Expect the world to end badly

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

Chaplain

Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE)

Talamban, Cebu City

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com

THIS is, of course, not meant to scare us nor to have a pessimistic view of life. Rather it is to be realistic, given the way we are and the way the world in general is, what with all our limitations and defects, even if we cannot deny that we are also full of good potentials.

Christ already warned us about this. “If this day you only knew what makes for peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. For the days are coming upon you when your enemies will raise a palisade against you, they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides. They will smash you to the ground and your children within you…” (Lk 19,42-44)

We have to learn to prepare for this eventuality. If Christ, who is God made man and who is our Redeemer, could not help but had to offer his life to save us, how can we think that our life and the world in general would take a different path?

Remember Christ telling his disciples, “A servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also.” (Jn 15,20) So we have to expect to have the same fate as Christ. And that means that we have to prepare for the worst scenario. The world will end badly. That’s already a given, a truth of our faith.

What we have to do is to always have a proper focus in life. Especially these days when we are easily carried away by many distracting elements, what with all we can devour in the social media, videos, etc., we need to remind ourselves quite strongly that we have to be well focused on what is truly essential in our life.

We have to remind ourselves that our life here on earth is actually a testing and training ground for what God, our Father and Creator, wants us to be, that is, that we be his image and likeness, adopted children of his, meant to share in his very own life in eternity.

Everything that we are, we have and we do in this life should be made as an occasion, material or reason for us to attain that God-given goal for us. Everything should be related and referred to him. Simply being on our own and doing things on our own, without any reference to God, is an anomaly. It would surely end in tragedy even if we feel we are having a good time in our life.

This fundamental truth about ourselves should be proclaimed time and time again because we are notorious for taking it for granted, if not for violating it. We have to remind everyone that we have to take the necessary steps for us to be aware of this truth and to live according to it.

Obviously, what is truly helpful in this regard is that everyone learns really how to pray, how to engage God in a continuing conversation, or at least to have an abiding awareness of his presence and interventions in our life.

That is why prayer is indispensable in our life. It is what would make us aware of who we really are, what the real purpose of our life on earth is, how we ought to behave in the different situations and circumstances of our life. It is what would help us to refer everything to God, what would keep us in the proper focus.