Where is happiness?

Every year, on All Saints’ Day, the Gospel calls our attention to the Beatitudes.

Unfortunately, however, since we hear them so often, the Beatitudes are sometimes reduced to the level of dull clichés. We listen to them, but we don’t hear them. If you were at Mass today, did you truly hear them as they were proclaimed, or did you perhaps “zone out” as they passed by?

It is hard to focus on them. They turn what we consider the “natural order” of things right upside down. Those who are blessed, or “happy,” or “fortunate,” at not those we have been brainwashed into choosing. Just look at the list of those Christ calls “blessed:”  the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure of heart, the peacemakers and the persecuted.

Things get shaken up; false notions are shown to be empty promises; our basic drives are called into question—the drives for security, power, approval, aggrandizement, notoriety, self-esteem, control; happiness is not what it appears to be or what think it should be. We may think we are climbing the ladder of success only to discover that we have set it up against the wrong building.

I turned to the Catechism of the Catholic Church to see what it had to say about this “reversal of fortunes:”

. . . true happiness is not found in riches or well-being, in human fame or power, or in any human achievement—however beneficial it may be—such as science, technology, and art, or indeed in any creature, but in God alone, the sources of every good and of all love. (#1723)

 At first sight, I find this difficult to embrace, but when I hold it up to the picture of my own life I can see how true it is. I have sought happiness in so many things, and never truly found it. And yet, I consider myself to be a happy man. Deep down inside, I think the happiness comes from my existence as a monk which demands a radical orientation towards God and the things of God, especially at this point in my life when I am no longer doing those things which in the past brought me honor and prestige and a bit of fame.  But enough about me. What do you make of all this, and how can you apply it to your own life? That’s the important question for you to consider on this All Saints’ Day.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this, either by commenting below or by sending me an email (bcamera@anselm.edu).

God bless.