William Shatner was a genius ...

... when he sang (said),

"Live life like you're gonna die, because you're gonna."

We are all going to die and there is nothing we can do about it. This idea has been in my head for a few days, since I read St. Athanasius's biography of St. Anthony for class. If you realize that your life is not under you're control, you can work harder to live for God. It's not morbid ... it's just reality:

... when we wake each day we should think that we shall not live until evening; and again, when falling asleep, we should think that we shall not awaken; for our life is of its nature uncertain and is measured out to us daily by Providence ...

Another very smart man, C.S. Lewis, says:

... The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when the world drama will end. The curtain may be rung down at any moment: say, before you have finished reading this paragraph. This seems to some people intolerably frustrating. So many things would be interrupted ... But we think thus because we keep on assuming we know the play. We do not know the play. We do not even know whether we are in Act I or Act V. We do not even know who are the major and the minor characters. The Author knows ...

I've had all that in my head, and then a visiting priest spoke for a couple minutes at dinner tonight. His basic idea was that if you want to have a good spiritual life when you are a priest, you have to start now. That is pretty insightful and I think it applies to everyone. If you want to be close to God, then do it now. If not now, when? Am I going to be a holy and prayerful priest if I don't try to be a holy and prayerful seminarian or even a holy and prayerful person in general?

I have found myself thinking that way many times: "I will be a great student next semester" or "When I'm in seminary, I'm gonna pray constantly" or "This summer I'll do everything I've wanted to." It easy to make goals for some time "when ..." but it's very hard to start doing those things right now.

That's my challenge for you and me. If you know you want to be *insert worthy goal*, then do it. God calls us to do our best for Him. Colossians 3:23 - 24 says, "Whatever you do, do from the heart, as for the Lord and not for others, knowing that you will receive from the Lord the due payment of the inheritance; be slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ."

And as Rage Against the Machine says:

It has to start somewhere It has to start sometime
What better place than here, what better time than now?
All hell can't stop us now ...