What Is the Meaning and Purpose of Life? This is the all-important question for every human being; for what will all the world beside profit us if we miss the whole purpose of our existence, if we fail to attain our true destiny?

 

1. Both reason and revelation tell us that God is the author and the last end of our life. Being creatures of God, the work of His hands, we belong to him absolutely. "In Him we live and move and are" (Acts 17: 28). The last end of man can be nothing else but God from whom he came, "for of Him, and by Him, and in Him are all things" (Rom. 11: 36). Hence the purpose of our life is to do the will of God, as it is written in indelible characters in every human heart, as it was proclaimed on Sinai and on the Mount of the Beatitudes, as it is manifested in the duties of our state and calling, and as it is made known to us by those who share in God's authority here on earth in the family, the State and the Church.

 

But our submission to God's holy will must not be founded on servile fear; it must be a voluntary, loving and generous self-surrender to His will. Our service must be the service of a soldier who unhesitatingly carries out the commands of his general; but also the service of a child that sees in God his loving Father and his greatest benefactor.

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2. This ideal of perfect harmony between the human will and the divine will is realized in the life of the God-Man Jesus Christ. He came on earth, as He Himself tells us, simply to glorify His Father and to do His will. He speaks of His Father's will as His food and drink, as the atmosphere He breathes, as His unfailing consolation. His whole life from the Crib to the Cross was one act of obedience to His heavenly Father. In His life and death He fulfilled most perfectly what the Angels proclaimed in their Christmas message: "Glory to God in the highest." Hence He could say on the eve of His Passion: "I have glorified Thee on earth, I have finished My Work Thou gavest me to do; and now glorify Thou Me, O Father, with Thyself" (John 17: 4).

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Christ is, therefore, the bright and shining example for all who seek to attain their life's purpose in its "height and breadth and depth", and thus to lay the foundation of their own perfect happiness; for true happiness can be found only in seeking God's honor and glory by doing His will. "God asks no service from us," says a wise and holy man, "which does not promote our highest welfare, and no glory in which we, His creatures, do not share. God seeks His glory in our happiness."

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Hence the simple words which we find on the first page of the little Catechism express the highest wisdom: "We are in this world to do the will of God and thereby to gain everlasting happiness in heaven."

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