Christian Rest

After the summer off, yesterday kicked off a new year of the Rite for Christian Initiation of Adults program and a new year of my commitment to serve in ministry.  It is during my volunteer time that my Sunday’s can feel quite hectic with activity.  Yesterday, I had go to mass in Vietnamese in order to make all the activities that I am involved in work.  RCIA takes a big chunk of my Sunday, I am at the church from 930AM to 1230PM setting up, tearing down and in class with my students.  The first weeks are rather chaotic because I am the secretary of the group and I am in charge of sign ups, receiving payment and making sure that I obtain all documents from each student.  Yesterday, also happened to be the Sunday of the month where I attend my Franciscan formation, that’s another three hours of my day from 2 to 5 PM.  Thus, I woke up super early to attend Mass and didn’t arrive back home until after 5 PM completely exhausted.

As I drove home after a day of so much activity I thought of the homily that Pope Francis recently gave on how we should live our Sunday, “For us Christians, the center of the Lord’s Day, Sunday, is the Eucharist, which means “thanksgiving.”  It is the day to say to God: thank you, thank you, Lord; thank you for life, for your mercy, for all your gifts.”  Sunday, as a day of rest should be lived and understood differently for us Christians.  It's much more than a day to do nothing.  Pope Francis went on to explain how people today interpret rest as what will be fun or what will bring them pleasure.  This existence filled with entertainment, alienation, and escape from reality is not true rest, “Man has never rested as much as today, yet man has never experience as much emptiness as today... (rest) is the moment of contemplation, it is a moment of praise, not of evasion.  It is time to look at reality and say: how beautiful life is!” That's just so beautiful, so inspiring it really makes me want to change how I approach my moments of rest.

You see, I am guilty of seeking rest for pleasure, sometimes I am so tired from a day’s work that I just want to vegetate in front of the TV.  At times this desire to have “me time” makes me want to dismiss my volunteer commitments.  Also as an introvert who needs alone time to recharge my batteries I can quickly talk myself into thinking that my need for alone time supersedes helping others.  Yet, as I drove home tired from a day of so much godly activity, I realized how happy I felt even if physically exhausted.  All morning I shared my love for God and my faith with a new batch of students in my class, then I went to grow in holiness with my Franciscan brothers and sisters and I was fed in the Eucharist.  It was my day of rest; yet, it felt so much more rewarding than sitting watching a marathon show on Netflix.  “Only in God does my soul rest,” the psalmist says - a true statement to find peace and fulfillment one day at a time.