By Rev. Joe McCloskey, SJ
Woe to the complacent in Zion! Lying upon beds of ivory, stretched
comfortably on their couches, they eat lambs taken from the flock, and calves
from the stall! Amos 6:1a, 4
But you, man of God, pursue righteousness, devotion,
faith, love, patience, and gentleness. Compete well for the faith. Lay
hold of eternal life, to which you were called when you made the noble
confession in the presence of many witnesses. 1 Timothy 6:11-12
Abraham replied, 'My child, remember that you received what
was good during your lifetime while Lazarus likewise received what was
bad; but now he is comforted here, whereas you are tormented. Moreover, between us and you a great chasm is
established to prevent anyone from crossing who might wish to go from our side
to yours or from your side to ours.’ Luke 16:25-26
Piety
Piety is seen in how we take care of the needy
of our life. Do we wait to be asked or
do we give before we are asked? Do we
give left overs or the best of what we have? God loved us so much that he gave his only Son
to be one of us. How we accept the gift
of God in our lives is seen by our piety where we have put on the mind and the
heart of Christ by following in his footsteps. Our piety has all it needs in Christ. There is a resemblance to Christ in the
goodness of each of us. How we
appreciate the good others do is seen in the flattery of imitation. Piety is shown in how we pursue righteousness,
devotion, faith, love, patience and gentleness. This is how we compete for the faith and lay
hold of eternal life. God gives life to
all that we do. The commandments are the
road map of eternal life. They teach us
how to live as Christ did. When “Christ
comes in his glory as the King of kings and Lord of lords, the unapproachable
light of Christ” will be ours. All honor
and power will be ours. All the Christ
decisions of our lives will make sense to our world. No sacrifice that we have made will be too
much.
Study
The rich man who dressed
in purple garments and fine linen and dined sumptuously each day is judged by
how he shared what he had. Generosity is
what the patriarchs and the great saints show us. How we listen to their words and try to follow
their example will be how we will be judged. We study the saints because they show us in
their time how Christ would have lived. Each
saint is a reflection of the plan of God for us. What we most notice and try to imitate is how
we will be judged. God gives us every
day the chance to make our lives worthwhile.
Action
Gradually we learn the
secret of life well lived is doing all out of love of Christ. We go to his cross to find the love that is
always waiting for us in our crosses of life when we live as Christ would have
us live. There is no bypass of the
cross. How we embrace it in his name is
the measure of our souls. Christ rich in
his heavenly existence embraces our life with all its difficulties. He makes out of our humanness the road to
heaven. How we do all for him is how we
honor him and share his eternal power. The
ordinary becomes extraordinary when we do what we are about in the name of
Christ. There is no need to do anything
more than the best we can do to allow Christ to live on in who we are. Christ is the best of all of us. Our littleness becomes his greatness when we
live his love.
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