This year the month of May, because Easter was so early, brings with it a positively overwhelming number of major feasts, from the Ascension to Pentecost, Trinity and Corpus Christi, and it is of course also Mary’s month.
I happened to be on retreat over Pentecost one year. At the end of Mass on the Feast of Pentecost a basket of folded slips of paper was passed round and we were invited to take one and discover the gift written on it. Mine was JOY. That, for various retreat-related reasons, really resonated with me. What God wants to give me, to give everyone, is JOY. How wonderful is that? How often do we allow ourselves to open our hearts, our lives, to this gift of the Holy Spirit?
Joy is not much in evidence in the world around us. It is difficult to feel joyful when the news is of wars, famine, violence, abuse, destruction, hatred. There may be a lot of negative stuff going on in our own lives, our relationships. How joyfully do we recite, for instance, Psalm 94(95) – Come, ring out our joy to the Lord … Does it really set the tone for each day? Or we may have alleluia-ed our way through Easter but can we still pray each morning now, several weeks later :This is the day that the Lord has made – we rejoice and are glad. Ps 117(118) ?
Joy is not automatically synonymous with what we see as happiness, or even just feeling ok. It is not as fleeting or superficial as that. It is not just having a good time. It does not depend on good health, a well-paid job, a happy family, success of any kind. It certainly does not come with being a “celebrity”. It is not compatible with “ I have the right to have the life I want to have.” I heard that comment in a television interview recently. The topic was abortion, the life she felt she had the right to have came at the expense of the life of the unborn child.
Joy is deeper than having what we want, far deeper. It is a gift at the core of our relationship with God and consequently with all those whose lives touch ours. It comes with trust, with peace and consolation. We have read and responded to John 15, hearing Jesus’ words addressed to us personally: As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you……….I have told you this so that my own JOY may be in you and your JOY be complete. Why, how have we somehow missed the joy born of knowing we are, each of us, loved by God, called by him, valued, gifted by the God who created us? What’s not to be joyful about?
If my own life experience is anything to go by, it can actually be very hard to accept, at a deep level, that God loves me, now, as I am, not in a vague and general way but quite specifically me, as an individual. If joy feels out of reach, then we may need to practise opening our hearts to its possibility in our own lives. If we really responded to the gift of joy, for instance, we could think about how today would be different. How would I be in each encounter? How might I face each difficulty? We might even ask ourselves if, at our funeral, our friends will remember us for our joyful heart, our joyful faith and trust in bad times and good. Maybe I could look back at the end of each day and give thanks for the moments when the gift of joy has enabled me to offer a light in someone else’s darkness, or to face with more confidence what I know lies ahead – maybe loss, a major transition, a frightening health diagnosis. Joy lies in knowing, trusting, that the Lord is alongside us, as he was on the road to Emmaus. Why would he not be? Joyful trust means I do not walk alone along the winding paths of my life.
We tend to be better at doing Lent than at doing Easter. There are certainly more people in church on Good Friday than at the Easter Vigil. Actually living out the joy of the Risen Christ is in many ways far more challenging than giving up something for Lent. We have in theory been praying with the Resurrection for several weeks, but maybe it will help to go right back to Easter Day and pray slowly again with each of the Gospel Resurrection appearances, taking time to let the message of joy take root in our hearts and carry us forward with quiet confidence into the days of our ordinary lives. Then we will know ourselves gifted and blessed and be a blessing to others.
Mary Cockroft
Oblate of Stanbrook Abbey
