Keeping an intense desire to see Christ

By Fr. Roy Cimagala

LET’S be like Mary Magdalene, a repentant sinner turned loyal disciple, who went early, even while it was still dark, to visit the tomb of Christ. When she found the tomb empty, she was, of course, heartbroken and went immediately to tell the other disciples. When the others came and saw the empty tomb, they could not do much, so they left. But Mary Magdalene stayed behind. That’s when she finally met the risen Christ. (cfr. Jn 20)

There is something in Mary Magdalene that is worth taking note of. More than that, there is something in her that is worth following. And that is none other than to have an intense desire to see Christ always, no matter what the conditions of our life are.

Like what happened in this gospel episode, Christ will always come to meet us and to give us some specific instructions. In this case of Mary Magdalene meeting Christ, she was told to tell the other disciples that he was going to ascend into heaven.

There should be no day, not even a moment, where we can have no concern about looking for Christ. This may require some drastic effort, but it really is something to learn since it is what is proper and ideal for our life. There is nothing in our life where Christ is not involved.

We have to be most wary of our tendency to think that in our life there are times and occasions when Christ can be ignored and left out. This usually happens in our daily affairs, in our routinary work, or in such human concerns like politics, business, recreation, etc. It’s precisely in these areas where we most need Christ, and where Christ, to be sure, is most interested to meet us and to guide us.

We therefore need to develop an intense desire to look for Christ. For this, we first of all should ask for God’s grace which is actually given to us in abundance. And from there, let’s go through some systematic plan of life that will nourish and strengthen our constant and intimate relationship with Christ, a relationship that should involve our entire self—body and soul, feelings, emotions and passions down to our very instincts, as well as our mind and heart.

It should be a plan that should obviously include prayer in all its forms—vocal, liturgical, ejaculatory, mental, contemplative, etc. Our life of prayer should be such that even when we are immersed in the things of the world due to our work and our temporal duties, we would still be aware of God’s presence, and it is doing God’s will that should always motivate us.

The plan definitely should include practices that will foster our spirit of sacrifice, penance and purification, given the obvious fact that no matter how much we try to be good, we would always be hounded by our weaknesses and the temptations around, and the possibility of falling into sin is high. This spirit of sacrifice would help us discipline ourselves in order to rally all our faculties for the service of God and of everybody else.

The plan should include a daily effort of ascetical struggle where, aside from fighting evil, we should aim at growing in our love for God and others, by developing the virtues as well as always strengthening them. It should help us to develop a growing concern for the others, doing personal apostolate wherever we are and whatever the occasion and circumstance may be.

Email: roycimagala@gmail.com