Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
February 1, 2026
Fr Ben Riley
Below the cemetery at Saint Meinrad Archabbey, there are two ponds. They are not very large, but they are quite beautiful. They sit on the west side of the property, so during sunset the red and orange light reflects off the water. There are walking trails that meander around the ponds, and a few benches dotted along the trail for rest and prayer.
I remember the details of the Saint Meinrad ponds so well because I spent a lot of time there while I was in the seminary, especially when I was struggling with something. I would often walk around the ponds in the evening, praying, thinking, wrestling, trying to make sense of whatever was weighing on my heart.
I remember very vividly one night in particular. It was about one week before graduation, which meant my ordination to the priesthood was only three weeks away. And although it’s a little embarrassing to admit, I was completely freaking out.
I was overwhelmed with doubt. I felt so unworthy to be a priest. I remember calling my dad with tears streaming down my face, telling him, “the Church does not need a priest like me — wounded, broken, sinful.” I told him I was only going to make things worse. No, the Church needs priests like Saint Thomas Aquinas, Saint John Bosco, Saint Maximilian Kolbe. The Church needs heroes who actually practice what they preach. I’ll never measure up.
The self-doubt and self-accusation were heavy on my heart. I was this close to giving up, so close to ordination, and my dad knew it. This is what he said to me.
“Ben, the greatest saints were first the worst sinners. God did not call you to be a priest because you are perfect. He called you because you are a sinner who loves sinners. You will tell people about God’s love and mercy because you have experienced it yourself.”
That helped. And you might think, great, this lesson is simple: we shouldn’t be so hard on ourselves because God’s mercy is greater than our shortcomings. And that’s true. But that’s not the point I want to make today.
Because here’s the harder truth. Even though I believe what my dad said, I still sometimes feel like I did that night by the ponds. I still often feel unworthy, broken, hypocritical. The doubts don’t magically disappear. The interior struggle doesn’t just go away.
There’s a quiet expectation many of us carry into the spiritual life: if I finally surrender to God, things should get easier. The anxiety should fade. The conflict should resolve. The suffering should lessen.
When I finally surrendered my vocation to God, I assumed something very human — that the interior struggle would calm down. That once I said yes, the conflict would fade.
What I discovered instead was that surrender didn’t remove the suffering. It revealed it.
And that discovery helps us hear today’s readings correctly.
In our second reading, Saint Paul tells the Corinthians, “Consider your own calling.” Not many of you were wise. Not many were powerful. Not many were of noble birth. God chose what is weak, what is foolish, what is lowly, so that no one might boast except in the Lord.
Paul is describing what surrender feels like. When we surrender, we discover how poor we actually are. How dependent. How weak. And God does not wait for that weakness to disappear. He chooses us and forms us in our weakness.
That is exactly what Jesus is naming in the Beatitudes. I don’t know about you, but I often hear the Beatitudes as cute spiritual anecdotes — gentle sayings meant to soothe us. But they are really not soothing at all. They are demanding, because they describe what faithfulness actually looks like in a broken world.
Blessed are the meek.
The suffering we face in this Beatitude is the suffering of restraint. It is the willingness to be silent when everything in us wants to speak, defend, explain, and win. Being right often comes at the cost of being unloving. Meekness means surrendering the need to justify ourselves, to control the narrative, or to have the last word. It means trusting God to take care of what we are tempted to grab back. That kind of surrender hurts.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.
The suffering of this Beatitude is the cost of fidelity. It is the willingness to do what is right and speak the truth in love even when it costs us friends, reputation, influence, or money.
Living the Gospel seriously will not make us popular. Upholding moral truth about chastity, the dignity of human life, justice for the unborn, the immigrant, the imprisoned, and the poor will put us at odds with the culture.
Refusing to consume what cheapens the human person in a hyper-sexualized world is a real sacrifice. Righteousness costs us something. But Jesus promises a deeper satisfaction that no approval or applause can give.
Blessed are the pure of heart.
The suffering of this Beatitude is the pain of enduring temptation. This is where surrender becomes concrete. Purity of heart is not about trying harder; it is about admitting our powerlessness. Left to ourselves, we cannot overcome lust, greed, comfort, pleasure, power, or pride. Purity comes from remaining in relationship with God through prayer and the sacraments, and from enduring the struggle of temptation rather than escaping it or giving in to it. That endurance is suffering. And it is holy.
The Beatitudes are not poetic language meant to sound nice. They are not instructions for avoiding suffering. They are promises that suffering, once surrendered, is not meaningless.
And ultimately, the Beatitudes are a portrait of Jesus Himself. He lives them all the way to the suffering of His cross. Which is why Saint Paul can say to the Corinthians that Christ became for us wisdom from God, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.
So the call to action today is not to seek suffering or glorify pain. And it is not to believe the lie of the devil, that God punishes us and desires our suffering. It is this: stop running away from the suffering that comes from faithfulness to God.
Stop assuming that struggle means failure. Stop waiting to feel strong before you trust in God.
Instead, surrender again, and again, and again — and then remain faithful inside what that surrender reveals. You are a beloved child of the Most High God.
Blessed are you when surrender hurts.
Blessed are you when fidelity costs you something.
Blessed are you when weakness becomes the place where Christ meets you for healing.
And here, at this altar, we place what we cannot fix into the hands of the One who never wastes our suffering.