Sr. Terezia Brichtová OP
In the Italian “New Dictionary of Spirituality” (its Czech edition is currently being prepared at the Carmelite Publishing House), the entry for “CRISIS” (author: L. De Candido) spans seventeen pages.
With this word, we often have an unpleasant feeling of something unfortunate. Economic crisis, vocation crisis, family crisis, etc. In the end, we find solace in the thought that it is, in fact, a crisis of growth.
However, according to the etymology of this term, its meaning is multifaceted. It is derived from the Greek verb “krino”, which means: I judge, I decide, I distinguish, I interpret, I evaluate. The most accurate Czech translation of the noun “crisis” would probably be “test.” When we disregard its unpleasant connotation from the time of totalitarianism, it has a profoundly positive religious meaning. Crisis, test, is related to the free will of man. The first one who tests is God. He places His creature before a choice, before a certain decision, and He has been doing so since creation. He started right away with the angels, continued with our ancestors, then came Abraham, Moses, the prophets. (How they were able to resist God's will!) Yes, even the Lord Jesus Himself underwent temptations, that is, crises, in the desert. And all people up to this day.
Crisis is not outside of us; crisis is within man. Whenever he has to make a decision – between good and evil, between good and better, between love and self-love – a crisis, a critical situation, arises for him. Man stands at a crossroads, at a junction. Before him stands the Judge. But this Judge is not a sadist; He does not maliciously watch how it will end, He does not lurk for His victim to “catch her in the act” and turn her over immediately...
No, He waits with a trembling heart, He is supremely active, offering man a helping hand to withstand the trial. And when that succeeds, the joy in heaven! Does not the Savior Himself say this?
The Beatitudes are also critical moments. You do not have to, but if you want to be poor, if you want to have a pure heart... blessed are you, you are blessed, happy! Makarioi hoi ptochoi, hoi katharoi... says the Greek text in Saint Matthew. But it feels as if alongside it we perceive an unspoken addition – MAKARIOS. When you choose the beatitude, there is another blessed one. Yes, God – Love, is blessed, happy, when He sees that His creature has freely chosen the better path, the path of life.
This was understood by Saint Therese of Lisieux when she wanted to make Jesus happy, she wanted to make Him joyful.
Is it childishness; can human emotions be attributed to God? Father Cantalamessa ponders this in his book “Living Under the Rule of Christ” and essentially claims this: man is created in the image of God, but not just because he has reason and will. Where does the affectivity, the sensitive heart come from in him? Well, everything that is good and noble in man can only be such because it exists in some way in God as an idea, a model, that it has emerged from Him as His reflection. When we speak of “anthropomorphic” representations of God, could we not rightly speak even more substantially of the “theomorphism” of man even in the aspect of affectivity?
And so daily, when we go through small or big CRISES, tests, our Heavenly Father offers us His hand (or the grace of His Spirit), and daily we can, by choosing beatitude, cause our Lord to be blessed, MAKARIOS.
