We are called out of ourselves. We are called into new life. We are called to become our true selves. When we step out of being the people we thought we were, as we become our true selves, we find a joy we find nowhere else. We find such joy because we have found new life, since we have been born into true life. Then we feel great joy because we've become who we've always been meant to be, opening our hearts to expand.
If we're awake then we recognize new life walking right through the door. Recently when I was working in the bookstore here at the hermitage, in walked someone who, I later learned, ventured out into the world to find her true self. She traveled to another country where she learned the art and practice of yoga. She returned to the states applying the new knowledge she learned as she became a yoga teacher.
When we reach a certain point in life, we reach a crossroads. At some moments we must admit that the life we have been living has not been feeding us with the sustenance we need for the journey we are making. Although it might seem unthinkable to continue while malnourished, nevertheless at times we do so. Sometimes the thought of making a change can produce such fear in us that we become paralyzed. Yet we're called to have the courage to step out of ourselves.
There's making the change so we can start being fed how we need to be. For some of us, we hear a call to learn a new trade, or to hone a talent we've been given but not been using. When we start risking for the sake of our development, and moreso when we do so with love of others, we grow into who we're meant to become. If our lives are not about evolving, if our lives are not about becoming more than we have been, then our lives are about nothing at all.
Then there's the question of whether we're making a change that will only benefit ourselves, or whether we're shifting in a way that helps others. It's easy to run off to another country for pleasure; it's a very different matter to go abroad to learn, then return and apply the knowledge gained for the sake of others' health, as with the yoga teacher I mentioned. We are called to develop ourselves not only for our own sakes, but also so that we can apply our skills with love of our neighbor.
When we give while providing a service which helps others come to fuller health, we help others to live in the way we're meant to live. When we're channels through which life flows, we find joy. When we help bring new life, we find the joy we've been meant to have, since God made us to take care of each other. We were made to show each other the love we would like to receive. When we embrace this duty of love, we find joy.
We find this joy here, right now, in this life. In this life as a monk that I've been living, I was privileged to have the joy of having Brother Joshua as one of my brother monks. Some of you know that Brother Joshua unexpectedly passed away last month. He had stressed that whenever he passed away, he wanted the celebration of his passing away to be an occasion not of sorrow and tears but of joy and laughter.
Given his spirituality and his enthusiasm and enjoyment of life, Brother Joshua viewed his passing out of this life as an opportunity to rejoice, to revel in the countless blessings he enjoyed while he was alive. Accordingly, not only during the funeral Mass yesterday, but also during the remembrances of him we shared after Mass, we happily and joyously recalled fond memories of him. We celebrated his life here and the new life into which he has just been born.
When we die, we're born into new life, a life that never ends, a life of joy since we are born into the eternity of the love of God, Who we will then finally see face to Face. Yet we get glimpses of that great love now, when we open our hearts to become who God made us to be, taking the risk to become our true selves, to become conduits of God's love, as God loves our neighbor through us with the love God pours into our hearts.*
* Romans 5:5
