New Self for a New Year

Hello friends,
I can not believe that I have let a month slip by without taking some time to reflect and write. As we begin a new calendar year, I pray that I will devote more time to my reflections and writings now that I have established a routine for school.

Today, in the Catholic Church, we celebrate the Epiphany of the Lord. In the simplest of terms, this celebration  remembers the how the Magi (aka Three Wise Men or Three Kings) received a vision or message from God which led them to the home of Jesus. As men of faith, the reason they were able to find Jesus was because they were open to how the Spirit of the universe might speak to them. This openness, I'm sure, was a result of their own self-images being centered on something much bigger than themselves. This idea of self-image is one that I'd like to expand on a bit further.

During this past Advent, I used a daily reflection book by Fr. Richard Rohr, ofm., to guide my journey toward Christmas. One of the days he talk about "addiction to our own self-image." As I thought about this, I began to understand what Rohr was saying. Too often, we promote and maintain our self-image based what society, family, friends, co-workers, teammates, etc., says is "proper". While we certainly want to have a good self-image, that self-image is always at its best when we only view ourselves that way God views us: as beloved children.  Rohr says this in particular, "I will take God's image of me any day, which is always patient and merciful, over my neighbor's rashly formed image of me." Think about your best friend. Is your friendship predicated upon shared circumstances (school, work, clubs, organizations) where common ground takes the form of class, race, age, income, dress, language, style, social venues, or peer groups? If so, ask yourself if that friend would still be your friend if none of those shared circumstances existed anymore. This may be tough to answer given it's theoretical context. However, the beauty about our self-image in God is that none of those things matter! We are beloved in God's sight no matter what. Rohr concludes his reflection with a quote from St. Teresa of Avila, "Find God in yourself, and find yourself in God."

I hope that in recognizing our true God-self images, we will come to have the kind of life-changing epiphany that the Magi that we still celebrate today.

May we be ever-faithful, ever-mindful, and ever-joyful.