The Pope referred to that passage in Acts where the Lord reprimands Paul for persecuting the Church: He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" He said, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting." (Acts 9:4-5).

There are many passages in the writings of Paul that speak about the Church being Christ’s body of which Christ is the head. When Paul says that Christ is head of the Church, his body, he means that Christ is directing it. He is its principle. Everything is organized around him.

Christ as head of the Church is the one who guides all its activities. He is the soul, the life of the body. Without him there is no life in the body, there is no Church at all as such.

Therefore, the Church is a person in a very real sense. Not just an organization. Or an entity. Or a "community." But rather a Person living out his life in all parts of the body, which is ourselves.

St. Paul admonishes us to "glorify Christ in our bodies" (1 Cor 6:20). In other words, Christ is meant to be glorified by all that I live in my body, because I am part of him and he is part of me through baptism. Christ living in me. Christ loving in me as the center of my person.

This is an "interesting" concept, if you really think about it. It means that the Lord Jesus wants to extend his activity through you and through me. He doesn’t want us to simply try to imitate him. He wants us to be surrendered to his action, to his activity. This is what it means to be "members" of the body of Christ.

But that leads to a question: what happens to me? If it’s really true that the center of David May’s person is Jesus Christ, what happens to good old David May? He wasn’t such a bad guy, was he? Why does old Dave have to be obliterated like that?

We fight Christ on this point more than on almost any other (except the one I’ll deal with in part three!). We are really afraid of losing ourselves—to him! I am afraid that if I become a mere "part" of Christ’s body, I will disappear for good, never to return.

Of course, this fear is not justified. And yet—there is truth in it. If I am part of Christ’s body, I will disappear, that Christ might live in me.

But then the strangest thing happens. When Christ lives in me, I’m more David May than ever—to the shock of many and the disappointment of some!

When Christ lives in Paulette, Paulette is more Paulette than ever. Yet Paulette really did "disappear." You have to hold on to both realities at once: "disappearance" and "permanence." Death and resurrection.

David May just can’t be David May until he dies! And then, much to his surprise (to tell you the truth), once he dies, he lives. Only now he’s more like Christ.

Jesus Christ has been wanting to be David May (or Paulette or Derek or Beth or…) for a long, long time. Jesus Christ has been wanting to be you…the real you.

The selfless, non-self-centered you. The ‘laying-down-your-life-for-others’ you. The you who knows he or she is loved by the Father, as Jesus knew this. For the Lord Jesus to be this in you or me, something will have to go. Guess who?! And yet, you will be back! It will be you—and it will be Christ.

This is the great paradox in being a member of Christ’s body. In other religions, it seems that the goal is to become "nothing." To attain to perfect stillness within and detachment from all that is, especially suffering. Even Christian mystics sometimes write in such terms of attaining to a sense of Nothing within.

But for us, at the heart of "nothing"—no thing—is a person: Jesus. In the midst of my nothingness, in the midst of Nothingness (capital ‘N’), comes the one who is Being: Christ my Lord. And he enters to fill me with his Person. It’s a real annihilation—and a real resurrection.

This is where our faith, our Christian walk, is different from that of other religions. We have a real human being who walked this earth, a real divine Person who took on our flesh, who wants to live in you and in me. He wants to love through you and to love through me. It’s a personal surrender to a personal Savior.

I remember once riding a bus from Calgary, Alberta, west to the Rocky Mountains. It was the first time I’d ever seen them, and I was taken up with the view from the bus window when I noticed that a couple of university-age students were having a discussion nearby.

They were talking about the nature of God! One was saying that he thought that God was "maybe a person of some kind." The other countered: No, definitely not. God could not be a person because "person" was a human concept, and the transcendence of the deity, should he exist, must be far beyond mere human concepts, like that of "person."

I just kept contemplating those splendid mountains! But I was thinking: "Boy, what a relief it would be if God were not a person! Then he wouldn’t talk to me any more! No more orders! No more "change your life now" directives! No more "repent and believe the good news!" My faith life would become quiet and tranquil indeed, if God were not a person.

However, I knew it then—and I know it now—God is a Person. He sees me. He watches over me. He corrects me. He gave his life for me. He loves me. Personal relationship with a personal Savior.

That brings us, finally, to the question of ordinary living and commonplace activity. If I really know and believe that I am one with Christ as a member of his body, then all that I am and all that I do can be an extension of his saving love and activity—an extension of himself—to the degree that I am surrendered to him, converted to him.

This reminds me of what Catherine Doherty taught us about washing cups. She had noted at one point that there was a growing aversion amongst the people here concerning the endlessly monotonous task of washing cups.

Then she made the rather bold statement that if we really understand what it means to wash a cup, we would never have this aversion again.

To her, washing a cup meant to wipe the tears of someone far away in a war. It meant to participate in cleansing the heart of someone filled with the grime of violence. It meant the cry of one’s own heart to be purified from what separates it from God. Of course, it also meant providing a clean and sanitary drinking vessel for my brother or sister.

This is what it means to know that I am a member of Christ, because he is always doing that kind of thing through his body, the Church: cleansing hearts, restoring hope, wiping away tears, restoring this world to his Father, providing a drink for the thirsty.

He is always saving souls, always pouring out love. He did it in all kinds of ways when he lived on earth, mostly ordinary ways, but culminating in his offering on the Cross.

Now his great desire is to live that offering in you and in me. When we understand this point, we understand the essence of what it means to be members of Christ’s body. Christ desires to act through everything about us, that ‘God may be all in all’ (1 Cor 15:28).

Suggested Readings:
Rom 6:3-5; 8:9-13; 12:3-12
1Cor 12:12-13, 27-31.
Eph 2:17-23; 4:1-6.
Col 1:18-23.

to be concluded in the January issue