Anxiety 

   “Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.  Then the peace that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and mind in Christ Jesus.” (Phil 4: 6 – 7) 

   We live in troubled times.  Evil seems to be gaining more and more power in our society and in our government.  Even in our churches there are priests and pastors who are bowing to the whims of an evil society.  Faithful Christians are often left wondering and confused; Christ and His truths are being set aside to appease rather than confront a perverse world.

   It can be very easy to become upset and anxious, wondering where our nation and the world is heading, but our anxiety does nothing to change the world.  We can stew and fuss about the way things are; we can complain and point fingers at those who we believe are the problem, but none of that will change the situation.  As hard as it is to accept, there is virtually nothing we, as individual Christians, can do to effect the change that we know needs to occur.

   But that doesn’t mean we can’t fight back against evil.  Every prayer we say reaches the ears of God and He always listens to the prayers of the faithful.  While we can’t know His plans or why things are the way they are at this point in time, we can know that He is in charge and will, at the time of His choosing, make all things new.

   Until then, we need to take the advice of St. Paul to the Philippians; we need to pray, and we need to pray often.  What we must not do is allow ourselves to become anxious and despondent, losing hope.  One of my favorite sayings of Archbishop Fulton Sheen is, “In the end, God wins”.  When we turn our anxieties and frustrations over to Him in prayer, He will give us the peace we seek.