INNER SANCTUARY | KAIROS GLOBAL | APRIL 2024

Author: Anil Israel

Intro: Anil Israel reflects upon the theological virtue, hope.

The Christian life is a life based on supernatural grace. ‘Grace is participation in the life of God’ (CCC 1996). To live the life of a Christian, our lives need to be powered by divine assistance – power from on high (Luke 14:49). We begin our Christian journey by receiving the sacrament of baptism. Through baptism, sanctifying grace is infused in the soul. Sanctifying grace is the life of the soul. Sanctifying grace includes the three theological virtues of faith, hope and charity which are essential for authentic Christian living. They are called theological virtues because they come from God.

Faith makes us adhere to God as the source of truth; hope makes us adhere to God as the source of good; charity makes us adhere to God for his own sake. ‘By faith, we believe in God and believe all that he has revealed to us and that Holy Church proposes for our belief. By hope we desire, and with steadfast trust await from God, eternal life and the graces to merit it. By charity, we love God above all things and our neighbor as ourselves for love of God’ (CCC 1842-4). 

‘Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ's promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit’(CCC 1817). ‘Hope is the power by which we firmly and constantly long for what we were placed on earth to do: to praise God and to serve him; and for our true happiness, which is finding our fulfilment in God; and for our final home: in God’ (YouCat 308).

Hope is the theological virtue by which we aspire with confidence to grace and heaven, trusting God, and being resolved to use his help. Hope looks directly to our eternal happiness. It is the reaching after good, and, in last analysis, after the supreme good, that is, God. Now, in reaching after God, we also reach for what the possession of God will give us, that is, eternal happiness. ‘Faith has to do with things that are not seen and hope with the things that are not at hand’ (St Thomas Aquinas).

We therefore ought to place our hope in God, not in man. When we try to accomplish everything relying only on our frail human efforts, we may fail. Failure may lead to despair. Despair is the absence of hope. 

If we look at the Exodus journey from bondage in Egypt to freedom in the promised land, we find that the Israelites wandered 40 years in the wilderness because 10 out of 12 spies reported with despair: we are not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we (Numbers 13:31). Only 2 of the 12 spies, Caleb and Joshua eventually made it into the promised land, for they never despaired – Let us go up at once and occupy it; for we are well able to overcome it (Numbers 13:30).

When a child is inside the mother’s womb that is its only known world. Yet the child has a hope that something better awaits on the other side of the womb. A whole new world beyond imagination. Similarly, our earthly life on planet Earth can be likened to a spiritual womb. All that we see around is not all that God has planned for us. Eternity with its magnificent splendour (Psalm 145:5), awaits us on the other side of time and space. Like the unborn child, may we too joyfully hope and await eternal bliss in our eternal home.

Scripture teaches us: we have hope as an anchor for our soul (Hebrews 6:19). Just as the anchor which holds a ship is not in the exact same place as the ship itself, our hope is not in this world. The ship is visible above the water like our visible world. But the anchor is invisible on the sea-bed firm and secure (Hebrews 6:19). Our ‘spiritual anchor’ is likewise in a holier, greater place – the inner sanctuary, behind the curtain (Hebrews 6:19). A sanctuary is a sacred place, set apart from the profane, ordinary world. 

In the Old Testament, the inner sanctuary is the holy of holies (Hebrews 9:3) behind the curtain, where the Ark of the Covenant was kept. In the New Testament, the ‘holy of holies’ is the tabernacle, where Jesus – the living bread (John 6:51) is present. So our hope should be anchored on Christ. Christ has secured our salvation, so we should have absolute confidence in our saviour. Just like the anchored ship remains secure in the midst of a storm, for the anchor is firm at the bottom of the sea, likewise our hope in Christ, prevents us from drifting away from him. We have confidence that he will carry us through the storm. For in this hope we were saved (Romans 8:24).

Now, we all have an inner sanctuary – a sacred space deep within our soul. Is it truly set apart for Christ our hope – the anchor of our life? How often do I visit my ‘inner sanctuary’? This sacred place is behind the veil of our earthly life. Earthly life is what is visible on the outside. What’s behind the veil – on the other (invisible) side of my life – is what’s going on inside. Is my inner life tuned and in-shape for life on the other side of the veil – life after earthly life – eternal happiness in heaven? The Promised Land lying on the other side awaits our individual response. May we cling on to the hope – anchored in Christ – to embrace the Promised Land.