A sound culture can only be built by saying ‘yes’ to life
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
Occasionally, God winks at us. It’s a silly phrase, of course. But there are three remarkable coincidences this week. It’s hard not to think that God is trying to get our attention.
The first is this: On Oct. 5, we celebrate the feast day of St. Faustina, and the Gospel for the day ends with the line, “The one who treated him with mercy.” St. Faustina, of course, is the patron saint of the Divine Mercy devotion. The funny thing is, the Gospel passage wasn’t specially picked for the feast day. It just happens to be where we are as we read sequentially through the Gospel of Luke.
I wonder how our political conversations about immigrants and the unborn and their mothers would be if they were all treated under the topic of mercy, knowing that the measure with which we measure will be measured back to us.
The second is this: On Oct. 9, we celebrate the feast of St. John Henry Newman — the first time we celebrate his feast day as a doctor of the Church. On the same day, the Office of Readings is a famous passage from St. Vincent of Lerins regarding the development of doctrine. Newman’s feast is celebrated on Oct. 9 because that’s the day he was received into the Catholic Church. And one of his most important works is “An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine.” He started writing it when he was pretty sure the Catholic faith was true. His plan was, if he still thought it was true after writing the book, he would convert. Suffice it to say, he still thought so at the end!
The reading from St. Vincent of Lerins wasn’t specially chosen for the day. It is coincidentally the reading for Friday of the 27th week in Ordinary Time — which this year is Oct. 9.
I wonder if our (painful) conversations with the Society of St. Pius X would be different if they believed what Vincent and Newman believed about the development of doctrine. Perhaps we wouldn’t experience this painful separation.
Third and last — and I’m putting it out of order, because it’s the most important point — we celebrate the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary on Oct. 7, and the Gospel reading for that day just happens to be Jesus teaching His apostles to pray. It seems like God is trying to get our attention when it comes to the importance of prayer.
Friends, prayer works! It isn’t just a pious act of wishing. Prayer actually does something — it exerts a kind of spiritual gravity in the world. We don’t always get what we want, to be sure! We always pray with the caveat of the Surrender Novena: “In our need, decide as you see fit for our temporal and eternal life.” But prayer does orient the world toward receiving God’s will. To use an image: It carves out a channel, into which and through which God’s will can flow more readily.
So, I ask us all to heed God’s wink and nudge, especially when it comes to praying for people to vote yes on Amendment 3. Pray that the people of Missouri will recognize that no sound culture can be built on the sacrifice of its children, but only by saying “yes” to life.
