September 4, 2024 // Perspective

Joy in Transition

Father Brian Isenbarger

As the folks of our diocese know, a few months back there were a number of priests who were recently transferred to new assignments and parishes. It was my first adventure moving to a new parish as a priest, and I must say it was quite an event!

When a transfer happens, a priest is moved from one parish family to an entirely different one. I spent my first days and weeks adjusting to everything being new – a new staff, a new house, new people. Things as simple as knowing how to turn the lights on in the church were all new. Then, on top of it all, they tell you that you are the one in charge! Yet, in the midst of all of the change and the different responsibilities, there was one constant: Jesus.

I will never forget several years ago Bishop Rhoades talking candidly to grade school students about his life as a bishop. He was mentioning the various demands and difficulties that required him to move from Pennsylvania to Indiana. He made the point that his best friend – Jesus! – was always with him. His best friend happens to be mine as well.

The wonderful thing about Jesus is that He is not simply an abstraction to be thought about or a teacher to learn from. He is the human face of God who comes to encounter us in our own humanity. Pope Benedict XVI is often credited for saying, “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

I would add to the Holy Father’s observation that the encounter with Jesus gives life an abiding joy. Because Jesus is always faithful to us, we are never left alone or abandoned. We can move from one place to another. We can live in want or abundance. Whatever the situation may be, the friendship of Jesus is available to us. This is the cause of our joy.

I have found this to be my own experience during my recent transition to St. Joseph Parish in Garrett. There are new people, new faces, and new rhythms – but it is the same Jesus. I meet Him every day in Eucharistic adoration and at Mass. I listen to Him daily in the Scriptures. I sense His warmth and love in my daily encounters with His people. And I see the spontaneity of His power in the ordinary events of parish life – confessions, anointings, visits with school children, etc.

In our modern world, I sense many are dying from joylessness. We are more mobile and interconnected than at any time in history, while more and more people find themselves isolated and alone. Our rates of depression and anxiety continue to climb, and our life expectancy has decreased for the first time in a long time. But Jesus looks at our generation just as He looked at His first disciples – inviting us into His abiding friendship, inviting us into joy. 

Fundamentally, I think this is the distinguishing proposal of Christianity in the 21st century. Our world has sought to find happiness in the intellectual propositions of Marx and Nietzsche. It has sought to find happiness in political power and hedonistic pleasure. And all of it has left us sullen and empty.

I once heard the story of a theology teacher who finished his lesson when one of his students came up to him after class. This aspiring intellectual called his teacher senseless for believing in the whole project of Christianity. He called Christianity a hoax and its followers foolish. In response, the teacher could have referred the young man to Aquinas’s five proofs for the existence of God, Anselm’s ontological argument, or some other theory to verify Christianity. Instead, the teacher simply replied: “Even if it’s all made up, and none of it is true, I am still happier than you!” The young man went away sad because he knew that joy was, in fact, Truth Himself.

Father Brian Isenbarger is Pastor of St. Joseph Parish in Garrett.