The past eight Wednesdays I have gone
through my book Idol Thoughts, laying
out the traditional doctrine of the eight thoughts that take us away from God,
from the happiness He promises us. The eight ‘idols’ that promise us happiness
on their terms, but which of course are false in their promises.
Having established in the book that
happiness is not found in the satisfaction of the body (gluttony), in the body
of another (lust), in material security (avarice), or in revenge (anger), in
getting one’s way (despondency), in oblivion (acedia), in human respect
(vainglory) or in mastery (pride), an obvious question arises.
Namely, so what is it, then? If all of
these thoughts are the idol thoughts, the lying thoughts that tell us false
things about happiness, what is the true happiness? As the blog title says,
‘Get To The Point’, Lemieux. What will
bring us happiness, many say? (Psalm 4).
OK, it’s the Eucharist, then. Satisfied?
Well, you should be.
That is, it is God and the possession of
God which is the happiness of the human person. Everything the thoughts seem to
promise us, all the drives and desires of our natural humanity that they
distort due to our fallen condition, all of this is fulfilled in a perfect and
everlasting way by our communion with God.
Ultimately, heaven. But here on earth,
Holy Communion. He gives Himself to us as food and drink, and so heals our
gluttony. His Body is given to us in an intimacy of communion beside which
sexual intercourse pales in comparison, and so heals lust.
His gift of Himself to us assures our
life in the most profound security—goodbye, avarice! He is the Divine Justice,
and comes to heal all the evil and injustice of the world, and so meets our anger
with the power of mercy. He does not give us our own way, or oblivion, but
rather shows us that what we really want is really real, and is found in Him
and in the path of love and communion in this world—take a bow, despondency and
acedia. You both had a good run.
In His gift of Himself to us in this way
He ‘validates’ our existence in the most radical sense possible, pays us direct
personal and intimate attention and lavishes us with Himself—no need for
vainglory. And in all of this we become true sharers of His Divine Life, truly
ascend through, with, and in Him to the heights of heaven itself—so, pride –
what were you offering us again?
All that the lying thoughts promised us,
He gives to us, all in that little Host that is the whole of Himself, the whole
of His life. It is not a symbol. It is not some strained metaphor. It is not
some vague abstraction. It is Jesus, really and truly Jesus, and because of
that, ‘It’ is God Himself, giving Himself to us here and now in the most
profound way possible.
In all the discussions of who can receive
communion and who cannot, I am sometimes grieved that there is little sense
that the gift of the Eucharist is what it actually is, what we all say we
believe it to be. And so it is worth making great sacrifices to receive it.
Worth making radical changes in one’s life. Worth losing everything, if need
be. Worth ‘selling all you possess and following [Him]’, as I read somewhere or
other. There seems to be little sense of that in the conversations going on in
the Church now—at least I haven’t heard anyone put it so baldly.
People may object at this point (it’s OK
– I don’t mind!) that when they receive the Eucharist they don’t ‘feel’ all of
the above. Don’t feel entirely happy, shall we say. That they tried all of that
Catholic stuff, and IT DIDN”T WORK. So then what?
The question of ‘feelings’ in the
spiritual life is a tricky one. We know that we cannot gauge life in general
simply by how we feel about it at any given moment (and of course ‘feelings’
are always of the moment). At least, people who are not entirely foolish know
this.
But at the same time, a happiness that
has no reference to any kind of experience is a bit unreal, to say the least.
The Eucharist will make you happy! But I don’t feel any better or different. Well,
it’s not that kind of happiness! Uhhh…. OK? Not terribly satisfying.
While there are complexities in all this,
some of which go into physical, chemical, and psychological depths I am neither
prepared nor qualified to discuss, there is one aspect I am qualified to
discuss. Namely, that some of our dissatisfaction with Jesus lies in the fact
that we approach the Eucharist still in the grips of the thoughts. In other
words, that we come to Jesus in hopes that He will gratify us in our selfish pursuit
of self-directed, self-defined, self-ordered happiness. ‘Prosperity
Christianity’ – the idea that we should have faith in God and in Christ so that
He can make us rich and successful… according to our lights, our desires, our
hopes and dreams.
When really, we should have faith in God
and in Christ so that He can make our lives successful and yes, rich… but
according to His ideas under those headings, which may be a bit different from
the world’s.
At any rate, I see from my word count
that I have written quite enough for
one day, so I had better wrap this up. And that’s it for my little tour of Idol Thoughts. I do
encourage you to buy it – American readers may prefer to use this
link. Next week in this space we will begin to look at the Year of Mercy – you
may be surprised to know that I have some thoughts about that subject. Until
then!
Beautiful, Fr. Denis! The "medicine of immortality" as St. Someone said. Jesus heals everything. God bless you. :-)
ReplyDeleteThank you, Father Denis, for your teaching.
ReplyDelete"May my thoughts be pleasing to him.
I find my joy in the Lord." - Psalm 104
Thanks, both of you. Glad to be of service.
ReplyDelete