The Dance of the Human Spirit Within the Heavenly Symphony of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful

 What follows is, of course, inspired by the heart-piercingly splendid theology of Fr. Hans Urs Von Balthasar.

Every human life is a single dance, but in response to a symphony informed by three interwoven mysteries: the Good, the True, the Beautiful.

The Drama of the Good-and-Evil; Person as Will, Freedom and Action; Spiritual Combat

Human existence is the engagement of our created freedom with that of others, with God and His kingdom, and against the Dark Kingdom. A binary choice: between the Good and Evil. It is constant, relentless spiritual combat. It is action: intelligent choice expressed in deed, concretely, in the flesh, over time. It is not melodrama or histrionics as in the sentimentality of soap operas; rather, it is engagement with, being grasped and formed, through choice, by powerful currents of the Good or Evil. The moral/spiritual realm is a simple binary: The Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Darkness, of sin and death, of Satan and his minions. Every person is a battlefield between the two; and yet every person is also living in the state of grace or the state of sin. The interior state of the soul is a hidden mystery, known only to God. But it is not detached from the flesh: the good tree bears good fruit. The Good (along with the True and the Beautiful) is diffusive, expansive, generous, welcoming. But in its inversion and perversity, so is the powerful Realm of Darkness. Each person is an actor in the Drama of salvation, of history, and endowed with heart-intellect-will, with freedom, with a mysterious integrity of charism, mission, suffering, and destiny. This mission is largely hidden from us in this life; it involves all the concrete detail of a specific life; in includes "state of life" (married, consecrated, ordained, single) and the unending and surprising itinerary of encounters, events, loves, failings, accomplishments, conspiracies, and delights.

The Human Intellect: Yeaning for the True and the Real

We see already in the young child an irrepressible curiosity about What Is? What is real? and Why? What is the purpose? The cause? The intention? The destiny and goal?

Creation, Reality, the Real...is the work of an infinite, absolute, perfect Intellect...that of God. The human person is created in the divine image and likeness to understand, engage, delight in, be in intelligent and deliberate communion with Reality in its totality. The human intellect is active and inquisitive, but fundamentally receptive as the True (like the Good and the Beautiful) manifests itself. The personal intellect is the Bride; the Real and True is the Groom. The intellect does not construct, imaginatively, the real...in a Kantian or postmodern sense. Rather, the intellect receives the Real, always in wonder, delight, gratitude. 

The Beautiful: Delight, Gratitude and Adoration

The Real, which is to say the True and the Good, is at the same time always Beautiful: delighting the heart-soul-intellect-will, as radiant and harmonious out of a mysterious, hidden-but-manifest inner integrity (form). The Real is always encountered as Good and True but also Beautiful; that is, delightful. Within the Trinity, this trilogy of transcendentals is absolute, perfect, infinite, eternal. In creation it is always finite, temporal, partial, mortal, and (after The Fall) flawed by sin, corruption and death. But the created is intended for participation in the Uncreated, the finite for the Infinite, the temporal for the Eternal, the partial for the Completion, and even the sinful for the Mercy of God.

Evil, Untruth, and the Ugly...although powerful in the historic realm...are themselves Unreality: negations, deprivations, distortions...empty of final substance and reality. They are finally powerless and vulnerable before the genuinely Good, True and Beautiful.

And so, even in this world of corruption, change, fragility, pain and sin...we delight always in the Real... and we exult (patiently) in Hope. In the very deepest darkness, the infallible/efficacious chiaroscuro of Divine Providence guarantees that the light...of the True, the Good, the Beautiful...shines all the brighter!