Sunday Sermon on the Parable of the Treasure in the Field

In case you missed it, the Gospel on Sunday was the Parable about the man who discovered a treasure in a field. He sold everything he owned to buy the field. The accompanying parable was the merchant of fine pearls who sold off everything he owned for the pearl of great price.

Fr. Poumade (sp?) gave a great sermon on Sunday, talking about how modern life these days distracts us from a true love of God. Our ideas of love have been tainted by the Hollywood-style mooshy-gooshy kinds of love, and we forget that true love is the willing sacrifice of oneself for the good of another, not just good feelings. Since God already has everything that is good for Him, the highest forms of love that we can give Him is obedience to His commands and the following of Our Lord's example, since He deserves nothing less. Our obedience should be motivated by love of God, not just a desire to avoid hell. It was one of those sermons that felt like it was directed solely at me.

After Mass, I talked to Fr. P about how one can move from the love of God that is motivated by the fear of hell to the kind of love that is motivated by nothing but a desire to do His Will. Obviously, there is no one answer (like, "Read this book, and you'll be there,"), but Fr. P had a good number of suggestions, and he gave me one piece of advice which is tried and true: act like you love God and you will eventually develop the right kind of love.

My next question was how do I act like I love God and participate in the joy that should come along with that without being a conceited prick, like what you see in modern Protestant ministers or people who seem to be always happy-go-lucky or slain-in-the-spirit or whatever else seems very fake and superficial. He told me that I was seeing the difference between true joy and optimism. True joy is serenity: nothing disturbs your love for God, whether good things or disasters occur. Optimism is a constant forced high that often crashes and burns with disaster.

Of course, I'm remembering all this two days after the fact -- a lot was said, and I'm forgetting a lot of it, but this was the gist of it. It was really good to hear.

Valentine's Day

With commercialism rampant in today's society, one wonders exactly why things like Valentine's Day has retained its name. Or, at least, I do. It's the day of love. Chances are, when you walk down the street, you'll run across more people making out than you care to see. I actually laugh out loud as I pass by them, but most people don't care. To them, the feast is Bacchanalian in nature only, and the feast of a Saint who's legend includes being martyred for celebrating Catholic marriages without empirical consent returns to the more carnal celebration of Lupercalia. With the surge of paganism as an acceptable religion, I'm almost surprised to not see the old pagan holidays resurrected in place of the Christian ones, no matter how badly the original Christian meaning of the holiday (or Holy Day) has been distorted.

I have no problem with Valentine's Day. It was always a day that I looked forward to at Christendom. It was the one time of year that I could write silly poems and get away with it, all for the amusement of the fairer sex. Had I written a poem for any woman there at any other time, I would be accused of stalking, but on this very special day, the giving of roses and poems describing affection to the girls was completely acceptable, and even welcomed by them -- or most of them anyway. There were always a few that hated it for whatever various reasons, but the solution for them was a simple one: don't participate. Go out to eat with your friends and avoid the Commons on that night, for there would be girls enjoying and sharing each other's poems, guys passing out flowers left and right, serving dinner and desserts, and there would be a dance later -- it was expected, and it was fun for almost everyone. But, as I said before, to those for whom it wasn't fun, whether it be someone who just broke up, or someone who hated the commercialism, or, worse still, someone who hated any such displays, deeming them unfit for the public eye, their solution was a simple one: don't be there.

On a more spiritual sense, this would lead me to talk about love. What is love? Love is not simply feeling all mushy over someone. Love does not intrinsically contain butterflies. Love is a conscious decision that a person makes to another person. Along those lines, true love can only be shared by people. Loving an object is not true love. Don't get me wrong, I love pecan pie, I love big trucks and muscle cars, and I love exercising in the gym. But there is no real love there. Strong attraction, yes; a feeling of connection, yes; love, no. Exercise can no more reciprocate true love than the sound of a 641 horsepower V12 7.3 L engine can tell me anything but, "I'm fun to drive."

:)

Of course, right now, I'm more inclined to drive such a car, simply because of the commitment that love requires. And just like a car needs to be fixed, even more so does a loving relationship need maintenance.

But I am out of my league for now. I am not in a relationship, and have not been in a serious relationship for a long time. Although I'm open to whatever God wills, I'm not planning to get into one either. I'm not prepared now in any capacity to reciprocate the highest possible connection between two people (aside, of course, from what is required by Christian charity), and I don't see myself ever being prepared for anything of the sort.

With that said, I hope you all have a very Blessed and Happy Feast of St. Valentine the Martyr (or Valentine's Day, whatever you wish to call it).