NURTURING OUR HOPE: HOPEFUL AND MOVING STORIES (#10)
Christian or theological hope increases in intensity in our hearts when we perform acts of faithful and loving hope, by the hand of humility and prayer, and patience and perseverance.
Beside the Sacred Scriptures, the writings of the Fathers of the Church and mystics, the martyrs, and the lives of the saints, there are some other books and texts that continue inspiring me as a pilgrim of hope to eternal beatitude.
I still remember – and go back to them from time to time – some books from my youth. In the first place, I recall The Little Prince, by A. Saint-Exupery. Every time I read the dialogue between the Little Prince and the Fox I am moved. The Little Prince tells the fox that there are no hunters in his little planet; unfortunately for the fox, there are no chickens either: “nothing is perfect,” the fox comments, before giving his simple secret of life to the Little Prince: “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” On the pilgrimage of life, theological hope - faithful and loving hope - is essential!
I also keep treasuring the book The Parables of Peanuts (well, above all, the Peanuts comic strip) by Robert L. Short that helped me understand the good humor and the theology of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts Family of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy and other wonderful kids (adults). Once Lucy and her brother Linus are watching the rain fall behind a window at home. Lucy comments: “Boy, look at the rain… What if it floods the whole world?” Linus answers: “It will never do that. In the ninth chapter of Genesis, God promised Noah that would never happen again, and the sign of the promise is the rainbow.” Lucy: “You have taken a great load off my mind.” Linus: “Sound theology has a way of doing that.” Another cartoon: Snoopy is writing a book on theology. Charlie Brown comments: “I hear you’re writing a book on theology.” “I hope you have a good title.” Snoopy: “I have the perfect title.” “Has It Ever Occurred to You That You Might Be Wrong?”
I continue enjoying The Way of a Pilgrim and the Russian Pilgrim’s continued mantra: “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me, a sinner.” Continuing conversion from sin renews our hope in God. I love Jonathan Livingstone Seagull (by R. Bach), the winged symbol of my hope. For Jonathan, “It was not eating that mattered but flight – more than anything else, he loved to fly! He was always on the way to a more perfect flight.” During his novitiate in flying, Jonathan was hungry but happy, because he was hopeful. ‘The trick,” he said, “is that we are trying to overcome our limitations in order, patiently.” Once, his mob of birds, interested only in eating, tried to kill him. Jonathan could not hate the mob of birds with little hope. On the contrary, he tried to help those hopeless seagulls – by loving them! Jonathan said: “You have to practice and see the real seagull, the good in everyone, and to help them see it in themselves.” This is love, or better, loving hope.
Another traveling companion is The Prophet, by K. Gibran, where the poet speaks of the different realities that affect our life. He tells us that giving is essential in life, and above all, giving with joy: “There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.” And working with love: “And all work is empty save when there is love. And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another. And to God.” And praying to God: “When you pray, you rise to meet in the air those who are praying. At that very hour, and whom save in prayer you will not meet.” Gibran writes: “The physical consciousness of a plant in midwinter is not directed towards the past summer, but towards the coming spring. The physical memory of a plant is not that of days that are no more, but of days that will be. If plants are certain of a coming spring, through which they will come out of themselves, why can’t I, a human plant, be certain of a spring to come, in which I will be able to fulfill myself? Perhaps our spring is not in this life… This life may be nothing but a winter.” Yes, but, in hope, a hopeful winter!
I am a pilgrim! I am on the way to God, the God of our hope. Where are you, dear God? I know that God the Father, the Good Shepherd, is looking for me, and I know that God, the Father of the prodigal son and of his elder brother, is expecting us!
As a follower of Christ, am I on his way, my way of hope? Two disciples of John the Baptist asked Jesus: “Rabbi, where do you stay?” (Jn 1:38). Jesus answered them: “Come and see.” Where are you today, Lord? He is present in the praying and fraternal community: “If two of you are united in asking for anything, it will be granted to you by my heavenly Father. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them” (Mt 18:19-20). Christ is present in the Sacraments, channels of grace and graces, particularly in the Eucharist: “This is my Body,” “This is the cup of my blood.”
Christ is present in the words of the Sacred Scriptures, particularly when these are proclaimed in the Church (Vatican II, SC, 7). He is also present in the needy of the world: “What you do to the least of my brothers and sisters, you do it to me” (Mt 25: 31-46). The Lord is present in prayer, including private prayer as an encounter with the Lord.
“Salvation is glimpsed by faith; it is anticipated by hope; but it is achieved only by charity.’’ “Hope feeds us on the journey with the manna of sweetness” (St. Francis of Sales: The Love of God: A Treatise).
BY WAY OF CONCLUSION
When all is said and done, what really matters is love – a love that is in this life “always ready to hope” (1 Cor 13:7). Only the practice of hope in love will lead us on the way to heaven: without holiness, “no one can see the Lord” (Heb 12:14).
Rooted in the past, faithful to the present, we march to the future: we have our eyes on the future. We all know the lovely oriental story of the old man climbing the Himalayan Mountains. It was wintertime – a cold winter. On that day, it was also raining, so the old man took refuge for a while in an inn along the path to the peak. The innkeeper asked him: “How will you ever get there, old man, in this kind of weather?” The old man answered him: “My heart got there first, so it easy for the rest of me to follow.” Where is my heart? And yours?
How hopeful and consoling! Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth… God… will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore. The old things have disappeared (Rev 21:1, 4) “Eye has not seen; ear has not heard nor has it so much as dawned on man what God has prepared for those who love him (I Cor 2:9). The Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come’… Let him who hears answer, ‘Come!’ Come, Lord Jesus! (Rev 22:17, 20). (FGB)
