By: Jay Ezell
Dang it! 7:56! Late again and it seems like a miracle we made it out the door at all. Kids not getting up on time. Not listening. Why do I have to repeat the same request over 3 times just for my kids to barely even pay attention? And that’s just the beginning. My meeting later today keeps stealing my attention, pulling me away from the present moment. The car needs to be cleaned. There are endless things to be done at home and really, it seems like I can’t find a stitch of peace. Oh yeah, it’s lent too and I really should be praying more.
When in the world will I have time to pray amidst all of this craziness of life?
You and I have been created with an inexhaustible desire, well, at least one. We might even feel driven by what seems like so many desires. There is one however that every human being on earth has. It’s something imbedded deep into our being. Deep in our soul. A longing. A universal longing. This longing, this desire is for the infinite. It’s a desire for God.
As humans we spend a lot of time attempting to fill this desire with finite things. Things of this world. Things that have a tendency to enslave us. Things that lead to bitterness, unhappiness, addiction, maybe even death.
God is infinite. We have been created from all eternity, each one of us with a great purpose. Yes, even you. In fact, we are all called to holiness. What exactly is holiness? Does it mean we are all supposed to run off and become priests or nuns or monks? No, in fact quite the opposite. Of course, we pray that many will continue to answer God’s call to vocations in religious life, however, the vast majority of us will remain exactly where we are. Immersed in the chaos of everyday life.
Getting ourselves and our kids out the door in the morning. Preparing for meetings. Working hard. Going to an afternoon ball game. These are temporal affairs. God our father is counting on you and me to live in the midst of these affairs and elevate them and ourselves in the process.
“The laity by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and ordering them to the plan of God.”
– Lumen Gentium, 31
Lumen Gentium is one of the documents published as a result of Vatican Council II. This quote is from chapter 4, point 31 of the document. This is the universal call to holiness. It is for all of us. We are all called to become saints.
Now, it’s one thing to hear this. It’s another thing to live it. It is also possible to get caught up in thinking that holiness is just for the priests, nuns and other religious people. Who am I to be holy? Also, how can I be holy? My life seems crazy sometimes, or if you’re like me, all the time! My house is a mess, my kids don’t listen and sometimes it seems like I can barely manage my life already. How in the world could I be holy!? I don’t have hours and hours to go and pray. I might even think, why on earth would I want to be holy? That doesn’t seem fun at all.
What if I told you that holiness brings every single one of us to a more authentic version of ourselves. What if I told you that God doesn’t want you to “die to yourself” so that you can become someone else. He wants you to get out of your own way (die to yourself) and become the best version of yourself. With your talents. With your brilliant ideas. With your dreams. When we get out of our own way, we work on eliminating pride, allowing the fullness of God’s creative power to flow through us. We become liberated. We become truly free. Free to live.
Holiness is nothing more than loving God more in this moment. I tell my kids frequently, only one thing matters in life, loving God more in this moment. If they are hanging out with friends, how can they be a better friend and enjoy that time more? They may resist fighting with their siblings a bit more if they focused on loving God more. If they are doing homework, they might do it with more focus and intensity and offer it to God.
As parents, we love God more when we lovingly embrace the 1,001 pinpricks and apparent monotony of days and weeks and months and years of the struggle of life. When we double down on our marriage by showing up with flowers or a surprise date. When we pick up around the house. When preparing meals. And, we can’t forget, the authentic joys of life.
We can all grow closer to God when we experience the authentic joys of life. Things like nature. A great conversation. A good book. The beauty of art. The exhilaration of good music. Our world is full of these. The wonder of God surrounds us. This is what we are all searching for.
I would like to invite you to consider a challenge. I challenge each one of us to level up in these final days of lent. To focus on becoming more authentically ourselves by loving God more in this moment and the next. To realize that our desires are good and they are fulfilled when redirected toward God in the most ordinary and wonderful things that surround us everyday. Thus embracing fully the universal call to holiness, right here, right now which will lead us to true freedom. Freedom to live.
