LIFE, MARRIAGE & FAMILY: Only God can truly satisfy
By Dr Rachel Bradley, Director of the Life, Marriage & Family Office
In a homily during his recent visit to Mongolia, Pope Francis said “all of us are ‘God’s nomads,’ pilgrims in search of happiness, wayfarers thirsting for love”.
The Pope said the Christian faith was the answer to the thirst of mankind, as it takes the search to satisfy our thirst “seriously, without dismissing it or trying to replace it with tranquilizers or surrogates.”
These tranquilizers and surrogates are all around us, clamouring for our attention.
We struggle through the suffering in our lives, wrestling with dissatisfaction and the belief that we need to somehow earn the love that we crave.
Social media and TV promote a façade of perfection, urging us to fix what is wrong with us, to be better, more attractive, have it all together, to be more productive.
If we just put in more effort, we imagine, maybe we could be loved and accepted. We will do almost anything if we think that it will give us this result.
Attempting to slake our deep thirst in these ways can at most, only give us a temporary feeling of relief. Only the infinite God can love us as we yearn to be loved.
Nothing but God can fill the God-shaped hole in our hearts. As St Augustine said, ‘our hearts are restless ‘til they rest in thee’.
We should listen to the still, small voice that tells us that we are ‘fearfully and wonderfully made’.
If we abide in the Word of God, we will hear that ‘He is our Father, who created us’, that He ‘will never forget us’, that He has ‘carved us on the palm of His hand’.
We are told that ‘the Lord delights in His people’, and “Fear not, little flock, for it has pleased your Father to give you the Kingdom’.
Spending time reading and chewing over Scripture allows this message to sink deep into our hearts over time.
The truth about our identity will gradually take the place of the distorted view that is so easy for us to pick up.
God is madly in love with us, He will do anything to win us to Himself, He became one of us and died in agony to win us back.
This is the good news, our desire to be loved is destined to be fulfilled in the most incredible way.