December 11, 2005

Most people would consider illogical the quotation of Richard Whately, a teacher of logic in the University of Oxford in the nineteenth century: “Happiness is no laughing matter.” He makes much sense if you under­stand that he speaks of happiness as a blessing not to be trivialized or treated as nothing more than a passing feeling of pleasure. True happiness, which is joy, con­sists not in having what we want but in having what we ought to want. So joy transports the souls even beyond laughter to ineffable serenity and radiance.

In Judaism, moral good consisted in justice: obeying the divine commandments and reaping the rewards for such obedience. In Greek philosophy, morality was the attainment of wisdom. Christ is the Just Judge desired by the Jews and he is the Wisdom from on High desired by the Greeks. But he is more that that. He himself is the source and object of our happiness. For this reason, Christian morality is primarily focused on happiness, more than behaving justly and wisely. This, as St. Paul attests, is why the Jews were scandalized and the Greeks thought absurd, the Gospel of Christ.

A puritan may lead a wholesome life, but his moral life contradicts Christ if it desires anything less than eternal happiness. St. Augustine says that happiness is not attained just in fleeing evil, but in reaching God. There are no sad saints, but sadness is a contagion of puritanism and libertinism alike. To say that saints are not sad does not mean they are remote from suffering. Their heroic virtue subjects them to the deepest pain in a vicious world. But their focus on Christ is a ballast and balance in the spiritual warfare, and in their deepest desolation they do not lose Jesus.

The Third Sunday of Advent is called “Gaudete Sunday” because it bids the Church to rejoice: “Gaudete in Domino semper” (always rejoice in the Lord). Selfishness inevitably is degrading and saddening because it locates happiness in the transitory ego. St. Thomas Aquinas says, “Sadness, as an evil or vice, is caused by a disordered love for oneself, which . . . is the general root of all vices” (Summa Theol., II-II, q. 28, a. 4, ad. 1). The approaching Christmas season inevitably evokes nostalgia and memories of loved ones which can sadden if the soul neglects Christ as the giver of all eternal life and unending joy. Cranking up Christmas carols out of season and wasting time and money in a frenzied social whirl are recipes for sadness, as they distract from the mystery of how Christ came into the world to save us from eternal death. In The City of God St. Augustine describes the moral choice between eternity and truth and love on the one hand and self-gratification on the other: “There is no good capable of making any rational or intellectual creature happy except God.”

Fr. George W. Rutler