Easter Reflection

Today is Easter.  As I was reflecting on Paul's letter to the Colossians, I was struck how he was saying because of Jesus' resurrection, "...you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God."   God has blessed me with old age.  This is the time when you really face your limits and if you did not know it before, it is right in front of you all the time - this life is not all there is.  Cardwell Nuckols, a psychologist and Christian wrote a book called the ego-less self.  He borrows Thomas Keatings terminology in talking about the false self.  Nuckols calls the false self the ego who wants power, control, security, esteem and affection.  These are like hooks that feed the false self.  As the saying goes, "Absolute power corrupts absolutely."  We see this frequently throughout the world.  We see it in human trafficking; we see it in the dictators who destroy their own people.  We see the need for security taken to an extreme when whatever you have is never enough.  What keeps drug cartels going?  The desire for more and more money, more security.  Human trafficking is about making profit at the expense of innocent children, women, and men, so those that are engaged in it can feel financially secure, and then some.  How often have people sold their souls for what other people think?  Compromised their own values, so they look better in someone else's eyes?  The sad part is I can see all these characteristics within myself at a much less newsworthy scale.   The true Self is the divine spark within each one of us.  When I was studying catechism as a child, we called this sanctifying grace.  My challenge as a Christian who believes in the resurrection of Jesus is to die to this false self, so that I may be more in touch with that Divine spark.  As Richard Rohr says, God loves us and we cannot add to that love or subtract from it.  We can accept it, respond to it, and grow in it, but we have no control over the fact that God loves us.  So day by day, hidden with Christ in God, I make the effort to die to the false self and grow in the love of the resurrected Christ.