I think one of the most damaging cliches in Christianity is that God wants you to be happy. That seems to short circuit the important part. God wants you to be with Him and therefore happy. Leaving God out of that formulation has been a catastrophe for our culture as well as many many souls.
The more we chase happiness the more we become slaves to our whims and passions. If we chase God and carry our cross we may find joy. the Bible says, “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” Those are the fruits of the spirit.
CS Lewis talked about the “right” to happiness.
November 20, 2023 at 9:53 am
It’s like saying: “Is there no one left here to judge you Daughter?”,
“No sir, they all left.”
“Then neither will I judge you.”
…and forgetting to say: “Go! And sin no more!”
November 20, 2023 at 2:39 pm
Exactly!
November 20, 2023 at 10:46 pm
Thank God and you for this insight!
November 22, 2023 at 4:05 pm
The fat king who wants an heir, has a corrupt Cardinal in his government.
Woolsey dissolved a monastery and kept the money for himself. Henry 8 got the idea of dissolving monasteries from the Church.
If the clergy had stood up to Henry, divorce wouldn’t have come so soon to England. And CS Lewis would have been culturally Catholic.
The real hurt was done to the victims of divorce, however. Standing up to Henry would have meant a charge of treason, and the Braveheart penalty. Thats a pretty high bar. And so the child suffers because the Fathers did not