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We all nurse a secret dream of glory. We daydream that in
some way we will stand out and be recognized. And so we
fantasize about great achievements that will set us apart
from others and make us famous. The daydreams vary but,
inside them, always we are at the center - the most
admired person in the room, the one scoring the winning
goal, the ballerina star, the actor picking up the Academy
award, the author writing the best-seller, the
intellectual winning the Nobel Prize, or even just the one
in the circle who tells the best story.
What we are chasing in all this is notice, appreciation,
uniqueness, and adulation so that we can be duly
recognized and loved. We want the light to be shining on
us.
And this isn't all bad or unhealthy. We are built to stand
in the spotlight. Our own reality is massively (sometimes
oppressively) real to us and scientists today tell us that
the universe has no single center but that everywhere and
every person is its center. And so it is not a big secret
that each of us feels ourselves at the center and wants to
be recognized as being there. We nurse a secret dream of
glory and, partly, this is healthy.
What's less healthy in our daydreams is how we envision
that glory. In our fantasies, glory almost always consists
in being famous, in standing out, in achieving a success
that makes others envious, in somehow being the
best-looking or the brightest or the most talented person
in the room. In our fantasy, glory means having the power
to actuate ourselves in ways that set us above others,
even if that is for a good motive. For instance, some of
our fantasies are daydreams of goodness, of being powerful
enough to squash evil. Indeed, that was the messianic
fantasy. Before Jesus was born, good-hearted and religious
people prayed for a Messiah to come and, in their fantasy,
that Messiah was generally envisaged as a worldly
superstar, a person with a superior heart and superior
muscles, a Messiah who would reveal the superiority of God
by out-muscling the bad.
But, as we see from the Gospels, real glory doesn't
consist in out-muscling the bad, or anyone else. When
Jesus was being crucified, he was offered precisely the
challenge to prove that he was special by doing some
spectacular gesture that would leave all of his detractors
stunned and helpless: "If you are the Son of God,
prove it, come down off the cross! Save yourself!"
But, with a subtlety that's easy to miss, the Gospels
teach a very different lesson: On the cross, Jesus proves
that he is powerful beyond measure, not by doing some
spectacular physical act that leaves everyone around him
helpless to make any protest, but in a spectacular act of
the heart wherein he forgives those who are mocking and
killing him. Divine kingship is manifest in forgiveness,
not in muscle.
That is real glory, and that is the one thing of which we
really should be envious, namely, the compassion and
forgiveness that Jesus manifested in the face of jealousy,
hatred, and murder.
We see this illustrated in the Gospels in the incident
where James and John come to Jesus and ask him to give
them the seats of glory at his side. Jesus takes their
request seriously and does not, on that occasion, caution
them against pride. Rather he asks them: "Can you
drink from the cup [of suffering] that I shall
drink?" In naiveté, they answer: "We can!"
Jesus replies: "The cup that I shall drink you shall
drink, but as for the seats [of glory] at my right hand or
left, these are not mine to give."
What Jesus is saying, in effect, is this: You will taste
suffering, everyone will, and that suffering will make you
deep. But, it won't necessarily make you deep in the right
way. Suffering can make you deep in compassion and
forgiveness, but it can also make you deep in bitterness
and anger. However only compassion and forgiveness bring
glory into your lives.
Jesus defines glory very differently than we do. Real
glory, for him, is not the glory of winning a gold medal,
of being a champion, of winning an Oscar, or of being an
object of envy because of our looks or our achievements.
Glory consists in being deep in compassion, forgiveness,
and graciousness—and these are not often spawned by
worldly success, by being better-looking, brighter,
richer, or better muscled than those around us.
We all nurse the secret dream of glory. Partly this is
healthy, a sign that we are emotionally well. However,
this is something that needs to grow and mature inside of
us. Our secret dream of glory is meant to mature so that
eventually we will begin, more and more, to envision
ourselves as standing out, not by talent, looks, muscles,
and speed, but by the depth of our compassion and the
quality of our forgiveness.
Fr. Ron Rolheiser
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