As we walk through the Christmas season and begin a new year, we have been listening to the readings from Scripture in which God first reveals his son to the world.
In the Gospel of Luke, we heard the angel proclaim to the shepherds “news of great joy that will be for all people.” Matthew tells the story of the magi who saw a star and knew it signaled something monumental – a Messiah had been born.
But as we round the corner and head into 2022, another familiar piece of Scripture comes to mind: Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, in which urges the church at Corinth to “strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts,” which he defines as faith, hope and love, “but the greatest of these is love” (1 Cor 13:13).
How can we approach the new year with these theological virtues in mind?
Faith
If we are people of faith, we will exercise our belief in God by attending Mass and showing others by the way we live our lives that we have a personal relationship with Jesus. It’s easy to say, “I’m saved by Jesus”; it takes more effort to make that salvation evident to the world.
One of the common dismissals from Mass exhorts us: “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life.” If we don’t practice our Catholic Christianity outside the one hour a week we attend Mass, then our faith is not very strong, and it certainly won’t inspire anyone.
Hope
Hope is hard to come by these days. We are all so flat-out exhausted from dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, with new variants and mutations throwing forward progress into a tizzy. We need hope – desperately so.
Jesus represents that hope. He is the one who reassures us that death is not the end, that heaven awaits us on the other side.
Everyone likes to talk about “brands” these days – corporate and personal; just look at TikTok or Instagram stars to see the personal brand taken to extreme. But it’s important to remember that Jesus’ “brand” of ministry was about lifting up people whom society tossed aside: the blind, the lame, the “unclean,” beggars and sinners. He brought hope to people who had never expected to have hope.
Isaiah prophesied: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who lived in a land of gloom a light has shone” (Is 9:1). It’s not hard to see that we, like the Israelites, are struggling, waiting for the light. Jesus brings hope and light to all.
But you have to take the bushel off the light for it to shine.
Love
And that’s where love comes in. When we exercise the greatest of the theological virtues, our light shines – the light of Christ within us.
“If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal” Paul tells the Corinthians (1 Cor 13:1).
We all know too many gongs and cymbals these days – they fill our airwaves and social media feeds. We need to get away from that negativity.
Sometimes we need to start loving people by simply being kind, by not criticizing or lashing out. It may help to eliminate some of the toxic people and their comments from your news feed – while praying for them.
Living the theological virtues of faith, hope and love might just be the plan we need for a happy and healthy new year.
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