Heroic Faith
“Filled with a noble spirit that stirred her womanly heart with manly courage, she exhorted each of them”
Whoa. Did you catch what was happening in the first reading today? The mother in the first reading is a baller. Not only does she witness the torture and martyrdom of her first six sons, but she also bolsters her seventh and last son to undergo the same fate. She believes in him and exhorts him into heroic faith. She calls the men in her life to be heroic.
Sisters, even as single women, we have opportunities to call men into heroism. We can build men up and show them that we believe in them and believe they are capable of more. Through our friendships and relationships, we can encourage masculine hearts to seek and to adventure and to risk.
Strong, heroic, feminine encouragement carries power.
Masculine hearts need something different than feminine hearts - and that’s a really good thing. We can offer our brothers opportunities to be heroic - in both faith and service. We can let them open doors and carry heavy things and pop the seal on tight jars, but we can also send them into battle. We can offer belief in their goodness, their strength, and their ability - just like the mother did in the first reading.
The mother encouraged her sons to carry masculine heroism by the witness of her own. That can’t have been easy, but heroic faith is often born in discomfort, vulnerability, and in moments when we’re unsure. It can look like moving to a foreign country or simply offering forgiveness to a friend - either way, when we engage belief in moments of weakness, it becomes heroic.
Heroic faith requires bravery.
All heroic faith requires bravery, but sometimes, our feminine heroism looks different than masculine heroism. Like the mother in the first reading, sometimes our heroism means letting men go, letting them run. Sometimes it means encouraging their desires - to adventure, to encounter danger, to leave comfort, to risk, to embark on a mission, etc...
This is especially difficult for me if I care for a guy - romantically or otherwise. I tend to “mother” guys I care about because my feminine heart longs to take care of them. But if I can be brave and send them out into the battle, away from safety, my heroic faith will bolster their own. This weekend, I saw a movie that demonstrated this kind of love perfectly.
Peanut Butter Falcon to the rescue.
Peanut Butter Falcon is a movie about a man with Down’s Syndrome, Zak, who escapes from his home in pursuit of a dream. His caretaker, Eleanor, goes after him and finds him following a rough-and-tumble fisherman with a dubious past (Tyler). As you can imagine, Eleanor’s love for Zak manifests in her desire to take him back home. But, time and time again, Tyler holds her back so that Zak can chase his dreams and become the man he’s always wanted to be.
Eleanor wasn’t wrong to care for Zak or to love him or to care about following the rules - but she “Mom-ed” him so much that she squelched the man he was capable of becoming. Instead of encouraging his dreams and ambitions, she allowed her fear to define her love. She didn’t bolster Zak’s faith in himself or invite him to risk or adventure at all, which was toxic because men need adventure.
Heroic men need heroic women in their lives to encourage them.
It’s true. Men and women need each other. And Sisters, we can offer the gift of heroic faith to our brothers. They need our encouragement and our belief in who they are and the men they are capable of becoming. Venerable Fulton Sheen says this,
“When a man loves a woman, he has to become worthy of her. The higher her virtue, the more noble her character, the more devoted she is to truth, justice, goodness, the more a man has to aspire to be worthy of her. The history of civilization could actually be written in terms of the level of its women.”
Regardless of the relationship, brother/sister or boyfriend/girlfriend, this quote is accurate. Sisters, I propose we become the kind of women Venerable Fulton Sheen is talking about. I propose we become women like the mother in the first reading. I propose that we call our brothers to heroic faith by the way that we love them - encouraging their goodness, calling out their crap, and sending them into battle with our belief behind them.
Father,
Thank You for creating us male and female. Thank You for making us complementary. We’re so grateful to have brothers who call us to be better women, and we’re so grateful that You allow our words to them and for them to carry power. Thank You for all of the spiritual gifts, but most of all, thank You for the gift of encouragement.
Father, help us to live with joy in who You are and the gifts You offer to us. Father, teach us Your ways. Help us to live in Your love and rest in the joy that’s always available in Your presence. Help us to be generous, kind, and patient with our brothers. Help us to call them on and call them out of themselves and into greatness. Help us to be good sisters to them no matter what the circumstances.
Father, thank You again for brothers. We love men - they are just the best. Thank You for creating such incredible people for us to lean on and to love. We love how they reflect You, Father. Help us to remember the goodness and the greatness You’ve placed within them.
We love You, Father. Amen.