I am a die hard baseball fan and player. In the game, we have sacrifices. Sacrifice flies are those times when we hit a long fly ball, we are out, but the person on base moves up or scores. Sacrifice bunts are intended to give up the batter for the sake of the runner scoring.
The idea is to give up one player for another and it helps to win. When we make sacrifices for our children, we are giving up something that would benefit us or make us happy in order to further the lives of our children. We do this gladly because we love our children and want the best for them.
However, these days there does not seem to be a connection that children understand. They often see that sacrifice as simply a parent doing their duty. It is not valued as a sacrificial act. You know what, that is our fault as parents. We live in a society where we have so much, we only really sacrifice from our abundance. For most of us, it rarely costs us from our needs in life.
This view by the receivers as just another duty done leads to the sense of entitlement that we see too often these days. Parents from the Greatest Generation, those born before WWII, really did have to sacrifice to help their children be more than their parents. The next generation, the Baby Boomers started the confusion.
The Boomers got the life that was better than their parents. They in turn said, ” I want my kids to have a better life” but here’s the thing, those Boomers had the better life and became successful. What we should have done is change our mantra to, “I want my kids to appreciate the life they have”. If we had done that, our later generations would understand sacrifice.
We should know better you know. Christ set the example of sacrifice and it was not a traditional blood sacrifice. Blood represented life itself, all of it. Jesus dying was about each of us giving up all of our lives to follow God. The blood is the symbol, not the object of sacrifice. When we celebrate the Eucharist, Communion, we are agreeing that we are willing to make that sacrifice of ourselves to God’s ways. It is both joyous and terrifying.
It is terrifying because we give up everything to follow and no promise of getting anything back. It becomes joyous when we discover that the life we gave up just doesn’t compare to the life we get in exchange. Let’s celebrate all of life, not just at communion but every day. We give it all up, sacrifice all, to have more.
TMM