The goal of the rest of our lives is to displace the culture of death with a civilization of love and life. This will probably be done not primarily by popes, presidents, judges, generals, or billionaires. Of course, the lives of prestigious people are important in God's plan. However, the Lord typically chooses to change the world through teenagers like Mary, carpenters like Joseph, toddlers like Samuel, weeping women like Hannah, loving husbands like Elkanah (see 1 Sm 1:5), and manual laborers like the early apostles (Mk 1:16ff). "God chose those whom the world considers absurd to shame the wise; He singled out the weak of this world to shame the strong. He chose the world's lowborn and despised, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who were something" (1 Cor 1:27-28).

God's way of changing the world is the "little way" proclaimed by St. Therese, the "Little Flower," and by many other saints. This means that the little things of our everyday lives are very important in God's plan. Because we are adopted children of God, the love and faith we show in the details of life will turn the world right-side up. Because we have been baptized into the body of Christ, everything we do has universal, everlasting significance.

Let us rejoice in our awesome dignity and consequent responsibility. Let us live earth-shaking, world-changing, simple lives charged with love.

Nihil Obstat:  Reverend Robert A. Stricker, June 23, 2003

Imprimatur:  †Most Reverend Carl K. Moeddel, Vicar General and Auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, June 26, 2003