Faith
Some Better Thing
We’re two weeks into the new year, and the grand designs that many of us made are at risk of faltering. One of the best ways that we can spend our time each day is in prayer. This tremendously important activity not only contributes to bringing God’s kingdom to earth, but it fortifies us for the struggles that we encounter in the ordinary life of our vocation.
There is no rule or formula that dictates how much we need to pray or ought to pray. It’s particular to our lives. Cloistered religious pray a vast majority of the day, but a parent has other holy obligations to attend to in the course of caring for their children.
The most common challenge we face in praying is just getting started. The time comes when we’ve decided to pray, but there always seems to be some better thing that we could be doing. I could pray now, but what about cleaning the kitchen? I could pray now, but what if I first just tidy my desk? I could pray now, but maybe it would be better if I work out first, and then I’ll be awake and alert.
We have precious few minutes and hours in our day. Our to-do list will never be complete, and there are many good and worthy things that we could do. But why not spend a few minutes in prayer, and then go do that other good thing?
Jubilee
It’s been 25 years since the Catholic Church last celebrated the Jubilee. I was in middle school in 2000, but I still remember the special events that occurred. Throughout the year, there will be many special opportunities to enrich our faith and draw from the treasury of graces.
In the Bible, the Jubilee was more than just a special year, spiritually. Debts would be forgiven, property rights restored, and slaves freed. It’s not difficult to imagine the joy that came with such liberation.
In the Catholic tradition, we’ve celebrated Jubilee’s for over 700 years, and these special years are meant to be equally liberating. There are opportunities for indulgences which erase the debt we owe to God’s mercy, and there will be many ways for us to participate in those opportunities.
In Rome, the Pope has opened the four Jubilee doors at the basilicas, and although most of us will be unable to walk through them this year, our participation in the Jubilee is not diminished. This is the year, our year, for us to finally lay down the sins that have been holding us back, and run through the wide open gates of God’s mercy.
Swept to Safety
In the entirely of salvation history, there are stories, major and minor, that all play their part. Every episode that made its way into the Bible contains enough truth and wisdom to fill a book of its own. This is especially true of the story of the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt.
Although it takes up less than a quarter of one page of even a large print Bible, the story contains rich theological value. In it, we glean insights into the silent character of St. Joseph.
In his familial hometown, but away from his adult home, Joseph dutifully brings his young family to obey the order of Caesar. On the outskirts of town, in some empty cave or abandoned barn, the child who is entrusted to Joseph is born. While he sleeps, an angel again visits Joseph in his dream, this time with an urgent warning. The enemies of the child are gathering, seeking his life, and Joseph must spirit him away.
Quietly and in haste, Joseph loads up his family and journeys across the frontier to and into the relative safety and anonymity of Egypt.
As the dragnet was pulled across the whole kingdom of Israel, Joseph slipped through and frustrated the first challenge to Christ incarnate. This early attempt to end his life prefigures the future attempts, and effaces the threat to the global order that this infant presented.
Joseph is understood to be a deeply prayerful man. Angels visit him in his sleep, a sign that even in the quiet, idle moments of his day, he is disposed to prayer and receptive to the voice of God. He never speaks, and never questions these celestial messengers, but humbly obeys them to the letter.
King Herod, though subordinate to Caesar and his governor, still wielded immense and oppressive power over his subjects. The search must have been massive, as Herod reacted with wanton cruelty to the words of the magi. Despite the scale of the manhunt, Joseph, a simple carpenter, outwitted them all. He strongly and silently swept his family to safety.
The Great I Am
Born on Christmas Day is the King of Kings.
He arrived in a damp, cold, dark place, in some cave in the backwater of a once-great kingdom, to a people oppressed by their rulers, foreign and domestic. He chose to reset the global order not in a time of fast communication and stable democracies, but in a time of mass illiteracy, brutal tribalism, and gruesome cruelty.
In the midst of this chaos arrived the great I Am. The spark He struck has turned into the roaring flame that spread through the whole world. None of it was possible without a God whose love for His people could not be contained, or without the simple “yes” of a newlywed couple that brought the Christ-child into their home.
Arrival
With Thanksgiving behind us, we’ve entered into what feels like the busiest time of the year. In just four weeks, Christmas morning will be here, followed shortly thereafter by 2025.
This holiday season, Thanksgiving-Christmas-New Year, is a stressful time, but there’s a certain peace that permeates the air. Maybe it’s the cold weather slowing us all down, or perhaps it’s the slowdown at work that gets us feeling this way. Though our to-do lists don’t get any shorter, it feels like we finally have permission to set aside some tasks and not be in such a hurry to get everything done.
Though that all may be true, there’s something else that causes us to pause; anticipation. We know of the impending arrival of Christmas, and the joy of the Christmas season. Everything around us reminds us of that fact, and it soaks up our attention. From the music on the radio in stores, to the sudden shift in liturgical decor, to the decorations across town, Christmas is top of mind. For one brief month, the whole world around us wants us to be distracted from our daily responsibilities and challenges and focus on Christmas.
The Messiah is on his way, and will arrive soon. What that means, a child born for sacrifice, connects us directly to the freedom of Easter. His arrival marks the beginning of a new chapter in civilization, where we can all see the great light and experience our hope, fulfilled.
Advent is a time of distraction, holy distraction. There’s plenty to do, and more that still needs to be done, but everywhere we look, everywhere we go, and everything we hear all calls our hearts back to the true joy of the season; the arrival.
Written for Me
Though I haven’t committed to routine self-improvement in the past two years, there was a recent time in my life where it was always top of mind. The last big undertaking was in 2022 when I completed Ascension Press’ Bible in a Year podcast. That was the first time in my life that I read the Bible and truly studied it as a comprehensive work, and the payoff has been huge.
Although the Bible was authored thousands of years ago and 5,000 miles away, it applies to my life today as it did to the authors then. It’s a book of human stories and experiences, that repeat throughout our lives. No matter the situation that I find myself in, I can almost always find a direct relationship to a story or character in the Bible. In those times, it feels as if it was all written only for me.
Filled with dark imagery, unimaginable suffering, and challenges that I hope to never confront, the thread of hope weaves throughout the chapters and verses. At the end of the story, no matter how dark things get, Light returns to assert dominion, the greatest triumph of all.
Overflowing
A good way to think about our lives, especially our spiritual lives, is as a cup. We can choose what we fill it up with. Things of beauty, prayer, the Sacraments, and acts of virtue fill up our cup to the point where it overflows.
When our cup is overflowing, it’s extraordinarily difficult for sin to enter into our lives. We are fulfilled, living life by God’s design, and there is simply no room for temptation to gain a foothold.
In the same way with time and our day, when we fill up our day with the things we must do, there is neither time nor opportunity for anything else. By filling up our spiritual life with these good things and heavenly delights, we can accomplish the same thing.
We carry the same habitual sins into the Confessional month after month, year after year. It can be easy to make small pivots and adjustments to increase our chances of overcoming this sin, but why not just completely snuff it out? Give it no quarter, no room, no attention. Even a giant log is no match for a river with a strong current.
Things of Heaven
For the many hours that I’m awake during the day, there are many things on my mind. I have what I need to do now, what I need to do next, and the random thought of what needs to be done in the future. From meal prep, to instant scheduling decisions, to the project at hand, my mind works all throughout the day.
To put it simply, I spend almost all day thinking of the things of man.
Stress builds through the day as my lists grow, and time runs short. I manage not only my schedule, but the schedule of my four children. I manage my list, and their school list. To my eternal surprise, they usually have their own idea of how things ought to be done.
I wonder how differently I’d approach stress, conflict, and challenges if I spent a few more minutes each day thinking of the things of Heaven. What ratio would be required to improve my self-esteem, my hope, and my attitude?
I am here today with a specific purpose and vocation, but my ultimate objective is not today. I am here to prepare myself and my family for the promises that have been made to us, and to be worthy to receive them. Bringing those promises, and their reality, back into my day could be the pivot point that changes the whole game.
Small Moments
When we aspire to greater things, we tend to fall into the trap of making big plans. I’ve never run a marathon, and frankly never run. So if I decided to run a marathon next summer, it’d be easy to get lost in the planning.
I’d need better shoes, a new watch, the right clothes, the perfect hydration system, an eating plan down to the calorie, and, of course, a daily training plan with tracker. Those things would help me, in theory, go from couch to marathon. But would I do it?
What if instead of dedicating hours to research, hundreds of dollars to new equipment, days to calendaring out the next year of my life, I just grabbed my shoes and went for a run?
This is how we approach prayer. We try to go from fresh out of the Confessional to saint in one big leap. But we don’t need history’s best prayer plan, or the most ingenious sequencing of novenas. You just need to find small moments throughout your day, times when there’s a natural pause, and instead of swiping mindlessly, pray mindfully.
The Plans
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.