(The feast of the nativity of St. John the Baptist)
Prophets are noted for their urgency as well as being very annoying. They are outspoken and can be strange. St. John the Baptist is no exception. He spoke out about the seriousness of our lives. About the importance of taking stock of what we are doing with our time here and how we are living and from that honest appraisal, to make straight our paths in serving the Lord in our daily lives. Prophets bring to light how short sighted it is to not spend our lives in carrying out God’s will for us. We are made for God, the Infinite and it is easy to forget in our everyday lives. Comfort and security can take center stage so completely that the thought about God, our lives and our death and what comes after can seem unreal and unimportant.
We see it all around us how transitory our lives are, yet we can waste it in simply escaping that fact. Julian of Norwich, a great mystic talks about how the heart of man is made for God, that nothing but God can sooth and heal the restless heart. Today restlessness seems to have become the reality of our everyday lives. Is it because the central reality of our existence, that we will all die, lose everything in this world and one day stand before God is a truth we would rather not contemplate. Do we fear looking at what we are becoming when we uproot ourselves from that which we are made for?
I believe that the Near-death-experience (NDE’s) also play a prophetic role in our culture today. Over and over again when people come back, they tell us that just about everything we give weight to in this life is really not that important when we go over our lives. It is about how we grew in love and service of others. It is not about power or success, or being famous etc., but about the simple fact in how we treat those we interface with everyday, especially those who can do nothing for us. If we interface with love then our power and success will be used to uplift others and not to simply use and manipulate them.
Br. Mark Dohle, OCSO
Holy Spirit Monastery
