The Catholic liturgical year runs from the First Sunday of Advent to the Feast of Christ the King, which we will celebrate next Sunday. As we get close to the end of the liturgical year, the readings at Mass focus on the end of the world. Predicting when the world will end is something of a pastime in some parts of American culture. However, the Catholic Church has never tried to predict the time of the end of the world, since Christ has clearly told us that it is not for human beings to know when the world will end.
Instead, we are to live with the expectation that the world might end at any time, while still being focused on our day-to-day responsibilities. A good way to approach the question is with the Benedictine Latin motto "ora et labora," which means to pray and to work. We should pray as if we were about to die in any moment, as if Christ were to return right now. At the same time, we should work as if we were to live in this world indefinitely.
Sometimes Christians focus on one or the other of these two objectives. Some Christians get so focused on Heaven that they forget about the work that we are expected to perform in this life. In the Second Reading, St. Paul the Apostle addresses this problem. In the community of Thessalonike, which he himself had founded, some had stopped working, relying on others to feed them, while they were awaiting the coming of Christ. St. Paul tells them in no uncertain terms that all able bodied persons must work for a living.
Applying the words of St. Paul to our own cultural context, we can differentiate different types of work situations. For many, work entails a job or business that brings money into the home. For some, work might mean working in the home as a homemaker or caregiver. Others might engage in spiritual work, such as some cloistered religious who spend their time praying for the world and receive charitable donations from others for their spiritual labor. Our society has also developed a retirement system, not yet known in the ancient world, allowing people to live on pensions or savings built up during their working years. Our cultural categories might be somewhat different from those of St. Paul, but the overarching point still obtains. No one who is of working age and is able to work should be idle and expect others to feed them.
Nor should our focus on Heaven keep us from seeking to fix the problems of the world. We should not say that we don't need to make our cities safer because the world will end one day anyway. Or that we don't need to solve the problem of homelessness because the homeless will end up in Heaven one day. Or that we don't need to feed those who cannot get food because Christ is about to return soon.
At the same time, some Christians get absorbed in solving the problems of the world so completely that they forget that our eternal destiny is Heaven. They want solutions in the here and now without anticipating the Second Coming of Christ and without looking to Christ as the King of the world. The danger for such Christians is that eventually they stop praying altogether and become no different from a secular NGO. Eventually, they may even end up promoting causes and projects that are fundamentally at odds with the teachings of Christ.
While we are to strive for a better world as long as we are alive upon this earth, the Gospel Reading for this Sunday also makes it clear that this world is not our final home. We can expect being persecuted for being Christians. We can expect to be hated for Christ. Indeed, while some speak of "Christian privilege," Christianity is the most persecuted religion in the world today. Christians can be reviled and excluded in American culture today in ways that no other religion could ever be treated. Globally, more Christians are being martyred today than at any other time in history. In Nigeria, a full-scale genocide is being waged against Christians. But where are the protests in the West against this genocide? Where are the Nigerian flags in people's social media bios? Where are the students disrupting speakers who have not denounced the mass killing of Nigerians? Clearly, the lives of Nigerian Christians do not matter to many Western activists today.
But we should not lose hope. Christ has made it clear that his will be the victory in the end. But before that time, we Christians can expect to suffer for his name. But he will always watch over us, even in our hour of greatest challenge. He says in this Sunday's Gospel Reading: "not a hair on your head will be destroyed. By your perseverance you will secure your lives" (Luke 21:17-18). That does mean thar we will not suffer or even experience martyrdom. But if we hold steadfast to Christ, he will raise us to new life in eternal glory.
Christ also says in the same passage: "Remember, you are not to prepare your defense beforehand, for I myself shall give you a wisdom in speaking that all your adversaries will be powerless to resist or refute" (Luke 21:14-15). The implication is not that we should not study and know our faith. Quite the contrary; we should work hard to shape our minds according to the teachings of the Church. However, we should not rely on our human understanding and thought processes to help us give testimony. We should unite our souls so completely with Christ that when we face challenges to our faith, he can work through us, he can speak through our words.
We do not know when the end of the world will happen. It could be tomorrow or two million years from now. But we will all experience the end of our personal world. We will all die one day. That day could be decades from now or it could be tomorrow - or even today. In that sense, from a historical perspective, the end is near for all of us. Whatever we do, we should be ready. We should be ready to meet Christ face to face any moment.
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The readings for the Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C, are:
Malachi 3:19-20a
Psalm 98:5-6, 7-8, 9
2 Thessalonians 3:7-12
Luke 21:5-19
The full text can be found at the USCCB website.
Photo Credit: The Last Judgement by Fra Angelico from Wikimedia Commons.
