We need to say farewell to sinful lifestyles so we can look forward to a new way of living
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
How are we at saying “goodbye”?
I ask because the readings this week are all about farewells.
We’re leading up to the end of the Easter season. In honor of that, the Gospel readings prominently feature Jesus’ farewell discourse (John 16-17). In tandem with that, the first readings prominently feature St. Paul’s farewell discourse to the Ephesian community (Acts 20). The last readings for the week are: 1) the concluding lines of the Acts of the Apostles, and 2) the concluding lines of the Gospel of John. It seems as if everything is pointing in one direction: the end!
I think most of us could stand to get better at our “goodbyes.” We could do that by saying what we really need to say sooner and more often. (Why wait until the very end to say: “I love you, I’m proud of you, I’m sorry for my mistakes”?) We could also do that by actually saying “goodbye” when we face it. Let’s stop dancing around the central issues!
“Memento mori” — remembering our death — is a practice in the Christian tradition that we could stand to bring back. Many good books have been written on this in the last decade. The actor Jonathan Roumie (who plays Jesus in “The Chosen”) regularly wears a memento mori ring. “Memento mori” reminds us that we all have to say “goodbye” to this life and should make our everyday decisions in light of that truth.
For now, the most important farewell we face is sometimes farewell to an element of our lifestyle. St. Cyril of Alexandria talks about our reception of the Holy Spirit in these terms: “With the Spirit within them, it is quite natural for people who had been absorbed by the things of this world to become entirely other-worldly in outlook.” Every addict in recovery knows this farewell deeply. But most of us could take a page from their book in terms of some analogous “addiction to sin” that we carry.
In the face of the need to say farewell to some element of our lifestyle, the enemy of humanity tries to get us to: a) look back, with regret, on the pleasures we are leaving behind, and to b) overlook the destruction that our addictions cause. The Holy Spirit, by contrast, tries to get us to: a) look squarely at the destruction, but also to b) look forward, with hope, to a new way of living. We have to choose which of those promptings we will follow.
At the end of the Acts of the Apostles, the reader knows that St. Paul is on the way to his death. It seems that St. Paul, too, knew this. So what did he do, in the face of his impending farewell? Acts tells us: “With complete assurance, and without hindrance, he proclaimed the kingdom of God, and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.” That’s the final line of the Acts of the Apostles. Facing his final farewell, St. Paul proclaims the faith.
What would you like the closing lines of your life to say? Why not start now?
