Image and Likeness of God: Acquiescence and True Happiness

            We are made in the image and likeness of God, a Trinitarian and perfectly Loving community. We are made to Love and to be Loved; we are made to be Holy. But it is our fixation on material Truth that tends to prevent us from entering into a relationship with God, and if we do not have that relationship we cannot experience or know (phronesis) what it means to Love and to be Loved. I imagine God shaking His head at me whenever I am like that obstinate student. I want desperately to “understand” how to Love and how deeply I am Loved by God. I intellectually know that it is impossible for me to really “know” Love, at least in a material sense (episteme), but I persist. My own pride prevents me from acquiescing, and that makes it harder for me to actually learn what Love is. It is like that math class in college. I need to stop trying to throw that rope at other material things to make me happy. I need just tie the rope around my waist and enter into a relationship with God. I need to let Him pull me closer to Him, and the closer I get to Him, the more I can know that He Loves me, like Monsignor Buchignani taught me. The more I know (phronesis) that I am Loved, the more I know what it means to Love others. I begin to understand on a level beyond my own intellect that there is a pie that will make all of us happy, but we do not have enough rope to get it on our own; we need to let God, the piemaker, pull us into His kitchen. There, we will all know what it means to be Truly happy.

            Christian Anthropology tells us we are made in the image and likeness of God. Theology tells us that image and likeness is Holiness, the ability to Love and to be Loved, transcendently. The authentic image and likeness of the human self, then, is one who Loves and is Loved beyond any material “reason” for Love. But if this Vocation to Holiness is beyond material reason or human intellect, the only way we can know our authentic self is if God wants us to. Of course, the nature of Agape is not forceful or oppressive; God will not insist that knowledge on us unless we desire it. Sacramentality or Sacramental Vision is an act of acquiescing. It is telling ourselves that we cannot know everything, and we need to rely on God to teach us. The act of acquiescing to God, of being Humble before God, is an act of entering into a relationship with God, and it is in that relationship that we can begin to Truly know what it means to be our Authentic Self. The result of this…True happiness.

(This guy was in my yard today.)