Happy Or Blessed?

[Note: Today’s guest blogger is Bob Baker. Bob has attended Spiritus Christi since 2015 with his wife, Elaine, and his daughter, Sophia, who is active in the youth group.  Bob is a Eucharistic Minister, and also a member of the Spiritus Men’s Group and the Spanish translation team.  He works at SUNY Brockport. Thank you Bob!]

In our country, happiness is the ultimate goal; it’s what we’re all pursuing.  It’s even written into our founding document.  So, sometimes I feel bad about not being happier.  I look around and compare myself to others: Am I as happy as my neighbor, co-worker, or relative? 

Years ago, a friend said to me: “I’m often not as happy as I think I’m supposed to be, but maybe it’s okay to be unhappy or depressed.  Sometimes, maybe it makes sense to be kind of sad.”  Her comment has always stuck with me.  There is something liberating in it.

I recently came across a book written by Sonja Lyubomirsky, who is billed as “the world’s preeminent expert on happiness.”  The book, coauthored with Harry Reis, is titled How to Feel Loved: The Five Mindsets that Get you More of What Matters Most.

I haven’t read it, but seeing a book about love written by a happiness expert made me wonder how happiness and love are related.  Is love supposed to make us happy?  

I thought about Martin Luther King, Jr.  This man’s love was enormous.  It drove him to change a nation.  And yet, I’m not sure how often he was happy, especially as he became more of a public figure.  If you’ve never seen the film Selma, it might be worth watching during this Lent season.  A few weeks ago, Lauren Urzetta wrote that Lent is a season for “opening our hearts to healing, justice, and love.”  Selma shows the commitment that is sometimes necessary to make those three things a reality.  Throughout the film, King’s love for individuals, for his people, and his country is evident. At the same time, it’s clear that he wasn’t always happy.  In fact, it doesn’t seem like being happy was a major concern of his.     

And what about Jesus?  Was he happy?  Did he offer happiness to people and teach them how to find it?  

Instead of a self-help book on happiness, Jesus gave us . . . .  the Beatitudes.  “Blessed are the poor in spirit; Blessed are those who mourn; Blessed are the meek” he says in Matthew 5.  Jesus identifies groups of people who seem like the ones who need self-help books.  But Jesus says that these people are already Blessed, which maybe isn’t necessarily the same thing as being happy.  

Mike Boucher got me thinking about the Beatitudes when he preached on them shortly before Lent began.  They are such a great way of entering into Lent, and they are worth holding onto.

In the Beatitudes, Jesus overturns conventional wisdom about happiness, morality, and fulfillment.  Instead of the confident, powerful, and virtuous who are elevated, it is the timid, the grief-stricken, and the oppressed.  Jesus is interested in something that goes far beyond happiness, something much richer and deeper. 

And in addition to the Beatitudes, Jesus gave us parables.  I like to think that each parable can be understood as an elaboration of one of the Beatitudes.   

In today’s gospel reading from Luke 18:9-14, we get a parable that illustrates this Beatitude: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Today’s parable is a story about two guys who feel unloved:

The first guy, the Pharisee, struts around the temple, “takes up his position,” and “speaks a prayer to himself” about how great he is.  This pompous man is trying to fill an internal void, so he prances around hoping for attention, which is often a convenient (but inadequate) substitute for love.  He’s wearing a façade of happiness—he’s trying desperately to convince himself that he’s happy—in order to cover up his sense of being unloved.  

And the other guy, the tax collector, is also feeling unloved, but he acknowledges this.  He is so aware of his shortcomings that he hides in a corner of the temple and lowers his eyes. Unlike the Pharisee, he looks at himself honestly.  And in that moment of honest remorse, God meets him.  And, he is Blessed.

Have you ever had a time when you felt a hardness inside you toward someone that you care about?  A close friend, a family member, your partner or spouse?  Maybe after carrying around the hardness for a while, something inside you breaks, and you let it go.  There is a release, a lightening. You are Blessed.

What does it mean to be Blessed, the way that Jesus uses the word in the Beatitudes?  I would like to think that being Blessed means that you know you are loved.  When you are merciful, when you are a peacemaker, when you are hungry for righteousness, you will know that you are loved.  When you are “poor in spirit” like the tax collector, you can know that you are loved by God.    

Lent is not the season for the strong, the mighty, and those pursuing happiness. It is for those who are beleaguered, weary, and anxious.  Lent is for those who are crouching and praying in the dark corner of the temple.  There in the shadows, they find Jesus, and are Blessed.