Reflections | THE GOAL

Msgr. Don reflects on how setting our intention on the proper goal can make all the difference in the world.

Good morning. Today, I want to talk to you about the goal of your faith, the goal of Christianity, the goal of whatever religion you're a part of. It's interesting because you can have a negative goal, and that's not unusual. So you can say, well, my goal is to stop doing this, stop doing that, and to avoid this. Whatever it is that we think gets us in trouble, keeps us from being fully who we believe God wants us to be. That's one focus. But there's another focus that would seem much more healthy. It's a positive focus. 

It's like, well, look at sin. Look at the description of sin, it's missing the mark. Missing the mark. So a good question is what's your mark? What are you looking for as a thing you want to focus your attention on and say, that's what I want to go for? When I'm in that direction, I feel like I'm in the right direction. So the most obvious thing you could look at is in scripture, there's a beautiful story about Jesus and his temptations. But one of the things about that is that he talks about the fact that many times people have a goal, particularly when they're thinking about their life in general. They would like it to be beautiful. They would like it to be comfortable, they would like it all to work out. Does that sound familiar? Please, God, help everything to work for me and my family and the people I love. So that's a goal that you might say is basically I want a comfortable, easy life.

And then there is another goal that also gets in the way. And that's that's the goal of saying, well, “You know what? I look at the way the world works and the world works out of power. And if you have money and power, you have everything the world offers. So that's the goal I want to be successful in the eyes of the world.” Not a good goal, but the core goal is something that is the only word I can use is I want to see. I want to know what I'm made for. I want to know what makes me fully myself. The only answer to that is truth. Your truth. If you set as your goal, “I want to be my authentic self. I want to be who God called me to be. I want to be effective in the lives of other people, not just doing something for me.” Then you've got the goal. And when that's the positive goal that you're looking for, I guarantee you'll hit that mark more often than ever, ever for a negative reason. A negative goal will help you do it. You'll do it because you're on the mark.

Have a good day.

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Kyle Cross