Winter Lightning

Some thoughts on congratulating the homilist today: Coulda; shoulda; woulda; and category mistakes.

2011-12-19T16:48:00.002-06:00

I am fortunate to live in a parish where, by and large, the homilies are very well done. Even the quiet weekday Mass is typically an occasion for words from the preachers which are thought-out, prepared, profound and explicative of the Scripture or the feast day being celebrated. It is not so everywhere and that is a tragedy.

The Mass I attended today, for the Fourth Sunday of Advent, benefitted again from a wonderful homily. In my small way of adding my voice to the project of encouraging good preaching, I thanked the homilist for his efforts this morning. I wanted to let him know that his hard work is much appreciated. I know it has to be hard work that is put into the homilies because they are so finely crafted and intricately balanced. The words are delivered with passion. None of this “just happens.”

When I returned home today, however, I realized my words of gratitude to the homilist were inapt. Although he may enjoy a metaphorical “atta-boy” pat on the back as much as anyone, the thanks I offered, albeit entirely sincere, were misdirected and failed to articulate what I experienced during the homily and, indeed, the rest of the Mass.

This good priest strikes me as a devout and holy man who knows that his homiletic role at the Mass is miniscule, compared to the infinite mercies and miracles being worked on the altar in front of and in the midst of the congregation. Although I thank him for his words, to think that the homilist’s artistry (however elevated it might be!) is appropriately measured against the infinite scale of the Sacrifice of the Mass is to cross into absurdity. I believe it was from Cardinal George that I first heard the expression “a category mistake.” No measure of exalted homiletic words can compare with what happens by God’s grace at the Eucharist. It is participating in “a category mistake” to offer words of gratitude about a homily when the homily is only the human effort to try to articulate the ineffable.

Rather than praise the homilist’s efforts today, I should have mentioned to him that one could have heard a pin drop during the pauses in his delivery. The congregation was hanging on his words, hungry to hear how the Incarnation expresses Gods love for us. I should have said to the homilist that it seems he knows this hunger first hand and he shared some of what he knew about satisfying that hunger. I am reminded of the old line about evangelization—evangelization is one beggar telling another beggar where the bread might be found.

Father, thank you for telling us where we might eat. You know where we can find what we need—because you must have been there first.

Surprised by sorrow.

2011-05-29T10:45:00.008-05:00

I was at the library yesterday picking up some DVDs (I had to return the Shogun series to Netflix and thus wanted some movies—does anyone agree with me that Shogun is interminably long, simplistically anti-Catholic (those cursed Jesuits!) and, did I mention boring?). I am tempted to say that in the unlikeliest of places, grace abounds. However, grace abounds always. It is my eyesight which is only periodically functioning.

As I was checking out the DVDs, a mother and father and a little girl, maybe six or seven years old, were in front of me. Mother asked the librarian, “Is this where we pay our library fines for overdue books?” The locution struck me as a bit verbose, formal. Father added, “We have four overdue books,” as if to highlight the magnitude of the transgression by emphasizing the word “four.” Thereupon, I heard the little girl offer to the librarian an emotion-filled, “I am sorry.” The little darling, unprompted, was seeking pardon for what apparently was her crime. Do we hug her or simply advise, “Go forth and sin no more”?

I do not know if mother and father were exaggerating the moral dimensions of the overdue books to teach the little girl. I do not know if the lesson was one which should have been taught in those particular circumstances. All I can do is wonder what the world would be like if we followed the little girl’s lead. Can you imagine sending a note of apology to the IRS along with our penalty for underpayment of estimated taxes? Who would think to apologize for a parking ticket for an expired meter. Would we be floundering in false guilt or would the world be a better place if we were to imitate the little girl? Her innocence touched my heart.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Still sitting with the Gospel: the Fourth Sunday of Easter. John 10:1-10

2011-05-19T14:41:00.011-05:00

The 10:30 A.M. Sunday Mass was treated to another of Father Steve’s usually fine homilies. This Sunday, however, he seemed particularly passionate. He made the case, convincingly, I think, that the image of who we call “the Good Shepherd” ought not evoke complacent, warm, tender feelings about Our Lord.

Perhaps it is helpful to illustrate my reflections with the images I discover from scouring the internet (at least, the images amuse me). If these images facilitate mulling over Father Steve’s thoughts, consider that Father Steve dismissed the soft image of the Good Shepherd and introduced us to the true Good Shepherd, a force to be reckoned with. This intense Shepherd is more like the gentleman pictured at the top of this post.

Father Steve called to mind for us that the Gospel’s shepherd image is from, among other places, the Old Testament’s book of Ezekiel (in particular, chapter 34). There, the righteous God is imaged as a shepherd who will call to account the defaulting priests and kings of Israel. They failed so utterly that the Lord will be the new shepherd. He will be the one who will take charge. The shepherd then of which Jesus speaks is Christ himself who will be and who is Ruler and Priest for all. Rather than triggering bucolic visions of frolicking sheep, the Good Shepherd has arrived in judgment to call us, to lead us to where he wants us to go. The Good Shepherd is the master and ruler of this new order of creation, as well as being the lord of our lives. The Good Shepherd will show us how to worship him and help us reject false shepherds. Our lives are not our own; they belong to the Shepherd. Our faith is not, to paraphrase Father Steve, something we might cobble together according to our own fancy, taste or predilections. Our faith is about submitting to the Shepherd.

Father Steve’s reading of the passage is bracing and it leaves one ready to ask, where do I sign on for this tour of duty? Yes, Lord, I am ready to be led by you and, yes, Lord, I have been away too long from your guiding staff.

Even as I willingly submit to the Shepherd, and after all the stage-setting preliminary words above, the point of this blog posting finally surfaces—Why does the Shepherd care what happens? Where is he leading me?

The grace of listening to the homily is that it led me to see that the reason the Shepherd cares whether I know him to be the one, true Shepherd is that the Shepherd cares about me. If the Shepherd’s sometimes stern messages cause me to listen intently, the messages are phrased so that I will understand the seriousness of what is at stake. It makes a difference not only to me how I live my life. It matters desperately to all who love me. All who love me seek the best for me. The Shepherd calls my name vigorously to alert me to the need to follow him to a place of truth and, where truth is, freedom is also at hand. The urgent message of the Shepherd is entirely a message of love which calls me to a place of life where I can “live abundantly.”

There is no threat here. There is, rather, an insistent call by one who loves me.

Mother, father and priest as Forerunner: What John the Baptist teaches us

2011-04-16T13:34:00.007-05:00

The Lord, a book written by Romano Guardini in 1954, is a most excellent meditation on Scripture. Guardini leads the reader from one acute psychological and theological insight to another. For example, in a chapter entitled “The Forerunner,” John the Baptist is compared to Moses. Moses stood at the threshold of the Promised Land, looking down from Mount Nebo into the land given to his people. But, because of an earlier failure of Moses, he was not to enter “the land flowing with milk and honey.” He could only look and dream and resign himself to God’s edict. Had Moses been faithful at all times, it would have been otherwise. John, on the other hand, was never intended to witness the fullness of Jesus’ mission. John was always Forerunner. That was his mission--to prepare the way for the Lord. John was always to be left out of the completion. What bitterness he must have been tempted to, as he saw his life ended by the weak-willed Herod whose moral spine collapsed under the demands of Herodias. John deserved better than this we want to protest.

We lament Moses’ failure to enter Israel but that is what God had ordered and we admire the strength of John who would suffer for a cause and not see its fruition. We applaud the faith of John, his willingness to prepare for the Messiah in accordance with the call John had heard. There is, however, something bittersweet, indeed something evoking pathos, in John’s life which gave love without apparent benefit. It is heroic for John to devote himself on the strength of faith alone. There is no hint that John was other than faithful, open-hearted Forerunner.

Is it too bold to ask, might we claim the mantle of John in some small way? Are we, each of us, not like John too? Our fondest, most precious hopes are in our children and, if it is our time in life, our grandchildren as well. Perhaps for the parish priest, his offspring is the parish he has labored to lead or the souls of those who more deeply convert their lives to Christ. However, neither we as parents or grandparents, nor the priest, will ever see the fulfillment of the work we have begun. We turn over the future to the Lord. Like John, we only prepare the way. We do our best in the present but we neither witness nor control the future. That is in God’s hands. We rejoice today at having been allowed to come this far. We give thanks for the opportunity to prepare the way for those we love.

Still sitting with the Gospel: Fourth Sunday in Lent

2011-04-05T11:35:00.005-05:00

This past Sunday’s Gospel from John about the man born blind led Fr. Mike’s homily to focus on the fact that the formerly blind man suffered a double loss of home. Not only have his parents abandoned him as they stand before the Pharisees, but also he is ejected from the synagogue and now shunned by his religious home.

The parents distanced themselves from their child, in order to safeguard their standing in the community. Perhaps it had been extraordinarily difficult to have had a sightless child, with the imputation of sin such condition brought. To have the sightless child now with vision focuses the community’s prying eyes again on the family’s awkward status—was the punishment lifted? What caused the change in their fortunes? Where did this power come from? Was it from good or evil? Not only would the parents have to revisit the connection between sin and disability, they were placed in the compromising posture of needing to admit that it was this Jesus who had changed their son. This was an admission it was impossible to make without loss of their religious community and, so, the son was sacrificed.

Of course, the son himself took the step of acknowledging Jesus and this one admission was sufficient to wipe away in a moment the years of being part of the clan. This one declaration of the son was sufficient to cross beyond the boundary of membership. Many things might be remediable for the community, but not this acceptance of Jesus. It is cut and dried, “You have acknowledged Jesus; you are out.”

As difficult as it might be to lose one’s religious community, that pain is surpassed by the pain of parental abandonment. Indeed, the interaction of defaulting parent and abandoned child is acutely painful for both child and parent. On the one hand , the son now knows that his parents (or did his father alone do the speaking?) are too weak to resist the power of the crowd. Any illusion about powerful parental authority evaporated. The man born blind must now see, and all must now admit, that the parents are not made of the stuff which can withstand the bullying will of the community. The child knows that he is now and will be hereafter on his own, whenever the stakes are high for the parents.

On the other hand, this is a loss experienced by the parents as well. The parents can no longer imagine themselves to be those who would protect their young. Moreover, the shame must have been mutual. How could father look at the son again without the blaze of embarrassment coming to the father’s cheeks—“I have failed to protect my son. I am weak.” And so too the son—“I lament that my father has to admit that he was too weak to defend me. Do I want to be my father’s son?”

In the midst of gladness over being able to see, that joy must have been tempered by the question whether the new sight was worth it—yes, sight is a wonderful thing, but what is the identity of the blind man now? He has no parents, he has lost the faith community he knew and his former occupation of street-side beggar is gone. The Gospel passage tells us that Jesus looked for the man to reach out to him, as it seems the newly-sighted man has no home except the one offered by Jesus.

This turn in the story to narrate Jesus’ active missionary venture to find the man offers hope for us. Perhaps it is the case that we, in our lives, have acted as the blind man’s parents. Perhaps there have been times when we were not faithful to our own children, as the demands of keeping up our own appearances or comforting ourselves have caused us to slight our children. Perhaps it is the case that some other interest of ours caused the family to be moved out of first place in our priorities. Perhaps it is the case simply that we blame ourselves for the times when we could have been better parents and perhaps it is the case that our children have an inkling of how weak we are. Nevertheless, just as in the story, the outreach of Jesus teaches us what we might do. We too can search out our children and offer to them a return to our hearts. We can carry them home again and perhaps both parent and child will learn to see anew.

The past does not have to be prologue to the future. We have the example of Jesus to teach us other possibilities.

Still Sitting With the Gospel: Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time

2010-11-13T21:49:00.006-06:00

We have no idea what is in store—no idea of how loved we are and how loved we will be for all of eternity. The Scripture the past Sunday, the Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, on November 6, spoke of the next life, the eternal life. In that existence, we “neither marry nor are we given in marriage.” What will be, aside from love, we do not know. “Eye has not seen nor ear heard what God has planned for us.”

These thoughts of the hereafter bring to mind a discovery I made several years back while I was considering one of Father Anthony De Mello’s meditations. Fr. De Mello was a Jesuit priest from India who died in 1987. Although criticized by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, he did nevertheless write some intriguing suggestions for meditation. One of his typical invitations was to consider what I would say or do today, if I were to know with certainty that my life were soon to be over. He invited prayer about the hereafter. Knowing of the Church's posthumous critique, I was always mindful of discerning where some De Mello writing I had in front of me might have run afoul of Catholic orthodoxy. It kept me alert and, in so doing, I think it deepened the opportunity for prayer. I truly needed to be and wanted to be mindful of the theology.

The discovery I made in one of De Mello’s guided meditations involved his suggestion that, as we deepen our relationship with God in the next life, we gradually disappear. I recollect the image that we are like a drop of water entering into the ocean. Quite immediately, there is nothing more of us. Our personalities, our souls and identities become merged into God’s.

Although there is indeed no reason to think that my puny self has any great claim on eternity, the fact is that De Mello’s idea seems to ignore the fact that God in fact loves me for who I am. Undoubtedly insignificant in earth’s history, undoubtedly to be forgotten by my descendants in one hundred years from now (if not many decades earlier than that), I am nevertheless more important than a drop of water in the ocean. I am important because God loves me.

No matter how weak or small or insignificant from the world’s view a child (or today, a grandchild) of mine is, the child is valued—beyond measure—because of who the child is. One of De Mello’s own phrases would ask if I think I were a more complete lover than God. If I can love a child who is “insignificant,” surely God in his infinite mercy will love me forever more. I can see why De Mello, despite his many good works, can be said to have, on occasion, gone astray. In his humility, perhaps he forgot that God “is not God of the dead but of the living, for to him all are alive.”

We are alive hereafter. We do not disappear.

STILL SITTING WITH THE WORD.

2010-10-31T21:11:00.001-05:00

The Story of Zacchaeus. Luke 19:1-10. Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Is there a touch of the comedic in the story of Zacchaeus? Do hard hearts smirk at a man so short that he had to climb a tree to see Jesus? Our better angel suggests the Gospel writer is inviting us to accept Zacchaeus as someone who is like us—deficient in some respect, “short” on some virtue. Overcoming deficits and responding to grace, Zacchaeus becomes a man of action. He “wants to see who Jesus was”—but surely this is more than curiosity to see a celebrity. Zacchaeus runs, climbs a tree and responds to a call to “come down quickly.” Despite the grumblings of the crowd, Zacchaeus and Jesus stand their ground. Overtaken by love, Zacchaeus changes the direction of his life. Ill-gotten gains are returned with a bonus and one-half of his wealth is given to the poor.

Now a man of grace-filled action, his life and likely the life in his household are changed. If there was a “Mrs. Zacchaeus,” how did she take the news of her husband’s new faith? Could she join in celebrating that one who was lost had been saved? Had she been waiting for him to know Jesus or was this a shock? What of those who worked for the “chief tax collector” Zacchaeus?

The story raises questions for me to ponder: Do I play the role of Zacchaeus? Is there something about me that is lost too? Am I willing to accept the motivation of grace to run and climb obstacles to find out who Jesus is and come quickly at his beckoning? Am I willing to endure the smirks of others as I chase after Jesus, despite my own deficits? Can I accept how a decision to learn Jesus’ identity will affect my other relationships?

Just as God’s grace moved Zacchaeus, so too does God seek to enkindle a spark in my heart—and in yours, as well—to come see who Jesus is.

With grace upon grace, Lord, boost me now into the tree. Bring my loved ones with me.

Tom McNeff died.

2009-12-05T21:49:00.008-06:00

Tom McNeff was a priest of Chicago. He accompanied me as I began my first tentative steps into ministry. He trusted me and called me to do better. Tom died a few days ago and his funeral was December 4 at the parish where he was pastor. Set forth below is the homily I was honored to preach at Tom's funeral.

May I ask you:
What is it that is at the core of the heart of every father?
What is his most earnest and keenest desire?

Every father seeks to draw to himself the children that he loves.
There is nothing more important to him
than that he implant in the heart of his children
that which is best in his heart.
The father draws the children closer and closer—
in order to show them a more excellent way—
in order to show them what is best,
in order to point them toward the future.
The father’s lifelong wish
is that the children grow straight and true and joyful,
so that, when the father no longer walks in their midst,
the children will see each day as a happy day,
see each day with the same eyes of wisdom that the father used.

This is true of every good father we know—
human or divine or the ordained men we call “father.”

In a lifetime of morning prayer, evening prayer, daily Eucharist,
pastoral work among the parishioners, and, yes, retreats,
in a life of “prayer, thought, discipline and action,”
God calls the man—who has given his life to God’s service—
God calls the man, day by day,
into an embrace deeper and closer and intimate.

At the end of one’s life,
especially at the end of a priest’s life,
it is the hope that the journey into the heart of God has proceeded deeply.
It is the hope that God will have shown his son the priest
a more excellent way.
It is the hope that the son will have become so united with God along the way
that the son has been able to see
what God had wanted to show him.

At the end of the earthly life of this priest-son of God, our Father Tom,
we are confident enough to say of today—boldly—
“O happy day.”
Our faith tells us that it is indeed proper to say that today
is a day of birth,
a day of new beginning.
O happy day.

In a homily from the fifth century, St. Augustine said,
“O the happiness of the heavenly alleluia, sung in security, in fear of no adversity!
We shall have no enemies in heaven, we shall never lose a friend.
God’s praises are sung both there and here,
but here they are sung in anxiety,
there, in security;
here, they are sung by those destined to die,
there, by those destined to live forever;
here, they are sung in hope,
there, in hope’s fulfillment;
here, they are sung by wayfarers,
there, by those living in their own country.

St. Augustine not only legitimates the notion of death’s happy day,
he also uses the image of a journey, of being in the far country which is really our home.

This was an image used by Tom quite often in his funeral homilies.
Frequently, the deceased’s life was described as a walk with Jesus,
like the one experienced by the disciples
walking with Jesus along the road to Emmaus.
Hearts burned with longing for the truth which only God can offer.

But today, I would have us focus on the identity of the priest, the alter Christus, we say,
somehow the “other Christ.”
Focus on the stranger who is walking and teaching and causing hearts to burn.
See the priest as the one enacting the part of Jesus in the Emmaus story.
It is the priest, after all, who gathers the people and
who offers the sacrificial meal.
In offering the Emmaus meal, Jesus’ true identity is revealed
and then he vanishes.
So too it is with the priest.
His true identity is revealed in the Eucharist and, like Jesus,
it is not the presider’s personality which dominates the Eucharist.
Jesus always pointed to the Father.
The priest points to Jesus.
And, like Jesus,
the priest disappears in the Eucharist.

As alter Christus, the priest offers the people everything they need—
he has brought the people Scripture and he has brought them the Eucharist,
he has given his life to them in love,
and, with that, there is nothing more to be done.
He disappears.
He has given everything that he has.

The teacher, Jesus the teacher, indeed, spiritual father to the disciples,
disappears from view once his mission is accomplished.
That is the way with all good fathers.

O happy day.
The dreams of the Father are fulfilled and Tom is going home to his eternal Father.
O happy day.
The dreams of Tom for his family are fulfilled—
they are gathered here this morning together to acknowledge
what Tom wanted them to know—
that God is lord of all,
lord of both life and death.
O happy day.
The dreams of Father Tom for his parish family are fulfilled.
The pastor, the father, has taught his lessons and he disappears.
The pastor has led the people to what is dearest and keenest in his heart—
the people have been led to the Eucharist.
He has shown them a more excellent way.

Looking at the life and death struggle of Father Tom
brings me to reflect—from the outside looking in—
at what a remarkable thing priesthood is.
The priest lives a life of love concretely, just as Jesus did.
There is that line from Dostoyevsky that says something like,
“Love in dreams is beautiful but love in action
is a harsh and dreadful thing.”
Love in the abstract is beautiful and it gives rise to sentiment and lofty feelings,
but love lived out in the everyday world can be very difficult and,
paradoxically, lonely.
It looks to me, from the outside,
that the priest devotes himself to love and lives it concretely.
If his life is not devoted to love, why would he live the way he does?
The priest does not merely mouth airy, gassy words about love.
He lives love.
He lives love so well that he has given up the comfort and joy of his own family.
He has given up love lived concretely with a wife.
And he lives that way so that he is free to love everyone.
He is available to all the People of God.
When he is dying, he is comforted and supported by brothers and family and friends,
but, if he does not have them,
he dies without the comfort of a wife and children.
That is part of the gift the priest makes.

Even in dying, the priest, a public person, intentionally or unintentionally,
is teaching and sanctifying by drawing people into their better selves,
calling the people to help him,
leading them into grace and prayer—
even when the prayers are for his own health.
Even when the prayers are, as they are today,
for the repose of the soul of the priest.
Love in action can be a harsh and dreadful thing.
Look at Jesus’ love in action.
Look at the Eucharist—
flesh and blood is sacrificed and consumed
for the sake of new life.
Jesus’ life lived in love is what makes the Eucharist intelligible.

In order to understand the priesthood,
we come to Jesus and his self-emptying love.
We come to the Eucharist.
We have read that the Eucharist makes the Church.
Well, the Eucharist certainly makes the priests,
those who guide us and walk with us when we travel to Emmaus.

When we all learn to take love into concrete action,
that will be a happy day indeed.
We will have learned that everyone’s life—
whether or not priest, whether or not father, whether male or female—
everyone’s life is to be modeled on Jesus’.
What a happy day!
Everyone will seek the best for the other.
Everyone will live a life which recapitulates the Eucharist.

When we live that calling,
all of our fathers—human and divine—
and, yes, our mothers too—
all will say,
O happy day.
We, the children, standing now alone,
will have learned that what is most important is to rely on God
by returning to Jerusalem
and to love without counting the cost.

Was That A Tarantula?

2009-11-27T13:09:00.010-06:00

One of the stops during my week in St. Kitts was to a government-run nursing home. A few years back, I had been to another tropical island nursing home--in Kingston, Jamaica. The one is St. Kitts was a bit smaller and seemed like a friendlier, more hospitable, place for both residents and visitors. We were there to visit a few parishioners and bring some small gifts.

There appeared to be about six different wards or houses, each of which had about eight or ten residents. It seems so strange to me to see the buildings so open to the outside--big openings to walk through but no doors, large openings for windows but no glass in the openings--only metal louvered slats which could be turned to keep out blowing weather, which, I guess, would be the case during hurricane season. However, the smells inside dissipate better with the openness and the heat of the day is mitigated by access to the fresh air. The facility did not have air-conditioning.

The men and women were in different buildings. We saw some people with very severe disabilities betrayed by their blank stares. We saw broken, non-functioning limbs and some broken minds. One man suffered so from involuntary jerking movements that he bounced himself out of bed onto the floor. It seemed to be a common enough occurrence, as no one was startled (except me) nor did anyone (including me) move to help him, as he pulled himself back into bed. I wonder what medications we might have here in the States to minimize that flailing about. Some of the residents were quite engaged and engaging.

We first visited one of the men of the parish and read some prayers to him. Fr. Jon was with us and he said a few words about the Gospel reading for the day. He spoke unhesitatingly in his homilette, as if he had said the words before. It is my experience, however, that no matter how trippingly the words fall from the tongue, they first are born in the heart. Fr. Jon is a kind man. Later, we met some of the women and we said some prayers with them and made small talk. Someone suggested a song and hearty singing ensued--two or three songs were sung with all their verses. It seemed hugely entertaining to the women. Singing is not my forte (and that is an understatement).

Memory of some of the women remain with me today. There was an Anglican woman who granted that she did nevertheless like to pray with Catholics. "We are almost family," she said. I also recollect the woman in the wheel chair who had both of her legs amputated at the knees and had a number of bandages and band-aids on her knees--was she a diabetic who lost her legs to the disease and who continued to suffer from the death of her extremities? How different is her treatment from what we might consider routine in the United States?

As I was walking away from the women's section, I saw, smashed on the sidewalk, a very large, very dead spider--maybe three inches long. Anything bigger than a daddy longlegs is a tarantula to me. I don't even know if tarantulas are indigenous to St. Kitts, but I think they are--a quick run through Wikipedia does not preclude the possibility. In any event, I was amazed at the size of the critter and the fact that he/she was simply left squashed on the sidewalk. For me, any spider that size would have warranted calling the county animal control officers. For the residents, I would imagine their own struggles are more pressing. Details like huge, dead, spiders are not worth bothering with.

Lord, comfort your people, all of your people.

Sometimes A Water Bottle Is Just A Water Bottle

2009-11-23T16:20:00.006-06:00

I want to begin sharing some thoughts about a trip I took to St. Kitts during the first week of November. I went with my son Christopher and my son-in-law Shawn. We stayed in the rectory of Holy Family Parish, in Molineux, a tiny town about ten miles from Basseterre, the major city in St. Kitts. We were there at the invitation of the parish administrator, a Missionary Sister of the Holy Spirit. It was quite an adventure for us middle class northerners and it was thoroughly enjoyed by the three of us. I do hope that our visit was worthwhile for the parisioners and the school kids I visited with--more about that later.

Right now, I want to laugh at myself a bit. Usually, I am good for a few laughs. However, when I play amateur anthropologist, mistaken insights are common. To wit, above is a picture--maybe you can tell--the picture is not that good (taken with my Blackberry)--a picture of part of the grave yard at the parish. We were there on All Souls' Day, a day of remembrance and honoring of the dead. To acknowledge the day, Sister Margaret, the parish administrator, had the young children make paper flowers to decorate the graves. When we inspected the graveyard after our arrival, we did note the paper flowers. The effect was touching. In addition to the flowers, one or two of the graves had partialy full water bottles sitting on them. Applying my non-existent anthropoligical training, I offered that the local custom was to offer comfort to the dead in their journey by providing water. "No, I don't think that's true," Sister Margaret corrected. "I think the kids just didn't clean up after themselves." The water bottles were not a message for the dead. They were a message for me--(a) don't be so sure of yourself and (b) littering is a worldwide problem. Put that in your anthropology pipe and smoke it.

Save your conscience. You only get one.

2009-09-25T21:32:00.010-05:00

Solzhenitisyn is not honored enough for his challenges to the West. Indeed, his critique caused a squirming discomfort in its auditors. He was dismissed by many as out of fashion, out of step. That is unfortunate. We needed his voice heard more widely. In the October, 2009 issue of First Things, there is a very good article--"The Moral Witness of Aleksander Solzhenitsyn"--from which the following is taken:

[In the novel In The First Circle] Solzhenitsyn writes: "The great truth for Innokenty used to be that we are only given one life. Now, with the new feeling that had ripened in him, he became aware of another law: that we are given only one conscience, too. A life laid down cannot be reclaimed, nor can a ruined conscience."

A conscience does not make some act good or bad. Rather, the conscience is the tool we use to determine whether the act, in itself, is good or bad. If you break the tool you use to discover the truth, you are unable to steer toward the good and away from the bad. All you have left at that point is your own self-referential sentiment--does the act feel good or does it feel bad--how does it make me feel?

Our sins might then be said to lie not so much in what we do but in the damage we do to our consciences. When we try to deceive ourselves, we damage the conscience. The more we engage in this deceit, the more the conscience is damaged. The sin is in the deceit of ourselves. The sin is in refusing to see. By the time we get to the stage of performing the act which is objectively evil, we cannot see the evil because our conscience has died

The Meaning of the Human Person Discovered!

2009-09-05T09:10:00.002-05:00

Actually, the title overstates things a bit.

What I did encounter this morning is an article in one of the several journals which come here to the retreat house library. What struck me is a reflection in the journal on music, or, as I read it, art in general. The article spoke of St. Cecilia, the patron of musicians and musical instrument makers. Mozart was quoted and it is that quote which goes to the heart of the matter. Mozart said,

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. Although the spirit is not master of that which it creates through music, yet it is blessed in this creation, which, like every creation of art, is mightier than the artist.

Journey with me for a moment.

It seems a question humans grapple with is whether we are spirit or flesh. Are we body or soul? Are we spirits who are freighted down with a body, a spirit only waiting to be released in death? (I have heard such a cringe-worthy thought expressed in conversation) Or, more correctly according to my study, are we not embodied spirits or, viewed from the other side, inspirited bodies? If there is not a duality of mind and body but rather some kind of interactive harmony and interdwelling of body and soul, then we might want to look at how this feels to us. We look to how we live this reality. It is here that Mozart and St. Cecilia come to help.

Surely, each of us has been “transported” or enlivened or thrilled with some musical performance we have witnessed. What is going on there? How do sounds, vibrations of air, enter our ears to transform our hearts and uplift our souls? How does the physical change our hearts, or, if you will, our souls?

I will suggest that the transformation we undergo from music well performed is a manifestation that we are simultaneously and inextricably body and soul. The artist is the one who works in the interstices of body and soul.

The next time you are carried away by a piece of music, reflect and wonder if the unity of body and soul has been expressed. And, if you are the artist, rejoice in the gift you are giving to those of us who can neither sing, nor play an instrument, nor dance, nor read music. Musicians, help us to join heart and body. You are explaining who we are and how we are made.

Don’t Stop Believing the Southern Cross.

2009-08-31T21:32:00.012-05:00

The title is my effort to tie together two of my favorite songs (“Don’t Stop Believing” and “Southern Cross”). I want to fold them into a wondering about the heartache each songs seems to evoke. I am taken with the melancholy that sometimes issues from music.
Showing my age a bit (a lot?), I enjoy Stephen Stills singing “Southern Cross.” (Try it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlVNod_krsM).

I am intrigued by the exotic names and the notion of sailing around the world or at least across a part of the globe I have never seen (and am likely never to see). I wonder how liberating it would be to see the Southern Cross—how far from my home I would have to be!

There are the lines in the song,

“In a noisy bar in Avalon, I tried to call you.
But on a midnight watch I realized why twice you ran away.”
And later—
“Think about how many times I have fallen
Spirits are using me
Larger voices calling…

When you see the Southern Cross
For the first time
You understand now
Why you came this way.”

What is that aching, that effort to try to reach home, even from a noisy bar? Why try to talk to the woman the singer has apparently alienated? And then, is the hurt salved somewhat by the strangeness of the Southern Cross even with the realization that he is alone. His comfort is to see the world. His freedom is lonely—but he has the Southern Cross. Is that freedom enough or does it hurt? And why does he pursue freedom at such a cost? There is something he is searching for.

Think of the Journey song “Don’t Stop Believing.”

(Try it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=barLaHrtvoM)

It begins

“Just a small town girl, livin’ in a lonely world
She took the midnight train goin’ anywhere.
Just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit,
He took the midnight train goin’ anywhere.”

They are going somewhere—“anywhere,” it is said. There again is the reaching for freedom and with it, the pain of being alone. It is dangerous in this world where the young people go. The singer coldly acknowledges that

“Some will win, some will lose.
Some were born to sing the blues.”

I surmise that the singer is going to be one of the winners. How otherwise could he be so distanced from the pain of the losers? It may be the case, though, that he has occasionally lost, as well as won, and he is ready to risk the loss for the sake of the thrill of winning. It is like seeing the Southern Cross for the price of love. The singer watches all those “streetlight people,” those young people on the streets of the city who have came to go “anywhere.” They walk the streets at night, trying to connect, trying to find what they came to find, all the while, surely, they remember what they left behind.

What is that yearning that we try to fill for ourselves? Does it not always fail?

“You made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”
--Confessions, Augustine, Bishop of Hippo.

2009-08-22T13:29:00.005-05:00

The First Station: Jesus is condemned to death.

P. We adore you O Christ and we praise you.
R. Because by your holy cross, you have redeemed the world.

The Roman government, in a conspiracy with the religious authorities, condemned an innocent man to death. Of course, he may have been a thorn in the side of those authorities, because he called them to purity. He may have been the occasion when peace was disturbed from time to time, but—guilty of a crime deserving death? Most definitely not. Most definitely not by our modern notions of justice.

The Way of the Cross is a way to walk on two levels. One level is to contemplate what happened to Jesus in order to try to enter into his mind and experience. The other level is more personal to us—personal in the sense that we are pressed to answer questions about ourselves. If I see Jesus, the innocent, condemned to death, I am called to reflect on my own life.

Do I fail to speak when I hear Jesus belittled, when he is condemned by our world, by my acquaintances?

Do I participate in a system in which innocent people suffer? Am I silent?

Are the unborn the innocent? The infirm? The stranger?

When the crowd gathers, where am I?

How is it that the Judge became judged?

The Way of the Cross--Not Just for Lent

2009-08-22T13:22:00.008-05:00

It is not morbid to think about death. Indeed, for the Christian, the way of death leads to life. For us, if we have the strength, a funeral might be the time to sing “O, Happy Day.” Our birth to eternal life is a minor recapitulation of the cosmic action of Jesus in dying and rising, a dying and rising which literally changes everything.

During Lent, Christians will reflect on the death of the Savior. Catholics, as well as others, will use the Way of the Cross. With Scriptural references and some stories from the ancient tradition, the believer follows Jesus from his death sentence and, implicitly or explicitly, the liturgy ends with the rising from the tomb.

Sometimes, the Way of the Cross is pursued as a lugubrious experience where we take on the sins of the world which led to the awful crucifixion. We accept the free-floating guilt of the world and admit our part in it. The mournful “Stabat Mater Dolorosa” is sung with lyrics reciting “At the cross her station keeping, stood the mournful mother weeping...” However, regardless of how solemn the Way of the Cross is, it ought to be, like death, paradoxically, a time for life. Acceptance of responsibility, a response to God’s grace, surely is the first step toward conversion and wholeness.

Many different booklets have been prepared to help guide the prayer. I do not like many that I have seen. Some are dated with old photographs of various inhumanities we have perpetrated on each other. Unfortunately, we have newer photos of how we have mistreated each other, photos which place the injustice of the crucifixion in a modern context. Some booklets are superficial as they ask reflection questions about the meaning of such complex notions as atonement and sacrifice. The questions are obtuse inquiries which too glibly recite, “Jesus died for my sins.” No doubt Jesus did, but how does this happen? How does atonement work? What is substitutionary atonement?

I want to try my hand at writing my own reflections for the Way of the Cross. It is my hope to use it this Lent at my parish, as well as individually contemplate the Way of the Cross throughout the year. Perhaps the reflection will make clear why the Way is not just for Lent.

Over the succeeding weeks, I will be working on the Stations (“the Way”) by crafting brief prayers and reflections suitable for group prayer. I will post the stations as I work on them. I invite your thoughts and suggestions and prayers. The next post will be the beginnings of the First Station.

Too Good Not To Share.

2009-08-11T13:38:00.005-05:00

From the very clever Icons and Curiosities Blog at http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/iconsandcuriosities/

Responding To a Gift Undeserved

2009-08-09T17:53:00.011-05:00

I post below my homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time. It arises out of the birth of this young man you see to the right. This is Kai Christopher, seen here, only a few minutes after birth. The homily was preached at the 9:00 AM Mass today.

A new grandchild came into my life about a week ago—
a healthy boy born to good parents who will love him
as they love his older sister.
From my perspective, baby Kai Christopher enters my life
without any cost to me,
without my doing anything to qualify for this.
Kai Christopher is a freely showered grace in my life.
A blessing.
A gift.
How should I respond?
Beyond giving thanks for the grace of this child, what should I do?

Knowing how to respond to a gift is important because
freely given gifts surround us.
Unearned gifts are in the structure of how God made the world.

Even our marriages and children come to us as gifts—
In a mature relationship, it is love which tells boy and girl to get married.
It is love which, traditionally, moves boy to ask girl to marry and,
from the boy’s perspective,
he lives his life so as to be worthy of her having said “yes.”
Love precedes the marriage.
Love sustains the marriage.
Children are an expression, a sacrament, of that love.
The gift of love, freely given time and again through the years,
raises the question
of how to live.
If she and the children love me even though they don’t have to,
what do I do in response?

Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians,
a very small piece of which we have for our second reading,
sets up this same dynamic—
a gift is given and then we are confronted with what to do.
In the chapters of Ephesians before what we just heard today,
Paul tells the people,
“Do not forget…
there was a time when you were immersed in this world
without hope and without God…
But God, who is rich in mercy,
because of the great love he had for us,
even when we were dead in our transgressions,
brought us to life with Christ—
by grace you were saved.
Christ raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavens…
For by grace you have been saved through faith,
and this is not from you;
it is the gift of God…”

Paul then asks the community,
what should we do,
how should we live,
because of this gift of salvation
which we have done nothing to earn?
If we have received a gift valuable beyond measure,
what do we do?

In the part of the letter we have today,
we are at the point where Paul has shifted from a description of the gift
to posing the question,
“we’ve got the gift of Christ’s love, now what do we do?”
We might shrug our shoulders,
quietly say, “thanks” and then
go on about our own business.
Probably that’s not enough.
The opportunity to have the gift of eternal life deserves a bigger response.
Probably, we want to do something.
There are a number of choices and I think we can and should
pursue all of them.
First off, as on the occasion of the birth of a child,
we can say thank you.
We can celebrate.
Life, whether eternal or earthly, is always wonderful
and salvation is wonderful in ways we cannot yet know.

You know that another word for this thanking is liturgy—
which is what you and I are doing this morning.
In our public worship of God, we are saying,
“thank you for giving us what we did not earn.”

And beyond liturgy, in addition to liturgy,
we take to heart what Paul says today.
He tells us,
“all bitterness, fury, anger, shouting and reviling must be removed.
Be kind…”

In response to a gift, we do something to honor the one who gave us the gift.
And we best honor the one who has given us the gift by loving the ones
the gift-giver loves.
The friends of my friend are my friends too.
The beloved of Christ must be loved by me as well.

Within the pattern of all our lives is the freely given gift.
Maybe the gift is a child, a grandchild, a spouse but certainly
we have received the possibility of salvation and everlasting life in Jesus.
We humbly receive the gift and try to become worthy.

Grabbing onto both parts of Ephesians—
the description of the gift as well as the call to respond to the gift—
might help us with a modern phrase we have probably all heard.
There are these people, well-intentioned I’m sure, who say,
“I’m not religious but I am spiritual.”
I am not entirely sure what that means but
I guess it is always a good thing to be at least spiritual.
I gather that being “spiritual” means that one has encountered God and
been overtaken by the awesomeness of God.
I think being spiritual even means offering praise to God.
It is like saying a heartfelt, “alleluia” when the baby is born.
But is there something held back by the spiritual only person?
What is that “religious” part that they can’t enter into?
I think it has something to do with independence,
maybe being satisfied in not participating in a faith community.
Maybe the spiritual-only person will walk with Paul part of the way—
there may be gratitude for gifts given,
but the response beyond “thank you” is something
the spiritual prefer to figure out on their own.

I wonder if there a willingness to honor God but a skepticism
about joining part of one’s life to a community.
For example, the spiritual-only person might engage in ritual to honor God,
but will the spiritual-only person do something
like help build and staff hospitals, schools, missions and soup kitchens
or pray for the world?
Paul called on the Ephesians, and us, to be
“...imitators of God…and live in love as Christ loved us…as a sacrificial offering…”
Is it easier
or more difficult for the spiritual-only person to
“live in love as Christ loved us”?

I would say for us all that if we combine gratitude with action,
we are spiritual as well as religious.

I am, by no means, the arbiter of who is right and who is wrong.
I will certainly defer to Paul.
What would Paul say?
Is it enough to only say thank you because of a gift
or does not the gift of salvation move us all to change our lives
and live in sacrificial love as Christ did?

Get Rich Quick Scheme: Count Your Blessings.

2009-08-03T17:46:00.011-05:00

I saw that slogan on a church billboard in town earlier this week. It seems on point to me--at the end of each and every day, there is always something (and usually many things) to be thankful for. To take a longer view, in counting my blessings, I look back over my life and I am amazed at the grace which has pursued me every step of the way.

These thoughts of gratitude merge into a conversation I have been having with others recently. I have been asking the question whether people remember only the good times or do they recall the bad past. Initially, I had thought that my memories were predominately of the good. Others insisted that they remembered mostly the hard times of the past. I do have to admit that there are days in my life which I do remember and I wish I didn't. Upon reflection, it is true that my memory does not always lead to counting blessings.

I think I have resolved this question a bit. It occurs to me that the recollection of the good days is nostalgia. The memory of the past good is not false, nor is it merely sentimental. The good old days I remember were good old days. It is simply that not all the days in the past were good--those other days I remember at different, non-nostalgic times and that is appropriate and healthy.

The warmth of good feelings arising over the decades of my life argues to me that life has been good. My life has been watched over by God. Call it nostalgia; call it remembrances of the truth. God has always been with me--the vacation as a five year old on the family's "trip around the lake"; the memory of the strength and security of an uncle; the coddling of a grandmother; the successes in school; the vigor of youthful health; the exuberance of tearing around town in a car, windows open, radio blaring and you are seventeen years old. These memories are good and, what is key, the goodness pervades.

What is that goodness that we feel in our moments of nostalgia? It has been God who was with me every step of the way. And if God was with me then, is he not still with me today? Am I not today creating the "stuff" of nostalgia for tomorrow? If so, the delightful endeavor for today then is to try to open my eyes to how I am accompanied right here and now.

Indulge me. Let me post a link to a video which speaks to the yearning to see the goodness of today. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmoE8_U-JTw.

For some reason, it is so much easier to see the goodness of life in the rearview mirror. And that is too bad for today.

The River Will Also Bring You Home

2009-08-01T09:07:00.006-05:00

In my studies for the Doctor of Ministry, I am, in general, working on the Church's teaching on marriage. One of the core values of Christian marriage is that marriage is not a private act. You cannot get married in isolation. Marriage makes promises not only between spouses but also to the community.

I ran across the following material from an article in the Winter, 2007 issue of Communio. The article is entitled "Wendell Berry on Marriage: Marriage in the Membership." The following is a mix of Berry's words and the words of the article's author, Anne Husted Burleigh. I thought the following to be beautiful:

"[Andy] imagines, for example, his grandfather, Mat Feltner, coming home from college to marry his love, Margaret Finley, and planning to settle on his father's farm at Port William.

"It is early June of 1906, a sunny day, when Mat, aboard the little Kentucky River steamboat, The Blue Wing, impatiently waits for his landing stop.

"At last he sees forming ahead of him, still blue with distance, the shape of the Port William hill, and then one of his father's open ridgetops, and then the steeple pointing up over the trees, and then the old elm at the landing. As the boat sidles in out of the current, he looks up and sees standing on the porch of the store above the road Margaret, who has loved him all his life until then, and will love him all the rest of it. She has heard the whistle and walked down to meet him. He waves, She smiles and waves back, and an old longing, the size of himself, opens within him."

"Just as he is ready to step onto the plank, an old man hooks him with his cane and asks him if he is Ben Feltner's boy. When Mat acknowledges that he is, the old man comments on Mat having 'been up there to that college,' and asks, 'Well, you'll be going away now, I reckon, to make something of yourself.' Mat, stepping free, says, 'No sir, I reckon not.' He sees ahead of him the compass of his life: Margaret is coming down the bank to meet him, her long skirt gathered in one hand to keep it out of the dew."

"Years later, when Mat and Margaret have grown old together in love, and Mat sees that the end of his life is near, he thinks tenderly of Margaret 'and of all that his plighting with her has led to.' All these years of fidelity, of their cleaving to each other and to their membership; all these years in which they could have lived their marriage any number of ways but they chose this particular incarnation of it, in this place, in this membership, on this farm, with these children: all these years in which they held in memory their grandparents, who came to Kentucky when the land was thick with great virgin forests and giant canebrakes, and every species of wild game--all this faithfulness to each other, to their particular incarnated place and to the remembering of the gift they have been given has created a work of art. This garden of marriage that they have tilled, tending their plot as steward, holding it in trust, in answer to a direct commission from Genesis to be fruitful and multiply, is a work of art--not a production of technology, but a work of art.

"Their marriage is bigger than the two of them individually; yet it is not the sum of the two of them. It transcends them; it is a new thing altogether, a new creation, an expansion of reality, a third thing. As their daughter-in-law Hannah says, "It is 'a room of love.'"

"In the end, Wendell Berry's works are hymns of fidelity, fidelity in marriage and in all other ways, fidelity that can only be the result of God's faithfulness to us. Finally, then, Wendell Berry's heroes and heroines are above all thankful for what they have been given, echoing the Canticle of Isaiah,
The living, the living give you thanks,
as I do today,
Fathers declare to their sons,
O God, your faithfulness. (Is 38:19).

Rollin' Down the River

2009-07-22T21:37:00.011-05:00

I have long been fascinated with the story of Huckleberry Finn. In particular, the role of the river in the story is intriguing. It seems that only on the river is there sanity. Only on the river is Huck safe and only there can Jim protect him. On the shores are the people, civilization, and there he encounters both adventure, as well as danger. Escape is by means of the river.

I don't want to stretch the river image too far and make it bear meaning larger than Twain intended. However, as I say, Huck's river attracts me and it raises for me questions about balancing life in prayer and life in service. Stated alternatively, there is a tension sometimes felt in being on retreat and leaving from a retreat. We think of Peter speaking to Jesus in the story of the Transfiguration. On that mountaintop, Jesus is transformed and Peter says, "Master, it is good that we are here" (Lk 9:33).

Like Huck on the river, Peter is happy and safe on the mountaintop. And, like Huck, Peter too has to leave the safe place. Huck is drawn to the shore--that is where he will find himself. Peter is led down by his Master to life in the midst of the people.

Life can be good on the river. If enough of us gather there, there will be camaraderie and joy. Ultimately, though, we need to go ashore. Ultimately, I think we need to resist seeing a great gulf between prayer and action.

Moody Blues.

2009-07-19T12:26:00.010-05:00

I post this largely because I am so pleased with myself with the wordplay in the title.

Aside from my pun, I post this because I have a quibble with an opinion expressed on Moody Radio this morning, heard on my way to Mass. The announcer referred to the human body as, in effect, inconsequential. He said it was only our "earth suit" and a "soul carrier." I doubt he considered the repercussions of that view.

To ignore the human person's existence as an enfleshed spirit and inspirited flesh is to be a dualist. A dualist sees the mind and body as separate, with the mind as superior to the body, whose task it is to serve the mind or the spirit. I do not think the announcer would want to accept the consequences of that theological anthropology. To be the dualist as the announcer was suggesting is to accept that the actions of the body are not significant. Stated alternatively, the announcer would come to the point of saying the good intentions of the mind could salvage an evil act of the body.

This dualist view is particularly problematic with regard to ethics. Does it not matter what we do with our bodies? Do not our bodies coexist inextricably with our mind or spirit during our earthly existence? Do we not declare who we are and what we believe with our bodies? Does not a married couple consider their one-flesh union immensely significant? If the body is trivial, the physical union of husband and wife likewise tends toward the trivial.

Consider further the implications of dualism in the same-sex marriage debate: proponents of same-sex marriage speak sometimes in terms of "plumbing" or "mere body parts" fitting together--the important dimension for them is the love of the couple. To speak this way is to ignore the spiritual act of the will manifested in what the human person does physically. Giving my "plumbing" to my wife is life-alteringly significant for both of us. Our mutual "plumbing" speaks and gives testimony to our lives together in fidelity and fecundity. Consider what we are saying to each other in the physical union: we are pledging ourselves to each other. Were we to separate body and soul, the plumbing does pale into insignificance.

The Sacred Heart

2009-07-18T21:18:00.019-05:00

For many years, I failed to appreciate the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I was aware of its symbol--the pierced, bleeding heart. I usually thought of the heart as depicted at The House of Blues where the heart is wrapped in barbed wire, rather than the thorns usually depicted. I did not get it. I was resistant to the piety. However, I stumbled on a book by Dietrich Von Hildebrand, called The Heart. Here, for the first time, I began to consider the significance of the devotion. In fact, I found the book persuasive and most helpful in prayer.

Too often, we (I?) regrettably fail to acknowledge the full humanity of Jesus and we become practitioners of the heresy known as docetism. That is to say, we see Jesus as God but neglect his human nature. Jesus then becomes disconnected from us and, with that distance we wrongly ascribe to him, he becomes less relevant to us. The Sacred Heart, at least as Von Hildebrand considers it, is a way to not only enrich our own lives and those we encounter, but also is a way unite ourselves more fully with Jesus, the God-man.

The mental move, the spiritual teaching, is to go from objectifying the Sacred Heart as some inanimate object and, instead, enter into a life in union with the Sacred Heart, the human manifestation of the personhood of Jesus. We do this by seeking to understand how the metaphorical heart of Jesus would have dealt with the very human situations he encountered. We look to see how, emotionally and affectively, Jesus would have been with his friends, how he would have felt in encountering both joy and sorrow.

We try to incorporate into our own lives the same kind of attitudes that Jesus had. The Sacred Heart is the heart of Jesus which loved and laughed and wept and experienced all the human emotions. The question for us--as those who assert our discipleship of Jesus--how do we love and laugh and weep? Are we loving and laughing and weeping in the same circumstances as Jesus? Are our motivations the motivations of the Sacred Heart?

A homely instance of this living with the Sacred Heart can be illustrated by a scene from The Passion of the Christ. During Jesus' "hidden years," the filmmaker imagines Jesus making a table which is too short to stand at and too tall to sit at. There is a scene of laughter as he seems to be teased by his mother Mary about the strange table. He and she laugh together. The Sacred Heart is there laughing. We too will laugh at the joys of life and when we do, we are invited to deepen the joy when we laugh as the Sacred Heart would laugh.

The Obligatory First Entry

2009-07-17T16:00:00.004-05:00

Of course, I have to explain myself.

Does the world need another blog? Am I another individual who believes that no thought of mine should go unpublished? Do I have great hopes for this blog? The answer to all three of these questions is "no." However, I do want to experiment with blogging so that I might learn about this newer form of communication. Learning by doing seems to be effective.

I would also hope to share my faith with those who might happen upon the blog. I nurture that hope as I view myself as a minister, specifically, as a deacon in the Roman Catholic Church. As such, one of my duties is to teach the Gospel in harmony with the Church. I offer this teaching both because of duty and obedience to what I promised at my ordination in 1998, as well as because (when I am at my best) I love others and want to offer them something that I think is good. More specifically, I want to offer the choice to live in the freedom of the Christian life. It has worked for me and it will work for you. Accordingly, I anticipate most of the material on the blog will be related to the Christian faith and, most likely, particularly the Catholic faith.
Why the name? The name comes from a line in the Dry Salvages portion of the Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot. Near the end of that quartet, Eliot writes,

"...but to apprehend
The point of intersection of the timeless
With time, is an occupation for the saint--
No occupation either, but something given
And taken, in a lifetime's death in love,
Ardour and selflessness and self-surrender.
For most of us, there is only the unattended
Moment, the moment in and out of time,
The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight,
The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning
Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but you are the music
While the music lasts. These are only hints and guesses,
Hints followed by guesses; and the rest
Is prayer, observance, discipline, thought and action.
The hint half guessed, the gift half understood, is Incarnation.

Perhaps in the days to come I will understand the title better and share that with you. In the meantime, the title to the blog seems significant to me. It suggests the gift of God's hand in all that we encounter. Too often, the gift passes us by unnoticed or unreflected on.

Come back again soon and let us discover the meaning of the sound and sight of winter lightning.