I have said this many times, but the witness of the saints who have gone before are a great gift of the Church for our benefit. Often we think we don't possess what is needed to attain sanctity, when it fact, there is only one thing necessary in this life, and that is to be a saint. As someone said, "What else is there?"
The fact is, we have been given all we need by grace to carry out our calling. And we often sell ourselves (and the power of the Holy Spirit) short. There is a story in the lives of the Desert Fathers that stuck with me over the years,
“Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and said to him, “Abba, as far as I can say, I do my little office, I read my psalms, I fast a little bit, I pray and I meditate, I live in peace with others as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. Tell me, Father, what else, what more can I do?” Then the old man, Abba Joseph, stood up, stretched out his hands toward heaven, and his fingers became like ten lamps of fire, and he said to him, “If you will, you can become all flame.”
Although I haven't read much of his life, the recent beatification of Carlo Acutis lends itself to this witness for the millennial generation. He was cheerful, devoted to the Eucharist, and was a whiz with computers. He was a teenager being a teenager while keeping his Catholic faith at the forefront, and using his gifts for God's glory and the benefit of his fellow men. If sanctity seems to be the thing of dusty volumes of patristic ascetics, Bl. Carlo's life, witness, and canonization would offer an argument to the contrary.
There is a tendency when we are younger and trying to find ourselves and who we really are to emulate our heroes in the faith. For me, it was St. Anthony the Great, who wrestled in the desert alone against Satan himself and lived a life of solitude and asceticism. I have an icon of St. Anthony (next to Our Lady of Guadalupe) in my prayer station to come to my aid when war is waged against me. But as I've gotten older, I've sought a spiritual father in the Church Triumphant who can maybe serve as a special patron given how God made me. As much as I love St. Anthony, God did not make me a solitary or an ascetic.
As I go through my spiritual rolodex, there are many many saints (those canonized and those who have not yet been but may be on the way) whom I love and whose diversity spans the breadth. I have written about many of them, and often invoke their intercessions depending on the intention and situation. There is great diversity among the saints.
Were there one I had to choose for my own life, though, to be a kind of "older brother" or mentor--a kind of "spiritual buddy system" whose gifts and personal charisms strike a chord, I think it would have to be St. Philip Neri.
There are many things I love about St. Philip, and many things about his life that have inspired me.
First and foremost, St. Philip had a burning love for our Lord, especially in the Eucharist. He was often taken to ecstasy with a heart on fire. He was spontaneous and impulsive. But he knew that the cornerstone of all virtue begins with humility. He cultivated this humility by sabotaging himself--like purposefully mispronouncing words in the presence of the bishop, or wearing ridiculous clothes or shaving half his beard off. Though he spent hours in prayer, he was also found by visitors to be reading joke books, which he loved. The lesson--to not take yourself so seriously--is one I find so important today.
St. Philip was also an evangelist. He took the "organic approach" to cultivating friendships and relationships across social and class lines. For one thing, he was a layman for many years, but engaged in this apostolic work for many years before he became (was encouraged, actually) to become a priest. He loved going out into the streets and talking with people; he took a very personalist approach to this. He was not a systematic thinking or master planner. The origins of the Oratory began with these informal meetings in his room, where those he invited could engage in edifying discourse, but not without action either. He encouraged frequent reception of the Sacrament of Penance and Communion, and made himself available at all hours for it.
St. Philip lived in the wake of the Reformation, and was one of the great saints of "rebuilding" called to renew the Church, especially in Rome, where he found it full of spiritual laxity and clerical worldliness. Remember, he did this as a layman, as he was not ordained until 1551 at the age of 36.
Humility, humor, and a love of people--these are the things I find myself so drawn to in St. Philip Neri. His organic approach to cultivating friendships and leading people to Christ as a layman are also creative and inspiring. If I were able to be matched up with any saint in history to learn from and identify with, it would be him!
We must be saints. The age is wicked, but despair serves no one well. In a time of confusion, we can offer clarity. In a culture of outrage, be lighthearted. In an age of great sinfulness, make known the great gift of mercy in Confession. We are living through a great leveling of the Church in the culture, and we need those on the ground to go out amidst the rubble and get to work rebuilding from the ground up.
We are given different gifts and talents, but we must first and foremost be ourselves! St. Frances de Sales gave a simple retort to the unattainability of sainthood, "Be who you are, and be that well. So that you may bring honor to the Master Craftsman whose handiwork you are.”
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