Our Hearts' Desire

How much do you desire God?

That was the question heading the most recent Restoration newspaper I read from Madonna House and it is a good question.  Ultimately it is the question that underlies all that we do throughout our lives, but particularly during Lent.

The whole purpose of Lent is to identify our desire for God.  We sacrifice goods in order to purify our desire within that we may recognize it as such.

Desire is like a flame; it starts small and it grows.

So Catherine Doherty wrote in the first article I read and I think the simile is so apt.  Desire truly is like a flame, which, as we feed it, grows and grows, while when we give it no fuel it dies away into embers, waiting perhaps for fresh kindling and a breath to bring it back to life.  The more we feed that desire the larger it grows until it becomes a bonfire and we are set on fire.  And then, as Saint Catherine of Siena said:

If you are who you should be, you will set the world on fire.

That conflagration may start from the smallest of flames.  It matters little whether you find in your heart only a coldness and emptiness or whether you feel that your desire for things of the world outweighs any desire for God.  If you feed the tiniest flicker with prayer and abandonment to God, you will become that burning light.

We exist to desire the Desired One: God.  As St. Augustine said, "Our hearts were made for Yourself, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in You."

Catherine Doherty's words speak so powerfully to the reason for our existence.  One of the greatest struggles of our lives is to determine the answer to that question: why do we exist?  The Baltimore Catechism answers it simply: To love and serve God in this life and be happy with Him in the next.  In that simplicity there is great truth and it is our desire for God that prompts us to love and serve Him.

In order for that desire to grow, however, and in order for that flame to burn, there must be room for it.  As Catherine Doherty puts it:

His every act, His every word, must be enclosed in our desire, for if we are to fulfill our desire to see Him when the door of death opens (and even before, for the Kingdom of God begins now), we have to imitate Him whom we are going to look at.

This will require that we empty ourselves of many things, since the kind of fiery desire we have takes a lot of space.  It is not just a little kindling that we are going to ignite but huge dry wood.

We must desire to empty every corner of ourselves of everything but this person called Jesus Christ, God and man, who died and resurrected so that we might see the face of the Triune God....