The Source of True Happiness

During our small group meetings, we talked about confirmation’s effects and purpose. We reflected on how the sacrament is related to our eternal happiness.

We talked about how God created us to be happy and that we can only find true happiness in God alone. St Thomas Aquinas’ discussion on those things in which man’s happiness consists helped the class to understand why man finds happiness in God alone. Not wealth, honors, fame, power, health, pleasures or created goods truly make us happy because it is impossible for any created good to make us happy. It is God alone who is the source of our true happiness because He created our souls to find happiness in him alone.

Instead of helping us attain true happiness, our society many times encourages us to seek happiness in sinful ways. When we fall into sin, we turn away from God who is the source of our happiness.

Confirmation binds us closer to Christ, it increases the Holy Spirits gifts in us, and it perfects our bond with the Church and gives us special strength of the Holy Spirit necessary to live a fully Catholic life. It increases our love of God and neighbor and strengthens us so that we are free to follow Jesus’ commands to love God above all else and to love and serve our neighbor as ourselves, even when it is not easy.

~ Reflection from Terry Smith's Confirmation small group