Happiness is incredibly important to have in everyone’s life, as it creates pleasure and satisfaction and gives people hope to move forward. Numerous components in life cause an individual to achieve happiness, for example, fulfillment in a person’s family life, profession, romantic relationships, and educational performance.
Money seems to make life appear to be working out well, but it does not contribute to a person’s emotional well being that leads to total happiness. People in today’s society believe that money does buy happiness, such as buying a bigger house, a nicer car, better clothes or even a more expensive vacation. The media has influenced people into thinking that wealth leads to happiness. Our culture in Canada and mostly America, is consumption-driven, which means the media shows us that we must want the expensive cars and clothes we see on TV, and the expensive jewelry we see celebrities wearing.
However, studies show that materialistic people tend to be less happy than those who are not. Many years ago, less than one-fifth of U.S. families had color TVs and only one in 25 had cable. Compared to the year 2007, when the median household income was $50,233 and almost everyone had a widescreen color TV and cable. Americans own twice as many cars as they did in 1967, we also have computers, iPods, and cellphones. This is an example of how our population is trying to meet the media’s standards. As a result of the influences brought upon from the media, we tend to believe that using our wealth to satisfy our material desires will bring us lasting happiness.
127 our experts are availableright now
The Church believes that money does not buy happiness, the Church states that the only way to find true happiness is through God. Christian happiness is the grace of loving and being loved by Jesus who gave his life for us. The Bible offers to us an extremely different interpretation of happiness compared to what many people in society currently think the view of this. Based on Scripture, true happiness is not something that we should specifically pursue; it always results from seeking something else.
When we try to be happy as humans or when we are trying to be pleased, most of the time we are not. When we forget about these specific things and start to remember the reason for which God put us on earth, we then find the happiness that God intended us to have become a part of our lives. 27 “The desire for God is written in the human heart because man is created by God and for God, and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for” (“Catechism”, paragraph 27).
This quote is stating that humans will only find happiness and truth through God and nothing else. If we continue to search for happiness and do not consider looking to God, then we will never find true happiness. Happiness can only come from God because he encourages us to love, which allows us to see the value of each person and be grateful for who we are. The beatitude that this behavior is breaking is, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”. This beatitude is stating that those who humbly recognize their need for God, will enter the kingdom of heaven. Those who look for happiness through money, do not recognize the need for God in their lives and are not poor in spirit.
Therefore, these people do not follow this beatitude and will never achieve true happiness since they do not fully recognize that God is the only one who can provide it.
