A Firm Disposition to do the Good

“A virtue is a habitual and firm disposition to do the good. It allows the person to not only perform good acts but to give the best of himself.” CCC #1803

As I write this, it is Thanksgiving week. A time set aside in our country for reflection and gratitude. You would think that it would be a peaceful time, with joy-filled family celebrations and goodwill being spread from friend to friend.

Yet, we hear (or experience first hand!) the tales of families for whom proximity brings tension or where the tension is so great that proximity to those we think should know and love us best is no longer an option. On the day set aside to remember how grateful we are for all we have, the advertising/media machine is going full tilt convincing us of stuff we still have to have and how we need to get a better deal on our stuff than our neighbor. This doesn’t exactly set the stage for a firm disposition to do the good, perform good acts or give the best of our selves.

It is in this context of the knowledge that we should be grateful but we are caught up in the stress and desire for what we don’t really need that we receive today’s readings with their predictions of the rough times to come before Jesus reappears. Jesus tells us straight out, a lot of crazy stuff is going to happen. It is going to be scary and people are going to try to deceive us, they will even try to convince us that He sent them. Don’t buy it! (Pun intended.)

So what are we to do? How do we keep putting one foot in front of the other and facing each new challenge when it just seems so hard to maintain our focus much less develop good habits?

The Holy Spirit gives us the gift of knowledge. If we rest on that gift and seek to know Jesus, we will receive the gift of understanding what he has taught us. We love him first, over anything else. We love our neighbor. Jesus gives us in the example of how he lived the understanding that love isn’t just words, it isn’t enough to just sing carols of peace and love. We are called to roll up our sleeves and work for it.

It takes the virtue of patience to ignore the siren call of this world to satisfy all our needs now and to wait on Jesus. Yet, that is exactly what Jesus is calling us to do in Luke. “Do not be terrified; for such things must happen first, but it will not immediately be the end.” We have to wait for His end. It takes patience to continue to follow His example when those who follow their own path seem to be the ones prospering. It takes a firm determination to not be distracted by those who offer shortcuts. We have to make a habit of being in prayer to stay connected to the one who “rules the world with justice and his people with constancy.” We need to routinely immerse ourselves in His word so that we have the confidence that “He has made the world firm, not to be moved.”

So I wish you patience this holiday season. Patience with those around us who are caught up in the world. Patience with yourselves as you discern how to best prepare for celebrating Jesus’s birth. Patience with God as He gives you all you need in His own time so that you are able to give back the best of yourself.

Sheryl O’Connor is happiest in her role as wife to Tom. Together, they are discerning Tom’s call to the Diaconate and he is in his Aspirancy year with the Diocese of Kalamazoo. She splits her time between Holy Family Healthcare where she is the Director of Strong Families Programs and her parish collaborative where she is the Director of Youth Evangelization.

October 15, 2018October 15, 2018

The Faith Of St. Teresa Of Avila

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Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the people I cannot change, the courage to change the person I can, and the wisdom to know it’s me.

“This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah.”

You gotta feel for Jonah. His is the unlikely prophet. (Can’t you just hear him saying, “Me, Lord, are you sure? See, look over there, there’s George. Look at George, he’d be much better. Yeah, that’s it, send George.” Since God doesn’t change his mind, Jonah changes his tactics. “Sure God, whatever you say. I’ll get right on that,” as he quite literally heads in the opposite direction.

Oh my goodness, how I can relate! There is a similar tape that plays in my mind telling me I am not good enough, smart enough, kind enough to do what God sets before me. And how many times have I assented to God’s will, only to put it on the bottom of my to-do list and say, “Sure, God, I’ll get to that.”

It is bad enough that God’s corrective action for Jonah is to have him cast overboard to spend 3 days in the belly of a fish. Once Jonah delivers his message, Assyria repents, is strengthened by God and eventually breaks Israel into pieces. It almost begs a sarcastic, “Thanks, God, glad I could help you but…”

But all the humor at Jonah’s expense aside, Jesus doesn’t make references lightly. The Israelites of Jonah’s time had turned away from God and God used a reluctant prophet to raise up the enemy who would destroy them.

In Jesus’s time, the Israelites have once again lost sight of what is important and reject Jesus. More concerned with maintaining traditional roles and precision law-abiding, they have lost sight of the law as a means to a relationship with God. They too reject a prophet, not just a prophet, “but one who is greater than Jonah”.

So what does this mean for us today? It is easy to look around and say, “Evil generation? Yes, we’ve got that covered.” Fortunately, we also have the saint whose Feast Day is today, St. Teresa of Avila. She is a guide. She too lived in an evil generation. Joining a Carmel in search of a quiet life and contemplative prayer, she instead found a place where wealthy and social elite gathered bringing with them trivial conversations and a worldly focus.

From a wealthy family herself, Teresa could have been content with being one of the society women who frequented the monastery, pious in their location and poisonous with worldly values. But St. Teresa joins the contemplative life and reforms it from within by looking to herself. Well aware that none of us have the power to live a holy life on our own, St. Teresa opened herself up so completely to the Holy Spirit that she is able to hear Jesus himself speak.

So like, St. Teresa of Avila, let us not bemoan our own evil generation and let us learn from the Israelites of Jesus’s time that the law of God is a path to Him and set to change the only one we can-ourselves. To be honest, St. Teresa, you scare the bejeebers out of me because you show me that there is no obstacle to being a contemplative besides me. Come, Holy Spirit.

While wearing many hats, Sheryl O’Connor is the wife and study buddy of Thomas O’Connor. Not having received the gift of having their own children, their home is filled with 2 large dogs and their hearts with the teens and youth with whom they work in their parish collaborative. Sheryl is the Director of Strong Families Programs for Holy Family Healthcare which means her job is doing whatever needs to be done to help parents build strong Catholic families. Inspired by the works of mercy, Holy Family Healthcare is a primary healthcare practice in West Michigan which seeks to honor the dignity of every individual as we would Christ. Find out more at https://www.holyfamilyhealthcare.org/.

October 3, 2018October 2, 2018

Beauty And The Beast And Our Catholic Faith

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“I consider all things rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him.”

You know how sometimes someone says something or makes a new connection for you and not only does a light bulb go off, but you want to just smack your head and wonder, “Why didn’t I ever see that?”

Last week, I heard someone draw a parallel between Beauty and the Beast and our Catholic Faith? Bear with me, and trust me, at first, I thought he was stretching it too.

In the beginning, the prince has everything he could want. He has power; he has wealth, he is surrounded by people who cater to his every need, he indulges every pleasure. We tend to look at people like him and be a little jealous.

But then he is approached and asked for the smallest of charities, to provide some shelter from the cold. He has nothing to gain from the old woman and turns her away. She warns him not to judge by appearances.

Because of his lack of mercy for the woman, he and the people around him are transformed by his vision of the world. He loses his human appearance and looks to all the world like a beast. Even worse, the people near him, lose their humanity to become objects. His punishment has been to make his invisible relationships visible to all the world. His only way out is to go beyond his shallow worldview and to love and become beloved.

Beauty and the Beast is one of those handfuls of universal tales which have variations in all cultures across the world. And why not? A tale as old as time, (haha, get it? But seriously, some researchers say it is over 4000 years old) it is the story of humanity from Adam and Eve on down. Adam and Eve have everything, they have been provided for in the Garden of Eden, they have a loving relationship with their Creator, and yet, they doubt God’s desire to provide for them. They trust the appearances of the devil and use the fruit, not for the purpose it was intended but to try to be something other than what they are. Their invisible doubts that separated them from God are made visible as they are expelled from the Garden of Eden. And as we all know, life has never been the same.

We all now search for the intimate relationship they lost. We are created with a desire to love, to be beloved and to send that love out into the world. Like the Prince (and Adam and Eve), we become distracted by all sorts of things that keep us from true love. We substitute love with power, a desire to control the events and people around us. We use people to gain influence and material wealth, not realizing that when we undermine their inherent dignity, we also undermine our own. We replace love with pleasure, using people and things to help us “feel” good; physically, mentally, and spiritually. We forget that feelings are transitory emotions and we are created for eternity. We put knowledge before love, trusting in our own ability to find truth rather than trusting the one who is Truth. We create all sorts of havoc in big and small ways, all in search of love.

In the story, it is a poor farmer’s daughter who teaches the beast/prince about love and saves him. As his heart opens to love, he and all those around him regain their human forms.

As Catholics, we know who saves us. We don’t follow one who teaches about love; we follow the one who IS love. Jesus the Christ, God become man, left the beauty of heaven to live among us, suffer and die. But death could not hold him, and through his resurrection, we too gain eternal life. “No greater love than this than to lay down one’s life for a friend.”

As Catholics, we also know it is not only about the “happily ever after” of love in heaven. Our faith is not only words we speak or prayers we offer. Our faith transforms us so that what is invisible is made visible in our actions, our works of love, mercy, charity.

It is the most beautiful of paradoxes, it all is summed up in the Gospel acclamation for today, when we regard all as rubbish so that we can gain Christ, he gives us everything back and what is more, it is all transformed in his love so that we begin our heaven here on earth by living out what it means to love, to be beloved and we serve God by serving one another. It is in that service, that reaching out in love for another that we find He has satisfied our own desires.

Dear Lord, help me today to see all those around me as you see them. Help me to be open to the little ways of showing love and providing small comforts to others in this world so that they too may find your comfort and love in the world to come.

Praise, God. He is amazing.

Now, excuse me, I have to go watch that movie again.

While wearing many hats, Sheryl O’Connor is the wife and study buddy of Thomas O’Connor. Not having received the gift of having their own children, their home is filled with 2 large dogs and their hearts with the teens and youth with whom they work in their parish collaborative. Sheryl is the Director of Strong Families Programs for Holy Family Healthcare which means her job is doing whatever needs to be done to help parents build strong Catholic families. Inspired by the works of mercy, Holy Family Healthcare is a primary health care practice in West Michigan which seeks to honor the dignity of every individual as we would Christ. Find out more at https://www.holyfamilyhealthcare.org/

September 15, 2018September 14, 2018

Our Lady Of Sorrows

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“‘Woman, behold, your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold your mother.'”

Biblical historians generally agree on which disciple this was of the twelve. Yet, he is not recorded with a specific name. As Catholics, who embrace Mary as our Spiritual Mother, we know that this disciple stands in for all of us, the disciples to follow. Jesus gave us his own
physical Mother to be our Spiritual Mother. Jesus told Mary to behold us. Mary doesn’t just see us, Mary beholds us. Mary beholds you. Yes you, she sees you as someone impressive and worthy of attention. She sees your heart, your efforts, not only the
results. She beholds me too and loves me in spite of my double chin, an extra 30 pounds and my often failed attempts to be a good daughter of the King.

Today is the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, right smack dab in the middle of September, a whole month devoted to remembering and consoling Mary in her sorrows. Mary voluntarily suffered right along with Jesus and experienced his pain as only a mother can feel the pain and suffering of her children. So, too, Mary is now feeling our pain, our sorrow, our grief in the midst of so much upheaval and hurt.
At the halfway point in a month dedicated to consoling our Mother in her grief, what can we do?

Are we adding to her pain or are we bringing healing and peace?
In preparing for Consecration to Mary, St. Louis de Montfort presents Mary as the Queen we can approach even when we may be afraid to approach the King. When a lowly servant had a gift for a king, the servant might approach the queen to present the gift on his behalf. What might have been a small, lowly gift, when presented by a queen on a golden platter becomes rich beyond what is visible. So too, Mary presents us to the King. She takes our meager gifts, the small sacrifices we offer up and presents them to our King, God himself in such a way that they become the finest gifts in all creation.

So what happens when we make a gift of our whole self? When Mary beholds you, when she beholds me, she takes whatever gift we can offer and burnishes it, cleans it up, makes it worthy of the King. When we go even further and make a gift of our whole selves, not just the bits and pieces we are comfortable showing, Mary takes us and presents our gift of self in the finest fashion. When Mary, as the Mediatrix of all Grace, sees that we intend to do God’s will, she
strengthens us, she intercedes for us, she will help us live out that good intention when we are unable to do it on our own.

So what if we each starting beholding each other? What if we focused on the gift that God created each one of us to be? What if we used our time, talent and treasure to be a small oasis of peace and healing for each other in a crazy, crazy world? Just think how much consolation we could bring to Mary and to each other.

While wearing many hats, Sheryl O’Connor is the wife and study buddy of Thomas O’Connor. Not having received the gift of having their own children, their home is filled with 2 large dogs and their hearts with the teens and youth with whom they work in their parish collaborative. Sheryl is the Director of Strong Families Programs for Holy Family Healthcare which means her job is doing whatever needs to be done to help parents build strong Catholic families. Inspired by the works of mercy, Holy Family Healthcare is a primary health care practice in West Michigan which seeks to honor the dignity of every individual as we would Christ. Find out more at https://www.holyfamilyhealthcare.org/

September 3, 2018

Openly Humble

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“I came to you in weakness and fear and much trembling, and my message and my proclamation were not with persuasive words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of spirit and power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God.”

Paul is so focused. He is so grounded in his purpose of bringing the message of Jesus Christ, crucified and resurrected, that he doesn’t let anything get in his way. Not even his shortcomings or weaknesses.

Shortcomings? Weakness? Oh, you mean those things about ourselves that we like to tuck away? Cover up? Stick in the back of our closet and try to forget?

As I write this, I have the results show from America’s Got Talent on television. (Yes, it is my summer guilty pleasure.) Simon Cowell was speaking after receiving a star on the Walk of Fame and said, “If anyone says fame is a bad thing, I don’t know what you are talking about, it is the best thing in the world.” So much of how our society functions are about only showing the parts of ourselves that will get us our 15 minutes of fame.

St. Paul didn’t want fame. He doesn’t want to be strong. He isn’t trying to use every tool at his disposal to convince us he is right. St. Paul turns the idea of success on its head and gives us what feels like the exact opposite of the world’s message. St. Paul, who evangelized so much of the world, embraces his weakness, his fear, and openly trembles, for he knows that it isn’t about him at all. If we put our faith in St. Paul, we miss the point!

If our life’s goal is to get to heaven and to take as many with us as possible, St. Paul does so by being so openly humble, so open to God’s spirit and power, that we don’t rely on St. Paul, but can see God working through him and are drawn to God himself.

Satan works in our insecurities and desire to present only a certain version of ourselves to the world. He thrives in the backs of closets, in the tucked away parts of ourselves. It is only through voluntarily bringing all that to light that God can begin to work. God works when we embrace our weaknesses. This is why he gave us the Sacrament of Confession and why we need to go often. Only through grace, can we allow him to be what the world sees when they look at us.

Heavenly Father,

Help me to be like St. Paul and embrace my weaknesses, to live with humility; secure in the knowledge of who I am in you. Help me to remember that true success is about creating spaces for others to fall in love with you.

Allow me to see the world with your eyes, hear with your ears, love with your heart. And when others look at me, may they see only you shining through all that I say and do.

Amen!

While wearing many hats, Sheryl O’Connor is the wife and study buddy of Thomas O’Connor. Not having received the gift of having their own children, their home is filled with 2 large dogs and their hearts with the teens and youth with whom they work in their parish collaborative. Sheryl is the Director of Strong Families Programs for Holy Family Healthcare which means her job is doing whatever needs to be done to help parents build strong Catholic families. Inspired by the works of mercy, Holy Family Healthcare is a primary health care practice in West Michigan which seeks to honor the dignity of every individual as we would Christ. Find out more at https://www.holyfamilyhealthcare.org/.

August 15, 2018August 14, 2018

Out Of Whack

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“Then another sign appeared in the sky; it was a huge red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and on its head were seven diadems. Its tail swept away a third of the stars of the sky.”

Lately, I have just felt off, out of sync. Like if life is a play, everyone else already knows their lines and I have yet to see the script. It seems I stumble through my days trying not to get in anyone’s way and crawl into bed at night with little strength left or the will to even say a prayer. I fall asleep before my handsome husband makes his way to bed; only to wake the next morning unrested and not at all feeling prepared to do it all over again.

And it seems like it is more than just me. When I look around, it feels like much of the world is out of whack too. Cardinals, the princes of the Church, and bishops are being exposed for misusing their authority and severely damaging both beautiful individuals and causing scandals so vast that it can’t be surprising if many turn away from God and His Church. In a dark world which is demanding that tolerance be valued over truth, they are providing grist for the mill.

“…the Almighty has done great things for me and holy is Name. He has mercy on those who fear him in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, and has scattered the proud in their conceit.”

Oh, how I need this today! The Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary into heaven is our day to celebrate that we have a spiritual mother who has not only gone before us on earth, she is already in heaven and interceding for us. When life gets rough and we need our Mom, we know right where to find her!

Today’s Gospel is the most we ever hear from Mary and God’s mercy gets two mentions. Even when the very stars fall from the sky (or the princes from their thrones) God’s mercy is there. The work of our life lies in how we respond to that mercy. If we want to live a truly holy life, not in a floating-angel-singing-all-day-type of way, but if we want to be holy in a crazy-out-of-whack-world-where-it-is-hard-to-find-and-keep-our-footing way, there is no easier, surer way to do that than to go to our Mother and imitate her virtues. (Just ask St Louis de Montfort!)

Virtues are more than just good habits, virtues are moral goods and something which is a moral good is not only good for us personally, but is a good for all of society. Virtues shine as lights in the world and are truth visible in the action of our behavior. As others have done since the early days of Christianity, in Mary’s virtues we can refocus and draw nearer to Jesus, even when the world doesn’t feel right. (We know it isn’t about our feelings anyway, those fickle bedfellows who come and go as they please.) It is about obeying the Father, following the Son, and cooperating with the Holy Spirit and if we are going to figure out how to do all that, there is no one better suited to teach us than the most faithful daughter of the Father, the most holy and humble Mother of the Son, and the most pure spouse of the Holy Spirit.

I always tell my sister, if you see me getting out of whack, or having a hard a time staying focused, just ask me when was the last time I prayed the rosary. While I always intend to pray the rosary daily, the fruit, or sometimes more obviously, the lack of fruit in my life is a dead giveaway of just how much time I am spending with my heavenly Mom.

So in this current time of life when the darkness of discord and distrust seems to be the pervasive way of the world, I can choose to respond to God’s mercy by committing myself to the rosary anew. I can offer up study of Mary’s virtues. I can prayerfully meditate on how those truths look in action and through God’s grace, I can carry with me, the light of Mary, my Mother which is her Son, Jesus.

If you see me soon, please keep me accountable and ask me when I last prayed the rosary.

Hail Mary, most pure

Hail Mary, most prudent

Hail Mary, most humble

Hail Mary, most faithful

Hail Mary, most devout

Hail Mary, most obedient

Hail Mary, most poor

Hail Mary, most patient

Hail Mary, most merciful

Hail Mary, most sorrowful

Mary, Mother of us all, pray for us, your children!

August 3, 2018August 2, 2018

Familiarity And Miracles

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In his book, Catholic Christianity, Peter Kreeft sets out the 3 C’s of any religion; Creed, Code, and Cult. Our Creed is what we believe, the words we speak. Our Code is how we live; our works. Our Cult is our practice, our worship.

We Catholics recite our Creed at every Mass and share it with most other Christian faiths. Just think of it, every Sunday, as we attend the heavenly banquet made present in the Mass (note: big miracle right there), we recite the Creed. Rather than a rote recitation, we should be joining this proclamation of faith with great joy, remembering that what we each proclaim individually, binds us together and our collective voices reach around the world and ring out in heaven.

Our Code is how we live. This is where the people in Jeremiah’s time had fallen down, just as we do now. Our Code is first broken down in the 10 Commandments, and then swept together in Jesus’s great Commandment to love God with our all hearts, with all our minds, and all our souls, and to love one another (paraphrased from Matthew 22:36-40). Jesus sets the standard. “No one has greater love than this, than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13). Jesus actually died for us, his friends. Most of us aren’t called to physically die. We are called to myriads of daily little deaths, where we give up a piece of ourselves, of what we want for the
good of another. That driver that ticked me off in traffic, did I let him in or cut him off? When my spouse wants to tell me about his day, do I put my phone down and give him my full attention or do I multi-task our relationship? Our Code is further deepened by the Beatitudes. Jesus outlines the values that drive our behavior and just in case we didn’t catch on, he gives us concrete examples for our daily life in the Corporal and Spiritual works of Mercy. We can look at this list and ask ourselves, do my words of belief lead me to these works on a daily basis?

Our Cult is how we offer worship. Occasionally, someone will tell me they find the Mass boring and they just don’t get anything out of it. While we share our Creed with many of our Protestant brothers and sisters, our Cult or worship, how we approach gathering before God sets us apart. In the Church before Mass we don’t talk to one another, not because we don’t want to be friendly, but because we know we are there to see someone greater than all of us. It is time to center our hearts and minds on our encounter with Jesus, who will be present body and blood, soul and divinity in the Mass. Just like the people of Jesus’s villages didn’t see his miracles because he was so familiar. These are great miracles that we may overlook through familiarity.

We find Jesus first in our priest, who is in persona Christi, in the place of Christ in the Mass. These men have sacrificed earthly families and what the world tells us is success to be present to us in Jesus’s place. They offer our sacrifices and through them Jesus makes himself present in the Eucharist. That’s a pretty big deal.

The words of the Bible are the incarnation of the Spirit. Like Jesus, the Bible is fully human and fully divine. The homily is meant to guide us to the Word. (Not getting anything out of today’s homily? Focus on the Word. Jesus is there.)

In the Eucharist, God makes himself fully present to us. Jesus promised he would never leave us alone and keeps that promise in a very real way.

Finally, Jesus is present to us in one another. Think about what happens on a physical level after your receive the Eucharist. Jesus is even more than simply someone we are incapable of conceiving fully, He is fully present in our bodies and becomes a part of who are, physically and spiritually. He is what we carry out into the world.

These are all familiar miracles.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus doesn’t perform great miracles in his own village, not because he can’t but because Jesus is so familiar, the people have no faith. Do we lose sight of the miraculous because it becomes familiar? We follow Jesus and are present in our villages everyday. When others look at us, are they drawn to know what we know, to love what we love? Or does familiarity with our works strengthen their disbelief?

Jesus, help me to see your great miracles in the Mass and not to lose them through familiarity. Guide me always to live the word, the work and the worship of our Catholic faith in a way that draws others to see through me to You. Amen.

July 25, 2018July 24, 2018

Do The Right Thing

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“They’ll do the right thing if I have to drag them kicking and screaming all the way!” Ever said anything like this? I know I have and if you are like me, we are in good company with St. James whose feast day is today. James and John (in Matthew, it is their mother who approaches Jesus; in Mark, it is the brothers themselves) desire to be at the left and right hands of Jesus; the positions of power for those who know the King. They are looking to be in the positions of authority when Jesus comes into his kingdom. A clue to how they see using that authority, comes in St. Luke’s Gospel, when the Samaritans did not welcome Jesus, James and John ask Jesus if he wanted them to call “fire down from heaven to consume them.”

This phrase, “if I have to drag them kicking and screaming,” came up in an argument with someone I admire and respect recently. We were having a rather heated discussion about how to lead a team to “do the right thing.” Our goal was admirable. We were discussing a plan for how to become more open, to go out of our comfort zone to reach out to others.

But somehow, for all our good intentions, we got lost. I mean really lost. The Good Lord knows I have used this exact same phrase more than a few times in my years as a school or parish leader. But somehow hearing it in this context shocked me as surely as if I had touched a live electrical wire. Within 2 days, someone else made a very similar comment to me about bringing people along, even against their wishes. I get it, I have been so sure that I knew the right solution that I just had to get others to see it my way to make it all work out. Just follow my plan and all will be well.

The Samaritans reject Jesus, so James and John plan to rain fire from heaven to make them change their minds and accept Jesus.

Jesus rebuked them and today’s reading rebukes those of us who attempt to use power or authority to overpower others. Jesus shows us that true leadership is humble. The purpose of leadership is to serve. Leaders who follow Jesus must first strive to be servants. Leaders who follow Jesus are not to impose their will on others, but to create opportunities for others to encounter our living God and to find their purpose in serving His will.

We humans, leaders included, are earthen vessels. We are fragile, afflicted, perplexed and persecuted. And that is a good thing! It is precisely because of our fragile, afflicted, perplexed, and persecuted state that God can be glorified. “Indeed, everything is for you, so that the grace bestowed in abundance on more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God.”

Of all of today’s readings, it is the Gospel Acclamation that pierced my heart. “I chose you from the world, to go and bear fruit that will last, says the Lord.”

Whatever my plans are, it is God’s plan that will bear fruit that will last.

Even when we find ourselves in a leadership position, God’s plan is for us to be servants. In order to serve Him, we must serve one another. In order to serve Him, we must serve those who look to us for leadership, we must serve those who lead us and we must even serve those with whom we flat out disagree. This is certainly antithetical to how the world views leadership. James and John were looking for power in the kingdom they thought was to come. Jesus shows us that his kingdom is already here and he has chosen us to go forth into the kingdom and bear fruit through humility and charity.

Heavenly Father, Please send your Holy Spirit to inspire me to lead with humility, to remember in order for my plans to bear fruit, my plans must be your plans, and your plans always include serving first. Help me to do, not just the right thing, but to do your thing. Amen. Glory to God.

July 18, 2018July 17, 2018

Daughters And Sons Of The King

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Ah-hoy!

There are a series of short oracles or prophesies, which are called the “hoy” oracles, because each one begins with the word “hoy” or “Ah!”. Sometimes translated as “woe”, the “hoy” at the beginning was meant to be an attention grabber.

The prophets, with Isaiah as one of the greats among them, repeatedly try to get the attention of the Kings of Israel. They point out again and again their infidelities and their failure to fulfill their responsibility to defend the weak and maintain justice for all their people.

In today’s reading from Isaiah, the prophet, speaking for God, describes how he is using Assyria to punish the people of Israel. This is common in the Old Testament, to credit or blame God for natural disasters, victory or defeat in war and to blame afflictions on sin.

A fuller definition for oracle is a prophecy which is ambiguous and obscure. That means we have to go digging, there is more to this than what is found on the surface.

The Catechism helps. Divine providence is the “dispositions by which God guides his creation towards perfection”. (CCC 302) God didn’t create the world complete and perfect (remember that perfect doesn’t always mean without flaw, it can also mean complete or whole). The world is on a journey towards its destiny and God is the not only the source of the sojourn but an active guide along the way. Scripture is very clear that divine providence is not some abstract, absent creator, divine providence is clear and immediate, God cares for all, from the least to the greatest events of the world and its history, (CCC 303)

“And so we see the Holy Spirit, the principal author of Sacred Scripture, often attributing actions to God without mentioning any secondary causes. This is not a ‘primitive mode of speech,’ but a profound way of recalling God’s primacy and Lordship over history and the world and so of educating his people to trust in him.” (CCC 304)

The Kings of Israel fell out of relationship with God and become satisfied with their own power among men. They were not faithful to God or the people around them. As a result, their kingdom was at risk and other kings take advantage and conquer them.

We too are royalty by virtue of our baptism. We are the sons and daughters of not just a king, but the King. We have a share in the joys of the kingdom and the responsibility of being a member of the king’s family. Just as Isaiah challenged the kings of old, we are asked: how are we fulfilling our responsibility to defend the weak and maintain justice? Do we become so enamored of our own work and success that we fail to value others? Are we guilty of infidelity to God or just as bad, infidelity to our responsibility to our fellow men; especially the vulnerable among us?

Before we start feeling hopeless and like it is all too much, we can’t possibly do it, the Gospel reading gives us our promised guidance for the journey. Jesus says, “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike.” Jesus isn’t talking about those who are childish, but those who are childlike; those who have a childlike faith; open and humble. He is talking to the poor in spirit who accept and rely on God’s providence.

God transcends all human knowledge and experience. Try as we might, all of our efforts to understand him, fall short of the reality. But the humble believer will see the face of God in Jesus Christ, who is the perfect (complete) image of God, the Father. And as St. Mother Teresa liked to remind us, we see Jesus Christ in the faces of those in need around us.

As daughters and sons of the King, we are royalty, and with that comes a great responsibility to further our Father’s kingdom. But he isn’t asking us for grand gestures or to win dramatic wars, rather he is asking us to be poor in spirit, to rely on him. We are to love and care for one another. “Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you.” (Mother Teresa)

Today’s Gospel reading ends with: “All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.”

Acceptance of our royal role, of our Father as our King depends on the Father’s revelation; and this is granted to those who have childlike humility and are open to receive it.

Ah-hoy! Now, that is worth our attention.

July 10, 2018July 9, 2018

Called To Preach

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St. Augustine calls Matthew the Teaching Gospel. Jesus is our teacher, the Incarnate Word, the Logos. So what are we to learn from today’s Gospel reading? At first glance, it appears more like a poorly constructed transition in a middle school writing assignment. We get demons and Pharisees and sheep and shepherds, a harvest and workers. It feels like St. Matthew was a bit all over the place.

If we look to the prophet Hosea for some help, he seems to have his hands full with Ephraim and the Israelites with their idols. Hosea was sent by God to help bring the Israelites back into covenant, into relationship with God. Israel’s prayers are no longer being answered; because prayer presupposes a docility to the will of God. Their altars were no longer places of sacrifice to God because they have become places of self-serving worship.

“Their idols are silver and gold, the handiwork of men…they have hands but feel not; they have feet but walk not. Their makers shall be like them”.

Hosea’s primary message is of God’s love and fidelity, despite people’s sins. Hosea had been sent to gather God’s people back together and to lead them back to God. However, the Israelites were so intent on their self-serving worship, their idols they can control, that they ignored Hosea. Hosea was a type for Christ; he was sent by God to the Israelites but was rejected and abused by God’s own people.

If we then turn to the Gospel, as Jesus was going out, a demoniac who could not speak was brought to Jesus and the demon is driven out. Jesus drives out the demon and the man’s speech returns. We can see God’s fidelity in bringing healing even though this man was brought to Jesus “as he was going out” presumably for a different purpose. We see the two different reactions to God’s love; awe and amazement by the people and dismissal and slander by those who seemingly should have known better.

“Jesus went around to all the towns and villages, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and curing disease and illness. At the sight of the crowds his heart was moved with pity because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd.”

This passage was especially used in Vatican II to demonstrate the universality of our call to evangelize; to spread the Christian charity that is at the heart of our mission as the living body of Christ, the Church. Jesus went around, he went out. He didn’t sit and wait for people to come to him on Sunday mornings. He went from town to village and proclaimed the kingdom. Like Hosea, he calls people to relationship this time by both proclamation and by healing them where they are hurting the most.

“Christian charity is extended to all without distinction of race, social condition or religion, and seeks neither gain nor gratitude. Just as God loves us with a gratuitous love, so too the faithful, in their charity, should be concerned for mankind, loving it with the same love with which God sought man. As Christ went about all the towns and villages healing every sickness and infirmity, as a sign that the Kingdom of God had come, so the Church through her children, joins itself with men of every condition, but especially with the poor and afflicted, and willingly spends herself for them.” (Ad gentes, 12)

As Jesus is so deeply moved in seeing the crowds, he uses the metaphor of the harvest to express his urgency. Just as farmers must harvest when the crop is ready, not a week early and not a week later because it is more convenient for the farmer’s schedule. Jesus sees the people as ready to receive the effects of Redemption. They are poised and ready to receive the Word. How can He get to them all?

We hear this today and we lament the shortage of priests and religious, but Pope Paul VI reminds us, “the responsibility for spreading the Gospel belongs to everyone-to all those who have received it! The missionary duty concerns the whole body of the Church; in different ways and in different degrees, it is true, but we must all of us be united in carrying out this duty.” (Angelus Address, 23 October 1977)

Each of us, by virtue of our baptism is called to work alongside Christ in proclaiming the kingdom. It isn’t that there is a shortage of baptized, the question we need to ask ourselves is what message are we proclaiming? Do our words and lives proclaim God’s kingdom? Is it possible, like the people of Hosea’s time, we have not disposed our wills to God’s so that our prayers may not be heard? Has our worship become self-seeking and self-gratifying? Have other idols replaced our Creator as our god?

What on the surface appears to be a jumble of mixed metaphors turns out to be a strong call to reexamine our lives, our idols, and most of all, our call to proclaim the kingdom. There are 1.2 billion Catholics in the world, over 70 million in the U.S. We are the workers. Let us unite in gratuitous love and spread the kingdom.

June 21, 2018June 20, 2018

Our Father

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The Catechism of the Catholic Church ends with a study of the Lord’s Prayer and the final paragraph of that last section is:

“By the final ‘Amen,’ we express our ‘fiat’ concerning the seven petitions: ‘So be it.'” –2865 Catechism of the Catholic Church

St. Augustine concluded that you could go through all the prayers of the Bible and not find anything that is not completely contained in the Lord’s Prayer. (CCC 2762) Tertullian stated that the Lord’s Prayer “is truly the summary of the whole gospel.” (CCC 2761)

Let’s be completely honest, when heavy hitters like St. Augustine and Tertullian have weighed in on the Lord’s Prayer, what is someone like me to add? I find the whole section on the Lord’s Prayer some of the best reflection on prayer and living a faith-filled life that I have ever read. (If you haven’t read it yet, run don’t walk to grab your Catechism. It starts at paragraph 2759.)

And in that final 2865^th paragraph, after 2864 paragraphs defining and describing what we believe as a community of faith, it seems appropriate that whole of the Catechism ends with our assent, our fiat to all that Jesus handed to us in this prayer.

We pray to Our Father, because through Jesus’s becoming man, we have a share in his family.

We pray for His kingdom to come because we are poor in spirit and long for that day, “as the deer longs for streams for water. (Psalm 42:1)

We pray for His will to be done because left on our own, we mourn and are in need of comfort.

We pray for our daily bread because we are poor, hungry, thirsty.

We pray for forgiveness of our debts, because we are called to be the merciful; to have already forgiven those who are in debt to us. Despite our limitations, we want to love with the heart of God.

We pray to avoid temptation because we want to be pure in heart.

We pray for deliverance from evil because we are persecuted and we desire peace.

Our infinite God’s entry into finite time and space, which began with Mary’s fiat, now continues each time we repeat Our Lord’s Prayer, with our own fiat. Our “So be it,” to God’s will, God’s plan.

No wonder the early Christians prayed it three times each day.

Amen.

June 10, 2018June 10, 2018

How Did You Know You Were Naked?

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God created us with a desire to be like Him. We have a tendency to confuse that innate wanting to be like God with a desire to be God. In the first reading, Adam and Eve disobeyed God. God created them, set the parameters and gave them dominion over all creation. They decided that instead of being like God and operating within the order He created, they wanted to be God and determine what is good and evil for themselves. This crossing over from desiring to be like God to acting as God is what resulted in the break in the relationship with God and as a result of the break in Adam and Eve’s relationship with God, they experience shame in their bodies and tell God they have hid because they are naked.

God doesn’t yell. He doesn’t chastise. He doesn’t lecture. He simply asks them how they knew they were naked.

How often do we not feel shame when we should? Someone wiser than me once explained that drawing closer to God is like turning and driving into the sunrise. The dead bugs, smears, and flotsam on our windshield doesn’t really bother us, until we drive into the sunlight. The sins and wrong choices in our life aren’t always obvious, until we start to align our lives with what God calls us to be. Sinning is not so much choosing evil over good as it is wanting to choose for ourselves what is good and what is evil. As we stop deciding for ourselves what is good and evil and trust God, just like our windshield in the morning light, all the little things that separate us from God start to stand out.

In the Gospel, Jesus says that a house divided against itself cannot stand. Our culture tells us over and over that there are so many other things that we should put first. But just like Adam and Eve, when we put the created (including ourselves) before the Creator, we are that divided house and we will not be able to stand.

I love how all these readings go together. Our hope is found in the words of the Psalms, “If you, O Lord, mark iniquities, Lord, who can stand? But with you is forgiveness, that you may be revered.” I think of the disciples choosing a replacement for Judas Iscariot, they put first being a witness to the Jesus’s resurrection, once that was in place, they could leave everything to chance and know they were oriented in the right direction.

We can do that too. As we discern right and wrong, as we prioritize our time, talent, and treasure, we can ask ourselves which decision will help us to be the best witness to the resurrection of Jesus. Once that is in place, we have oriented ourselves to the Light and will be able to recognize when we have confused being God with desiring to be like God.

And, as I recognize my own shame, my own nakedness, I can rest in, “With the Lord there is mercy, and the fullness of redemption.”

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