The Wheel
Abba Dorotheos of Gaza - “Draw the outline of a circle. The center point is the same distance from any point on the circumference. Let us suppose that this circle is the world and that God Himself is the center; the straight lines drawn from the circumference to the center are the lives of human beings.
Let us assume for the sake of analogy that to move toward God, then, human beings move from the circumference along the various radii of the circle to the center. At the same time, the closer they are to God, the closer they become to one another; and the closer they are to one another, the closer they become to God.”
Abba Dorotheos has an elegant insight into the Christian life as we are the spokes on the wheel with Christ at the center as the hub. We move closer to Christ with our love for Him and He in turn draws us closer to Him, towards the center.
If we extrapolate this to the macro level, we can see that the analogy of the wheel is much more than the individual Christian life, but the communal Christian life of the Christian faith. Each spoke as an expression of the Christian faith all pointing towards the hub which anchors them together in Christ. Each spoke, each church and ecclesial community in love with Christ and He in turn in love with us, connecting us on the wheel centered around Him.
However, as spokes we can focus too much on ourselves thinking that we are the only spoke of the wheel with the direct connection to Christ while failing to realize that the body of Christ is one, united in Him. If we stop focusing on just our own spoke and draw near to God, He will draw near to us. As we draw closer in faith and love, we will partake of communion with Him and there we will find communion with one another through Him.
The force of His love draws us closer together as long as we don’t quench the Spirit in quarrels that I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas, and I am of Christ. Are we not all one in Christ? Is the body of Christ to be divided with the eye saying to the hand that is has no need of it or the head saying to the feet that it has no need of it? There are many parts, but one body. The bride is one body united in Christ as the universal Catholic Church. The sister churches and ecclesial communities are all one in Christ. We must push towards loving God with all of our heart, all of our soul, and all of our strength, and seek the real presence of Christ that we may have communion with Him and in turn, with one another.
For there is no greater commandment than to love the Lord your God will all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. And the second is like it, that you love your neighbor as yourself. This is how humanity will know that we are Jesus’ disciples if we have love for one another. With our love for one another, we are united in Christ and the rim of the wheel is connected through fellowship in our acts of faith, acts of hope, acts of charity.