Ut in Deo Sit

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Ut in Deo Sit

If one of the key elements of loving another person is to will that person’s good, what exactly does that mean? Well, of course, willing their good can include willing that they be happy; that they be healthy and well; that good things will happen to them; that good things will come their way; etc. But the deepest love you can have for someone is to will their ultimate good. And what is their ultimate good? What is every single human being’s ultimate good? Ut in Deo sit: that they may be in God. To will someone’s ultimate good is to will that they might reach their intended destiny, the destiny for which they were made: to be in God, to share forever in the eternal circulation of love that is the divine life. Thus, to will someone’s ultimate good is to will that they might choose Love. To will someone’s ultimate good is to will that they might say Yes to their God-given mission of love and fulfill that mission in their lives. To will someone’s ultimate good is to will that they might excel in the school of love, continuing to grow in their ability to love selflessly as their life progresses. To will someone’s ultimate good is to will that they might grow into God’s “bright image” of them.

Keeping the beloved’s ultimate good in mind and heart will guide you as you strive to will the good for them at specific times and in specific circumstances of their lives. To will their good at any point in time is to will whatever will help them learn to love God and neighbor more deeply. To will their good is to will whatever will help them to say Yes to their mission of love. To will their good is to will whatever will help them fulfill that mission. To will their good is to will whatever will help them to excel in the school of love, to will whatever will help them to grow in their ability to selflessly give and receive the gift of self in love. To will their good is to will whatever will help them take another step toward becoming the loving person God created them to be. To will their good is to will whatever will help them be in God.

In a happy coincidence (actually, it’s not a coincidence at all), to will all of that for the beloved is simultaneously to will their ultimate happiness, and to will that they find a profound sense of meaning and purpose in life, and to will that they be free, and to will that they be at peace. For the fulfillment of all of those deepest desires of their heart is ultimately to be found in Love.

* This article is based on an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations. Photo by Marcos Paulo Prado on Unsplash

Copyright 2024 Rick Clements

 

The Creative Power of Love

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The Creative Power of Love

Love is creative. Love is transformative. Love can create something good that was not there before. Love can take what is there and transform it into something better.

The Christian faith teaches that God created the universe ex nihilo: out of nothing. Not out of some pre-existing primordial matter, but out of nothing. The entire cosmos, everything that exists in the universe, all created out of nothingness. How could that be? How could God possibly have created everything that exists, including ourselves, out of nothingness? By the creative power of love. That is why the Christian faith also teaches that God created the universe ex amore: out of love. Love can make be. Love can bring something into existence that did not exist before. Finding and approving of the good in other people (and ourselves) is actually a form of participation in creation, in God’s creative power, because it is a participation in God’s creative love.

Purely human love can be transformative (as exemplified, at a simple level, by what has been referred to as the “Pygmalion effect”), but just think of what love can do when it is the divine love flowing through us, the divine love that created everything that exists and sustains everything in being from moment to moment! If we take the time and effort to look carefully, we can see goodness in other people that we may never have noticed before. In fact, we can sometimes see goodness in them that they have never noticed before! We may even be able to see goodness in them that is not actually there yet! When we look at another person with an open mind and an open heart, we can see into the possible future. We can catch a glimpse of God’s bright image of that person. We can catch sight of the God-given potential for goodness in that person, a vision of who and what God created that person to be. We can see that person, at least partially, through God’s eyes. And when we communicate that goodness to the person in whom we see it, when we convey our approval of the goodness we see in that person, that approval can transform them. That approval, that encouragement of the good and the potential for good in the other person, can cause them to blossom and thrive like never before. Some parents know this. Some teachers know this. Some coaches know this. They have seen it happen firsthand. In fact, one of the most rewarding experiences one can ever have as a parent, as a teacher, or as a coach, is to watch something good and beautiful appear in your child, in your student, in your athlete, that was not there before, or that was at best partial and undeveloped, in response to your approval and your encouragement of that person.

God has given each of us the incredible privilege, and the serious responsibility, of participating in the creative, transformative power of love. Take the time today to stop and notice the goodness in at least one person, and to praise them for that goodness. You just might transform someone’s life.

 

* This article is based on an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations. Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash

Copyright 2024 Rick Clements

 

Lord, I Want to See

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Lord, I Want to See

Most of us are not physically blind, but we all suffer from at least some degree of spiritual blindness. And one of the most common types of spiritual blindness is not being able (or willing) to see the good in other people. Striving to open our hearts and minds to see the good in every other human being is an important first step, but it’s generally not enough. We need some help. Divine help. We need God’s help to love in the deepest sense of the word. We need God’s help to love as God loves. We need God to instill the divine love in us, to infuse us with the divine love, so that we can then love others with the divine love. And being able to love others as God loves them requires first and foremost that we be able to find and focus upon the good in each and every person.

We all need to pray on a regular basis for that grace, especially with regard to the most difficult people and the most difficult situations in our lives. We need to pray for God to transform our way of looking at, and thinking about, other people. We need to pray for a God’s-eye view, so to speak. We need to pray to be able to see with the eyes of Christ, who during his earthly life always saw the potential for good in people even when others could not. We need to pray for our hearts and minds to be transformed into the heart and mind of Christ. We all need to join with the blind beggar who repeatedly asked Jesus to help him as Jesus was passing by him on his way to Jericho. Touched by the man’s persistence, Jesus stopped and asked him, “What do you want me to do for you?” The blind man immediately replied, “Lord, I want to see” (Luke 18:41; NIV). As people who are so often blind, whether willfully or inadvertently, to the good in others, let us join in the blind man’s entreaty: Lord, help us to see!

Copyright 2024 Rick Clements

* This article is based on an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations.

Photo by David Travis on Unsplash

There Are No Ordinary People

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There’s an old saying: Ubi amor, ibi oculus—where love is, there is the eye. Love helps us see. Love helps us see the good in others, especially when that goodness is not so easy to see at first. Love helps us find, and approve of, the goodness in other people. Seeing that goodness is, in part, a matter of will—we have to want to find the goodness in other people. But seeing goodness in others is also a matter of developing a particular mindset, a particular attitude, toward other people.

What is our attitude toward other people? Are people basically good, or basically bad? Do all people have intrinsic value and dignity, or are they only valuable if they are in some way useful to us—to the extent that they serve our purposes or needs, approve of us, agree with us on important issues, etc.? Being able to find, and to continue to see, the good in other people may require that we begin to think about people (all people) differently than we have in the past. It may require that we adopt a new attitude toward people. What kind of attitude? God’s attitude. And what is God’s attitude toward people? That people are very good (Genesis 1:31). God’s proclamation that the first human beings were very good was, in part, God’s way of saying “How good that you exist!” And God says that about each of us. Every one of us. Or else we wouldn’t exist. It is God’s love which created us, and it is God’s love which sustains us in existence. All of us—even that person we find to be so cantankerous, so petty, so annoying, etc. If God can exclaim about every person he created, “How good that you exist!”, we should be able to find a way to do that, too.

God proclaims human beings to be very good because he made us imago Dei, in his image and likeness (Genesis 1:26). God made us like himself in our ability to think and reason, but he also made us like himself in our ability to love. Everything that God created is good because it shares in God’s being, the being of the Infinite Good. But human beings are very good because we share in God’s capacity to love. Every single human being has intrinsic value and dignity because God loves them. Every single human being has intrinsic value and dignity because they were made imago Dei. Every single human being has intrinsic value and dignity because they were created to be a child of God. Every single human being has intrinsic value and dignity because Jesus died and rose for them so that they could share in, and contribute to, the eternal circulation of love that constitutes the divine life. Keeping these truths in mind will make it much more possible for us to find and approve of the good in other people.

Admittedly, some people, although made imago Dei in their capacity to love, don’t seem to be exercising that capacity very much. But maybe part of our mission in this life is to help draw the capacity for love out of people who are like that, to draw the capacity for love out of that difficult person whom no one else seems to like very much, by first loving them. Loving them starts with finding some good in them, and finding some good in them starts with seeing them as being children of God. All of them. As C. S. Lewis put it, “There are no ordinary people.” We need to adopt that attitude toward every person who crosses our path in life.

* This article is based on an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations.

Copyright 2024 Rick Clements

Photo by RODRIGO GONZALEZ on Unsplash

Where Love Is, There Is the Eye

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How do you find, and then continue to see, the good in other people? Especially those people in your life who are particularly difficult to get along with, much less love? How does one love even the seemingly unlovable person? Well, first of all, you have to want to find some good in them. Finding and approving the good in other people is an act of your will. You have to choose to look for the good rather than the bad in others; you have to choose to focus on the good rather than the bad. As fallen creatures, we all tend to be a mixture of the good and the bad. To will to focus on the good more than the not-so-good in others is to open your heart more fully to love. Genuine love cannot take root when you are quicker to see the faults and shortcomings in others than you are to see the good in them.

There is a Latin phrase that applies here: Ubi amor, ibi oculus — “Where love is, there is the eye.” Love enables us to see. Love enables us to see the good more clearly: in other people, in ourselves, and in life itself. Love enables us to see beauty and truth more clearly as well. Adopting a predisposition toward love by consciously willing to find the good in others makes it easier for you actually to see the good that is there — the good that otherwise might have escaped your notice. Adopting a predisposition toward love opens up our eyes, our minds, and our hearts to other people.

There’s another old saying that is also relevant here: “People see what they want to see.” Well, that’s often true. Old sayings don’t tend to become “old sayings” unless they have at least a grain (and often much more than a grain) of truth in them. People do tend to see what they want to see. If people choose to focus on the faults and shortcomings of other people, that’s mostly what they will see in them. But thankfully, this phenomenon works in the other direction as well: if people choose to focus on the good in others, then they will mostly see the good. Resolve to focus on the good in others rather than the not-so-good, and to keep yourself focused on the good you do find in them. When you notice your attention drifting toward their faults, consciously re-direct your attention to the good. Obviously, we need to exert extra effort to focus our attention on the good in the other person when we’re dealing with people we find to be more difficult to love. But like most things in the school of love that is this earthly life, this becomes easier with practice. One of the reasons God places those difficult people in our lives is precisely to help us grow in our ability to love.

* This article is an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations

Photo by Marc Schulte on Unsplash

Copyright 2024 Rick Clements

Finding Treasures in Pockets of Time

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Finding Treasures in Pockets of Time

When I run into other moms at church, in the neighborhood, or at the grocery store, I find that I am having the same conversation over and over. I say, “Hi! How are you?” and she replies, “Busy!” and then delves into her litany of appointments and tasks that fill her schedule, and I reply in kind by agreeing and sharing my own over-scheduled obligations. We end our rushed conversation and run off to get something else done.

Sometimes there are things in our lives that we need to purge. It may not always be easy to remove it, but often, we are aware of the things that consume our time and give us nothing in return. I find, in my life, those things are typically self-centered, and when I choose to live the way Christ wants me to, I am given the strength to remove those things that take up too much of my life.

As mothers, though, so much of our life is spent in service to others. We are chefs, nurses, house cleaners, and chauffeurs, not to mention boo-boo kissers, story time tellers, snuggle buddies, and behavior correctors. Then our mother-in-law comes to visit, and we must be the perfect hostesses. The list goes on indefinitely, but the hours in the day do not.

How do we find time for Christ when we are pulled in so many different directions? It is especially difficult when these many different directions are for good things for our families. From time to time, I have found myself wishing for the seemingly simple life of a nun, especially when I am craving time and intimacy with our Lord but finding the demands of my vocation of motherhood to be standing in my way. But then I remember the beautiful gift of my calling, and I have worked to grow in my relationship with Christ within the demands of my schedule.

I rarely have large blocks of time, but I am regularly gifted with what I call “pockets of time” throughout the day. I have five minutes here or there, often while I am waiting for something, that I used to spend scrolling on my phone or otherwise distracting myself. Now, I try to be purposeful with these pockets of time and turn to God in prayer, even if I don’t have time to read the daily readings or journal in my Bible study workbook.

I used to get stuck in my growth toward Jesus because if I didn’t have 20–30 minutes to sit down, read, pray, and reflect, I wouldn’t do anything at all. Then, by the end of the day, I would feel like a failure because my spiritual time was just something else that I didn’t get done today (along with a shower or getting that laundry from a week ago folded). Somewhere along the way, I realized that God never gave me a set of expectations for how and when I have to pray. That came from my own unrealistic expectations, compounded by comparing myself to other women who seem to have it all together in their faith journeys.

Now, instead of dedicating 20–30 minutes to God in the morning, I turn to Him for a minute or two 20—30 times per day. Before I get out of bed in the morning, I say hello to the Lord, offer my day to Him, and ask Him to show me His will. When I begin a household chore, I offer it for someone in need. I pray for a moment before I start a workout, thanking God for the gift of my body, the temple which houses my soul and the Holy Spirit. I have learned that just a few moments is all it takes to recenter my day and draw closer to Christ.

The best part about approaching my prayer life in this way is how my spiritual life has deepened and grown. Previously, once I had completed my morning prayer time and reflection, I would check the “Time for God” box and then go on with my day. Now, by regularly recentering myself and refocusing on God many times throughout the day, I am able to let Him work in me and through me all day long. It is such a gift that God has helped transform my life so that my entire day has become a prayer.

© Maria Riley 2024

How Good That You Exist!

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How Good That You Exist!

Everyone wants approval from other people. Some people are more desirous of approval than others, and some people are more aware than others of the existence of this desire within themselves. But the fact is, we all want to be approved of by others. Even gang members want to be approved of (at least by other members of their gang). In fact, that’s one of the main reasons that some adolescents seek out gang membership in the first place: to gain a sense of approval from their fellow gang members, to experience a sense of belonging and acceptance. Kids who experience approval at home, and who have a sense of belonging to a solid family, are far less likely to seek out a gang to join, and are far less likely to respond to a gang’s efforts to recruit them.

So what does it mean to “approve” of someone? Literally, it means to judge that person to be good, in the sense of having value or worth.[i] We all want to be judged to be valuable. We all want to be judged as being worth something. Josef Pieper, the insightful Roman Catholic philosopher from Germany, described the type of approval we seek, and the type of approval that others seek from us, as being captured by the exclamation, “How good that you exist!” We want other people to be glad that we exist, and other people want us to be glad that they exist. We all want to feel like we matter, that the world would be diminished by our absence.

You cannot truly love another person if you cannot honestly proclaim that it is good that they exist. You cannot truly love another person if you cannot first see some good in them. Finding some good in the other person is the first essential step toward being able to love them. And once you have found that good, you then have to continue to see the good in them, even at times when you may find that very difficult to do. Otherwise, love dies.

* This article is an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations

[i] Pieper, Faith, Hope, Love, 164.

Copyright 2023 Rick Clements

Photo by Annette Sousa on Unsplash

A Wonka Way of Life

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A Wonka Way of Life

I love board games. I especially love them now that my kids have graduated from Candyland to (slightly) more advanced and strategic games. I find that playing board games with my kids is the easiest way for me to have them off screen time without them driving me insane or physically accosting each other. (Yes, my girls look adorable, but they’re feisty.)

Our current family favorite is Willy Wonka’s The Golden Ticket Game. Essentially, you play as one of the five children from the film, and collect Willy Wonka Bars through various actions. At the end of the game, when all the pretend candy bars have been collected, the players look inside their Wonka Bars to discover if they have won one of the coveted Golden Tickets. At least one player is left without a Golden Ticket, more if someone is lucky enough to have found more than one ticket in his or her own stock pile of candy bars.

Since they were itty bitty, I’ve never let my kids win at games. (Okay, maybe I skew the game a little bit, but I’ve never completely thrown one.) I believe that learning how to deal with losing is an absolutely fundamental skill that our kids need to learn as early as possible. We have a little song that the loser sings to the winner after a game, which goes, “You won, you won, but I had a lot of fun.” Then the winner has to clean up the game so there’s a tiny bit of retribution.

The original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie from 1971 still gets regular viewing around our house too. (The anticipation is already growing for the Willy Wonka origins story releasing later this fall.) In the original film, we meet the eccentric Willy Wonka, who lives in a realm that seems contrary to the rest of the world. His jovial spirit and quirky mannerisms can seem enticing and confusing at the same time. He delivers countless iconic lines; my favorite one is when, after he says that they have so little to do with so much time, he exclaims, “Wait. Strike that. Reverse it.”

I feel like Jesus says that to me too in my call to Christianity. He says, “The world is doing X, but you need to strike that and reverse it.”

The American cancel-culture is infectious these days. When a person makes a single mistake, we are not only permitted but encouraged to cut them out of our lives permanently. This goes for celebrities and family members alike. If someone doesn’t agree with our religious or political views, we simply unfollow and block all communication. If someone hurts us, we self-medicate with booze instead of searching for true peace through forgiveness. We justify and excuse our actions because the rest of the world behaves that way too.

As Christians, we are called to live an upside-down, Willy-Wonka-type life. Where others refuse to forgive, we are called to love all the more deeply. Where others seek worldly recognition, we are called to work lovingly from the shadows. Where others seek riches, we are called to generously share all that we have been given. When the world says, “Do X,” we have to wait, strike that, and reverse it.

© Maria Riley 2023

Photo License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

Food for the Journey

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Food for the Journey

In the sacrament of the Eucharist, Jesus provides us with the strength and sustenance we need to tread the path of the cross, to make our way through the school of love that is this life. In the Eucharist, Jesus breaks open his Body and pours out his Blood as literal food and drink for us so that we can become more fully incorporated into his Body, more fully united with God in love. But he also breaks open his Body and pours out his Blood for us in order to strengthen and fortify us with the divine life and love, so that we can, in turn, break ourselves open and pour ourselves out in love for others. That is why the Eucharist has sometimes been referred to as “food for the journey.” The Eucharist nourishes and supports us on our own journey toward Love, and the Eucharist also strengthens us to go out and become “food for the journey” for other people.

A couple of years before he died, Pope Saint John Paul II wrote an encyclical in which he encouraged Catholics to rediscover their sense of amazement at the Eucharist.[i] It’s a message that many of us need to hear today, especially at a time when surveys indicate that only 31% of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist,[ii] and only 39% of Catholics attend Mass on a weekly basis.[iii] Here are three ways to regain or strengthen your sense of amazement at the Eucharist: 1) Read, and re-read, and meditate upon, the words of Jesus regarding the Eucharist in the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John. Jesus makes it abundantly clear that the Eucharist is his actual Body and Blood and not merely some “symbol” of his love for us. Jesus also emphasizes the absolute necessity that anyone who claims to be his follower allow himself to be fed by the Eucharist; 2) If you’re not already attending Mass every week, start doing so. Jesus can’t feed you with the Eucharist if you don’t show up at the table. You wouldn’t choose to starve yourself physically; don’t starve yourself spiritually, either. Commune with the heart and mind of Jesus in the Eucharist, and allow him to transform your own heart and mind to be more like his; 3) “Receive what you are; become what you receive.”[iv] This profound exhortation regarding the disposition with which we should receive the Eucharist was first formulated by Saint Augustine. Meditate deeply upon Augustine’s insightful phrase, and strive to adopt this attitude every time you receive the Eucharist.

In the Eucharist, we receive the Body of Christ, incorporating us ever more fully into that Body, the Body to which we were first joined at Baptism. When we receive the Eucharist, Jesus abides in us, and we abide in him (John 6:56). Fortified by that divine food and drink, we are, in turn, to become the Body of Christ in the world. Like Jesus, we are to “break ourselves open and pour ourselves out” in love for our fellow human beings, becoming “food” and “drink” for them as they make their way through their own journey to Love.

Copyright 2023 Rick Clements

* This article is an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations

Photo by Morgan Winston on Unsplash

[i] John Paul II, Ecclesia de Eucharistia.

[ii] https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/08/05/transubstantiation-eucharist-u-s-catholics/

[iii] https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/attendance-at-religious-services/

[iv] https://earlychurchtexts.com/public/augustine_sermon_272_eucharist.htm

Love Is Life that Pours Itself Forth

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Love Is Life that Pours Itself Forth1

Why must the path of self-giving love also be the path of the cross? Can’t we be loving people without having to travel the way of the cross? No, we can’t. At least, we can’t be the deeply loving people that God has called us to be (Mt 16:24; Mk 8:34; Lk 9:23). Because we were created to share in the divine love, we’re called to learn to love as God loves. And that means being willing to break ourselves open and pour ourselves out in love for God and our fellow human beings, just as Jesus did on the cross. And that requires busting some holes in the walls that we have all built around our egos, the walls that get in the way of love: walls of pride, and self-protection, and self-pity, and fear, and prejudice, and hatred, and anger, and . . . the list goes on and on.

Sacrifices made for the sake of the beloved and suffering undergone for the sake of the beloved help to punch holes in those walls we’ve built around our egos, holes that allow the divine love to flow into us more freely and to then flow back out of us to God and neighbor. Self-sacrifice and suffering for the sake of others help us break out of the self-imposed dungeons of our egos and join more fully in the eternal circulation of love. That’s why sacrifice and suffering turn out to be required courses in the school of love. That’s why we all have to be willing to walk the way of the cross. Yes, it can be painful (sometimes, very painful) to open ourselves up to love, to open ourselves up to self-sacrifice and suffering for the sake of love. But doing so also turns out to be immensely fulfilling, even joyful. We are most fully alive when we are most fully breaking ourselves open and pouring ourselves out in loving self-gift to God and neighbor, for it is precisely then that we participate most fully in the superabundant, overflowing love and life of God.

[i] Hans Urs von Balthasar, Heart of the World. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1979, p 25.

This article is an excerpt from Rick’s latest book, The Book of Love: Brief Meditations.

Photo by Henrique Jacob on Unsplash

Copyright 2023 Rick Clements

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