Psychologists use the term “generativity” to describe behavior through which human beings demonstrate a concern to establish and guide (or, “control”) the next generation. That is, human beings engage in behaviors that are consciously or unconsciously intended to make them immortal…to continue to exist in this world beyond their death. Generative behavior can be expressed in hundreds, if not thousands of ways, some of which can be pathological.
The most prominent form of generativity is that of begetting children so that a parent lives on through one’s children. What parent doesn’t hope to transmit something of value through one’s life or character lives on through one’s children and grandchildren after assuming “room temperature”?
Other forms of generativity include:
In his book, The Myth of Sisyphus, the existentialist philosopher Albert Camus called such hopes “absurd.” Camus believed that generative behavior—based on the illusion that one can become immortal—is a denial of the fact of one’s mortality. Forget about all of those once “to be emulated” people who now are relegated to the dustbin of human history. For Camus, it’s just a matter of time before each and every one of us is rendered completely irrelevant in terms of the history of humanity.
Think Camus is absurd?
Just consider the fact that most people cannot even identify the first name of their maternal, great, great grandmother without whom they’d never be here.
Can you?
Today’s remembrance of the Baptism of Our Lord reminds us that our greatest achievement as human beings is not to achieve immortality—to be remembered on earth beyond our death—but to achieve eternal life. Even if we are remembered for a while in time, immortality will inevitably come to its absolute end when time ends at the end time. In contrast, we believe that God’s eternity has no beginning or end and, in our baptism, each of us has been “regenerated”—God’s generative act of freeing us from the power of sin—so we once again can participate in God’s eternity.
In this sense, generativity solely for the purpose of achieving some degree of immortality isn’t “absurd,” as Camus argues based solely on the numbers. No, it’s to deny God’s plan for us as unique, individual human beings!
In this sense, generativity solely for the purpose of achieving some degree of immortality isn’t “absurd,” as Camus argues based solely on the numbers. No, it’s to deny God’s plan for us as unique, individual human beings!
Furthermore, God has entrusted to us unique bodies, temperaments, personalities, and talents through which God intends to express something of His divine life and love to others. That is to say, God has created us as unique beings and has also entrusted each of us with a personal vocation through which God intends to manifest something of His divine life and love—to be that “light for the nations”—to the people around us. Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta once spoke of this personal vocation in terms of “being a pencil in God’s hand,” likening God to an artist, the world in which we live to a canvas, and human beings to the various colors and shades of pencils that God uses to sketch His picture of this world.
If each of us is to be that unique pencil, it requires being free of sin so that we will be responsive to God’s impulse and direction, so that God can move us where God needs us to be in order to complete His masterpiece. To be responsive, selfishness and false pride need to be eradicated and, in baptism, God has done just that. God has freed us from the power of sin—the greatest power being mortality—so that, as we are responsive to God’s initiative in our daily lives, we will participate in God’s eternity here and now.
How might we do that?
Answer this question:
Do you view what you to do make a living (or, for our young
people, what you hope to do one day to make a living) as a
job” and “career” providing gainful employment or as a
“vocation” and “privilege” where, in your own, unique, and
unrepeatable way in all of history, you are able to manifest
something of God’s divine life and love through your work?
Anyone can be a politician, lawyer, physician, shopkeeper, brick layer, police officer, cashier, teacher, auto mechanic, or sanitation engineer. But, only you can reveal something of God’s divine life and love as the politician, lawyer, physician, shopkeeper, brick layer, police officer, cashier, teacher, auto mechanic, or sanitation engineer God created you to be.
For many of us, we think the “job” and “career” make us important. Perhaps so in term of this world and mortality. But, less so in terms of immortality. And, absolutely nothing in terms of God's eternity. It’s the “privilege” of manifesting something of God’s divine life and love in this world through a personal “vocation” that is absolutely important.
As we recall Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River—where God manifested Jesus’ divinity for the second time—forget about begin desirous of and seeking immortality, which is absolutely guaranteed to fade and wither with time, just like the body. Instead, recall God’s gracious act of “re-generativity,” the Sacrament of Baptism which we have received. At that moment, God manifested himself to us and called each of us a beloved son or daughter in whom He is well-pleased.
Today, God is calling each of us to manifest something of His divine life and love for today’s world—to be that “light for the nations”—just like His only begotten Son did for the world of his day.
A brief commercial break...
Lent begins on Wednesday, February 13.
Each year, the people at Magnificat® produce a companion edition for the season of Lent. Similar to a what older Catholics may remember as a “prayer book,” the companion edition contains all sorts of prayers, readings, reflections, art, and activities for every member of the family to prepare each day of the season of Lent for the resurrection of Christ on Easter morning.
Grandparents might consider purchasing a copy for themselves and copies for each grandchild. Confirmation sponsors might consider purchasing a copy for themselves as well as the person they have sponsored or are sponsoring in the faith. Spouses might purchase a copy for themselves and use it for daily prayer during the season of Lent. Parents might purchase a copy for the family and use it to lead prayer before dinner each evening.
At a price of $3.95 for 1-4 copies (plus $1 shipping/handling), $2.50 for 5-9 copies (plus $3 shipping/handling), and $1.50 for 10-49 copies (plus $5 shipping/handling), the companion edition makes a perfect and very affordable opportunity to prepare for the resurrection of Christ on Easter morning as well as an Lenten gift to spur family, friends, and colleagues toward greater spiritual growth during the holy season of Lent.
The companion edition has a limited press run that sells out each year. Furthermore, orders are filled in the order received. So, place your order early.
To place an order for the 2012 companion edition of Magnificat® for the season of Lent, call 1-970-416-6670, email specialissue@magnificat.com, or go to www.magnificat.com for ordering information.
The most prominent form of generativity is that of begetting children so that a parent lives on through one’s children. What parent doesn’t hope to transmit something of value through one’s life or character lives on through one’s children and grandchildren after assuming “room temperature”?
Other forms of generativity include:
- Founding a company with the hope that one’s name will live on across the decades through that company. Take Henry Ford and Mellon Bank, for example. Artists produce masterpieces of literature, sculpture, architecture, painting, drama, and the like hoping that their art makes them immortal. Shakespeare, Rodin, I.M. Pei, Renoir, and Arthur Miller come to mind.
- Soldiers and first responders hope the sacrifice of their lives will gain them immortality. Having just completed reading Newt Gingrich’s novel of the Revolutionary War,Gettysburg, Friedrich Wilhelm August Heinrich Ferdinand von Steuben comes to mind. And hailing from Chicago, the U.S. Navy’s first flying ace and Medal of Honor recipient in World War II, Lieutenant Commander Edward Henry “Butch” O’Hare—as in “O’Hare Airport”—comes to mind.
- Many people devote themselves to public service—educators, physicians and nurses, appointive and elective office, and the like—in the hope they will live on through the service they provide others.
- So too, many athletes hope to achieve immortality through election to the “Hall of Fame,” just as many producers, directors, actors, and actresses hope to do the same by winning a much-coveted “Oscar.”
In his book, The Myth of Sisyphus, the existentialist philosopher Albert Camus called such hopes “absurd.” Camus believed that generative behavior—based on the illusion that one can become immortal—is a denial of the fact of one’s mortality. Forget about all of those once “to be emulated” people who now are relegated to the dustbin of human history. For Camus, it’s just a matter of time before each and every one of us is rendered completely irrelevant in terms of the history of humanity.
Think Camus is absurd?
Just consider the fact that most people cannot even identify the first name of their maternal, great, great grandmother without whom they’d never be here.
Can you?
Today’s remembrance of the Baptism of Our Lord reminds us that our greatest achievement as human beings is not to achieve immortality—to be remembered on earth beyond our death—but to achieve eternal life. Even if we are remembered for a while in time, immortality will inevitably come to its absolute end when time ends at the end time. In contrast, we believe that God’s eternity has no beginning or end and, in our baptism, each of us has been “regenerated”—God’s generative act of freeing us from the power of sin—so we once again can participate in God’s eternity.
In this sense, generativity solely for the purpose of achieving some degree of immortality isn’t “absurd,” as Camus argues based solely on the numbers. No, it’s to deny God’s plan for us as unique, individual human beings!
In this sense, generativity solely for the purpose of achieving some degree of immortality isn’t “absurd,” as Camus argues based solely on the numbers. No, it’s to deny God’s plan for us as unique, individual human beings!
Furthermore, God has entrusted to us unique bodies, temperaments, personalities, and talents through which God intends to express something of His divine life and love to others. That is to say, God has created us as unique beings and has also entrusted each of us with a personal vocation through which God intends to manifest something of His divine life and love—to be that “light for the nations”—to the people around us. Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta once spoke of this personal vocation in terms of “being a pencil in God’s hand,” likening God to an artist, the world in which we live to a canvas, and human beings to the various colors and shades of pencils that God uses to sketch His picture of this world.
If each of us is to be that unique pencil, it requires being free of sin so that we will be responsive to God’s impulse and direction, so that God can move us where God needs us to be in order to complete His masterpiece. To be responsive, selfishness and false pride need to be eradicated and, in baptism, God has done just that. God has freed us from the power of sin—the greatest power being mortality—so that, as we are responsive to God’s initiative in our daily lives, we will participate in God’s eternity here and now.
How might we do that?
Answer this question:
Do you view what you to do make a living (or, for our young
people, what you hope to do one day to make a living) as a
job” and “career” providing gainful employment or as a
“vocation” and “privilege” where, in your own, unique, and
unrepeatable way in all of history, you are able to manifest
something of God’s divine life and love through your work?
Anyone can be a politician, lawyer, physician, shopkeeper, brick layer, police officer, cashier, teacher, auto mechanic, or sanitation engineer. But, only you can reveal something of God’s divine life and love as the politician, lawyer, physician, shopkeeper, brick layer, police officer, cashier, teacher, auto mechanic, or sanitation engineer God created you to be.
For many of us, we think the “job” and “career” make us important. Perhaps so in term of this world and mortality. But, less so in terms of immortality. And, absolutely nothing in terms of God's eternity. It’s the “privilege” of manifesting something of God’s divine life and love in this world through a personal “vocation” that is absolutely important.
As we recall Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan River—where God manifested Jesus’ divinity for the second time—forget about begin desirous of and seeking immortality, which is absolutely guaranteed to fade and wither with time, just like the body. Instead, recall God’s gracious act of “re-generativity,” the Sacrament of Baptism which we have received. At that moment, God manifested himself to us and called each of us a beloved son or daughter in whom He is well-pleased.
Today, God is calling each of us to manifest something of His divine life and love for today’s world—to be that “light for the nations”—just like His only begotten Son did for the world of his day.
A brief commercial break...
Lent begins on Wednesday, February 13.
Each year, the people at Magnificat® produce a companion edition for the season of Lent. Similar to a what older Catholics may remember as a “prayer book,” the companion edition contains all sorts of prayers, readings, reflections, art, and activities for every member of the family to prepare each day of the season of Lent for the resurrection of Christ on Easter morning.
Grandparents might consider purchasing a copy for themselves and copies for each grandchild. Confirmation sponsors might consider purchasing a copy for themselves as well as the person they have sponsored or are sponsoring in the faith. Spouses might purchase a copy for themselves and use it for daily prayer during the season of Lent. Parents might purchase a copy for the family and use it to lead prayer before dinner each evening.
At a price of $3.95 for 1-4 copies (plus $1 shipping/handling), $2.50 for 5-9 copies (plus $3 shipping/handling), and $1.50 for 10-49 copies (plus $5 shipping/handling), the companion edition makes a perfect and very affordable opportunity to prepare for the resurrection of Christ on Easter morning as well as an Lenten gift to spur family, friends, and colleagues toward greater spiritual growth during the holy season of Lent.
The companion edition has a limited press run that sells out each year. Furthermore, orders are filled in the order received. So, place your order early.
To place an order for the 2012 companion edition of Magnificat® for the season of Lent, call 1-970-416-6670, email specialissue@magnificat.com, or go to www.magnificat.com for ordering information.
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