The future we might not have

Human beings have been called homo prospectus, which loosely translates as the One Who Anticipates the Future. Beyond complex language and sophisticated technologies, what makes humans unique is our ability to anticipate what is to come, and we spend a lot of our lives thinking about and planning for the future. My thoughts often drift towards driving back to Michigan next summer, or retirement, or watching my son land his first solo flight.

​But our ability to anticipate the future is limited because our lives are not as stable as they seem. Aldous Huxley once said, “the only thing we can say for certain about the future is that we are totally incapable of foreseeing it accurately,” and this limited ability to predict the future is visible in the Parable of the Rich Fool who stores up grain so that he can “take life easy; eat, drink, and be merry” (cf. Luke 12:19).

“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you.”  ~Luke 12:20

​The Rich Fool is spending his energy on a future he won’t have. I don’t know the state of the souls of some of my favourite artists – such as Otis Redding (dead at 26 in a plane crash), Albert Camus (dead at 52 in a car crash), and John Candy (dead at 43 of a heart attack) – but I wonder if they were all thinking more or less the same thing as the Rich Fool. They had achieved worldly success and were likely planning to enjoy the fruits of their labour. But nothing is more certain than death, and nothing more uncertain than the hour. The same goes for me. I might not live long enough to enjoy retirement, meaning that I also spend a lot of time working toward a future I might not have.

This realization could easily lead to a You-Only-Live-Once-focused hedonism, which would compound the foolishness of waiting to be happy until we’ve achieved a material milestone. God asks the Rich Fool, “Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ Gaudium et Spes provides the answer that “everyone must consider his every neighbour without exception as another self.” Whoever is not giving their riches to God (through their neighbour) is missing the point and failing to anticipate what comes after.

I am writing this on August 9, the perfect day for Jesus’s teachings over the past two liturgical weeks to sink in. On August 9, 1942, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross was murdered at Auschwitz (aged 50). She saw it as her vocation “to intercede with God for everyone.” August 9, 1943, is the day when Blessed Franz Jӓgerstӓtter was beheaded for his refusal to fight for Nazi Germany (aged 36). He wrote to his wife, “I cannot believe, that just because a man has a wife and children, a man is free to offend God.” On August 9, 1945, Nagasaki was bombed, and Servant of God Takashi Nagai (then 37) worked tirelessly to help the victims, only discovering two days later that his wife had been burned to death in the explosion. All he found of her was her right hand holding a rosary. He wrote later in The Bells of Nagasaki: Even one precious life was worth saving. Japan was defeated, but the wounded were still alive. The war was over, but the work of our relief team remained. Our country was destroyed, but medical science still existed. Wasn't our work only beginning? Irrespective of the rise and fall of our country, wasn't our main duty to attend to the life and death of each single person?

Takashi Nagai and his family.

A Jewish philosopher, an Austrian farmer, and a Japanese doctor provide three examples of people who were not storing things up for themselves. They were people who rejected the prospect of taking things easy and were instead rich toward God. Some argue that the Christian belief in an afterlife discounts this world, but the examples above show that nothing could be further from the truth. These saints committed to this world precisely because they anticipated the eternal future of their souls.

Memento Mori

The more I contemplate memento mori – “remember that you must die” – the more I am called to greater love in my present relationships. My inescapable mortality is a call to virtue right now. The more I consider Jesus’ promise that we will be sorted in the final judgment, the more excited I am to visit with my friends at the long-term care facility I volunteer at on Monday nights.
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When I catch myself daydreaming about the future I might not have, I gently redirect my attention towards my eternal future because Jesus advises, “you do not know the day or the hour” (Mt 25:13). To live each day as if it was my last includes making sure I am dressed and ready for service (Luke 12:35) so that I can rejoice in this life and (hopefully) the eternal future that God offers beyond the fleeting pleasures of this world.    ​​

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Written by Jason Openo for Faithfully.