Weekly Lenten Reflections 2005: Week 6

We hold the We hold the death of the Lord deep in our hearts.

(BB 424) Living, now we remain with Jesus the Lord.

1. Once we were people afraid, lost in the night.

Then by your cross we were saved;

dead became living, life from your giving.

2. Something which we have known, something we’ve touched,

what we have seen with our eyes,

this we have heard, life-giving Word.

3. He chose to give of himself, became our bread.

Broken that we might live.

Love beyond love, pain for our pain.

4. We are the presence of God; this is our call.

Now to become bread and wine:

food for the hungry, life for the weary.

For to live with the Lord, we must die with the Lord.

THEME: “The evil twin” of apostolic zeal: busyness.

201. Our Salvatorian life is apostolic and is the expression of the love of Christ urging us to spend ourselves for the salvation of all people, confident that thereby we ourselves grow continually in our union with God.

202. We proclaim Jesus Christ to all people by all ways and means which the love of Christ inspires, especially through the witness of our lives, our kindness, and our apostolic zeal. In fulfilling this ministry we always respect human dignity, and we are ready to serve all people without distinction.

203. In the selection of our apostolic activities, faithful to the charism of the Founder and the purpose of the Society, we are guided by the call of the universal Church, the signs of the times, the manifold needs of all people, and the capabilities and gifts of the members.

206. We are obliged to evaluate our apostolic activities periodically, especially according to Gospel values, and to update the methods and means we employ in them, in order to ensure an ever more adequate response to the needs of the people of God (SDS Const.)

Tonight on the eve of the Triduum, we come to the end of our Wednesday Lenten reflections for this year. I sincerely hope they have been helpful and challenging to you at least in some small ways. I have enjoyed reflecting on the issue of the “evil twin” and finding some way to share those reflections with you. We shall close this year’s series with a reflection on apostolic life and its evil twin: “busyness.”

Our renewed Salvatorian Constitution approved in 1984 indeed beautifully reflects the charism of the Founder. But we must honestly admit that it also reflects much of the youthful activism that swept though the world in the 1970s. We read in the Constitution that we are an apostolic society. We embrace the vows and the common life in order to enhance our apostolic effectiveness. Here the spirituality of the older Constitution which insisted on the two-fold aim of the Society (personal holiness and the salvation of souls) is collapsed into one aim: apostolate. Perhaps in those heady days it seemed to some as if concentrating on personal holiness was an outmoded, middle class preoccupation. They were optimistic, hoping that true personal holiness would flow automatically as a natural outcome of spending ourselves for others in apostolic service.

This way of seeing things was not completely new in the 1970s. In the very early days when the Society was bursting with very young, energetic confreres, the Founder had to warn them against this very danger: the danger of stressing the apostolic spirit so much that the religious spirit was pushed aside and finally lost completely (cf., DSS XXIII, 1901/ 05/ 17). You would do well to read this short address.

Formed by this new Constitution and being young and enthusiastic your-selves, you are all in great danger of falling prey to the “evil twin” of apsotolic zeal: busyness. The danger is not quite so great in these years of temporary vows where your apostolic commitments are monitored by your superior and restricted by your academic demands. But when you leave here and find yourself alone in a parish or formation house, who or what will restrain you, especially if you have confused busyness for apostolic zeal? Here we must study carefully Fr. Jordan’s example.

The Founder was certainly a busy man. Clearly, he was fully occupied with the apostolate of building up the Society. But for him, merely being busy did not capture or manifest the true apsotolic spirit. Being a true Salvatorian was never for him simply a matter of working hard in an apostolate. To be a true Salvatorian meant to be an apostle – to live like an apostle, to work like an apostle, to pray like an apostle, to suffer like an apostle. This and only this lead to personal holiness and to effectiveness in our apostolates. Hard work, and busyness are never enough.

Busyness can look wonderful to others and feel great to us . . . at least until burn-out sets in. We get admiration, compliments, and have concrete accomplish-ments to show for all our hard work. But while we are so busy, what happens to our community spirit? To our fraternal life? To our prayer life? To the life of the evangelical counsels, especially to our religious obedience? Where is the holiness, prayerfulness and wisdom we were so sure would crown our busyness? And once our religious, spiritual life is in tatters, what’s left? Where do we turn? How do we start over? If we are not careful, the “evil twin” will have won. So don’t be fooled. True apostles are zealous and not just busy! Never confuse the one for the other.

By Fr. Dan, SDS