This blogging stuff can be really hard.  It’s not easy to make yourself vulnerable, to share your thoughts and feelings with anyone and everyone, and to ponder – I cringe to admit – why those reading your posts don’t then “Like” them!

 I hate doubting whether what I consider so important and interesting ……really is.   Is what I’m saying ringing any bells with you, at all?  Is it at all relevant to your own life? 

Too often I ask those same questions about my efforts at the parishes….are my attempts at adult formation relevant to you, at all?  Are they making any kind of difference in your world?  Are all these hours of work producing any worthwhile results? WHY am I doing this?! Does anyone CARE?!

 I think we all have similar doubts don’t we? (Or so I hope!) Does it matter that I went out of my way to treat my spouse, my housemates, my classmates, my co-workers well this week?  Does it matter that I took time to pray with my kids, to donate to St. Vincent de Paul, to cook that meal for my sick neighbor, to go to Mass?  Who really cares?

I wish I could say these sorts of feelings didn’t plague me.  I wish I could write that I am willing to serve simply because I feel God asking me to do this – to write this blog, to work so hard at bringing people together to learn and pray.  I wish I could do these things because it seems the right thing to do – with never any hesitation before or afterwards….realizing that it’s really God’s work going on, not my own!

The great spiritual writer Henri Nouwen wrote quite poignantly about his own struggles concerning this several times.  Especially in his book The Selfless Way of Christ he discusses this need to be relevant – to create noticeable, productive results.  To get the numbers!  To increase the collections!  To bring vast numbers of people “home”!  To be spectacular, noticed, admired and affirmed in whatever we do.  

These, Nouwen claims, are along with the desire for power the same temptations Jesus faced during the forty days he spent in the desert following his baptism.  These are the temptations each of us stares down almost weekly.  And that struggle, good people, can get really old, can’t it?

So, is the battle worth it? Nouwen claims that when we continue to serve in whatever way we are called,  although “our lives might remain the same, even when few people offer us praise, and even when we have little or no power, we come to know ourselves as God knows us, as sons and daughters hidden in God’s love and life.”  We walk more with Jesus and we become more like Jesus.  Hmm.. I guess I could handle THAT…. maybe!  With God’s help! But what about you….do you LIKE it?  

P.S.  Check out chapter 2 of Nouwen’s book – it’s great. And please trust me… this really isn’t just a ploy for more “likes”! 

Sue Sack

Sue Sack is Director of Adult Faith Formation for Precious Blood, St. Rita and St. Paul, Englewood