My husband and I heard a loud rumble in the sky and immediately ran outside to see what kind of aircraft was making that noise. My son, the avid airplane aficionado, wasn’t even home to come outside with us, but we still went and admired the unique Skycrane helicopters flying overhead to battle the wildfires in our area.
Six years ago, I probably wouldn’t have even registered the noise outside, let alone be able to distinguish the sounds of airplanes versus helicopters. Now I listen as my son monologues about lift, thrust, aerodynamics, G-forces, and who knows what else. I cannot comprehend it all, but I share in the excitement of airplanes because my son loves them.
Similarly in marriage, I have learned a lot about wood grain, sanders, and power tools because my husband is a woodworker. I can admire design elements and attention to detail that I would have never noticed before because I have come to love what my husband loves, simply because I love him.
My love for my family members has changed what I love. It is no different in the spiritual life, where my loves have been transformed by loving God.
When I was a high schooler beginning my faith journey, the focus was on the discipline of saying my prayers and giving up the fun things my peers were doing because deep down I knew faith was better. It came across as more of a sacrifice for God, because my loves were not yet transformed.
Now, almost thirty years in, I no longer wish I was reveling in sin or partying on Friday nights. I have tasted the good life that comes from following Christ, and I am hungry for more. I have fallen in love with God, and it has transformed how I see the world. I’m committed to the beauty of God’s plan for marriage, I never want to miss Mass on Sundays, and I look for opportunities to connect with my Lord throughout the day.
This is the good life—a foreshadowing of Heaven that we can experience now.
A recent memory that illustrates this was the Mass where my daughter received her First Communion and Confirmation. Family had come into town, friends filled the pews, and the community that we had invested in at our parish were also part of this small group of kids receiving their sacraments.
I sat next to my husband who, through the years of commitment and struggle, I loved even more fifteen years later. Beside us were my four other children, who I couldn’t have even imagined I wanted as a new bride, but fiercely love every day. I was surrounded by family and friends and a church I am deeply devoted to. As I watched my daughter, radiant in her white dress, receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit and the Body of Christ in the Eucharist, I was filled with this joy and peace that can only be described as ineffable, wordless, utterly heavenly.
As I had my own turn receiving Christ’s True Presence in the Eucharist, the tears spilled over. Through the years of leaning into marriage, being open to life, remaining in the Church even when people disappointed me, praying when I didn’t feel like it, and obeying the teachings of the Catholic Church, I have come to love what God loves.
St. Augustine says it well in his Confessions; where following Christ was once a painful sacrifice, his heart becomes truly converted. He writes, “And what at one time I feared to lose, it was now a joy to me to put away.” He describes how it was God Himself who entered Augustine, sweeter than all pleasures yet more veiled than all mysteries.
Now, this does not mean that there aren’t sufferings and struggles along the way. On the contrary, those struggles are what God uses to shape our loves and mold us more closely to His heart. For if I do not learn to love God now, what makes me think that I will choose to love Him for all eternity? But if we learn to love God now, we can find we were living in a bit of heaven all along, for heaven is wherever God is.
How do we embark on this journey to be transformed by love? Prayer. Prayer is not just thinking about God or asking for things. Prayer is using words to communicate and then moving beyond the words into deeper communion. Prayer is not talking about God but talking with Him. Prayer is an encounter with God in response to His love.
Just like in any relationship, we use our words to be known. We share our names, our jobs, fun facts about ourselves, moving further into more personal details as the relationship progresses. Words disclose our inner life, and we use our words to tell God what is on our mind or stirring in our heart. And then we get to know God by reading His word to us—Sacred Scripture. Scripture reveals God’s love for us, speaks to the joys and struggles of what we are going through, and shows us our identity as part of the bigger story. Over time, as we share our hearts and learn to listen for God, we find He is speaking to us all the time: through wise people, the prayers of the Church, the thoughts that we think, or in the silence of our hearts.
As we enter deeper experiences in prayer, we find room for more silence, for silence is the language of love. We gaze on His glory, and the Holy Spirit becomes the interpreter and translator of our prayer, letting our hearts speak to each other beyond the limits of words.
When we are transformed by loving Him more in prayer, we begin to see His love all around us: in the people He has created, in the world He has given to us, and even in the sufferings. We begin to grasp how He never leaves us alone in the midst of unimaginable pain because He is united to us through our sufferings.
Finally, we receive His incarnate Word, Jesus Himself, through the Sacraments. The Eucharist becomes our highest expression of love and our deepest encounter of intimacy this side of Heaven. We grow in our union of wills to want whatever God wants and love whatever God loves. This encounter invites us to enter into the mystery of God Himself and leaves us thirsting for the eternal wedding banquet of Heaven. As the Book of Revelation says in the last chapter:
The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let him who hears say, “Come.” And let him who is thirsty come, let him who desires take the water of life without price. (Rev 22:17, RSVCE)
Author’s Note: If you are interested in learning more about how to grow in this relationship of love through prayer, consider picking up a copy of my new book Ineffable: Learning to Love the God Beyond Words, available through Sophia Institute Press.
Photo by Seljan Salim on Unsplash
