So I like Shock Top beer for its flavor. But now I have another reason to like them -- they have a pretty cool advertising campaign going on right now. As I was driving this weekend I saw a billboard of theirs that said, "It's the end of the world. Live life unfiltered." I saw that and immediately thought, "Yeah, I want to live my life unfiltered." And I'm not talking about beer.
Our Catholic faith teaches us that it is the end of the world. Since the coming of Christ 2000 years ago, we have been living in the end times. History turned a corner when God became Incarnate and decided to walk around with His creations down here on earth. Since then we've been living the final chapters of the story. Now that doesn't mean we think the world will come to an end next week. The truth is we don't know when it will end. Even Jesus said that only His Father knew that info! So it may be tomorrow or it may be ten million years from now. But we do know one thing for certain -- the end will come.
And for us, our personal ends may come at any moment. We may die peacefully in our sleep at the age of 98, or we may die in a car crash this afternoon. We don't know when our end is coming, but it is coming nonetheless. We would do well to, then, to live our lives with that in mind and treat each day like it could be our last. That means really living life to its fullest -- we should live life unfiltered.
You don't need the filter of our modern culture telling you that you need the latest gadget to be happy. You don't need the filter of movies or tv telling you what "pretty" or "handsome" is supposed to look like, and how you fall short of that ideal. You don't need the filter of society telling you that you need to have a career before you can marry, or the filter that says two children is more than enough.
You don't need the filter of selfishness getting between you and true friendship. You don't need the filter of fear and anxiety keeping you from true greatness. You don't need the filter of pride keeping you from seeking forgiveness. You don't need the filter of hatred keeping you from healing.
You don't need that filter that separates out sex from love and marriage and children and family. You want to see and understand them all as one wonderfully connected reality. Husbands and wives don't need the filter of contraception preventing their two bodies from becoming one flesh.
And most of all you don't need whatever filter you have in place that is keeping you from God. You want to be plugged in, with direct access to His grace. Open yourself up wide to whatever He has in store for you. It might be a bit scary, but that's ok. Trust Him. You only have one life. So toss out all these filters and live it with everything you've got.
God bless,
Matt
WCU Catholic Campus Ministry
Matthew Newsome, MTh, campus minister
(828)293-9374 | POB 2766, Cullowhee NC 28723
