Tag: <span>Good</span>

October 15, 2020September 24, 2020

Destiny’s Child

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

“All things work for good for those who love God,” says St. Paul in a different epistle (cf. Rm. 8:28). For those in union with Christ, suffering is an opportunity to draw nearer to Him, become more like Him, and win further application of the infinite saving grace He merited on the cross. For those in union with Christ, triumphs and joys evoke gratitude, praise, and further trust in God. All circumstances, good and evil, increase love.

And Paul powerfully outlines the final result in today’s first reading. Adoption to the divinity through Christ. Every spiritual blessing in the heavens. Forgiveness of transgressions. The riches of grace.

And for this glorious destiny, per St. Paul, God chose us before the foundation of the world. A glorious plan, a glorious destiny.

What a contrast with Jesus’ message to the scribes and Pharisees in today’s gospel. He tells them, “The wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and Apostles; some of them they will kill and persecute’ in order that this generation might be charged with the blood of all the prophets shed since the foundation of the world.”

A very different destiny indeed.

It may seem unfair that, whereas for those of us who give ourselves to God with all our hearts, everything has been destined to work together for good, the destiny of Jesus’ audience here was to get heaped on them blame for the blood of all the prophets, even those who came before them. All things working, we may say, for not-so-good.

It is true that all of our destinies were pre-planned by God. And yet, God causes no evil. None. God is simply so incredibly powerful, so unfathomably sovereign, that He can create a rich race composed of completely and utterly free beings, fully capable of choosing between good and evil; foresee the choices of each free will; and–mark this–weave all of those free responses into a grand mosaic of history by far more impressive, more coherent, more pregnant with perfect meaning than any work of art ever conceived by the imagination of man.

As Lord of history, God is so powerful that He transforms not only neutral circumstances but even acts of freely chosen evil into key masterstrokes composing the rich and thoroughly beautiful work of art that is the glory of those who have chosen to love Him.

So, what are you worried about, again? 🙂

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: In your dialogue with Jesus, contemplate His ability as King of the Universe to weave all circumstances together for your good–to center, in a sense, all of history itself on your individual welfare, and yet to do this for each of His friends. Tell Him you adore Him and trust Him, and place all your eggs in His basket. Tell Him that you are setting your hand to His plow, never to look back.

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August 20, 2020December 13, 2020

Din of Evil, Triumph of Good

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Two discouraging words when it comes to the spread of evil and godlessness are “majority” and “power.” “Satan is having a field day,” some say, and it is true. We decipher the cunning hidden agendas of individuals and organizations with massive amounts of money and key positions of cultural and political leadership aimed at removing God and His principles from every aspect of culture and society. They deceive others, and in some cases themselves as well, into thinking that the agenda is about justice and personal freedom. But in reality, they push continuously toward totalitarian government supplanting Divine Providence, and political alignment with a certain overreaching social agenda supplanting personal morality and charity.

But today’s readings betray an even deeper force at work that we can decipher. If indeed the noisy powers of the day, in every age, repeat over and over the first sin of supplanting God with man, something else is going on. Something else which, while quiet, carries the impetus of a volcanic surge.

That “something else” is the tireless and unstoppable impetus of God’s mercy. Here, words like “minority” and “weakness” become wondrous and beautiful, as God moves through the populous, drawing real people close to Him, purifying them, and leading them back to Him. He is quiet and understated, but His mercy is gloriously stubborn as it searches every human heart for a crack or crevice of openness through which He inserts the challenge to follow Him.

“I will pour clean water on you and wash away all your sins.” “Many are called, but few are chosen.”

If we consider history in this light, it belongs to the saints–both those recognized, and those anonymous. Even the stage of evil upon which they act out their lives is set for their sake, as a contrast against which their virtue and beauty shines, and a challenger through which their greatness is strengthened and increased.

We must work tirelessly for the triumph of good in the world, including in the public sphere; but our hope should not lie in a flashy, short-term victory. Rather, we must hope in the hidden but glorious action of God in hearts that we will never see, who may never be interviewed on TV or participate in a poll. Just as He acts in our hearts, not through external pressure, but through the breeze of His Holy Spirit.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Talk to Our Lord about the prevalence of evil in the world. Does it disturb Him? Does it worry Him? Does He have it all in hand, or is He expecting us to “save Him” from it? On the other hand, if He has it in hand, How would He like us to help along the triumph of good in the world? What are His expectations for us and from us in an often frighteningly chaotic world?

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