Saturday, March 01, 2014

Never Satisfied.

For a little more than a week now I've been sort of following a diet that my wife is on.  It's mostly at night, I, we (my son and I) eat what she eats; and it's all good, high in fiber, tasty, all that, but I never really feel full, never do I have that feeling of yeah, that was a really good meal and I am stuffed.  There is often that ( mini voice in my head speaking) Yeah, that was pretty good, but I am still hungry! but I know that this is good for me so I'll try to soldier up and move on.  "I'll have one cookie, please".  Oh well.  But the more I think about it the more I see the parallels between this trying to eat right and the spiritual life, especially my spiritual life.  At one time I was a member of a Secular Franciscan Order, and I am a professed Secular Franciscan.  I say was, because I no longer follow that way of the Franciscans.  The S.F. live the complete modern theology Catholicism, tied up completely with the Novus Ordo Mass, which we (H and I) do not attend.  How could we?  Once we discovered the Rule of 1221 and began attending the TLM our lives changed completely.  What we thought was good food for the soul was nothing but food for the man, an exhalation to ourselves.  For me, to go to Holy Mass, I almost always come away with a longing for more.  When I go to Mass and I leave I'm not completely satisfied, completely filled up as after a nice big meal.  No, Mass for me is what it is, the Sacrifice of Calvary in an un-bloodied manner, but also it serves as a sustaining event until the next Mass, and also, especially a Low Mass, can be a time of beautiful reflection and prayer.  I love especially the Low Mass during the week,  (praise God I am able to attend one!) 7:00am, before work.  A beautiful way to begin the day.  And then that time spent allows the mind, body and soul to come together in a correct way to begin the work day.  But there is always that longing, that desire for more of God, more of this holy life that I believe most of us long to live, are called to live.  In a perfect world is to be left alone, to follow the Words of Our Lord in order to achieve our final goal, Heaven.  I know this isn't happening, not to very many of us.  Our state of life leaves us no other choice but to get muddy, get dirty almost each and every day.  And that is alright, it is our duty to show ourselves to the world, to give good example.  That may be the only way we can call souls to God nowadays. The wave of this world is about to wash over us, and we, a bit like clams in their shells must hunker down and let this madness pass over us.  Our longing will sustain us, like a deep prayer that echos in our breast, our favorite one that we resort to in dark times.  The fullness of fluff that passes for a lot of Christianity today will perhaps overwhelm the world we live in for awhile, maybe even though our lifetime, but we can do nothing about that.  Strive for more, never let our hunger be satisfied, never live to say 'This is all there is in my spiritual life", never be satisfied with ourselves. The life of a Christian is a constant war against the world, the flesh and the devil.  Once we are satisfied, we have lost.  

Pray for us, O Holy Mother of God, that we may be worthy of the promises of Christ.  

3 comments:

Do Not Be Anxious said...

I feel much of what you feel, kam, but I am doubly blessed in that morning mass is followed by adoration of the Blessed Sacrament for an hour, at which time the second mass begins. That time after mass is the "extra cookie" I need to make my day start "full."

kam said...

That IS excellent!

Fr. Arthur Joseph said...

Dear Kam,

Very inspiring and let us all pray that with Our Lady's help we will always hunger for Him, always follow Him and in these days in particular follow Our Lady's urgent plea at Fatima that we all pray the Rosary for peace.

Fr. Joseph