Today I read these words, “Oh, I have long been sick of the world and its cares, of its false pleasures and dangers . . . .”

What kind of a person would speak like that?

Somebody contemplating suicide?

Somebody suffering clinical depression?

Somebody looking for sympathy?

* * *

No, none of those.

It was somebody who had found something better than the things of the world to live for – something “out of this world”.

Somebody wanting to put her life completely at God’s service — which made the worldly ambitions that mostly people live for seem tedious by comparison.

It was, in fact, the young Mary MacKillop, sharing with her mother her reasons for entering the religious life of a Sister of Saint Joseph.

Her browned-offness with this world’s godless attitudes echo the words of Saint Paul in the Bible:

“God forbid that I should boast, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” 

* * *

Does this blog overdo the emphasis on the Bible and God and the Catholic religion etc?

Well, there is a desperate need out there for Australians to find something — something better to believe in than what they believe in at present.

2,500-plus Australians commit suicide every year.

That is about seven suicides per day.

For every completed suicide there are over 30 attempts – which means there are over 200 people a day attempting suicide.

There are 50 percent more deaths by suicide in Australia than by road accidents.

* * *

What can we do?

We must copy Saint Paul and Blessed Mary MacKillop and direct our ambitions and desires – not towards worldly delusions and mirages – but towards the reality of God.

To make Australia a happier place, let’s not forget willingness to listen to those who are unhappy, and to offer them simple kindness.

We might dwell on some other words of Mary MacKillop in that same letter to her mother:

“How many are lost through the coldness and indifference of those who might and should think more of their eternal welfare and less of this miserable world . . . .”