What We Shall Be
/When you’re a younger member of a religious community like I am, people tend to ask you about what the future of your community will be. Sometimes they even ask about the future of the entirety of religious life. The reality is, though, that I know as much about the future as anyone else does, which is to say that I don’t know anything about the future. If I had a crystal ball and could predict the future, well, I’d be in an entirely different kind of work.
Also, asking someone to predict the future implies that the future is fixed. It’s says that God has written some kind of script and it will all just unfold according to plan — if we say our lines correctly and follow our stage directions, that is. However, I don’t think that’s how it works. I’m a sister of Providence, not Predestination, and I don’t think the future is predetermined. I think we create it with God, step by step, with every choice we make in the present. We dream, plan, and set goals for the future, and that’s fine, but we don’t really know how it will transpire. We can predict and respond to how we think things might be, but the future remains a mystery.
This Sunday’s Second Reading speaks of this for me. “What we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like Christ.” We don’t know what the future will be, and we don’t know who we will be in the future. And that’s not just true for us in religious life; it’s true for all people. Just cast your mind back to the 2019 New Year’s Eve. Maybe you set some intentions or resolutions. Maybe, like me, you had some hopes for the new year – 2020 in all its shining possibility. None of us could have predicted all that 2020 would actually hold. And thank God for that! If I had known ahead of time, I would have entered it with fear and dread, and I may not have lived into it and received the gifts that it offered. It’s good to feel hopeful, to set intentions for a new year, but I have to know that when I do, I also have little control over circumstances. All I can do is live with intention. I can control my responses to things, and that’s about it. If I respond wholeheartedly to life’s events, both good and challenging, I’ll continue to grow into the person God created me to be, never really getting there but growing closer to God in the process. What I shall be has not yet been revealed. I do know that when it is revealed I shall be like Christ.
So, I don’t know what the future holds, but for now I want to be the kind of disciple that Jesus describes in the Gospel. I want to be someone who can recognize the voice of Christ speaking in my life because I know Christ and Christ knows me. I want to be the kind of person who loves well and is loved in return. That last part is less within my control than the first, and the first part means I have some inner work to do. That work often gets done in a one-step-forward-two-steps-back kind of way, but it’s still growth. All these things are not so much about the future, although each choice I make in the present will likely have implications for the future. All I can do is live this day.
As I look back over these thoughts, I realize that this reflection is kind of a pep talk to myself. Maybe it’s a pep talk to you too, but it’s something I always need to be reminded about. I know it’s true that I can’t control the future – events or other people’s reactions and perceptions of me – and yet, I try to control all of those things. Why do I do that? It’s a waste of time and energy, but I still do. I guess that’s why I find this passage from the First Letter of John so reassuring. “Beloved, we are God’s children now.” We are God’s children. That’s who we are; we don’t have to do anything to make that a reality. And we are God’s children now – not “we used to be but now we’re not,” not “we will be but aren’t yet.” What we will be has not yet been revealed, but we will be like Christ. So, it matters but doesn’t matter what events will come to pass in the future. Whatever happens, and whomever we are when it happens, we will be like Christ.
I don’t often live with this realization, and I’m made aware that I don’t whenever I pray the Act of Abandonment to Divine Providence, a prayer that’s important to my congregation. There’s a line in it that says, “Peaceful and contented in all, I will allow your Providence to govern my life without worry or over-eagerness.” Dang. I’m almost always filled with worry or over-eagerness or both at the same time! I tend to get consumed with distractions in the present and worries about the future. Any rare moments of presence and contentment are a gift from God; I can pray for them, but I can’t bring them about by myself. I just receive them when they come.
I still remember one of those moments from years ago, one of those gifts of presence from God. I was twenty-four years old and in a full-on discernment about my future. Should I enter religious life or not? As I wrestled over this decision, there was a lot of fear but also a lot of excitement. There was worry but mostly joy and a bunch of over-eagerness. And it was intense. I rarely do anything placidly, and that was certainly true of my vocational discernment. However, there was one night when I was sitting on the porch of my little apartment, cycling through all the questions of discernment, when there was a pause. Everything got quiet. A gentle feeling of love and peace came over me, and I just received it. In that moment, I knew that it didn’t matter what I chose, if I entered community or did something else. In anything I did, God would be with me, and God would love me, and that would be enough. What I shall be had not yet been revealed, but I trusted that when it was revealed, I’d be with Christ.
And then I went back to worrying about the future. Of course I did. That’s what I do. However, that moment of peace shifted things. It took the pressure off. In fact, that peaceful, loving encounter with God is still with me. It calls me back to receive God’s love now, years after that quiet moment on my porch. And so, even if I can’t do it all the time, I bring myself to this present moment that I’m living – a chilly April morning in Cincinnati when I’m not worrying about the future of religious life or our community or God Space or myself. I’m just here. And God is here. Who I am has not yet been revealed, but whoever I am, I will be like Christ. I am God’s child now. And so are you.
For Reflection
What do you worry about? What helps you to be present to God, to be open, to trust?
Who are you now? How is God with you now?
What do you need from God in this moment? Maybe you could spend a little time with God and see what God wants to reveal to you.
Sister Leslie Keener, CDP
Sister Leslie Keener, CDP is the director of God Space, a community-building spirituality ministry in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. She’s a Sister of Divine Providence with a Masters in Ministry and a Certificate in Spiritual Direction and Retreats from Creighton University. She directs retreats, meets with people for spiritual direction, and serves as the vocation director for her community. She also serves on the Coordinating Council of Spiritual Directors International. She enjoys music, dancing, meaningful conversations, and this present moment.