'How often do we contemplate God’s nature as joyful love? I suspect we are more likely to image him as stern and serious rather than overflowing with abundant joy. Yet when we reflect on the life of Jesus, a joyful God is who he reveals: ‘At that time, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, Jesus exclaimed, ‘I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth’ (Luke 10:21). Indeed it could be argued that the whole spiritual life is founded on Jesus’ invitation to ‘enter into the joy of your Lord’ (Matt. 25:21). God wants to share his joy with us through his gift of the Spirit of Christ: ‘I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete’ (John 15:11). Therefore, Christ wills that his disciples be known by their joy as a fruit of the Holy Spirit that they possess. In the words of St Paul: ‘I want you to be happy, always happy in the Lord’ (Phil. 4:4). In the midst of a world weighed down by troubles, the Christian is a person possessed by a divine joy that is infectious and attractive. This is why for Mother Teresa, ‘joy is a net of love by which we catch souls’ for ‘the one filled with joy preaches without preaching’. It is why joy is described by G.K. Chesterton as ‘the gigantic secret of the Christian’ (Orthodoxy) and by Leon Bloy as ‘the infallible sign of the presence of God’ (Letter to Jacques Maritain). For all Christians called to participate in the new evangelization, it emphasizes the importance of giving a united witness to the joy of the Lord for ‘with Christ joy is constantly born anew’ (Pope Francis, The Joy of the Gospel, 1)'.
Fr Billy Swan