Practicing admiration, gratitude, generosity, and humility help us to appreciate each other, and not compete with each other so that we benefit from each other’s strengths. Now, that’s good for business!

Mass Readings Audio
http://ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/18_07_01.mp3

Welcome to the fourteenth episode of By Your Life. Thank you for joining me. If you haven’t already, please subscribe at the right side of the page so I can send you notifications when each new episode is posted.

My goal is to inspire, empower, support, challenge, and encourage you to connect Sunday, with Monday-Friday, in a secular, business world. It is my desire to help you live our Catholic faith in the marketplace and to trust that it is good for business. I hope to offer you practical ways to go forth and glorify the Lord by your life.

In this edition, we will reflect on the readings for the Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time. I love these reading because they inspire a new perspective and are rich in leadership lessons.

In the first reading from the Book of Wisdom 1:13-15; 2:23-24, the author speaks of the goodness of God’s creation. He writes:

For he fashioned all things that they might have being; and the creatures of the world are wholesome, and there is not a destructive drug among them nor any domain of the netherworld on earth, for righteousness is undying.

Greatness exists in all of humanity. John Buchan, a Scottish politician, expressed this truth when he wrote: “The job of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity but to elicit it, for it is already there.”

Great leaders are successful because they see the potential in others, value their gifts, foster their development, and don’t diminish it; instead, they encourage it. But, not everyone is able to see this greatness in others, and when they do, they see it as a threat. As a result, what we experience each day when we have customers complaining, employees bickering, and bosses belittling is far from what God intended. What happened to the wholesomeness and righteousness God created and described in the Book of Wisdom?

We get the answer to this question at the end of the reading. “By the envy of the devil, death entered the world, and they who belong to his company experience it.”

By envy of the devil, death entered the world. Envy – the resentment of good things that happen to or belong to others. Envy – the inability to be satisfied with your gifts, but always wanting what others have. Envy – as Gore Vidal wrote, “Whenever a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies.” Envy – one of the seven deadly sins.

If we don’t want to belong to the company of the devil, how do we combat envy? Bishop Robert Barron, in his video series Seven Deadly Sins, Seven Lively Virtues, tells us how to counteract the deadly sins by consciously living the antidotes or the “Lively Virtues.” For envy, the lively virtue is admiration.

Think about the last time you felt that twinge of envy. For me, it was recently when I was reconnecting with a friend who I hadn’t seen in over 15 years. As we proceeded to catch up on each other’s lives in a few hours over dinner, she talked about her successful career. I found that I was comparing myself to her. We had started out in our careers together, yet she progressed to hold much “bigger” jobs than I. Yes, I was envious of her success.

I processed this feeling while I was driving home after our dinner together and I realized that her success does nothing to diminish mine. A “bigger” job wouldn’t have made me happy. If I had the opportunity, I wouldn’t trade my career for hers. I am grateful for both our success.

Looking at others with admiration, we recognize and appreciate that all good comes from God, regardless of whether it comes to me or to someone else. Admiring someone’s gifts is actually giving glory to God.

I also think that in addition to admiration of God’s greatness in others, a little bit of gratitude for what God has given us, goes a long way to help us combat this deadly sin.

St. Paul, in the second reading from his Second Letter to the Corinthians, 2 Cor 8:7, 9, 13-15, gives us a little more insight into how to grow in virtue and that is to be generous.

He writes, “Not that others should have relief while you are burdened, but that as a matter of equality your abundance at the present time should supply their needs, so that their abundance may also supply your needs, that there may be equality. As it is written: Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less.

A common application of generosity is giving money, and certainly, there is a need for this in general, and in the workplace. When a team member experiences a personal financial crisis, there are many examples of co-workers “passing the hat” to help that person out so they can get back on their feet again. But it doesn’t have to be about money. It could be stepping in to pick up the slack when someone is sick, on vacation, or simply over-loaded, knowing that they would do the same for you. All our workplaces would be more successful if this type of generosity were practiced on a regular basis.

However, I think there is another, a bigger picture view of what St. Paul is writing about when he says, “Your abundance at the present time should supply their needs, so that their abundance may also supply your needs.”

God did not dish out the same gifts in equal amounts to each person. Rather, he gave us complementary gifts in just the right amount for our unique purposes. The best example of this is the difference between a great salesperson and a great accountant. In my experience, neither would be successful at each other’s jobs or at least they would not be happy.

The salesperson would go crazy each day having to be in the office, working on a computer, and analyzing data. Similarly, a great accountant would loathe having to pick up the phone and call a stranger and ask for an appointment. They would sit at their desk rearranging the paper clips before they could force themselves to make a cold call. But, that is okay because they are great at analyzing data and accurately accounting for the sales the salesperson makes.

One’s strengths compensate for the other’s weaknesses and vice versa. “Whoever had much did not have more, and whoever had little did not have less” because we each have exactly what we need to fulfill our purpose. (See episode 013 about Living on Purpose.)

It is the job of a great leader to recognize people’s strengths and put them to work. As Peter Drucker said, “Leadership is about creating an alignment of strengths – making people’s weaknesses irrelevant.”

When we come together in the workplace, and we complete each other, not compete with each other, we are able to appreciate the other’s competencies, and seek each other out for help. Which brings me to the Gospel from Mark 5:21-43 and the importance of asking for help.

In the Gospel, Mark writes about two miracles. Both the woman afflicted with hemorrhages and the synagogue official turned to Jesus as a last resort. For twelve years she suffered, and the child of the official was near death before he sought the Lord’s help.

How often do we wait until the last minute to ask others for help and how often do we try to do it ourselves before seeking God’s guidance? Our pride can get in the way. Pride – another of the deadly sins.

I’m working with a leader who is extraordinarily good at developing project plans. It is second nature to him and he just assumes others can do it as well. When they don’t, and they run into trouble down the road, he gets frustrated because it is more difficult to rescue a project near the end than it is to address obstacles up front.

You’ve probably experienced this extension of Murphy’s law that says, “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong,” and at the worst possible time, because nothing is as easy as it looks, and everything takes longer than you expect.

We can’t always rely on Jesus and a miracle to pull us out of a jam. A little bit of planning and a little bit of asking for help up front can help us avoid a lot of the issues we deal with on a daily basis. Yet, we also face problems that are bigger than we can handle. When we do, it takes humility to recognize it and ask for help, both from God and from others. After all, what problem can you have that the Creator of the Universe can’t solve?

The crowd at the house of the synagogue official obviously didn’t recognize this in Jesus because “they ridiculed him.” And what did Jesus do? “He put them all out.” Miracles cannot happen where faith does not exist. Both the woman and the official reached out in faith and their prayers were answered.

Let us ask the Holy Spirit to help us grow in admiration, gratitude, generosity, and humility so that we may combat the deadly sins that damage our relationships with God and with others.

Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created. And You shall renew the face of the earth. 

May God bless you abundantly and may you glorify the Lord by your life.  Amen

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Many thanks to Fr. Stan Fortuna for his musical gifts, especially the traditional and contemporary versions of Come Holy Ghost (Come Holy Spirit) that you hear in this podcast. You can find more from Fr. Stan at  http://www.francescoproductions.com/ or on Facebook.