ADVANCING THE NEW EVANGELIZATION
Winning the World for the Sacred Heart of Jesus
Hope in Suffering
Father Pieter vanRooyen
A
year ago last August, in the days following the Pennsylvania grand
jury report on sexual abuse by clergy, I had lunch with a devout
family from my parish. The husband and wife told me about their love
for Christ and the Church and their eagerness to share the faith with
their friends and neighbors—they wanted nothing more than to help oth-
ers come to Christ in His Church—but with sadness in their voices they
lamented, “news like this makes it almost impossible to evangelize.”
Many of us know firsthand the challenges
that face the New Evangelization in twenty-
first century America. In the wake of the
sexual abuse crisis within the Church and
an increasingly secular worldview outside
the Church, where can Catholics turn to find
the strength and courage necessary to stay
engaged in the New Evangelization? The an-
swer lies in the gift of Christian hope.
What makes hope so powerful? Com-
pared to faith and charity, hope seems insig-
nificant. We know the power of faith (recall
the woman with the hemorrhage who was
healed when she touched Jesus with faith,
Mark 5:34), and we know the enduring
character of love (1 Corinthians 13) , but what
do we believe about the power of hope?
The poem Portal of the Mystery of Hope,
by Charles Pegúy, provides a poignant il-
lustration of the nature and power of
Christian hope. The author describes faith,
hope, and love as three sisters who take a
walk through the rocky path of life. Faith
and Love appear tall and strong—after all,
these are the gifts most necessary for Chris-
tian life—but their little sister, Hope, stands
small and diminutive: “the little hope
moves forward in between her two older
sisters and one scarcely notices her.” Walk-
ing between faith and love, hope looks
weak and insignificant.
But the truth is otherwise; “It’s she in the
middle who leads her older sisters along.”
26
It looks like faith and love take their little
sister hope for the walk, but in truth it’s
hope that keeps pulling her older sisters
along the way. Pegúy wrote:
Without her, they wouldn’t be anything.
But two women already grown old…
It’s she, the little one, who carries them all.
Because Faith sees only what is.
But she, she sees what will be.
Charity loves only what is.
But she, she loves what will be…
They march ahead like grown-ups.
Like serious grown-ups.
Who are always a little tired.
But she’s never tired…
Christian hope pulls faith and love into
action. When present obstacles make faith
and charity tired and lethargic, hope’s for-
ward gaze stirs these latter virtues into ac-
tion. Thus, the Bible describes hope as an
“anchor of the soul” (Hebrews 6:19) . Like a
climbing hook anchored on a mountain
peak, hope stretches upward through the
ardor of present difficulties in order to reach
a future good. 1 Hope is a theological virtue,
a gift from God given with faith and love,
through which Christians cling to God’s
promises in the midst of present difficulties.
But is hope just blind optimism? What
makes Christian hope different from mere
wishful thinking? When I hope it doesn’t
Sacred Heart Major Seminary | Mosaic | Winter 2020
rain, I still carry my umbrella. How do I
know my hope is not just wishful thinking?
Natural hope—like my hope for a sunny
day or a pay raise—may disappoint, but
Christian hope does not disappoint, it is
“a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul,”
because it’s rooted in Jesus, who died for
our sins and lives to bring us to the Father
in Heaven (Hebrews 6:19) . In the face of dark-
ness and discouragement within and out-
side of the Church, hope clings to Christ
who has promised to guide and protect
the Church from the gates of hell. Chris-
tian hope can transform our work in the
New Evangelization because it reminds us
that our efforts do not stand alone but they
participate in God’s work of salvation. The
obstacles intimidate but the power to over-
come is the Lord’s.
Although faith and love are needful for
Christian life, we are also saved by hope
(Romans 8:24) . I pray that Catholics stay en-
gaged in the New Evangelization through
growth in the virtue of Christian hope, by
frequent acts of hope, such as the follow-
ing: “My God, I hope in you, for grace and
for glory, because of your promises, your
mercy, and your power.”
Father Pieter vanRooyen is an assistant professor
of theology at Sacred Heart Major Seminary.
1
Cf. ST I, q. 17.