True love.

“You have made us for yourself, Oh God, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You.”

When our hearts have been made to contain an Infinite Being, it makes sense when our hearts are constantly longing to be filled. Simply said, we must not think that there is something wrong with ourselves when we constantly find ourselves wanting and feeling the need to have anything and everything that would give us happiness. It is the very unique fingerprint of our human soul: We are made for eternal joy.

On the other hand, it is our lifelong struggle to distinguish between Fool’s Gold and the true treasure that awaits each and everyone of us. Indeed, we are grateful for mankind’s technological innovations, for mankind’s intellectual evolution, but, it has, I feel, only made all of us believe that our treasure lies in the creation of man; that man himself is the source of his own happiness.

When we then seek the world for the food for our souls, we settle for finite things to inadequately satiate our infinite desires. The key doesn’t fit, and we are not being opened up to allow the things that have been promised to us from the very beginning -- life, love, joy, peace, strength. When the key doesn’t fit, we are not being opened to receive the fullness of life. In a world where convenience has become man’s first and foremost priority in life, the eternal peace that gives us strength to face the adversities of life loses its value.

It is then with great urgency that we need to strip the world of its invitation to a life of convenience for we were made for so much more than comfort and ease. You and I were made for the blessed life, for the life filled with tales of victory. Let this be a reminder that to strip the world is to strip ourselves because we are the world. What we must bare vulnerably is our soul -- both fragile and strong, needy, but also already containing the only infinite thing we finite beings need and live for: Love.

This is both the source and what we derive from the source. This is the summit of our entire lives. It is the highest act we can ever do unto another and ourselves; it is the highest feeling we can ever choose to feel, the highest attitude we can ever have. When we are stripped of anything that allow us to escape vulnerability, we discover that what we thirst for in this life is love after all. With that said, we must never settle for the love that makes us aware of our fleshly beings. We must be so brave as to diving into the infinite depth of love so that it may penetrate the depths of our souls.

By nature, we first seek the tangible for we in ourselves are tangible manifestations of our unseen souls. However, by nature, our souls also tirelessly seek its fulfilment. Our tangible and intangible natures tell us that we then must immerse ourselves in sacraments. This is for the reason that sacraments are outward signs of inward graces in the same way that our bodies are outward signs of inward graces. The sacraments we celebrate baptizes us in order to partake in the Banquet of Love; we celebrate our humanity in reconciliation as we are both able to humbly accept our limitations as man, and also allow the gift of healing to remind us that God makes all things new; our limitations are not the end of us, and, surely, they do not define us because “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13.) God makes all things possible for us including and, ultimately, union with Him. Moreover, the sacrament of marriage allows us to experience true love as one gives his or her life to another thus making real Christ’s very definition of the greatest love of all: that one lay down his life for another. Similarly, those with the special calling to the religious life also experience a love like this as they marry their mind, body, and soul with God and His people. Over and over again, with these sacraments God renews us, heals us both physically and spiritually. These sacraments make real and tangible the things we need to attain the fullness of life.

Living life to the fullest is not to be able to do anything. It is being able to live knowing that with God, we can do anything, and that He, who placed infinite desires in our hearts, waits patiently and desperately longs for us to make His overflowing cup of Love our fount of life.

This is our life: to recognize our need for love, to know we have love in order to love Love and let His love overflow into the hearts of others. There is nothing more and nothing less that we wake up for each and every day.

Fight, even and especially yourself, to always have love for it is the life you are dying to live.