HOPE, THE NEGLECTED “MIDDLE CHILD”
(Friday, October 4)
Two days ago I listened to a brilliant talk given by Fr. John Behr, on the third chapter of 1 Thessalonians. Where St. Paul says, “But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought good news about your faith and love” (1 Thess 3:6), Fr. John noted the absence of “hope” from that good news. St. Paul’s usual triad of “faith, hope and love” is diminished to just “faith and love,” so Fr. John reflected on the possibility that the Thessalonians were lacking in hope.
This made me think of the three little sisters, the Holy Martyrs Faith, Hope and Love, who were 12, 10, and 9 years old respectively, when they were martyred, so Hope was the middle child in the family. If you’re familiar with the term, “Middle Child Syndrome,” you might know that the middle child in a family can experience (real or imagined) neglect and unfairness compared to siblings. And I’m thinking that hope, in the sense of the Christian virtue, is often really neglected in our times, when disturbing news (either in the broader world or in personal life) might easily trigger in us feelings of impending doom. Or feelings of “despair,” which comes from the Latin words “de” (down from) + “sperare” (hope), meaning an abandonment of hope.
This state of mind and heart, despair, is considered the gravest “sin” (meaning “missing the mark” or missing the point), because we’re missing the whole point or purpose of our cross-carrying journey, when we despair. And that point is growth and new life, which is always around the corner, when we are experiencing the birth-pains of our big or small difficulties in this world, in Christ. We always “look for” or “expect” the resurrection of the dead and the life of the age to come, as we profess at the end of the Creed, throughout the vicissitudes of our cross-carrying walk through time. And this means we hope. It is hope that feeds “patience,” which Hans Urs von Balthasar called “the power to wait.” We wait the storms out, as we trust (in faith) that God is present and true; and as we care enough for God, ourselves and one another (in love), to be of the little service we can be, to do the next right thing even in the darkest times.
Hope is neither a sticking our heads in the sand, nor a delusional optimism, nor toxic positivity, which is the most annoying thing in the world (I say as a cynical New Yorker). It is a clear vision of both the Cross and the Resurrection, as the entire Mystery of Christ (as Fr. John Behr’s little book about all this is entitled) unfolds every day in our lives. I need not abandon hope, every time I fail, or say the wrong thing, or oversay the right thing, or “miss the mark” in certain responsibilities or relationships in some other ways. Hope is a divine energy that God shines upon me, as He looks at me, blessing me with time; the “acceptable” time that is now, and that is given to us as the opportunity and (in Christ) promise of change. The failures and defeats, – also in the big geopolitical picture of our world, – are not the last word in our story. The last Word (and the first) is God’s dignifying call to us, to follow where His Son is always leading each of us, through His way of the Cross, and that is to more growth and more life. Let us love one another, dear friends, and let us share hope with one another, as we trust our loving God to lead us through this Friday, the day of the Cross. Amen!
