You don't know anything!?

A Reflection on the readings for Daily Mass for Thursday of the Fourteenth Week of Ordinary Time, July 7, 2016.

Hosea 11:1-4, 8e-9
Psalm 80:2ac, 3b, 15-16
The Holy Gospel According to Saint Matthew 10:7-15

I was haggard and disheveled.   I hadn't slept a wink.   My wife was even more tired than I was.  Our daughter was refusing to sleep.   She had decided that night time was day time, and day time was night time.  It was turning our life into a topsy turvy mess.  Here it was two A.M. and she was bouncing off the walls.  My wife was asleep in a chair where she had finally succumbed to her fatigue, having to work again in a just a few hours.   My eyes were blood shot and cracked and I kept saying go to bed!   A few hours later I called my dad and mom and I apologized to them for all the times I had kept them awake as a child.  I knew I had been hyper active and all those years I got upset when they asked me not to eat candy or drink soda... how many nights had I done just this to them?

“When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.”― Mark Twain

Kids always seem to know better than their parents.   There is something about the aging process that makes a child who hits pubescence seem to think that anyone older than them must simply just not understand life.  All of a sudden no one else is right, everyone else is either stupid or crazy, and only I can ever figure out the truth.  It makes it hard for parents, but the much more difficult cross to bear is that it hurts.  It makes our hearts ache for that child.  Knowing what we had to go through to learn, knowing that they are making mistakes that will lead them to pain and sorrow.... that is the silent sword that pierces the heart of one who loves their child.   We've been there, even if they don't believe.. even if they don't think we can ever understand.... we've had our hearts broken, we've had our lives riddled with sin, we've been down those roads.. some of us to places we won't even talk about.

The first response is often anger, isn't it? "Why won't you listen!"  "I'm trying to help!"  "Won't you just learn from my mistakes and not make the same ones?!"  Growing up that's how I heard that verse from Saint Matthew.   "Shake the dust off your feet" and move on.   They weren't worth getting worked up over, just find someone else to proselytize was the message I received.   It's not the one I hear today when I read those words... it's rather a reminder of what we see at the end of the reading from Hosea... "My heart is overwhelmed and my pity is stirred.  I will not give vent to my blazing anger...[] For I am God, not man."  God isn't calling us to reject those people, to shake the dust off and leave them to lose their way.  He's rather saying, do not let fear cling to you.   It's as if He is saying "I've got this."  Don't let the dust of the situation cling to you, drag you down.. take away your joy and peace.   Rather trust in the Lord, you're God.   Lift them up in prayer and leave it to Him.

That's a hard lesson to learn isn't it?  Offer them at the foot of the cross.  Like the Blessed Virgin Mary we are challenged with standing and watching as a 'sword pierces our own soul.'  She is our example, the ultimate of discipleship.  Even when she did not understand she kept all of it in her heart and thought about it.  She did not discourage Him from this path, but rather, she asked Him to perform the first miracle of his ministry.  That's our other thought... to lift them up, to say Jesus.. we are asking you to turn the water of their life.. no matter how dingy or used it may become... into something exquisite... a wine fit for a king.  That's the interesting thing about that miracle isn't it?   These were the ceremonial cleansing jars.. where people washed their hands and feet from the trip.  Water was precious (is precious) in those lands.   They wouldn't waste it and did not know about germs or such.. so they just washed and put it back.  Yet it became the most beautiful of wines did it not?   Their life, our lives... are in His hands.  Are we ready to be transformed into wine?

My Dad When I Was...
4 years old:
My daddy can do anything!
5 years old:
My daddy knows a lot!
6 years old:
My dad is smarter than your dad!
8 years old:
My dad doesn't know exactly everything.
10 years old:
In the olden days when my dad grew up,
things were sure different!
12 years old:
Oh, well, naturally,
Dad doesn't know anything about that.
He is too old to remember his childhood.
14 years old:
Don't pay any attention to my dad.
He is so old-fashioned!
21 years old:
Him? My Lord, he's hopelessly out of date!
25 years old:
Dad knows a little bit about it,
but then he should because he has been around so long.
30 years old:
Maybe we should ask Dad what he thinks.
After all, he's had a lot of experience.
35 years old:
I'm not doing a single thing until I talk to Dad.
40 years old:
I wonder how Dad would have handled it.
He was so wise and had a world of experience.
50 years old:
I'd give anything if Dad were here now
so I could talk this over with him.
Too bad I didn't appreciate how smart he was.
I could have learned a lot from him.
I sure do miss him.
from Ann Landers

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

A Little Salt and Lime

The other day I posted on Facebook about how disappointed I was when the school had a celebration for Cinco de Mayo and didn't include everyone.    I still don't know the details of why it was all inclusive, or even offered to everyone who wanted to participate.   What I do know is that it being Cinco de Mayo I want to talk about the significance of this holiday.   Here in America we tend to use it as an excuse to 'eat tacos and drink margaritas' as Father Don waxed poetically this morning.  The thing is, it's a celebration of freedom, of overcoming adversity and enormous odds.

I think to truly understand the significance of this date, we have to understand what the world was like when these events were occurring.   Mexico had been at war with America, followed by it's own internal civil war and was nearly out of resources.  Many lives had been lost, the treasury itself was almost bankrupt and the people were prime targets for occupation.   The United States were embroiled in their own civil war and couldn't pay attention to the geopolitical maneuvering that was going on.  Many countries decided to demand payment from Mexico for it's debts to them, but only the French saw this as an opportunity to gain new lands and peoples.   So they attacked the Mexican country and even though the French military was considered strong and enormously better trained and equipped than the small Mexican force, yet, the Mexican army "crushed" the premier army of the world.

Eventually the French did take over the Mexican government but were expelled a few years later.   The US began to get involved, the Mexican people continued to revolt never giving up, and all of these situations caused Napoleon to retreat.   This is a decisive moment in history not just for the Mexican people, but for the entire continent.  In fact, many historians believe that had the French maintained their hold in Mexico from the onset of this war they would have joined the southern forces to overthrow the northern yankees and our country would have turned out much differently than it did.  Lots of repercussions there that we need to understand as a people.

What does that have to do with the readings for today?   I think the first reading shows us a good example of exactly what the Mexican people did.   They were grounded.   They planted themselves where they needed to be.   They never gave up on their cause, even when they suffered defeat.  The Apostle Paul was not always successful.  Just the other day we read about his failure at the Areopagus, where people basically said "call me some other time, not interested."  Now we see him working tirelessly at a trade to support himself while still trying to spread the Gospel.  Then a few friends come and begin to support him so he can work at preaching instead of making tents.  Even then, with 100% of his efforts concentrated he begins to lose his temper and claims he's finished with the Jews.   But God isn't!  Paul ends up moving in with a man who lives next to the synagogue and all of a sudden the leader of that synagogue and his entire family converted!  Paul kept working, even when it seemed it wasn't going his way.  His friends backed him, supported him and worked with him.  No matter what failures, no matter what successes... they still worked preaching the word of God.. just like the Mexican people on Cinco de Mayo, they fought against odds that the rest of the world would never have faced, and were triumphant.

I think that's our lesson for today.  To stand our ground, to move when God needs us to move, to fight when God needs us to fight, and to preach when God needs us to preach.  How though do we prepare for all of this?  How do we get ready for knowing where God wants us?  How do we know when it's time to preach, when it's time to make tents, or when it's time to move shake out our garments and move on to a new household?   The Gospel reminds us of that simple truth.   Jesus disciples were a bit confused when he said: “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me.”  We 2000 years later, in light of much theological thought and discussion have a glimpse into that truth.  Jesus was sending the Holy Spirit to not only lead us, to guide us and teach us, but also to make bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.   That's how we see him in the most substantial and present way we can on this side of Heaven.   Though he went away physically in his human, glorified body;  he comes back every time we gather to worship.  When the Priest lifts up that Host and says the words of consecration, do you realize that is the fulfillment of that promise?  "You will see me."

So when we receive him, when we gather together and proclaim to be Christian, we have to ask ourselves.. have we shaken out the dust of our cloaks?  As I was reading the office of readings this morning, these verses stuck out in my head:

Little ones,
let no one deceive you;
the man who acts in holiness is holy indeed,
even as the Son is holy.
The man who sins belongs to the devil,
because the devil is a sinner from the beginning.
It was to destroy the devil’s works
that the Son of God revealed himself.
No one begotten of God acts sinfully
because he remains of God’s stock;
he cannot sin
because he is begotten of God.

That is the way to see who are God’s children,
and who are the devil’s.
No one whose actions are unholy belongs to God,
nor anyone who fails to love his brother.

When Paul shook his cloak he was getting rid of everything he felt was wrong with that place, even the dust of the air.  How about you?  Your body is the temple of God, your spiritual covering... have you shaken out those things which are unholy? Or are you clinging to some of that dust?  What stands between you and being the kind of man/woman that God has created you to be?   It's been 40 days since Easter Sunday, have you transformed your life?   Or are you back in the same old ruts?   We have work to do Church.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."