There Is No Condemnation

The idea of needing to earn God's love keeps rousing its ugly head here and there in various ways, revealing an insidious monster that penetrates souls and prevents them from receiving the abundant life Christ promised.  Of course, spoken in such clear fashion, the idea is laughable.  Who could really believe they needed to earn God's love?  If you ask people, likely most if not all would know in their heads the right answer.  Yet, as the prophet Jeremiah put it, "more torturous than all else is the human heart" (17:9).

This false belief that we need to earn God's love appears beneath the visage of everything from scrupulosity and perfectionism to affected piety and hypocrisy.  In each case you can trace back the problem to the root sin of pride.

Diagnosing pride's sinfulness in this case, however, merely returns us to the need to be humble enough to receive God's love and hence back to the beginning of the vicious cycle of needing to earn God's love.  Yet, as Saint Paul said: "There is no condemnation in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:1).  Also, Jesus Himself says: "Is there no one who condemns you?  Neither do I condemn you" (see John 8:10-11).

Certainly pride exists within our hearts, but let us look beyond this sin to other forces at work in our subconscious minds and hearts.  As Americans, we live in a country founded on a principle often known as the "Protestant work ethic."  That idea essentially amounts to the need to work hard that we might achieve everything by our own efforts (and hence extends easily to spirituality with the idea of needing to earn even God's approval and love).

Furthermore, American ideals arose out of the principles of the Enlightenment whose thinkers essentially eschewed Christianity for Secular Humanism.  Instead of God being responsible for all that was good and the sole arbiter of goodness, mankind took that role for these thinkers who believed in the supremacy of reason and science.  Isn't it ironic that such a perspective would then invade Catholicism itself which Enlightenment thinkers had rejected?  Yet to me it seems it has: we have somehow absorbed this false idea that we of our own power must achieve human perfection.  Yes, that is what it means to believe that we must earn God's love: it means to believe that we are responsible for our own sanctification rather than merely accepting His free gift to us.  Take that to its logical extreme and it means that we believe we do not need God; we essentially make ourselves our own god.

Before you find my perspective too cynical, however, let us look even deeper into the human psyche.  As intelligent beings, we naturally seek the cause for every effect.  Consequently, when some negative emotion assaults our hearts, we immediately want to know the purpose.  If we feel bad, we want to know why.  We want to know whose fault it is.  We are not content to remain ignorant.  Hence we either look outward for a scapegoat, blaming someone or something else, or we look inward, blaming ourselves.

The latter perspective, seen in the light of religious tradition, becomes that much-referenced catholic guilt.  The phrase is suitable because of the meaning of the word catholic: universal: we all feel guilt when we know we have transgressed our moral code.

One common response to that guilt is to lower one's standards to the point at which one can no longer transgress them and thus cannot experience that negative emotion.  For this reason, many believe that we ought to repudiate religion, and specifically Catholicism, because it causes people to feel guilty, which leads to a vicious cycle of psychologically-unhealthy responses to spirituality.  Now I would argue that by that same logic we ought to outlaw food because it causes people to feel cravings, which lead them to overindulge and become gluttonous.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, someone might become so focused on pious practices as to be rigidly bound up in them and demand that all others abide by the same rules.  Everyone else thus must be wrong in order to preserve that fragile shell of security formed by legalism.

As Aristotle so aptly pointed out, the virtue must lie between the two extremes.  What, then, is the answer?

Love.

Perhaps that might seem too simple an answer.  Let me put it another way:

God.

Yes.  God is Love.  Therefore, we can say also that Love is God.

Consequently, if your encounter with the Truth has been anything less than an encounter with Love than you have not truly found God.  Furthermore, I'll wager a guess that if you find within yourself on some level the belief that you must earn God's love that it is because you believe also that you are unlovable.

Do you recognize that lie within yourself?

That is the lie masked by the belief that you must earn God's love along with all its various permutations.  If you believe that you must do something in order to be loved, whether by God or by anyone else, then you believe that you are lovable based upon what you do rather than who you are.

Modern psychology will happily point out to you the importance of your childhood development for the formation of your image of God.  Now before you happily blame your parents so you don't have to feel guilty about having a false idea of God (as you do if you believe you must earn His love), let me point out to you that they could not give you what they themselves had never received.  How could they show you that you were loved unconditionally if they had not themselves believed in and received unconditional love?  In this fallen world few of us have received that love.  Perhaps we flee it because it is too much for us.  Perhaps we flee it because we are afraid.

Fear.

If you look again at those two responses to guilt, you might see fear operating beneath them both.  The same is true for the idea that we must earn God's love: for if we can earn it, then we are in control of it, and it is far more comfortable to think of being in control than of facing the infinite God who is the Unknown who yet stoops down to us that we might know Him.

 "Perfect love casts out fear." (1 John 4:18)

Only God's infinite and unconditional love can cast the fear out from our hearts, but we must let Him, and that letting Him seems to be a life-long process.  It seems to take so much to unravel the knots we tie about ourselves.  Sometimes perhaps it may seem futile and we may wonder why He allows us to tangle ourselves so deeply in the lies of the enemy, but there we are left with the mystery of iniquity, the mystery proclaimed in the Easter Exultet as "O Happy Fault!"  Only a God of infinite love could bring good out of the dark shadow that sin and shame cast over our hearts.

Take courage, then, in whatever darkness you walk and listen to the wisdom of Saint John Paul II whose feast day we celebrate today: "I plead with you — never, ever give up on hope, never doubt, never tire, and never become discouraged.  Be not afraid."

It takes great courage to open your heart to God and to allow yourself to be vulnerable enough to encounter Him in the depths of your being where He speaks love through His silent presence, imperceptible to your senses.

Will you let yourself be loved?  Sometimes I think that is the most difficult thing in all the world.

Thus I leave you with the resounding words of Saint John Paul II, taken from Christ's own words in Scripture:

"Duc in altum!  Put out into the deep!  Be not afraid."

Love Is Not Loved

I love joking with friends about how saints have a habit of stalking us.  When a certain saint takes an interest in me—take Saint Therese of Lisieux for instance—I will find her appearing through holy cards or quotations from her that particularly strike my heart or someone mentioning something about her that catches my attention.  Somehow or other she makes her presence known.

So too with other saints.

Not so with my dear patron, however: Blessed Jacopone da Todi whose feast is today.  Because he is not so well known it is difficult to run across him in as many places as one can find a more popular saint such as Saint Therese.

Recently my heart was a bit sad as I thought of that, wishing that he would reach out to me but thinking it would not happen.  I forgot about it, though, as happens with so many of the little things that pass through our minds and hearts.

Then I was reading the words of the day from the Spiritual Diary, a book that was my Nonna's, on the Solemnity of All Saints and in it were these words:

Blessed Jacapone could not bear to see people giving themselves over to sin, especially during the days of Mardi Gras, and he would repeat: "Love is not loved!  Love is not loved because He is not known."

That was a beautiful gift as I remembered my almost-prayer of wanting Jacopone to reach out to me, for I felt like he had.

It seemed like he reached out to me a second time when I was researching for my paper through my studies on how to help people be receptive to the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  It seemed the most unlikely of places, as I read a book by a Mexican archbishop, Luis Martinez, on the Holy Spirit—a beautiful book called The Sanctifier.  There again I found those same words of Jacopone's:

"Love is not loved!"

Those words of my dear patron bring my mind back to the Baltimore question and the answer to what is the purpose of our lives: "To know, love, and serve God is this life and to be happy with Him in the next."

It is such a simple statement and yet so profound.  But why is it that we do not love Him who is love itself?

I would echo Jacopone's words: I believe that we do not love Him because we do not know Him.

Wherever we find doubt or fear or worry or anxiety or discouragement or any of those negative emotions within us blocking our relationship with God, it arises out of some wound or lie about who He is.  We do not truly know Him as the all-provident Father who can do nothing that is not for our greatest good and who can allow even the evil perpetuated by our free will in order to bring it to a good end.

I wish I had the courage to run through the streets and shout as Jacopone did about Love not being loved because He is not known.  I wish I had the courage to stand out there and offer to pray over any who would heed that message and wanted to allow the healing power of Love to transform them.

Yet in my little way I shall make that cry to the hearts of my friends and to my own heart.  Even more, I shall beg Love Himself to make Himself more fully known that He may be more fully loved.

Especially shall I beg Him, Emmanuel, God-With-Us, to make Himself known once again in our coming celebration of Christmas.  I will go to kneel at His feet, to adore the little Child who is King of Kings and the Lord of the universe, and I shall there beseech His mercy that He who is God may look with favor upon me who am not.  There too I will pray for you that you may be free in knowing your littleness before Him and rest with reckless, childlike abandon in the Father's arms.

Buried Gold

There is so much to bury these days:
Old friends, old loves, dreams, the lamp
At the end of the lane, petals soft and damp
From sweaty hands, voice so loved, so dear,
Expectations of what may be, and fear
Of what may not, the pursuit of happiness
Spent in toil and grasping, fingers that hold
Riches that turn to dirt and grime and mold...

Mound it all up in the dust, pack it down,
Stamp the ground with your boots,
Water it with your tears. Somewhere roots
Will grow. Somehow the seed that dies
Will sprout forth—somehow warmth will rise
To touch the dead hard soil—wither lies
That a bud may blossom and keep tryst
For all that is buried in the heart of Christ.

Come Hell or High Water

Of course we don't usually have such a clear conversation with God about what He is doing in our lives (or not doing), partly because everything is obscured by the mist of lies, and partly because the conversation happens rather in our actions than our words.  However, a writer must needs put into words such experiences, as for example when we face great trials and tribulations in our lives.  Also, it can help to illumine further truths about our journey by looking at reality bluntly expressed in the words of an ordinary conversation:

---

Me: I'm going to do it come hell or high water.

Jesus: All right, if that's really what you want.

(He lets there be a little hell or high water, proverbially speaking:)

Me: Oh, Lord, take it away! I can't go on like this!

Jesus (gently): That's not what you said in the beginning. You could have said: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

Me: Isn't that what I meant?

Jesus: Is it?

Me: Well...

Jesus: Or did you mean: "I've got this under control and I want to win the victory all by myself."

Me: ...

Jesus: I am with you always, but I will never force Myself on you.

III. Jesus Falls the First Time

V. We adore Thee, O Christ, and we bless Thee.

R. Because by Thy holy Cross, Thou hast redeemed the world.

We have such a fear of falling—a fear of failure.  We do anything we can to avoid admitting our own brokenness, our own inadequacy.

Do you think Christ thought of that as He fell beneath the weight of the cross?

Imagine Him, fallen on one knee, barely keeping from pitching head-first upon the ground, and then imagine Him turning to look at you, as if to say: "See, I have fallen.  I will get up and go on for love of you.  Will you get up and go on for love of Me?"

When we fall, we do not want to get up.  We want to remain where we lie.  After all, if we do not rise we cannot fall again.  If we are failures, we need not fear failing.

Yet we must strip aside those lies.  We must stand up again from each fall no matter if we know that we shall fall again.

He knew that He would fall again.  He knew how painful those falls would be.  At least we are spared that knowledge.  We do not know when or how we will fail.  We do know, however, that we weak mortal creatures will fall as surely as did our Lord beneath the weight of our sins.

If He could get up and go on, so can we because He told us to follow Him.  He would not have said it were it not possible.  Therefore, even from the depths of our failures and inadequacies causing us to muck about in the mire, we can stand again, muddy and bloodstained perhaps, but with eyes flaming with the fire of love.

Only love will carry us up and onward.  Only love will bring us face to face with Him.

My beloved Jesus, it is not the weight of the Cross, but my sins, which have made Thee suffer so much pain. Ah, by the merits of this first fall, deliver me from the misfortune of falling into mortal sin. I love Thee, O my Jesus, with my whole heart; I repent of having offended Thee. Never permit me to separate myself from Thee again. Grant that I may love Thee always; and then do with me what Thou wilt. (From the Stations of the Cross according to Saint Alphonsus Liguori.)

Eight Years Ago Today

It is rather surreal to think that eight years have passed since that feast of Saint Francis when I set out with only one comrade upon a pilgrimage of about two months and three hundred miles.  I marvel at the faith and daring I had then.  I wonder if I would still have that much courage and trust were I to feel the call pull at my heart now.

Many thoughts and feelings still surface as I reflect upon that time.  I am sure it was a time of much grace, but it was also full of so much difficulty and darkness—full of the cross.

For a long time afterward I found it painful to think of the pilgrimage despite the moments of beauty.  Yet time and grace have healed the wounds of things not turning out as I expected and the suffering caused by less-than-pure intentions, bringing me face to face with the mercy and providence of God.

Many times I wondered whether I had chosen wrongly.  It is so easy to think of our efforts being soiled by our pride, selfishness, vainglory, or other sins, and to therefore turn away from action.  That is true especially for those of us inclined toward perfectionism.  We see that we have acted for ourselves and not for God alone and consequently begin to imagine that we can never do anything good or that all our efforts are in vain, but there the enemy trips us up in the age-old lie of pride disguised so falsely as humility.

Peace comes when we unmask that lie.  We can rest serene in the arms of Providence when we know that we are not in control—that He is God and we are not.

We try to love in order to receive the results we desire or to help people to make ourselves feel better.  We try to witness to our faith or support some political agenda in order to strengthen our self-esteem.  So many things we do right for the wrong reasons. Yet whatever our flaws, whatever our sins, He is stronger.

If God can bring good out of something so horrible as the crucifixion, why should we doubt His power to bring good out of our good actions done with flawed intentions?  He does all the time.  We only have to surrender yet again, falling humbly on our knees before Him and letting Him work.

So I try to do now as I continue forward, step by step, day by day, going on into eternity, carrying the burden of my cross forged of my own sins.

I do not remember only the darkness or only the sinfulness.  I remember also the joys, the trust, the abandonment to Divine Providence.  I remember how He provided for us all along the way, often with overwhelming and delightful surprises.

Much has changed since then and much remains the same.  So it ever seems to be.

On pilgrimage 2009

On pilgrimage 2017

I am on a different pilgrimage now.  It is interior more than external, but it is a pilgrimage all the same.  With each passing day, I feel the power and weight of that immense decision made that day that feels so long ago.  I continue on buoyed by faith as I carry you and your intentions in my heart....