“Stand Firm and Hold Fast” By Melanie Rigney

 

 

“Stand Firm and Hold Fast” By Melanie Rigney

Tuesday of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time

Therefore, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours. (2 Thessalonians 2:15)

The Lord comes to judge the earth. (Psalm 96:13b)

“Blind Pharisee, cleanse first the inside of the cup, so that the outside may also be clean.” (Matthew 23:26)

Piety

Jesus, cast the demons of fear and anxiety from my mind. Help me to stand firm.

Study

I was in first grade at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and that was old enough to understand something bad, very bad, might happen. I have a vivid memory of sitting in my father’s lap and asking if he would have to go to war. My father was a man who struggled with searing memories from his World War II service in the Pacific and who was not given to shows of emotion for his children. He held me close and said I was too little to worry about such things. I felt safe.

We live in a world so fraught with uncertainty that it is quite tempting to despair of God’s interest in us and to use something or someone else to get through the day. The world has always been like this, and likely it always will be.  With personal fears and anxieties, how will we feed ourselves and our families? Will we recover from that injury or betrayal—and ones writ large that I don’t even need to detail for you. The easy promises of a stress-free life can be so tempting.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been thinking about my father’s big strong arms enveloping me during the news that night more than fifty years ago, sitting in that armchair at 829 N. Summit. He could have told me that told me everything was going to be all right or that he was too old to go to war again, or a whole lot of other things he couldn’t be sure of. But instead, he told me the truth—that I was too little to worry about it. And while we are called to love and care for our neighbors and ourselves, we cannot let our fears and anxiety turn us to anyone other than God for the answers. As Teresa of Avila wrote: “Let nothing disturb you, nothing frighten you, all things are passing… God alone is sufficient.

Action

Print out Teresa of Avila’s prayer. Keep it with you for the next week, and pray it when you are tempted by a quicker fix than God seems to be providing.

 

Image credit:  Pixabay https://pixabay.com/photos/anxiety-fear-mystic-mystery-ghost-2878777/