Unshakeable Hope

     In the Catholic Church, today is a Holy Day of Obligation, which means that the faithful must attend Mass. The purpose of today in the Church is to commemorate all the Saints who have served God so heroically throughout history. Their lives, many of which ended in the sacrifice of their blood for their faith, serve as inspiration for all us sinners who live with the desire to do good but a weakness of will that often leads us to sin and despair.

     Before and after the Mass, I spent some quiet time reflecting in front of the Blessed Sacrament, which is Jesus truly present in the Eucharist. I was particularly struck by my own insignificance in the midst of the God and Creator of all. Archbishop Fulton Sheen, himself on the road to being declared a Saint, said that, measuring ourselves by the infinite, we ought to be absolutely convinced of our nothingness.

     Often, I feel there's a impassable chasm between what I ought to do and what I do each day. The words of Saint Paul in his letter to the Romans rings true: I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil which I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me. So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. (Rom 7:15,17-21) This is not some average guy saying this, but a Saint! If a Saint struggles with this same battle against sin as we do, then it can be very easy to lose hope for ourselves.

      But it's important to recall that Saint Paul was not always...well...Saint Paul. He started his life as Saul, a persecutor of the early Church. He took part in killing some of the early martyrs such as Saint Stephen. How then did he convert his life? Only through the grace of God! For I believe he stood at the edge of that same chasm that we all face. Neither Saint Paul nor you nor I can cross into a life of holiness by ourselves. The only bridge sturdy enough to support the hefty weight of our sinful baggage is the Cross of Jesus. Through Christ, all things our possible. As Saint Paul puts it: There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death. For good has done what the law, weakened by flesh, could not do: sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh. (Rom 8:1-3)

     In God's Kingdom of Saints, there is room both for a martyr and the man who stoned him. That is not a message of despair, but one of unshakeable hope, if only we are willing to acknowledge our weakness and dependence on God's mercy. As another future Saint, Blessed Pope John Paul II, said, "We are not the sum of weakness and failures. We are the sum of our Father's love for us." Perhaps the secret of the Saints is this: they understand that alone there are nothing, but with God there is nothing they cannot conquer, even sin and death!