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From Sunday Examiner (Hong Kong)April 4, 2010
While a detailed, scientific knowledge of theology may have
little to do with the intensity of lived faith or the commitment to living a
holy life, it does have a lot to do with presenting Christianity in the public
conversation and the ability to relate our faith to the culture in which we are
immersed.
This Easter weekend, as over 3,000 adults line up to receive the sacrament of
baptism in churches around Hong Kong, questions are being asked about how well
they have been prepared for the occasion and, maybe the unspoken question is,
how can we move beyond the sacramental to the life of witness to Christ in the
world.
If each catechumen were asked why they have asked for baptism, no doubt there
would not be any one standard answer. Some people come to faith years before
taking the formal step towards baptism. Some come on the inspiration of the
lived faith of a friend, acquaintance or family member, some are searching for a
meaning in life, while others may be looking for answers, perhaps to questions
they do not even know how to ask.
However, when they arrive at the baptismal font, they stand at the point where
faith and culture interact, where the basic story of Christian faith, as told in
the cultural setting of another time and place through the scriptures, must be
translated into the God-inspired values of the culture in which they live, some
of which have been covered with the dust of neglect or the ignominy of abuse.
A youth worker put it this way. “They are seeking to trust the culture in which
they are immersed, a culture which bombards with the seductive lure of the false
gods of consumerism and instant gratification. The values of the scripture are a
key to doing this.”
Some people come to faith years before taking the formal step towards baptism. Some come on the inspiration of the lived faith of a friend
She described the challenge as encountering self, to discover the values we want
to be dominant in our person; then encountering Jesus, as the living inspiration
of the core of that value; and ultimately, expressing the experience in the
everyday language of our life. Since the faith of the laity is essentially a
faith for the marketplace, not the sanctuary, it develops by doing the practical
before the theoretical. “The desire for faith is born in the activity,” the
youth worker says. “The faith develops in the reflection.”
She described this through the experience of a young man who began doing prison
visitation. “At first he said, ‘I want to do something good.’ Then he graduated
to, ‘I want to help them.’ Then, ‘I am working for justice.’ However, finally he
realized that the true value of what he was doing transcended even his own
being, as he said, ‘I do it to be part of the kingdom of God’.”
This is the point where an American bishop described the mission of the laity as
the manifestation of their priestly soul, or what St. Peter described as the
royal priesthood, which witnesses and ministers in the lived culture of everyday
life.
It is the point where the Taiwanese bishops noted the challenge to be
theologically literate is important, in order that Catholics may be better able
to give an account of the hope they witness to in the public square.
