Maybe Faithful Is Enough

A reflection on 1 Corinthians 4:1-5 for Friday of the 22nd Week in Ordinary Time.

There are days when I would very much like my faithfulness to look impressive.

I would like prayer to feel deep and focused. I would like everyone to arrive at Mass calm, appropriately dressed, and spiritually receptive. I would like family prayer to happen without anyone getting distracted, arguing over whose turn it is, or suddenly remembering that they need a drink of water.

That is not always how it goes.

Sometimes faithfulness looks much less polished. It looks like showing up tired. It looks like beginning a prayer again after being interrupted. It looks like apologizing when I have been impatient. It looks like trying to teach my daughters something about God while being reminded, rather quickly, of how much I still have to learn myself.

Saint Paul writes that we are “servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God,” and then he says something wonderfully simple: a steward must be trustworthy.

Not impressive. Not admired. Not unusually productive.

Trustworthy.

I find that deeply reassuring because I can so easily turn the spiritual life into another place where I measure myself. Am I praying enough? Serving enough? Teaching my children enough? Am I doing enough at the parish? Is our family Catholic enough?

There is always some imaginary person doing all of this better, probably with matching shoes and children who sit perfectly still through the homily.

Paul gently pulls me away from that comparison. My job is not to create an impressive Catholic life. My job is to be faithful with what God has actually entrusted to me.

That changes the question.

Instead of asking whether I accomplished enough, I can ask whether I loved the people in front of me. Did I return to prayer when I wandered? Did I forgive? Did I tell the truth? Did I make room for God in the middle of an ordinary day?

Motherhood has taught me that much of what forms a life happens through repetition. Meals are made again. Clothes are washed again. Questions are answered again. Bedtime prayers are prayed again. The same child may need the same reassurance more than once, and I may need the same grace from God far more often than I care to admit.

There is something very Catholic about that repetition. We return to Mass. We return to confession. We return to Scripture. We make the Sign of the Cross again and again. God does not seem embarrassed by our need to begin over.

Faithfulness is often less dramatic than I imagined it would be.

It may be staying when leaving would be easier. Listening when I would rather defend myself. Keeping a promise no one else remembers. Bringing my family to God even when our prayer feels distracted and imperfect.

None of this looks especially remarkable from the outside.

But perhaps that is the point.

God is not asking me to impress him. He is asking me to trust him enough to keep showing up.

And on the days when I feel as though I have done very little well, I find comfort in that.

Maybe faithful is enough.