Who Art in Heaven
One
Far Away or Very Close?
Imagine you’re writing a letter, or an email, to someone you think is on the other side of the earth. An eighteen-hour plane ride away, twelve time zones. You’re writing to tell them how much you miss them, how hard it is to be so distant. And then you look up from your writing and imagine your shock and happiness when the very person you’re writing to is standing right in front of you, smiling. They’re not a world away after all! They’re right there, with you, here and now!
Do you understand that that’s actually what’s happening every time we begin the Lord’s prayer? Every time we say, “Our Father, who art in Heaven,” the divine Father who feels so far away, is actually right there, right here, with us?
Two
God Isn’t an Absentee Father
Some people say they feel like God is an absentee Father, someone who isn’t there for us. Maybe He’s generous and indulgent, maybe He’s strict and harsh, but He’s not around. Maybe we feel that way because we think of Heaven as some point in space, billions and billions of miles up and away. But of course, it isn’t.
God the Father isn’t a physical object. He doesn’t dwell in space. When we think of Him like that, we think of Him as far away and unconcerned with us. The Book of Job presents this false idea when it criticizes those who say that, “The clouds are his covering, and he does not consider our things, and he walks about the poles of heaven.”
That’s not it. That’s not how it works. God counts the hairs of our heads. He watches as every sparrow falls to the ground. He deliberately preserves everything in existence at every moment, holds us in being.
Like a mother standing and holding her infant child in her arms, she’s as intimately close to that child as can be. And God’s even closer to each of us. He doesn’t just sustain us in the air, He sustains us in existence.
And if we have allowed the Father into our souls through grace, if He has come and made His abode within us, as Jesus said He would, then He’s even closer to us than that.
He’s not just keeping us in existence, He’s not only surrounding us with care, He’s inside us, loving us from within. And that’s what Heaven is. The soul perfectly in God and God perfectly in the soul.
Three
Heaven as Sanctity
Heaven is the perfect communion of the soul with God. Heaven is where we don’t resist God’s love, and where we don’t restrain our love for God. What does it mean to be in Heaven? Basically, it means to be a saint. And that’s where God is. Heaven is where God lives. And He lives in the souls of the saints.
So when you say, “Our Father, who art in Heaven,” think of the holiest, happiest person you know. That’s where God lives. That’s what it’s like to be in Heaven.
The point is that heaven starts now. Pope Leo XIII once wrote that what we have here and what the saints have in Heaven differs only in degree; not in kind (Divinum Illud Munus, #9)
Our Father, who art in Heaven, bring us to Heaven too. Not later. Now. Burn through the walls of sin and cowardice that keep us from being saints, that keep us from being happy, that keep us from being with you, and keep you from being with us.
Four
Heaven is a long way off for Most of Us
So if Heaven is where God dwells with the saints, they in Him and He in them, whether in this life of the next. Well, then actually maybe Heaven is a long way off.
It’s not a long way off spatially. As we’ve seen, there’s actually no spatial distance between us and God. None at all. But it’s a long way off spiritually.
Because you and I have a lot of resistance to the Father that has to be broken down. We have a lot of obstacles to God’s love, and until those are ironed out, whether in this life or purgatory, we will not be in Heaven.
How do we find out what those obstacles are? What’s keeping us from Heaven? Actually, it’s simple. What keeps us from the true God is the same thing that’s always kept humanity from the true God.
What keeps us from Our Father Who Is In Heaven is idolatry. If we can rid ourselves of our idols, really rid ourselves, then we’ll be in Heaven.
So what are our idols?
Five
Idols of Earth or Our Father in Heaven?
In the Old Testament, idols represented the things of earth. Idols were made out of earthy materials: wood or mud or metal
Idols were connected to some natural, phenomenon, a river, a tree, fertility, rain. And idols made you attached to something of earth, power, security, comfort, wealth.
By contrast, the true God dwells in heaven, not on earth. He tells you to forsake your idols, your earthly attachments. He says that every worldly thing is passing. That it’s not enough, and it won’t last. That you can’t set your heart on it. And He says if you make anything other than Him, anything on earth, your ultimate value, the one thing you can’t live without, you will be lost.
Our Father is in heaven. Idols are of the earth. Satan called the Lord of this world. Figure out what worldly attachment is binding you to earth. Figure out what worldly thing makes you sin, makes you anxious, and makes you reserved in giving yourself to God. Figure out what worldly thing is making you bow down before an idol, and making you obey Satan.
When you say, “Our Father, who art in Heaven,” ask God to help you detach from that thing, to not care about it so much. Maybe mortify your desire from it.
Remember, you can be in heaven with your divine Father as soon as you cut the cords of idolatry weighing you down to earth. So why not do that now?