Based on a chapter called the Final Judgement in Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini’ s book “Piccolo Manuale della Speranza – Vivere con Fiducia il Nostro Tempo” [A Small manual of Hope – Living our lives in Trust]. Giunti Editore S.p.A. Milano, 2012.
One day, he got into a boat with his disciples and said to them “Let us cross over to the other side of the lake”. So, they put to sea.
Luke 8, 22-25
Two questions emerge from this gospel episode, which tells the story of the time when Jesus and his disciples were crossing the lake and were hit by a violent storm. While Jesus was sound asleep, apparently oblivious of the danger, the disciples panicked. They went to wake him up shouting that the boat was going to sink. Jesus then calmed the wind and the waves.
The first question concerns Jesus. Who is this person that, until now appeared to be a normal person subject to the laws of nature like everyone else, but that now orders the elements to calm down and they obey him? The question of Jesus’ real identity is the major thread in the whole of Luke’s gospel, and that eventually culminates in the recognition of Jesus as the Son of God during the crucifixion.
There is another question raised by this episode, one that concerns us very closely: where is our faith? Are we real believers, do we have faith and thrust in Jesus even when he appears to be asleep while all kinds of storms hit our life and we are afraid that we will be going down? How do we react when such events happen?
Above all, what are the tempests in our life? The first that come to mind are existential, personal difficulties – failures, illness, failed personal relationships, business projects that go wrong. Many circumstances may push us to consider this question and, for us who believe, push us to have faith in Jesus and be sure that if He is on the boat with us nothing bad can happen to us.
Besides these personal difficulties, there are also other storms that we can define as “collective” ones and others we can describe as being “ideological”. In the former case, we can include those circumstances where it becomes very easy to break the law and commit crimes, often with our actions dictated by the circumstances. It is what is sometimes termed as “sin structures”, that is, those situations where it is difficult not to sin because of the way most people around you think, and the social mores tempt you to let go. These are bad blizzards in which we not only go on a personal basis but also as a group, as communities. It is essential however that during these difficult times we keep our faith in Jesus, proclaim the salvation truths we believe in, certain that Jesus, even if apparently absent, is on the boat with us and could at any moment wake up and command the menacing elements to stop tormenting His people.
There is a third type of storm, less tangible and hence more dangerous. This is the one we have termed “ideological storm “. It occurs when a person does not even have an inkling that he/she is hurting others as her/his moral values have been totally dulled. In a book written more than 30 years ago by a modern philosopher, Karl Jaspers, he compares the spiritual condition of our times with a huge machine that is moving but without a driver. Our society is divided in many independent segments or silos, all essentially unrelated to one another. They share no moral or ethical values and even the segments themselves, internally, lack any such standards. They only have rules. Not ethical ones, but only instructions for use like home appliances have. The direction that man is taking has become obscured. No one really knows where we are going because the fundamental ethical values and the perennial truths that underpinned society have been put in cold freeze. Hence, we are lost, not knowing how to make life’s choices except those to have fun and pass the time in any way we can.
The more we accept to conform with this movement, that is to let ourselves be led by subtle persuaders – like the Internet or TV – the higher will be the number of people who are disoriented and conformist. If in these situations there is also a rejection of religious values, this leads to the rejection of the concept of sin and an estrangement from anything divine. God becomes irrelevant and man’s inherent dignity is no longer recognized.
Hence, the acceptance of reality is no longer equivalent to the acceptance of God’s will but becomes the search for a suitable equilibrium between one’s personal interests and that of his group. When we ignore the perennial truths about God and about man, when we reject the idea that this is world that God wanted, then there will be utter confusion, and everything becomes permissible if it is to my advantage.
This gospel episode asks us to delve deeply not only in our own personal worries or about those of our society, but more so to watch out for the wrong perspectives that may dictate our life’s important choices. We must work hard to correct and adopt the proper way of seeing things, to react in a Christian way to others. We must make the truth stand out. We must negate all ways of thinking about our world that exclude the divine.
Jesus, on the boat, did not intervene immediately. He allowed the disciples to do their part to fend off the wind and waves. Jesus asks the same things from us; to face our “storms” with courage and faith. The Lord will not disappoint us. He will repay us with peace of mind and heart. Then we will no longer be at the mercy of the whims of our time and fashion, nor of the obscurity of our times, but we will be able to find and follow the way of the Lord.