The practice of freedom: Learning to live the virtues Part I

Introduction
Maturity in Christ does not make everyone alike, but produces the same fruit of the Spirit in wonderfully different lives.
The Church walks one common Way, yet each unique person walks that Way amid particular circumstances.
Our relationship with God is personal, but is not self-invented. We do not each receive a different Gospel.
We share the same Christ, the same commandments, the same sacramental life and the same practices of prayer,
fasting, generosity, repentance, forgiveness and watchfulness.
We also struggle with the same human passions and temptations.
Yet our cooperation with God’s grace takes form according to our health, age, vocation, responsibilities and maturity.
The medicine is common; the prescription is personal.
This is the first part of a series that will continue, as Bishop Taylor Pryce used to say, “as long as need be.”

Part I: When love can no longer travel
The Second Letter of St John ends with a wonderfully human admission.
The writer has much more to say, but does not wish to communicate only with “paper and ink.”
He longs to speak face to face, so that their joy may be complete (2 John 12).
Paper and ink could carry his words across the distance. They could express affection, encouragement and truth.
But they could not make physical separation cease to matter.
The same is true of our technology.
It is sometimes suggested that technology can solve loneliness.
It can’t.
A telephone or video call can’t replace sitting together, sharing a meal or embracing someone we love.
But when circumstances take away one expression of love,  the Holy Spirit can teach love another faithful form.

Consider two sisters who, for many years, could fly across Canada and stay in one another’s homes.
Now advancing age, arthritis and increasing incapacity have closed that possibility.
They must face the painful realization that they may never again be physically present with one another as they once were.
That is a real loss, and it must not be covered with cheerful religious language.
Yet the command to love has not disappeared.
However, the practice must now change.

Love may mean learning unfamiliar technology, arranging a call, listening attentively,
remembering the agreed time, sharing memories and carrying one another in prayer.
Their conversation will not be a second-rate imitation of love.
Neither will this erase their grief over no longer embracing one another physically.
This will be faithful love taking the form presently possible.
This speaks directly to seniors, but not exclusively to seniors.
This also speaks to those who are hospitalized, disabled, geographically separated, imprisoned, caregiving or housebound.

We live in a culture that measures human worth by speed, independence and productivity.
When a person can no longer earn, drive, remember, lift or organize, the world may gradually begin speaking around that person rather than speaking to them.
The Gospel refuses this arithmetic.
In Christ, a person does not become less human because that person has become more dependent.
Indeed, the later years may reveal what was always true: life is gift, salvation is communion, and none of us carries ourselves into the Kingdom.

The temptation is to believe that because we cannot love as we once did, our love must now be less.
The virtue that answers this temptation is faithfulness—not the denial of loss, but love continuing within our present limitations.
“Love one another” is the common command.
How that love is practised will depend upon the people and their circumstances.
That is synergy.
God’s grace precedes and enables our response.
The Holy Spirit awakens desire and gives strength.
But the sisters must still consent, learn, telephone, use Zoom or FaceTime,
listen, persevere and begin again when the contraption refuses to cooperate!
Grace does not make their effort unnecessary.
Grace (God’s Uncreated Engergies throught hge Holy Spirit) makes loving effort possible and fruitful.
Bodies may become incapacitated, and travel may become impossible, but vocation does not thereby disappear.

A Small Act of Cooperation
Is there someone you love whom age, illness or distance prevents you from seeing as you once did?
Begin by acknowledging the loss.
Faith does not require us to pretend that a telephone call is the same as sitting together, sharing a meal or embracing one another.
Tell God honestly what you miss. Then ask: What form can love take now?
Perhaps this means agreeing upon a regular time to telephone or speak by video.
This may mean asking someone for help setting up a device, sending a brief voice message on difficult days,
writing a letter, sharing photographs or praying the Lord’s Prayer together before saying goodbye.
Do not attempt everything all at once you may get “spiritual indigestion”!
Choose one small act that can be offered faithfully.
This does not deny the loss.
This simply refuses to allow loss to have the final word.

Questions for Reflection
Is there a relationship in which I am grieving what can no longer be done?
What small, faithful act of presence remains possible—and what help might I need to make it possible?

Prayer Merciful Father, You know those whom we love and the distances we cannot cross.
Receive our sorrow for what is no longer possible.
Keep us from despairing, withdrawing or believing that we have nothing left to offer.
By Your Holy Spirit, show us the form that love may take today.
Give us patience to learn, humility to receive help and faithfulness to keep reaching toward one another.
Draw us more deeply into communion with You and with those whom You have given us to love,
until every distance is overcome in Your Kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.