By Father Rich Tomkosky
What do you want from God? That’s an excellent question a good priest asked me once when I was going to Confession; and it always stuck with me as coming from the Holy Spirit. What do we want?
This Easter season, we are celebrating the fact that Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity made man, suffered and died the most horrible death imaginable in order to give each of us the chance to be free from our sins, if we want that. Do we? Do we love Jesus; do we love our Catholic faith or do we sometimes or often times see it as a “burden” preventing us from living a fully happy worldly life? Or as something not essential to our daily life?
Being baptized a Catholic Christian is only the start; we must desire to have a second conversion in which we take the faith to heart and try to incorporate it over time into every aspect of our life. The Lord wants this for us more than we want it ourselves! He is never outdone in generosity in providing the graces needed to help each one of us grow in holiness with our own unique vocation, family background and circumstances as well as our individual temperament and own strengths and weaknesses. Trust Him with your life! Let’s also ask the help of our Lady and St. Joseph, our guardian angel and our favorite saints who want to get us to Heaven.
Faith is a very mysterious gift. Wherever we are in our heart, mind, and will right now in regard to belief in Jesus and the Catholic faith, the Lord wants to help us grow. Not everyone believes, we don’t know why, that includes people who received a Catholic education from kindergarten through graduate school – but if we are willing, the Lord will help us grow in faith or revitalize the faith we have allowed to grow stale or taken for granted. And I will help you too. Get in touch and we can have a nice talk. There were quite a few people this Lent who had been away from the faith on some level and got back through Confession.
Are we all willing to grow with the Lord, so we can help Him in the process of saving souls, especially hardened sinners as Our Lady reminds us at Lourdes and Fatima, of which Saint Bernadette (Penance) and St. Jacinta (daily Mass & other sacrifices) and Saint Francisco (prayed many Rosaries) took to heart.
What do we want? Hopefully to become a saint and lead as many other souls to God as possible.
Father Rich Tomkosky is the Pastor of Saint Thomas the Apostle Parish in Bedford and the Pastor of Seven Dolors of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish in Beans Cove.
