Love and Sacrifice

I like to listen to Clark Howard on the radio. He is a wealth of information for those who are looking to simplify their life and minimize the expenses of daily living. He also spends a lot of time talking with people about saving for their retirement and whatnot. While I find those segments interesting, they are not compelling. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I used to be in business. I plan prudently for retirement as well as the next person, maybe better. It’s just that so many see a well planned, comfortable retirement as the ultimate goal. For the Christian, retirement is merely a step the journey. Our ultimate goal is heaven. St. Augustine said it well: “Our hearts are restless, O God, until they rest in you.” 

One thing is abundantly clear in this week’s gospel passage. Namely, the Kingdom of Heaven is not about accumulating things in this life. The one who dies with the most toys, or the most fabric, or whatever…still dies. Rather it is about emptying oneself for others. The ancient Greeks had a great word for this – “kenosis.” 

This complete gift of self found its greatest expression in the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. Christ emptied himself completely so that we might “have life and have it to the full.” (Jn 10;10)

I think that this idea of self-sacrifice, this kenosis, helps us to make sense of what Jesus means when he says that we must “take up our cross” daily if we would follow him. You don’ have to look far to see it in real life.  Parents sacrifice daily for their children; spouses sacrifice daily for each other; pastors for their people.

It is in a life lived for others where we learn that a full life is not so much about having all the right things, but rather in giving oneself to right relationships with God, self and others. Love of God, who emptied himself for us on the Cross, finds its expression in our love for each other.

In part, this is what St. Paul is referring to when he writes to the Romans:

I urge you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God,
to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice,
holy and pleasing to God, your spiritual worship.

Romans 12:1

To empty oneself as Christ did, to live a kenotic life, can be profound at times. But usually, it is lived under the radar, in mundane tasks and the sacrifices of daily living.

I have an uncle who is a saint.  His cause has not been promoted yet, but I am convinced that someday it will be.

Don Cahill came into our family when married my Aunt Joann in 1947.  Soon after they were married, she developed rheumatoid encephalitis.  She recovered after a year and they had four children, cousins Mike, Pat, Donny and Jan.  They made their home just outside Portland.  In 1974, when Aunt Joann was 48, she returned from a wedding with what seemed like the flu. But instead it was another type of encephalitis, different than the first. This one destroyed her brain, erasing her memory. It changed her personality. Once devout and quiet, she became quite talkative, sometimes sweet and sometimes screeching and hollering. She never did remember her children or her husband.

For the next 34 years Uncle Don made her meals. He ironed. He hosted holidays. He kept Aunt Joanne looking great: He shopped Nordstrom and bought her undergarments and Clinique makeup, which he learned to apply quite expertly. He shaved her legs. He curled her hair; he took her to the beauty shop. 

Every Sunday he took Aunt Joann to Mass. Uncle Don was more of a practical Catholic than a devout one, but he knew that she would have wanted to be there. But before they left the house, he made sure her lipstick was perfect, and that she was dressed in a snappy outfit.

Sometimes people would ask him why he went through all the trouble and he simply replied, “People don’t realize that I really, really love her.”

With the Cahills living in Oregon and our family living up here, I didn’t get to know Uncle Don as well as I would have liked. But still, on the few occasions I did get to spend time with him, he would not strike you a as particularly holy or heroic man. He simply went about loving his wife and living his faith in a very practical, businesslike way because it was the right thing to do.

Uncle Don died Feb. 19, 2008, after his final bout with cancer. His biggest worry was who would take care of Aunt Joann when he passed. 

Of course, their kids picked up the ball and she lived a very dignified life for another 12 years, entering eternal life on July 5^th at the age of 94. I like to imagine the happiness of their reunion in eternity. 

If Uncle Don taught me anything, it is that holiness is not complicated.  And where love is present, sacrifice comes without hesitation.

Yes, I have an uncle who is a saint.  His cause has not been promoted yet, but I am convinced that someday it will be.

I look at Jesus’ words in the Gospel today.  I listen to the words of St. Paul to the Romans. I think about my Uncle Don and Aunt Joanne and their life together. 

And I realize that that a grace-filled life is not so much about having all the right things, but rather in giving oneself completely to the right relationships with God, self and others. The love of Christ, who emptied himself for us on the Cross, finds its best expression when we too empty ourselves out of love for one another.

         James Dean, the Rebel Without a Cause, was wrong. The purpose of life is not to “Life fast, die young and leave a good-looking corpse.” I think Hunter S. Thompson came closer to the mark when he wrote: “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”