Lex Orendi, Lex Credendi?

For tomorrow's daily mass the readings continue to examine the Epistle of Saint James.  He continues to encourage us to work for God's kingdom and to avoid things of the world, things of the ego and of the flesh. He uses some pretty strong words, indeed.   He compares worldly things to adultery!  Why would he do that?   Because this thing we live as Christians is a relationship.  We, the Church, are the Bride of Christ. Greed, pride, and disordered attachments to worldly things are the very cause of our conflicts, arguments, even wars.  When we do these sorts of things we are breaking our relationship with Christ, we are 'cheating' on Him with something worth much less, with something inanimate.  It's a rejection of the one we should love completely and instead replacing it with something that doesn't fit.

You know those kid games?  The ones where you have all these different shapes and you have to fit the correct game piece into the right hole?  Well, each of us is created with a God shaped hole in our heart.  We can force something into it, for a time.. and it might even kind of fit.. but eventually it rubs us and chafes us.. because it's not the right shape, not the right size.  Only when we take a God shaped object and put it in a God shaped hole does our life become complete.. anything less... is adultery.. it's cheating.. it's avoiding the rules of the game and jamming something that shouldn't fit in there to try and fill up that hallow, empty place.

“Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.”

― Augustine of Hippo, Confessions

James reminds us of that saying: lex orendi, lex credendi.   That is: how we worship is how we believe.  If we worship as if God is the most important thing in our lives then that will help us form our belief, and vice versa.  If you worship like God is a thorn in your side, something that chafes and makes life harder?   So will you begin to believe.  I pray the liturgy of the hours every day.  I pray about an hour in the morning, fifteen minutes midday, and an hour a night.  Sometimes it's tedious and my mind wants me to think: I could be doing other things!  My favorite show is on!  The yard needs mowing!  I could be running or riding my bike!  So many excuses flow in that make me want to skip it.   If I continue to do that though, I am choosing the wrong shape to fit in my God shaped hole.   If I act like God is just something to fit in my schedule, well then I'm gonna start feeling that way.. treating him that way... Instead if I realize it's a gift to pray for the Church... a gift to spend time with the creator of the Universe praying the words He has revealed to us through the Holy Spirit.. If I instead treat it like the most precious thing in my life instead of something to just fit in, and I put God at the center of my day and then put everything else in my calendar, well that's when I am living out our relationship to it's fullest.

Jesus reminds us of that with a simple phrase: “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me.”  A child is so trusting, aren't they?  Yesterday I got to see my twin nieces.  It doesn't matter how long it's been they run up to me, hug me and ask me to lift them up.  They play with me and of course want to see my phone.    They trust me.  There is joy in their eyes and hearts, a joy at seeing one that they love.  It reminds me of that poster in our lobby at the Church, the one for Food for the Poor, which reminds us of Matthew 25.   When did I see you thirsty?  Whatever you did for the least of these.   When did I see you hungry?  Whatever you did for the least of these.  When did I see naked?  Whatever you did for the least of these.  We are all made in the image of God... every person out there; especially the downtrodden, the widow, the orphan, the refugee, the immigrant, the poor; are not only God's children but to be seen as Christ in the world.  We are challenged to not only receive Christ in the Eucharist, but to go forth and look into the world with his eyes... we should look on those in need of our help with that same joy that my nieces exude when they see someone they love.

When we leave Mass it's not enough to just go home and wait for tomorrow, it's not enough to simply go about our day not thinking about Christ.   We are challenged instead to go forth and live our faith.  That Latin phrase has another part: Lex credendi, lex orendi, lex vivendi.  As we worship, so we believe, so we live.  The way we act in our worship, leads us to believe certain things, and believing certain things leads us to live a certain way.  If we worship in the Mass in a way that shows we believe Jesus is present in the Eucharist, our belief will grow to reflect that.  As our belief grows our lives will change.  We will go forth into the world attempting to feed the poor, give drink to the thirsty, comfort the widow and the orphan, find home and safety for all in peril, house and protect the refugee, and share Christ with every person we meet.   Both readings reflect a simple truth.. all of this requires humility.   It is in being a servant that we emulate Christ the most.  Are you ready to be a servant?  What better heart can Christ fill than the one that reflects His own?

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."

Where's the bread?

Refugee Holy Familyby Angel Valdez

The readings for today could not be more apropos for so grand a Saint as Saint John Neumann.  To be a Saint means to have embodied what it is to live the Christian life faithfully and in imitation of Christ.  This Saint did so in a powerful way that should inspire each of us to live more fully the calling we have received and taken up in our Baptism.  We are indeed the body of Christ.  We should be reaching out to the poor, the down trodden, the alien, the refugee. Have we forgotten that in our affluent society?  Mayhaps even all of us are taken with a bit of this 'afluenza' that is so conveniently tossed around as a medical condition these days?

In the first reading we see this powerful line: Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.   How poetic and difficult this one line is to hear.  Jesus challenged us to love not just our friends, not just our family, not just those who are good to us.. but even those who are our enemies, those we cannot stand, those who turn our stomach into a wrestling ring for our dinner.  Yet, if we do not know love.. we do not know God. 

Then we see an image of Christ's love in the Gospel, the feeding of five thousand.  Christ asks his disciples to give them food to eat, and they remind of that old Wendy's commercial, "Where's the beef?"  “Are we to buy two hundred days’ wages worth of food and give it to them to eat?”  "Where are we gonna get that kind of bread Master?"  Here they are with God himself and still haven't figured it out.  Jesus, the Word, has already equipped them with everything they need to feed this crowd.   They've seen him cast out demons, heal the sick, bring the dead to life, calm the storms.  He has proven himself the master of all, from the body to nature itself.  Then he says something as simple as 'feed my flock' and they wonder how it can be done.  Jesus of course already knew the answer, and his command over the very laws of nature itself is demonstrated for the glory of God in the multiplication of loaves... taking what would normally only feed a few souls and feeding thousands with more left over than that which he started with.

When Saint John Neumann came to America to be ordained a priest, the church he was assigned over had no steeple or floor.   That did not deter him.  Even though his Parish stretched across an amazing distance, from Western New York to Lake Ontario, he travelled on foot to visit the coal miners, the sick, the immigrant.  When he found that a great deal of his congregation spoke Gaelic, and remember this is a time of severe persecution for the Irish immigrant, he learned the language himself that he might hear their confessions.  He who had been given the Bread of Life, took it directly to the people, celebrating Mass with them even at times on their own kitchen tables.

That's what you and I are called to do, in the means of our own vocations.  You see, love is not love without another.  One can say they love themselves, but that is truly ego.  Love is love when it is given.  That is why we believe God to be a trinity... because God is love.  Yet, even though the Father and the Son loved one another, so much so that it became another person, that love was not held on to for just themselves.   No, it poured out.. it overflowed... it came out into the universe, creating and building... for us.  A love that to this day calls out to us and seeks us, asking us to become one with it.  God sent his only-begotten Son into the world so that we might have life through him.  God wants us to be partakers of his divine essence, to live for eternity with Him, to become like Him.   We have received that promise thorugh Baptism, been strengthened through Confirmation, and renew our covenant and relationship with him through the Sacraments.   That's not all though. It doesn't end there.

Jesus said, “Give them some food yourselves.”   He multiplied the bread, but he expected the Disciples to provide it.  He multiplies our love, but he expects us to provide it.   Just like Saint John, we must journey out into the world and start providing the bread.   We must reach out with what we have been given, and share it with those who do not have it.  This is on both a physical and spiritual level.  We not only need to share the Word, reaching out to those who do not know Christ, and inviting them into a relationship with him; but we also have to share those blessings we have been given with the world. 

It's so easy to forget that there are those out there who do not have.  In a time of celebration, in a time that is often excessive and gluttonous, there is often a feeling of comfort and joy; and there should be.  We cannot forget the people who have no such comfort.  Christmas of all times is a reminder of refugees, of people fleeing a repressive regime, of a man and woman with a new born child, who are journeying into a country not their own.  Have we forgotten them?  We must ask ourselves, are we looking for the Holy Family?  Do we continue to seek Christ as he seeks a safe place to live?  Remember, at the end of time we will not be judged on degrees, certificates, or eloquence of speech, for not even Moses had that.  What we will be judged on is: when I was naked, did you cloth me?  When I was hungry did you feed me?  When I was thirsty did you give me drink?  When I was in prison did you visit me?

At the end of Mass we are given a sending, a message from the Church to it's body... It is not a time to go home and go back to a normal worldly life.  It is a calling from Christ to go forth, and glorify God with your life.  It is a calling for you to reach out to the alien, the widow and the orfan.  It is Christ saying, "Give them some food yourselves."   He will take your meager offering and turn it into a feast worthy of a King.

His servant and yours,
Brian

"He must increase, I must decrease."