Serving Others as an Offering to God

A love for the world enables laypeople to live and work with "naturalness" in any circumstance, without a distinctive dress or manner. All that should set them apart is their rectitude and their charity. If we must be set apart in some other way, let it be in the excellence of the work we do -- in the service of others, as an offering to God. Secularity means behaving in a way that is consistent with our place in life, which is the very place where God has called us.

It would be unnatural for us to draw attention to ourselves with public displays of piety, just as it would be unnatural for my wife and me to draw attention to ourselves with excessive public displays of affection. My affective reserve -- whether in piety or in kissing -- does not mean I am ashamed of my status as a Christian or as a man married to Kimberly. Nor does it mean I am observing any kind of excessive secrecy. It is merely the reserve that's proper for the world -- or at least for the particular corner of the world where I live.

In a similar way, our homes need not be decorated like medieval churches in order to be sanctified. They should be identifiably Christian, of course, but they should also be distinctively homes and not cathedrals.

Nevertheless, secularity, like any good thing, can be overdone. In our zeal to laicize our piety, we shouldn't leave people guessing whether we're Christians...

"Live as the others around you live," St. Josemaria said, "with naturalness, but 'supernauralizing' every moment of your day."

Ordinary Work, Extraordinary Grace by Scott Hahn

We had a newly ordained priest assisting our pastor many years ago. In his zeal, he couldn't talk to anyone about anything, even something as simple as the weather, without telling a "real life" story that would link the conversation to Jesus. It was painful to watch him talk to children especially. They would come up to him and try to talk to him and his tone would grow patronizing and he would answer questions like, "Did you play baseball when you were little?" with something like, "Yes, I did and God likes to see us growing strong ... as long as we play it like good Christians."

He left our parish after a short time ... our pastor had even less taste for such platitudes than our family did. However, I never forgot the sterling example he provided of what not to do, and which we are reminded of so well in the excerpt above.

Tags: Catholicism, Christianity