Search
From the Pastor's Desk: Feb. 13, 2022
-
The Gospel today presents us Jesus’ inaugural address – His first big sermon in the Gospel of Luke – Luke’s version of the Beatitudes as a part of the Sermon on the Plain. Luke’s setting reflects Jesus’ very down-to-earth ground rules for inclusion in the Kingdom of God. The message is less spiritualized than the version of St. Matthew, with more concrete social implications. His words put down the standards of His society and raise up those of the Kingdom of God. His message is clear in telling us what matters most and what He wants for us - blessedness. He wants us to be blessed.
In the Bible, this word refers to something very specific: the kind of happiness that only God can give, the kind He created us for, the kind we yearn for in the depths of our hearts and that we can never seem to find. In His first sermon He is telling us the path to this kind of happiness- a meaning, a purpose, a fulfillment that goes deeper than the superficial kind that comes from money or popularity.
Jesus came to show us how to live like that. That's what He wants. He wants us to flourish. How easily we forget about this! How easily we fall into the devil's old trap of seeing our Christian life as a list of obligations, a hindrance to fun, and a limit on our freedom. But we were made by God. And the creator always knows what's best for the creation. Everything Jesus teaches, everything He asks of us, everything the Church teaches about how to live, what to do, what to avoid -these are the Creator’s instructions, meant for our benefit, for our blessedness. Jesus doesn't want us to waste our lives; He wants us to live them to the fullest.
The vocation of married life is just another way to live the fullness of life of discipleship. This Sunday, the church celebrates World Marriage Day with the theme “Called to the Joy of Love.” Marriage has always meant to be the bedrock of society. Its cornerstone! Marriage, although under attack in recent decades, works. It makes people happier, live longer, and build more economic security. Children with married parents perform better in school. Deep down, everyone wishes they could have a rewarding lifelong commitment with their spouse. But in the midst of challenges, we forget how marriage can benefit our personal lives. We are losing our determination and the skills to keep marriages healthy and strong. Marriage breakdown is costly to our kids and to society at large. Divorce and unwed childbearing cost the U.S. taxpayers a whopping $112 billion annually. In these economically challenging times, building stronger marriages helps build a stronger nation.
“The beatitude we are promised confronts us with decisive moral choices. It invites us to purify our hearts of bad instincts and to seek the love of God above all else. It teaches us that true happiness is not found in riches or well-being, in human fame or power, or in any human achievement - however beneficial it may be - such as science, technology, and art, or indeed in any creature, but in God alone, the source of every good and of all love...”(Catechism of the Catholic Church- CCC #1723).
This week invites us to focus on the purpose of our lives – to get to heaven. We are reminded that the physical and material desires are not to become obstacles on the way to heaven. We are also reminded not to domesticate the call to discipleship, since it always demands the high price of exclusion, struggle, hardship, suffering and opposition. And yet, in these totally reversed ordinary standards, we are called to “rejoice and leap on that day…for your reward will be great in heaven.”
“Life is difficult. We can accept that or get aggravated, but we cannot change it. The easy life is a mirage. Those who chase that illusion end up angry, broken, disappointed, cynical and resentful. The problem isn’t that life is difficult. The problem is that we expect it to be easy or we try to make it easy.” (Matthew Kelly, Life is Messy, p. 60/61)
I wish you a blessed week everybody!
With prayers,
Fr. Andy
