The people of Anchorage, Alaska have a great appreciation for organic eating and green living. There is an evident love of whole grain granola and many who will only buy delicious and organic Alaska Grown produce. This city chooses to run on whole and organic foods. Now, if you have not lived somewhere like this, imagine the smallest and most shiny apple you have ever eaten, or the bruised and filthy pears that were sitting in your local megamarket. Now organic fruits and vegetables are a little different, they may not last as long and they may not look as bright but anyone can notice a difference when they bite into them. Upon that first bite, you notice a slight difference; upon further inspection and ingestion you realize that an organic piece of fruit that has not been contaminated by pesticides or given growth chemicals or been waxed over to look like it just popped out of a cartoon, is in fact tastier, more wholesome, and ultimately, more like nature intended it to be.
The person is like the organic produce. He is the most wholly good person you have ever encountered. His character reflects kindness and charity. As you get to know him, you observe that nothing he says or does has been tainted by the vices of the world. They are truly a whole spiritual person.
A whole spiritual person is he who is living for other. A whole spiritual person will show in his words and actions that he believes he is not the only worthy being on the planet. He is reverent to everyone in whatever state they come to him; he properly takes care of whatever land or object comes into his possession. But above all else, it is evident that he is living for something greater than himself, he does all things in light of a greater end. Now a fruit, being inanimate, cannot actively serve a greater end. But similar to the fruit, the more faithful a person is to his own nature, the more he will cultivate his own excellence, the more reverent he will be.
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Hildebrand in Chapter 10 of Liturgy and Personality, points out that the person is their truest self when they are organic. “The true essence of the organic is an all-pervading fullness of meaning.” If a person is really organic, than their essence as a true and proper human being will shine forth in all that they do. For example, an organic person will have joy in the face of any trial for he knows that no matter how difficult the trial may be, its value will form him and make him better. By acknowledging the value of the trial, he is more organically human because he acknowledges that suffering is part of being human.
In the same way that an organic apple would be whole in how it is intended to be, an organic man will be whole in how he is intended to be. Thus, if organic produce is as close as it can be to how nature intended it, then organic man is as well. To be as close to what we ought to be, this is indeed to be a good and whole person.
Pictures
Alaska Grown Logo
Fresh Fruit
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