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Pope Benedict XVI’s first encyclical, Deus Caritas Est (God is Love), must be regarded as one of the great meditations on the Christian life in our time. This pope has long been concerned with the pervasive attempt by modern, secular culture to contain, marginalize and even redefine the event of Jesus Christ in history and in the lives of individual believers.
This concern is evident in the opening words of the encyclical. The pope writes, “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person.” In other words, Jesus Christ is someone other than merely a great teacher or a moral leader. The encounter with this living person “gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.” Thus, Christianity cannot be reduced to simply a moral code or a philosophy of life.
Christianity is the personal encounter with the God who is love, and as the pope reminds us, “love is now no longer a mere ‘command’; it is the response to the gift of love with which God draws near to us.”
This, of course, changes everything, since as Pope Benedict tells us: “God’s way of loving becomes the measure of human love.”
As one concrete example, the pope discusses marriage: “Corresponding to the image of a monotheistic God is monogamous marriage. Marriage based on exclusive and definitive love becomes the icon of the relationship between God and his people.”
The revelation of God’s love in Jesus Christ has profoundly revealed each person’s relationship to his neighbor. Through his suffering on the cross, Christ has united himself to every suffering person throughout history and especially those within the Church. As the pope explains, “Union with Christ is also union with all those to whom he gives himself.” This reality has profound consequences for the life of every Christian since “the entire activity of the Church is an expression of a love that seeks that integral good of man.”
The Church is compelled to works of charity, just as it must proclaim the word and celebrate the sacraments. And the work of charity can never be reduced to a type of welfare service or agency. Rather, it must be in every way Christlike. As the pope writes, “I must give to others not only something that is my own, but my very self; I must be personally present in my gift.”
One can hardly imagine a document more relevant to the Knights of Columbus, dedicated as we are to the principles of Charity, Unity and Fraternity. Pope Benedict is not only speaking to us, he is in so many ways speaking about us.
My hope is that every brother Knight and council will read, reflect on and discuss this great encyclical, and that in this way it will help to form and inspire an even greater dedication to the charitable work and life of our great order.
Vivat Jesus!
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