You know I love asking hard questions, because hard questions can give us beautiful answers! So… how holy were we when we were 36 years old? How spiritually close were we to God? Was He the center of our life? Were we firmly dedicated to prayer? And how much have we spiritually grown since we were 36. For those of us who are younger than 36, where are we going to be spiritually when we’re 36? Will we have reached a certain spiritual maturity? Will we stop committing mortal sins? Will we stop committing deliberate venial sins?

Archbishop Miller came two Fridays ago and mentioned how St. Anthony died when he was 36. I thought, “36? Oh oh… That’s next year for me.” St. Anthony reached the goal of holiness, heroic virtue, loving nothing more than God when he was only 36. And I realized: I’m not there yet. But it kindled something in me, and my desire for holiness was strengthened, and I can’t get it out of my head. I want to be a saint. And this may sound funny, but I want to get there soon!

We all know that there’s always room to improve, so we tend to think holiness is reached at the end of our lives. If most Canadians live until around 75, that’s when we’ll get there. But the life of St. Anthony destroys the myth that we have to wait until we’re in our seventies before becoming holy. Actually, God’s grace can make us holy by the age of 36. And it’s better to strive for holiness sooner rather than later. Because to want something later that’s available now is silly. It’s like saying, “I want to be happy when I’m 75.” No one says this because everyone wants to be happy now.

Here’s the beautiful message of St. Anthony today for all of us: holiness is offered to us now. God offers everything we need to reach holiness now: His love, His grace, a deeper relationship with Him. We may not take Him up on the offer, but He is offering it right now. The saints are very clear that the essence of holiness is uniting our wills to God’s: “wanting what He wants, loving what He loves” (Ralph Martin, The Fulfillment of All Desire, 153). And this is something all of us can do right now.

Let’s apply this to our situation: when we’re at Mass, are we praying and listening, or are we deliberately distracted? During our Novena these past few days, because I wasn’t celebrating Mass I would come in and out of the side door and back door to listen to the homily or help with Communion, and I could see some people really praying, concentrating, preparing before Mass. And then I could see a few people having conversations, talking outside, etc.

Holiness is offered to us tonight! How are we going to spend our night tonight? What’s the best thing to do? Choosing the best is choosing holiness. Choosing the best is always God’s will.

St. Anthony was known as one of the best preachers ever and known for miracles, but that’s not what made him holy; that was the fruit of holiness. What made him holy were his daily choices to love what God loves and do what God wanted. A few examples: he followed God early in life, not just following his friends and leading a superficial life, but became a friar at the age of 15 or 16. After two years, he asked to be transferred to another priory because too many friends were visiting him and it was becoming a distraction—surely a hard choice. And when he became a Franciscan, he humbled himself and devoted himself to prayer, solitude, washing dishes and sweeping floors.

God is not calling most of us to become friars, but, like St. Anthony, He is asking us to humble ourselves, follow Him more closely, get rid of distractions, and to focus on the things that are really important in life. People tell me all the time that they’re distracted with so many things. You don’t need me to tell you what is a distraction for you; you already know.

This past little while has been somewhat hard for me. I’ve been tired and stressed, and it’s affected my body and digestion. I even had two nightmares in the past few weeks, and I can’t even remember the last time I had a nightmare. (I know what you’re thinking: it’s right around when Deacon Lucio got here, but, no, it’s not his fault.) Recently, there was one moment when I started to get very angry. But it was a gift of God when I said, “I’m not going to let this anger take hold of me.” It was hard and painful to go against my inclination, but it was a deep experience of God. I tried to do what God wanted in that moment.

When I was a teenager, I read a little booklet on the saints, with pictures and very simple prayers; it must have been made for children. On the last page there was a question, “What made them saints?” The answer was something like this, “Because they were agreeable when they wanted to be disagreeable, they were silent when they wanted to talk, they loved when it was difficult to love, they were kind when it was difficult to be kind, and they smiled when they wanted to be sad, and they listened to Fr. Justin’s homily when they didn’t want to listen. It was that simple, and always will be.” So beautiful. We can do this at every moment.

A young man once told me how his mother didn’t like his girlfriend. She was always criticizing her, always unhappy with her and always seeing her faults. It was hard for him to live with this; he loved his mother and girlfriend but his mom wouldn’t accept her. One time she was criticizing her clothing and how she was always hunched over and shy. And he said to her, “You’re mocking her” using a strong word in their native language, and so she slapped him, twice. They had been in so many arguments before and he was sick of it, so, in a moment of grace, he gave her a hug and said he didn’t want to talk about it anymore. His mom texted him later saying that his hug was like a balm for her, it was healing. This young man didn’t have to wait until he was 75 to act in a holy way. He was only in his twenties.

My friends, the magic year is not 36 years old. The magic year is next year: where are we going to be spiritually next year? Are we going to overcome our problems? Are we going to change our habits? For me, I’ve resolved to start right now, and by God’s grace, I’ll be much closer to Him. We have an opportunity to grow. All we have to do is love what God loves and do what He wants. Holiness is offered to us right now.