Unity of Life

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.

A politician was once heard speaking to a reporter and saying that he was willing to do anything to help rebuild his war-torn country in the aftermath of some terrible destruction.

It was an interesting comment, but not long afterwards, that same man allowed his marriage to fall apart.

The physical devastation of a country can be repaired within a few years, but once a marriage relationship is destroyed, it can rarely be renovated.

Preventive maintenance takes ongoing work that must be done sooner or later.

This meditation is about Unity of Life, which means living our Christian vocation in all situations.

It means living out what we believe in, being the same on the outside as we are on the inside and thus avoiding the danger of a double life, of being two different people—the person that other people see outside our home and the person that people of our family see inside the home.

We don’t profess a whole series of beliefs and virtues, but then take a vacation from living them in certain moments or occasions.

St. Paul said to Timothy: “But, as someone dedicated to God, you must avoid all that. You must aim to be upright and religious, filled with faith and love, perseverance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith and win the eternal life to which you were called and for which you made your noble profession of faith before many witnesses” (1 Tim. 6:11-12).

I heard of a weekend for travel agents that was organized in a certain country. They were being flown to a new island where there was a new resort, to try out the resort so that they could write about it or promote it later on in their work.

Shortly after take-off, somebody took the microphone and started saying, “We’re going to have a wonderful weekend, it's going to be fantastic, let's all have a great time.” He was painting a picture that sounded a little bit dangerous and a bit suggestive.

When he finished, another travel agent went to take the microphone and added a few more words, He said, “Well, yes, let's all have a great time, let's do everything that we're meant to be doing, but let's also remember that less than an hour ago we left our wives and our children back at the airport. Let's make sure that we don't do anything this weekend that might disappoint them.”

With those few words, he changed the whole tone of the weekend and of the previous speaker. This is living our unity of life in all situations.

“Now, before God,” says St. Paul to Timothy, “the source of all life, and before Jesus Christ, who witnessed to his noble profession of faith before Pontius Pilate, I charge you to do all that you have been told, with no faults or failures, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who at the due time will be revealed by God, the blessed and only Ruler of all, the King of kings and the Lord of lords, who alone is immortal, whose home is in inaccessible light, whom no human being has seen or is able to see: to him be honor and everlasting power. Amen” (1 Tim. 6:13-16).

We try to take our faith and put it into practice, to live it. It's not just a question of knowing virtue, but of putting the virtue into practice.

Our Lord says in the Gospel of St. Mark: “How rightly Isaiah prophesied about you hypocrites in the passage of scripture: This people honors me only with lip service, while their hearts are far from me” (Mark 7:6).

One thing that Our Lord had no time for was a lack of unity of life. That's why He lambasted the Pharisees with every strong word He could muster.

He saw through their duplicity. They professed one thing on the outside, but they were completely different on the inside.

There's a potential Pharisee in each one of us. The Sunday Mass-going Catholic who doesn't put their faith into practice in concrete ways the rest of the week is a disappointment to the Church. He doesn’t present a life of faith to children, to families, to the environment, to neighbors, to friends, and our apostolate.

We're all capable of speaking about one thing but doing something different. Of course, in the home, in the family, the first people to notice something like that are children. They see through it immediately.

The goal is to try to make sure that our heart is where it should be: our heart in our faith, our heart in our marriage, our heart in our family, our heart in our work or in the particular sport that we're engaged in.

“Their reverence of me is worthless;” said Our Lord, “the lessons they teach are nothing but human commandments. You put aside the commandment of God to observe human traditions” (Mark 7:7-8).

Our Lord does not put down human traditions. Certain cultural practices may be very good, very laudable, to be promoted, to be fostered, but they have to be in their place.

We cannot put aside the commandments of God for the sake of human traditions. That would be a de-Christianization of society.

In the Gospel of John, Our Lord says, “Do not work for the food that perishes, but work for the food that endures until life everlasting, which the Son of man will give you, for on him the Father, God himself, has set his seal” (John 6:27). This is very sound advice.

We might find ourselves working a lot for the food that perishes. But our faith invites us to look up, to look to the deeper realities, to look to the meaning and the purpose of our life.

Pope St. John Paul II liked to say that in Christ, we find the meaning and the purpose of our life. We don't find it anywhere else.

What does it matter if we lose everything in this world in order to gain life everlasting? (cf. Matt. 16:26). That's the message of the saints and of the martyrs.

The one thing that the Church is asking for in this period of history, which all the recent popes have talked about, is saints for this particular time: people who are heroic in living their faith and practicing the virtues.

“You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, what can make it salty again? It is good for nothing and can only be thrown out, to be trampled under people's feet” (Matt. 5:13).

The modern professional arena, in almost all professions, provides challenges for our unity of life. We have to try and live by certain principles, reflect the truth, and truly be what we believe in, and do a great apostolate in that way.

In another country many years ago, I knew a medical student who was supposed to start to perform and help in abortions. But he knew he couldn't do that as it was against his Catholic faith. He refused to cooperate.

I think this was the first time in that particular university and in that particular hospital that any medical student had taken that stand. He was very clear.

The professor came to him and read the riot act. He threatened to kick him out of the faculty, that he couldn’t pass his exam, couldn’t continue in his medical studies, if he didn't knuckle down and cooperate and go through the training like everybody else.

But the fellow stood firm. He said, ‘I don't care. You can do all those things. I will not cooperate in doing this evil.’

So they called the number two in the Department of Health in that country to come and talk to him.

They got a bit scared because they saw that if all the Christians behaved like this, they might paralyze the whole abortion industry. They got a bit concerned that they had to squash this from the very beginning.

They brought in the top brass to threaten him again with all sorts of things: ‘Even if you go to another country and you qualify there, and you try to come back to this country to practice, we will not allow you to practice in this country.’

But still he held firm. Then the authorities saw, Boy, this guy is serious. They saw that if everybody takes on this attitude, ‘we might have a revolution on our hands.’

So they backed down. They allowed the fellow to pursue his studies. He did his exams, he finished his course, he qualified, and he is now happily practicing medicine in that place. With that, he gave a great example of unity of life.

The student went through a difficult period. He didn't sleep too well for a couple of weeks or months, but he won the battle of the day.

In all areas related to a pro-life culture, there are all sorts of similar battles that have to be fought and won: in pharmacies, in check-out places in supermarkets, maybe lawyers handling divorce cases, businessmen who have to insist that all the business is done above the table and not under the table, properly accounting for the company money and credit accounts, among other things.

All these are great occasions to lead a unity of life, to give example to other people as to what a Christian is and what that means.

“The truth will make you free” (John 8:32). It means we live by the truth.

Even if the whole world is going to collapse on top of us, we tell the truth, because the devil is “the father of lies” (John 8:44).

We could try to make a resolution in this period of prayer to try never to tell a lie for the rest of our life and to give perfect witness to the truth.

Our Lord has said, “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hilltop cannot be hidden. No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bushel; they put it on a lampstand where it shines for everyone in the house. In the same way, your light must shine in people's sight so that they see your good works and they may give praise to your Father in heaven” (Matt 5:14-16).

This is our vocation, to live out our faith in concrete situations.

In 1984 there was a Catholic lady, nominally Catholic, who was running for the presidency of the United States. On the issue of abortion, she said, ‘I am against abortion privately but when I go into the political arena, I can't impose my views on other people and so I have to let it pass in those places.’

Cardinal John O'Connor of New York came out very quickly and pointed out that that was not acceptable. If you are a Catholic, then you are a Catholic 100 percent, through and through, inside the political arena and outside the political arena.

In those situations, you are not imposing your views on other people; you are merely defending something right and good for all persons all over the planet. By living our unity of life, we don't impose anything on anybody.

To practice this virtue, we can see sometimes that we need a lot of fortitude. We need a lot of clarity of ideas. Often, by living and practicing our faith in concrete situations, God may want to work wonderful miracles.

In the case of that medical student, a girl came to him later who had no religion and said, ‘I admire the stance that you took and I'm not going to participate in those things either.’

She used human rationale, and there were many nominal Christians who probably went along with those criteria. But those two gave a great example to the rest of their class.

“I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, with me in him, bears fruit in plenty; for cut off from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).

There was a girl in a class in Brazil. A teacher came in and started to lament the Church's teaching on contraception and other areas, and started to give rather confused ideas.

This girl had quite a bit of formation and she realized, ‘I have to try and defend the Church in this moment, to raise my voice.’

She put up her hand and tried to clarify a few ideas, very politely, briefly, but clearly said, ‘I think the teaching of the Church is because of this, this, and this.’

The teacher wasn't happy, and the lady teacher said, ‘You come into my room after class.’

The girl was very worried and thought to herself, ‘Oh my goodness, now I'm in big trouble, I should have kept my big mouth shut.’

She prepared herself for the worst and she went along to the teacher's room after class. She remembered a phrase from Scripture, when Our Lord said, “Do not be worried when you're brought before governors and kings on my account…do not worry what you're about to say because I will place on your lips what needs to be said” (cf. Matt. 10:18-20).

She began to give out to God saying, ‘You said that you would place on our lips what needs to be said in these situations, and now look at the mess I'm in. I should have kept my big mouth shut.’ She wasn't very happy with God.

She went along and knocked on the door of the teacher’s room and went in. The teacher said, ‘Where did you learn those things that you were saying in the class?’

Very apologetically, the girl said, ‘You see, I go to this center downtown where they give a lot of Christian formation, and I think I must have picked up some of these ideas there.’ She tried to say it as apologetically and as low-key as she could, trying to save her bacon.

But the teacher said, ‘Well, keep going to that place.’ The girl got a bit confused: ‘Keep going to that place, but you were saying the opposite there in class?’

The teacher said, ‘Because when I was your age, I used to go to that place. They were trying to get me to change my life, but I didn't have the courage or the generosity to do so. Ever since then, I've spent half my life saying stupid things, and the other half trying to justify what I was saying. So keep going to that place.’

The girl came out of the teacher's room, lifting up her eyes to heaven and saying, ‘Thank you, Holy Spirit, thank you, Holy Spirit.’

We stick our neck out sometimes with our unity of life. Think, how many times in my life have I stuck my neck out for Christ?

Have I been laughed at or derided or insulted? How many times has my neck been chopped off? Probably not too many. We may have a little more way to go in living our unity of life.

We are told in Deuteronomy, “Listen, Israel: Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh. You must love Yahweh your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength. Let the words I enjoin on you today stay in your heart.

“You shall tell them to your children, and keep on telling them, when you are sitting at home, when you are out and about, when you are lying down, and when you are standing up; you must fasten them on your hand as a sign and on your forehead as a headband; you must write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates (Deut. 6:4-9).

It’s interesting to see how the Old Testament and the New are very strong in this particular area. We may find ourselves in all sorts of ordinary situations, but Our Lord wants us to stick our necks out a little bit.

A friend of mine told me he'd been invited to a sort of a stag dinner by some fellow who was rather successful in business. He invited six or eight friends. They had a marvelous meal and then sat down to watch a movie.

As soon as the movie started, this fellow realized, ‘this is not a very savory movie’ and he knew he had to do something.

He stood up and said to the host, ‘Look, it's been a marvelous evening, a marvelous meal. I've had a great time but thank you very much, this is not my type of entertainment.’

He bid goodnight to everybody and he left, knowing that in a sense he was spoiling the whole party; probably when he left, he would be the talking point for many nights to come.

But he didn't mind that, because he knew he had to be faithful to his Christian vocation.

There are certain situations when we have to say no, when we have to clash a little bit with our environment. Christians are always people who have clashed with their environment.

If we're creating a little bit of a stir around us because of the way we live our faith, probably God is very happy, because Christians have come to shake the bushes a little bit, to remind people of what life is all about.

In Matthew’s Gospel, speaking of the Pharisees, Our Lord said, “You must therefore do and observe what they tell you; but do not be guided by what they do, since they do not practice what they preach. They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on people's shoulders, but will they lift a finger to move them? Not they!

“Everything they do is done to attract attention, like wearing broader headbands and longer tassels, like wanting to take the place of honor at banquets and the front seats in the synagogues, being greeted respectfully in the market squares and having people call them Rabbi” (Matt. 23:3-7).

In another place He says, “For I tell you, if your uprightness does not surpass that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20).

A modern-day Pharisee might comment a lot on the Sunday homily, or might have a lot to say about the external ceremonies in the parish, but he might not be focusing on the goal of holiness and apostolate, which is the goal of our Christian vocation, or of seeking formation to help us to be a better instrument in the parish, to build things up, to evangelize the community, to lift up the spiritual temperature.

“No one can be the slave of two masters,” said Our Lord. “He will either hate the first and love the second, or be attached to the first and despise the second. You cannot be the slave both of God and of money” (Matt. 6:24).

Our Lord points out in very concrete ways where the devil may have a hold on us in this particular way.

Unity of life can be defined as the harmonious compenetration between the religious, doctrinal, ascetical, spiritual, professional, family, and social aspects of our lives.

It's achieved by harmoniously blending—though at times it may be hard—our work with the demands of formation and family life, and above all with piety, with the loving fulfillment of the norms of our plan of life.

When we practice this virtue, Our Lord will grow in us, and us in Him, “in age and wisdom and grace, before God and men” (Luke 2:52).

It means that we don't have any walls between our personal convictions and what we do in public. We are transparent, authentic.

It's a wonderful thing to meet transparent, authentic, simple people. Their word is their bond.

You know immediately what their values are all about, what they stand for. They're not one thing today and another thing tomorrow; or changing their colors in all sorts of situations.

There is a unity between the ascetic and the apostolic part of their lives. Our Lord said to Martha, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but only one thing is necessary” (Luke 10:41-42).

Our Lord simplifies everything and says that everything must blend into contemplation. Our apostolate, our prayer, and our work blend into a unity that's called contemplation. It's a unity between the human and the supernatural.

Christ was perfect God and perfect man, so we don't have compartmentalized sections of our life, different hats that we put on here and there.

We're open to life in our marriage because we live for faith and generosity. We let God be God in our marriage; put our faith into practice in concrete ways.

There is no greater way to build up faith in our children, in our families, in our environment than that. Real virtue put into practice.

Unity of life makes life a lot better for everybody around us, because we know where we're going, and we know why we're going there. We're focused on the goal.

The key to all of this is our interior life—the interior life of ordinary Christians who are continually in the street, in the fresh air, and who, at the same time, are continually attentive to Our Lord in the street, in our work, in family life, in sport.

“Any honorable work can be prayer and all work which is prayer is apostolate.” In this way, the soul strengthens itself in “a simple and strong unity of life” that finds expression in all sorts of ways (cf. Josemaría Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, Point 10).

Edith Stein was a Jewess in the 1930s. She was one of the most prominent woman philosophers in Germany.

She went all over Europe lecturing against the National Socialism of the Nazis. She was public enemy number one. She said all the time in her life she was “looking for truth.”

One day she wandered into a Catholic church out of curiosity. While she was there, a lady came in with her shopping basket, coming from the marketplace, and knelt down to say a prayer.

This had an enormous influence on Edith Stein, because she saw the real faith of this lady put into practice—making a visit to the Blessed Sacrament. Suddenly the real presence of Our Lord at the Blessed Eucharist came alive through the example of the faith of this woman.

Eventually, Edith Stein converted. She became a Carmelite nun. She had to flee Germany. Her sister also became a Carmelite nun.

But they were found in Holland by the Nazis. They were captured; they were sent to Auschwitz, and she died a martyr's death.

St. John Paul II proclaimed her as one of the patronesses of Europe and her feast day is this week (August 9): St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, one of the patronesses of Europe, a Jewess, who attributes part of her conversion to the unity of life lived by a housewife just going about her daily duties.

One of the saints says, “Do not forget that the unity of life which our Christian vocation asks for demands a great spirit of sacrifice” (cf. J. Escrivá, Letter 6, March 11, 1940).

Very often unity of life is sacrifice. Mortification. “We are on a divine path in which we have to follow the footsteps of Jesus Christ, carrying our own cross. God hopes that we'll carry it generously” (Ibid.).

“A life of prayer and penance, and the consideration of our divine filiation, will transform us into profoundly pious Christians” (J. Escrivá, Christ Is Passing By, Point 10).

Like small children before God, we must reject all thoughts which separate us from Him. Thus, “Christ in your mind, Christ on your lips, Christ in your heart, Christ in your works; your whole life, your heart, works, intelligence, and words, full of God” (Ibid., Point 11).

“Thanks to these periods of meditation, to those vocal prayers, aspirations, we will know how to convert our day with naturalness into a continual praise of God. … We will always be in His presence. Just as people in love continually direct their thoughts toward the person they love, all our actions, even the smallest ones, will be filled with spiritual efficacy” (Ibid., Point 119).

When we look at Our Lady—she said the words, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done unto me according to your word” at the Annunciation (Luke 1:38)—they weren't just words. They were a program for the whole of her life.

She lived them in all situations: in Nazareth, in Bethlehem, in Egypt, and finally, at the foot of the Cross.

We could ask Our Lady that we too might learn how to respond to the call of God in the same way that she did, living our faith to the full in all circumstances.

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.

DWM