Every-Day Beatitudes
February 3, 2008

Readings for the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Reading 1: Zeph. 2:3; 3:12–13

Responsorial Psalm: Ps. 146:6–7, 8–9, 9–10

Reading 2: 1 Cor. 1:26–31

Gospel: Mt. 5:1–12a

Link to Readings

By Father Paul Hrezo

How many of you have been able to read through the Old Testament books of Exodus through Deuteronomy without getting bogged down in the books of Leviticus or Numbers? Admittedly, when we sit down to read the Bible, we usually prefer to turn to passages involving drama and surprising turns of circumstances, like in a miracle story or a parable. Yes, sometimes we are able to benefit from St. Paul’s step-wise (and passionate!) explanations Our Lord’s teachings in his letters, and sometimes we prefer to get into some of the concrete teachings of Our Lord in a more matter-of-fact format. Still, there’s something about a story that helps to bring truths to life more vividly.

So, what parable or story could we draw upon to illustrate the Beatitudes?

Actually, the Beatitudes ultimately don’t need a story or parable to illustrate them. Daily life itself is the best illustration of the truths Jesus teaches us through the Beatitudes.

At first appearance, the Beatitudes can seem hard to accept. Wouldn’t it be better for a person to be surrounded by their dearest loved ones? Wouldn’t it be better for a person to be full of spirit? Deeper meditation on the Beatitudes, however, can help us to see that when we have experienced mourning or when we have come to a point in life of being poor in spirit, and so on, these are actually moments when we realize that we are alive or have been living life fully. When we truly mourn, that’s because we have loved. If we are poor in spirit, it’s usually because we have poured out our hearts for another, and it is often at that moment when we realize that we need others, especially the Lord, to receive a renewal and to be able to enter back into life more actively.

What about other Beatitudes, such as the Beatitude on meekness, for example? Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the land. Wouldn’t it be better for a person to have boldness and confidence? Two passages from St. Paul’s letters can help us to understand true meekness better. In Galatians 6:2, he says, “Bear one another’s burdens, and so you will fulfill the law of Christ.” Then in Philippians 2:3–5, we are taught to “humbly regard others as more important than yourselves, each looking out not for one’s own interests, but [rather] for those of others.” This enables us to have the same attitude as Jesus’ attitude.

Bearing One Another's Burdens

So, rather than being tied so much to the opposite of boldness and confidence, true meekness is actually more a matter of having enough confidence and boldness to care about someone else and to do something to help them bear their burdens. Helping someone to bear his or her burdens is no easy task. At the same time, this is what helps us to come alive and to experience the Gospel as something more concrete. Being truly meek, in the sense of caring about another more than oneself, can help us “to inherit the land,” in the sense that more of life, then, has meaning and concern for us.

But, what if you feel like you’ve never really experienced some of the Beatitudes, or at least not for a long time? Then you are at the right place because the Lord wants to renew His life in you and to reconnect you with life. What’s more, the Beatitudes are ultimately a description of Jesus’ own life. He is the one who has lived the Beatitudes most completely. He is, therefore, the one who can and wants to help us to come alive through the Holy Spirit, enabling us to live the Beatitudes.

Furthermore, even if we have experienced the Beatitudes deeply, we need to be sure that we are living them in the Lord and with the Church and not simply on our own. In such situations we could be left empty or drawn astray. Take, for example, an experience of being persecuted for righteousness or for the Lord’s name. It is possible that our feeling persecuted may be because we are standing for or are promoting something that just isn’t in complete keeping with the complete Gospel. We could be experiencing people from within the Church seemingly pressuring us or even persecuting us, when in reality they are simply trying to bring us back more truly to the heart of the Church.

Living in the Heart of the Church

Nevertheless, generally speaking, if we are truly living the Gospel, there will be some resistance we encounter from one source or another (if not especially from our own hearts!). St. Ignatius of Loyola was sometimes more suspect of his missionaries and their faithfulness to the Gospel message if they weren’t encountering any resistance. Ultimately, however, we want to live the Gospel in and at the heart of the Church as much as possible, so that we will have the kind of support we need, from the Lord and from each other (and be able to offer support to others as well). We ultimately need support if we are to endure through the persecutions we experience in being faithful to the Gospel.

As a spiritual exercise for sometime this week, consider the various Beatitudes and ways in which you have experienced them recently. Then, try to see the ways in which those experiences of the Beatitudes have proven Jesus’ statements to be true. Have you experienced the blessedness of mourning by realizing the depths of your love for the person you miss? Have you experienced how being single-hearted for the Lord has enabled you to encounter Him on the faces of people around you? Has that helped you to have a more concrete hope for seeing the Lord in Heaven? Has meekness or caring more for others’ needs, maybe through a simplicity of life as well, helped you to experience a better savoring of the ordinary things and the usual people you encounter in life? Has that then enabled you to inherit more of “the land”? Has that also helped the land of your heart to be restored to you and enriched? Each of the Beatitudes can provide richness for reflection.

So, may a deeper gratefulness for the breadth of what we experience in life, especially in the surprising power experienced through living the Beatitudes, help you to encounter the Lord more profoundly here in today’s Eucharist. May the Lord bless you with a deeper experience of His truth and therefore experience His presence now, giving you the hope you need (which we all need) to see you through to eternal life with the Lord in heaven. Amen.

Fr. Paul Hrezo, a priest of the Diocese of Steubenville, is currently serving as Spiritual Director for the college seminarians at the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus, Ohio. He is also the current State Chaplain for the Knights of Columbus.

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