Advent: How Much Is Enough?

Deanna Bartalini reminds us that our spiritual life is not about everything, but about enough.

Enough means having or doing what is required; nothing else is needed; stop. However, as I take in information from people around me and the world, I sense that enough can be taken as giving up or not doing your best. I hear the question, “Am I doing enough?” spoken quietly with a look of concern that somehow, the person is letting others down. Am I doing enough for my children husband, and employer? The list can be endless. And then the question is applied to our spiritual life.

That can be dangerous. God is not about “enough.” He is about fullness, abundance, and lavish love which we receive from Him because we are His. We cannot repay Him for all He gives us or outdo Him in generosity. But we want to thank Him; that is a natural inclination, a response to His goodness.

Somehow though, our desire to thank gets tangled up in doing it in a certain way, the best way, and we start to feel and then believe that we can never do enough. Now there are many things in our faith that are done in a certain way—the sacraments quickly come to mind. Those need to be done in a certain way. But there are far more things that can be done in many different ways and still be efficacious.

Right now, we are at the beginning of Advent. Is there a way to do Advent? Yes. The way it works for you! When I was in elementary school, I don’t recall ever celebrating Advent at home or in school. I went to Catholic school, and we didn’t make paper-plate Advent wreaths and purple paper chains or put straw in the manger for baby Jesus. And I think I turned out quite knowledgeable and grounded in my faith.

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When my children were young, we had an Advent wreath and we lit it every night, I think after dinner. I recall intense conversations among other moms if the candles were to be lit every evening or only on Sundays. What was the rule? Honestly, I said nothing because I could not charitably say, "You are overthinking this and need to relax."

Whatever you can do with the right intention is enough. If there was one thing I could have told my younger self it is that I am doing enough. Somehow my thinking that I wasn’t doing enough led me to believe that I was not enough in God’s eyes. And nothing was further from the truth. My desire was to do all the things, the prayers, novenas, Adoration, Holy Hours, Bible studies, and more. If I did all the things, I would be enough. Not true. Enough, when we look at it as fullness, is how we are created by God.

Click to tweet:
What we do, how much we do, how well we do it: not the point of the spiritual life. #catholicmom

What we do, how much we do, how well we do it: not the point of the spiritual life. Your season of life is huge in determining what your daily spiritual life looks like. For some of us, it is five quiet minutes in God’s presence with intention. For others, it is daily prayer for an hour, Mass, and weekly Adoration. And for most, I think it is somewhere in between.

You know if you are doing enough in your spiritual life. If you have small pricks of conscience that lead you to consider if you are doing enough, pay attention. God may be calling you to more prayer time or to go deeper into Scripture. Keep in mind, though: overwhelming guilt or shame is not from God. If God calls you to more, He will lead you with love.

Our spiritual life is a way to learn how to best live out the life God has graciously given us. It is a means to an end, not the end. Not only in this Advent season, but in every season know that enough is enough.

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