Cristologia

Christianity, which is the following of Christ, consists of an entire life which is converted into a true sacrifice. This is not reduced to acts which are properly “religious”, like prayer or the sacraments, but rather the entire existence of the Christian should be converted into a form of living for God. Secularity, understood as the human and mundane condition of our life, is the substance of living as a Christian.

In the face of the hells created by violence, oppression, and repression, the victims of injustice seem to have no other alternative than fight (action-reaction) or flight (silent submission). This booklet explores the “third way” of Jesus, which goes far beyond those two options. This “third way” is the path of active non-violence, a path that requires great lucidity, creativity, faith, and constancy.

Often we come to the Exercises thinking about ourselves, perhaps even a bit anguished at what we believe might turn into a new inspection of our interior lives. If this is the case with you, then you will certainly be relieved to know that the focus of the points for prayer that you will find here is not on ourselves but on Jesus, and more concretely it is on the Jesus presented to us in theGospel of Luke.

The author of this booklet,  an expert in Ratzinger's theology, has in a few pages and through the use of clear, intelligible language, attempted to put the Christology of J. Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, into context, from the perspective of his theological biography. This background is necessary if we want to avoid relying on the use of stereotypes, and if we want to fully appreciate what is being said in its correct context, at both a theological and ecclesiastical level.

The same fear that Jesus Christ can inspire in us today he inspired in those days, not only in the Jewish religious authorities, but also in his own disciples.  Among these latter, however, the attraction of Jesus turned out to be stronger than the fear.  Something of that nature is what is asked of us today: that same confident following of Jesus which dares to hear the oft-repeated words, “Do not be afraid”.

Dorothy Day is perhaps the most important figure in twentieth century North American Catholicism.A layperson, a mother, a grandmother, a worker, a revolutionary and a deeply religious woman, Dorothy offers us a new way of life for these difficult times at the start of the twenty-first century.

Believers or non-believers, we all should make an effort to oil the joints of our common existence, if we want to avoid sliding down a slope that could end in an unprecedented catastrophe. This booklet describes the privileged place that the encounter with God has in our relations with others, since contemplation is at the heart of interhuman relations and so is one of the chief characteristics of Christianity.