When a person has a deep hunger to understand and become proficient at something, we say they "have a mind for it":

Bill Gates, for example, has a mind for working with computers;

Lee Iacocca has a mind for running a business;

Vince Lombardi—one of the greatest coaches of all time—definitely had a mind for football. (Given that this is Super Bowl Sunday, I had to mention Vince at least once! I hope you don’t mind.)

Applying this idea now to our faith: As Catholic Christians, we need to develop a mind for the Beatitudes. That is crucial, if we someday want to be numbered among the greatest in the kingdom of God! But developing a mind for the Beatitudes is extremely difficult, because they so easily confound our human minds!—that is to say, from a purely human perspective, they make no sense! I’ll demonstrate this for you now by turning each of them into a question.

Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are the poor in spirit? You mean blessed are those who know their absolute dependence on God? I thought dependence was a sign of weakness, and independence a sign of strength!

Blessed are they who mourn? Are you serious? A woman from our parish had major surgery on her wrist several months ago, and it never properly healed. Recently, she went back to her doctor in Boston to get it checked. While she was in the city, she slipped—and fell—and broke both her wrists! Blessed are they who mourn? She might have a hard time understanding that one right now!

Blessed are the meek? You mean blessed are the wimps of the world who let others walk all over them? That does not compute!

Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness? What fun is there in that? As Billy Joel put it in one of his songs, "I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints; the sinners have much more fun!"

Blessed are the merciful? Does that mean we’re supposed to dispense with justice, and allow terrorists and rapists and murderers to go free?

Blessed are the clean of heart? Don’t you also have to be shrewd and cunning, so that others don’t take advantage of you and make you look like a fool?

Blessed are the peacemakers? Ever try to bring peace into a situation? Ever try to mediate peace in a family dispute? In my experience, you can go from being the bearer of peace to the target of everyone’s wrath in no time at all! What kind of blessing is that?

Blessed are they who are persecuted for holiness sake? Blessed are those who are insulted and persecuted and slandered for the cause of Christ? That sounds like masochism to me—and since when is masochism a virtue?

"Please stop, Fr. Ray, my mind is on overload!"

That’s right—and it should be!

As a human being with a human nature tainted by concupiscence, I do not have a mind for the Beatitudes, and neither do you. If anything, we have a mind for the anti-Beatitudes! Sad to say, they make far more sense to us.

That’s why I said a few moments ago that we must develop a mind for these truths—which requires personal effort on our part (as well as the grace of Almighty God!).

Of course, we can take some consolation in the fact that this is true for almost everything else that’s productive or worthwhile in life: like it or not, effort is necessary to develop a mind for it.

For example, Bill Gates did not come into this world with a mind for computers; Lee Iacocca wasn’t born with a mind for business; and the late, great Vince Lombardi didn’t come out of the womb with a mind for football: Gates developed a mind for computers over time; Iacocca did the same with respect to business, and helped to save the crumbling Chrysler Corporation; and Lombardi did it as a pro football coach, which is why the Super Bowl trophy now bears his name.

And how did they develop "minds" for their respective enterprises in life? Very simply, they studied, they pondered, and they learned.

So how do you develop a mind for the Beatitudes? You do the same thing: you study, you ponder, you learn, and, of course, you pray—because ultimately this has to be the work of God’s grace in us.

I’ll illustrate this now by using myself as an example. Over the years, I’ve learned more and more about the Beatitudes, I’ve dealt with the misconceptions I had about them, and I’ve studied the lives of many people who have actually lived them. I’ve also pondered my own experience—and prayed about it—such that I can now see more clearly the wisdom of these spiritual truths.

I know, for example, that whenever I’ve tried to run my life my own way—without reference to God—I’ve made a mess of things. On the other hand, when I’ve relied on God, he has made my paths straight (to quote Proverbs 3): blessed are the poor in spirit. I’ve come to recognize that the death of my dad in 1971, the death of my mom in 1990, and the other trials I’ve experienced in my life have also been occasions of great personal and spiritual growth. I’ve known others who have also experienced growth through suffering, and who have been reconciled with members of their families in the aftermath of terrible tragedies: blessed are those who mourn. I’ve learned from observing my grandmother and other godly people that being meek doesn’t mean being a wimp, it means trusting God even when things seem to be falling apart all around you. To trust the Lord in the midst of that type of darkness requires incredible inner strength: blessed are the meek. When I compare the life of a John Paul II to the life of a Jim Morrison or a Kurt Cobain—both of whom lived recklessly and died tragically in their youth—I realize that those who hunger and thirst for holiness are really the blessed ones. As I observe the conflict between Jews and Arabs in the Middle East (and the violence between other ethnic and religious groups), I realize—as the Holy Father said in his New Year’s Day address—that "There can be no peace without justice, and no justice without forgiveness.": blessed are the merciful. From watching my saintly mother, I learned that it’s possible to be—in the words of Jesus—"clever as a serpent, and innocent as a dove": blessed are the clean of heart. And yes, working for peace is almost always difficult, and sometimes you find yourself the target of other people’s wrath—but I think the goal you’re trying to attain is well worth the effort: blessed are the peacemakers. And, as far as persecution and insults are concerned, everyone experiences them at some point in life. So the crucial question is not: Will I suffer persecution?—because soon or later we all will. The key issue is: For what will I be persecuted?—Will it be for doing evil, or will it be for following Jesus Christ? There’s no peace in the former, but there is peace—and even a measure of joy—in the latter, as Jesus indicates in the final beatitude. And the joy and peace only begin here; they reach their fulfillment in the Lord’s eternal kingdom. St. Peter put it beautifully in his first letter when he wrote, "If it should be God’s will that you suffer, it is better to do so for good deeds than for evil ones."

Does all this mean that Fr. Ray is a saint? No, far from it! All it means is that I’ve learned a few important lessons which are helping me to develop a "mind for the Beatitudes."