Why Joy is More Christian Than Happiness

The Fr. Mike Schmitz Catholic Podcast

Ascension

Christianity, Religion & Spirituality, Society & Culture

4.9 • 7.1K Ratings

🗓️ 27 September 2018

⏱️ 8 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Happiness is circumstantial. In fact, the word has the same root as the word “happenstance”. And yet, despite how fickle it is, many of us base our lives on the pursuit of happiness. Joy, on the other hand, is the abiding and pervasive sense of well-being. Fr. Mike explains that joy is, as G.K. Chesterton wrote, “the gigantic secret of the Christian.” The Christian understands that God knows his name, loves him, and is here with him now. This never changes, and it is what gives the Christian a perpetual joy to which happiness cannot compare.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	You know, it's interesting because a lot of people say that that's all they want, that's
0:11.6	all they want in life, and just want to be happy.
0:14.3	Isn't that kind of one of those drives we have?
0:17.5	In fact, in some ways you could say we're made for happiness, but we're going to come
0:20.5	back to that in a second.
0:22.4	We all have a longing for happiness.
0:24.6	That is for sure.
0:25.8	It's not like news of the year that is just kind of something we all know.
0:31.4	We all long to be happy.
0:32.8	We all want to be happy, and some of us make it the goal of our life to be happy.
0:37.6	I remember hearing us.
0:38.6	I call it just talk about that and said, that is a terrible way to live.
0:42.1	So if you're like, that's me, I like, oh never mind.
0:45.3	That's a terrible way to live.
0:46.2	If happiness is the goal, why?
0:49.1	Because happiness is almost always circumstantial.
0:52.5	It's almost always a thing we experience, not something we can actually achieve.
0:56.0	I mean, think about this.
0:57.0	We have the levels of happiness.
0:58.0	I'll make another video on that one point.
1:00.3	But we have pleasure, comfort.
1:03.7	I just want to be at peace.
	...

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