Daily Gospel Reflection

The Anti-Anxiety Formula

Welcome back to Radical and Relevant. One of my favorite readings today from the Gospel of Matthew 6:24-34: "No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon. Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat and what you will drink, nor about your body and what you will wear. Is not life more than food and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not more valuable than they? And which of you, by being anxious, can add one cubit to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the valley, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will He not much more clothe you, O man of little faith? Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' For the Gentiles seek all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be given to you in addition. Therefore, do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day's own trouble be sufficient for the day."

We live in a very anxious time; it's one of the most common emotions that people experience in our society today. And Jesus uses the word, I think, five or six times in this one reading, always preceded by "Do not be anxious." And he talks about why not to be anxious, but he also gives us a formula for how not to be anxious. And he says, "Don't get worried about tomorrow." That's where, very often, our anxiety comes from; it comes from venturing in the future and imagining different scenarios, and often maybe worst-case scenarios, and then coming back into the present and worrying about these future possible negative scenarios that then fill us with anxiety. And so it's an invitation to trust in God, it's an invitation to believe in God's providence, and it's an invitation to stay anchored in the present moment, which is where we always find God: in His peace, in His joy, in His love, in His contentment. God is always in the present. We can't find God in the future; we find Him in the present. We can't find God by racing back into the past; we find Him in the present. And whatever is trying to take us away from the present is usually what is causing us to be anxious, to be overwhelmed, to be restless, to be discontented. And so today's reading is a beautiful invitation to come back into the present moment and just to walk with God in the now. Have an amazing day, and remember: be bold, be Catholic.