“What if you knew what you know now?”

It’s a question I can’t stop thinking about from Fr. Mike Schmitz’s Mass series on Hindsight 20/20 from earlier this year. I keep replaying scenes of the not-so-distant past that feel so foreign now, like having dozens of friends over for supper or chasing toddlers in the church foyer so as not to disturb the very full sanctuary during Mass. How could we have known that so much would change in such little time?

In so many ways, we’ve had to review our priorities, encounter our fears, and confront our future.

Unlike generations before us, who may have been growing up during the war, our generation has not faced the reality of death in the way that we have this past year. When my dad underwent cancer surgery just weeks before the pandemic, I became even more acutely aware of death. 

I scoured the Internet looking for healthy lifestyle changes; I even took out a cookbook from the library aptly titled “How Not to Die”. Needless to say, death was so often at the forefront of my mind that I felt paralyzed and unable to move forward.

As our society started to become more used to a new way of living behind masks and within safe distances, I noticed that my anxiety did not ease up; in fact, it got worse. 

The shroud of uncertainty continued to pervade my thoughts and it weighed on my heart so heavily that I struggled to see the daily joys of life. I had to actively fight for peace at home and willfully find joy. I became preoccupied with the reasons people could die: Covid? Cancer? Heart disease? Tragedy can affect our lives at any given time! 

And even though my family was mostly healthy, I found it difficult to ride the tension between fear of the what-ifs and freedom in the present. 

Even when some of the dust settled, like when my dad’s surgeon said the surgery was successful and that he was “cancer-free”, I didn’t know how to live in the freedom of his healing. I discovered that being declared cancer-free comes with a surprising burden of uncertainty and fear about the future, particularly of the disease ever coming back, or the possibility of it being passed down through generations. My fear took on different shapes and kept rearing its ugly head during inopportune times. 

To deal with thoughts and feelings, I distracted myself. I read books, watched tv, cleaned obsessively, and scrolled incessantly. Each activity helped—for a while at least. I moved on to another distraction, and then another. I had to keep going; I had to keep my mind busy to prevent the fear of the what-ifs from getting hold of me. 

The more distracted I was, the more numb I became. And the more numb I became, the less I felt afraid. To be honest, I knew it wasn’t that I was feeling less afraid; my fears were still there, they were just lurking under the surface. 

I wasn’t feeling less afraid—I was just feeling less. 

The more I contended with the uncertainties of life and confronted fears about death, the more I realized that my struggle wasn't so much about being afraid of dying; I was struggling with being afraid of living. 

I have shifted so much of my focus on fighting illness and confronting death that somewhere along the line I lost sight of what it was like to be truly alive. Living requires vulnerability and courage. It requires the ability to feel, and to emotionally respond to things that come our way—both good and bad. We’ve been pummelled with so much unwelcome change;  I just wanted to pause and keep everything under the status quo.

Giving In to Life "On Pause”

In the last year, we've modified our behaviours to be “on pause”: waiting for a vaccine, or for travel restrictions to lift, or celebrations and regular Mass to be allowed. 

In some ways, we think about time in a way that is relative to when the pandemic is over and life goes back to normal.

However, I realized that merely waiting for life to get back to normal gave me permission to get by with just the status quo. By being distracted and numb, I did not have to feel too much or be truly engaged. I realized that I was afraid to “unpause” because then maybe I would need to start feeling again. Being numb may have given me the illusion of blocking out my fears, but it sure did successfully keep out my joy. 

Is this truly the life that Jesus came to offer to you and me? 

In John 10:10, Jesus says: “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”

Abundant life sure sounds like a far cry from my well-intentioned efforts to keep the status quo!

The more I grow older, the more I realize that I exhibit this same pattern through difficult moments. 

When I need to confront fears about uncertainty, my knee-jerk reaction is to find different avenues that I can exert control, even if that just looks like finding ways to be numb. 

Thankfully, the Holy Spirit is relentless in His pursuit of my heart. He keeps drawing me close, offering comfort that no amount of distraction can ever provide. One particular song has helped me navigate these difficult unpredictable days. I usually play this song on repeat, and let the words wash over me, penetrating deep into my soul:

I've carried a burden / For too long on my own / I wasn't created to bear it alone
I hear Your invitation to let it all go / I see it now / I'm laying it down
And I know that I need You
I run to the Father / I fall into grace
I'm done with the hiding / No reason to wait
My heart needs a surgeon / My soul needs a friend
So I'll run to the Father again and again

I especially like the language of my heart needing a surgeon, because I know full well the heavy layers I added to my calloused heart because of all my efforts to numb the pain away. 

Through the Holy Spirit’s intervention, I realize that I am afraid to live because it requires me acknowledging that I can’t keep on bearing burdens by myself. Despite my best efforts, apart from God, I can not be fully alive.

Being an Easter People

Having a vulnerable heart isn’t just about having the capacity to feel difficult emotions and work through them. A heart that is numb experiences neither suffering nor joy, but a heart that is alive and vulnerable experiences both, and lives joyfully knowing that our hope comes from the Lord.

Pope Saint John Paul II has an ever-relevant reminder for us: “We are an Easter people, and Alleluia is our song.” This is such a poignant reminder for me because sometimes we can forget that Christ’s resurrection still makes an impact on our lives today. 

Our call as Christians is to be Easter people, to be people marked by hope and unshakeable joy. Being Easter people reminds us that Easter is more than a singular event that occurred in history or an annual event the Church celebrates around the spring. While both are true, Easter is much more than that—it’s a lifestyle, a way of living.

A heart that is fully alive is wholly abandoned to God, able to release burdens that are far too heavy to carry alone, and able to experience true joy even in the midst of suffering.

When we're fully alive we are able to delight in others and rest in the knowledge that God truly delights in us. A heart that's fully alive laughs wholeheartedly and weeps deeply, unafraid to bring both praise and supplication to God. 

When we're fully alive we won't need to run from reality by turning to distraction because we know that God meets us in the present. Our joy is deep, unshakeable, and constantly available to us. We are fully alive when we live the life that God calls us to. 

I have been reading John Eldredge’s book called “Waking the Dead: The Secret to a Heart Fully Alive”. And these words have really struck me: “When we hear the words ‘eternal life’ most of us tend to interpret that as ‘a life that waits for us in eternity’. But ‘eternal’ means ‘unending’, not ‘later’”.

This is something I need to remind myself constantly. The life Jesus offers is here, now. I look forward to the glory that awaits the Church at the end of time when Jesus returns. But the knowledge of this glory, of the “future full of hope” (Jeremiah 29:11), needs to add to my joy now, not take away from it. 

So if someone told me to reflect on the year 2020 and asked me, “What if you knew then what you know now?” I would have encouraged myself to have a vulnerable heart, not a numb one, and to seek to fully live. 

My prayer for you, and for me, is that we would come to experience the Resurrection in a real and personal way. I pray that we would find our hearts burning, walking in the newness of life, revelling in the freedom that Jesus offers. May we all rest in the peace of the Holy Spirit, and partake in the abundant life gifted intentionally to us by our loving Father. 

“[B]ut when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:15-18)