Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
I will admit: when I first heard that Disney was making a movie based on the ride “Pirates of the Caribbean,” I was very skeptical that it would be a good movie. But, 7 movies later, I am happy to be wrong. One of the staples in every movie has been Captain Jack Sparrow’s special compass, which doesn’t point towards north, but points towards whatever the person holding it wants most. The compass helps Jack find the Black Pearl, the fountain of youth, and all the other things and places that Jack or the other characters want, especially rum.
Of course, a compass that points toward what we want is not real. It would be a nice invention, but, as far as I know, it doesn’t exist. If it did exist, though, where or to what would it point? Would it be a new house, a new car, or something? Or would it point to a place, or even to a person?
We are a society that generally gets what it wants pretty quickly. If we want to know something, we simply ask Siri or Alexa. If we want to buy something, we put it on the credit card, even if we don’t have the money to buy that thing. Our desires are satisfied quite rapidly. But we are probably also one of the most miserable societies in this history of the world, because more often than not, our desires fluctuate between very transitory or passing things or relationships. When it comes to the deeper things of life, many people seem to set those aside.
And yet, our deepest desire is for God. The cliché phrase puts it this way: we have a God-sized hole in our heart. St. Augustine, the great Doctor of the Church, puts it this way in his book The Confessions: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” We seek after so many things and people, but what we really want, what all those things and people cannot give us, is a deep relationship with God. And the things and even other people cannot fulfill those desires because we really want the infinite, and those things and people are finite.
A person on the road to heaven would have a compass that would point right here, to the tabernacle, because inside is Jesus, who is the deepest desire of our hearts. The person who is living out the call that God gives to every baptized person to be a saint would want to have God. Yes, that person would probably have other things–a house, a car, personal relationships–but they would all come second to God.
Is God the treasure that we desire? Is God the pearl of great price in our life? The person who is working in the field and finds a treasure, then does everything he can to buy that field so that he can have that treasure. The merchant who is searching for a fine pearl sells everything he has so that he can get that one, perfect pearl. What do we do to deepen our relationship with God? What are we willing to give away?
Because in order to say yes to God, we have to say no to other things. That’s not just true with our relationship with God, it’s true with everything in life. Whenever we say yes to one thing or person, we say no to another. When I said yes to becoming a priest, I was also saying no to every single woman that would cross my path for the rest of my life (in terms of a romantic relationship). For a married woman, when she says, “I do,” to her husband, she is also saying, “I don’t” to every other man, no matter how handsome or kind he might be. When a student says yes to partying on a Tuesday night, he or she is saying no to the homework that is due the next day. Saying yes to anything means saying no to the other options. That sounds tough, but it’s the way life works. And it’s true whether the choice is for something good, or for something that is a lesser good.
Christianity in general, and Catholicism in particular, is getting more difficult to live. We no longer have a culture which supports living out our faith. The truths of the faith which cannot change are so often now opposed by friends, family, and even the government at times. We have not yet reached systematic persecution in the United States, but the groups who call those who live out Catholicism bigots, backwards, and hate-filled seem to grow every year. More and more we will have to decide what religion we will say yes to: Catholicism or hedonistic secular humanism–a secular type of religion that tells us to do whatever feels good, whatever we want? And that decision will be made by what we love the most, what we truly think is the treasure in the field or the pearl of great price.
If we had a compass that pointed to what we want the most, where would it point? If it doesn’t point to that tabernacle, more precisely, to Jesus who is inside it, then Jesus invites us to reprioritize our lives. God has made us for Himself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Him. May God be the strongest desire in our life.
