Sense and Nonsense: The Mystery of God’s Grace

When John Paul II recently visited the Dutch island of Curacao in the Caribbean, it was, as I recall, the ninety-third different political entity he has visited. Since then he has logged a couple more. No doubt, John Paul has more frequent-flyer miles than all the Apostles and all the previous popes put together. No one doubts, of course, that St. Paul would have rivaled John Paul had he a big Alitalia jet at his disposal. St. Paul actually did pretty well with a boat.

John Paul belatedly made it to Malta, the famous island republic off Italy, at the end of May. St. Paul, whose visit to Malta is recorded in Acts, would have been proud of what Pope Wojtyla told the people there. In fact, L’Osservatore Romano, in its English Edition (June 4, 1990), headlined the visit this way: “Peter on Paul’s Island.”

I was especially struck by the homily the pope gave on the island of Gozo at the Marian shrine called “Ta’ Pinu,” a place about which I know exactly nothing. My European travels somehow never took me to Gozo. But I do admire the Holy Father’s great care to visit and pray at every Marian shrine he can in his travels. He is teaching us something here that we should not miss.

The Mass on May 26 was addressed to families. “Today, Malta’s families must still rely upon Mary’s motherly protection and care,” John Paul told the Maltese families gathered before him. John Paul takes his teaching mission very seriously, and yet, if you watch him, very happily. There must be something profoundly consoling in teaching the truth. If bishops, priests, media, professors, pundits, or even families will not tell us what the faith is about, he will.

In this homily, John Paul proceeded to go over the basic teaching about human life and its spiritual depth. I do not know about anyone else, but I must confess I find much consolation just to have him repeat the things I know, or should know, about myself, about those I know and love.

Let me list his remarks in three propositions:

•”Our faith teaches us that each human life, beginning at the moment of conception, is a gift from the Creator, and endowed with an infinite value in His eyes.”

•”Our faith reminds us that all human beings have been created in God’s own image and likeness and given a vocation and destiny that will find their ultimate fulfillment beyond this earthly existence, in communion of life and love with the Blessed Trinity.”

•”Faith also teaches us that we are united with all other members of the human race in a deep moral solidarity, that our actions and choices have consequences not only for ourselves but for others, and that we shall be judged by the measure of our love and concern for the least of our brothers and sisters.” The pope added that these truths are primarily learned and defended in the family—which may be why the family has so many enemies today. He acknowledged the difficulties many families have in keeping these teachings in the forefront of their lives.

What were the means John Paul proposed to counteract any temptation we might have to deny or ignore these truths? His answer was simple. It was St. Paul’s “pray always.” And he added, pray “especially within your families, in humble thanksgiving for everything that God in His goodness has done for you. Ask Him every day to help you to remain faithful to your vocation which he has given to you in Christ.”

This summer, I concelebrated Mass a couple of times with Monsignor Buckley or Father Henry at the beautiful old Mission Santa Cruz in California. The newer, more modern church, whose spire is such a noble landmark as you come into Santa Cruz from over the mountains, was closed because of the damage done by the October earthquake.

In the morning congregation were my brother and sister-in-law, with whom I had been staying, and maybe 30 or so other local folks who all said hello after Mass, though some stayed to say the Rosary. I thought somehow, as I watched them, that the prayers of these good people at Mass in the morning—their prayers for each other, for their families, and for the needs of our kind—were what held the world together.

Certainly, the Holy Father thinks that. What could be more disarming than to have the most important man in the world come to visit families in a Marian shrine in Gozo in Malta, a place 99 percent of the world’s population never heard of, and tell them with St. Paul to “pray always”? He tells them to pray because their lives are gifts, and they are destined for eternal life—the most important thing they can know about themselves. I am sure if John Paul ever makes it to my brother’s parish in Santa Cruz, as he just might, that is exactly what he will tell the morning congregation.

If our particular lives are indeed gifts of the Creator from our very conceptions, if we have infinite value, if we are intended for communion with the life of the trinitarian God, then we must employ the salvific means that Christ taught us, not the means we might think suitable on our own reasonings. “It is easy for individuals and families to be so caught up in the many anxieties of daily life that they fail to stand back, put their lives in spiritual perspective, and rediscover the truth of their own vocation.”

If we sit back and try to think of all the things the pope might tell an ordinary gathering of faithful, be it in Santa Cruz or on the Island of Gozo, we cannot help but suspect that what he told them is exactly what a pope should have told them—that they are themselves from their conception, that their lives are gifts of God, that each has an ultimate destiny beyond death to receive the trinitarian life, that our relation to others is a serious matter, that we need to pray always if we are to understand the most important things about us.

A friend of mine once told me that a mother is in a very advantageous position spiritually, for she knows exactly what it is that God wants her to do. She knows about the gifts and mysteries given to her in conception. I thought of this remark again when I read these words of the Holy Father before the Shrine of Ta’ Pinu: “Mary’s cooperation in the mystery of God’s plan as it unfolded in the Incarnation of her son invites all Christian parents and children to think about their own vocation to be cooperators in “the mystery of God’s grace” at work within their families. Again, I ask myself, who else tells us this but the pope? This, too, is “the mystery of God’s grace.”

Author

  • Fr. James V. Schall

    The Rev. James V. Schall, SJ, (1928-2019) taught government at the University of San Francisco and Georgetown University until his retirement in 2012. Besides being a regular Crisis columnist since 1983, Fr. Schall wrote nearly 50 books and countless articles for magazines and newspapers.

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