GOING BEYOND BORDERS: The Liberating Path of Moral Integrity

We live in an age where morality is at its peak—or rather, its pit—of decadence. More than ever we see it plunging deeper into the quagmire faster than we can pull it up. In our country alone we are faced with a never-ending charade of graft and corruption not only in the government but even in private sectors as well. Modernization and secularization are invading our culture to the point of endangering the existence of the values of our Catholic Christian heritage. We cannot fail to mention the damaging effects that the sex education program is proliferating among the youth.

Morality is slowly being pushed into the background as people are beginning to see that those who don’t live up to moral guidelines seem to be happier, seem to be more fulfilled, and seem to be more liberated.

There are those who still feel within the depths of their souls that there is still a need to follow a path that leads to true happiness and freedom. But they are often left with a confusing hodgepodge of beliefs, ideologies, and philosophies in life before them.

There are some who have become indifferent, closing in on themselves, failing to interact with the world. Some have become fanatical in their views that they fail to bend to right reason.

Yet there are more people in the “middle” than those in the “extremes”. They are not too devout as to be called ‘holy’ and ‘living saints’; nor are they so deeply plunged into an immoral life as to be dubbed as reprobates. They are simply “normal”, “ordinary”. They “go with the flow”. They are very relativistic in their beliefs and principles. If truth be told, they aren’t normal. They are actually confused whether they know it—or choose not to acknowledge it—or not.

Multiple Standard Morality Disorder

Just because we haven’t done any serious crime, like killing someone, we think we are living a typical morally integrated life. But if we closely look at our hearts and our actions, we will find that we are self-deceived.

We believe in God, the Father Almighty; Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, our Savior; and the Holy Spirit, One God, Three Persons in the Holy Trinity. We believe in the Blessed Virgin Mary and the angels and saints. But, we also believe in feng shui. We put statues of Buddha, the green money frog, and bagwas in our home to ward off evil spirits and bring in good luck. We believe in one, holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church, but we seek out fortune-tellers for a palm or tarot card reading.

We acknowledge the Pro-life stand on abortion and euthanasia, but we can’t put our foot down on artificial birth control and contraception because we believe that our so called ‘desires’ (lusts, to be exact) have to be satiated rather than controlled.

On the other hand in our social life, we are quick to condemn politicians involved in graft and corruption cases, but we can’t condemn ourselves each time we make ‘little’ bribes to get what we want and get ‘some’ office supplies to use at home.

We pick and choose whatever we like from different beliefs and principles and disregard those that we don’t like. More often than not, we don’t even live up to the very ‘pickings’ of our ‘collection’.

We have our own set of notions as to what is right or wrong. But, most of the time we excuse ourselves when we perform the very act which we condemn in others. Our very actions betray the ‘morals’ which we have chosen to follow.

The result of such a mindset is a relativistic attitude. Truth and Morals become subject to our personal preference. Truth and Morality are inseparable from the teachings of Christ. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. If we wish to attain eternal life, we cannot follow our own way, we cannot claim to be our own truth, nor can we live our own life according to our whims and fancies.

Let’s picture ourselves in a bowling alley. God has already placed before us the firm, hard and unwavering bowling ball of moral integrity through the Commandments and the precepts and teachings of the Church. But some find it too heavy, too restricting, too impersonal and wanting in creativity and style. And so they opt to choose a bag of multicolored marbles and roll it down the alley. But they don’t hit the pins because the marbles scatter even before reaching the target.

Only in the end do they realize that their moral life has gone haywire. They are in a deep-seated stage of a ‘multiple standard morality disorder’ that seems beyond repair. They find themselves on the brink of ‘going marbles’ because their life has gone out of balance.

But God calls us to freedom. God calls us to go beyond the borders of our prison—a prison which we have helped the devil to make. God is giving us the most beautiful, the quickest, and the surest means to be free from the shackles of sin and the chains of our incongruent belief systems. He has given us Jesus Christ, Our Saviour and Divine Brother and the Blessed Virgin Mary, our sweet and dear Mother. She who was preserved from the stain of sin will help us and intercede for us.

In, with, and through Mary let us leave the old sinful road to the liberating path of a fully-integrated moral life.

Beyond Borders

We read in the Book of Chronicles that a man named Jabez, a descendant of Judah, called upon the God of Israel praying, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from hurt and harm!” (cfr. 1 Chr. 4:9-10)

Jabez is an image of a man seeking the ways of God in order to live a moral and upright life. In his short and simple prayer we find the necessary steps on how to go beyond our borders.

“Oh that You would bless me…”

1.       Get Out of the Noise—and Pray.

How do we call upon God’s blessings? On our own we can practically do nothing. But our God is a loving and gracious God. He always makes the first step to reach out to us. He gives us the necessary graces to draw near to Him. He calls us and we must listen to Him.

But in these times we live amidst multiple distractions, each calling up our attention. The noise, the humdrum of our busy and preoccupied lifestyle—these are hindrances to the voice of God who wishes to speak to us.

Once, the prophet Elijah went to the mountain to look for the Lord. He wasn’t in the great wind, or in the earthquake, nor was He in the fire. Then the sound of sheer silence came. Elijah wrapped himself in a mantle and found the Lord there. (cfr. 2 Kgs 19:11-13).

But not all of us have the opportunity to go to the mountains or stay in a retreat house. The most we can do is go to a church and visit Him in the Blessed Sacrament. All we need to do is to get into the depths of our soul in a silent atmosphere. God speaks in the silence of our souls. There we can listen to His voice in our conscience. There we must do the most necessary thing: to pray.

And if we feel as if we have forgotten to pray, let us draw to our Blessed Mother. Like a little child, let us ask her to teach us how to pray once more.

Now that we are in her arms, she will guide us and help us along the way.

2.       Look into the Mirror

Before we get our acts straight, we need to look into the mirror and see where we’ve messed up. This means examining our conscience. (A suitable guide based on the Ten Commandments and precepts of the Church will be very helpful.)

We must see and point out where we are weak and where we need a major overhaul.

Have I rendered proper worship to God? Have I compromised it by dabbling into other beliefs, most especially superstitious and pagan ones? What are these?

Is it in my collected principles which run contrary to Christian morality?

Am I self-righteous? Am I a hypocrite? In what way? Are my actions consistent with what I believe or say?

How about my relationship with others? Have I been good to them? Am I a burden to them?

“Enlarge my border…”

3.       Be Free and Get Healed!

Now that we have pointed out our sore spots, we need to get them cured. We need to go to confession.

Jesus Himself instituted this sacrament so that we who were once dead may rise to life with Him (cfr. Eph 2:3-4). It is Christ Himself who forgives us and absolves us from our sins through the priest.

No amount of “praying-over” and “miracle crusades” can equal to the healing and cleansing power of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Here we are washed in the Blood of the Lamb of God. We are freed and delivered from the clutches of Satan. Only in this sacrament can we break free from our once self-fenced walls and go into the verdant pastures of a moral life of grace.

Then we must go to Jesus once more in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Here we receive Him Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Our soul, once thin and unkempt, will be nourished and restored to vigor.

“That Your Hand might be with me…”

4.       Put on New Clothes

Having been restored to grace, we must do our part to sustain and live it perseveringly. We need to pray constantly that He will always guide us in this new path and that we may stick to it.

We have already put away with the old clothing of iniquity. We must now put on new clothing—new norms of behavior based on Christian morality.

“The highest norm of human life is the divine law—eternal, objective and universal—whereby God orders, directs and governs the entire universe and all the ways of the human community by a plan conceived in wisdom and love.” (Declaration on Religious Freedom, n.3)

St. Thomas Aquinas says that if our actions conform to God’s law, we are moral and will attain happiness. We Catholics are truly blessed because God has given us the Catholic Church to guide us through.

“And that You would keep me from hurt and harm.”

5.       Put on the Armour of God

St. Paul admonishes us, “Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise, making the most of the time, because the days are evil. So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.” (Eph. 5:15-17)

 He further adds, “Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power. Put on the whole armour of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armour of God, so that you may be able to withstand on that evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand therefore, and fasten the belt of truth around your waist, and put on the breastplate of righteousness. As shoes for your feet put on whatever will make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace. With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

 Pray in the Spirit at all times in every prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert and always persevere in supplication for all the saints.” (Eph. 6:10-18)

“God writes straight in crooked lines,” so the saying goes. He knows how to make everything, even our past life, work for our own good, that is, our salvation. Once we have been set on the right path, it is our duty—our loving duty—to write legibly within the lines He has bound us.

God loves us that is why He has given us His only Son Jesus Christ to save us from our sins; Mary, to be our Mother who unfailingly intercedes for us together with the angels, especially our guardian angel and all the saints; the Ten Commandments, the teachings and the precepts of the Church, and the Pope so that we may not lose our way in this earthly sojourn and that we may live a morally integrated life.

It takes time, much prayer and hard work on our part to please God by an upright life in the midst of a world going downhill. It takes much courage not to conform to the ways of the world when everybody’s doing it. It takes much sacrifice to conquer our old ways and live a life of moral integrity. It seems burdensome and difficult but we must have faith if we truly wish to do this out of love.

John the Apostle has this to say, “For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith.” (1 Jn. 5:3-4)

6.       Walk the Talk

Jabez prayed, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from hurt and harm!”

What was God’s response? The Book of Chronicles simply says, “And God granted what he asked.” (cfr. 1 Chr. 4:10)

St. John admonishes us, “Let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have boldness before God; and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey his commandments and do what pleases him.” (1 Jn 3:18-22)

Finally, St. Paul tells us, “Now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom. 6:22-23)

Friends, let us take Mary as our Advocate and she will surely help us go beyond the border. All we need is to make the first step and the rest will inevitably unfold.

Be free!

(Written for Promaria Magazine, when I was still a Franciscan friar.)