Saturday of the Thirty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time
In response to the Gospel reading for today, I want to say to Jesus: “Who doesn’t have a drowsy heart?” Especially these days!
Yes, some may owe their drowsy or weary or worn-out hearts to carousing and drunkenness, and that is a shame, to be sure. But, for most of us, I’d wager that our trouble is that third cause of a drowsy heart: the “anxieties of daily life.” They are relentless, aren’t they?
If it’s not wildfires, river floods, hurricanes, or rising coastal waters, it’s a long government shutdown and all the pain that goes with it, major structural changes in the Church, federal budget cuts, prices that keep going up, and on and on it goes. Oh, and it’s the holidays. So, it’s time to produce a magical Christmas for the whole extended family! More stress.
Those anxieties of daily life that Jesus mentions are real. They impose themselves upon us. They are significant and demanding. We can’t wish them away. And, yes, they do dull the heart.
Speaking for myself, I am super well aware that, as I get more busy and more stressed I become more self-focused. I feel so put upon and put out by life. So many inconveniences. So many irritations. So many worries.
I am reminded of George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life. I know a lot of folks don’t like that movie—schmaltzy! Got it. But it’s often the case that a film with staying power, as this one has had, has something to say to us ,even if we don’t especially like the film.
As you probably know, George is in a very bad way. Everything seems to be going wrong. His boss is an ogre and corrupt. The Great Depression is underway. He’s in financial trouble and can’t see a way out. And he’s got this knob at the end of the banister on the first floor that is no longer attached, such that every time he touches it coming down the stairs, it comes off. So irritating!
Everything looks impossible and, even worse, shameful. He’s lived his life very badly. He’s lost. His heart is beyond drowsy.
To bring an end to his endless troubles, he decides to throw himself over a bridge on Christmas Eve. Just as he is about to jump into the snowy waters below, an angel appears, interrupts George’s plan, and takes him on a tour of all the lives his own life has touched in important ways—lives that would be so very different had he not blessed them the way he did.
George is deeply moved by his own story, shown to him by the angel. He decides his life is worth living after all and returns home. And he does so with intense joy—running through the streets of Bedford Falls and reveling in the falling snow.
His heart woke up from its more-than drowsy state and felt joy once again. More than that, having faced the goodness of his life (with all of its challenges and troubles and tribulations), he is a changed man. So changed, in fact, that he is no longer about being irritated by the irritations of life.
He runs down the stairs to help decorate the tree (or something) and grabs the knob again. And, sure enough, it comes off again. George looks at the knob in his hand and smiles—a huge smile.
What does Jesus mean when he tells us to watch out? Get ready? Be vigilant?
I am sure he means a number of things. But one of them (I think) is that making sure our hearts don’t become drowsy is about challenging us to resist the temptation to get consumed by the worries of the day. And there are plenty! So, this is a big challenge. And he challenges us also to remember that, actually, this is a wonderful life. It is a great gift! May we smile at all those irritating knobs we are sure to encounter today!
—Susan Trollinger