Walk With Me

Born Again

There was an alcoholic who badly wanted to change his life. At first, he became a born again Christian thinking that as long as I accept Jesus as my personal Lord and Savior then I will be changed. After a decade, He simply became an alcoholic born again. After that, the alcoholic decided to go to Iglesia ni Cristo (INC) thinking, INC will be able to change me because they are the new true Church in the Far East. But after another decade, he was the same alcoholic who just belonged to INC. Twenty years have passed he was still an alcoholic. So the alcoholic thought of a crazy idea, that is, to become a Catholic priest. After a decade, the man became a priest but still an alcoholic. So the alcoholic, now priest, decided to apply for dispensation. For the next decade, what the alcoholic did was to finally accept that alcoholism was too overwhelming for him to handle. So he went to Alcoholics Anonymous, then after 10 years, he was healed.

No religion, affiliation, or status in life can directly guarantee conversion in a person. It is a struggle we ought to make every day even opening the possibility of fighting for it up until our last breath. Moreover, fighting for our own conversion singlehandedly will never suffice because we will be needing others to help us heal. Then for us to finally ask help from others would take a great dose of humility.

In today's gospel we are drawn to reflect on the words of Jesus when he said, "No one will enter the kingdom of God unless he is born again from above." Perhaps, being born again from above means accepting how limited we are on our own and letting God take over the things we cannot control. There are many things for us to change for the better yet ironically we resist change, sabotage ourselves, recall our shameful past, and reject God take hold of us. May we learn to work on our conversion as though everything depends on us and learn humility in faith as though everything depends on God. Amen.