Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Who knows the desires of one’s heart? Deceitful, “desperately corrupt” Jeremiah tells us (Jer 17:9) The depths and breadth of our desires bewilder us. Lost in this space, anxiety grows for we do not know the direction our heart should take. As St. Paul cries out, “I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do” (Rom 7:19).
There exists an inner conflict between the carnal and the spiritual, between good and evil, obedience and disobedience, all three leading either to life or death. Anxiety, the trouble within our heart, develops when we feel the power of death pulling us down into the depths of forsakenness and the pull of God drawing us into his divine life.
Intense anxiety exists in this dilemma. It puts us to the test as the Psalmist says (139:23). Tests, those paradoxes that we endure due to the conflict between good and evil, life and death, reveal the inner workings of the heart. These tests cause intense anxiety as the Lord probes the mind and the tests heart “giving to each according to his own ways” (Jer 17:10). The Pentecostal Sequence: Veni, Sancte Spiritus, expresses explicitly our anxiety:
Where you are not, we have naught,
Nothing good in deed or thought,
Nothing free from taint of ill.
Heal our wounds, our strength renew;
On our dryness pour your dew;
Wash the stains of guilt away:
Longing to put an end to the struggle between obedience and disobedience, the ways of the world—the flesh—or the ways of God—the Spirit—anxiety arises. As St. Paul relates, anxiety is the thorn in our flesh (2 Cor 12:7). God tests the righteous revealing our hearts and minds, purifying them while exposing them not just to others but to ourselves. Unveiled, our hearts long not for self-satisfaction, but for divine glorification. Made for immortality, our mortality needs purification.
Pulled by the Holy Spirit to excellence, our bodies yearn for the things of the flesh. The flesh, more than just bodily passions, yearns for life without God. In this yearning to be free from God, death enters. The very anxiety we try to avoid becomes the reality that plagues our heart.
Though unrealized, we care for the body and all our earthly needs to the detriment of our soul. Focused on the carnal and earthly seeking worldly knowledge that satisfies our curiosity—not our hearts’ true desires, destroys our spiritual, transcendent soul. These thorns penetrate deeply, as they did Adam.
St. Paul trying to explain sin and death, reveals Jesus as the New Adam Who brought life out of Adam’s sin the reason why death entered our world.
“Because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ (Rom 5:17).
God is always faithful, we, however, become unfaithful if we follow Adam’s lead. As Adam, we desire to eat of the tree of knowledge which seemingly gives us satisfaction, but in the end, reveals the Divine Life of the Lord lost within our souls. Beholding the Divine Glory becomes our greatest shame for we, as did Adam, reject it; yet desperately long for it. This is sheer hell.
The Holy Spirit ought to be our only love, for the Spirit breathed his love into us and gave us both physical and eternal life. Yet, when Adam fell out of love and chose to live by the spirit of the world, not only did death enter the world on account of his sin, but anxiety did too. So focused on our physical death, we forget that the real death we ought to fear is not that of the body, but that of the soul—the loss of Holy Spirit breathing God’s life into our hearts.
Eating of the apple—indulging in freedom from God—reality strikes. The Divine Goodness which gives the ultimate delight to our heart becomes our loss. We cast ourselves out of God’s presence only to recognize He and He alone truly satisfies our heart’s desires. The loss of God causes desolation. Because of Adam’s choice—to live without God—we all suffer. He the father of humanity gives us our identity. We are without the Divine identity. To express this fall from grace, we read,
Constituted in a state of holiness, man was destined to be fully “divinized” by God in glory. Seduced by the devil, he (Adam) wanted to “be like God,” but “without God, before God, and not in accordance with God” (Catholic Church, Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd Ed. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), p. 100, # 398).
Because Adam chose infidelity, Jesus comes as the New Adam restoring our identity by his fidelity. Made for immortality, death enters causing anxiety as we struggle to decide. Do we remain faithful to Jesus Who unites his divinity with our humanity so that our humanity may be restored by his divinity?
Casting ourselves out of God’s presence leads to death, not just death of the body, but death of our life in God. We surely die when we remove God from our lives. Our death does not come immediately, but slowly and painstakingly because God does not wish the death of a sinner but that he convert and live (Ex 18:23, 33:11, 2 Pet 3:9, Titus 2:11). Conversion of our wills, fidelity to God, creates the anxiety which plagues our hearts desire. We are fallen and would rather live without God; yet deep in the desires of our heart, we hear the voice of Jesus stating. Fear Not! (Matt 10:26).
Jesus’ call immerses us into death. The death we ought to fear is not the death of the body, but the death of the body and soul as Jesus states: “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Mt 10:28). God’s breath dwelling within gives life; and when we disobey God’s ways, both our body and soul die for we do not have the divine life dwelling within. This is mortal sin: we are dead to Divine Life.
True anxiety comes when we face death, both physical and spiritual. Yet, Jesus corrects our anxiety calling us to fear God rather than man. To fear, that is to honor and reverence God first so that we fear disobedience rather than the persecutions that come from doing God’s will.
This battle within our heart’s desire, obedience to God’s will or disobedience to do my will, becomes the tension. The Paschal Sequence: Victimae Paschali Laudes, cannot express it more clearly.
Death and life have contended
In that combat stupendous:
The Prince of Life, who died, reigns immortal.
Jesus the New Adam filled with the Spirit of God combats the spirit of Adam filled with the spirit of the world. These two spirits duel within our hearts too. We battle between life with God and life without God.
This battle, as Jeremiah declares, creates terror, “Terror on every side” (Jer 20:10). Those who uphold the ways of the world—the spirit of the flesh—whisper, take revenge, and denounce those who follow the Spirit of God. Anxious, the battle terrorizes us creating fear and a fright for we are pulled apart in our heart as to what side to take.
The reality, the push and pull between life and death, creates anxiety for we, who are fallen fearing the death of the body become blind to the death of the Spirit. This is what happened at the start. In the beginning, God breathed life into Adam and Eve. He made them for Himself, as St. Augustine so eloquently wrote, “for Thou has formed us for Thyself” (https://www.vatican.va/spirit/documents/spirit_20020821_agostino_en.html). Yet, St. Augustine continues revealing the tense anxiety that everyone experiences.
How shall I find rest in Thee? Who will send Thee into my heart to inebriate it, so that I may forget my woes, and embrace Thee my only good? (https://www.vatican.va/spirit/documents/spirit_20020821_agostino_en.html ).
Anxiety probes and tests only to purify our desires. Purified, we take delight in the Lord’s way for He gives us the true desires of our heart. Knowing the way, our anxiety diminishes because we follow the Psalmist: “Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act” (Ps 37:5).