I find it hard to let myself experience joy. Perhaps I am too pessimistic and analytical, but I feel perfectly justified in waiting for the other shoe to drop. In fleeting moments when I sense the gathering presence of God, I can glimpse the ecstatic, a sense of wonder and gratitude, or even a deep sense of peace.
But joy? That’s for suckers, right? I’m an academic—heck, I’m an adult. You can’t fool me.
But we are called. In his first encyclical, Pope Francis observes that “With Christ joy is constantly born anew” (Evangelii Gaudium 1). The pope, who lives with the brokenness of the world pouring across his desk daily—for whom the extent of desperate migration, intractable war, and the depravity of human trafficking is vividly announced every hour—this pope smiles with real welcome, is gentle and open with children, and belly laughs with his fellow Jesuits.
As this papacy moves into its latter years, an “insidious worldliness” that Francis has warned about from the beginning continues. It undermines the Church from within, as tensions and polarization divide our community, giving more weight to particular prayers or ritual actions than to the joy of gathering in community in the great liturgy we share. In this we simply mimic the worst of our social worlds, as a jaded and distracted culture chips away at our ability to “sow bountifully,” and slams the door on the harvest as well.
In these days, perhaps joy is one of the few truly radical acts that remains, as we invite others to see the generous and welcoming bounty of the Christian life.