Week Beginning October 20, 2024
Your Heavenly Father Knows Best
If you could have a super power, what would it be? Would you like to be invisible, speed travel throughout time and space undetected, know everything there is to know, control things with just a thought, live forever, bilocate? Maybe you would like the power to benefit others through unending generosity, unwavering forgiveness, or instantaneous healing. When it comes to the supernatural, these super powers are not science fiction. They belong to our all-powerful, all-knowing, ever-present, eternal Creator. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, my thoughts higher than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:9).
Imagine that you have a magic crystal ball that enables you to look back in time. Would you do anything differently with the benefit of hindsight? Imagine that you can also see into the future. Would you change your course with the benefit of foresight? What if you have perfect wisdom and understanding about everything? Would you use that information for the acceptance or avoidance of circumstances today? Would you desire other goods, make different choices, or change your perspective?
It is likely that without a crystal ball and super powers, some of the decisions we make for ourselves are less than optimal. Fortunately, however, we have something far better to guide us. We have our heavenly Father, Who creates everything, knows everyone, and is the author of all life for all of eternity. As our loving Father, He wants what is ultimately best for us. “For I know well the plans I have in mind for you–oracle of the Lord–plans for your welfare and not for woe, so as to give you a future of hope” (Jeremiah 29:11).
Do you want to make the most out of your life? If so, one of the most important things you can do is ask God what path He chooses for you. Living your best life means living the life God wills for you. Blessed Henry Suso recommends that you “Abandon yourself utterly for the love of God, and in this way you will become truly happy.” Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque states: “It seems to me that the happiness of a soul consists entirely in conforming to the most adorable Will of God; for in so doing the heart finds peace and the spirit joy and repose.” Psalm 1:1-3 encourages us to obey the plans of the Lord to find our true happiness:
“Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in company with scoffers. Rather, the law of the Lord is his joy; and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted near streams of water, that yields its fruit in season; its leaves never wither; whatever he does prospers.”
Don’t miss out on what God has in store for you. Find your highest purpose as part of His divine-human collaboration. His way is superior to our way. His plans are better than our plans. God’s gifts exceed our wildest imagination. Why not benefit from the perfect and infinite wisdom of our heavenly Father?
Following the path of Jesus leads us to understanding the will of God. Saint Teresa of Ávila notes that “All blessings come to us through our Lord. He will teach us, for in beholding his life we find that he is the best example.” The Reverend Raoul Plus connects this to the importance of frequent prayer. He observes, “We see in the Gospel that whenever our Lord was about to undertake some important step, He always paused for a moment to raise His eyes to Heaven, and only after this moment of recollection did He take up the work He had to do.” Saint Charles Borromeo advises that prayer strengthens our discernment and resolve: “We must meditate before, during and after everything we do. The prophet says: ‘I will pray, and then I will understand.’ This is the way we can easily overcome the countless difficulties we have to face day after day, which, after all, are part of our work.”
Ultimately, prayer leads us out of spiritual blindness and helps us seek “what eye has not seen” (1 Corinthians 2:9). The Most Reverend Bishop Robert Barron reflects:
“Focused on the worldly goods of wealth, pleasure, power, and honor, most people don’t see how blind they are to the truly important things: giving oneself to the grace of God and living a life of love. If you have not surrendered to the grace of God, you are blind. How wonderful it is, then, that these men in the Gospel can cry out to Jesus in their need. They are, of course, making a petition for physical healing, but it’s much more than that for us. It’s asking for that one thing that finally matters: spiritual vision–to know what my life is about, to know the big picture, to know where I’m going. You can have all the wealth, pleasure, honor, and power you want. You can have all the worldly goods you could desire. But if you don’t see spiritually, it will do you no good; it will probably destroy you.” *
Part of sharpening our spiritual vision is acknowledging that we cannot see everything as God does. Sometimes we need to shift our perspective in order to appreciate God at work. Trusting in His providence, obeying His laws, and expressing gratitude all help us along our path to eternal happiness. Saint Claude de la Colombiere offers exceptional insight:
“It would be foolish to think that we can see better than God Himself, who is not subject to any of the passions that blind us, knows the future and can foresee all events and the consequences of every action. Experience shows that even the gravest misfortunes can have good results and the greatest successes end in disaster. A rule also that God usually follows is to attain His ends by ways that are the opposite to those human prudence would normally choose. In our ignorance of what the future holds, how can we be so bold as to question what comes about by God’s permission? Surely it is reasonable to think that our complaints are groundless and that instead of complaining we ought to be thanking Providence.”
This week, trust in God for your happily ever after. Accept Him as the director of your life and the center of your storyline. Understand that you may not “see” in the moment the good that He wills for you. Look outside of your own situation and discover how your circumstances are woven into other plots. View setbacks as valuable lessons to learn or tests to strengthen your spirit and resilience. When you feel you are in freefall, pray that God opens your parachute. If your parachute remains closed, the story is not over yet. Keep the faith. Make this a regular habit, and see what happens.
* Barron Quote Added 12/6/24
Week Beginning October 13, 2024
You Are Not Alone
One major issue with most self-help programs is that they expect us to do everything by ourselves. This promotes self-reliance, which over-emphasizes our human abilities and dismisses our divinely infused need for God. Jesus explicitly says that we must stay connected to Him in order to flourish. “I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). Instead of helping us to achieve the wellbeing we desire, self-reliance separates us from the vine and deludes us into a state of pride and spiritual death.
We are not alone, and we are not meant to live solely by our own abilities. Through the supernatural grace of God, we are invited to participate in the spiritual life, to experience lasting communion with the Lord, and to contribute productively to a divine and human collaboration. Only when we allow the Holy Spirit to illuminate our souls, only when we fully cooperate with God’s grace, and only when we freely trust in His creative power do we begin to thrive the way the Lord intends for us. We are not expected to do everything by ourselves, and we simply cannot by design do anything properly without God.
Living in right relationship with the Lord enables our fulfillment and our happiness. Saint Bonaventure concludes that “Since happiness is nothing else than the enjoyment of the supreme good, and the supreme good is above us, no one can enjoy happiness unless he rises above himself.” We begin to rise above ourselves when we humble ourselves before God.
Humility allows us to appreciate the absolute awesomeness of the Triune God. Humility reminds us that everything we are and everything we have is on loan from our Creator. Humility makes us grateful for all of His gifts. And humility gives us hope in His promise of joy and life everlasting. Saint Padre Pio of Pietrelcina observes that “You must not be discouraged or let yourself become dejected if your actions have not succeeded as perfectly as you intended. What do you expect? We are made of clay and not every soil yields the fruits expected by the one who tills it. But let us always humble ourselves and acknowledge that we are nothing if we lack the Divine assistance.”
Our reliance on our loving Father only serves to deepen our bonds. Saint Jean-Baptist de La Salle cautions that “The more you abandon to God the care of all temporal things, the more He will take care to provide for all your wants; but if, on the contrary, you try to supply all your own needs, Providence will allow you to continue to do just that, and then it may very well happen that even necessities will be lacking, God thus reproving you for your lack of faith and reliance on him.”
God’s generosity knows no bounds for His faithful children who place their trust in Him. Jesus assures us when he says, “Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they?” (Matthew 6:26). Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque notes: “Do not be afraid to abandon yourself unreservedly to His loving Providence, for a child cannot perish in the arms of a Father Who is omnipotent.” Saint Paul of the Cross encourages us to “Entrust yourself entirely to God. He is a Father and a most loving Father at that, who would rather let heaven and earth collapse than abandon anyone who trusted in him.”
Just as we can’t save ourselves by our own power, we can’t become our best selves without divine guidance and strength. Saint Alphonsus Liguori states that “Those whose hearts are enlarged by confidence in God run swiftly on the path of perfection. They not only run, they fly; because, having placed all their hope in the Lord, they are no longer weak as they once were. They become strong with the strength of God, which is given to all who put their trust in Him.” Whatever we endeavor is elevated and perfected when we partner with God, the source of our fortitude and the light on our path. Saint Paul reveals: “I have the strength for everything through him who empowers me” (Philippians 4:13).
We are not alone, and we do not have to do things all by ourselves. Saint Óscar Romero remarks that “We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.” Saint Francis de Sales explains: “In all your affairs lean solely on God’s Providence, by means of which alone your plans can succeed. Meanwhile, on your part work on in quiet cooperation with Him, and then rest satisfied that if you have trusted entirely to Him you will always obtain such a measure of success as is most profitable for you, whether it seems so or not to your own individual judgment.”
This week, stop acting like you are all alone. Turn to your heavenly Father and prayerfully discern His will for you. With His guidance each day, select priorities to address. With His strength, set out to accomplish those tasks for His glory. Ask for His help at the start of every day, and reflect on how you feel His presence in your efforts every night. Make this a regular habit, and see what happens.
Week Beginning October 6, 2024
You Are Made for Happiness and Joy
What is your deepest desire? If your answer is a temporal or worldly good, ask yourself what end benefit you hope to receive from that good. Once you obtain it, will you be completely and permanently satisfied? What else might you want? Continue along this line of questioning until you arrive at your ultimate desire, the one thing that provides absolute and unending contentment and joy.
After completing this exercise, you might realize that the things we think make us happy provide limited enjoyment for a fleeting period of time. It is unwise to hinge our hopes on some earthly possession or life circumstance; it is unfair to rely solely on another person for our welfare. Tangible pleasures, human achievements, wealth, health, honor, and power all leave us seeking something more, something better.
Our human limitations prevent us from fully grasping the innate beauty and vastness of God’s plan. “God has made everything appropriate to its time, but has put the timeless into their hearts so they cannot find out, from beginning to end, the work which God has done” (Ecclesiastes 3:11). God bestows in us this inherent sense of something beyond our world, of something beyond our present. He designs us with the need to search for meaning, to find truth, and to live purposefully.
Saint Thomas Aquinas suggests that only a perfect and infinite good can totally and eternally gratify our persistent longing for truth, pleasure, and fulfillment. This all-consuming hunger is infused in our hearts by our Creator, so that we may be drawn toward Him. Getting to know and love God, the supreme and everlasting source of everything good, leads us to our final goal of attaining true happiness in the highest good. Pope Saint John Paul II notes that “It is Christ you seek when you dream of happiness.”
The Bible reveals an unceasing pattern of God working for the wellbeing of His people. As pure love and pure good, He creates us to flourish in blessed friendship with Him and to experience His happiness and joy. Our identity as children of God is at the core of our existence. While our other roles and relationships change, our union with God is meant to sustain us forever. Catholic tradition relays that Saint Thomas Aquinas is so certain of this that when Jesus asks him what he would like as a reward, he replies, “Non nisi te, Domine” or “Nothing but you, Lord.”
Saint Augustine explains that “True happiness is to rejoice in the truth, for to rejoice in the truth is to rejoice in You, O God, who are the truth.” He continues: “Those who think that there is another kind of happiness look for joy elsewhere, but theirs is not true joy.” Once we understand and accept that our entire being–mind, body, and soul–is designed with an interminable yearning for happiness that can only be satiated divinely, we can begin to prioritize how we live our lives and dedicate our resources. Jesus advises us to seek first the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33, Luke 12:31), knowing that when we do so, all other things fall into place.
Servant of God Hans Urs von Balthasar refers to living a life properly ordered toward God as living the Theo-Drama. Playing our God-given role in His perpetual story of the universe is the greatest and most exciting thing we can do on this earth. God is exciting, and we are made to participate in that excitement. Unfortunately, so many of us become distracted by lesser things or caught up in our own personal drama where everything revolves around ourselves. Anything we dream up through our limited human imagination is simply a boring Ego-Drama compared with the infinite perfection of the Theo-Drama that God offers us. The happiness that God promises always surpasses any happiness that the world promises.
Ask yourself again to state your deepest desire. If it is not communion with God, upon what other good do you place higher value? The Venerable Fulton Sheen observes that “If you do not worship God, you worship something, and nine times out of ten it will be yourself.” Self-worship is a form of pride, which distances us from God. Without God, you will always feel like something is missing in your life, like there is something better out there. God creates us out of love with that pining in our hearts meant only to be filled with His love. When we try to fill that void with other things, we still feel empty. Only our Creator can make us whole. When you open your heart to God, He completes you with the love that you are made to encounter.
This week, follow in the footsteps of the great Saint Thomas Aquinas. Reward yourself with something that will bring you closer to God when you are feeling down or when you crave a treat. Pray, go to adoration, attend daily Mass, make a heartfelt confession, meditate on the Rosary, read scripture, do something charitable for someone else, express gratitude, forgive someone, appreciate the wonder of Creation, or do anything good with the intention of growing in friendship with the Lord. Make this a regular habit, and see what happens.
