Ordinary Time 31st Sun C

Thirty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time
1st Reading: WIS 11:22-12:2
Responsorial Psalm: PS 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13, 14
2nd Reading: 2 THES 1:11-2:2

Alleluia, alleluia.
God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might have eternal life.
Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel: LK 19:1-10

Love makes the world go around. You might think this is from some cheesy love songs from the 1950s or 60s. Actually, it is much more ancient, much more venerable. In fact, it begins with a pagan philosophy, with the great philosopher Aristotle, who tells of how love does move the stars. He tells of how, by the unmoved mover, by the very existence of this reality, the stars are, by the love of the unmoved mover, set into motion, and so they move. Love makes the world go round. Of course, in the Christian worldview, the love of God creates a world, creates an order, creates something dynamic and active, and moves it. So, the love of God create this world and moves it; the love for God moves it.
 
We like to talk about love in Christianity: love, love, love;  love of God, God is love, etc. We can be overwhelmed sometimes, cloying-like sometimes, and lose a sense of reality. What is this love of God? People say God’s love is made manifest in the world, and that is true. In the order of the world, the providence of the world. And people say that God’s love is made manifest and other people. And that is certainly true: in the kindness and goodness of many people; our parents, our friends, etc., we see God’s love made manifest. We see it in the person of Jesus Christ: God made man. His life is a manifestation of love, God’s love. The face of God that we can finally see, this is transcendent power. We see God’s love made manifest in the sacraments, especially in the Holy Eucharist: in that tiny piece of bread, in what appears to be bread and wine, Christ is really and truly present, in a very palpable and powerful, real way. And all that is true.
 
It is interesting that in the early church, Christians were seen as bizarre by other people. Bizarre, in that they thought they were cannibals and other weird things, but also because they often met Christians who struck them by their kindness and great charity. It was very bizarre to see people do stuff, very good stuff, for other people for no good reason. It was very striking. That’s what love does. When we are loved, we want to share that love with others. When we experience goodness, we want to share that goodness with others. Goodness is diffusive, as the phrase goes. When we are happy, we want to share that happiness. So, the more we love God, the more we are loved by God, by that eternal love, and we want to share it with others, it is so overflowing in our lives. 
 
Prayer and the virtuous life are not always easy. There are trials and temptations and difficulties, dryness. Actually, the life of prayer is not always easy, and can be quite difficult at times. And people give up, which is unfortunate. But there’s no happiness otherwise. There is no goodness and satisfaction otherwise. To possess God’s love is to possess everything that is desirable, doable. You have to work through difficulties: it’s a given that if things are going really badly now, they won’t be later. They will shift. If things are going really well now, they become worse. By this cycle of goodness and suffering, trial and difficulty, of joy and then dryness - this spiral can be a spiral upward, and we are purified and transformed, we are made stronger. So we and God become sharers of His divine life together, an amazing reality. God is love, and we are called to experience God’s love. And the more we try, the more we pray, the more we experience that palpable, healing, transforming, interior, ecstatic reality. It does take effort – all things to do. It does take time. But it’s worth everything you have. A French novelist once said, “There is only one sadness: not to be a saint.” All of us are called to be saints. We know this from All Saints’ Day. All who are Saints are in heaven, all of our potential is fully realized, the supernatural life is given to us and we are happy and fulfilled. Each according to what we have done in our lives, according to our ability, and the opportunities and capacities given to us. There is only one sadness: not to be a saint.  There’s only one sadness: not to experience God‘s love. And it is not “pie in the sky when you die.” It begins here. It has to begin here, because the Christian life is not doable otherwise. Virtue and holiness are not doable otherwise. This is not stoicism. God gives us a power to be like Him. The more we cooperate with the power, the more we are like Him. And in doing so we will find our eternal destiny.