Spiritual Growth at Work: Mortification
If you've followed these posts recent Sundays, you know we've been discussing the declining trend in our society and culture. In light of this, we've emphasized the importance of each of us growing in our spiritual lives (another way of saying growing closer to God). Let's take these ideas and apply them to our work today by focusing on an old friend of these pages: mortification. We'll see why mortification plays such a crucial role in resisting the decline of our society and culture.
We're going to call on one of the great Catholic spiritual writers, Father Edward Leen, to guide us here. One of the reasons I especially like Father Leen is that he treats you like an adult. He doesn't try to sugar-coat his words or talk down to you. He expects you to be able to read and understand serious ideas about our Faith. I say this so you understand this is serious stuff, so slow down and read his words carefully as we go through them. And as we study Father's words, let's keep especially in mind those situations where we might apply the practice of mortification at work.
A simple definition of mortification would be any action that subdues bodily desires. It's practice is not unique to the Catholic religion. So let's first let Father Leen explain the aim of mortification from a Catholic perspective (again, read slowly and carefully):
If each of us brings order to our individual lives, we can begin to turn things around in our world. The flip side of this would be that if we individually do not bring order to our lives, our world will continue down its slippery slope at ever-increasing speed - as any Catholic can see each and every day as he or she engages with the world.
When we leave our homes to go to work each day, we engage with our world. Work is the first and primary place (after our home life, of course) where we can bring the proper order that flows naturally from the serious practice of our Holy Faith. And here we see the first aim of mortification, as Father Leen reflects the teaching of St Paul, to: ‘strip ourselves of the old man with his deeds, and to put on the new, who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him who created him.’
When we encounter difficult situations or difficult people at work, how we react to these difficulties not only reflects the state of our own soul, but also communicates something to others. In the workplace, we are afforded the opportunity to demonstrate the living presence of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in what we do and how we do it.
A simple example of how this applies to us at work might be how some men speak about women. So many men indulge what can only be understood as their lust by referring to women in terms that reflect that lust. (I'm being delicate here.) I hope you don't - ever. Such language belies a disordered view of women, as well as an inability to control their sensuality as reflected in their words. The practice of mortification can help us to control the tongue; perhaps then working on the vice of impurity that drives those words. In Father Leen's words: "Mortification aims at replacing disorder by order, revolt against God and reason by subjection to Christ and His faith, disordered nature by vivifying grace, and self-indulgence by purity and justice."
Next time we dig deeper as we follow Father Leen's lead in showing us just how profound and important mortification is in our spiritual lives.
We're going to call on one of the great Catholic spiritual writers, Father Edward Leen, to guide us here. One of the reasons I especially like Father Leen is that he treats you like an adult. He doesn't try to sugar-coat his words or talk down to you. He expects you to be able to read and understand serious ideas about our Faith. I say this so you understand this is serious stuff, so slow down and read his words carefully as we go through them. And as we study Father's words, let's keep especially in mind those situations where we might apply the practice of mortification at work.
A simple definition of mortification would be any action that subdues bodily desires. It's practice is not unique to the Catholic religion. So let's first let Father Leen explain the aim of mortification from a Catholic perspective (again, read slowly and carefully):
“Mortification aims at the rectification of disorder in our fallen nature, so that it may be replaced by that order in which sense is subject to reason and reason to God. By His Grace, Jesus Christ gave us power to recover, in a certain measure, this rectitude of our nature. The function of mortification is to enable us to ‘strip ourselves of the old man with his deeds, and to put on the new, who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him who created him.’ Mortification aims at replacing disorder by order, revolt against God and reason by subjection to Christ and His faith, disordered nature by vivifying grace, and self-indulgence by purity and justice."The decline of our society and culture reflects this disorder of our fallen nature. This fallen nature of ours causes us to live under the sway of our senses, our feelings, rather than our reason. So we need to change such that reason gains the upper hand over our senses and our feelings. And that's where mortification comes in.
If each of us brings order to our individual lives, we can begin to turn things around in our world. The flip side of this would be that if we individually do not bring order to our lives, our world will continue down its slippery slope at ever-increasing speed - as any Catholic can see each and every day as he or she engages with the world.
When we leave our homes to go to work each day, we engage with our world. Work is the first and primary place (after our home life, of course) where we can bring the proper order that flows naturally from the serious practice of our Holy Faith. And here we see the first aim of mortification, as Father Leen reflects the teaching of St Paul, to: ‘strip ourselves of the old man with his deeds, and to put on the new, who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of Him who created him.’
When we encounter difficult situations or difficult people at work, how we react to these difficulties not only reflects the state of our own soul, but also communicates something to others. In the workplace, we are afforded the opportunity to demonstrate the living presence of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in what we do and how we do it.
A simple example of how this applies to us at work might be how some men speak about women. So many men indulge what can only be understood as their lust by referring to women in terms that reflect that lust. (I'm being delicate here.) I hope you don't - ever. Such language belies a disordered view of women, as well as an inability to control their sensuality as reflected in their words. The practice of mortification can help us to control the tongue; perhaps then working on the vice of impurity that drives those words. In Father Leen's words: "Mortification aims at replacing disorder by order, revolt against God and reason by subjection to Christ and His faith, disordered nature by vivifying grace, and self-indulgence by purity and justice."
Next time we dig deeper as we follow Father Leen's lead in showing us just how profound and important mortification is in our spiritual lives.
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