Category: Erin

With All Your Heart

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERASixteen years ago today, I stood in a white robe before the bishop as he anointed me with chrism and spoke the words of Confirmation: “Be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit.” I still remember the joy I felt walking into the church that day, feeling the presence of so many saints rejoicing over me. I was ready to take part in the mission of the Church, to follow those saints toward Heaven. I didn’t know how God would call me to serve in the years ahead, but I trusted in Him to lead me forward—and that was enough for me to say yes to the journey.

So many journeys start with a “yes.” There is no way for us to know every detail of the adventure that awaits, but if we know that the one who invites us is trustworthy, then we can accept the call with joy. Our relationship with God and our trust in Him are what allow us to do His work and keep His commandments. In today’s Gospel we hear that the most important commandment is to love God, and then to see and love God in others and within ourselves—because without a foundation of love, all our efforts will be fruitless. If we don’t love God with all our hearts and all our understanding and all our strength, then we won’t be able to trust Him to lead us, and we won’t be open to receiving His grace.

He is One and there is no other than he.
And to love him with all your heart,
with all your understanding,
with all your strength,
and to love your neighbor as yourself
is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.
—Mark 12:32–33

In Confirmation, we actively choose to follow God in a public way, opening our hearts to receive the gifts of the Holy Spirit and offering our lives to be used as God sees fit. But before we choose Him, He has already chosen us. The graces we receive through the Sacrament are meant to be used as resources for the mission on which we are sent, and He sends us gifts that are particularly suited for us. All we need to do is to be receptive, to open our hearts just a crack and allow His grace to flood in. We are called to do things that might seem impossible on our own, but when we remember the graces that have been given us, we realize that we are armed for the task.

We are called and chosen. The unfolding of our lives is not a random set of coincidences; rather, every moment carries great purpose and meaning. God has recruited us as unfit soldiers, yet by grace His will shall be done in us.

I will heal their defection, says the LORD,
I will love them freely;
for my wrath is turned away from them.
I will be like the dew for Israel:
he shall blossom like the lily;
He shall strike root like the Lebanon cedar,
and put forth his shoots.
—Hosea 14:5–7

Reflect today on the journeys God has led you on in the past and where He might be calling you today. Are you ready to say yes to Him, to receive whatever He gives? Lay out your worries before Him so that He can demonstrate His love for you. Turn your attention toward this most important commandment and nurture your relationship with God. Let Him show you how loving and trustworthy He is, so that you can say yes to Him with all heart, all your understanding, and all your strength.

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Image: Hermann Hammer, Sacred Heart of Jesus on Pinus Cembra in the Stubai Alps between Salfains and Grieskogel / CC0 1.0

Chosen

Bilińska_Joseph_sold_by_his_brothersToday’s first reading recounts the story of Joseph being sold into slavery by his brothers. Jealous of the attention he was getting from their father and annoyed by his prideful behavior, they acted out of anger and got rid of him. However, it becomes clear in Scripture that Joseph was not only his father’s chosen favorite; he was also the chosen one of God, to fulfill a mission in Egypt.

When Joseph’s brothers came face to face with him again many years later, and when they realized that Joseph was the one who had the power to save their lives from famine, surely they feared that he would remember their crimes against him and be unwilling to help. But Joseph was moved to tears to see them once again, and he forgave them immediately for all they had done:

“Come closer to me,” Joseph told his brothers. When they had done so, he said: “I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt.
But now do not be distressed, and do not be angry with yourselves for having sold me here. It was really for the sake of saving lives that God sent me here ahead of you.
The famine has been in the land for two years now, and for five more years cultivation will yield no harvest.
God, therefore, sent me on ahead of you to ensure for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives in an extraordinary deliverance.
So it was not really you but God who had me come here; and he has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his household, and ruler over the whole land of Egypt.

—Genesis 45:4–8

Joseph was indeed chosen, but his chosenness did not have the significance he first imagined as his father’s favorite child. He was chosen not because of his own merit, but simply because he was in a position to serve others. Over the course of his journey in Egypt, he became aware of his own faults and gained a sense of humility. The people that God calls are not always the best or holiest individuals, but they are given an opportunity to do something for God. God had a plan for Joseph and used him in spite of his flaws. Joseph’s pride faded when he realized that he was undeserving of the honors he coveted. By the end of the story, his brothers’ jealousy faded as well—in particular Judah’s—for we can see that they no longer hate the fact that Joseph is ruler over them but willingly bow down to him. Joseph and his brothers all reach a peaceful resolution by acknowledging their own weakness and unworthiness of power. Joseph, however, is a successful ruler because he realizes not only that he is unworthy of power but also that he has been chosen regardless, and he can fulfill this task with God’s help. It is humility that allows him to accept his role as ruler despite his weakness, for he is acting in obedience to God and simply accepting what he is given instead of seeking power out of sheer avarice.

Each of us is given a unique role to fill, and in many situations we are asked to play a supporting role. It is up to us to embrace the role we are given and fulfill it to the best of our ability, rather than being jealous of those who have roles of greater importance or shirk the responsibilities of our calling. It would be foolish to think that we are better than anyone else, even if it appears that we are in a more influential position; some are called to quieter, hidden lives and live them meaningfully.

Joseph was chosen to rule over his brothers and save the lives of many, but that doesn’t mean he was a better person than his brothers were. The Jewish people were indeed God’s chosen people, but that does not mean they were better than the Gentiles. Joseph was chosen to be the conduit for God to carry out His plan, and the Jewish people were the conduit through which God Himself entered the world in the person of Jesus Christ.

It is no surprise that Joseph and Judah emerged as the strongest clans in Israel, when one considers the fact that these two brothers were the ones who most fully accepted and embraced the roles given them by God. They became the men that God created them to be instead of fighting against their lot in life or demanding more. In everything, they acted with humility.

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Image: Anna Bilińska-Bohdanowicz, Joseph sold by his brothers / PD-US

The Humility of the Centurion

The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.
—Exodus 14:14

And Jesus went with them,
but when he was only a short distance from the house,
the centurion sent friends to tell him,
“Lord, do not trouble yourself,
for I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof.
Therefore, I did not consider myself worthy to come to you;
but say the word and let my servant be healed.”
—Luke 7:6–7

Many of you have probably seen Christine Horner’s opinion piece that ran in the Huffington Post in July about this line of Luke’s Gospel, which we repeat at every Mass just before receiving the Eucharist. When we say these words, we declare ourselves unworthy to receive God and then invite Him in anyway, acknowledging that in His great mercy, He will heal us. Horner reacts strongly against this, saying: “Dialogue and constructs that perpetuate ‘I am not worthy’ are the root of all evil behavior.” In reading this line, she perceives it only as a guilt trip and an expression of self-hatred, not as a statement of humility.

Many Catholic writers have responded with beautiful commentary on the true meaning of this verse. Deborah Savage reflects on the value of true humility in a letter addressed to Horner:

The humility that the Catholic Christian seeks has absolutely nothing to do with the “self-denigration” you seem to think it requires. By definition, the starting place and foundation of the virtue of humility—which St. Augustine claimed was the quintessential Christian virtue—is the truth about myself. And the genuinely humble person understands herself to be, in the first instance, a creature, a person made in the image and likeness of God. Her dignity and her worth flow from this fact and not from any personal accomplishments or earthly achievement.

Humility is that virtue that permits her to acknowledge both her gifts and her weaknesses, secure in the knowledge that she is the recipient of the gift of life and that, in fact, all is gift. Though all children begin as little self-centered egoists, as she matures, the child can be taught—or will eventually learn on her own—that her fundamental posture toward this generosity must be a profound gratitude.
…
And this is the truly sad part about our situation. The cause of violence in our culture is not the call to admit my weakness, my uncertainties, my mistakes. The cause of violence in our culture is the refusal to accept the reality of sin and to recognize that, in that regard, we are all the same: in need of forgiveness and compassion. The cause of violence in our culture is our inability to see the humanity of another and to love them—to will their good—even if we think they might be flawed. You yourself point to the paradox at work in this exchange; it starts with a recognition of my own humanity and an acceptance of myself as I am, created by God, held in existence by God, redeemed and loved by him who is the source of life.

Thomas Clements writes on how we should focus on the fact that the Lord heals our unworthiness. We should not be insulted at the suggestion that we are unworthy; rather, we should acknowledge it as truth and rejoice in the fact that He redeems us anyway:

In our fallen human nature, we sin, turn from God and hurt our communion, which hurts our souls. In this way, we are unworthy, but God is quick to make us worthy through His grace. Our souls need healing from a God who never sins, is always Good. He revealed to us through St. James, “Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you,” and “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

And David Mills ponders what it really means to be unworthy:

Have the writer and other would-be Children of Eden never met a deeply good person, a holy person, much less a saint? Have they not felt unworthy in the presence of real goodness? Felt that here was someone you would feel it an undeserved honor to have in your home?

I suspect they have met but haven’t recognized genuine goodness, and if so they’ve inflicted on themselves a huge loss. It’s a gift, meeting people who are so good. The good man and woman is a beacon, is the light of an open door at the end of a dark hard journey. It’s a gift to feel unworthy in the presence of goodness, because that goodness comes from a God who wills us to become worthy and has provided the means at great cost to himself.

Without perceiving our own littleness, we cannot marvel at His greatness. True humility does both these things—we must keep our own egos in check, but we cannot stop there. Perhaps this is what Horner was trying to get us to avoid, a fixation on our unworthiness without looking upward to find its cure. True humility is not self-denigration or despair, it is not a feeling of helplessness or powerlessness. True humility sees that we are small in comparison to One much greater, Who will protect us and care for us. True humility sets aside all worry about our own faults and mistakes, knowing that He will cover us with His grace, no matter how many times we stumble. And this is only possible when we perceive our unworthiness and ask to be healed.

If we do not acknowledge our need for God’s mercy, we cannot receive it. If we think we are already worthy, then what is the point of inviting Him in? He does His greatest work in us when we kneel at His feet, embrace our dependence upon Him, and allow Him to use us as His instruments—not when we rely on our own plans, our own skills, our own cleverness; not when we fight tooth and nail for our own autonomy. He will let us fight, He will let us flounder until we fall again at His feet. And then, when we rest in Him, He will fight for us—we need only to be still.

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Image: James Tissot, The Confession of the Centurion / PD-US