Dealing with a Tough Stretch at Work By Remembering Life's Purpose

Even in the midst of our glorious Easter Season, sometimes you can hit a tough stretch at work. I'm in one now. Everything's hard. Too many things going on at once. This deadline and that feel like they're hanging over me, like a sword of Damocles. Some days, the tasks on my "To Do" list stick me like they're little pins and I'm a cushion; other days I see black clouds of impending doom looming over the horizon. (A little dramatic, perhaps, but, hey, it really feels that way some times.) Stuff gets done, but only with the greatest effort, stuff that seemed to flow with grace and ease only last week.

Well, wouldn't you know it? My spiritual reading each morning just gave traced a little silver lining around those clouds just in the nick of time: Life's purpose is to purify us and not merely to gratify us. Everything falls into place when you consider this, doesn't it? At least it does now for me. (Reminder: Make time for spiritual reading every day. You never know when it will ride to the rescue!)

This little summary of life's purpose came with a quote from Father Edward Leen. I want to share it with you today. I think you'll find it especially helpful if you're in a tough stretch. But even if you're not, even if things are going just fine and dandy at the moment, take some time to read it carefully. You'll be glad you did.

“Our happiness is attained when the undivine in us, that which in us is unlike God and alien to Him, is purged away from our souls. This purgation, if not done in this life, is wrought out with extreme agony in the life to come. Purgatory is a loving invention of God which pursues man, for his own good, beyond the gates of death. Multitudes, failing to profit, on this earth, by all that Christianity provides for them to effect the divinization (sanctification) of their souls, quit the world, the task not completed. Were there no Purgatory, souls that leave this earth unpurified, though not entirely estranged from God, could never enjoy the Beatific Vision. Nothing defiled can enter heaven, enjoy intimate union with God, and share His Beatific Life. Faith, laying hold of sufferings and uniting them with the cross of Christ, enables man to accomplish, during the time of pilgrimage, what otherwise has to be accomplished at incalculably greater cost, when the time of trial is past. So bitter is the process of purification in the world to come, as compared with the same process as wrought out on earth, that God, in His love, gives largely of the cross to His friends in order to save them from the fate of quitting the world unpurified and, consequently, immediately inapt for the Beatific Vision.”

For some of us, a first reading might "taste" like some kind of unpleasant medicine. You know this must be good for you, so you swallow it. But, really, couldn't they make it taste better? But maybe you take that essentially emotional reaction and set it aside. You open your heart and engage your mind. Read it again, maybe more slowly, more thoughtfully. Put some of your intellect into your reading and I think (I hope) you'll see that Father Leen has served up mighty meat for the soul. Eat heartily, but chew slowly. Give yourself time to digest it. Maybe even come back to it from time to time.

We're all wrapped up in the world for sure, and when you throw in the flesh and the devil you can understand why we need to step back and remind ourselves of our real purpose. Our spiritual reading can be a good source of recollection for us. All it takes is 10 - 15 minutes a day, at a time when we're not distracted, when we can pay attention and think about what we're reading,  Don't think you're too busy for it. Even when things really, really press in on you at work, and it seems like you can't spare a minute, make time for this. The world, the flesh, and the devil - even your pressing work - can wait.

Happy Easter!