In our lifetime we make millions of choices. Some of them are simple like choosing between decaf or regular, chocolate or vanilla, whereas some are very serious and even life-changing. Should I marry this person? Is the Lord calling me to be a priest or religious? There are significant choices we make every day that reveal our values, our identity, and even express our faith. This past Tuesday many of us joined millions of Americans and made choices at the polls doing just that. Guided by our values, faith, and hopes, we chose people who we believe are like-minded with ourselves and will make good choices as elected officials, forming a democracy envisioned by our nation’s founders.
In the months leading up to our journey to the polls, we have been bombarded with voices attempting to guide the choices we make there. Unfortunately, many of these voices have been rude, deceitful, smug, and divisive. Who has not heard someone bemoaning the distressing loss in the level of political discourse in our country? I am tired of the name calling, the vile accusations, the hate speech, and the demeaning way many politicians choose to treat others with differing opinions. These voices have gone to the extreme of supporting acts of violence and intimidation. It is beneath us.
As those who have chosen to follow Christ, we are the people who commit ourselves to “Live Jesus.” Even Jesus struggled with choices. What else is the agony in the garden but a struggle with his choice to do the will of his Father? The theologian, Father Ron Rolheiser writes, “The choice Jesus faced that fateful night was not whether to die or not die. It was about how to die. Jesus’ choice was this: Do I die in bitterness or in love? Do I die in hardness of heart or softness of soul? Do I die in resentment or in forgiveness? We know which way he chose. His humiliation drove him to extreme depths, but these were depths of empathy, love, and forgiveness.”
Following this long and, at times, arduous journey to the polls, maybe it is time to reflect on our own choices. Are the choices we make done with empathy, love and forgiveness as guides? Do we bring the values and a Christlike way of living to our family life, our workplace, and in the interactions we have with others? Are our voices reflective of the choice we have made to “Live Jesus?”
Saint Francis de Sales writes, “I recommend to you the gentle and sincere courtesy which offends no one and obliges all, which seeks love rather than honor.” (Letters to Persons in the World IV 2)
What is your choice? Is it decaf or regular? Chocolate or vanilla? Hate and resentment, or gentle and sincere courtesy, the virtue that warranted Saint Francis de Sales to be called the “Gentleman Saint?”
Live + Jesus!
Father Jack Loughran, OSFS
Provincial
Toledo-Detroit Province
