Ought

The Blessed Virgin is beloved of God and Queen of Heaven.

The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Michael O’Brien)

I have been thinking a lot over the last few days about what God ought to do for me.

It is easy enough to think that God is supposed to give me an easy life.  He loves me after all.  And this means – I reason to myself – that life should be very easy for me.  In fact, this is not at all the case.  Life is not easy for me.  Sometimes it is very difficult.

Now I know that I am one of the luckiest people who live on the Earth.  I have my health and my family and a roof over my head and money in the bank.   I am truly blessed.  But there is always something to complain about.

I have a roof over my head, but I would prefer a bigger roof.  I have a family around me, but I would prefer less conflict and more compliance.  I have money in the bank, but more money would be most welcome.

And all of these small things can add up to a point where I might be tempted to be completely ungrateful for what I am being provided with…

I have been thinking about this today.  You see, I stumble into a problem when I start considering the spiritual reasoning of God Himself from an Earthly vantage point.  Think of the Blessed Virgin.  She is beloved of God.  Of all human beings ever created God loved her the most.  He does this not because he unfairly loves one of His children over another, but because the Blessed Virgin is a mirror reflecting perfect obedience and humility back at God.  In this way she has made herself perfectly easy for God to love because she has removed herself from the equation and instead, God considers only the eternal merits of each action and the perpetual good.

Now, the Blessed Virgin is perfectly pleasing to God.  And her life was hard.  She was an unmarried, teenage mother.  She was poor.  She was uneducated.  She was powerless.  She was a refugee – a stranger in a strange land.  She gave birth in a stable.  She was a widow.  She was without a permanent home and travelled around with her Son.  She was the Mother of a falsely convicted criminal, whose disciples were persecuted by the religious authorities of the day.  She died young (or at least was assumed into Heaven at a young age).

And she is beloved of God and Queen of Heaven.

And I have been reflecting on this today, for it seems to me that if I were really serious about loving my Beloved, I would trust in what God does in my life, rather than what I think He ought to do.

Maybe then, I can allow God Himself to do as He pleases for MY GOOD, rather than getting in His way with all my oughts.

For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.