Suffering is a part of life, but it is a part that we actively seek to rid ourselves of. No one enjoys suffering, and even those who understand and appreciate what suffering brings about choose not to pursue it. Most often, suffering comes about as a result of our personal sins, which means that we can trace the origin of our suffering back to the moment we are tempted and desire to sin. The early Christian community and the modern world are not as different as we think; those first followers of Christ experienced the same temptations we do today, and they also reacted to the existence of sin and suffering in the same way that so many do today.

In this passage from his letter, James issues a clarification to a fallacy that is heard even in the modern age: if we are called not to sin, why would God put temptations in front of us? This question puts doubt into God’s active role in our faith journey, and subsequently makes us question whether what we consider sin is even sinful or not. It is a dangerous mindset, and James rightly points out that the desire to sin does not come from God. It comes from within us. Those things that tempt us do not cause us to sin; we sin because we choose to act upon our desire. This calls to mind the words of Christ during his public ministry: evil comes from within, not outside of us. Still, there is an even more fundamentally disordered nature to acting upon our desires. God has given us what we need most in life, and to those things in which we may not presently have, He has made sure to give us access to them so that we can pursue them on our own. When we act on our disordered desires, we are not only causing harm to ourselves; we are also indicating to God that what He can provide is not enough for us.

This brings us to an uncomfortable scene in the Gospel, when Jesus confronts his disciples with the truth that they either do not care about his miraculous power or they choose not to understand its deeper meaning. He had performed perhaps his most significant miracle by feeding thousands of people with only a few pieces of fish and a few loaves of bread, and the disciples are still worried about only having a single loaf between them. Moreover, we hear an uncomfortable message from Jesus: “Do you still not understand?” When we focus on our immediate desires, we distract ourselves from God’s gifts. We cease trusting in Divine Providence, and limit our ability to what we alone can do. We should take these words from the Gospel as a personal message from Christ. Why do we continue to prioritize desire that leads to sin and suffering? Do we still not understand what God is offering to us?

What makes a person great? Depending on how we each individually define greatness, all of us clearly desire to be great. For some, that might mean being extremely skilled, while for others, it might mean assuming incredible amounts of power. A common theme of any form of greatness is the amount of influence someone has, although greatness should be measured by positive influence. The problem is that our modern sense of greatness is very simplistic; in fact, it follows the pattern we see throughout human history. We tend to measure greatness by very corporeal, temporary, and material criteria. Time and time again, we consistently see that God does not bestow greatness in the same way. Instead, He will always choose to exalt those who would otherwise be considered powerless and worthless in the eyes of the world. 

This is a theme we see from the Old Testament to the New Testament to the life of the Church. God chooses Noah, a remarkably humble and simple man, to keep the human race alive. He chooses Abraham, an old man with no prospects in life, to be the father of His chosen people. He chooses Joseph, a simple carpenter from a simple town, to be the head of the household in which the Son of God would be raised. He chose 12 unassuming men, from fishermen to tax collectors, to build up the Kingdom of God and share it to all the ends of the earth. In the history of the Church, God has chosen that important messages, especially those revealed through Marian apparitions, be given to the lowest members of society, from the indigenous Juan Diego to the poor shepherd children of Fatima to the chronically ill Sr. Agnes Sasagawa. Every single one of these individuals should be considered “great” because it was through them that God established his kingdom on earth in a more visible manner. What is it about humility that makes it the single most important component of greatness?

We should compare two things to answer this question. In Genesis, God prevents the tower of Babel from being built any further and scatters the builders throughout the world as punishment. By all accounts, the tower could have been humanity’s greatest achievement, a monument to our privileged position in the ontological hierarchy. But the builders made it as a monument to their own achievement rather than a dedication to the power and glory of God. Conversely, Pope Pius IX gives us a clear answer to the necessity of humility when speaking of his own role. He considered himself weak and powerless, but believed that this was the primary reason he was chosen to lead the Church. In his humility and weakness, and in the humility and weakness of his predecessors and successors, God reveals to the world that He is ultimately in control of His Church. When we humble ourselves, we put God in control. Through our own abilities, we are powerless. Only through God is true greatness possible. 

Would you consider yourself to be a good person? If someone were to claim that they are a good person to others, how would you react? It can be a bit uncomfortable for us when we are around someone who claims to be a good person because goodness is not something that needs to be claimed; it should be evident in one’s actions. When someone does claim to be good, it makes us question whether they have sincerely considered this question. It should be our goal in life to be good, especially towards others, but so few of us actively work towards goodness on a daily basis. If we were honest with ourselves, especially when we look at our own sinfulness, we would immediately claim that we are not good, but we are trying. 

This doesn’t just apply to goodness. Think of any virtue that manifests itself in one’s actions. James asks this question of the early Christian community in his letter: who among you is wise and understanding? Imagine someone reading this letter from James and immediately thinking, “I am wise and understanding!” Someone who is truly wise would know that this is a rhetorical question asked by James to challenge his community. Someone who is truly understanding would know that their actions affect others, and to instantly claim goodness for oneself neglects those we have hurt in the past. The thesis of James’ letter is simply that virtue is something that needs to be revealed in behavior. By being virtuous in your actions rather than claiming it about yourself, you are exercising the foundational virtue that strengthens all other virtues: humility. Socrates is widely regarded as the greatest philosopher of all time because he famously said, “I know that I know nothing.” As he grew in his knowledge of the world around him, Socrates realized just how little he knew about the knowledge that actually existed. It’s a humbling experience to realize how limited you are, and those who neglect to recognize these limits incur the additional restriction of pride that blinds them to their surroundings.

What can be done in humility that cannot be done in self-confidence? In the Gospel, a person approaches Jesus claiming that his disciples were unable to exorcize a possessed child. Jesus’ frustration becomes visible by calling his generation faithless before healing the child himself. Faithlessness is a form of pride in self; the disciples were unable to heal the child because they considered themselves to be the ones doing the healing, rather than as agents of God’s power. The boy’s father alternatively shows us the power of humility: he brings the child to Christ, knowing that he can do nothing himself. The child is healed directly because of the father’s faith in Christ. Do you want to be faithful? Do you want to be good and virtuous? It starts with humility. Humble yourself before God and God will work through you to do powerful things. 

The Church as we know it is a lot larger than we might realize. The Catholic Church has the fullness of God’s revealed Truth because of the authority which we have held onto through the many schisms and breakups of the Church. But those communities that are outside of Catholicism, namely the Oriental Churches, Orthodoxy, and Protestantism, are all still members of the Mystical Body of Christ. We know this because Christ tells us exactly this in the Gospel: when John approaches Christ to tell him that people are doing works in his name though not as a member of their community, Christ reveals an important truth: “whoever is not against us is for us.”

It might initially seem heretical to consider a schismatic group as a member of the Mystical Body of Christ, but think of them instead as an individual part of the body (using St. Paul’s analogy) that needs vital attention or else it is at risk of being lost. The Church, as the Mystical Body of Christ, will live the same history as the person of Christ did. There will be hurt, physical pain, scarring, and anything else that Christ suffered in his life that we will experience as a Church. It is our responsibility, then, to find those areas that need attention and to fix them. We need to repair past relationships, bring home those who are lost, all while holding firm to the Truth of our faith. This, however, is the most important thing for us to remember: we are not in control of either the success or the failure of this endeavor. Only God can change the hearts and minds of those who are lost, and only God can welcome them back into the fold. In this endeavor, we are merely meant to serve as messengers. The success of repairing the Mystical Body of Christ is not our own, and neither is the failure. Instead, we are called to give thanks, continue to pray, and move on. We have to remember this, because our lives are so fragile that we know nothing that is to come. James tells the Church in his letter not to make plans on how their evangelization efforts will go - you have no idea what your life will be like tomorrow. Instead, we must live by an all-important axiom, both when things are going well and when things are going poorly: “If the Lord wills it, we shall live to do this or that.”

In life, we live in the moment. At this particular moment, you might be struggling. At the next, you may be elated. Our current state of mind must not dictate our work as members of the Body of Christ. Are you hopeless or helpless right now? Trust in God, because you have no idea what your life will be like tomorrow. Are you currently content and satisfied or filled with joy? Remind yourself to stay diligent, because you have no idea what your life will be like tomorrow. Are you loving the people in life who need to be loved? Are you going after the lost ones? Are you serving your community with joy? Are you offering yourself and everything you do to God? This is how God will measure our work. Life is hard. Relationships are hard. Healing from the past and hoping for reunification under God is challenging, especially when it pertains to the Church. But we ought to be comforted by that first community who had their very lives threatened and still rejoiced in the hope of the love of Christ. The world around us is not under our control except for our own individual selves. If you want the love of Christ to exist in the world around you, it starts with you. It starts with praying. It starts with remembering that tomorrow is unknown, so be hopeful and remain vigilant. 

Every person seems to be seeking after happiness above all else in their lives. While we know as Christians that this can have multiple meanings and that happiness understood as pleasure will not leave us satisfied, we ought to also remind ourselves that, above all else, God desires our happiness. When we are brokenhearted, when we are agitated, when we are listless and anxious about the future, God suffers with us. Like a parent who suffers when they see their child suffering, God’s heart breaks when He sees our hearts break. But God understands true happiness; He understands that nothing can satisfy us in this world (as St. Augustine said, our hearts are restless until they rest in Him) until we are wrapped in His embrace in Heaven. This means that He, who loves us so much, actively prevents us from falling into those things that keep us from Him if we ask Him to guide us. If it’s something we desire in the present moment, our hearts break. But knowing that God is leading us to that which will ultimately lead to our eternal happiness, we should rejoice in the hope of what is to come.

The biggest issue of the modern search for happiness is that we are en masse moving away from meaning and responsibility (which are historically and traditionally valid ways of finding true happiness) and replacing them with materialism. All products of materialism only have one thing in common - they all corrode. That corrosion, James tells us in his letter, is a testimony against us if we have invested everything into that which will not last. Eventually, the corrosion of our material wealth can lead to the corrosion of our own souls if we have invested in nothing else. This could be a lesson against wealth-hoarding, or a lesson in the virtue of giving up your excess, but we are told to do this all the time, both by the Church and even by society in some false sense of perceived virtue masquerading as sincere altruism. Instead, we should reflect on that with which all humans struggle: the materialism that is wrapped up in the good things of this world. Yes, money can buy us nice things and nice things could potentially harm our souls. But what about those things that we think of as being virtuous that are nothing more than elements of this world that will pass away? This includes beauty, strength, vigor, youth, etc. All of these are wonderful to pursue and to cultivate, but if we elevate these to the only things that matter, we lose our souls as quickly as those who invest their souls in their material wealth. Physical beauty, strength, vigor, and youth pass away because they are things of this world; what lasts is only the love that remains when all of that is gone.

In a family, a couple do not lose these characteristics over the years; instead, they pass them on to their children, who preserve their own beauty, strength, vigor, and youth. The same thing applies to our Faith. When we get to a point where knowing Christ has utterly transformed us, it becomes selfish to keep it to ourselves; it becomes our responsibility to pass it onto the next generation, to share it with our children. Through them, the radiance of life, love, and faith survive in the generation to come, just as all those things tied to the earth remain only when we pass them on. When Christ sternly warns us against causing the youth to sin, he is demanding that we share what makes life worth living with them, and that we do so properly and without selfishness. All these things will eventually pass away, and all that will remain is the Word of God, Love Incarnate. Our only hope in participating in that Love is by sharing it and passing it on to the next generation. 

The letter of James gives us a fascinating insight into the practices of the early Church community. As with all communities, governments, nations, and social groups, we tend to think that Christianity slowly evolved into what it looks like now. Catholic churches, especially those built at the height of the Church’s power, can be grand and marvelous. The sacramentals and vestments appear intricate and beautiful. Our liturgical rituals are precise and well-ordered. None of these things initially seem to be how the humble early Christians lived their sacramental lives, but we must understand that Christianity was a continuation of Judaism, not a rupture. Rituals, vestments, and individual practices from Judaism carried over into Christianity seamlessly because those early Christians still considered themselves Jewish.

Fundamental to Christianity are the sacraments, and even in those we find their precursors in Judaism. Sacramental acts of reparation were done in Judaism to bring the individual back into communion with God. Now, we in the Church practice sacraments that focus on our cohesion with the community so that, together, we can focus on God. In this letter from James, he speaks about a few of these community-based sacraments which we still have to this day. A sacramental life first begins with prayer, especially in the midst of suffering. Then, in those moments when suffering has passed, we focus on expressing gratitude to God. Then, when we are sick and are in need of the help of those around us, the Church community steps in through the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick, described in detail and purpose by James. He also warns about waiting until these moments to ask for forgiveness for sins. He lays out the earliest explanation of the sacrament of Confession. There is a reason why we also call this sacrament Reconciliation: we confess our sins to the representative of our community in the priest, who uses the power of forgiveness from God to welcome us back into the active participation of the community.

All seven sacraments are focused on the community at their core. The Christian life is a life of community, and the sacraments bring us into community. Although we may be criticized for some of our sacraments, we can read James’ letter with great hope that we are carrying on exactly what the early Christians did. Just as their active faith was not a rupture from Judaism, our sacramental life is not a rupture of those first Christians. We are interested in bringing souls to God through the community, not forming an exclusive club for the select few. Part of that is offering ways in which we can be welcomed back when we stray away from the community. The ultimate act of love is to act for the sake of others, especially when they are most in need, and the sacraments of our community allow us to do so. As James says, "whoever brings back a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins."

God gave us bodies for a reason. We, as human beings, are the meeting point between the earthly and the divine, sharing a soul with those heavenly beings like the angels, and sharing a body with those things over which we have been given dominion. God gave us our bodies so that we might understand the world around us that we are meant to protect; our hearts are moved by the suffering of animals, the exploitation of the environment, the draining of resources, all because our bodies are able to tell us the pain of the physical world. However, it is our soul, which is a reflection of the Divine, that moves us to act in loving care to make the physical world a better place. The soul is not caged by the body, and the body is not enslaved by the soul; rather, they work together to create something entirely unique - a human person.

Our bodies are so important to who we are that we, as Catholics, firmly state in the Apostle’s Creed that we believe in the resurrection of the body, that at the end of time, our bodies and souls will reunite because they are meant to always exist with one another for eternity. However, death as a consequence of sin has made it so that our bodies and souls separate for a time. Moreover, sin has introduced degeneration of the body in this life - we get sick, we suffer injury, we grow old. God could very easily undo these ailments for us, but instead gives us an opportunity to use this consequence of sin to become an act of love, both toward Him and toward our neighbors. When the Israelites in the desert were stricken by serpents who bit and injured them and they returned to the Lord for protection, He answered their prayers, not by removing the serpents, but by having the Israelites craft a bronze serpent that would heal them when they were bit. They would still be bit. They would still be poisoned. But God gave them a way to transform what was once penal into something sacrificial and loving. Sometimes it seems that life is a constant stream of consequences to our sinfulness; but the Church enables us to transform these struggles in life into something communal, something sacrificial, something loving. At the heart of our existence, God created us out of love, which means he wants more than anything for us to be happy. Our happiness is contingent on Him because He is the only thing that can make us truly happy. In order to find that true happiness, we must talk with Him constantly - we must pray. In the Church, we pray not just with our words, but also with our bodies. This physical prayer manifests itself in the sacraments.

In his letter James talks about the earliest iterations of the sacraments of healing - anointing of the sick and confession. These were not inventions of man, but divinely-ordained ways in which our prayers to God must be made physical. When we suffer from physical ailments, we must pray and be anointed in the name of the lord. When we sin, we sin against God (who always forgives us when we ask) and the Church (in which case, we must confess our sins to a representative of the community we’ve harmed, which we do to the priest in the confessional). In order to be healed in both body and soul, we need prayer. We need this communication with God to conform and work together with our bodies. When God became man, He took on a body of His own that He has not shed - in Heaven, Christ still has his glorified body. That body retained the wounds of the cross as a symbol of the love and sacrifice he offered. Our bodies are scarred, aged, and imperfect, but God offers us the opportunity to use these imperfections as symbols that we have used our bodies for love, in atonement for our sins.