May 1, 2009
This line from an old pizza commercial brings up an exercise in one of my management courses while studying for my MBA. What you had to do is think for a while about what you would like your epitaph to say about you. I never thought about it this way. Another way to put this exercise is to ask, "What kind of a person are you? How do you want people to remember you?"
The Catholic Church focuses a lot on sin, and rightly so. Catholics examine their consciences, or should examine their consciences, frequently. But much of what is contained in a list of sins to be checked against our thoughts and actions leaves a lot under the radar. Pope John Paul II has contributed, along with some phenomenologists such as Max Scheler and St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein), to examining personhood, and there are many Catholics who may or may not be sinners according to the list in the books, of which I cannot judge, but they fall short in their personhood.
The reason for this is that we generally see personhood as a static concept. We say that the unborn baby is a person, and so it is. But it is in an undeveloped stage. The personhood requires development, and the development of personhood requires that we open our hearts to others, that we have empathy, that we see ourselves as the image of the persons of the Blessed Trinity, who are known to us as complete self-giving. In short, personhood is the gift of ourselves to others.
Unfortunately in my experience, I have run into many Catholics, some of whom have professed themselves to be exemplary, who have been very short on personhood. They are self-centered, arrogant, intellectual bullies, unable to empathize, paranoid and uncaring. These folks have persecuted me and others seemingly for no other reason than that it makes them feel superior.