“Behold thy mother and thy brethren, without, seek for thee. And answering them, he said: Who is my mother and my brethren? … For whosoever shall do the will of God, he is my brother, and my sister, and my mother.” (Mark 3:32-35)

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What is the meaning of life? I mean what is the meaning of life?

We’ve spoken of what it means to have a life. It means listening to God, by whatever messenger he sends to us. It means seeking God, and seeking him in all honesty, not compromising the truth. It means knowing that the truth is absolute, and you can’t just make it up for your yourself. This is having a life–it is that search we wanderers are making.

To have a life is to seek out the meaning of life. And what will we find? In any search there are two possible outcomes:

1. You find what you’re looking for.
2. You fail to find what you’re looking for.

St. Teresa once had a vision of outcome #2:

I was one day in prayer when I found myself in a moment, without knowing how, plunged apparently into hell. … [I]t was our Lord’s will I should see the place which the devils kept in readiness for me, and which I had deserved by my sins. … I felt a fire in my soul. I cannot see how it is possible to describe it. … I have undergone most painful sufferings … yet all these were nothing in comparison with what I felt then, especially when I saw that there would be no intermission, nor any end to them. [And in turn these] sufferings were nothing in comparison with the anguish of my soul …this inward fire and despair … utterly without the power to hope for comfort.

The Autobiography of St. Teresa of Avila, Ch. XXXII

The Saints are unanimous in their descriptions of Hell. It is physical suffering of which one moment is greater than all the sufferings on earth combined. And it is spiritual suffering whose pain is still infinitely worse: the torment of eternal separation from God.

St. Teresa explains that her vision of Hell “was one of the grandest mercies of our Lord.” She says it was “of the greatest service” having “destroyed my fear of trouble and of contradiction in the world.”

Not only did this vision give her strength in adversity, but it gave her strength to overcome vice. She says, “How could I possibly take any pleasure in those things which led me directly to so dreadful a place?” She describes herself as a horrible sinner, whom God saved in his mercy, whom he brought by degrees to the path of perfection. She had been on the path to outcome #2. She had almost missed the whole point of life. Seeing the end of this path, she was brought back to the true path, the path to outcome #1, which is the Truth itself.

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This Truth, the meaning of all life, is Heaven and the eternal vision of God. Let’s be “narrow minded”: there is no other possibility. You don’t make you’re own meaning. You don’t make your own truth. That’s ridiculous, when you can barely make your own sandwich. That’s the path to chaos and total alienation from God.

Do you think that the one that created us doesn’t care what we do? Do you think He made us for no reason at all?

Only in absolute humility can the truth be seen. We are surrounded by distractions from the truth path. The greatest distraction of all is you, your own individual self, and all your “needs.” Until you give up on everything, you have nothing.

“If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall find it.” (Matthew 16:24-25)

What does it mean to be truly selfless? It is precisely this. To put yourself and your desires last in all things. This is not as easy at it sounds. It is not easy to simply be “a good person.”

When you read the lives of the Saints, St. Teresa, St. Francis of Assisi, Mary and Joseph, St. John the Baptist, St. Therese, you find always this in common. They strove with all their might to kill their own desires.

They denied everything to take up their cross. But what does this mean, to take up your cross?

The world hates the heavenly. It feels judged by God, and so it turns away. Who, at a bar, wants to hear a sermon? Who, watching their favorite TV show, wants it to preach them a moral? Who, engaged in any guilty pleasure, wants to ponder what God thinks of it? The world will go to any length to get rid of the memory of God.

It has, indeed, gone to very great lengths. How many nuns in their habits do you see these days? How many monks in their coarse clothing? How often have you seen monks or nuns or priests portrayed in movies with reverence, and not in mockery? Not often. “But yet the Son of man, when he cometh, shall he find, think you, faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8)

Those who follow Christ, who proclaim their faith in things miraculous and divine, they have marked themselves out especially for persecution. For contradiction, for fear, contempt, and disdain. You are a “fundamentalist.” You don’t believe in modern science. You are a bigot and a racist and you are part of an oppressive patriarchy.

The bear all this is what it means, in modern times, to bear your cross.

And this is why you must give up everything if you want to truly follow Christ. You must give up tolerance, liberty, and diversity of opinion. You must embrace the label “fundamentalist.” You must come back to tradition, to respect of authority, to feeling guilt for your sins. You must submit to the authority of the Church. And now, when the persecution of the Church is so hot, that Rome itself, infiltrated by Freemasons, has apostatized and we are popeless, you must embrace the labels of “sedevacantist,” “conspiracy theorist,” and “radical” as well. So be it. As St. Athanasius put it when the Arian heretics had taken over most of the church hierarchy in the 300s:

“They have the buildings, we have the faith.”

They indeed have the buildings, and more than that. They have the movie studios, the banks, the newspapers, the universities, and the internet. Their propaganda fills the airwaves and commands the attention of almost every man, woman, and child throughout the world. To make friends, you quote TV shows. To get annoyed looks, you quote the Bible.

When God came to earth, he came as a man, Jesus. And he founded a Church. There is only one such Church that has lasted through all the ages. The Traditional Catholic Church.

This whole modernism kick is leading us off the precipice. Have I not convinced you? Indeed I don’t expect to. Only by God’s grace do any of us see the light. But let us do everything for Him Who gave us everything, and Who has the ability to give us infinite joy … or infinite pain.

What is the meaning of life? There are answers out there for those who seek. So please do seek. Be diligent. You only have one life, and next to eternity, it is short.