When you think of goals you may think of where you want to be 1, 5, or 10 years down the road. But what is your ultimate goal?

Monsignor Stuart Swetland, host of Go Ask Your Father™, recently reflected on what our goal in life is – or should be – during a recent Catechetical Corner. He said:

“Today I want to talk a little bit about what our goal in life is – which is heaven. Here’s how the Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it in paragraph 1877:

The vocation of humanity is to show forth the image of God and to be transformed into the image of the Father’s only Son. This vocation takes a personal form since each of us is called to enter into the divine beatitude; it also concerns the human community as a whole.

So when we talk about our goal we say it in different ways. We talk about the vocation or universal call to holiness, and what that paragraph reminds us is that is very personal. Each and every one of us should be struggling, working, cooperating with God’s grace to become the saints we are called to be.

Each and every one of us are fearfully and wonderfully made. We are each unique, and that path and way to holiness will have unique aspects to our personality and our person. God has created each of us, and we are each uniquely and individually loved by Him.

And so we work toward that personal holiness. But at the same time, holiness is a task for the whole community to work together to become the saints we are called to be – the communion of saints. And this is where the virtue of solidarity comes in.

Later in that section of the Catechism, jumping forward to paragraph 2012, this is how the Catechism puts it:

We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him . . . For those whom he fore knew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.

So we are called to be ‘other Christ’s.’ Isn’t that a beautiful thing? To be truly Christian is to be ‘other Christ’s.’ Now, of course I’m quoting from Romans chapter 8, but it is also paragraph 2012:

And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

The glory of God, as Pope Francis reminded us when quoting St. Irenaeus, is the human person fully alive. And we see in the Assumption of Mary that fullness being manifest because she is body and soul in heaven. And we look forward to the bodily resurrection and union with Him in the glory of heaven.

That’s what we pray for, that’s what we hope for, that is our goal in life. There is only one goal in life – union with God. To become saints individually and as a community.”

Listen to the reflection below:

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