WHEN I read the beatitudes (Luke 6: 20-26), I get confused as I see things have been put together in a rather haphazard manner and the different topics being poorly connected with one another. It does seem to me that I see trees, many trees, but am not able to see the forest.
In his 6: 20-26, evangelist Luke states the beatitudes together with their opposites, to make their meaning doubly clear. For example, Luke writes, “How blessed are you who are poor, the kingdom of God are yours”. And the opposite Luke writes: “Alas for you who are rich, you having your consolation now.”
If I read one sentence and compared the other sentence which has opposite meaning, I can understand better. But it does not work when I put all sentences together. I still get confused.
Things start changing when I discover that the sermon has a center around which everything else is arranged in a certain order.
What is the center? In the center of the beatitudes I find that I should be like God, and that my eye should be “simple” as His eye. I think that a center around which everything else is arranged in a certain order in the beatitudes is “simple eye.”
Being indifferent
So the keyword of this reflection is “simple eye.”
What does it mean?
Simple eye means a state to be indifferent. Being indifferent, we do not need any profit, any self-will, self-interest or self-love. We are indifferent in order to be open to the calling of God. Without any selfish intention we are free. We see many things simple. If we see everything with “simple” eye the things do not appear so sophisticated.
Let us put this in how we handle conflicts in our daily works. Conflict in itself seems so complicated, which put us in nowhere. We see conflict like walking in the dark night. We see nothing. But we can see conflict as a simple thing if we use our “simple eye.” It means that if we free ourselves from our self-will, self-interest or self-love, we will see our conflict as a simple thing that can be solved easily.
Freeing ourselves does not mean that we are afraid to face conflict. We have to be humble rather than being afraid. Being humble makes everything more possible. It put us to be ready to listen and to understand. We understand rather than to be understood. By doing so, I think, we can easily handle it. It may not solve the problem quickly. However, at least, but we make some progress and in the right tract. Would you do so?
Mispan Indarjo, words are inspired by “Simple Eye” written by the late Father Augustin Moling SJ.
Photo credit: Mispan Indarjo
