Happy Easter! Christ is Risen!
Happy Easter! Christ Is Risen!
We've spent a lot of time going over how to manage the distractions and disruptions that descended on us in the past few years. Not that it's unique to have to deal with such, but that latest batch has its peculiar challenges. And so we turned to our faithful companion, The Rule of St. Benedict, to assist us.
Then there was Lent. It comes every year and brings its own challenges. We've tried to devote ourselves to those Three Pillars of Lent: Prayer, Fasting, Almsgiving - perhaps with mixed success for most of us.
But despite the war in Europe, inflation, our nation divided, the phony and false main stream media that leads so many of us down rabbit holes of lies, manipulation, and fear - and this is only the short list - Lent ended and Easter has arrived right on time. Now Easter brings the joy of the Resurrection. If that joy butts heads with the troubles we mentioned that have piled on over the last year or so, well, that's the way of the world.
Reminder: Our Lord, as a result of His Passion, Death, and Resurrection,
has overcome the world. Hold that thought. Treasure it. It will provide
ballast and balance in the face of all the distraction, disruption,
dysfunction, and discombobulation that the world's troubles continue to drop on our
heads.
So why bring up the troubles brewing out there on this glorious day? For one thing, because, despite Our Lord's ultimate triumph, there's no use pretending everything's hunky-dory when it isn't. Without getting caught up in the particulars, it's looking more and more like inflation, food and other supply issues, even war, will now become more and more of our daily diet as we work our way through the rest of 2023, if not the rest of this decade.
Easter looks through and past all
this. But we're still here in the Vale of Tears until our own (we hope
and pray) triumph. We celebrate the Resurrection, trust in Our Lord's
ultimate triumph, and ask for the grace and the courage to face whatever
awaits us.
And lest we let whatever may be put a damper on our Easter, maybe we recall the last few years, when some of us who work for a living lost our jobs due to the ridiculous lock-downs that killed a lot of businesses and pulled the rug out from under many others. Indeed some may still remain unemployed.
Having labored in
the bowels of the supposedly finally ended Covid Mess, never mind the new
troubles mentioned above, let's hope we're all tough enough to face the
stark realities
that have confronted us in different ways, depending on the nature of
our work and our individual temperaments and personalities. The fact is,
many - if not most of us - face an uncertain future. With recent bank failures, the always changing world seems to be facing a financial crisis. And with that, it's a good bet the economy has already headed into a recession.
In our work lives, if we
keep our current occupations, we're not sure what that will look and
feel like, even if things actually do stabilize or improve.
As for our personal lives,
we may want to simply work on the fundamentals: Pray, receive the
Sacraments, spend time reading good spiritual works, the Scriptures, as
well as continuing study of our Catholic Religion. There's always more
to learn. Anchoring our Catholic Faith on solid ground with these daily
efforts, we'll be prepared for the inevitable twists and turns that will
likely come our way.
Of course, in all this, our goal must always be to grow closer to Our Lord. He just proved the depth of His love for us. We know this if we meditated on His Passion during Lent and now revel in His Resurrection.
So
despite the troubles that keep piling on,
Easter still injects a joyful energy that keeps us on our toes, not
simply to do our jobs, but perhaps even to spiritually dance to the
joyful "Alleluias" that we'll be hearing in abundance during the glorious Easter Season.
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