He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

Passionist spirituality is centered on the image and salvific purpose of the Cross throughout the development of humanity and creation. Beyond the vast letters and the diary that St. Paul of the Cross wrote the only booklet that we know he ever produced was an intense spiritual exercise based on the devotion to Christ’s passion which he called “Mystical Death”. In this work and in some of his letters St. Paul of the Cross, the founder of the Passionist (not to be confused with St. Paul the Apostle), centers much of his spiritual direction on a mystical transformation that we are all privy to and from which we grow ever deeper into our relationship with Christ. This mystical transformation occurs to us within our life journey when moments of great suffering happen to us. For St. Paul of the Cross all suffering has the capacity to bring us closer to the redemptive suffering of the Cross, this is the part of the journey that he calls “Mystical death”. It is not an actual death but in a sense it is a part of us that is dying. We let go of something that we have been used to or comfortable with. When we can allow this suffering to transform us and to be redefined by our suffering in way that will change our actions, behaviors and way of thinking  then we begin to participate in a “Divine Rebirth”. In our life journey major events like suffering will give us mini passion and resurrection moments that can transform us towards God and Christ if we allow ourselves to be transformed into a greater existence.

But Fr. Thomas Berry, CP also suggested that the “Wisdom of the Cross” as defined in Colossians challenges us to see the wisdom of suffering as it impacts creation as well. Since humans have the gift of consciousness then we are called to reflect on “a certain coherence between the grandeur of the universe and the majesty of the cross of Christ”.  In the following passage from his article titled “The Wisdom of the Cross” Fr. Berry applies the Passionist spiritually of “mystical death” and “divine rebirth” to the evolving universe.

This coordination can be understood quite clearly when we consider the central role of sacrifice in the redemption process and then observe the central role of sacrifice in the unfolding of the emergent universe. We might even say that the redemptive suffering of Christ lies in the line of creative transformation moments revealed to us in the universe throughout the entire course of its history.

Fr. Thomas Berry integrated the Christian principle of redemptive suffering to the contemporary situation of environmental devastation. In doing this he challenged us to see how we can transform our own relationship with creation. Our world is in the midst of suffering and we bear some responsibility for this suffering. Catholic social teaching has called us to reflect on these environmental issues and to transform our relationship with the earth in order to respond to this level of suffering that will have an impact on us all.

We are called to address the issue of toxic chemical pollutions:

Nor can the moral character of development exclude respect for the beings which constitute the natural world…. We all know that the direct or indirect result of industrialization is, ever more frequently, the pollution of the environment, with serious consequences for the health of the population.-  Pope John Paul II, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, #34

We are called to address the issues of global warming and climate change:

At its core, global climate change is not about economic theory or political platforms, nor about partisan advantage or interest group pressures. It is about the future of God’s creation and the one human family. It is about protecting both “the human environment” and the natural environment…. We seek to offer a word of caution and a plea for genuine dialogue as the United States and other nations face decisions about how best to respond to the challenges of global climate change. – USCCB, Global Climate Change, #3

We are called to halt environmental degradation like deforestation, desertification and mountaintop removal:

The way humanity treats the environment influences the way it treats itself, and vice versa…. Every violation of solidarity and civic friendship harms the environment, just as environmental deterioration in turn upsets relations in society. Nature, especially in our time, is so integrated into the dynamics of society and culture that by now it hardly constitutes an independent variable. –Pope Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate, #51

We are also called to address the situation of water scarcity, a situation that is of particular concern for our own basic existence:

Similar attention also needs to be paid to the world-wide problem of water and to the global water cycle system, which is of prime importance for life on earth and whose stability could be seriously jeopardized by climate change…. The ecological problem must be dealt with not only because of the chilling prospects of environmental degradation on the horizon; the real motivation must be the quest for authentic world-wide solidarity inspired by the values of charity, justice and the common good. – Pope Benedict XVI, January 2010

The Passionist JPIC Office has developed a retreat program based on the redemptive spirituality of the Cross to move us towards a transformed relationship with the earth and each other. The program is called “Living Simply so others may Simply Live.” Towards the end of this program we promote an action program adapted from the Passionist Earth and Spirit Center that will give individuals some practical ideas for adopting a Christian lifestyle that is attentive to these ecological issues and that pursues a right relationship with oneself, the human community, and the environment.  Visit our Passionist JPIC Resource page to see if this program or the Passionist Earth and Spirit Center program is something that you parish or retreat center may want to explore.

Based on this one could legitimately ask, “What can the Passionist contribute to the social issues of our time separate from what the universal Church already proclaims?”

The Passionist, like so many other religious communities of the Church, contributes to the social teachings of our Church in two ways. On the one hand we have a specific spiritual perspective that is based on the charism that we have from our founder. This lens can often offer us a deeper perspective on any social issue in that it places the issue within the specific Christian spirituality that is the hallmark of our community. In the case of the Passionist community we reflect on issues from the perspective of Christ’s suffering and Passion. The Passionist Constitutions explain this spiritual perspective in this way:

We are aware that the Passion of Christ continues in this world until He comes in glory; therefore we share in the joys and sorrows of our contemporaries as we journey through life toward our Father. We wish to share in the distress of all, especially those who are poor and neglected; we seek to offer them comfort and to relieve the burden of their sorrow. The power of the Cross, which is the wisdom of God, gives us strength to discern and remove the causes of human suffering.   

Our spirituality looks at social issues from the perspective of redemptive suffering. Our devotion to the Passion constantly reminds us that the social Passion that Jesus suffered was not in vain. Coupled with the Resurrection we know that through the power of God the suffering of humanity can be redeemed if we journey with God and place all our suffering within the framework of establishing the Kingdom of God. Through the mystery of incarnation Jesus took on our suffering. Obviously we know that does not mean that suffering has been eliminated. Instead it means that God continues to walk with us in our suffering. This has been recently expressed by Pope Benedict XVI 2007 encyclical titled Spe Salvi:

Man is worth so much to God that he himself became man in order to suffer with man in an utterly real way—in flesh and blood—as is revealed to us in the account of Jesus’s Passion. Hence in all human suffering we are joined by one who experiences and carries that suffering with us; hence con-solatio is present in all suffering, the consolation of God’s compassionate love—and so the star of hope rises.      

Our spiritual focus then is to examine all social issues from the vantage point of redemptive suffering. We identify with the very real suffering that is happening. We then reflect on how we can find meaning in the midst of this real experience of suffering. This search for meaning will call us to reevaluate the national and global policies that are affecting the suffering community that we are walking with. We then advocate redeeming society from these negative social or economic policies in a way that can heal the social wounds that they are directly or indirectly causing.   

The second way that the Passionist contributes to the Catholic social position is through our direct ministries of service. We are called to be in solidarity with the human community that is suffering. That call to solidarity means that we are expected to have a real ministry of presence and service to the community that is suffering. Since suffering can be experienced in so many different ways, our lay and vowed community can serve this mission through any variety of programs. When we advocate and promote social positions of our Church it is important for us that we do not raise these principles and positions from a theoretical framework. So we raise the real ministry experience of our international community who serves the population whose suffering we are addressing at the moment.

In the next few weeks we will be sharing our spirituality and ministerial experiences over the issue of immigration. Afterwards we will continue addressing other Catholic social issues but always from these two ways. We will share from the spiritual reflection of our charism and from the ministry experience of our communities.