[愛、仁慈、包容]
綜觀耶穌基督的一生,知道祂明白這個道理:
It is no measure of health to be
well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.
( Jiddu Krishnamurti )
不少人相信不去教會的就不是基督徒,
所以追隨教會,重視教友們互相「支持」的人很多。
如果一所教會病了又如何?
這並非社會的病,這是神聖的病,沒有人敢論斷?
How can the church be terribly misused?
信了耶穌,就得到了「道路、真理、生命」,
自己就可以舒舒服服嘆世界!
我們相信真理來自信念,不是來自批判。
我們喜歡聖經那一部份,就找那一部份出來「證明」,
不喜歡的那一部份,就當作看不見。
有上天堂的便宜就該和弟兄姊妹們一起分享,
但千萬不要叫我們為信仰而犧牲。
既然已經買了上天堂的保險,為何還需要辛苦?
「這樣的事、沒有律法禁止。」
At issue here is the question:
“To whom do I belong? God or to the world?”
Many of my daily preoccupations suggest that
I belong more to the world than to God.
A little criticism makes me angry,
and a little rejection makes me depressed.
A little praise raises my spirits,
and a little success excites me.
It takes very little to raise me up
or thrust me down.
Often I am like a small boat on the ocean,
completely at the mercy of its waves.
All the time and energy I spend in keeping
some kind of balance and preventing myself
from being tipped over and drowning shows that
my life is mostly a struggle for survival:
not a holy struggle, but an anxious struggle
resulting from the mistaken idea that
it is the world that defines me.
( Henri J.M. Nouwen )
教會裡服膺的善惡,往往以仁慈來做藉口。
有人認為「愛之中沒有批判,愛不需要智慧」,
凡事包容,凡事相信,凡事盼望,凡事忍耐;
所以可以讓愛矇蔽理智,對事實和真理視若無睹。
不少教徒就是利用「愛、仁慈、包容」這些藉口來迴避真理,
於是世上的鹽就忽鹹、忽甜、忽酸、忽苦、忽辣,
世上的光就忽明忽滅,時光時暗,曖昧不清。
The real tragedies of life are many:
1. when we are afraid of the light.
2. what dies inside us while we live.
3. that it ends at a young age,
4. when we waste so much of our prescious time
before we realize our ignorance.
5. when we choose the wrong scratch-line.
6. when we climb the wrong social ladder.
7. the path to wisdom is so difficult.
Of all people only those are at leisure
who make time for philosophy,
only those are really alive.
( Lucius Annaeus Seneca )
It does not take much strength to do things,
but it requires great strength to decide on
what to do.
( Elbert Hubbard )
True wisdom is to know
what is best worth knowing,
and to do what is best worth doing.
( Edward Porter Humphrey )
But small is the gate and narrow the road
that leads to life, and only a few find it.
( Matthew 7:14 )