Have you ever changed your mind about something? I don’t mean you decided to have chicken instead of steak for dinner or you went for a walk instead of cleaning the kitchen. I mean changed your mind about something significant, almost life changing. Kind of like when a South sider realizes the best baseball team is on the Northside. I share this question with you today because Our Lord is telling us to how to be happy and it causes me to share one of those attitude changes that does help me embrace a more joyful spirit. “Happy those who weep now, you shall laugh”. 

My story begins with something that used to annoy me. It’s something that people would say to me every now and then, and I know it was said from a desire to help me or comfort me. So, I mean no disrespect. It’s just that it annoyed me. What’s that annoying saying? It goes something like this, “Oh, don’t worry so much, don’t be troubled, if God wants you to have it, you’ll have it, if not, so be it.” You may be thinking why would a priest of God find that annoying? Shouldn’t he be all about God’s will? Well, you’d be right, every good Catholic should be about knowing God’s will. Don’t we say in the Our Father, “God’s will be done here on earth as it is in heaven”? Absolutely. 

Then why is “don’t worry so much” so annoying at times? Because responsible people know that it takes effort to get things done. Responsible people make plans and create strategies, business plans for success. Responsible people see irresponsible people as the people who don’t make plans, don’t show any effort. Then they end up mooching off the spoils of the hard workers. Life throws so many challenges at us every day. So, when someone says, “If it’s God’s will, you’ll have it.” Inside I say, “God helps those who help themselves. I shouldn’t expect or depend on miracles to fix my problems or get things done”. I imagine most of us have been there. 

But now I find myself loving this mysterious notion of God’s will. It truly can be a key game changer in the attitude department. Now, when I say to myself, or another says to me, “If God wills it, it will be done” a sense of peace comes over me. The kind of peace that Jesus encourages in His Beatitudes. If I say, “I really want all my parishioners to fully embrace Catholicism and make my parish a beacon of light for the diocese” or if I say, “I really want so and so to reconcile with their sibling or their spouse” I know I have to do as much as I can to accomplish it. But when I tell myself, “If God wills it, so it will be” the burden feels lighter, much lighter. It’s a declaration that God is an active ingredient in all that goes on. God wills us all to be happy but we don’t always will what God wills.