ACAT 13: Body Vs. Soul

Does taking care of our body somehow interfere with taking care of our soul?

We come back to the interconnectedness of soul, body and mind with hopefully a little more clarity.

All three elements – body, mind and soul – are integral parts of who we are.  The core of our identity rests in the soul, the center from which our thoughts, feelings, intentions, impressions and actions arise.

Much has been debated over the centuries as to the role the body plays in the health of our soul.  Some contend that the body and soul are in constant battle, with the cravings of the flesh ever drawing us toward pleasure at the expense of virtue and morality.  Some feel that morality is subjective, and that contentment of the body reflects, or promotes, contentment of the soul.  Some fall somewhere in between.

The Catholic Church has a very well-defined moral code spelled out in its Catechisms, consistently seen from the Baltimore edition to the 1992 edition published under Pope John Paul II, to the most recently published 2011 Youth Catechism (YOUCAT).  The Catholic Church is very specific in telling us that comfort of the body must not take more importance than the integrity of our soul.  Why?  Because, a life ordered around pleasing the body is incompatible with the intended design and operating parameters of the soul.

Here is a way to summarize the right order of living:

The role of body and mind is to promote and uphold the purity and integrity of the soul.

  • Purity: Preservation from corruption
  • Integrity: Wholeness; being undivided

We can use a chart like this to compare operating parameters:

Body Soul
Mortal (will die) Immortal (cannot die)
Tangible Intangible
Can change appearance Cannot change appearance
Does not determine who a person is by itself Determines who a person is by itself
Has infused, actual cellular identity Has infused, actual essential identity

 

Though we might see this as a list of opposites, taking care of our body does not have to interfere with taking care of our soul, or vice versa.  It would be absurd to think that God would set up a creature opposed to itself.  The two are not designed to be at odds.  In fact, when each maintains awareness of the other, body and soul work in harmonious balance which upholds the wholeness of the entire person.

Imbalance occurs when we exaggerate emphasis on our body’s needs or consider our bodily needs more frequently than considering the needs of our soul.  Think in terms of the chart above.  If we spend a great deal of energy on things that are mortal, we have less to devote to the immortal.  If we focus on sensual feelings, we spend less time feeding our intangible needs.  If we put more stock in our body’s appearance than our soul’s identity, we neglect that core part of ourselves that makes us who we are.  It begins to sound like common sense.

Living in right order means that our body’s actions respect our soul’s operating parameters.  Choosing body over soul neglects the immortal.  What does this mean, since a soul can’t die?  It will never cease to exist… but, if neglected, a soul can starve.

One last question: Can it ever be that we give too much emphasis to soul care, and not enough to body or mind?  No.  Here’s why: The soul is the essence of our life.  A healthy soul produces a sound mind and actualized body.  A very, very healthy soul produces a very, very sound mind and a very, very actualized body.  Shall we keep going?  Is there such a thing as too much health?  Thankfully, no!

When we look at it this way, then, the best way to care for the body is to lavish excellent care upon the soul.  Does care of the body interfere with care of the soul?  No; it BEGINS WITH, and THRIVES UPON, care of the soul.

 

 

ACAT 12: Soul Care is In Our Control

Is our soul’s care completely in our control, or is it affected by outside forces?

 

Before we attempt a question this big, let us please keep in mind our reason for asking in the first place.  We are looking at this section in the Baltimore Catechism:

Q: Why must we take more care of our soul than our body?

A: In losing our soul, we lose God and everlasting happiness.

Now the variables of control come into play.  Is the soul interconnected with body and mind, or is it separate?  Recall this graphic:

By proportion, the importance placed on body and mind should be less than that placed on the soul.  This is because body and mind are the components of ourselves which are enlivened and given identity by the soul, which is our core identity.  The body and mind are those parts of us which interact with the outside, and the soul is that which dwells on the inside. We might say that body and mind are influenced by the soul from the inside, and by forces beyond our control from the outside.  As such, any consideration of outside forces begins with body and mind… and, if we want to go even further, we can consider body and mind as outside forces unto themselves!

But, first, what do we mean by “in our control”?  The choices we make?  How can we ever know if anything is purely “in our control”?  Even our behavior, which originates in the body, can be arguably influenced by factors beyond our control, both from outside ourselves and far within, on the molecular level.  We did not start our own hearts beating, after all!

Let’s hurry up and define some of these things before we get too far out of hand.  Outside of high philosophical and theological circles, we think the following definitions will suffice:

– IN OUR CONTROL: Things we freely choose

– AFFECTED BY OUTSIDE FORCES: How far our actions stray from our intentions

All this, and we haven’t even answered the question yet.  Is our soul’s care completely in our control, or is it affected by outside forces?

The care we give to our soul is the sum total of the intentions we formulate (which are in our control) and the choices we make in the context of both things we can and cannot control.

We cannot control the majority of forces which act upon us.  But our intentions are solely ours, and so the choices we make are often like arrows shot in wind, fog and all sorts of tricky circumstances.  The important point to remember is that intentions count in the equation.  We are not purely victims of circumstances, nor are we masters of our own fate.  We are conscious beings in between, and the God who put us here knows that we are not always able to act without influence and interference.  If we keep God in our intentions, our souls will not be lost.  The more we keep God in our intentions, the more our souls will stay on the path God imagined for us.  And the more we focus on outside forces, the more easily we will find ourselves disoriented.

ACAT 11: Lapses in Soul Care

What can we do to correct lapses in soul care?

So far, the formula has been kept very simple.  Care of the soul is done for love of God, trust in God’s designs and in the sight of God’s gaze.  What then, can we do, when we fall short -whether by deliberate choice or by underestimating just how difficult these things can actually be to accomplish?

First off, let us make this very clear: Lapses in soul care are part of the earthly human condition.  Even with the purest intentions, we live and operate in an environment that does not readily support soul care.  The constantly flowing thoughts, feelings and sensations of ordinary life make it difficult, if not impossible, to separate out the things that remind us of God at their very substance from the things that feel so good we look to them, and away from God, in their appreciation.  It really does not take much to distract us from God.

What, then, when that happens?  Once or twice, we can catch ourselves and gently turn our minds back toward God.  Habitually, though, if we forget to do this, it can become very easy to focus more on what is right in front of us than what we can only recall through faith.   Our bodies are great attention grabbers, and once they grab top billing, soul care drops down: first to an afterthought, and then to progressively lower levels of priority until it reaches “cut.”

It comes back, then, to cultivating a sense of awareness: of God, of ourselves, of one another, in that order.  But if our soul care has dropped significantly, we may need to build our awareness from the bottom back up.  By recalling the God-endowed value of others around us, we begin to remember the God-endowed value of ourselves; and then God Himself, Who Endows Value.

Sound spiritual practices are rooted in awareness, but when we find soul care slipping, there are also specific means of maintaining this awareness once it has been recovered.  Catholics enjoy the sacrament of Reconciliation, also known as Confession, as a means of directly eradicating impediments to soul care.  Outside of Reconciliation, there is prayer, community support, pastoral counseling, liturgical participation, spiritual reading and reserving time for silence to get us back on track.  That last one, reserving time for silence, was a practice championed by our Patron Saint Thorlak during his time as Abbot at the Augustinian Monastery at Thykkvibaer.  More than just unplugging or refraining from talking, recollected silence is a deliberate listening.  Consider the difference between passive silence and active listening to see how the faculties are enlivened and engaged by periods of deliberate silence.

Is there ever a point of no return, where we lapse so greatly that thinking of God seems hopeless?  Not during earthly life.  God is always a glance away.  He created us, endowed us with infinite value and set us up with an incredible operating system.  Nothing we do to ignore, forget or disown our soul can erase its existence… or its value.  Our souls can never depreciate.  Our responsibility, then, is to remember our souls’ value, and adjust our actions accordingly.  It’s that simple.

ACAT 10: Putting Our Soul At Risk

What courses of action are harmful to our soul, or place our soul at risk?

We continue our deeper look at the warning put forth by the Baltimore Catechism that neglecting to care for our soul leads us to lose God for all eternity.  Even as appropriate as it may be to view that word “lose” as a sense of defeat, failure, or game-over, it is just as apt to consider that “lose” can also refer to something slipping out of sight, or not being where we can find it.  Either way we are separated from God.

It would require a great deal more than annotation to delve into how a person’s actions can put the welfare of the soul at risk.  Our task here is to give an overview and a sense of direction, rather than an exhaustive treatment.

Generally speaking: We place our soul in harm’s way any time we seek to remove it from God’s gaze.

If we think of God’s gaze being filled with his love for us, then the things that would lead us to avoid God are those which are not good for our souls.  Try as we might, we cannot think of any exceptions to this guideline (and it’s not for lack of trying!)  Observe some examples that come to mind:

  • Going against anything moral (lying, stealing, cheating)
  • Purposefully calculating something that hurts another person
  • Doing things we would not have God watch us do
  • Avoiding God when we feel embarrassed, inadequate, frustrated or angry

That last one may surprise some of us.  God does not punish us for reacting to our feelings, does he?  No.  But notice the example does not say to avoid the feelings or the reactions… it says that avoiding God in those moments puts our soul in harm’s way.  God knows us and loves us in our strengths and our failings, so why would we feel the need to pull away when we are at our most vulnerable?

So very often we base our presence on what we bring to the room. And just as often we on the spectrum can feel overwhelmed, or empty, or unglued, or insecure, or shaggy around the edges, or grouchy, or tested to our very last limit… and be absolutely correct in declaring, “Leave me alone! I’m not very good company right now!”

Statements like this are not what would put our souls at risk.  However, cultivating the habit of assuming God assesses us based on the quality of our successes, our moods or our cumulative merits is unfair to both ourselves and to God.  God does not operate on human terms.  He created us.  He knows our operating systems, but is not subject to them.  Taking our own space is perfectly fine for a time, but going to the extreme of shutting ourselves out of God’s gaze cuts off our spiritual oxygen.  God knows us even at our worst moments, and loves us exactly as he loves us in our best moments.  God’s love is not merit-based and does not fluctuate, either calculatingly like the stock market or erratically like the weather.  God’s love is a constant… a given… an immovable absolute.

Even when we remove ourselves from his gaze.

The flip side here is that God’s love never wanes; and so, it also does not push, beg, force or chastise.

Are there consequences to the things we choose?  Most certainly.  Is there such a thing as Divine Justice?  Most certainly.  Does Divine Justice work the same way we understand human justice?  Most certainly not.  It can feel like there are no eternal consequences to the things we do, whether openly or in secret, whether we believe they count or believe they have no effect on any other person… but it remains those things which lead us to cut the connection which put our soul in mortal danger.

ACAT 9: What Happens if We Neglect Our Soul’s Care?

If care for our soul means knowing, loving and serving the purposes of God in our lives, neglect would be those times when we disregard opportunities to know God, love God or serve God’s purposes in the things we ordinarily do.  Sometimes this happens through circumstance and chain reaction, very often because “God-things” are not immediately visible and get pushed aside by the visible, tangible things taking up all of our attention first.  It takes lifelong practice to remember that God is invisibly present in everything, as present as the atmosphere which sustains us, and there will be times when it simply slips our minds.  The more often we can call God back to mind, the stronger our foundation becomes for remembering His presence and incorporating God into our conscious activity; but, realistically, there are always going to be times when other concerns of the moment occupy our minds first.

Neglect is not always a passive thing, however.  Sometimes we neglect things purposefully, like when we ignore incoming calls or let the laundry pile up.  Neglect can equally be a function of habit, or avoidance, or even a deliberate act of aggression – such as choosing not to follow through on something we have promised.

What happens when we neglect God’s presence in our lives?

Neglect in any relationship results in growing apart, loss of familiarity, loss of comfort, and loss of trust.  These things can all be gained and rebuilt again, but if continuously neglected, the gap becomes greater and greater, eventually creating unfamiliarity, discomfort and distrust.

As we go further, we realize that, if God created us and is present in all creation, it is not possible for Him to be unfamiliar, uncomfortable or distrustful with us.  It rests entirely on our shoulders to remember Him.

Following the spectrum described above, neglect can range from gradually, even accidentally forgetting God to deliberately turning away.   The effect is the same, regardless: loss of spiritual connection and purpose.

What happens if we lose our spiritual connection and purpose?

Plenty.  For starters, waking up in the morning gets harder and harder.  People around us get more and more tedious.  Tasks feel fruitless.

This sounds a lot like depression, but is it the same thing?  We know that depression is caused by biochemical imbalance resulting from many different contributing factors, sometimes spontaneously and sometimes from depletion due to chronic distressing.  But in both cases, imbalance results because our bodies are not designed to live like this.  It is just as untrue to say that all depression is spiritually caused as it is to think that spiritual unrest can’t happen in perfectly healthy bodies.  Body and soul work together for the same purpose, like harmonious melodies in the same composition.  So, it is fair to say that a loss of spiritual connection and purpose results in hardship on both body and soul.

When we find life pointless, we stop thriving.  We also tend to dry up in terms of what we might have to offer others around us.

This might just be enough to say that neglect of the soul is not a good thing.  The Baltimore Catechism goes us one step further: it says that chronic neglect puts us at risk of losing our soul forever.  This, again, would be the result of our failure to cultivate and maintain that connection to God.  He relies on us to stay connected with Him in our lifetime so that we will want to see Him face to face in the next.  If we grow unfamiliar, uncomfortable and distrustful now, we’re definitely going to shrink away from any idea of spending eternity with Him.

But, if not with God, who holds all creation together in Himself… then… where?

In losing our soul, we lose God and everlasting happiness.

That remains unknown.  We can’t know where we will be.

In other words, our soul will be lost.

ACAT 8: Body and Mind Serve the Soul

Q: Of which must we take more care, our soul or our body?

A: We must take more care of our soul than our body.

Q: Why must we take more care of our soul than our body?

A: In losing our soul, we lose God and everlasting happiness.

Last week, we examined the notion that our soul can and should be cared for, lest we lose it altogether – so the writers of the Baltimore Catechism warn, without much in the way of elaboration.  Before we examine particular questions, we ought to look at the relationship between body and soul, both in the 21st century context and as we surmise the writers originally intended.

 

In looking at the whole person, body + mind + soul are most often viewed as harmonious equals.  Body = our physical identity; mind = our thoughts, words and ideas; soul = our essence; that which makes us who we are.  This organic approach acknowledges the interdependence of all three aspects without assigning priority to one over another.  It seems quite reasonable: if our body is in good health, our mind functions well; if our mind and body function well, our core self thrives.  When one aspect is compromised, the other two experience consequences in kind.

This organic approach works if all three aspects are truly equal.  Many would propose they are.  If we consider, however, our previous examination of what comprises a “soul,” we begin to see that equality between the three is not possible.  It becomes obvious when we recall that the soul is the core of our identity as imagined by God.

  • Disharmony within the body can impact, even disable the mind; but can it alter or determine who we are at our core?
  • Disharmony within the mind can impact our thoughts and words; it can greatly tax our bodies; but, again, can it alter or determine who we are at our core?
  • Disharmony between body and mind can create numerous setbacks in our ability to live well and function well; but can it alter or determine who we are at our core?
  • Disharmony between body, mind and soul may give rise to an inability to perceive or be satisfied with our core identity, and can result in restlessness, protest and desire to alter one or all until we feel satisfied. But this is where it gets complicated and absolutely another discussion all by itself.  First things first.  We’re only at the foundation stage of this block tower, and those blocks about body, mind and soul identity are far too important to neglect when we get to them.  Don’t worry; we’ll get there!

In sum: Is there anything that can alter or determine who we are at our core?

In the Catholic worldview, no.  Only God, who loved our core identity so greatly that he created it, and gave it a body and mind to serve its life here on earth.

This bears repeating:

Our body was fashioned and given to serve our soul.

Our mind was fashioned and given to serve our soul.

Body and mind do work closely together, and are to a great degree interconnected – although we can make the case that there is some autonomy of each.  The mind can still generate thoughts and ideas when the body is disabled.  The body can do things without thought, or without words, or without ideas.  However, the two working together is the ideal, and that is generally what is held true in the pursuit of wellness.

Our body and mind are given to us to serve our soul.

Then, what is the soul’s purpose?

(Remember? Say it with us!) To know, love, and serve God in this world, and to be happy forever with God in the next world.

Body serves soul -> body’s purpose is to promote knowing, loving and serving God in this world.

Mind serves soul -> mind’s purpose is to promote knowing, loving and serving God in this world.

Why couldn’t the writers of the Baltimore Catechism have said that, then?

Perhaps they were not speaking to an audience who would have imagined body, mind and soul as being organically equal.  Somehow, the past few decades have pushed so to break out of stereotyped, externally assigned identity that we have forgotten the reality that each individual has a unique, INTERNAL identity that was not merely assigned to them by God, but comprises their very existence as initiated by God.

 

ACAT 7: Body and Soul

Q: Of which must we take more care, our soul or our body?

A: We must take more care of our soul than our body.

Q: Why must we take more care of our soul than our body?

A: In losing our soul, we lose God and everlasting happiness.

For concrete, linear thinkers of the 21st century, these statements beg for argument.  We are conditioned to see body and soul as interconnected, if not equal in importance.  How many products and services assert their superiority by being “good for body and soul”?  Moreover, the principle of self-care has gained great support in recent years.  Few can argue with “you cannot pour from an empty cup” and “taking care of yourself shows self-respect,” and those of us on the spectrum know that anxiety and constant self-monitoring takes a hard toll on our physical health.

It is the phrasing of the Baltimore Catechism that is dated – but not the message.  The original writers would likely be just as confused by our contemporary notions of wellness and holistic perspective.  If we keep reading, we see the context in which the writers felt this was important enough to put this at the top of the hierarchy: “In losing our soul, we lose God and everlasting happiness.”

Losing our soul does sound frightening.  But… how did we get there in just one question?  And where is the accompanying information, such as:

  • How can we take care of our soul?
  • What happens if we neglect our soul’s care?
  • What courses of action are harmful to our soul, or place our soul at risk?
  • What can we do to correct lapses in soul care?
  • Is our soul’s care completely in our control, or is it affected by outside forces?
  • Does taking care of our body somehow interfere with taking care of our soul?
  • How can we take care of our body without compromising our soul?
  • How exactly is a soul lost?
  • If a soul is lost, can it be recovered?

As we progress on our journey into the Baltimore Catechism, it becomes more and more apparent that writers take a very parental tone.  This is not at all surprising, considering the structure of the Catholic Church is often seen as parental.  In the historical time periods when parental authority held high esteem, this analogy was coherent and harmonious with the prevailing culture.  In the past sixty years, however, Western culture has seen a huge shift in how parenting is viewed.  Individuality and personal choice is championed over obedience and the sense of being shepherded.  In part, this is why many of us feel such a disconnect with Catholic catechesis.  We are conditioned to question authority before deciding how we feel about something.  But aren’t there still matters where the voice of authority takes precedence over values clarification, particularly where danger is concerned?  It would not be useful to question the declaration of a state of emergency, for instance.  Doing so would put our lives in danger and unnecessarily deter others in their ability to seek safety.  If we give the writers the benefit of the doubt, perhaps they felt it more important to get our attention right to the point rather than lose us in a logical but lengthy buildup.

Our over-arching question here is whether or not those questions above are addressed anywhere later on, or if we are simply expected to take this by itself, without elaboration, as a warning given in our best interests.  The Baltimore Catechism does get into these things, but in a way that is widely distributed throughout the contents of the document, not as directly as we asked them.  Therefore, we will take these questions on in the coming weeks’ posts before going any further.

Keep in mind our purpose remains to create a Catholic catechetical commentary compatible with autistic thinking.  If anyone wishes to take a more direct route and, say, look at a more up to date catechism, the Vatican website offers the most contemporary catechism at: http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/_INDEX.HTM.  Another good resource is the Youth Catechism, YOUCAT, easily found by online search in print and electronic formats.  We assure readers that the Church is not hopelessly dated and out of touch; we simply chose to use a catechism in the public domain.  Bear in mind it is not the Church or its catechism which has changed over the years; it is the diversification of the ways people think.  Including autistically.

ACAT 6: Happy with God in the Next World

The Baltimore Catechism has told us that God exists, is the creator of all life, and desires to have us here to know him, love him and serve him… and then, to be happy with him forever in the next.

If we notice, our catechism takes quite a jump from “why are we here?” to “where do we go from here?” in that last clause of the sentence.  We go from knowing God, deciding we love him and choosing to follow his designs to then reaching bodily death, at which time the terms become: <we will be happy> / <with God> / <forever> / <in the next world>.

1) We will be happy

Keeping in mind the Baltimore Catechism was written with school-aged children in mind, this word “happy” should be taken at face value.  We can interpret this in the most simple way, a shortcut for the sum total of things that include contentment, peace, delight, freedom from anxiety and, generally, anything we’d tag with a smile emoji… only, on a much deeper, more fulfilling level than the things that we’re used to, that last only until they fade or the next good thing comes along.  This is an enduring happiness, a perpetual contentment, a rest of the soul that once was restless.

2) + with God

Does our bodily death free us from the spiritual signal-blocker that keeps us from seeing God face to face?  Does bodily death transport the soul from here where God is not, to there, where God is?  These things cannot be satisfactorily defined or studied, and so, the particulars of what physically constitutes the afterlife remains up for both scientific and theological discussion.   It is, however, a term of our faith that we believe, in some capacity, that our soul remains alive and is able to perceive God with the certainty and clarity which our bodily existence cannot permit.  We concede the “what,” knowing we do not have a definitive way to describe the “how.”

3) + forever

As theologians understand the reality of God’s creation, there is both linear, measured time here on earth and a transcendental, non-measurable state of “just being” that is so vast and deep as to defy linear tracking.  That word “forever” can evoke anxiety when it is something of an unknown quality.  Even though the terms already include being “happy,” there is a permanence to this “forever” that triggers a second-guessing in our human nature.  We are conditioned to know where our exits are, how the escape hatch works, and how to tolerate being stuck by anticipating that things will eventually change.  The key here is to remember that God’s “forever” is not static.  God’s reality is one of constant creation, perpetual beginning, perfect stability and all-encompassing security.   This “forever” is more like the state we find ourselves in when we finally hit our stride and want to keep going.

4) + in the next world

Ah, the afterlife.  So many connotations, so many explanations, so many words.  The term “heaven,” for instance, originated in the ancient belief that souls travel beyond the bonds of earth’s atmosphere, into the firmament, to join ranks with the stars.  We have modernized this concept to also mean “perfect bliss” or “supreme pleasure.”  But “heaven” is not the only way to refer to the afterlife.  Our catechetical writers refer to “the next world.”  What does this mean?  In the purest sense, “world” means a specified environment containing the sum total of interactions and experiences therein.  “The next world” can mean both the place itself and the way we experience it, just as in gaming there are many successive worlds in which the same player can interact in different and increasingly sophisticated ways.  The takeaway here is that, once our soul is separated from our body, our experiences and interactions do not cease; rather, they continue, in a manner which we can only access once we graduate to that level.

And so, there it is.  God created us, and offers us to live and use our life in this world to discover him, and consider offering our love and support of him in response.  Those of us who do will experience him here and then receive the happiness he offers us with him in the world to come.

We conclude with a brief parable attempting to explain the principle like so:

If this world is a forest, and we are each a tree, the forest is that which nurtures tree growth, and no tree diminishes another’s importance.  God imagines us, tree after tree, with great love, and places us in this forest to be both delightful as ourselves and to be delightful to the other trees.  Once we have grown to fullness, we can see what we, and each other tree is to become.  The trees who embrace being trees of the forest will thrive in the fulfillment of their design.  The trees who doubt can choose not to remain, but by this choice, they may still become something useful – but they can no longer fulfill what their creator imagined they would one day be.

ACAT 4: The Process of Relating to God

[Readers, please note: Ordinarily, the respect due to God is expressed by capitalizing the H in pronouns.  However, writing about familiarity in relationship requires a lot of these pronouns – and that capital H is becoming distracting.  God deserves respect, yes; but he does not demand it to the point of distraction.  We considered what it would mean to drop the capitalization in favor of increasing comfort and familiarity, and it feels right.  We mean no disrespect to God by using lowercase pronouns.  We offer it to God, in love, as a sign of our desire to grow closer in familiarity with him, intending no offense.]

Last week, we began looking at the Baltimore Catechism’s proposal that God created us to know him, love him, serve him and be happy with him in the life to come.

We suggested seeing this first as a task list given in order of importance, with each step intended to prepare us for the next, flowing with a natural logic.  We can’t love someone without knowing them.  We can’t serve someone without loving them (and, before any buzz starts, we already have Missionary Thoughts lined up to go more deeply into that word “serve,” especially wondering how it can lead to happiness when it sounds so contractual).

Yes, each step is a foundational block, and each successive step builds further on the previous one.

But it is not a flat, linear progression.  It is a dynamic process, a progression of modules leading one to the next and then building upward, constantly adding more layers for each completion of the cycle, day after day in our lifetime.  The four together are a constant, living process.

 

 

 

 

This process, in fact, describes building a relationship with anyone:

 

When an enduring relationship is forming, what we discover about someone (= getting to know them) eventually gives rise to a particular fondness.  We can feel this as we feel love toward our family members, or toward our friends, or in the general sense of the value and dignity we feel toward others.  But then, we begin to concretely “love” in the verb sense by showing affection, or speaking affirming words, or including people in our activities as we might invite a friend, a guest or someone on the sidelines without a partner to participate in what we are doing.  We love by giving gifts, making food and welcoming visitors.  Loving can be offering to drive somewhere, or answering the phone when we are already tired, or forgiving those who overstep their boundaries with us.  If we notice, knowing (taking in concrete, measurable data) gives way to loving (forming an abstract conclusion) which gives way to doing, or serving (concrete action motivated by abstract feeling).

Thus, loving forms the bridge between knowing and doing (or, serving), which leads to being happy with each other in the relationship.  As each module augments the other in the process, a foundation is formed.  The process repeats and repeats and repeats in the rhythm of the relationship, as though placing bricks one atop the other in an ever-growing structure.

 

So, how easily can we replicate this process when our someone (God) is not three-dimensional?

Knowing: Books, videos, homilies and Scripture are some of the many formal ways we can know God, but evidence and ideation of God occurs frequently and much less formally.  Imagination can be the best tool for us to encounter God interiorly and to make deeply personal and emotionally relevant observations that will help us know him better.

Loving: Can we yet sit back and reflect on what we are reading, what we are hearing about God, what we see in creation around us, through natural beauty and the love of animals, and feel a connection with – even a fondness for –  God?  Maybe so… or, maybe not yet.  Maybe it comes and goes.  If all we do is believe he is there, eventually, we’ll find him… but only if we pay him attention and remember to include him.  He is just like any one of us who are not easily seen or heard above the others in the room.  Silence does not mean he is not interested and not participating in our lives.

Serving: Moving from the abstract toward the concrete, how can we enact our love of God by responding to what we know about him?  How are we to know what delights him, what needs he has, or what he might ask as a favor?  We can’t give God rides to the store, or buy him gifts, or make him dinner.  We can’t listen to his hard day’s work stories or let him stay an hour past when we told him we had to go.  However, in Matthew 25:35, Jesus says, “When you do it for the least among you, you do it for ME.”  We can love God by loving his proxy, the person in front of us.  Service becomes a tool to discover and express our love, not a mandate – but more on that next week!

Being Happy With God:  Relationships take time.  Few of us are ever lovestruck instantaneously, but rather, we cultivate familiarity and comfort by giving our attention to knowing others here and there until they becomes part of our everyday and less an awkward silence in our lives.  The same is true of God.  Loving God means feeling the comfort of his being silent with us the way we welcome our friends to be silent with us… and to let us comfortably be silent with them.

ACAT 3: Why are we here?

Now there is a loaded question, and one asked in many senses.  Why are we “here” – right here, right now, in these circumstances?  Why are “we” here – why us?  And why does God wire some people to have autism?  Is it preplanned?  Is it a deliberate system hack embedding a hidden superpower?  Is it a functional design flaw?  Is it a variation?  Or is it out of God’s hands, the result of some consequence of the imperfections we must accept living in a fallen world?

“God does not make mistakes!” is often heard where such questions arise.  We could rightly spend pages and pages looking at the theology of variation, of suffering and healing; and just as rightly strive to characterize autism as a state of being that includes both strength and weakness.  Autism does not predict happiness or success any more than eye color or shoe size, nor does it suggest propensity toward or immunity from the suffering that comes with the human condition.  Life is hard.  Life with autism is hard.  But so is life with size ten shoes.  Perhaps it is good to look at why God created any of us, and then consider how our individual variations fulfill that purpose.

Question Six of Lesson One of the Baltimore Catechism may be the best known, most-memorized line of the entire book.  Why did God create people? To know Him, to love Him, to serve Him in this world, and to be happy forever with Him in the next.

What does all that mean?  Why does that leave a lot of people feeling dissatisfied, unsettled, even angry?

Let’s be real.  If we read it with 21st century eyes, we are likely to think God is a narcissist who created us to admire Him and do His bidding.  And then, as we pull that thought out further, we consider all the things we are asked to do in the name of God and religion – like pray, go to Mass, and deny ourselves pleasures because God says they are sinful – and many of us want out before we even get started.  Add in the hard stuff, and it really starts to look like God has a cruel streak!

The answer to these, and all other such concerns, can be found by knowing God.  Like a list of ingredients, the item named first is done so to emphasize its importance: God made people, first and foremost, to know Him.  God fashioned our combination of body and soul so that we might consider who He is and what He is like.  No matter what issues or doubts we have, this is where we need to start.

How do we know God?  How do we KNOW anyone?  There are hundreds of ways, each with their own level of depth and detail.  The origin of the word “know” suggests it is an act of comparing and contrasting, matching up similarities and distinguishing between differences.   Knowledge can come through observation, pondering, reading, listening, discussing and doing.  For those of us on the spectrum, factual knowledge is usually our strength.  Knowing someone is a little more complicated: it requires proximity, social engagement and the ability to interpret the experience, whether through direct contact, observation or imagination.  It’s hard enough to do that with the people around us.  How can we engage with someone who is invisible, intangible and immeasurable?

Well, maybe it’s not THAT difficult.  Just last week, in spelling out attributes of the human soul, we said: “Each person has a unique, essential spirit… that is invisible, intangible and immeasurable – but is expressed through all that we feel and all that we do.”  Come to think of it, those invisible, intangible and immeasurable elements ARE how we know others!

AS WE CAN COME TO KNOW OTHERS, SO WE CAN COME TO KNOW GOD

Realistically, knowing others still relies on our five senses taking in data that is tangible and measurable.  By seeing the actions, hearing the words and participating in the actions of others, we come to know their character.  It takes significantly more detective work to know someone we cannot see, hear or physically engage with.

We really ought not to go any further in our assumptions or conclusions until we give this knowing a fair shot.  It may take us awhile.  What many people find helpful is not to look forward, but to look backward, back to a time when we might remember experiencing something that reminded us of God, or something someone said was what God is like.  Most of us have some kind of notion of “God” from our early childhood, either from what we are taught or what we pick up from what we’ve seen and heard along the way.  Many of us remember something that caused us to stop and feel a tremendous sense of awe, or wonder, or wish, that reached beyond ourselves and our senses into that unseen, unknown realm which we intuitively know is there but we just as intuitively know that nobody can see… yet.

If “knowing” is comparing and contrasting, we might do just as well to think of a time in our past when we felt like hiding, or shrinking away, or suddenly covering up something we love because we have a need to protect that love.  Those are the moments autistic people know best when someone else makes a comment or a statement (or worse) that pierces a moment of our most oblivious joy with the sharp pain of their ridicule or misunderstanding.

What is it that gets pierced?  What is it misunderstood, or ridiculed?  Is it us, our very selves?  Or is it that sense of joy, or insulation, or innocence, or immersion in something we love to the point of losing ourselves into it?  Most of us would agree it is not us, per se, but the love we feel which is ridiculed.

Maybe we cannot sense God when things are running smoothly and people are treating us well.  But when we are hurt, what is it that hurts?  What is it that we seek after when we hurt, in our earliest childhood? It is an invisible, intangible, immeasurable something.  Maybe we can’t define it, but boy, do we feel the pain when it gets injured.  That innocent wonder which is wounded when love is ridiculed – it certainly fits the description we’re going for.  Could that be God, or God’s likeness, or God’s echo?

Our closing point before we keep going next week: The progression of “why are we here?” goes from knowing God to loving God.  “LOVE” is not something that can be forced, faked or coerced.  The writers of the Catechism know that.  It follows that we cannot love anyone we do not know.  Before we get wrapped up in conclusions, let us stay where we need to be in the progression: let us strive to KNOW God, and trust that the rest will flow from there.  If we are facing an obstacle to engaging with our faith, go back to the beginning.  Worry about nothing else until we can say, confidently, that we KNOW God.  Nothing else will work until that connection is working.