Where do you find truth and happiness?
Catechism Meditation:
The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for. ―No. 27
REFLECTION. In his reflection on Embracing the Virtuous Man from the book, Praying with Saint Paul, Fr. Peter M. Girard, O.P. writes… The Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us that since all human beings are created “by God and for God,” we discover the truth for which we long only in his embrace. Whenever we embrace the truth about our creation in his image, therefore, we find happiness and fulfillment even in the midst of life’s trials and tragedies. Conversely, when we embrace falsehood as the measure and inspiration of our moral conduct, we discover only misery and a denigration of the human person, even surrounded by earthly comforts.
Growing in holiness, therefore, necessarily involves a “putting away” of our habits of sin and striving for holiness through the embrace of virtue. St. Augustine understood this well once he began to say “yes” to the Lord’s wondrous acts. After convincing himself that a secular life alone could bring him fulfillment, the thirty-two-year-old Augustine began to listen to the sermons of St. Ambrose in Milan’s great cathedral. After reading St. Paul’s exhortation to reject vice and embrace virtue, in Romans 13:13, Augustine gave his “yes” to embracing the “new self.” In his famous Confessions, we see St. Augustine as the model of the one who put away the old self so that he might emerge as a new creation through grace.
St. Paul reminds us that only through the graces of Christ, poured forth in his Precious Blood, can we put away the “old self” and embrace a life of virtue (see Eph 4:22-24). Like Saint Augustine, we may well have spent years living in darkness of vice. However, since we are created fundamentally “by God and for God,” it is never too late for us to begin embracing virtue.
PRAYER. Father, help us to recognize that You offer the truth and happiness that we are searching for. Help us to find it in You.
Timeless Wisdom Quote:
“The world tells us to seek happiness; Christ tells us to seek holiness—and happiness follows.” ― Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen