My kids (even now that they are high schoolers) are still sorting things out. Of course, they are loving and giving and earnest, but they can also get stressed and selfish and moody. And, I guess, so can I. But there is no absence of love. From them. Or from me.
And it made me realize that the fullness of what it means to father or mother a child is to be strong and present, to love unconditionally, and to pay it forward. We have to smile when everyone is crabby, inquire when everyone is silent, and love when everyone is tapped out. It is not our place to count receipts or reconcile the ledger of kindness. Instead, it is our place to cheer and counsel, discipline and love infinitely regardless of the balance sheet.
Perhaps W.H. Auden said it best in his poem “The More Loving One”:
Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.
How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.
Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.
Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.
Our children love us. That is certain. But our love for them—that endless well that never, ever runs dry—is infinite. So, as you lay eyes on your children tonight (or the next time you see them), don’t count the receipts, reconcile the ledger, or consult the balance sheet. Simply smile, take a breath, and say to yourself, “Let the more loving one be me.”
Reciprocal love is the place and form of encounter with God.
--For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, Mission
Scripture is all about relationships. It is not possible to consider yourself a person of the Word and live isolated, cut off from other people or independent, isolated in your own independence. It’s not possible for people of the Word, for the Word calls us constantly to relationship – to relationship with God, yes, certainly, but to relationship with God through relationship with one another. Our relationships are God-based. If they are based in the Word, they are based in God. They are grounded in God’s love which is infinitely forgiving.
How do we live in relationship with God and other?
To live in relationship is to be blessed. This is the message of Psalm 128, which reminds us that to walk in God’s ways, to live the way God intends for us to live, is to embrace fully our relationship both with God and with other. Blessed are those who fear the Lord and walk in his ways, the psalmist reminds us: relationship is at the core of human existence, and our awe – our fear of the Lord – allows us to cross any barrier to achieve it.
This weekend we celebrate the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph with texts that remind us that relationship – family in its myriad forms – is a state or condition to be lived… and it takes work! Children, the Book of Sirach tells us, are to honor and revere their father as they obey a mother’s authority. Relationships change, they evolve, and yet we have no identity without them, just as we have no identity without God. And so, as Paul tells the Colossians, we must put on heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility gentleness, and patience, but over all these we must put on love. That love is the foundation of our relationship, the source of all other virtues combined, modeled in the death and rising of Jesus. Thus, what we live in relationship in our family is also meant to be lived in our identity as church, as we accept our subordination to God and to other as essential to the bond of love, the bond of perfection that keeps us together.
In Matthew’s Gospel, Joseph will need to ground himself in loving obedience as he listens once again to the angel of the Lord who instructs him to flee to Egypt with Mary and Jesus, and stay there until he is told otherwise. Out of love for his family, out of obedience to God, Joseph puts relationship first, that the prophecies about Jesus might be fulfilled. Jesus is blessed by his family as we are blessed with our relationship with God and with other. May we continue to live out that relationship as we walk in his ways, living the bond of perfection that is God’s love.
This “vintage” post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
Christmas in Bethlehem… A cold, clear night made brilliant by a glorious star, the smell of incense, shepherds and wise men falling to their knees in adoration of the sweet baby, the incarnation of perfect love.
--Lucinda Franks
What would appear to be a humble human birth is at the same time holy and miraculous, with animals laid down before the Lord, and the star of Bethlehem guiding the Magi to Christ’s cradle.
To wonder is to dwell in amazement, surprise and the miraculous. One can experience wonder when meditating upon the magnitude of the universe, or in contemplating Blake’s poetry or art. Wonder is when we apprehend the sublime and the magnificent in what we encounter every day, with both humility and delight. The wonder in the Christmas story is that something as human as a baby could also be something as foreign as God.
In thinking about the meaning of the nativity today, I find its most potent and radical message to be one not just of wonder, but of wonder as means of approaching difference, of experiencing and understanding the Other. As God, Christ is supposed to be radically foreign, but as Jesus he is intimately human. The theology of incarnation explains that union’s tension, but the broader philosophical implications concern how love must be inculcated by wonder at this paradox. The philosopher Simon Critchley, describing the contours for a “faith of the faithless,” writes that “Christ is the incarnation of love as an act of imagination… the imaginative projection of love onto all creatures.”
Wonder is the antidote to hatred, for wonder is fundamentally radical. Had Herod any sense of wonder for the exquisite singularity of all people, would the massacre of the innocents have commenced? If we had wonder at the individual universe that is each fellow human, at the cosmic complexity of other people, would we put refugees in cages?
We do not have to look far into the current state of the world to realize that this time requires a return to wonder — what I would call a “politics of wonder,” predicated on both empathy and celebration of difference. Those of us, religious believers or not, who understand the profound meaning of the nativity must fight on behalf of wonder and in the service of a future society that places wonder at its very center.
--Ed Simon, “In Praise of Wonder”
Blessings at Christmas from Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Mill Valley!
This is no time for a child to be born,
With the earth betrayed by war & hate
And a comet slashing the sky to warn
That time runs out & the sun burns late.
That was no time for a child to be born,
In a land in the crushing grip of Rome;
Honour & truth were trampled by scorn-- Yet here did the Saviour make his home.
When is the time for love to be born?
The inn is full on the planet earth,
And by a comet the sky is torn-- Yet Love still takes the risk of birth.
--Madeleine L’Engle
Blessings at Christmas from Our Lady of Mount Carmel, Mill Valley!
I’m so glad Jesus was born in a stable. Because my soul is so much like a stable. It’s poor and in unsatisfactory condition – yet I believe that if Jesus can be born in a stable, maybe he can also be born in me.
--Dorothy Day
[W]hatever cultural warm and fuzzy feelings we have around Christmas, God becoming human and being born among animals was not a pretty sight. This Christmas I want to enter more deeply into that: into the communion of animals and angels who were there, but also into communion with all the beings who are outside the stable.
How to hold those two things in tension, I’m not sure. Maybe we’ll know more on December 26. But one thing I know: God is still entering into our lives and into this world. I am not worried about us not being able to encounter God on Christmas [2025]. God will be there. God will meet us in our needs. What we can bring is our own searching for the spaces in which God, once again, comes to us.
How hard it is to accept your way. You come to me as a small, powerless child born away from home. You live for me as a stranger in your own land. You die for me as a criminal outside the walls of the city, rejected by your own people, misunderstood by your friends, and feeling abandoned by your God.
As I prepare to celebrate your birth, I am trying to feel loved, accepted, and at home in this world, and I am trying to overcome the feelings of alienation and separation that continue to assail me. But I wonder now if my deep sense of homelessness does not bring me closer to you than my occasional feelings of belonging. Where do I truly celebrate your birth: in a cozy home or in an unfamiliar house, among welcoming friends or among unknown strangers, with feelings of well-being or with feelings of loneliness?
I do not have to run away from those experiences that are closest to yours. Just as you do not belong to this world, so I do not belong to this world. Every time I feel this way I have an occasion to be grateful and to embrace you better and taste more fully your joy and peace.
Come, Lord Jesus, and be with me where I feel poorest. I trust that this is the place where you will find your manger and bring your light. Come, Lord Jesus, come.
The world waits for a miracle
The heart longs for a little bit of hope
Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel
A child prays for peace on Earth
And she's calling out from a sea of hurt
Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel
And can you hear the angels singing
Glory to the light of the world
Glory, the light of the world is here
The drought breaks with the tears of a mother
A baby's cry is the sound of love
Come down, come down, Emmanuel
He is the song for the suffering
He is Messiah, the Prince of Peace has come
He has come, Emmanuel
Glory to the light of the world
Glory to the light of the world
Glory to the light of the world
Glory to the light of the world
For all who wait
For all who hunger
For all who've prayed
For all who wonder
Behold your King
Behold Messiah
Emmanuel, Emmanuel
Glory to the light of the world
Glory to the light of the world
Glory to the light of the world
Behold your King
Behold Messiah
Emmanuel, Emmanuel
The world waits for the miracle
The heart longs for a little bit of hope
Oh come, oh come Emmanuel
To hear Lauren Daigle sing "Light of the World,” click here:
He did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him.
--Matthew 1:24
The great spiritual task facing me is to so fully trust that I belong to God that I can be free in the world—free to speak even when my words are not received; free to act when my actions are criticized, ridiculed, or considered useless; free also to receive love from people and to be grateful for all the signs of God’s presence in the world. I am convinced that I will truly be able to love the world when I fully believe that I am loved far beyond its boundaries.
Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?
Will you go where you don’t know and never be the same?
--The Summons
What would you do if God called you by name? Would you think you were dreaming? Or would you listen, paying close attention? How would you respond if he asked you to do something unthinkable, something that might cause you to be teased, mocked, even scorned?
St. Joseph was very much summoned by God, or maybe a better word might be invited… invited by God to do something extraordinary. Matthew’s genealogy tells us that Joseph, the husband of Mary, was the son of Jacob, who was the son of Matthan, who was the son of Eleazar, and so on, all the way back to David. Joseph is thus a prime candidate to be the adoptive father of the heir God promises David, God’s servant, whose royal throne, God says, will be firm, forever. Jesus is his heir, an heir who will call God his Father.
We know that Joseph himself had strong models in faith, not only his ancestor David, but also, long before, his forefather Abraham. Both Abraham and David had deep faith in the Lord; when God calls each of them, they say yes.
Surely Abraham and David were inspirations to Joseph! And so, when God calls Joseph (by name!) and tells him not to be afraid to take Mary into his home, (which would have been scandalous!), not to be afraid because it is through the Holy Spirit that this child has been conceived, Joseph says yes… not in words (he never speaks!) but in actions: he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him, and took his wife into his home. It’s extraordinary!
Joseph doesn’t know where God is taking him, but he listens to God's request. He will go, and will be transformed. Through his care and love for Jesus, God’s love is shown, God’s name is known. Joseph is not afraid to leave himself behind and focus on those around him first and foremost. What gives him the strength to say yes to this extraordinary invitation? Faith.
Joseph must have been a man of incredible faith and love, full of compassion. Matthew's gospel describes Joseph as a just man, a man of strong character. And he must love Mary tenderly; he is willing to care for her and her child -- their child. Joseph will do whatever it takes to protect them, taking them to Egypt to escape Herod, anxiously searching for the twelve-year-old Jesus when he disappears in Jerusalem, yet accepting that Jesus must be in his Father's house, always.
Thinking about the story of Joseph made me reflect on my own models in faith, first and foremost among them, my parents. My mom was a fraternal twin, and her twin brother Norman was a child with Down syndrome. My grandparents both died before I was nine years old. They had cared for Norman at home in the forties and fifties and sixties, at a time when this simply was not done.
When my grandparents each died, the question was, where would Norman go? One of his siblings lived in a studio apartment and worked full time, another already had four boys in a house of under 1000 square feet. My mom was willing… but so, importantly, was my dad.
My dad had always been a strong model of faith for me. I remember seeing him kneel by his bedside every night, praying, and teaching the three of us kids to pray as well, because prayer allowed him to remain in relationship with God, and he wanted us to know that joy. Dad was generous to a fault, giving away half the produce we grew in a giant garden, sharing what he had (though he had to feed six on a factory worker’s salary), sharing with friends and family members and even strangers.
But it was when Norman came to live with us that I saw my dad’s tremendous faith, faith in action, and the fruits of that faith in our household. I remember being more than a little uncomfortable with my uncle’s life with Down syndrome. He looked different and he could not speak clearly, though he loved to engage, so having friends over could be a bit complicated, as we “translated” his words so they could understand him.
But my dad was committed to making Norman’s life as unrestricted as possible. I remember him spending hours teaching Norman over and over to tie his own shoes, and to write his name in big block letters.
Like St. Joseph, my dad had an extraordinary attitude of trust in the presence of God, listening to God's words, open to all God would reveal. He knew that he was not in control, but he allowed the Lord to work through him.
Henri Nouwen once wrote that, when Jesus talks about faith, he means first of all to trust unreservedly that you are loved, so that you can surrender in complete trust to the love of God revealed in you!
My dad did that. He said yes when God summoned him to take on something difficult, and he could do this because of his great faith. Through his willingness to be open to change, to risk the easy comforts, he revealed God’s love to me in so many extraordinary ways. I try to live up to his example.
Whose faith has helped you to open to God’s will? Who are your models in faith? Might you include St. Joseph, or the Virgin Mary, who also said yes? Are there folks in your own life, past or present, whose faith lets God’s love be shown? Think about that… and then share their stories, if you can, allowing that faith to enter your own heart, and then spreading it far and wide, that God’s life might be grown in our world… through our faith.
--OLMC Communion Service Reflection, March 19, 2024
To hear John L. Bell’s hymn, “The Summons,” click on the video below:
Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary, your wife, into your home.
--Matthew 1:20
God told Sarah and Abraham to set off to a land where you don’t know where you’re going. Real growth happens and real grace breaks in when we have to deal with what is other, foreign, different. What’s dark, unfamiliar, frightening, and uninvited will stretch us in ways that the familiar and secure cannot.
--Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI, Facebook, September 15, 2023
Joseph accepted Mary unconditionally. He trusted in the angel’s words. The nobility of Joseph’s heart is such that what he learned from the law he made dependent on charity. Today, in our world where psychological, verbal and physical violence towards women is so evident, Joseph appears as the figure of a respectful and sensitive man. Even though he does not understand the bigger picture, he makes a decision to protect Mary’s good name, her dignity and her life. In his hesitation about how best to act, God helped him by enlightening his judgment.
Often in life, things happen whose meaning we do not understand. Our first reaction is frequently one of disappointment and rebellion. Joseph set aside his own ideas in order to accept the course of events and, mysterious as they seemed, to embrace them, take responsibility for them and make them part of his own history. Unless we are reconciled with our own history, we will be unable to take a single step forward, for we will always remain hostage to our expectations and the disappointments that follow.
Try to put yourself in Joseph’s shoes, just for a moment. In Matthew’s Gospel, Joseph has just learned that his betrothed, Mary has been found with child, and, knowing the child is not his, he is struggling to see a path forward. In his confusion, Joseph is bolstered by his own sense of what is right: unwilling to expose her to shame, he decides to divorce her quietly. What stops him? Well, it is true that he is visited in a dream by an angel of the Lord, but it is still up to Joseph himself to follow through on the angel’s command. Why might he do that? Remember that Joseph’s community has been seeking the face of the God of Jacob, as Psalm 24 notes, for centuries, and those who seek God’s face must stand open, ready to trust that one day God will fulfill the promise of Isaiah, the promise of a Messiah who will deliver the people of Israel. One can only imagine, therefore, that it is Joseph’s faith, his profound trust in the Lord’s promise, that allows him to believe the angel’s explanation of Jesus’ divine conception – for it is through the Holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in her – an echo of the prophet Isaiah who had long before revealed that the virgin shall conceive and bear a son… Hence, Joseph, son of David, accepts the angel’s reasoning because he is open, because he chooses to trust – to trust in the Scriptures, to trust in God, to trust in God’s promise.
What does this trust imply for those who seek God today? Paul reminds the Romans that (as Joseph was aware) through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, God promised to send his Son, Jesus, the very embodiment of the gospel or Good News. Jesus, descended from David according to the flesh, is the Messiah they have been seeking for so long, as revealed in his resurrection from the dead. So, too, must we recognize that our salvation lies in Jesus Christ: through him we have received the grace of apostleship, a call to belong to Christ, a call to be holy. To do so, we must first trust in God’s promise, seeking the face of God in the infant Jesus to come, Emmanuel, God-with-us, opening our hearts so that he may be born in us as he was born of Mary. Mary and Joseph understood the need to open in trust to God’s loving promise; do we?
This "vintage" post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture Class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
Strengthen the hands that are feeble; make firm the knees that are weak.
--Isaiah 35:3
“Hello darkness, my old friend…”
Everybody knows the iconic Simon & Garfunkel song, but do you know the amazing story behind the first line of The Sounds of Silence?
It began 62 years ago, when Arthur “Art” Garfunkel, a Jewish kid from Queens, enrolled in Columbia University. During freshman orientation, Art met a student from Buffalo named Sandy Greenberg, and they immediately bonded over their shared passion for literature and music. Art and Sandy became roommates and best friends. With the idealism of youth, they promised to be there for each other no matter what.
Soon after starting college, Sandy was struck by tragedy. His vision became blurry and although doctors diagnosed it as temporary conjunctivitis, the problem grew worse. Finally after seeing a specialist, Sandy received the devastating news that severe glaucoma was destroying his optic nerves. The young man with such a bright future would soon be completely blind.
Sandy was devastated and fell into a deep depression. He gave up his dream of becoming a lawyer and moved back to Buffalo, where he worried about being a burden to his financially-struggling family. Consumed with shame and fear, Sandy cut off contact with his old friends, refusing to answer letters or return phone calls.
Then suddenly, to Sandy’s shock, his buddy Art showed up at the front door. He was not going to allow his best friend to give up on life, so he bought a ticket and flew up to Buffalo unannounced. Art convinced Sandy to give college another go, and promised that he would be right by his side to make sure he didn’t fall - literally or figuratively.
Art kept his promise, faithfully escorting Sandy around campus and effectively serving as his eyes. It was important to Art that even though Sandy had been plunged into a world of darkness, he should never feel alone. Art actually started calling himself “Darkness” to demonstrate his empathy with his friend. He’d say things like, “Darkness is going to read to you now.” Art organized his life around helping Sandy.
One day, Art was guiding Sandy through crowded Grand Central Station when he suddenly said he had to go and left his friend alone and petrified. Sandy stumbled, bumped into people, and fell, cutting a gash in his shin. After a couple of hellish hours, Sandy finally got on the right subway train. After exiting the station at 116th street, Sandy bumped into someone who quickly apologized - and Sandy immediately recognized Art’s voice! Turned out his trusty friend had followed him the whole way home, making sure he was safe and giving him the priceless gift of independence. Sandy later said, “That moment was the spark that caused me to live a completely different life, without fear, without doubt. For that I am tremendously grateful to my friend.”
Sandy graduated from Columbia and then earned graduate degrees at Harvard and Oxford. He married his high school sweetheart and became an extremely successful entrepreneur and philanthropist.
While at Oxford, Sandy got a call from Art. This time Art was the one who needed help. He’d formed a folk rock duo with his high school pal Paul Simon, and they desperately needed $400 to record their first album. Sandy and his wife Sue had literally $404 in their bank account, but without hesitation Sandy gave his old friend what he needed.
Art and Paul's first album was not a success, but one of the songs, The Sounds of Silence, became a #1 hit a year later. The opening line echoed the way Sandy always greeted Art. Simon & Garfunkel went on to become one of the most beloved musical acts in history.
The two Columbia graduates, each of whom has added so much to the world in his own way, are still best friends. Art Garfunkel said that when he became friends with Sandy, “my real life emerged. I became a better guy in my own eyes, and began to see who I was - somebody who gives to a friend.” Sandy describes himself as “the luckiest man in the world.”
--Adapted from Sandy Greenberg’s memoir: Hello Darkness, My Old Friend: How Daring Dreams and Unyielding Friendship Turned One Man’s Blindness into an Extraordinary Vision for Life
To hear Simon & Garfunkel’s beautiful song, “The Sounds of Silence,” click on the video below:
In Advent, the four weeks of expectant waiting for the Christ child invite us to welcome that sense of “not yet but in the fullness of time” into our faith lives and challenge us to trust in “the slow work of God.” As Christians, we wait not just for the baby in the manger, which was a historical event in the distant past; we wait for that time when we can recognize God’s presence in all things at all times and in all places. [Certain] spiritual practices [can] be especially helpful in cultivating this sense of hopeful anticipation that keeps God in the driver’s seat and my own shortsighted need for control under wraps.
When I am stuck in traffic – or stuck in a situation in which I impatiently wait for some future development – I often think of my experience as one of “absence.” Being isolated into a small vehicle behind miles and miles of unmoving machinery feels very much like a “lacking.” I’m not where I want to be, I can’t do what I want to do, I won’t get to those I wish to see when I’d like. This “absence” of all I long for can feel very empty and barren. But when I remember that God is always “present,” not absent at all, the space in which I wait becomes filled with sacred possibility.
Centering prayer has been a helpful practice for me when I’m tempted to think that “not yet” is the same as “nothing at all.” When I meditate quietly, breathing in the silence of hopeful expectation, and return my focus to a sacred word or phrase, I am reminded that there is a substance to my waiting. The phrases I like to use most are simple ones, like “Holy God” or “Peace of Christ.” God is present in the generative emptiness of my surrender to him. There can be a powerful experience of grace in the waiting, and Advent is an ideal time to begin or recommit to this form of contemplative prayer.
What is the scent of water? Renewal. The goodness of God coming down like dew.
--Elizabeth Goudge
The expectation of Advent is anchored in the event of God’s incarnation. The more I come in touch with what happened in the past, the more I come in touch with what is to come. The Gospel not only reminds me of what took place but also of what will take place.
In the contemplation of Christ’s first coming, I can discover the signs of his second coming. By looking back in meditation, I can look forward in expectation. By reflection, I can project; by conserving the memory of Christ’s birth, I can progress to the fulfillment of his kingdom.
I am struck by the fact that the prophets speaking about the future of Israel always kept reminding their people of God’s great works in the past. They could look forward with confidence because they could look backward with awe to Yahweh’s great deeds.
[I]n the future that God promises us, says Isaiah: “Then will the eyes of the blind be opened, the ears of the deaf be cleared; then will the lame leap like a stag, then the tongue of the mute will sing.” In God’s reign, everything can grow and everyone can flourish.
This is beautiful imagery, but it can feel far from where we are today. All we need do is look around and see the war in Ukraine, poverty in our inner cities and people still suffering and dying from Covid to know that we are far from Isaiah’s vision. How can we keep the faith in the midst of such misery? LGBTQ people also know what it means to live in hope and have their hopes dashed, often by the very church that encourages these hopes. Sometimes it’s hard to find signs of God’s presence among us.
That’s why Sunday’s Gospel passage, about John the Baptist, is so extraordinary. From his jail cell, John sends messengers to ask Jesus, “Are you the one?” In response, Jesus invites John to notice what is happening: the blind see, the deaf hear and the lame walk.
So a question for us today is: Where are our blooming deserts? Where are our rejoicing steppes? In other words, where are the signs of God’s presence in our daily lives? Advent is all about desire. Can you desire to notice these things?
The desert and the parched land will exult; the steppe will rejoice and bloom.
--Isaiah 35:1
The loss of contact with God's wise design is the deepest root of modern man's confusion; By living "as if God did not exist," man not only loses sight of the mystery of God, but also of the mystery of the world and the mystery of his own being.
The truth is attractive. John the Baptist speaks the truth, and they come flocking to him. He doesn’t seek glory for himself—in fact, he accepts that he must become less so that Jesus can become more. And he preaches not for his own gain, but to proclaim a future wonder just being born as Jesus begins his ministry. So his vehemence and the force of his message—come forth and confess your sins, because the kingdom is at hand—come through clearly and effectively. Good news about the future and forgiveness while you’re at it… not a bad deal.
We see that so often today, both in popular media and on the local level: the slick and clever message that doesn’t stick, doesn’t last; the preachers whom the writer Katelyn Beaty calls “celebrities for Jesus,” who are looking to make a buck and end up hurting Christians—and losing their way completely.
But then we look at the events we commemorate in the season in which we are now fully engaged: the Christ Child about to be born to the least likely of people in the most humble of circumstances. There’s no reason to be drawn to that person either, on the surface of it—and yet he attracts shepherds, kings, wise men, angels. And John the Baptist himself, eventually, someone who knew that God speaks most clearly through the gritty and the humble. That’s hot.
In this Gaudate Sunday’s reading from Isaiah, the prophet offers those who have remained faithful in exile a portrait of God in his creative wonder, creating things anew, bringing what was lifeless back to life: The desert and the parched land will exult; the steppe will rejoice and bloom when your God comes to the earth to save you, bringing everlasting joy. Our limited human vision has a hard time imagining this miraculous renewal; we are afraid to hope, too scared to see our own limitations as possibilities – we can’t see with God’s eyes. We can’t really expect, only hope: hope in the fulfillment of the promise, hope that our own eyes will be opened, hope that our ears will be cleared…
Like John the Baptist in this Sunday’s Gospel from Matthew, we have built up so many expectations around the coming of Jesus. Like the Israelites before him, John thinks he knows what to expect: a Messiah who comes in a blaze of wrath, a powerhouse ready to take on the world! But Jesus is quick to point out that John and his followers just need to open their eyes: the prophecies are being filled right in front of them: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them. Jesus doesn’t come to meet human expectations: he comes to fulfill God’s promise of salvation, bringing redemption to all who accept God’s invitation to relationship.
And what are we to do, as we wait? Trust, as the psalmist does, that God will keep his faith (Psalm 146), sustaining us, protecting us, raising us up, setting us free. Even if we really understood what that meant, it’s not easy to wait; waiting requires patience, as James tells his readers, repeating that word four times in this week’s short passage. Patience, patience, patience… It's not easy.
Alas, there is no “What to Expect” book for hearts waiting pregnantly for Jesus to come, and we can’t know what Jesus’s coming will bring to our lives. But we can be patient, trusting that the depth of our love will deepen our ability to wait, hearts firm, as we embody God's love for all, expectantly, with patience.
This “vintage” post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture Class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
When my body won't hold me anymore
And it finally lets me free
Will I be ready?
When my feet won't walk another mile
And my lips give their last kiss goodbye
Will my hands be steady when I lay down my fears, my hopes, and my doubts?
The rings on my fingers, and the keys to my house
With no hard feelings
When the sun hangs low in the west
And the light in my chest won't be kept held at bay any longer
When the jealousy fades away
And it's ash and dust for cash and lust
And it's just hallelujah
And love in thought, love in the words
Love in the songs they sing in the church
And no hard feelings
Lord knows, they haven't done much good for anyone
Kept me afraid and cold
With so much to have and hold
Mmm, hmm
When my body won't hold me anymore
And it finally lets me free
Where will I go?
Will the trade winds take me south through Georgia grain?
Or tropical rain?
Or snow from the heavens?
Will I join with the ocean blue?
Or run into a savior true?
And shake hands laughing
And walk through the night, straight to the light
Holding the love I've known in my life
And no hard feelings
Lord knows, they haven't done much good for anyone
Kept me afraid and cold
With so much to have and hold
Under the curving sky
I'm finally learning why
It matters for me and you
To say it and mean it too
For life and its loveliness
And all of its ugliness
Good as it's been to me
I have no enemies
I have no enemies
I have no enemies
I have no enemies
To hear The Avett Brothers sing, “No Hard Feelings,” click on the video below.
We don’t get harmony when everybody sings the same note. Only notes that are different can harmonize. The same is true with people.
--Steve Goodier
If you dare to believe that you are beloved before you are born, you may suddenly realize that your life is very, very special. You become conscious that you were sent here just for a short time, for twenty, forty, or eighty years, to discover and believe that you are a beloved child of God. The length of time doesn’t matter.
You are sent into this world to believe in yourself as God’s chosen one and then to help your brothers and sisters know that they are also Beloved Sons and Daughters of God who belong together. You’re sent into this world to be a people of reconciliation. You are sent to heal, to break down the walls between you and your neighbors, locally, nationally, and globally.
Before all distinctions, the separations, and the walls built on foundations of fear, there was a unity in the mind and heart of God. Out of that unity, you are sent into this world for a little while to claim that you and every other human being belongs to the same God of Love who lives from eternity to eternity.
--Henri Nouwen
Image source: Vincent Van Gogh, Starry Night over the Rhône (1888), https://finearttutorials.com/guide/unity-in-art/
Quotation source 1 Quotation source 2
Today is the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which celebrates the belief that Mary was preserved from original sin from birth, making her a uniquely pure vessel to bear Jesus.
The medieval mystic and composer St. Hildegard of Bingen captured the ecstasy of Mary’s response to God's invitation to bear his Son in her beautiful chant, “O virga mediatrix” (12th c.):
Alleluia!
O virga mediatrix,
sancta viscera tua
mortem superaverunt
et venter tuus omnes creaturas illuminavit
in pulchro flore de suavissima integritate
clausi pudoris tui orto.
Alleluia!
O branch and mediatrix,
your sacred flesh
has conquered death,
your womb all creatures illumined
in beauty’s bloom from that exquisite purity
of your enclosed modesty sprung forth.
To hear St. Hildegard of Bingen’s spectacular “O Virgo mediatrix,” presented by Laurie Monahan and Barbara Thornton, click on the video below:
John the Baptist teaches us… that each of us, through service, consistency, humility, witness of life – and always by God’s grace – can be a lamp that shines and helps others find the way on which to meet Jesus.
--Pope Francis
About thirty years ago , I asked the seventh grade students at St. Pius School in Redwood City about the church, which was a sort of round edifice, like Our Lady of Mount Carmel. I asked the students to tell me, in their own opinion, What are some of the most important things that you see when you come into a church? Some of them said, The altar. Some of them said, The crucifix, or, the tabernacle. They mentioned things that are important to us for our faith.
Then one boy raised his hand and he said, For me, the most important thing is the green exit sign. And I thought, What? There was laughter among his fellow students, but he explained: At the end of the Mass, we are sent forth on mission. He didn’t say it exactly like this, but his message was, We hear words of mission and commission: Go and glorify God with your lives. Go in peace; the Mass is ended. Go and spread the Gospel by everything that you say and do.
So his words always come to my mind whenever I see a green exit sign in any church. That is what John the Baptist is all about, too. He is a sign pointing toward Jesus. He tells the people who come to him, I am just a voice in the desert. I’m merely a prophet. I’m pointing the way to someone who is much more important than I. He is so great, he is so central, he is so magnificent, that I’m not even worthy to untie the sandals on his feet. So don’t follow me, John the Baptist says, Follow him!
And when Jesus comes, when John sees him at the Jordan river, John will utter those words that we use at every Mass: Behold, the Lamb of God! Behold him who takes away the sins of the world. He does! Jesus does take away our sins. Jesus does strengthen us in holiness and comfort us and make us more like him. And then, he sends us out under that exit sign, to be his Body in the world.
Silence frees us to learn, to become, to reflect, to respond, and to repent.
--Sr. Joan Chittister
To repent is not to look downwards at my own shortcomings, but upwards at God’s love. It is not to look backwards with self-reproach, but forward with trustfulness. It is to see not what I have failed to be, but what by the grace of Christ I might yet become.
The way you look at things is not simply a private matter. Your outlook actually and concretely affects what goes on. When you give in to helplessness, you collude with despair and add to it. When you take back your power and choose to see the possibilities for healing and transformation, your creativity awakens and flows to become an active force of renewal and encouragement in the world.
In this way, even in your own hidden life, you can become a powerful agent of transformation in a broken, darkened world. There is a huge force field that opens when intention focuses and directs itself toward transformation.
--John O’Donohue, Benedictus – To Bless the Space Between Us
When, in Matthew’s Gospel, John the Baptist preaches in the desert of Judea, he attracts all kinds of interest, even though his message is not an easy one: Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand!, he cries. In biblical texts, the desert is often a place of transformation, barren, yet open to new life coming forth, a place where metanoia (conversion) is possible. To repent – as those coming for baptism must learn – is to see with clear vision the sins of the past, to acknowledge the divisions one has created, to mourn them and then rise from them: only then can new life come forth from that which has been barren.
This world in which what seemed dead will bear fruit is clear in the beautiful poetry of the prophet Isaiah, who foretells that a shoot will sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots, a bud shall blossom -- Jesus, the Son of God. In this description of the Messianic promise, Isaiah describes a remarkable transformation, a new world where justice and faithfulness trump wickedness, and enemies can come together in peace – wolf and lamb, leopard and kid – for there shall be no harm or ruin on this holy mountain, God says. Isaiah’s message of new life is echoed in Psalm 72: Justice shall flourish in his time, and fullness of peace forever.
Yet this transformed world is still not ours. Paul tells the Romans that by endurance and by the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope, fostering the kind of harmony that Isaiah describes, where all can glorify God with one accord. For harmony refers, musically, to two notes sung at the same time that resonate with one another. Likewise, our reading of the Scriptures teaches us that all we do affects those around us: Welcome one another, then, Paul says, as Christ welcomed you. In our quest for new life, may we strive above all for harmony, remaining open to the transformation to which we are called during this season of Advent, heeding John’s call to repent, turning from sin to love, letting that love circumscribe our existence, and glorifying God as we do.
This "vintage" post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
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