From the crib to the Crucifix: Making all the difference in this world, all in preparation for the next...

The wisdom of our culture tells us that if we don’t make a lasting difference in this world, we haven’t lived our lives well.

That’s a good piece of wisdom!

The question that Catholics need to ask themselves is: “What kind of lasting difference and how am I to make it?”

Research indicates that people who make a lasting difference in this world master a few things that really matter and live and die to do them.

Unfortunately, many people today predicate those few things with coming from a well-respected and wealthy family, possessing a high IQ, having glossy, four-color, magazine-cover good looks, attending fine schools, and vacationing on Martha’s Vineyard. It’s called having the correct “pedigree.” These people—and they are legion—believe these few things provide a virtual “lock” on their lives making a lasting difference in this world. Moreover, everyone around them shares and affirms this belief, as do their adoring and fawning legions of admirers.

For those who haven’t been so blessed with those few things and don’t possess that correct pedigree, they’re told to set their sights a bit lower: To be liked by others, have a good job, be surrounded by a bevy of friends; to have a good marriage with two good children—yes, only two, preferably a boy and a girl. Beyond that, if they’re lucky enough to have a second home at the shore for some getaway weekends, holidays, and vacations each year, an enjoyable retirement, and what used to be called the “grace of a happy death,” that’s vanilla buttercream icing on the three-layered chocolate cake of “life” (or chocolate buttercream on the three-layered vanilla cake of “life”)!

This isn’t caricature.

How many TV commercials bombard us daily portraying older couples who have made their lasting difference in this world and are blissfully ending their years in this world living in gated, plus-55, retirement communities? “The Villages” in Florida come to mind or, just up the street, “Shannondell.”

Looking prospectively, whether it’s the more glitzy or more modest list, those are the “few things” most young people today have learned from their elders and have decided to chase. Their hope? To make that “lasting difference” so they also can retire to live out their days in this world at the next generation’s “The Villages” or “Shannondell.”

From the perspective of the Catholic faith, both lists provide a recipe for tragedy, the tragedy of having lived a wasted life.

How so?

The Source of their lives doesn’t figure into either list.

Think about it: Neither list boasts anything that’s so great, majestic, unchanging, or glorious that can set a heart on fire with passion and purpose that’s worth “dying for.” The only way to make one’s life “count for something great” and make a “lasting difference” in this world is when the Source of our lives is the center of each day and we do those few things that count for the next world.

Here’s a real tragedy: To retire in comfort and die in comfort—where the dream ends—having added nothing of value to the world, all the while living in the delusion “my live has made a difference in this world.”

That is a tragedy…it’s called the tragedy of “fatal success.”

Catholics who live a “Christmas crib faith” buy into this narrative, paying the tithes of countless days spent devoid of either purpose or passion...nothing “to die for.” Heeding our culture’s wisdom, they wrap themselves in the swaddling blankets of seeking to make a difference in this world by being like everyone else—a clone—the irony being they believe “It’s my life to live as I choose to live it.”

Yes, indeed! A life that ends in the grave in this world, having not made one whit of a difference in this world, as history attests.

That is a tragedy…if only because our lives aren’t ours, as if they are a possession like a pet.

In contrast, our Catholic faith reminds us that our lives have been entrusted to us by their Source and for the purpose of glorifying that Source in all we say and do. Moreover, as modern genetics attests, none of us has been created as a clone. No, each of us has been created with a distinct and irreplaceable genetic code—a distinct, divinely inspired purpose in life—through which each of us can make not just a real difference in this world but all the difference in this world. And, as we live our days fulfilling that genetic code—living out that purpose—our hearts teem are motivated by and teem with passion...to the point that we’re willing to die for it.

Sounds like Jesus!

Upon hearing that, Catholics who live a “crib faith” become like the deaf-mute in last Sunday’s gospel. Why? That vision of life—of God’s life in us—requires making a personal sacrifice (it’s called “having skin in the game”—sacrificing our desires, plans, goals, and hopes for ourselves to make a real difference for a higher purpose that will make all the difference in this world.

For Catholics who live a “crib faith,” this vision of life—be obedient to God’s will and to make that sacrifice—is a tragedy of epic proportions.

Don’t buy into that narrative. Think instead: That isn’t a tragedy; no, that’s a glory.

Why?

Today’s Alleluia verse called to mind St. Paul’s statement to the Galatians—the very people he previously addressed as “You stupid Galatians!”:

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.

What did St. Paul mean when he wrote “never to boast except in the cross of our Lord”?

For Catholics who live a “Good Friday crucifix faith,” the journey from Bethlehem to Calvary represents a lifetime of living each day with purpose and passion by being obedient to God—bringing our personal genetic code to fulfillment. That’s how those who live a “crucifix faith” spend a lifetime that ends in what the world views as tragedy that, in retrospect, has made not just a “real difference” but “all the difference ” in this world.

St. Paul directs our attention to Jesus and Good Friday as our icon.

Want your life to count for something truly great in this world and that lasts in the next for eternity?

Embrace a “crucifix faith”: Make fulfilling God’s purpose for you the cornerstone upon which you construct and live each day with passion. Don’t desire what this culture promotes as a valuable and satisfying life that ends in the grave. Instead: Desire what’s infinitely great, infinitely beautiful, and infinitely satisfying by keeping firmly fixed in mind the mission statement of those who live a “crucifix faith”: “Ad majorem Dei gloriam!” (“To God’s greater honor and glory!”).

Live and die for that and you will make a difference that lasts for eternity!

Only one things matters to those who live a “crucifix faith.” As St. Paul spoke of that one thing to the Galatians:

To boast of nothing except in the cross through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.

That represents this week’s challenge from scripture: To become centered more in the Crucifix than the crib by making the Crucifix our passion in life…the one thing each of us loves, the one thing each of us honors and cherishes, and the one thing in which each of us rejoices. Everything that’s of any purpose, is worthy of any passion in life, and has made all the difference in this world in life is found in the Crucifix, the font of all blessings and life.

How might each of us do that?

Each day this week, identify what otherwise you would characterize as inducing suffering. Instead, consider that suffering opening the door to a blessing. Think about Jesus thinking about his crucifixion as a blessing!

• Got into a car accident? Get injured in it? Boast in the crucifix by giving thanks for the blessing that you’re not dead. Stop brooding over an automobile that needs to be repaired! That would be a tragedy!
• Hurricane Ida cause damage to your home or property? Boast in the crucifix for the blessing the hurricane didn’t cause you bodily harm. Stop brooding over the loss of material things you will not take with you to the grave! That would be a tragedy!
• Your fiancé dumped you? Boast in the crucifix for the blessing you didn’t waste your days building a marriage on sand and perhaps cause your children to suffer the ill-effects that could last a lifetime. That would be a tragedy!
• Your spouse died? Boast in the crucifix for the blessing of those days and years of marriage you enjoyed. Stop spending your days filled with grief at your loss. That would be a tragedy!
• Feel guilt about things you’ve done in your past and they cause you to blush with shame? Boast in the crucifix for the blessing that the death and resurrection of God’s only begotten Son has freed you from your sins. Stop living in the past and rightfully experiencing guilt for what you cannot change. That would be a tragedy!

God is the Source of Life. Evil seeks to destroy life and is successful each time—and just like the people in today’s gospel—you and I fail to embrace a “crucifix faith” that leads to new life in Christ, clutching instead onto the swaddling blanket of a comfortable “crib faith” that ends in the grave.

Each day this week, recall that every evil experienced in this life presents a decisive choice: To boast in what inevitably leads to tragedy and death by living a “crib faith” or boast in the crucifix by living a “crucifix faith” and start making all the difference in this world.

To the people who listen to the wisdom of this world devoid of the Source of their lives, the design of the crucifix is disgusting, calling to mind the most horrific aspects of humanity’s ultimate rejection of the Source of their lives. To these people, Jesus offers this rebuke: “Get behind me, Satan. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”

As bad as forsaking this opportunity really is, each missed opportunity has a negative impact that reaches beyond us and infects others. When you and I fail to witness to an authentic Catholic faith by revealing in our words and actions—educating others about a “crucifix faith”—they won’t learn how to stand under the Crucifix like Mary, contemplate its difficult and very harsh lessons, and learn to boast in the crucifix by embracing it as the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

To the people who do listen to that wisdom and make the Source of their lives the center of each of their days, the design of the crucifix gives glory to God. It reveals how what people in this world view as a tragedy represents yet another missed opportunity to fulfill our purpose by living it passionately today, each day moving forward to make all the difference in this world.

To these people, Jesus says:

Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and that of the gospel will save it.

And, as St. Paul noted to the Galatians:

The world has been crucified to me, and I have been crucified to the world. The world is dead to me, and I am dead to the world.

Embracing a “crucifix faith” is how we will know “it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself up for me.”

When Christ died, his death becomes our death when we are united to Christ by a “crucifix faith.” The “I” who lives is the new “I” of a “crucifix faith.” The old self—the “I who lives for me”—died on the cross with Christ.

May it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

That’s what it means to live a “crucifix faith.”

The goal of this living faith is to boast in the Crucifix and, thus, in living each day to glorify God in fulfilling the distinct purpose for which God created each of us. That is how, like Jesus, each of us can embrace the Crucifix  and “make a difference”…all the difference in this world, all in preparation for the next.