Sourpusses!

"My dwelling, like a shepherd's tent, is struck down and born away from me."  A shepherd's tent is a hastily constructed tent that is only intended for the night.  Something that if the wind picks up is blown away and no longer to be found.  When the shepherd's move on they are often left in place and within a short time nothing is left but tatters and rags. One would be hard pressed to even tell what it was that had stood there.  It reminds me of the scene in the Wizard of Oz when the house circled in the tornado and you could see all of this being carried off with it.  Our dwelling though, is our body.  Hezekiah feels that his life is over and he mourns the loss. 

The readings remind us that this life is fleeting and finite.  That our only hope is in the Lord who made heaven and earth.  Hezekiah calls out to Him and He performs a miraculous healing and even makes the Sun itself move backwards in time to prove it will come about.   We often do a lot to extend our lives.  We diet, we exercise, we go to doctors time and again.   Those are all good things.   Do we take it to God in prayer?  He is the source of life itself.  Why do we only tend to do the physical while ignoring the spiritual half of our lives? 

One of the more serious temptations which stifles boldness and zeal is a defeatism which turns us into querulous and disillusioned pessimists, “sourpusses”. - Pope Francis

Some take it to extremes though.  Saint Francis at the end of his life looked back on all of the mortification he did on himself, the rough life that truly destroyed his health, and he realized that that was not good either.  God did not create us to live lives of dour, resent-filled hours.   He created us to be at peace and filled with joy.   Yes, to be a temporary structure, but one that is so filled with love that it is not concerned with the next moment.  A structure that just provide shelter to those in need in the present, not consumed with the ills of the past or the fears of the future.  Mortification is important, but we have to be careful how far we take it.  If it draws us closer to God?  Continue.   If it makes you feel hopeless or despair?  Get rid of it. 

Jesus reminds us that God gave us everything He gave us for our own benefit.  Even the Sabbath was not meant as something to make you starve yourself, but a day of rest in which you could commune with God and with one another.  It is not a rule made by a tyrant who sits around all day waiting to cross your name out of His book of life the moment you make a mistake, but one made by a loving Father who realizes His children often forget that they too need to take a day to rest and recover.  Be a shepherd's tent, but don't let the world blow you away before it is time.  Take a moment each day to recover, and a day each week to rest and contemplate the wonder of God's great gift to us.   All of our life is a gift, and the Gospel a treasure to make us fully human, not to punish us and turn us into 'sour pusses . ' 

His servant and yours, 

Brian 

"He must increase, I must decrease." 

A Reflection on the Daily Mass readings for Friday of the fifteenth week of Ordinary time: July 15, 2016. Isaiah 38:1-6, 21-22, 7-8; Isaiah 38:10, 11, 12, 16; Matthew 12:1-8

Are yall ready for this?

As a man who is discerning a call to diaconate tomorrow’s first reading really speaks to me about that call.    The most amazing part to me is how skillfully Luke has worded the death of the first Christian Martyr, Saint Stephen, to show how it mirrored the very death of our Savior, Jesus Christ.  

They both spoke with Wisdom and no one could resist their arguments - (Acts 6:10, Matt 13:54)
Both had false witnesses testify against them - (Acts 6:11, Matt 26:59)
The Pharisees stirred up the crowd to turn against them (Acts 6:12, Matt 27:20)
Both were brought in before the council for trial - (Acts 6:12, Matt 26:59)
Both were falsely accused of Blasphemy (Acts 6:13, Matt 26:65)
Both were accused of breaking the Law of Moses (Acts 6:13, Matt 12:2)
Both were associated with high priests - (Acts 7:1, Matt 26:3)
Stephen was dealing with the same people - (Acts 7:1, Matt 26:57)
Both prayed for forgiveness of their executioners - (Acts 7:60, Luke 23:34)
Their bodies were both buried by devout men - (Acts 8:2, Matt 27:59)

That is the ultimate goal of Christianity isn’t it?   To have our lives so configured to Christ that when people look at us they see not us, but the image of our Lord and Savior lived out in our actions and words.  Stephen managed this in a way that led to martyrdom.  Martyrdom is the supreme witness given to the truth of the faith: it means bearing witness even unto death. The martyr bears witness to Christ who died and rose, to whom he is united by charity. He bears witness to the truth of the faith and of Christian doctrine. (CCC 2473) Not all of us are called to Martyrdom.  Many of us may live a long, productive life that ends in a quiet and peaceful death.  That doesn’t free us from not only needing to be more like Christ, but it should be our desire!  We should want to be more like Him!  To live in a way that not only honors his memory, but makes him present to those around us.  It reminds me of Philip, who we do not see being martyred but still presenting himself much like the story of Stephen.  

When we look at these two men we see clear examples of what we are being called to do.  We are being called to live our lives in a way that images the life of Christ.  A life of faith and obedience to God the Father.  One in which we go forth regardless of the danger or consequences that might be involved with preaching the Gospel of Christ, even if it means going to our own death.   Why?  What is in it for us?  What is worth all of this hubbub?  That’s where the Gospel begins to point us.  

Jesus has just performed some major miracles in the presence of these men and women on the shores of the Sea of Galilee.  The people have all the evidence in their presence to say that he not only multiplied the bread, but also somehow miraculously crossed the sea in the night without a boat.   This man has done something which is not natural, something that only God should be able to do, he has command over the elements!  He forms reality around him, changing the storm into calmness, water into something which can be walked on, bread into something which multiplies and feeds beyond it’s capacity.  

Yet when they come to him, they aren’t looking for the right thing.  Their stomachs are empty again… they just want more food.  I can imagine the people seeing a new way of life in which they just follow this man around for free food and entertainment.  Jesus goes on to give them the bread of life discourse, in which we Catholics see the Eucharist.  The Old Testament is filled with examples of God providing for his people:  Thus the flood and Noah's ark prefigured salvation by Baptism, as did the cloud and the crossing of the Red Sea. Water from the rock was the figure of the spiritual gifts of Christ, and manna in the desert prefigured the Eucharist, "the true bread from heaven.”  (CCC 1094)  Unlike the manna which their fathers had eaten in the desert, which only fed them for a day, Jesus was offering them something more powerful, something more filling, something greater than that bread which must be gathered every day.  He was offering them his very self.. Body, soul and divinity… in the Eucharist.    He offers you the same today.  He is offering you eternal life.

Are you ready for that?  Each of us is called to specific vocation, to a specific way of life.  You are the only you there is.  Pope Francis reminded us of that in his simple, yet eloquent way:

You are called to journey this life in a way that leads to eternity in the presence of God.  You are called to be the best you, you can be.   That doesn’t mean you have to be like me… your calling is unique.. The way you do things is unique.. God made you to be you, but to be the real you requires living a life in conformity to the image in which you have been made.. In the image of Christ.. Are you ready for that?  It begins anew every time we step forward and receive him, responding Amen…” All that you have said, we will do.” (Exodus 24:3)

His servant and yours,

Brian

“He must increase, I must decrease.”

Till we've seen this journey through

Tomorrow we celebrate the feast of the chair of Saint Peter.  The authority of the Pope seems to be a stumbling block for many.  They question why we believe that there is one man with the ability to lead us, to guide us, and to have the authoritative ability to decide when the rest of the church may come to a stalemate.  Protestant scholars for decades have attempted to undermine this gospel reading.  They try to say that Jesus was either speaking to everyone there, thus giving the keys to every Christian; or they attempt to say that the office of the first Pope was his and his alone, thus dying when he died.  I'm not sure why we go to such lengths to try and interpret this scripture differently than those who would have been there to hear it.

To any first century Jew they would have heard this:

"And so I say to you, you are Peter,

and upon this rock I will build my Church,

and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.

I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.

Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven;

and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

Which would have immediately have reminded them of this: 

I will clothe him with your robe, and will bind your girdle on him, and will commit your authority to his hand; and he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. And I will place on his shoulder the key of the house of David; he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.

That quote from Isaiah puts it directly into perspective.  The author was writing about the installation of the prime minister of the Kingdom of David.  That is, a man who was being given authority over the kingdom only below David himself.   Anything Eliakim thus would have said would have been law, just as if David himself had said it.  It would have called them back to Pharaoh and Joseph, when Pharaoh declared "You shall be in charge of my palace, and all my people are to submit to your orders. Only with respect to the throne will I be greater than you."  That's what it means to be second in the Kingdom, to have the authority to declare and decide in the absence of the King until his return.   We see when Jesus tells them that the Pharisees sit on the chair of Moses that the Jewish people already have the concept that authority is passed down from one 'chair holder' to the next.  Why do we humans have such a problem with structures of authority?   Why do we seek to try to be in God's kingdom without following those God has put above us?  We want God on our terms, but by the very nature of who God is, we can only receive him on his terms. 

The thing is though that people see the title Priest, Bishop, Cardinal, Pope, and even Deacon to be titles of honor.   They demand to be able to receive those titles too!  I want it!  Everyone should be able to be a priest right?  Women?  Men?  Sinner or saint?  They look for the honor and the authority.  What the average person misses is that those titles... those titles are not titles of honor, but titles of service.  It's not something a man is to choose for himself, it's a calling! That's why the Pope is often called the first among equals.  "Do not lord it over those assigned to, but be examples to the flock."  To take on Holy Orders is to become less, to become a servant, to take on the responsibility of helping everyone else get to heaven.  

As a father my primary vocation is my marriage.  I am responsible for living my life in a way that points to Christ.  For loving my wife into heaven.  Raising my children up in a way that gives a reason for the hope that I proclaim in my words and actions. 

As a man discerning the call to the diaconate, I find that both exciting and intimidating.  As a father my primary vocation is my marriage.  I am responsible for living my life in a way that points to Christ.  For loving my wife into heaven.  Raising my children up in a way that gives a reason for the hope that I proclaim in my words and actions.  That's enough of a challenge and a responsibility on it's own, isn't it?  Yet, I feel called to a deeper level of service.  I feel called to serve the widow, the orphan, the stranger.  Called to be configured to Christ the Servant in such a way that I become responsible for every person in our Parish.  To see that their needs are met as far as I am able.  To run into the world with tears flowing, to seek the feet of Jesus and to wash them and dry them with whatever means possible.  Driven to seek his face in the unhappy, the broken, the sad, and the downtrodden.  A man compelled to offer himself up as a living sacrifice for all, while still leading his family as the spiritual head of the household, and loving his wife as Christ loved the Church. 

That is an honorable calling, I agree.  Is it a title that will give me glory in this world?  Riches?  Wealth?  Those things which people seem to think are the models of success?  No.  I will spend seven years in formation just to begin this journey.  At that point, God willing, I will become a Deacon.  Then I will spend many more years studying, growing, and serving.  I will not receive a paycheck.   I will serve however I am asked, if my humility is intact, and then I will hopefully die one day noticed only by the King himself.  I only want to die a man who can honestly say when you were thirsty, I gave you drink.  When you were hungry, I fed you.  When you were naked, I clothed you.   I gave you not just my cloak, but my tunic too.  I loved you Jesus, with all that I am, with all that I could be.  I loved you... and I loved your body.  I loved the Church and it's members as much as my mortally inadequate body was able.  Then when I see the Chief Shepherd is revealed, I pray that I might have the honor of sharing that unfading crown of glory with each and every one of you.  

We are called to be Saints, we are called to be Holy.  Set apart.  The Apostles handed on their authority in the way they saw fit.   The Chair of Peter continued from man to man, until it rests today on the humble yet Charismatic man we know as Pope Francis.  I do not envy him the amount of humility, patience, and temperance needed to be the ultimate of Servant Leaders.  So let us today recognize that special authority that Jesus put on the shoulders of the leader of the Catholic church, while at the same time realize that we too are called to be servants.  Christianity is not about what we get out of it, but what we put into it.  It's about growing closer to Jesus Christ through a living, organic relationship with his Church.  Are you with me?  Are you ready to give up those things standing in the way?  Peter and his successors have loosened the gates of Mercy.   Our Pope has declared a jubilee year of mercy to pour out God's graces to the entire world.  That begins with each and every one of us, but it can't stop within us.. it has to pour out through us to others via our words and deeds.  So today let us pray that prayer attributed to the name sake of our current Pope:

Our Pope has declared a jubilee year of mercy to pour out God's graces to the entire world.  That begins with each and every one of us, but it can't stop within us.. it has to pour out through us to others via our words and deeds.

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.  Where there is hatred, let me sow love.   Where there is injury, pardon.  Where there is darkness, light.  Where there is doubt, faith.  Where there is despair, hope.  Oh divine Master, grant that I may not seek so much to be consoled as to console.  To be understood as to understand.  To be loved as to love.  For it is in giving that we receive.  In pardoning that we are pardoned.  And in dying that we are born to eternal life. 

His servant and yours, 

Brian 

"He must increase, I must decrease."

So ya thought ya might like to go to the show

In today's news feed I found it interesting to see headlines that declared Donald Trump and the Pope at war with one another. One article making it seem as if the Pope had declared Trump a heretic and excommunicated him, another in which Trump declared the Pope despicable for questioning his Christian faith. All of them had one in thing in common, they weren't showing the whole truth. Clips out of context and misquotes abounded. What the Pope said rather, was that building walls instead of bridges was not the action of a Christian. What the Pope said was radical.  What he said was counter cultural.   What he said is Catholic teaching.

The readings for tomorrow's daily Mass remind us of this simple truth. God wants to forgive us. He wants to bring us to the fullness of humanity, to become the person that we are created to be. Thomas Merton said “For me to be a saint means to be myself. Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is in fact the problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self.” That doesn't mean that how I am currently acting is saintly. Rather it means when I truly live out the fullness of what God created me to be... when I am the authentic Brian he intended me to be, that's when I find Sainthood.. that's when we have arrived. I remember when I was in school as a kid the ladies in the cafeteria had a sign hanging up with this little boy kind of frowning as if he was trying to figure something out. It said "I know I'm somebody, cause God don't make no junk." How true.

A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian. This is not the gospel. - Pope Francis

What do writings about anger and hatred have to do with Trump and the Pope? The Catholic Church teaches :

Our attitude to our neighbor will disclose acceptance or refusal of grace and divine love.  (CCC 678)

The more filled we are with love, the more we treat our brother with love, dignity and respect. The more like God we are, the more we want to share that love. Many conservatives often want to quantify this love by saying that of course Jesus did not mean to put ourselves at risk. Yet, when people came to capture him in the middle of the night he did not even defend himself, but even had Peter put his sword away. Then he healed his 'enemy.' Now, we have a right to self defense. Of that the Church has been clear of over the years. Not only a right but even a grave duty. (CCC 2265). Jesus though called us to a radical notion, a self giving that goes beyond our own box.

The problem truly has become our segregationist attitude. We in our search for greed, security, and pleasure; have divided the world up into countries, states, and political entities. It's a system that helps bring order, sure. It's also a system that turns our fellow man into the 'other'. Then we decide who is 'us' enough to be included as our neighbor, and who isn't. When we say 'lets take care of those at home first,' we are essentially saying 'those born in our country deserve more freedom, more love, more charity than those who were born elsewhere. How is that we get to decide that? What did they do to deserve that? Why is being born somewhere a deciding factor in how much we care for someone? Isn't that pretty much what the caste system attempts to do? Those born into the right family are treated with respect and dignity, those in the wrong are the unclean, the outsider, the ones who will always be downtrodden.

Building bridges, not walls. That is what Christ came to do. Christ came to tear down the wall of hostility and make the two into the one, the gentiles and the Jews into one family (Ephesians 2:14). He didn't come to die only for those in America, only those in the Church, or even only those who are free from sin. No he came to die for all men, that all might come to be one. When we pray the our Father we are praying for 'us.'

Finally, if we pray the Our Father sincerely, we leave individualism behind, because the love that we receive frees us from it. The "our" at the beginning of the Lord's Prayer, like the "us" of the last four petitions, excludes no one. If we are to say it truthfully, our divisions and oppositions have to be overcome.  (CCC 2792)

Doesn't that just hit home? It's time for us as Christians to truly ask ourselves, are we living the Gospel? Are we holding anything against our brother? Are we serving God's Kingdom or our own? The only crime many of these refugees have committed is being born in a country that is not our own. A crime that they did not choose to commit. In the case of Mexico alone, we see people being murdered in a drug war, raped and pillaged. Then we demean and degrade them by keeping them at bay. We use terms like illegal to make them seem unwanted, undesired, criminal. We put up a mental wall that makes us feel safer, and then cheer when someone wants to put up a physical one to keep out those undesirables. What will we do on judgment day when Christ says to us, “What you did to the least of these, you did to me”? None of us got to choose where we were born. It's time to stop punishing people for that.

What will we do on judgment day when Christ says to us, “What you did to the least of these, you did to me”?

The first reading from Ezekiel is wake up call. It remind us that for those who choose to do good, to live the fullness of what God created them to be, heaven awaits. For those who reject it, those who decide to do evil and ignore the potential for freedom of excellence that God has offered them, awaits the fires of Gahanna. 

The affirmations of Sacred Scripture and the teachings of the Church on the subject of hell are a call to the responsibility incumbent upon man to make use of his freedom in view of his eternal destiny. They are at the same time an urgent call to conversion: "Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few."  (CCC 1036)

Today we are faced with a choice. Jesus is asking us for water, he is asking us for food, he is a stranger asking for shelter. How will we respond to him? We have a right, even a duty to keep those we are responsible for safe. We also have a duty to reach out to fellow man and lift him up to that fullness that he too is created for. That fullness which was revealed completely and perfectly in the person of Jesus Christ. That's what Christianity is all about. That's what Lent is about. Forgiveness. Prayer. Fasting. Alms-giving. We are deeply entrenched in the desert of our own ego. God is offering us a chance to move outside of our own small mindedness and reach out to the rest of the world and say, “Christ is the way the truth and the life.” More poignantly than ever echoes the words of that beautiful hymn, “They will know we are Christians by our love.”

His servant and yours,

Brian

“He must increase, I must decrease.”

She is Fairer Than the Sun, suprassing every constellation in the stars.

I watched a friend of mine one time as he interacted with a girl that he was clearly in love with.  Every day he would hang out with her, listen to her intently, and help her in every way he could.  Eventually she asked him to help her go out on a date with his friend.  The hurt in his eyes was evident to all of us around.  We all knew he was in love with her.  Everyone knew, but her.  How did he respond though?  He helped her to be happy.  Talking to his friend, he set up the date.  He suffered in silence as she dated, had her heart broken, and eventually broke up with this man.  All the while he was there for her. A shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen, a true friend.  I don't know if she ever knew he loved her.  It's really a story that belongs best in a romantic comedy, but of course those always have happy endings, right?

I see tomorrow's Gospel reading in much the same way as what I described before.  The Pharisees wanted to know when the Kingdom of God would be among them.   Jesus warned them that it was already there.  God had already condescended among men, becoming a man himself.  Here stood the Kingdom of God right in front of them.  Jesus Christ.  His heart was bulging with love for them.  He came to die for them.  He emptied himself of everything in order that he might live among them, and redeem them to himself.  Then they came to him and asked, where can we find that which makes us happy?  Don't you see?  He's right there in front of you!  How easy for us 2000 years later to judge them. 

Yet, do we truly see him each day?  Isn't he calling out to use daily?  In the face of a friend?  In the eyes of a stranger?  In the brilliant rays of a morning sunrise?   Do you see him?  Or do you keep looking over him trying to find him somewhere else?  We don't need to be going to and fro, asking for signs and wonders.  No rather, he's already here.  All we have to do is open our eyes, our hearts, our minds.   He calls out to us from the tabernacle, in the Eucharist and he says, "I love you.  I will do anything to make you happy.  I have died for you, and offer you eternal life." 

Why do we fail?  Why is it so hard to see him?  One thing I think is something that the first reading mentions.  We lack true Wisdom.  Wisdom it says is the aura of the might of God, and a pure effusion of the glory of the Almighty.   She is the refulgence of eternal light.  The spotless mirror of the power of God.  Aren't those beautiful descriptions?  It is through Wisdom that we begin to actually notice God in our daily life.  Not necessarily in explosions and miracles, though those can happen too.  Rather though, also seeing him in the ordinary.  In the simple and the plain.  Saint Josaphat was one of those who had Wisdom.

We have many today who make the same error that men were making back in his day.  They only see God in this rite or that rite of the Catholic church.  In their ardor and zeal they reject anything that does not fit their box.  Going as far as to reject the Pope, or the Orthodox, or to form their own society rejecting the Novus Ordo.  Josaphat, unlike some of the schismatics of today, clung to his unity with Rome.  He did not want to change from his orthodox faith, and he did not want his people 'Latinized'.   Yet, he fought to bring understand and unity to his people.   Saint Josaphat died seeking to reunite the two, not to create more division.

That is true Wisdom isn't it? What do we take away from all of this?  I think that we learn that like Saint Josaphat we need to work for unity.  We need to pray for and seek Wisdom that we might see God in our brothers and sisters.   That we need to look for Jesus calling out to us saying, "behold, the Kingdom of God is among you."   We need to look inside, examine ourselves, and ask.. are we working for unity or division?  We need to let God's Wisdom and love flow through us until we too become an aura of the might of God, a pure effusions of the glory of the Almighty.  Until we are so close to Jesus Christ that when others look at us, they see not us, but rather Him shining through us.  Let us cling to the Sacraments, seek His face, and continually knock on the door of our own hearts asking it to open to the influence of the Holy Spirit. 

His servant and yours,
In Christ,
Brian

The Material World

There is this notion going around (and has been for many hundreds of years).  The church has been combating it from a very early time.  The Gnostics have long held (since the 1st and 2nd centuries) that all of creation was evil.  That notion is that the material world, that is all of creation, is 'bad' and the only good thing is the spiritual. What though would that notion say about Jesus Christ himself, who though fully God was also fully man?  Or about God himself who created matter?   This notion that our world is not worth the time we spend here and all that matters is Heaven to come has indeed infected the popular Christian music of our time.  A small example:

All I know is I'm not home yet

This is not where I belong

Take this world and give me Jesus

This is not where I belong

On one hand the lyrics are poignant and meaningful.  Being in Heaven with Christ is the goal of our existence.  The danger comes though when we spend all of our time thinking of things to come, without trying to see the beauty and gift of what Jesus has already given us.   It's kind of like getting a shirt that you kind of wanted for Christmas.  Then every time someone asks you about the shirt you're wearing, you start instead talking about the one you are going to get later.. the good one.. the one you got on is just a necessary thing to get you through.

We often forget the simple truth that when God looked back on creation, he said it was very good.  Not just mankind, but all of it.. the trees, the earth, the animals, the plants, in the water and on the earth.

And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, a sixth day.  Genesis 1:31 RSV-CE 

I think that is why this new encyclical, Laudato Si' is so pertinent and necessary for our times.  We have wrongly treated the word dominion as a right to complete domination.   As if we have the right to rape, pillage and destroy what God created and deemed very good simply because we are in charge of it.  How much like the renters of the vineyard we seem to have become who started treating it like it was their own.

“Hear another parable. There was a householder who planted a vineyard, and set a hedge around it, and dug a wine press in it, and built a tower, and let it out to tenants, and went into another country. When the season of fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants, to get his fruit; and the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the first; and they did the same to them. Afterward he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ And they took him and cast him out of the vineyard, and killed him. When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”

Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the scriptures:

‘The very stone which the builders rejected
has become the head of the corner;
this was the Lord’s doing,
and it is marvelous in our eyes’?

Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruits of it. And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but when it falls on any one, it will crush him.”

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they perceived that he was speaking about them. But when they tried to arrest him, they feared the multitudes, because they held him to be a prophet."

Matthew 21:33-41

How very fickle we humans are indeed.  We did the very thing Jesus speaks about.  God created for us a vineyard, filled with so many beautiful and wonderful things.  He gave it to us to take care of and instead of enhancing it's beauty and productivity, we often just destroy parts of it in search of greed and wealth.  Then the son himself came, and we did just like Jesus spoke of... we killed him and claimed the world as our own.  Yes, we have much to learn.  I am thankful for God's mercy because we as a species definitely do not deserve it.  May God forgive us for all we have done, and may the Pope's encyclical reach all to all people of the world and remind them that we have a duty to creation and we need to start living it.

An Encounter with Christ

As many of you know, I've taken some time away from the computer for Lent; only recently returning to Facebook and blogging.  During that time I've tried to add some other pursuits that would help me grow closer to God.   One of the things I decided to do was get back to 'pleasure reading.'  With classes for ministry formation, bible studies, prayer groups, etc... a great deal of my reading has been 'assignments' or things I needed to research to plan a prayer retreat, or even the Facebook posts.  So I picked out a few books to read, to help me grow closer, but also books that are just for me.  Books I wanted to read.

One of those books is The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything by Reverend James Martin, SJ.  This book interested me because of our new Holy Father, Pope Francis, and his Jesuit background.  I don't know a lot about Jesuits so trying to understand their spirituality is very interesting and enlightening to me.   I've also been reading the wonderful book, Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads given to me as a gift by my dear friend Laci.   One of the interesting things I have found about Father Martin, is that he consistently looks for Gods presence in everything.  In every person. In every action. In every thought. In every 'desire'.   He looks to find God, if not in the moment, at least in retrospect to the end of his day when he does his daily Examen.  There is such a wonderful anecdote in the book by Father Martin about a man working in an administrative position who, when the door bell rings, would say "I am coming Lord!" in preparation for trying to see God in whoever had come to visit or to do business.

Such a simple concept, to look at your day and try to find God in each person you talk to.  In each task you are doing. In every blessing and even in every problem.  Father Tim Seigel  used to say much the same thing, when he would talk about the beauty of our round church.   He would tell us that in each person in the room, there is Jesus waiting.  I even remember a story about a grumpy old man that someone was trying to serve or at least talk with in a shelter, and the story ended with "Jesus wasn't in a very good mood that day."

It all boils down to "whatever you have done for the least of these, you have done for me" and in the same token "whatever you have not done for the least of these, you have not done for me."  This long introduction leads me to such a simple moment, but one that really opened my eyes and blessed me this morning.   On Thursdays we say a chaplet of Divine Mercy in our Sanctuary after Mass.  Today as we were praying for Mercy for the world and all of us in it, I was drawn to contemplating Mary Magdalene and the gospel from a few days previous.  In that Gospel Mary arrives at the tomb and finds it empty.  She is devastated.  Jesus walks up but she doesn't recognize him in his glorified state, and I'm sure her grief stricken heart and tears helped make it even more difficult to recognize anyone at all.  She, thinking he was the caretaker, begged him to just tell her where Jesus body was and she'd come get it.  She turned back to the tomb, turning her back on God... and a moment later, Jesus said her name.   Something so simple, but immediately she recognized him.  As we were praying for Divine Mercy, I was thinking of the beauty and mercy of that tender moment... being called by God, by name.

There I sat thinking looking around at the faces of the beautiful people praying with me, and asking myself do I see Jesus in this room? In Richard and Gene I always find love, in Mary I find patience and fortitude, in Paul I find the kindness to go out of his way to help everyone.  Yes, in these people I see Jesus every day.  My heart was content for I thought, "Yes, I have seen Jesus today in his body!"

Then as we were leaving, I was talking to Rita about the prayer basket we had set up in the entrance and she, as always, was kind and generous.  Then as she was leaving she gave me a hug and a kiss on the check, and she said "You tell your children and wife," then she paused for a moment as if taking time to get every word just right and said, "Haley.  Hannah. Sarah.  Moira. and Julie."  Pausing between each name as if they were precious and beautiful, and then "that I love them."   Then she walked away.  There He was.   When I was least expecting him, when I thought I had already seen through my own effort what he had to offer me for today, the God of Surprises blessed me with a beautiful moment in which he reminded me "I have called you by name.  You are mine." (Isaiah 43:1) Thank you Lord for reminding me that you love and watch over my family, and that they belong to you.  May I try to live up to that honor of having them in my life; and thank you Lord for Rita, for being your instrument today to bring me such a beautiful present.