Charity Should Inspire Our Pursuit for Knowledge

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

INDEED! Otherwise, our pursuit for knowledge not motivated by and oriented toward love for God and others would only be a pure exercise of self-indulgence, prone to many other anomalies like pride, vanity, lust, greed, envy, etc. that definitely would undermine our true identity and dignity as persons and children of God who are meant for loving.

That’s simply because, as St. Paul once said: “Knowledge puffs up, but charity edifies.” (1 Cor 8,1) And again, that’s because the very dynamic of knowing is for the known object to be in the knower, thus puffing him up, while that of loving is for the lover to be in the beloved, thus, edifying him.

We need to make everyone aware of this basic necessity of ours, explaining its why’s and wherefore’s. But even more importantly, let us find ways of how everyone, especially the young ones, can feel and act upon this necessity. It’s quite obvious that the pursuit of knowledge nowadays is motivated only by worldly and temporal reasons.

The pursuit for knowledge should always be understood as an effort that is linked with God, with his will, plans and designs for us. It should be related to this truth of our faith that we and everything we know and discover are meant for a supernatural life.

It should not be done independently of God, and much less contrary to his laws. We should never think the knowledge we accumulate, no matter how mundane, has no relation to God.

This is because everything comes from God and belongs to God, and everything is under a divine plan that is of course completely mysterious to us. Yet, in spite of the mystery, we are capable of knowing and understanding at least parts of it.

Our problem, of course, is that we often pursue knowledge fully at our own designs, with our own motives and purposes. We hardly relate it to God and his plans.

We sometimes even go to the extent of thinking that God has no business in this effort, or worse, that there’s really no God, and that we are just on our own to know and discover whatever we want and whatever we can.

This charity-inspired pursuit for knowledge, of course, is not easy to achieve. We have to contend with so many difficulties. First, there are our weaknesses, like our laziness and our attachment to worldly things. They hinder us in our effort to connect our knowledge of things with God

There also are temptations from the devil and the world itself that seek to bind us to our own world, keeping us quite egotistic and increasingly unmindful of God and of others.

Besides, the objective connection itself between our knowledge and God is charged with mysteries that can easily lend itself to confusion and indifference. It can lead us to get discouraged at the dark prospect of ever knowing it clearly.

But if our mindset is to know and discover this connection and relation, sooner or later we will see it more and more clearly. Obviously, we have to be patient, pursue the effort without let up, and use all the means to make this possible.

We, for example, need to reflect and pray. This practice has to be deeply ingrained in us. Our problem is that very few people realize this need. Many prefer simply to be very active and to enjoy things.

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com