Sanctity

The Christian and the World

"As I pointed out many years ago [in Integral Humanism], the deepest requirement of a new age of civilization, to the extent to which Christianity inspires it, will be the sanctification of secular life...

In these perspectives [i.e., those that recognize that the Christian call is indeed one to inner sanctity and perfection in love] we may understand that a new 'style' of sanctity (I do not speak of a new 'type' of sanctity, for sanctity has its eternal type in the person of Christ), a new step in the sanctification of secular life, is needed for the rejuvenation of the world.  Not only will the spirit of Christ overflow into secular life and seek for witnesses among those who labor in yards and factories, in social work, politics or poetry, as well as among monks dedicated to the search for perfection; but a kind of divine simplification will help people to realize that the perfection of human life does not consist in a stoic athleticism of virtue or in a humanly calculated application of holy recipes, but rather in a ceaselessly increasing love, despite our mistakes and weaknesses, between the Uncreated Self and the created self.  There will be a growing consciousness that everything depends on that descent of the divine plenitude into the human being of which I spoke above [in this article], and which performs in man death and resurrection.  There will be a growing consciousness that man's sanctification has its touchstone in the love of his fellow man, which requires him to be always ready to give what he has—and himself—and finally to die in some manner for those he loves."