The Lord called me from birth,
from my mother’s womb he gave me my name. (Is 49:1b)
One of the things we crave is a sense of belonging. We want to know that we count, that we matter.
That is why we do the things we do from the time we are born.
We engage in all sorts of behaviors designed to get our parents’ attention, our teachers’ attention, our employers’ attention.
Is it not freeing, then, to hear the prophet, Isaiah, proclaim, “The Lord called me from birth, from my mother’s womb he gave me my name?”
When we were conceived, if was through the cooperation of our parents. However, it was directly through divine intervention.
God created us. He formed us in our mothers’ wombs. He fashioned us and made us His own.
In a world that shouts to us from every direction, trying to get our attention and asking us to buy into its values, how comforting to know that we do not have to do so.
We can reject the values of the world because we have other values to which we can cling and on which we can depend.
FAITH ACTION: God formed you. God called you. Live as a child of God this day!
[The last opportunity for confession at St. Thomas More before Easter is this evening from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m.]