Coram Christus – The Presence of Christ

A creed for every occasion would be a daunting assignment.

Imagine how many occasions would cry out for and demand their own creeds!

A creed, one creed, to cover all possible occasions would equally if not more intimidating.

The core wording could be reduced to utter simplicity, but the commentary and definitions would fill volumes of annotations. It is a take to broaden one's creedo and a take to reduce it.

I had a professor who spent a chunk of his life writing theology books to address various life stages, challenges, and questions. He could have used 200 years to get a good start.

I spent several hours settling on two words that are somewhat tentative, but expandable: Coram Christus.

Rather than translate it literally, I will say what I mean by it.

It is to live in awareness of and to reflect the presence of Christ in the world.

It is based upon a lifetime of premises and branches into a lifetime of implications.

I chose seven to apply to the moment:

Resist evil – In myself first, but also in the world, I desire to be part of the resistance. That has to mean being for something before I am against anything. I believe that resistance to evil manifest in hate, injustice, ignorance, corruption, and human suffering is the very definition of God's wrath that is neither opposite of or complimentary to God's love. It is God's love.
Stand – It is a continuation of the resistance and is the steady and sometimes static movement that places our lives and fortunes on the life for our convictions and for the people with whom we stand. It reaches beyond cause to the cause of the cause and it takes energy, courage, and faith.
Nothing in hand but an extended hand – We do not come to the world with a show of force, intimidating power, financial leverage, or violent intentions. We come extending our hands. We do not come with all the answers or the people who are going to rescue the world. We come as partners and fellow pilgrims. When we are with the poor, we are the poor; when we are with the oppressed, we are the oppressed. We are the immigrant, the ostracized, the marginalized, the maligned, the woman caught in adultery, the prodigal son, the Pharisee, and Publican.
Accept pain – It is our lot in life to suffer on three levels. We will suffer because suffering is the common experience of humanity. We take our chances, roll the dice, breathe the air swim in the gene pool, live with fallen people, and draw the cards. We will suffer because we make mistakes and bad decisions that effect our health, welfare, relationships, and economic outlook. Finally, we will suffer because we are doing what is absolutely right and there are those who wish to stop us or because our sacrifice will work for their redemption. Ours is to accept our pain whether it is random, deserve, or redemptive through our own persecution. To define our lives by pain avoidance is to miss living.
Inflict none – That is the goal. While we do not run from our own pain, we sprint away from the possibilities of hurting others. We will have some misses. We will, just by living and ultimately by dying, bring pain to people's lives, but our intent is to never do so, not to our loved ones, not to our friends, not to our enemies.
Always love – This is getting even closer to the core. Jesus reiterated the Law and the Prophets that our chief duties are to love God and love our neighbors. It is the standard by which we evaluate all of our motives and all of our behaviors.
Never back down – From what must we remain steady and steadfast? Not our personal rights and prerogatives. No. We must never back down from resistance to evil, standing for righteousness, extending our hands to others, accepting hardships and adversity, nonviolence, and love. We must never back down from the call to be the presence of Christ in the world when that means sticking out like a sore thumb.