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Gospel Reflection for Thursday, March 6, 2025
Every moment in history has its peculiarity. For the one we are living in now, we could say it’s the time of the «self.» The individual has placed themselves at the center of the universe. The most important thing is their well-being, their feeling good. Everything else is secondary to the «self.» It’s as if each person has placed themselves at the center of the universe and everything else—other people, the world, and everything imaginable—are planets orbiting around them. Everything is at their service. Everything for their well-being. The «self» thinks this way. The «self» is what is important, the only thing that is important, and everything else is in function of their well-being. As a sociologist said, everything surrounding the individual is like prostheses. It is valuable as long as it helps. When what surrounds them does not help or favor the well-being of the «self,» it is simply discarded. This happens with glasses or shoes. But it also happens with a relationship or a friendship. It is valuable as long as it helps, makes them grow, makes them feel good. The moment it doesn’t, the relationship is cut off, discarded. And they look for another one that helps them feel good again. Exactly as they change glasses when the ones they have no longer fit and don’t make them feel good.
Jesus’ proposal for this beginning of Lent is precisely to «decenter» ourselves: to stop considering ourselves the center of the world, to stop thinking that our feeling good is the fundamental objective of our life. There is something much more important: the cause of Jesus, the Kingdom. For the Kingdom, one must leave everything, deny oneself. My needs, my problems, my anxieties, become secondary because the Kingdom is the most important. And the Kingdom is fraternity, it is love. It is to think first about the well-being of others. The Kingdom is precisely placing the other, especially the poor and needy, at the center (and considering oneself as a planet or satellite). Only those who lose their life for the Kingdom will find full and true life, the life of the Kingdom. In other words: what good is it to seek your well-being so much if in the end you end up more alone than ever? Following Jesus is to decenter oneself and place the «other» at the center of my life and my concerns.