In Athens, Greece, you can find statues of Socrates and Confucius facing each other, signifying a kinship between the quests for wisdom celebrated in the East and the West. These statues inspired Tom McGuire, USCCA Director Emeritus, to invite us to reflect on John C. H. Wu's words in Beyond East and West:
Mencius had a wonderful insight into the workings of providence. He said, "Whenever Heaven wants to confer a great work on anyone, it first drenches his heart with bitterness, submits his nerves and his bones to weariness, delivers his members and his whole body to hunger, reduces him to the most extreme indigence, thwarts and upsets all his enterprises. By this means, it wakens in him good sentiments, fortifies his patience, and communicates to him what was still lacking in him." He illustrated this principle with the events of history. "From these things," he concluded, "we see how life springs from sorrow and tribulations, while death results from ease and pleasure." One can hardly imagine how deeply this philosophy of suffering has influenced the Chinese outlook on life. During the last war, the most popular poster seen on the walls in China was: "When you hear of victory, don't be elated. When you hear of defeats, don't be disheartened." This, I submit, is the secret magic that has pulled China through so many national crises. Any philosophy that keeps one humble in prosperity and hopeful in adversity cannot be very far from the spirit of Christianity. (emphasis added)
Do you see parallels between Christian teachings, Western philosophy, and these Eastern teachings of Mencius as described by John C. H. Wu? Wu continues:
Perhaps the most celebrated aphorism of Mencius was: "The great man is one who has not lost the heart he had as a child." This prepared my mind to appreciate the words of Christ: "Believe me, unless you become like little children again, you shall not enter the kingdom of Heaven."
Indeed, both Jesus and Mencius teach on the importance of a childlike heart in the spiritual life. What could they mean by these sayings? Wu further discusses the thought of Mencius on virtuous character:
On the cultivation of the interior life, Mencius has said something which has influenced me profoundly:
What belongs to the superior man cannot be increased by the largeness of his sphere of action, not diminished by his dwelling in poverty and retirement...What belongs to his nature are love, justice, propriety and knowledge. These are rooted in the heart; they manifest themselves as a mild harmony appearing in countenance, a rich fullness in his back. They spread even to the four limbs; and the four limbs seem to understand without being told.
This tallies very well with the spiritual doctrine of St. Benedict and St. John of the Cross.
Whenever I think of Confucius and Mencius, Buddha and Lao Tse, I am inclined to call them—as St. Justin Martyr called Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle—"Pedagogues to lead men to Christ."
Could Christ be the Truth towards which Confucius and Mencius, Socrates and Plato were striving? Could these figures help us to understand the Catholic faith in a deeper way? With his experience of coming to Christianity from a background of Eastern thought, John C.H. Wu can help us make sense of why statues of Confucius and Socrates appear as friends in the Agora of Athens.
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