OUR LIFE IS A MYSTERY STORY

The great (only a personal opinion, or course) mystery story writer Mickey Spillaine, in talking about how he read mystery stories, admitted that he read the end of the story first to see who did it and then went back to the beginning. He said that he read mysteries in this way so that he could better follow the plot. That would be a great way to follow the plot but it would also take all of the fun out of reading mystery stories.

Life, our life, is truly a mystery story that is still being written. It is a mystery not in the sense that we have to figure out who is going to do what to us or who truly was to blame for something that happened to us. Rather life is a mystery because we have no idea what the rest of our life will bring. We do not know how that story will end. That’s the real mystery, isn’t it?

Yes, we have plans for the future, near and very distant. We plan the day. We plan for our vacation. We plan for retirement. We all have plans, some more definite than others, to be sure, but we have them. However, we have no idea of knowing whether any of these plans will materialize. We may die before any one of them takes place. We may live to see most of them fulfilled. But we simply do not know.

Our life is not predetermined. No one, including God, knows how our life we till turn out, even how tomorrow will turn out. Our free will and God’s giving us that free will to do as we please help determine how our life will proceed and even end. What is more, the free will of every other human being also helps determine what happens next in our life. How often have we had to change our plans because someone or something else – a boss, a sick child, an accident – forced us to do so?

That may be unsettling when we think about it, but it is also a fact. In fact, instead of the mysteriousness of life being at times so much a cause of worry and concern, it can be a cause for some peace of mind. Much of our life is truly out of our hands and is in the hands of others, even at the whim of their free will. We cannot control what others do. We only have control over our own lives and even that control is limited by our own human limitations.

If Mickey Spillaine were alive today, and if he took a look at our life as it is right now, he would have no idea how it might evolve let alone end. Neither do we. Would we want to know? Do we have any desire to be like Mickey Spillaine and know how the end of our life will take place – all the details – and then watch as our present life unfolds that will eventually lead to that pre-determined end even if that were possible? I doubt it.

Just as the joy of reading a good mystery story is in paying attention to all the details, so the joy of life is living in the moment. It’s not that we are not concerned how our life will turn out; we are, we most certainly are and we moist certainly well should be. Rather it is the fact that the rest of our life has not been written. It is written moment to moment, day to day. We are called to live each moment as faithfully and as fully as we can and watch as the mystery of our life unfolds.