Quarter Life

Today I turn 25 and most people phrase it as, "Today you turn a quarter of a century old!"  As silly as that seems, it kinda resonates with you.  The phrase at once makes you feel 1) really old and 2) really young.

It provides a context for this milestone: you've still got miles to go before you sleep.  Century gives it a feeling of history too, your life is lived out in the history of the world and we often remember the dead as, "the generation that lived through....they saw this happen...they fought this war..."  Our lives are bigger than just our small sphere we see daily.

I had to resist the urge to make a list of what I want to do in my 25th year.  I wish I could say it was because a list would limit me too much but the real reason is I was too lazy to find a sharpened pencil (for a list like that you really need to be able to erase!) and I was scared.  Marking it down on paper makes it semi-permanent, resolutions that will lead to disappointment.  Or joy.  Depending on the list and what you make of it.

So as I take stock of my life I've noticed a few things going into 25:

• We are called to sainthood.  As I get older and notice I'm struggling with the same sins and temptations as I was when I was 15, I am aware of the continual struggle placed on us in this world and the need to embrace that suffering and offer it to God.  This is what makes saints, a total and whole love for God and a willingness to passionately endure all for Him.  I am no where near that point.  And as much as I pray that I may be a saint for the sake of God's kingdom, my flawed humanity speckles that petition abundantly with pride.  And that's okay, because we all have to continually pray to God to take our pride and give us the gift of humility, and our sin of pride can be an invitation to do that.
  
• Authentic manhood comes with age and getting closer to Christ. I often hypothesized as a kid what I would be like when I grow up to be a man.  Now that I am an adult, I'm no closer to knowing.  But as I get older, and have seen more, I see the lines filling out a little more.  I get the context of my humanity in the larger scope of society, the Church, and, most importantly, the person of Christ.  All people are called to imitate Christ but each gender in a particular way.  As a man, I feel called to empty myself as Christ did on the cross, giving for those I love everything.  But it's not a substantial gift: while Christ gives us Easter, Christmas, and every Sunday to celebrate His Sacrificial love, our sacrifice as men often is the equivalent of 5 minutes of card shopping on Valentines Day or a President's Day poem that makes the reader suffer more than the author (apologizes to my fiancee!).  But with age, the sacrifices get bigger.  Husbands will give more of themselves than a bachelor, and fathers in a way unique to them.  At all times that sacrifice must be rooted in Christ: Christ as a young man teaching in the temple turns into Christ as a bridegroom consummating his marriage to the Church with his passion and death on the cross.                                                                                                
• Work is important but not your identity.  As I previously wrote, I am recently unemployed.  But I've learned through my brief last job, a few freelance gigs here and there, and my unemployment the value and proper place of work.  Being productive and working is a good that helps round us out as people, it adds to our sense of self worth and helps us realize our potential as individuals and as a community.  But it is not everything.  I was laid off and a little over a month later my grandfather passed away.  A month after that, my other grandfather lay in the hospital for two weeks.  I've gotten to spend much more time with my family and I've seen that work is a small part of the equation but a very necessary one.  I've seen friends and loved ones become overworked, stressed beyond belief, and isolated by the drudgery  of their daily lives.  And, honestly, in my unemployment I've even been a little jealous at times of their situations just out of a desire to make a living.  But it's no living if you exist only to work.  Work is a good thing, it yields productivity, money, and self esteem.  But it is just one part of life.  Family, love, joy, charity, these are all a higher priority than work.  And at the very top of the list is God.  We do not have worth to God because we are workers for God loves all His children, even those who cannot physically or mentally be employed.
  
  Our value comes not from how much we produce but by how much we are loved by God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. So many saints have done little in the eyes of the world, neither on the top of Forbes lists or even the Church hierarchy.  I think of Saint Therese of Liseux, who died at 24, one year younger than I am today.  She did nothing in the eyes of the world, tucked away in her cloister, but she loved so completely that she's been called one of the greatest saints of modern times.  Do not become so encapsulated wholly by work that you forget you're not just a worker.  We are not made for work but for loving God and honoring Him in all we do.  Work is a necessary part of that but not superior to our leisure, family and prayer. I resolve to make time for all these areas of my life and I want to do a better job of trusting God at 25 that he will provide me with the work He calls me to.
  
• I am not ready to be a father but I look forward to learning how. Being a dad is the second most important job in the world, behind being a mom. I have no idea how to be a father at all.  I have good role models in my own father and other adult men but actaully being a dad scares the crap out of me.  But I am an engaged man and as I look forward to when I turn 26 and get married I am so excited to finally be a husband and a father.  I feel like all men are called to some sort of fatherhood whether its spiritual or physical.  With our beloved mother companions we raise the next generation and bring them into the faith.  As a new godfather to a baby just born yesterday I don't know how to guide her or help her in her faith, much less how to hold her or change a diaper.  But God will show me, good Father that He is, how to care for His child and my own, when the time comes.  

It is indeed an exciting challenge to live life.  Taking a life lesson from the first movie I ever saw in theaters, that I still love to this day, Hook: 

May we all have a joyful and blessed year, whatever our age. 

God love you!  

~OneCatholicGuy