised erroneously this would be a clash between the Church of Rome and the rest of Christendom (actually that was an unfortunate skirmish which had taken place five hundred years earlier). Today we have before us a clear vision of a pending clash between Christendom as we have known it and an anti-Christian collation made up of several factions all of which seek the virtual destruction of all Judeo-Christian values and the Jewish nation from the face of the earth.
One should have no problem in identifying those who have vowed to perpetrate the latter threat above. The Islamic Jihad is no longer simply a slogan for Muslim radicals who have systematically begun to infiltrate all of western Europe and intend to unite behind its banner in an armed and dangerous powerful presence in the Middle East poised to control North Africa and incorporate itself with the Arab nations to the west of Israel all of whom long to see the Jews driven out of what they believe is their land. If you don't see or understand this you are not paying attention or are wearing carefully fitted biased blinders.
The other anti-Christendom factions are not militarily armed forces working feverously to acquire nuclear weapons for mass destruction. Their goals, under the protection of what they believe to be a central enlightened secular government, are the dissolution of traditional moral values and spiritual concepts which impede the rapid advancement they desire to establish a modern debased society in which individuals are released from all constraints of the moral and natural laws which formed the foundation for western civilization. These willing but spiritually unconscious and unsuspecting cultists must in return offer undying loyalty to the messianic political leaders to whom they have pledged their support.
These poor souls and their voices should also be obvious to all who have eyes to see and ears to hear. They are among the young and immature who seek identity in revolutionary causes, the rich and glamorous in entertainment who know no depth to their desires for multiple relationships, career politicians who cherish power over principles using taxes to perpetuate their assumed benevolence, academics who have inflated their egos with degrees of utter idolatry giving them a false sense of infallibility, and the not to be over looked every day laity and clerical Christians in name only who were quick to abandoned the faith whenever the pressures of our new normal society threatened to isolate them from the crowd subjecting them to the ridicule of the enlightened. These are certainly the poorest of the poor for they chose to selfishly bury the talents they were given.
There truly is a religious war being raged today and it could very well be the last we are a part of before our Savior comes to renew the face of the earth because the many forces opposed to Christendom have unashamedly pronounced their distain for the Pope, Christians, Israel, Jews and seek to remove all mention of God's word from public view and our public our schools proclaiming to the world that our great country is no longer a Christian nation. Are we not to believe the spirit of the Anti-Christ is aroused, visible and actively present like never before in our world today?
Leo
4 months ago
Agree with you Bill Sr. It is very true what is mentioned in this article that to be Catholic these days: "It means being misunderstood, wrongly accused, disparaged and persecuted". Indeed, the prosecution of the Church and Christ's followers is at an all time high. It is a fact that the only religion that is what Christ meant it to be is the Catholic religion. And the WAR on the Catholic religion is rampant. The anti-Christ agents are trying to convince everyone to believe in "nothing" in an attempt to triumph over God and permanently destroy Him. Once you take God and believing in Christ out of someone's life, then they become a piece of clay which you can easily shape and manipulate anyway you want.....they become your servants. That is the big push right now all around the world. By taking away family culture, turning kids against their parents, pushing for "individualism", ridiculing those who believe in our Lord and making them feel ashamed of their beliefs, teaching the young that it is OK to act on their teenage impulses, laws to allow drug use and many other tools in use today, evil is fighting hard to win. But evil will not win. As Christians We are taught to turn the other cheek, but I think that perception needs to change. I think we should no longer give evil a chance to make us turn the other cheek.
Bill Sr.
5 months ago
Deacon Keith
Thank you for allowing a little light to shine in the darkness of the death and delusion which Evil, through the hands and minds of those who put God aside have manufactured and surrounded this poor soul and so many more of His people in recent days, by your thoughtful words and those of our Holy Father.
This has helped ease my anger making me aware of something we tend to forget when we allow ourselves to be overcome by the multitude of events which give evidence of the mounting presence of Evil in the world. That would be that, as you say, we must not abandon our mission understanding God is in control of the results.

"Part of our mission is to walk into the culture, filled with the love of God, equipped with the splendor of truth, and continue the work entrusted to us as Catholic Christians.

in order to be his credible witnesses among our fellow man."

Our job is to faithfully help BUILD the kingdom on earth and we have to leave it to the prescriptions of our almighty and merciful God to preform any justified DESTRUCTION of Evil and its minnons.

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