We are always manipulated in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. I think specifically of commercials. My overall impression of commercials is that they are designed to make us feel bad about ourselves.
The idea is to get us to buy something we probably don’t need to “feel better about ourselves.”
As we watch people in commercials, it’s easy to think, “Gosh, my tan isn’t that deep. My hair isn’t that nice. My car isn’t that flashy.”
If you feel down or depressed when you go to bed at night, it’s no wonder. We ingest dozens or hundreds of those messages all day.
Fortunately, Jesus was not that way. Jesus didn’t come to tell us what we were not. He came to tell us who we could be.
Jesus came to share his own life with us. Perhaps St. Paul expressed this reality best when he wrote, “It is now no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20).
Christ modeled a very challenging lifestyle. He wasn’t born in luxury, but in a stable. He didn’t grow up in an affluent neighborhood, but in Nazareth. He didn’t die in comfort, but on a cross. Jesus was not a savior Madison Avenue would have created. Yet, in seeming to have nothing, Jesus had everything.
The Gospel of John tells us our Lord came so we might “have life and have it more abundantly.” Life to the fullest would be a life filled with love. And love is what the world is really looking for. Because we have Christ with us and in us, you and I have that love.
I especially invite young people to consider a life of service to the church as a priest or religious. You can bring to the world what the world is really looking for – love and peace.
More stuff will not bring that love or peace. You can bring the very presence and love of God to others through a life of service and prayer. Think and pray about it. God wants to get into the world again through you and me.
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