Even if that makes sense theoretically, it can be hard to see it in the real world. This week, though, we saw an example of it here in Stuttgart. The torrential rain caused flooding, damaging homes and businesses and ruining crops. That’s really bad, obviously, and we might wonder why God permitted this bad thing to happen. While only he knows the answer in full, we can understand in part by looking at the good he has brought out in people responding to the bad. Various groups and individuals in the Stuttgart community mobilized to help those who were stranded, to shore up homes and businesses and churches that were in danger, to buy and deliver food and other essential items to those who were in need, to begin repair and assistance efforts of those that were affected, and more. Now, you might say, “Well, Father, that’s just the right thing to do,” to which I would respond, “You’re right!” Those efforts that I described are examples of courage and charity, two virtues that have the tendency to unite people and which would not be present in the world unless good people had to respond to bad things. I have no doubt that in the coming weeks, those good efforts will be extended, and with courage and charity our community will continue to respond to the bad with the good.
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| Stuttgart residents help a person in need. (Photo credit: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Thomas Metthes) |
It is too simplistic to say that God allowed the flooding for the purpose of making us better: more courageous, more charitable, etc. But when we face adversity – a flood or whatever else – he does offer us an opportunity to become those things – to become holier, to receive his grace needed for that moment and grow in the virtues that will help us to respond well. In today’s second reading, St. Paul describes his own courage in a time of trial. He has been laboring with the Corinthian community for some time, and his spirit is tired. In a very real sense, he is ready to die: he wants “to leave the body and go home to the Lord.” But he also knows that this is not for him to decide, and so he strives to be courageous, to receive the grace needed for the present moment to do what he must do. Paul knows that one day he will be judged, called to account by God for what he did or did not do with the grace and time given to him.
Isn’t this helpful also for us? We also need courage to meet the trials that come our way, to do what is necessary in the moment. True courage is not being unafraid, having no fear at all, like one might see in a comic or an action movie. True courage is doing what is necessary and right even in the midst of fear. Christian courage finds its strength ultimately in God, in a hope rooted in the Lord. Both the prophet Ezekiel and Jesus himself tell us today that God is at work in building a kingdom; his action guides the course of things and so also guides the purpose of our lives too.
This week, along with the other priests of our diocese, I was on retreat at Subiaco Abbey in western Arkansas. Each afternoon, we had some free time, and I went for several long walks in and around the monastic grounds. As I did, I observed the different activities that the monks do as part of their labors. Some were tending gardens, others were caring for the cattle, others were working in the shop fixing equipment of different kinds. It occurred to me that they probably do not always know what everyone else does, or why, or how it is important to the life of the community. Maybe only the abbot knows how all of their different activities fit together – how the good of the community is being built up through the activity of each one. But rather than worrying about the fact that they don’t understand everything, the monks just focus on their work in the present moment, trusting that it is part of a larger plan of everything working toward the good of all.
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| Image courtesy of countrymonks.org |
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| Image courtesy of countrymonks.org |
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