Sydney
7 September 2003
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Tasmania accused
on same-sex adoption and ‘marriage’
Refugee
kids freed, but for how long?
Matter
of perspective
Archbishop
honours Year 12 students
Treasured
Gospels from Holy Island
Own
faith is vital to dialogue – cardinal
Marist
laity unity move
$50,000
for Susan’s pilgrimage
Good
Shepherds find green pastures
Upgraded
Bulls go into bat against their demons
Editorial:
A parallel universe?
Letters:
Age of consent
Conversation:
Prof Friedhelm Mennekes, parish priest and art lecturer - Space for art in a sacred
space
Why
the world is the way it is
1500
reasons to be proud of his school
Brothers
died on mission to save their leader
‘Don’t
forget your people back home’
Pius
XII – Hitler, the Holocaust and ‘Canossa’
On
‘going to Canossa’
Laity,
clergy share the pastoral load
Pell
embraces Cardinal's vision for Sydney Synod
Kylie
on line to help kids
Engadine
sisters in Columban art show
Why the world is the way it is
By Bek Griffin
Perhaps it is the incredible rate at which technology has advanced since the industrial revolution. Or maybe it’s the wealth that some nations have amassed, while others slide further into impoverished despair.
For some reason or another, it would seem that the humanism of the Renaissance has reared its ugly head in the modern era. The individual is of integral importance, along with his or her rights and choices. The family unit, and most other types of community for that matter, are getting pushed into the background.
In the modern world, God exists to serve the needs of the individual. If the individual needs something, then the solution is to demand from God that he fulfil that need. Similarly, the family unit and the community exist as little more than a support network to serve the individual.
This warped spin on reality is what has the world in such a mess today. The pride and arrogance of the modern individual is the real root of all evil.
Pride: The sin of our first parents.
How many of us echo the sentiment of Adam, that it wasn’t our fault?
We didn’t eat the apple. It was our first parents. So why are we landed with the punishment for their crime?
But look at the world today. Human pride is recurring. Each and every one of us repeats that same display of pride, like our first parents did so long ago. This pride defines us as a people, it is embedded deep within our culture.
Today’s average young married couple believes that it is their right to choose if and when they will have children. Openness to life is an alien concept to them. Today’s average young woman believes that it is her right to choose whether or not she will allow her unborn child to be born into this world. More and more today the average aged person presumes that it is their right to end their life when they no longer want to deal with the suffering that is part of their life.
Today it is all about the right to choose, because my life belongs to me. Wrong.
Paul insists: “You are not your own.” (I Cor 6:19). We belong to God and he alone has the right to choose when to give life, and when to take it away. If we claim the imagined right to decide when to give or take life, not only do we commit a crime against a real, God-given human right, namely the right to life, but we come close to claiming divinity. Pride returns.
Still, there is still hope. I’m utterly convinced that the solution to the widespread disrespect for human life lies in humility. Where there is humility, there is no room for this pride that is the root of all the evil that surrounds us today. We need to make a study of humility; I dare say the best place to start is with the life of Our Lord. He is the best example any of us can follow.
Bek Griffin is a 4th year computing student at Sydney University. Voice of Youth is co-ordinated by the Catholic Chaplaincy, Sydney University, based at the JPII Student Resource Centre Level 1, 245 Broadway NSW 2007. Phone 9518 6415 or visit www.usydcc. Org