By Ryan LeBlanc

When does admiration lead to hope, and when does it lead to envy?

Early in our relationship, my wife and I would go for walks and look at houses.

That’s all. Walking was a cheap way to pass the time, since where we lived featured some beautiful homes and gardens that we could look at for free.

It is always a great joy to enjoy beauty with a companion.

We would see graceful and dramatic heritage homes, and say things like, “I’d love to have that porch,” and “That’s a nice colour for a front door.” We’d share what we liked and didn’t with each other. Still discovering the other person, we noticed we had similar tastes. Even still, different details would catch the other’s eye, and we would appreciate all the sights: mine, hers, and ours.

The Future Beckons

In these ongoing discussions about what we wanted our home together to be like, we were able to try on different identities, weigh certain values, and critically examine our own and each other’s underlying beliefs.

The neighbourhoods we walked were gorgeous, and eventually we had our favourite routes with our favourite houses. Of course, we started while living in basement suites of large beautiful houses, and so we dreamed of when we would be older, more established, and, well, richer.

That dream seemed far distant, maybe unattainable. And so, we would notice sometimes that our conversation veered towards longing, insecurity, and resentment. Yes, my friends, while we dreamt of a lifetime of holy marriage, we also spent our time in moments of envy.

We wandered quite a long while, constructing our dreams together and envying those we perceived to be living out our dreams already. Eventually I had occasion to think, what of this experience leads us to embody the Gospel, and what leads us away from it?

That is, when does the experience of admiring houses lead to hope, and when does it lead to envy?

The Twist of Envy

What I felt happening in my own heart as we walked was a mix of light and dark. Like the parable of the weeds and wheat, I spent some time just watching and waiting.

It seemed that when we were excited and trusting in God, we could talk about what our life would be like together with joy and expectation – whatever good we could imagine, God’s plan would be even better. In this way, the many hidden twists and turns of our future family did not disturb our peace, because we knew we would arrive at home in the end.

On other days, we might be tired or frustrated or fed up, and our discontent would pour out to vent against “the rich homeowners” who were so busy working too hard, or vacationing overseas, or speculating in real estate, to actually enjoy the beautiful houses they owned. We could feel that our scraping by was a shameful poverty, and our path to what we thought of as financial security was too long, too arduous, too perilous, for us to enjoy the journey. (We could feel this way today!)

Do you see the twist that envy introduces to our appreciation, our dreaming?

Untwisting, Abundant Generosity

Seeing beautiful houses helped us imagine what family we might co-create with God – a life-giving communion of love, along with the building in which we would spend most of our time. We were inspired, lifted up, ennobled and encouraged.

Perceiving other households containing more worth than our own possessions hooked the smallest drift of worry blowing through our hearts and attached a despondent and oppressive spirit to us.

To defend my own self-worth, I had to mentally balance the books somehow. If God loves us all equally, why did I read such a disproportion between what I received and what my faceless, nameless, unknown neighbour had? My self-generated answer was my own anguish at another’s good fortune. Rather than trust that God had the right house for our future family to live in, I locked myself up in grasping at my neighbour’s goods.

As I watched what was going on in my heart, I realized something: envy dissipates in the face of God’s abundant generosity.

Towards Our Forever Home

When I returned to a humble, but secure, basement suite, and spent time with the person I liked the most, I realized my life was rich. And that I did nothing to deserve it.

In fact, I enjoyed every beautiful house we saw together, and I didn’t have to pay for any of them! And if God could provide joyful companionship for someone like me who keeps getting caught up in envy, then he can take care of me come what may.

I’m still walking through my neighbourhood, often with my family. I still have favourite houses and I still watch others’ gardens for ideas I would like to try in my own.

Keeping our eyes open to what is beautiful in this world can help us see what we long for. When envy edges into our admiration, it becomes a signpost that maybe our hope has been shaken. Envy is an invitation to rediscover the boundless grace God wishes to pour into our lives.

With our eyes and heart open to receive these endless delights, God leads us, step by step, to our forever home. We can rejoice in every hint of heaven that teaches us one more delight, inasmuch as we accept them in passing, rejoice in their goodness, and keep walking humbly towards delights we cannot even imagine.

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Ryan LeBlanc is a teacher with Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools and a parishioner at the Cathedral of the Holy Family. His writing is available on his blog at ryanleblanc.podia.com

Catholic Saskatoon News is supported by gifts to the Bishop’s Annual Appeal: dscf.ca/baa.