As you can imagine, I regularly get the chance to talk with young Catholics from around Vermont. In conversations with them, I ask about things that are most challenging in living their faith.

One struggle I hear most frequently is that young people feel isolated. They look around their parishes and don’t always see many other people their age who are practicing their faith. This is something I desire to change…

On the sixth day, God created people: “God said: Let us make human beings in our image, after our likeness” (Gn 1:26).

Whenever I reference this verse around youth, I emphasize that it uses the words “us” and “our” instead of “me” and “my.” It says, “Let us make human beings in our
image,” not, “Let me make human beings in my image.”

This underscores God’s nature in the Trinity: 1 God, 3 persons. This is a mystery beyond our absolute understanding: the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit share a perfect bond of love.

We are created in the image and likeness of this love. Indeed, we are made for this perfect love — to take part in it.

In this way, we are not meant to be alone. We are made for relationship. Our lives do not make sense in isolation.

At Creation, Adam is formed out of the dust of the ground, and God breathes into him the breath of life. Soon after God creates the first woman, Eve, saying, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gn 2:18).

So, God casts a deep sleep over Adam. He takes a rib from his side. “The LORD God then built the rib that he had taken from the man into a woman. When he brought her to the man, the man said:

‘This one, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh’” (Gn 2:22-23).

We hear Adam exclaim when he sees his bride. He’s recognizing her as God’s beautiful creation — made in God’s image and likeness. He’s recognizing her in love — someone with whom he can live in communion.

When God tells Adam and Eve to be fertile and multiply (Gn 1:28), He is telling them to let their love bear fruit, to make a gift of themselves, to sacrifice for one another, and to will the other’s good. He is telling them to truly love.

This is the very thing God wills for us — His Church.

He gives his Apostles and all of us the Great Commission, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” (Mt 28:19).

He doesn’t want us to be isolated. He wants us to grow together, fostering community. He wants us to be fruitful and multiply.

As we strive to live holy lives, we are missing the point if we think only of ourselves. The Catechism states, “‘All Christians in any state or walk of life are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity.’ All are called to holiness: ‘Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect’” (CCC 2013).

The theological virtue of charity referenced here centers on loving God with all of our being, but it calls us into deeper love of Him through others.

As a Church, we need to recognize the needs of those around us.

What are we doing to reach out to others? What are we doing to grow and nurture new relationships? What are we doing to quell the feeling of isolation among our brothers and sisters? This is our call.