I am currently making my way through the little book of
talks collected under the title The Road
to Eternal Life by Michael Casey, OSB. I have found it very helpful not
only as a commentary on the Prologue to the Rule of St. Benedict, but as a
distillation of much of the best of Western catholic Christian thought and
practice.
With the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul yesterday, we
have entered into a short period in the calendar focused on this Apostle, his
character and story, ministry, and some of the important figures arising from
that ministry (including the Patron Saint of the parish I serve).
In a delightful example of synchronicity, my daily readings
from Casey’s book have recently drawn much of their insight from the writings
of the Blessed Apostle, and I wanted to share with those who might read this
blog a few passages I have found very useful.
“It is by God’s grace that I am what I am” – warts and all.
When I survey the landscape of my giftedness, it is not hard to praise God as
its origin. There is, however, another side to my life that I hope will never
intrude into public awareness. This is the shameful history of my selfishness
and hardheartedness. For this I alone seem responsible. Indeed, this appears to
be what Saint Benedict is saying in the fourth chapter of his Rule: “If he sees
anything good in himself, let him refer it to God and not to himself. But let
him know that the evil is always from himself and take responsibility for it.”
(RB 4.42-43)
I do not want to appear to be ascribing to God the ugliness
that is entirely my own creation. What I am saying is that the aspects of my
life that are displeasing to me are not outside God’s plan; they are designed
to bring me to a fuller realization of the unconditional character of God’s
love. If I were all sunshine and light I could easily believe that God loves me
because of my inherent goodness and that, in some way, I have made myself
eminently worthy of that love. That seems to be a harmless enough delusion, but
it is not. What do you think will happen when eventually I fall into some
action that even I cannot deny, excuse, or rationalize? The logical conclusion
will be that because of my misconduct God no longer loves me. My shame will
quickly lead me to despair, as though God could be surprised and disgusted by
the way human beings act.
Here’s what the fourteenth-century English mystic Julian of
Norwich has to say about this situation:
For, in truth, we shall see in
heaven for all eternity that though we have sinned grievously in this life, we
were never hurt in God’s love, nor were we ever of less value in God’s sight.
This falling is a test by which we shall have a high and marvelous knowing of
love in God forever. That love [of God] is hard and marvelous that cannot and
will not be broken for our trespasses…In love mercy allows us to fail somewhat,
and in failing we fall, and in falling we die…Our failing is full of fear; our
falling is marked by sin; our dying is sorrowful. Yet in all this the sweet eye
of pity never departs from us and the working of mercy never ceases. (Revelation 14, chaps. 61, 48)
It is true that it is by God’s grace that we are what we are
and by God’s grace we have been preserved from countless calamities of our own
making. Even though we fall short of our own hopes and expectations, it is by
God’s grace that we are what we are. God has a plan for us, of which we have
only the sketchiest knowledge. Let us allow God to get on with the work and not
delay its outcome either by taking credit for what meets with our approval or
by becoming downcast when we are plunged into the mystery of our own
resistance. “It is by God’s grace that I am what I am.” Whatever I have, I have
received from God, and whatever I have become, it is part of the mystery of
Providence. As always, the bottom line is this: I can never be beyond the pale
of divine mercy.
As I reflect on this passage, a number of things stand out
as very important and useful in my life as a disciple and in my work as a
pastor of souls.
The first is found in the sentence: “Let us allow God to get
on with the work and not delay its outcome either by taking credit for what
meets with our approval for be becoming downcast when we are plunged into the
mystery of our own resistance.”
In my own life, I have often been intensely frustrated—and
embarrassed—by the degree to which I have resisted God’s promptings and
direction. Invariably, when I finally let go of the resistance to what God is giving
me grace to embrace (this is the moment of compunction or penthos, followed by repentance), real growth follows.
Over the years, I have come to see my resistance as an
apparently necessary part of the work
of being a disciple. Instead of being disgusted or even terribly embarrassed
about this, I am gradually coming to accept that part of my humanness is being
a thickie when it comes to learning the Gospel way of life.
In doing so, I have found that the resistance actually
declines. Part of the resistance to God, it seems, is simple pride and
stubbornness. When one accepts the limitations of the self and our actual need
to fail as part of the process of believing and growing in belief, this
self-acceptance leads to quicker repentance and greater assurance of God’s
ongoing love for me…in spite of my sins.
The quote from Bl. Julian of Norwich is another part of this
section of Casey’s book I find helpful. That the sweet eye of pity never departs from us and the working of mercy never
ceases is an important truth for me to accept as I learn the implications
of what we are taught in 1 John 4:8 (“God is love”). If God is indeed love,
then all elements of a human-style transactionalism or quid-pro-quo
relationship must be cast out.
St. Paul experienced perhaps the most intense form of
realization that one’s faith has been mistaken. The feast we celebrate on
January 25 is as much about his failing on his own as it is about God’s success
in his life. His failing, then his falling, and finally his dying-and-rising to
new life in Christ, is a clear exposition of what all who follow Jesus must
undergo, each in his or her own way.
This fact never departed the Blessed Apostle. His writings
frequently betray self-knowledge of his resistance—in the past and as an
ongoing reality in his life. But, “It is by God’s grace that I am what I am”
remains true for him—and us—at each step of the journey. This form of
self-acceptance does not lead to complacency; indeed, it is inimical to
complacency. Rather, it is a growing awareness of what God’s love for us really
means, and how that love brings forth from us more and more desire to let
salvation be accomplished in us, rather than resist it.
It is not that God creates our sinfulness or our brokenness—not
at all. Yet, God’s work in our life goes beyond the day-to-day: he knows our
potential self already, and the work of salvation we experience in moments of
growth and in moments of resistance to that growth partakes of an ongoing
relationship, a communion that is itself an expression of our created nature
and God’s revealed will for his creatures. In this sense, our resistance—like St. Paul’s—becomes
part of our own story of God’s victory rather than merely our folly. Even our
resistance, you see, must be given over as an intentional offering to God.
When we learn to “get over ourselves” and allow God to love
us through the good and the bad, we join St. Paul in being able to say: “It is
by God’s grace that I am what I am,” and say so in hope as we make our way towards that perfection which only
communion with our knowing-and-loving Triune God makes possible. And that is
very good news, indeed for as-yet imperfect disciples like me.
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