 |
||||||
Jesus said, “I give you a new
commandment: love one another. As I have
loved you, so you also should love one another. This
is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love
for one another.”
|
||||||
The
splendor of the movie "Shrek" and especially the closing session is
that "ugly"
is portrayed as "beautiful." Our world
must be taught that even people who may be considered most ugly are
nothing more than a
further extension of what is beautiful because it is not the externals
that make a person; it is what is internal.
|
||||||
|
There are many
conclusions to the directive of Jesus that we must love one
another. One of them has to do with who is truly
beautiful. No matter what bodily
features people are blessed or not blessed with, they are people who
according
to Jesus should be loved by all. If we
are to love every person, then, in a sense, every person is beautiful.
The teaching of Jesus and the teaching of the movie “Shrek” are in exact accord: no matter what people look like, they are always lovable. And if they are lovable people, then they are beautiful. God has created them that way. And therefore, there is no such thing as an ugly person. Young people today especially must listen to this doctrine. With all of the commercial stress on improving our looks, beauty and health, our thinking could easily have a rebound effect. If we think that we can only look good if we use a certain product or do a certain exercise or have to be a certain weight or wear certain clothes, then there will be times when we conclude that we don’t look good. And since we don’t look good, we might wrongly conclude that we are ugly. There is a place in the Christian atmosphere for improving the way we look as attractive human beings, but we must never miss this Christian "fact": because we are human, we are lovable, and because we are lovable, we are all beautiful no matter what we look like. In Jesus’ mind, and therefore in the Christian’s mind, a person can never be described as "ugly." |
||||||
|
THOUGHT
In
your opinion, do we as a society stress
beauty too much? Yes or no and why?
PRAYER Good and gracious God,
your Son gave us the
commandment to love everyone, and therefore he placed every person on
the
highest level, making it possible to call everyone "beautiful." Help us never insult another by calling them "ugly,"
and may we always strive to honestly love every person. Be
with us, we pray.
|
||||||
©2007
Capuchin Province of Mid-America
Fr. Mike Scully is a member of the Capuchin Province of Mid-America |