Truth. Justice. Whatever.

I recently saw the movie "The Sheep Detectives," and thoroughly enjoyed it. As I was leaving the theater, I saw a movie poster with the tagline, "Truth. Justice. Whatever." written at the bottom. This is for the upcoming film, "Supergirl," and the tagline is a nod to the old Superman phrase, "Truth, justice, and the American way." I keep thinking about that "Whatever," line. It certainly expresses a youthful angst and a rebellious disillusionment with the world. The image on the movie poster matches that tagline with an edgy, defiant Supergirl.

The funny thing is that you can pull up a 70 year old poster of a James Dean movie and find the exact same sentiment, but this makes sense because almost everyone goes through a season of life where nothing seems to matter or be working out and "whatever," could be their tagline. It also makes sense because it is a perfect tagline for a world without God. So many people live a life without purpose, and they think the only meaning in life is the meaning they create for themselves. They do not know that they have a soul and that God loves them dearly. They live a "whatever," kind of life.

Of course, I forget everyday that I have a soul. I forget that the saints tell us that our soul is a mirror meant to reflect the glory of God, like St. Paul writes about in 2 Corinthians 3:18, "And we all, with unveiled face, reflecting the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another." The saints tell us that the mirror of our soul gets dirty and muddy, it doesn't reflect God's glory, and we start to live a meaningless, "whatever," kind of life just as if we didn't know that.

All of us are going to have times where, "Truth. Justice. Whatever." could be the tagline for our life. When we are in a season like that, we are tempted to fill the emptiness of that "whatever" with something, and it is usually filled with one or more of our sinful passions. Several times I have shared this acronym for our passions, PALE GAS: Pride, Anger, Lust, Envy, Gluttony, Avarice, and Sloth. Of course, our sinful passions make the mirror of our soul more muddy, and we eventually end up in a "whatever" type of mindset again.

If we want a joyful life and not a "whatever" kind of life, we need to get the mirror of our soul clean. The challenging but good news is that we don't have to clean it ourselves because we can't clean it ourselves. The Holy Spirit through the purifying work of Jesus is the only one who can clean that mirror. We need to go to confession, love God, say our prayers, and go to Church. This cleans our soul, and then each day our task is to not muddy up our soul again as we turn away from sin and learn to love the way that God loves.

Our dear Theotokos teaches a beautiful thing here. As the mud is removed, and the mirror is illuminated by the glory of God, we can become magnifiers. Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord" (Luke 1:46). Right now, your soul magnifies something, and it might not be the Lord.

Maybe you feel the pull towards a "whatever" kind of life. Let us remember that we were lovingly created to partake in the love, light, and life of God and we are called to share this every second of our day. Let us allow the Holy Spirit to clean off the mud, illuminate the mirror of our soul, and enable us to magnify the Lord in everything we do.

This makes me wonder, if we created a movie poster for your life, what would the tagline at the bottom read? I don't think it would say, "Truth. Justice. Whatever." I think it would have to do with God's love for you, His healing journey with you, and His plan to share his blessings through you. What do you think?

---

Originally published in the Holy Apostles E-bulletin. Subscribe here.