Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines happiness as a state of well-being and contentment (Joy) or as a pleasurable or satisfying experience.
In a Pew Research Center survey taken in January of 2019 on the relationship between religion and happiness, it found that actively religious people are more likely than their less-religious peers to describe themselves as “very happy.” In the United States, for example, 36 percent of the actively religious describe themselves as “very happy,” compared with 25 percent of the inactively religious and 25 percent of the unaffiliated.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines happiness as “joy and beatitude over receiving the fulfillment of our vocation as creatures: A sharing in the divine nature and the vision of God. God put us into the world to know, love and serve Him, and so come to the happiness of paradise.”
St. Augustine tells us in his writings that “we all want to live happily; in the whole human race there is no one who does not assent to this proposition, even before it is fully articulated.”
And, yet we seem to naturally succumb to seeking happiness in worldly things we can see and touch no matter what our age. Whether it be physical, mental or emotional, if it gives us instant gratification, it is more likely to supplant any happiness that comes to us over time or at the end of our earthly life.
Does that mean it is wrong to seek worldly happiness? No, not if helps us to realize that this type of happiness is limited by our life span.
For example, if we purchase a vehicle with all the bells and whistles, we can appreciate what it has but need to remember it will only last for a specified time. We need to accept and use it for the joy it brings into our life to accomplish whatever good purpose we bought it.
In our relationship with God, we know from Him through scripture that He created us out of love to love Him and all He created. By doing so we can receive the promise of everlasting happiness upon our human death to a life of foreverness in heaven. The world offers us nothing beyond our earthly life.
In this Easter season let us confirm the gift of eternal happiness through Jesus by His dying on the cross for our sins and His being raised from the dead. We can do this by spreading joy and peace as God’s servants to those in need. Doing this helps those caught up in temporary worldly gifts to better understand how God’s power can both offer a realistic perspective of how to live our lives on earth and to better prepare to transition to everlasting life forever in heaven.
It seems to me this type of proposition far outweighs the temporary aspect of fleeting enjoyment. Instead, let us enjoy worldly gifts but embrace God’s sacrifice of promising us eternal happiness based on our faithfulness to His ways of living.
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