"One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
From the Pledge of Allegiance
From the Pledge of Allegiance
For nearly two thousand years, Christianity has proclaimed that man was created in the image and likeness of God. But what does that actually mean? Among other things, it means that we were created with the capacity to know God, to love God, and ultimately to give ourselves completely to Him. In other words, we were created to worship.
Yet a sobering trend has taken place in American society. According to the Pew Research Center, approximately 24% of Americans who were raised Catholic now identify with no religion whatsoever. They have joined the growing ranks of the religiously unaffiliated, commonly referred to as the "nones." And when we consider that 43% of Americans raised Catholic no longer identify as Catholic, we begin to appreciate the magnitude of this spiritual transformation.
In my view, these statistics raise a serious theological question. If human beings were created to worship God, what happens when they abandon Him? Does the desire to worship simply disappear or does something else take His place?
I would suggest that the human heart cannot so easily escape the purpose for which it was created. When we remove God from the center of our lives, I contend that something else has to move into the empty space.
St. Augustine understood this nearly sixteen centuries ago. In his Confessions, he famously wrote, "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you." St. Augustine recognized that human beings possess a longing for something greater than themselves and that we are creatures who seek meaning, purpose, and belonging. And herein lies the danger. When that longing is no longer directed toward God, it can become attached to things that were never intended to bear the weight of our hopes.
In light of the recent election, consider the increasingly prominent role of political ideology in American life. All political movements promise justice, equality, security, and a better world. These are certainly worthy aspirations, and remember that Christians have a moral obligation to always work toward the common good. But what happens when a political philosophy becomes something more than a means of governing society? What happens when it becomes the source of our identity, our moral convictions, and maybe even our hope for salvation? At that point, we risk transforming politics into a substitute for religion.
This is not a danger confined to any particular political party or ideology. Whether the object of our devotion is socialism, nationalism, capitalism, or something else entirely, the spiritual danger is the same: We begin expecting something created to provide what only the Creator can give.
St. Augustine developed this understanding through what theologians call the ordo amoris, or the right ordering of love. St. Augustine recognized that our problem is often not that we love evil things, but that we love good things in the wrong order. For example, justice is good, freedom is good, and prosperity is good. I think that we would all agree that even government, in its proper capacity, serves a legitimate and necessary purpose. But none of these things is God, and none can satisfy the deepest longing of the human heart.
The Second Vatican Council reminds us in the document Gaudium et Spes that man "cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself." Let that sink in: we were created to give ourselves away in love, and that self-giving can only find its perfection in our relationship with God.
The most troubling consequence of America's growing religious disaffiliation is not simply declining church attendance, rather the possibility that millions of people are searching for ultimate meaning in things that can never provide it. The great danger of a society that abandons God is not necessarily that it will believe in nothing, but that it may begin believing in almost anything.
Through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, may we always remember that our hearts were created for God, and that no political philosophy or human institution can ever take His place.