3^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, A             January 27, 2008

The story says that Peter, Andrew, James, and John dropped everything to follow Jesus.  In other words, their faith in Christ became their number one priority.  They had an undivided heart that brought them true happiness.  Their lives were not torn apart by conflicting allegiances.  A divided heart cannot be truly happy.  How do we know that?  We know it from human experience, like the life of a young man I want to tell you about. 

His mother was a devout Catholic.  His father had no religion and a violent temper.  As with many dysfunctional families, the young man’s faith journey suffered.  As an infant he missed out on baptism, but he did receive some religious instructions, so, when he suffered a serious childhood illness, he asked to be baptized.  With simple faith he believed that if he were to die, he would go straight to heaven.  His mother arranged for baptism, but in the meantime he recovered and changed his mind.  It seems his faith in God was only of the “rainy day” variety. 

His teen years were rather unsettled.  He was searching for that elusive true happiness in his life and he saw his education as the way to find it.  So, he took his studies seriously.  But he had to drop out of school for a year at age 16 since his parents could no longer afford the mandatory tuition required in their country.  Our young man then sought out happiness in other places.  He tried promiscuous sex, drugs, and alcohol.  The next year he was back in school living with a girlfriend who soon got pregnant and had a son.  Yet, he felt his life was still very much unsettled, and he continued to struggle morally and spiritually.  Next he turned his energy in pursuit of happiness to the study of philosophy, and he even looked to the Bible for answers.  Unfortunately the Bible didn't do much for him, so he dropped it to pursue a philosophy emphasizing secret knowledge.  He dabbled in astrology and continued his self-gratifying pleasures.  He trusted all this would somehow make him happy.  Still obsessed with his girlfriend, he took her overseas with him to a teaching position he accepted at the age of 29.  His mother eventually convinced him the woman was a bad influence on him, so he left her, only to take up with another woman soon after.  So his life unfolded:  restless and unfulfilled, seeking happiness in the pursuit of sex as well as in academic disciplines where he hoped to find God’s truth and happiness.  An ongoing attraction to Catholicism was maintained on a low simmer.  He kept a mostly unread New Testament on a table at home.  

Then, one day a friend told him about two men who had converted to Christianity by reading the life of St Anthony of Egypt, the founder of monasticism.  He went out to his garden so torn between his attraction to a life of pleasure and the life of faith that he fell down and cried the words of the psalms, "How long, O Lord?  Will you be angry forever?  Do not remember my past sins."  While lying there he felt he heard a voice repeating, "Pick it up and read it, pick it up and read it."  He took this to mean the Bible, so he went inside and opened it at random to Romans chapter 13 and read, "not in orgies and drunkenness, not in promiscuity and lust, not in rivalry and jealousy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the desires of the flesh."  Finally at the age of 32 he embraced Christ wholeheartedly and found the happiness he was seeking. 

Does anyone know who this young man is?  Yes, the great Church father and theologian, St. Augustine. 

Augustine finally realized that happiness eludes a divided heart.  A divided heart is a heart ripped apart, in constant anguish.  Giving God partial allegiance does not work. 

So, what in your life might you be hanging onto and don’t want to let go of...  that you know deep down inside offers only an empty illusion of happiness?  Embracing that and a relationship with Christ at the same time cannot work.  Two gods cannot make you happy.  Only one can.

This is what Christ means in the Beatitudes when He says, “Happy are the single hearted, for they will see God!”