IV. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness:
they shall be satisfied. (Mt 5:6)
December 15, 2006
Hunger and thirst arise from inner emptiness. The more basic the need, the more intense and insistent the hunger, whether for needs of the body, like food, drink and sleep, or for needs of the mind like self-understanding, significant accomplishment and self-approval.
Physical, bodily hungers are insistent and their satisfactions are immediate, so it is easy to devote our energy to achieve these pleasures and ignore those of the spirit or mind. As rational beings, however, the needs of the spirit must be met if our lives are to have present meaning and ultimate significance. For if we do not understand ourselves and find significance in our lives, we live alienated from our very selves and end up in despair.
Knowledge, insight comes from order. A jigsaw puzzle, for example, is unintelligible when all the pieces are jumbled together in a box. Only when all the pieces are fitted together in right order does the picture appear. To understand facts discovered in nature or in the laboratory scientists must construct a theory that integrates and reduces to order all the observed facts. Similarly, to understand ourselves and to find meaning in our own actions we must order them to one ultimate goal. Only then will our lives have real meaning and significance.
Christ has given us the goal we must pursue: “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5:48). “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness” (Mt 6:33).
But what is righteousness? It means the practice of all the theological and moral virtues. For these virtues cannot be practiced in isolation from each other. A person who is kind must also be just and generous and patient, just as a person who lies and steals is not only untruthful and unjust but unkind and ungenerous as well.
Christ gives us a sure, simple way to be righteous. “This is my commandment: Love one another as I have loved you” (Jn 15:12). St. Paul explains why Christian charity constitutes righteousness: “Love cannot harm one’s neighbor. That is why it is the fulfillment of the Law” (Rm 13:10; Ga 5:14). And he tells us that charity is kind, patient, never jealous, boastful, rude or selfish (1Cor 13:4-8). Love like Christ’s, then, is the ideal we must strive for if our actions are to take on the order that gives meaning to our lives. Christian charity is righteousness, holiness.
But why are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness blessed? Because those who pursue it faithfully find that their lives become more satisfying. Everything they do or suffer takes on meaning. They grow stronger by trusting in God to help them overcome obstacles. They grow in love, joy, peace, patience, long-suffering, gentleness and chastity (Ga 5:22). In a word, they are at peace with God and at peace with themselves. In their hunger and thirst for holiness they open their hearts to their neighbor and to God, so he can take possession of them. This is what Christ promised: “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word and the Father will love him and we will come and make our home in him.”
The reason, then, why those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are blessed is that in pursuing righteousness, holiness or Christian charity, they find God is at home with them, and they at home with God. They have in their life a foretaste of the kingdom of heaven that awaits them.
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