Don’t despair

Feel like your work is thankless, monotonous and tiring?

Pope Benedict has you in mind. And he has some encouraging words.

In a traditional meeting that takes place every year in January, Benedict XVI today received members of the General Inspectorate for Public Security in the Vatican.

But read on. This conceivably applies to anyone and everyone.

In his remarks the Pope referred to the sacrifices their activities involve, sacrifices that also affect their families “because of the shift-work required in order to maintain constant watch over the area around St. Peter’s Square and the Vatican”.

Or whatever you do in your daily work.

He went on: “A new year is beginning and we have many expectations and hopes. Yet we cannot hide the fact that many threatening clouds are gathering on the horizon. We must not, however, lose heart, rather we must keep the flame of hope alive in our hearts. For us as Christians the true hope is Christ, the Father’s gift to humanity. … Only Christ can help us build a world in which justice and love reign”.

Now look at the beautiful simplicity of this message. 

Benedict XVI told the members of the Inspectorate that their work “can be experienced as a mission; a service to others through order and security and, at the same time, a form of individual asceticism; what we may call constant internal vigilance which requires harmony between discipline and cordiality, between self-control and attentive welcome of the pilgrims and tourists who come to the Vatican.

“If undertaken with love”, he added, “such service becomes prayer, a prayer even more welcome to God when your work is thankless, monotonous and tiring, especially during the night and in bad weather. It is by doing their duty well”, he concluded, “that each of the baptised achieves his or her vocation of sanctity”.

Whatever you do, do it well. And take heart. Remember when Barack Obama said ‘We are the answer we’ve been waiting for’? This is one way to be that.