A Week in Grace

What would transform the Church? If every Catholic spent a week reading about grace. Simply grace.

Maybe we'd stop thinking and acting so Pelagian. Maybe I'd stop trying to be "good enough" for God. Maybe I'd stop freaking out over what God wants from me and start realizing my Father wants eternity for me. 

Maybe I'd see that the blood on my hands is the same amount as the blood of Jesus that's on yours. Then, maybe I'd stop judging you. Maybe I'd stop all those comparisons I constantly, automatically, find myself doing because maybe my dignity would suddenly rely on something bigger than how much I tell myself I'm better than you. 

Maybe I'd stop condemning myself.

Maybe I'd stop lying to my wife and my kids. Maybe I could look in the mirror and not feel ashamed before I start the day's deceptions. Maybe I could stare into the darkest part of my heart without flinching, not because I am strong, but because You are already there, working. Reconciling.

Maybe I'd embrace hope instead of trying to micromanage my own security, assuredly seeking my own self-interest. Maybe I'd stop using God to get happiness, and realize that He is my happiness, that He is not my instrument of self-actualization. He exists, and that would be enough for me.

Grace. A gift, not an entitlement, and Heaven is not my retirement package for being decent (*after college). Grace gets past the "good enough" moralizing. Freely given and undeserved, You have done something matchless in this world:

You fathered me.