Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Sick Pilgrim

Home
Catholic
Dark Devotional: The Terror of the Saintly Call

Dark Devotional: The Terror of the Saintly Call

Last updated on: October 28, 2016 at 8:22 am by Guest Contributor

Dark Devotional: The Terror of the Saintly Call 2016-10-28T08:22:04-05:00 Guest Contributor

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Photo Credit: Jonathan Ryan

At that time, Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town.
Now a man there named Zacchaeus,
who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man,
was seeking to see who Jesus was;
but he could not see him because of the crowd,
for he was short in stature.
So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus,
who was about to pass that way.
When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said,
“Zacchaeus, come down quickly,
for today I must stay at your house.” (Luke 19)

I don’t scare easily. Ghost stories told in dark woods are more likely to result in fits of laughter on my part rather than terror. Insects and snakes are creatures that I don’t enjoy (in the sense I wouldn’t invite them to live in my house, to share a bed with me); but I’m not terrified by the existence of creepy-crawlies. “You do you,” I say to these creatures. I’ll stay here.

Yet, I am terrified by God’s resounding call to give my life over to the practice of self-gift. I can only imagine the trembling fear that seized Zacchaeus as he heard, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house” (Lk. 19:15). The very Lord of the universe, the Word made flesh, cries out, “Come and see me.”

I often wonder what Zacchaeus would have thought. Once, I had a teacher call me to the front desk in order to give me a discipline slip. Such slips, while now laughable to my mature self, were horrifying to my do-gooder, 8th grade existence.

During lunch, I had thrown a tater tot with some velocity at a friend. It was a senseless sin of the first order. The kind of thing that was often performed by junior high boys but rarely noticed. I assumed that the teachers simply allowed the captives to perform this act in order to keep the peace of the prison (or school depending upon your perspective).

As I walked to the front desk, I prepared to receive my punishment. The teacher had written a discipline slip, except he filled it with various affirmations of my character (this was an excellent way for me, incidentally, to shed my reputation as a do-gooder). He let me know that he was tired of writing discipline slips and wanted to offer praise of a student rather than punishment.

This must have been what Zacchaeus had experienced. In encountering the voice of Jesus, he meets the one who knows all of his sins. All of his faults. All of his follies. Zacchaeus must have expected a good railing. He must have expected judgment.

But he gets something even more terror-inducing. Jesus does not come to chide the tax collector. He comes to give the totality of divine love. The kind of divine love that is so scary because it requires that we change our lives. That we, like Zacchaeus, give not just half our possessions but our whole being over to the purifying terror of the call.

What scares me most is that God is calling me.

In some sense, All Hallows Eve and All Saints Day are twin festivals. On All Hallows Eve, we revel in the terror of a haunted world. We laugh at evil, revealing its powerlessness. For what can the darkness do in a world in which love reigns. In which light shines even into the darkness, and the darkness cannot understand, cannot conquer, will not win.

The real terrifying day is November 1st. For on this day, we hear the divine call that the purpose of human life is not profit, not prestige, not power. But saintly love. And that I’m called to this love. That I, as well as a host of unknown saints, are called to see love, become love, be love.
What terrifies me is not ghosts or ghouls. Elves or werewolves. Snakes or spiders.

What terrifies me is that I’ve been called to be a saint.

______________________________________________________

Timothy O’Malley is the director of the Notre Dame Center for Liturgy. He is the author of Liturgy and the New Evangelization: Practicing the Art of Self-Giving Love (Liturgical Press, 2014). He is presently working on a monograph entitled On Praise: Worship and the Eschatological Imagination. This book is a work of historical liturgical theology, unfolding the eschatological dimensions of Christian worship in Augustine, John Henry Newman, Joseph Ratzinger, Jean-Yves LaCoste, and others.

Previous Post

October 27, 2016

We are Blood Thirsty: Twilight, Fifty Shades, and Leviticus

Next Post

October 29, 2016 The Crucifixion Made Halloween Possible

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Advent Approaching Mystery art Book Reviews Catholic Ghost Story Catholicism community Confession Current Events Dark Devotional Deconstruction Deconstruction Fellow Travelers I Want To Believe Interview Laudato Si Lent Mary Matthew's Letters Movie Reviews Music Reviews Our Charism Personal Essay Pilgrims Pope Francis Popular Piety Prayer Publishing Richard Beck Saints Satan Sheed and Ward Sick Pilgrim Charism Sick Pilgrim Chats Sick Pilgrim Events Sick Pilgrim Travelin' Medicine Show Sick Pilgrimage to The West Sick Pilgrims Small Joys Spiritual Autobiography Spooky Files of Ave Maria Magazine Spooky October Spooky Pilgrim Spooky Pilgrimage Strange Journey The Inklings Things Keeping Us Going Trying to Say God TV Reviews Uncategorized women in the Catholic Church Wonder Podcast Write the Vision

Select a Month February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 October 2019 September 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

True or False: Believers are sealed with the Holy Spirit as a guarantee of their inheritance.

Select your answer to see how you score.

FALSE TRUE