Rectifying our thoughts and intentions

IN the face of the many good developments taking place today, we have to be ready to quickly rectify our thoughts and intentions so that we avoid getting easily carried away by the passing if not false allurements that these achievements and accomplishments usually bring.

This means that whatever we do with these new developments, whether we are inventing them or studying them or using and enjoying them, we should refer them always to God. Short of that, we open ourselves to the possibility of getting into a spin of merely worldly forces that despite their highs and perks can get us nowhere but our own corruption.

Obviously, these new developments, like our new technologies, can give us some advantages and conveniences. But we should always remember that whatever advantage or convenience they give can only have a relative value.

They can only acquire an absolute value if referred to God and invented, studied, used or enjoyed according to God’s providence. Otherwise, they can pose as potential danger to us, since they can spoil us or occasion in us many moral anomalies, like vanity, pride, lust, greed, envy, etc.

In our involvement with them, let us quickly thank God for whatever advantage they give us. If we are amazed at what these new technologies, for example, can accomplish, let’s not forget that we should first be amazed at God’s power and wisdom that is behind all these amazing developments.

We should not just stop at being amazed at the ingenuity of the inventor concerned, or at the technical perfections the gadgets possess. We should relate everything to God as the ultimate source and goal of all these developments.

More importantly, we should try our best to discern how these new developments are supposed to play or to work in the abiding providence of God. They should never just be an object of our own plans and designs.

Without referring them to God’s providence, they can only become tools to our own selfish designs that we often mask with extravagant hypes and clever deceits. Let’s remember that without God, the only thing we can do is evil. Christ said it clearly: “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.” (Lk 11,23)

Let us explode the myth that we can do some good even without God’s help and providence. This, of course, does not detract from the truth of our faith that God can derive good even from the evil that we produce.

But this should never be an excuse for us to do whatever we want to do, since we can rationalize that God can always derive good even from the evil that we produce. Let’s remember that God’s omnipotence and his love for us that is full of mercy never do away with the requirements of justice.

We should see to it that we are always rectifying our thoughts and intentions, always referring everything to God who is the only one who can determine what is truly good and evil, safe and dangerous in the new developments we are having today.