Generosity in Correspondence

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

“Whoever gives to one of these little ones but a cup of cold water to drink because he is a disciple, amen, I say to you, he shall not lose his reward” (Matt. 10:42).

God is generous, extravagant in many ways in showering His rewards, His gifts, His graces. He invites us also to have a similar generosity. To be generous, particularly in corresponding to grace. He gives us the grace to be able to do certain things. He hopes that we will respond in the same generous way with which Christ responded on the Cross.

Our Lord was always very moved by generosity. “He sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the treasury, and many of the rich put in a great deal. A poor widow came and put in two small coins, the equivalent of a penny.” Our Lord said, “She has put in more than all the others. She has put in all that she had to live on” (Mark 12:41-44).

Our Lord is moved by generosity. On other occasions He encourages people to be generous. Before the rich young man, He places that astonishing challenge: “Go, sell all that you have, give to the poor, and come follow me, and you will have treasure in heaven” (Mark 10:21).

Our Lord chose the pathway to having treasure in heaven. That word “treasure” is an interesting word to focus on a little bit in Scripture. It’s a word Our Lord uses with certain frequency: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where rust and moth consume…, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven. … Where your heart is, there your treasure is also” (Matt. 6:19-21).

Our Lord points us to the real treasures, the real treasures of this world that are to be found in virtue, in holiness, in Christ. “For you know that the price of your ransom from the futile way of life handed down from your ancestors was paid not in anything perishable like silver or gold, but in precious blood as of a blameless and spotless lamb, Christ” (1 Pet. 1:18–19).

Christ shed His blood copiously on the cross. Not just one drop of blood, but the blood flowed. He gave everything.

The Psalms invite us to ask ourselves, “What shall I give back to God for all that he has given to me?” (Ps. 116:12). If we look back over our life and see the graces that God has given to us, the talents, the abilities, our sight, our hearing, our limbs, our education, our Christian formation, so many things that God has given to us and that He hasn’t given to other people—He has a right then to expect an awful lot, that we be generous in our self-giving.

“He got into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat” (Luke 5:3).

Initially Our Lord asks for a little. But later He’s going to ask him to “launch out into the deep” (Luke 5:4). To leave the comfort of the shore, to be out in the deep water where the big fish are, to forget about himself in order to fulfill the plans of God.

St. Josemaría says it’s worth the effort to give ourselves totally to correspond to the love and confidence that God has given to us. God gave himself totally: “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son” (John 3:16).

Our Lord wants us to give, and to give with a generous heart—not to give in a stingy way, reluctantly, but wholeheartedly. “God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. 9:7).

There’s a story of a pastor in Scotland who, by one of his parishioners, was given a special dessert. This dessert was swimming in whiskey. He liked whiskey very much, and he was very grateful for this dessert. But he didn’t know who it came from; it was given anonymously.

He was so grateful that he wanted to thank this person. But he knew that he couldn’t mention whiskey from the altar because the congregation were very sensitive about things to do with temperance. He thought all week for a way of how to convey that gratitude to that particular anonymous parishioner for this very nice dessert.

Then he got an idea. The next Sunday came and after his homily he said, “I want to thank very much that parishioner who gave me that very special gift. But what really moved me so much, and I was so grateful for, was the spirit in which it was given.”

Our Lord doesn’t just look at the gift, He also looks at the spirit in which it was given. He wants us to give with that generous heart.

Often the things that God asks of us may not be material things. He may ask us for our time, for our energy, for our charity, for our understanding, for our patience, for a greater effort in our apostolate or beginning again, or a new hope, or optimism when things might seem not to be going as well as they might. He wants us to practice this virtue with Him, and also with others.

Generous when it comes to fulfilling the norms of our plan of life. The time for our spiritual reading, the time for our heroic minute, the time to give a little bit more attention, our time, or energy to this particular person that is around us, who may need it at that moment. These are the areas where God calls for a little more.

We’re told in Scripture: “If you, evil as you are, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him!” (Matt. 7:11). That word “more” is very much associated with Our Heavenly Father. He gives more all the time. More than we can give Him.

But He loves it when we try to give that more, when we go out of our way, when we go the extra mile, when we’re not calculating, when we don’t seek anything in return. Our Lord has also promised us that every little good thing that we do will be rewarded. “Whoever gives to one of these little ones but a cup of cold water to drink because he is a disciple, amen, I say to you, he shall not lose his reward” (Matt. 10:42).

It’s a virtue of great souls who find their reward in the act of giving, great souls who have realized what they have been given. When we look back at our life and the things God has given to us, we’d have to say that God has been super generous with us. He’s gone out of His way, showered us with graces and gifts and good things and beautiful things, which He hasn’t given to so many other people.

When we follow a pathway of giving ourselves to God, sometimes people of the world think about the things we have to give up. But in reality that’s not the case; we receive so much more.

The generous person knows how to give without demanding. Practicing that virtue enlarges our heart, so that every person we see or we find somehow finds a place in that heart. We have room for everybody.

With generosity in interior things, we learn how to forget about the little irritations of daily life. We’re generous with our smile, with the peace we give to others. We’re generous in letting the little irritations flow under the bridge. We let things pass.

We’re told in The Forge, “Lord, may your children be like red-hot coals, without flames to be seen from afar. Let them be burning embers that will set alight each heart they come in contact with” (Josemaría Escrivá, The Forge, Point 9).

Generosity can be contagious. Hopefully other people are touched by our generosity and they’re moved also to be generous. We set alight with this virtue each heart that we come in contact with, so that they also feel that desire to give of themselves, to give a little more, to go out of their way.

He says, “You will make that first spark turn into a [big] fire, for your angels are very skilled at blowing on the embers in our hearts. … I know, I have seen it. And a heart cleared of dead ashes cannot but be yours” (ibid.).

Love has very clear expressions. True love is founded on sacrifice, manifested in external works. Not just in words, not just in a nebulous way. ‘Lord, help me to be generous in my sacrifice, generous in my mortification, generous in my self-giving.’ Our Lord is waiting for and wants our generous effort.

So we love this virtue: “Put out a little from the shore, but now launch out into the deep” (cf. Luke 5:4). Could it be that Our Lord is saying those words to us in relation to this virtue at this particular moment in our life so that we discover areas where we could be more generous? In our patience, in our kindness, in our forgiving, in our work, in our fraternity, our family life, in our apostolate.

To live with God means to run risks, because God is not happy sharing. He doesn’t just want a piece of our heart; He wants our whole heart. He wants us to infect other people with this virtue.

There was a monk passing a beggar in the street one time and the monk tossed a jewel into the hat of the beggar. The beggar was a bit surprised; he never saw a jewel before. He immediately thought, “Well, it must be a fake. Nobody would ever give me a jewel.”

But he thought it might be worth the price of a meal, so he went to a jeweler’s shop just to see if it was worth anything. He found it was worth $50,000. He couldn’t believe it. He went around in a daze for a few days, imagining now what he could do with all of this money. He could buy a house, he could buy fine clothes, he could buy nice things to eat.

But after three days he came back to earth and began to wonder, “Why did this monk give me this jewel? He must have known what it was worth. He must have known what he was doing.” He came to the conclusion that if this monk gave him this jewel, he must have something that’s worth more than the jewel. That’s why he was able to give it away.

When this beggar began to think about this, he thought, “Well, if he has something that’s worth more than the jewel, then that’s really the thing that’s worth having. That’s much more valuable than the jewel. I think what I’d really like to have is that thing that made him give me the jewel.”

This began to bother him a lot and he then began to go and look for that monk and seek him out, and he found him, and he said, “Look, I will give back to you the jewel that you gave to me, if you will give me what it was that made you give it to me, because I think that’s much more worth having.”

Of course he was talking about the virtue of detachment and generosity. That’s the real treasure.

“To grow closer to him,” said St. Josemaría, “to be ready for a new conversion, a new rectification, to listen more closely to his inspirations—those holy desires which he brings out in our soul—and to put them into practice” (J. Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, Point 58).

Our Lord invites us to leave our comfortable state and our egoism, to complicate our life. In a get-together St. Josemaría said, Complicarse la vida para Jesucristo. “Complicate your life for Jesus Christ” (also paraphrased in J. Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, Point 19).

Allow our lives to be complicated by others, by what we’re asked for, by what’s demanded of us at this particular moment.

[Peter] Drucker, in his book The Effective Executive, focuses on what makes people effective. He says they don’t just do good things, they do the right things. They do the right things because they ask themselves the right question, which is always, “What can I contribute?”

What can I give in this get-together, in this conversation, at this mealtime, in this circle, or this recollection, or this time I spend with my friend, or this job that I’m doing—what can I contribute? And what can I contribute that perhaps nobody else can contribute? When we contribute that thing, that makes us effective.

A more positive tone in the conversation, a different topic, a piece of news, a joke. Something that lightens the moment for everybody around us. It’s the consequence of thinking about the others always, of not holding anything back.

In Bethlehem nobody holds anything back. In this year of St. Joseph, we can look at the generosity of Joseph again, and again, and again. Leaving Nazareth, setting up in Bethlehem, going to Egypt. “Remain there until I tell you” (Matt. 2:13). Generosity in his remaining. Generosity in just doing what he’s been told, doing what he’s asked. And then coming back to Nazareth. All the time, a tremendous correspondence.

We could try to be generous in our moments of humiliation. When we make mistakes, when our mistakes are pointed out, when we’re humbled by circumstances—we can look up to Our Lord and say, ‘Lord, this moment is yours. Help me to be generous in my acquisition of virtue, to take a big step forward in this difficult moment that you’ve sent me. Embarrassing, laughable, humbling, when you make me see my mistakes.’

We’re asked for a total commitment, a commitment of love. Be generous with our self-surrender.

St. Ignatius says, “to give, and not to count the cost.” The devil may always be moving us to count the cost: ‘Look at what I’m giving. Look at how much I’m giving. Look at how generous I am.’ Or to make comparisons or calculations, or to keep a score card of past wrongs.

“To give, and not to count the cost.” Lord, here is the blank check. You write whatever you want.

“To fight and not to heed the wounds.” Our Lord doesn’t keep focusing on His wounds on His way to Calvary. He forgets all about them, forgets all about Himself, because His mind is on souls. The sky’s the limit. Every drop of His blood.

To toil and not to seek for rest. We’re formed not to always be thinking about our rest. Maybe the rest of the world might spend the whole week thinking about their rest. We don’t think about our rest. We leave our rest in the hands of others, in the hands of God.

When we’re told to rest, then we rest. When the time comes to rest, then we rest. But we’re not walking around all day thinking about “When am I going to get a break” or “When am I going to sit down and read the newspaper or something? When is ‘my time’ going to come?”

Generous in not seeking our rest. If ever the moment comes when we’re told to rest, then we better be super obedient in that particular moment. “You sit down and do nothing.” If ever that day comes, we can sing a Gloria and a Te Deum.

But then we also better be very obedient. It’s important that we rest. We rest in order to recover, or we rest in order to get well, or we rest in order to change, or to handle the situation, or to see things differently. It can be very, very important.

Interesting to see how St. Josemaría emphasized the importance of rest (J. Escrivá, The Way, Point 706; Furrow, Point 514; Friends of God, Points 62, 137) Conversations, Point 111). As we get older, rest is not a luxury; it’s an obligation.

“To labor and not to seek reward.” The reward of what people will think. Our vanity taking off. How people will see this thing. That little bit of pride that’s deep down there inside us, that “me” part of everything. That self-love that we want to try and stand on. Generous in conquering that.

When there is generosity and self-giving in a family, then there is peace, there is serenity, there is joy. There’s happiness, because happiness in this world is found through giving—through giving and through self-giving.

That’s why we’re told, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son” (John 3:16). Christ left nothing for Himself. He teaches us that generosity expands the soul. God loves that generous heart that gives.

On the contrary, lack of generosity can be difficult. It can be ugly. Stinginess, selfishness can be like a slow-acting poison. It can have a deadly effect. There’s a small journey from lack of generosity to lukewarmness.

Our Lord invites us to try and always be erring on the side of that generosity. Avoid getting attached to the little or to the much that we may have—clothes, time, energy, jobs that I like.

We try and accept humbly our limitations, generously struggle to overcome our defects, living order, making a schedule, setting specific targets in our work, a to-do list, what’s the most important, not just doing the things we like first, but maybe the more difficult things. Generosity in our punctuality for events of family life; we give them importance.

“I do not live for Christ, but Christ lives in me,” says St. Paul (Gal. 2:20).

We’re called to heroic sanctity. Sometimes heroic generosity. “Leaving all things, they followed him” (cf. Luke 5:11). These are the demands of the calling that we have.

“In doing their work,” says St. Josemaría, “and living their lives as children of God in Opus Dei, my children should be not only fulfilling, but loving, which means to joyfully give more than is demanded by our duty.”

St. Josemaría liked that phrase of “giving more.” Going over and above, beyond the call of duty. Giving Our Lord everything, not just in our budgets, but in cash, in every moment, in all the moments of our life, so that we conquer that love of self that may be there.

“To win a war, my children,” he said, “it’s sufficient normally to win the last battle. But in the interior life, we must be trying to win all of them. Woe to the person who’s not trying to win all of them, because it might happen that one of those lost battles might be the last, so the soul might lose the war.” So, what is the most important thing of all? Persevere up to the end. Save yourself.

“Let each one carry the burdens of the other” (Gal. 6:2). What can I contribute? What can I give? How can I help this person? If we think carefully about each of the people that we live with, we’ll find things.

St. Josemaría says, “Often the greatest charity is prayer.” Generous in our prayer for others.

This week we have the Feast Day of Our Lady of Mount Carmel [July 16], whom God has given to us as a model of generosity for all time, one who, without having a vocation, gave herself so completely. We love to celebrate her feast days because of what they mean for us, what they say to us. “Lord, help me not to be calculating.”

Our Lord tells us He’s going to give us great rewards for that generosity, the thousandfold (cf. Matt. 25:29). But He wants us to give everything (cf. Luke 14:33).

Help me to be ready to help, with an upright intention, anyone who might need our help. That little bit of affection. When I was going out of the compound a day or two ago, last Thursday or Friday, just driving out, there was a little girl coming in a bit late to school, and she looked about Standard Two or Three.

Her mother was accompanying her; maybe there was some little problem. At a certain moment, in the middle of the pathway, I think there were no other cars around, the girl stopped and turned towards her mother and gave her a big embrace.

She was a little child that needed a little bit of encouragement just to go to school today—something that we all went through at some stage. It was a very maternal moment taking place right in front of my car, blocking the way, just as though the Holy Spirit was saying, “You take a good look at this.”

I felt there was something there that I needed for the next meditation on Monday morning or something. But it was—on the one hand, it was very beautiful, it was very maternal. If it was staged, it couldn’t have been done better.

That little girl just needed that little bit of gentle, maternal encouragement in that moment. The mother did all the right things, all there in glorious technicolor before my eyes so that I would get the message. It was rather nice in some ways.

Generosity to give the people around us that little bit of affection that they need. What can I contribute? What is the right thing to do in this moment? Everybody around me needs affection, needs encouragement, needs love. Our God is a God of love, who has generously poured out that love, and wants us to pour it into the lives of other people generously around us.

We’re ready to do favors for the people who ask them from us. “Can you do this, can you do that? While you’re there at the shop, could you ever…” In principle, yes, we’re available for all those little favors that very often are little things, but which demand the extra mile. That little bit more of an effort.

It was said that in the 1930s one of the ways that St. Josemaría generated friendship with many, many people was by doing all sorts of little favors for them. Often those little favors are the pathway to people’s hearts. Little things that make their life acceptable.

That means we’re not saying no to people. Generosity in accepting people as they are, without attaching too much importance to the defects. Avoiding negative criticism, even interiorly. We could have a smile on our face all day long, but interiorly, we could be full of complaints and criticisms and comparisons. Often the battle is in those interior thoughts. Generous in my kind thoughts, my charitable thoughts.

With all of this we make it easier for people around us to come closer to God, because we reflect the love of God in everything we do.

Generous in giving others the benefit of the doubt. Generous in making it easier for people around us to ask us for things. People around me find it easy to ask me to do this or do that and give me a hand. We have the inside lane a little bit with people, because we’re easy to deal with, and because they can ask us things.

“We should offer the Lord,” we’re told in The Forge, “the sacrifice of Abel. A sacrifice of young unblemished flesh, the best of the flock; of healthy and holy flesh, a sacrifice of hearts that have one love alone—you, my God. A sacrifice of minds, which have been shaped through deep study and will surrender to your Wisdom; of childlike souls who will think only of pleasing you. Lord, receive even now this sweet and fragrant sacrifice” (J. Escrivá, The Forge, Point 43).

Every day Our Lord asks us for that little sacrifice, that little thing in this particular moment. We’ve been told, “Love is repaid with love” (J. Escrivá, Furrow, Point 686; In Love with the Church, Point 48).

Those little cups of water, symbolic of so many other little things that we might do each day. “Whoever gives to one of these little ones”—an insignificant little person that we might meet along the way—"a cup of cold water to drink because he is a disciple, amen, I say to you, he shall not lose his reward” (Matt. 10:42).

Our Lady was generous with her visit to Elizabeth. She didn’t just spend three minutes or three hours or three days, but three months (Luke 1:39-45, 56)—a model of what our friendship should be, our reaching out to others.

Mary, may you help us, from contemplating your example, to learn how to be more generous in the little things of each day.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

EW