By Anthony Selvanathan
Special to the Herald
There comes a point in adulthood when the lives of those around us begin to change in ways we once assumed would naturally happen for us too.
A friend gets engaged. Another gets married. Someone announces a pregnancy or buys a first home. We are genuinely happy for them, yet sometimes their happiness awakens a quieter question within us: What about me?
I know that question because I have asked it myself.
At my home parish, I am now the last single young adult Catholic in my age group. The friends I grew up with have married and begun families of their own. I rejoice with them; some of those marriages and families belong to people I love dearly. Yet being happy for someone else does not erase our own longing.
I still hope someday to marry and share my life with someone. Perhaps that is one of the harder truths about comparison: It does not always begin with jealousy. Sometimes another person’s blessing simply brings our own unanswered prayer into sharper focus.
That experience changes shape throughout life. A couple longing for a child may feel it while watching friends grow their families. Parents may compare the different paths of their children. As we grow older, we may look at someone our own age who remains active and healthy while illness or diminished independence has changed our own lives.
The circumstances differ, but the question underneath them is remarkably similar: Why does their path look like that while mine looks like this?
Near the end of John’s Gospel, Peter asks almost the same thing.
The risen Jesus has just entrusted Peter with the care of his flock and told him, “Follow me.” Almost immediately, Peter turns toward the beloved disciple and asks, “Lord, what about him?”
It is difficult not to recognize ourselves in that moment. Peter has been given his own calling, yet he still looks toward someone else’s path.
Jesus does not give Peter the comparison he seeks. Instead, he directs him back to the life entrusted to him: “What concern is it of yours? You follow me.”
Perhaps we need that reminder too.
There is nothing wrong with longing for marriage, children, meaningful work, financial stability, healing or reconciliation. Faith does not require us to become indifferent to the good things we hope for.
But another person’s life cannot become the measuring stick for our own. God does not ask whether our lives measure up to someone else’s; he asks whether we are faithful with the life entrusted to us.
That can be difficult when we are waiting. When something we have prayed for does not happen, silence can begin to feel like an answer.
Sometimes the answer may indeed be no. Sometimes it may be “not yet.” And sometimes God may be leading us toward something different, perhaps even better than we imagined. The difficulty is that we rarely know which answer we are living through while we are still waiting.
That uncertainty does not mean God has forgotten us. Scripture is filled with people who lived between promise and fulfillment. Their waiting was not empty; God was still at work even when they could not yet see where he was leading them.
I am trying to learn that same trust.
For me, it means continuing to hope for marriage without treating my present life as a waiting room. There are friendships to deepen, people to serve, work to accomplish, prayers to offer and opportunities to become more fully the person God is calling me to be.
Christian surrender does not mean pretending we no longer care how the story ends. We can hope deeply without putting our lives on hold.
Christ may not show us exactly what comes next. But while our stories remain unfinished, we can keep hoping, keep asking and keep trusting that God is still at work.