This is why it is not hard to see that this group who are so tied to the yoke of slavery being touted by the secularist agenda as ‘freedom’ is in a worse position spiritually than Israel was either at the time of their bondage in Egypt prior to their redemption from it or Israel’s position at the time of Christ’s birth being an oppressed tribal nation swaying under the might of Roman armies. I say this because whilst Israel was oppressed and was crushed so heavily under the weight of this oppression, they had God on their side and He was looked to fervently as their deliverer, their Messiah, their Redeemer. This latter group in our time are the “nones”, they have no God to call upon in their hearts because either they have erased Him from their identity and life or it is that their backstory has, whether it be tied to chaotic upbringing or being naiively led astray by misguiding circumstances of their formal education. For they are even more lost than the crowd whom Jesus saw from afar and whom He had pity on because He saw they were like sheep without a shepherd. See, they were like sheep because they still conscientiously belonged to God’s flock and had not altogether given up on their Maker whereas these people in the now time – the nones – the secularist ideologues, and the lumpen masses that follow them and cleave to their atheistic agendas are like sheep who have been cunningly deceived by the father of lies, the ancient serpent, into believing “they are as good as ‘goats’ and that is as good as it gets” – are brainwashed to think they can happily remain as such, all the while their hearts are numbed to the way out of this pernicious deceit that comes through embracing a softness of heart, an unflurried compassion that recognizes the intrinsic need for a Good Shepherd to lead and guide them out of the falsehood of thinking they are ‘goats’ by helping them recognize their innate but submerged desire to become the sheep they were created to be again, the lambs who will want to be content and find green pastures by following the voice of the only One who knows how to lead them to such places.
This terrible phenomenon of blindness to the stark reality of their spiritual plight is the casualty of wandering aimlessly down the road to perdition all the while groping for ‘help’ from those who are equally as aimless and directionless but who nonetheless believe that a finite materialist-oriented solution to the problems they face will ultimately save them from their ills. In the secularist vision the techniques and means to supposedly creating a society of equity become ends in and of themselves for to these people there is no greater purpose to life than to build one’s vision around implementing these techniques and means as though they are “the be all and end all”, the only hope of salvation for life here on earth.
I know what that is like because I was once there amongst that aimless throng myself although I perhaps believed that I “believed in God”, although my heart (little did I realize it then) and the spiritual reality of my life was far away from him, for while I consciously did not view secular society as having all the answers, I nonetheless kowtowed to the spiritual authority of secularism in my life without being aware of it, until one day, God sent me hurtling rockbottom and that woke my senses on all levels to what was actually going on. It was you could say, a type of illumination of conscience which flicked the switch for me.
The archbishop went on to say that beliefs about creating human solutions exclusionary to a knowledge of God are not necessarily always done proactively and deliberately but can be seen to be an evolutionary result of a falling away much like that which Jesus alludes to in the Gospels when He says that sheep can just naiively wander away from the fold sometimes without thinking about it. And for me personally, there is no better comparison than the state in life of being on autopilot.
In no way did Gomez deny that many people in these secularist social movements were well-meaning. He observed that
Clearly, this is a powerful and attractive narrative for millions of people in American society and in societies across the West. In fact, many of America’s leading corporations, universities, and even public schools are actively promoting and teaching this vision.
This story draws its strength from the simplicity of its explanations — the world is divided into innocents and victims, allies and adversaries.
But this narrative is also attractive because, as I said earlier, it responds to real human needs and suffering. People are hurting, they do feel discriminated against and excluded from opportunities in society.
We should never forget this. Many of those who subscribe to these new movements and belief systems are motivated by noble intentions. They want to change conditions in society that deny men and women their rights and opportunities for a good life.
Of course, we all want to build a society that provides equality, freedom, and dignity for every person. But we can only build a just society on the foundation of the truth about God and human nature.
This whole thing is immensely convoluted and what you have is the contemporary phenomena of the lumpen masses being aware they are in the midst of a battle but they remain lumpen (unconscious of their true state of spiritual oppression) because they do not as yet understand it from the angle it ultimately is best understood from and that is the standpoint of a spiritual battle.
Whilst the National Catholic Register (NCR) has affirmed the many positives of Archbishop Gomez’s address, it disappointingly descended into a tardy/hacknied castigation of the Liberation Theology initiative which btw both St Oscar Romero and Gustavo Gutierrez were proponents of and which also has much to offer the unique situation in Latin America due to its inception there and because it was attempting to interpret, articulate, and respond to the peculiarities of violence and systemic tyranny that has often plagued that part of the Americas throughout much of the 20th & 21st centuries. Further to, Liberation Theology is an example of a quintessentially Catholic approach to ecumenism that exudes a distinct Latin American quality which gives it that manifold compatability with meeting the pastoral needs of the region and it is one example of a faith-centered social movement which is at the same time spiritually informed by and anchored to the history and events of the Latin American locale.
Michael Warsaw, in writing for the National Catholic Register (NCR) quoted Archbishop Gomez as saying:
Our Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI warned that the eclipse of God leads to the eclipse of the human person. Again and again he told us: when we forget God, we no longer see the image of God in our neighbor.
While this is so unerringly true as our most turbulent 20th century history has so grotesquely testified to this fact, it is equally worth remembering that Pope Benedict XVI exhorted the whole Church in his brilliant encyclical Deus Caritas Est towards embracing wholeheartedly and living out with unmitigated zeal and ardour the preferential option for the poor by never forgetting “love for widows and orphans, prisoners, and the sick and needy of every kind, is as essential as the ministry of the sacraments and preaching of the Gospel” § 22.
The preferential option for the poor essentially concerns the need for pastoral governance to embody this preferential option as a core credo or charism of its sacred duty in light of it’s apostolic mission and role. Where it doesn’t, it miserably fails in its vocational mandate. It’s a sad reality that far too many parishes have gone down this road of not authentically living up to this vocational mandate. While most if not all have some kind of auxillary committee or service body that exists to facilitate these apostolic works, all too many of these service bodies are at the margins of parish life and quintessentially remain merely auxillary. Most of the time the pastor of the parish has very little to do with these programs and at most will keep an occasional eye open in view of their activities.
The Liberation Theology approach however, takes a radically different ministerial action relative to the role of the pastor and other parish leadership in response to this mandate of preferential option for the poor. These leaders openly embrace the servanthood model taught and exemplified by Jesus in that they drop everything else when needs arise and are on a daily basis willing to devote the time and energy of a blood brother or sister to be with and amongst the outcasts and most marginalized of the parish for the good of both their material and spiritual development. In most parishes in Australia for example, this kind of thing is a rarity. And this is the problem I would like to draw your attention to in the now time of our Plenary Council here in this country. If there is to be genuine Church reform here, it must begin with and have as a focal point of continuity this kind of infrastructural & functional revolution. It’s all well and good for pastors and parish leadership to direct newcomers and other parishioners from the pulpit by telling them the likes of “Btw, there are heaps of apostolic initiatives happening within this parish. Go get yourselves acquainted with them……” end of story insofar as orienteering, induction, and introduction goes. That is just way too impersonal and out of touch with the tangible needs of being welcomed, loved, accepted, and ministered to that each person, (and more especially those who do feel a strong and persistent sense of alienation within the parish), actually needs.
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Keywords: Nones, Good Shepherd, Lumpen, Liberation Theology, Pope Beneict XVI, Spiritual Battle
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