Mark 10:45

Tag: Scriptural Reflection

  • The Song of the Dove: Feast of Saint Stephen

    Acts 6:8-10; 7:54-59; Matthew 10:17-22

    Of all the customs that have ever arisen during the celebration of the Twelve Days of Christmas, perhaps the strangest occurred in the 18th and 19th centuries. Beginning on the Feast of Stephen, young boys in Southern France, Great Britain, and Ireland would hunt and kill a bird; specifically a wren, then display it and parade it around town asking for money.

    It’s hard to understand how this bizarre ritual started or why it was done, let alone how it could continue for two hundred years, but a good dose of superstition was probably involved. In certain places the wren was considered symbolic of priesthood or prophecy. An old Irish word for wren meant “bird of prophecy,” and some Irishmen associated it with a type of pagan priest who foretold the future. Although we have no idea what the poor little bird was supposedly prophesying, one thing is known: The wrens’ song is very loud; allegedly ten times louder than other birds their size. Who knows; perhaps the boys thought they were doing their town a favor.

    In the reading from Acts, the members of the local synagogue may have thought that they were doing their town a favor when they silenced Stephen. But his was the song of the Dove, not the wren. Luke says that Stephen was filled with the Holy Spirit; as Jesus made clear in the gospel, His wisdom cannot be overcome. Like Jesus, the only way to try and silence Stephen was to kill him; it is no coincidence that Luke patterns Stephen’s passion and death after that of Christ. For example, in Luke Jesus tells the Sanhedrin before he dies that from this time on the Son of Man will be seated at the right hand of the power of God (Luke 2:69); here, Luke has Stephen say Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God (Acts 7:56).

    snow wrenLike the mysterious sacrifice of the wren, this may leave us curious. Why does the Church take the first day after Christmas to remember the first martyr? The answer lies precisely in the similarity of Stephen’s passion and death to Christ’s. Christmas is the celebration of the birth of Jesus; the same Jesus who came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45). It was in the giving of his life that Christ most profoundly served, for only by the perfect sacrifice of himself could his disciples have hope of being born into eternal life. Thus with Stephen; he could most greatly honor his Savior by imitating him in life even if that meant dying, that he might be born into eternal life with Christ.

    It might seem odd for the Church to see death as the way to honor life; after all, if Church members die, how can the Church survive? That brings up another fact about the wren. Although winter can devastate its population, the bird is extremely hardy; it always finds a way to survive. What is true for the wren is doubly true of the Dove; those who have been graced to speak with the power of the Holy Spirit have been hunted, killed, and displayed for over two thousand years; still, the Church continues to find ways not only to survive but to thrive. In fact, it is the irony of man and the glory of the Holy Spirit that the martyrdom of Stephen gave rise to the greatest come back in Church history. Notice near the end of the first reading, Luke tells us that the witnesses laid down their cloaks at the feet of a young man named Saul (Acts 7:58). Saul, the same man who stood silently by at the death of the first martyr, in time became Paul, the loudest and hardiest wren of all.

    St. Stephen, pray for us.

  • The Three Consolations: Thursday of the 3rd Week of Advent

    Judges 13:2-7, 24-25a; Luke 1:5-25

    I remember once years ago sitting with my mother, watching TV. The shows were full of young people and I jokingly remarked, “I guess no one over 40 can be on TV.” Mom saw no humor in it; she replied, “Our society has no use for us older people, especially women. In their eyes, once we’re past childbearing age we’ve outlived our usefulness.”

    That got me thinking about the Hebrew world of today’s readings. Elizabeth and the mother of Sampson could probably identify with my mother’s feelings. They lived in a culture where barrenness was seen by many as a punishment from God (Genesis 16:2, 20:18). For such women the future was bleak; nothing but loneliness and insecurity to look forward to. No wonder some of them were prompted to despair (Genesis 30:1).

    Especially during seasons such as Advent and Christmas when we exalt the virtue of hope, people still fall prey to the loneliness, depression, and anxiety that lead to despair. Rather than consolation they are in desolation, the sense that God sees our hopelessness yet has abandoned us, left us in the dark, and is never coming back. We cannot see that it is only an inner sense and not the outward reality; the voice of the Prince of Lies telling us we are worthless, that God doesn’t love us and is far, far away. The truth is that God is as near as our next breath and loves us so much that we are worth dying for.

    It is the wait that fools us. If God loves us so much, why do we seem to wait forever for him to answer? The women in the readings must have wondered the same thing. Day after day, week after week, year after year they waited; still no answer. It would have been easy to give up. Yet what does Scripture say? Elizabeth, like her husband, was “righteous in the eyes of God, observing all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blamelessly” (Luke 1:6).

    In other words Elizabeth persevered, and it was this that kept her from falling into despair. This is a lesson for us. We too must not only endure times of desolation but use them to strengthen our spiritual gifts. We cannot learn prudence when the way is always clear, justice when all is fair, fortitude when times are easy, or temperance when we get everything in just the right amount. We cannot strengthen our faith when all is seen, or charity when all is given. In the same way, the virtue of hope grows stronger as we persevere in waiting and through that perseverance appreciate ever more deeply the coming of that which we most long for: Unity with God, the object of our hope. Desolation is not the time to turn away from God but toward him; to reinvigorate our hope in the everlasting joy of heaven. The time is now, for Advent is the definitive season of waiting, when hope longs to be rekindled.

    stained-glass-4522405_640The great gift of fertility given to Samson’s mother and to Elizabeth are confirmation that perseverance is rewarded. God sees all of us who endure desolation and, in his own time and manner, provides from the storehouse of his infinite mercy the life-giving consolation of his Spirit. When we find ourselves in times of desolation remember to ask the intercession of St. Elizabeth; she understands very well not only the pain of endless waiting but also the indescribable joy of the Holy Spirit’s three priceless consolations: The new life of St. John within her womb; the love and help of Mary, the Mother of Hope; and most of all the fulfillment of Hope itself: Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

    St. Elizabeth, pray for us.

  • How Not to Lean: Thursday of the First Week of Advent

    Isaiah 26:1-6; 55:6; Matthew 7:21, 24-27

    In the 12th century the people of Pisa, Italy could say like Judah in the first reading, A strong city have we (Isaiah 26:1). A military, political, and economic force, they had recently triumphed over Palermo in Sicily and returned home with the fortunes of war – millions in booty and a shipload of soil from Golgotha in the Holy Land. Eager to show off their wealth, the people set aside a large plot of land called the Field of Miracles and in it filled a new cemetery with the sacred soil, built a majestic cathedral and baptistery, and set to work on what was to be the largest bell tower in the world – 200 feet high.

    Unfortunately, Pisa could also say that the Lord humbles those in high places (Isaiah 26:5). Before it had risen 3 floors it was obvious the tower was leaning. Perhaps they forgot that the word Pisa is Greek for marshy land, its ground too soft to support such a structure. Construction stopped and started for centuries as different architects tried different things, all with the same result: Fixed on one side, the tower would lean the other. By 1990 it leaned so badly that it had to be closed to the public. Finally, after millions in repairs it reopened, still leaning. As one expert said, “Sandy and soggy ground is definitely not ideal for tall, heavy towers unless they have rock solid foundations.”

    As we begin a new Church year in these early days of Advent let us consider our own spiritual foundation. Like ancient Pisa we have been given so much. We are a strong city – the City of God. Strong walls and ramparts protect us – the four walls of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. We have neither the marshland of Pisa nor the dirt of Golgotha but something infinitely better: The Father, the eternal Rock (Isaiah 26:4), his Only Son who died on Golgotha giving birth to the Church, and the Holy Spirit sent by them to guide her into all truth. And we have every tool needed to build our faith: Sacred Scripture, Tradition, and the teaching authority vested by Christ in his Church.

    But all of that goes for nothing if we build our faith on the sand of ourselves and not on the rock foundation of God. How do we do that? By reading Scripture with our own mind rather than the mind of the Church; failing to give the assent of faith to Church teachings we find difficult; following whatever preaching tickles our ear; taking for granted or ignoring the Sacraments as the means of receiving sanctifying grace; and failing to see all people, especially those we don’t like, as made in the image and likeness of God and loved infinitely by him as we are.

    italy-3577677_1280These and many more are like the soft, marshy soil below the tower of Pisa. Like that tower, a faith built on human weakness will lean and no amount of stopping and starting, tinkering and refining will fix it. It must be torn to the ground and rebuilt on the foundation of Christ and his Church, for we must take the faith as it is, not as we would like it to be.

    This is painful but growth often is; to be fertile and capable of bearing fruit, soil must be dug into, plowed, upturned and weeded. It’s no different in the spiritual life; we must go deep into our minds and hearts, tear them open if need be, do all that we can to prepare them for the foundation of Christ. This will require that we come to him by repenting, admitting our weaknesses and failings, and resolving to amend our lives; trusting in God and all that he has revealed, whether we fully understand it or not.

    These first two weeks of Advent are a time set aside by the Church for exactly this. Now is the time! As the gospel acclamation says, call to him while he is still near (Isaiah 55:6). In the end each of us will stand before him from one of two places: A tower of faith built solidly on the rock of Christ or one built on sand. The Master Builder has already given us his advice; we find it in Proverbs: Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding (Proverbs 3:5).

    In other words, remember the tower of Pisa: When we lean on our own understanding, we simply lean.

  • An Attitude of Gratitude: Thanksgiving Day

    Sirach 50:22-24; 1 Corinthians 1:3-9; Luke 17:11-19

    I recently came across an article written by a psychologist who believes that developing an “attitude of gratitude” is important for our mental health. In her words, “Being able to appreciate what is important to us is a truly valuable way of stepping back from the stresses we are experiencing and re-framing our thoughts and attention, our feelings and behavior.”1

    With all due respect, she should have checked Scripture first. If she had gone even as far as today’s readings she would have found much more insight.

    The author of Sirach goes right to the heart of the matter when he reminds us to be grateful for the gift of life itself from conception onward. The grim realities of abortion and euthanasia are evidence of a culture where people do not understand the value of their own life let alone anyone else’s. The kind of social sickness that breeds such an attitude will be hard to heal but we have on call the Divine Physician who knows how to treat it. As we continue to pray for his intervention let us not forget our part; that is, showing thankfulness to God for the gift of all human life by doing whatever we can to support it, whether that means women in crisis pregnancies, people suffering from abuse or neglect, or those who are encouraged to end their lives. The world must come to see through Christ and his Church that every human life is infinitely valuable because it is made in God’s image and fashioned according to his will (Sirach 50:22).

    God’s will, that we have life and have it abundantly now and in eternity, comes to the fore as St. Paul reminds us of the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus (1 Corinthians 1:4). While human life is certainly enough to be thankful for in and of itself, God has given us the opportunity to share in so much more: Eternal life through the gift of his only Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom we have fellowship and of whom we partake at every Eucharist just for this purpose.

    eucharist-1591663_640Still, a common problem is that we tend to take this fellowship for granted and forget gratitude. We fall into a routine of receiving Communion with little or no thought as to what – or rather Who – we are receiving. Like the nine lepers in today’s gospel passage, we are given what we ask for but then go back on our way with little regard either for the gift or what it cost the Giver. St. Paul goes on to warn about the grave danger of such ingratitude: That is why many among you are ill and infirm, and a considerable number are dying (1 Corinthians 11:30). The healthier, more grateful response is to first discern whether we are in the state of grace to receive Christ and, if not, to make ourselves a more worthy vessel. Like the leper who, once cleansed, remembered to be thankful, we thank God for what he has given us through the Church – the gifts of faith and the Sacraments through which he touches, heals, and sanctifies us.

    Today is Thanksgiving Day here in the United States, a day set aside to show our gratitude. Wherever you are, I urge you to stop and think about all that God has given you. No matter who you are or how many problems you struggle with, there is reason to be grateful. First and foremost, be grateful for life; each breath is a gift from God given that we may live life to the full. Secondly let us be grateful for each other; each person is a gift from God, sent to make us holy. Finally, let us thank God for the gift of the Church, through which Christ comes to us in Word and Sacrament to be one with us and above all to make us one with him, now and in Eternity.

    A very blessed and happy Thanksgiving.

  • Viva, Cristo Rey: Blessed Miguel Pro

    Daniel 1:1-6, 8-20; Luke 21:1-4

    In biblical studies, as in life, things aren’t always what they seem. For example, some books of the bible seem like history; they mention real historical people and places and the situations they describe seem real enough. However, clues such as language and historical inaccuracies show that the author had another purpose in mind; he is speaking symbolically.

    Thus it is with the book of Daniel. Scholars tell us that the symbolism running through its stories points to two particularly strong themes: The ability of the Jews to thrive in a Gentile world and the importance of remaining true to the traditions of the faith.

    Both themes appear in Daniel and the gospel according to Luke. By successfully bargaining with the Gentile authorities about their diet, four young Hebrew men were able to remain true to their religious identity. Not only that, when the king discovered that their wisdom and understanding far surpassed that of his own people, these men, who it seemed were the conquered, were in fact conquerors.

    These themes also run through the ministry of Blessed Miguel Pro. Born in Mexico, Pro was sent abroad as a seminarian and ordained a Jesuit priest in Belgium in 1925. Finding that he could not thrive abroad due to stomach ailments that nearly killed him, Father was returned to Mexico, despite the great persecution of Catholics currently underway.

    This might seem like the worst thing for an ailing priest, but things aren’t always what they seem. In fact, his ministry to the people of Mexico restored Father’s health. Like Christ and the saints, his food was to do the will of the One who sent him, and he greatly delighted in doing God’s will right under the authorities’ noses. A master of disguise, Father was never what he seemed. He ministered in prisons posing as a policeman; in posh neighborhoods dressed as a rich man; in slums dressed as a beggar. Hiding in plain sight, he taught, gave Communion, said Mass, absolved sins, confirmed the faithful, and prayed over the dead. Father Miguel Pro, like the widow in the gospel, seemed to have almost nothing, but in reality had everything, and freely gave it. He who seemed to be conquered was the conqueror.

    miguel proEventually, Father was caught, imprisoned on a false charge and on the morning of November 23rd 1927 faced a firing squad. Even here, he was a conqueror. Before the cameras and all assembled, he forgave and blessed his persecutors, held out his arms in the shape of the cross and shouted “Viva, Cristo Rey (Long live Christ, the King)!” With that, Father Miguel Pro died.

    The government published a photograph of his execution, believing that it would frighten Catholics into submission. Once again, things were not what they seemed. Father Pro, arms outstretched like a cross, displayed such Christ-like strength, such fearlessness in the face of unjust persecution, that the photograph and Father’s last words became the symbols around which Catholics rallied to resist the repression even more strongly. This was not a photograph of the conquered but of the conqueror. Ironically, the government quickly banned their own photograph.

    Like the young men in the first chapter of Daniel, Blessed Miguel Pro thrived in a hostile environment because he remained faithful to his calling and his religious heritage. While our culture and our authorities are not as openly hostile as was Mexico in the early 20th century, there is constant and perhaps growing pressure to minimize the voice of Christ and his Church in the public arena. While the times may seem bleak, remember: Things are not always what they seem. Let us imitate Blessed Miguel Pro by being in the culture but not of it; by ministering in whatever way we can to preserve and build on the good that has come before. Finally, let us remember that, in the end, we bow to only one authority – that of the Triune God.

    Viva Cristo Rey. Long live Christ the King.

    Blessed Miguel Pro, pray for us.

  • Mother and Disciple: The Feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

    Zechariah 2:14-17; Matthew 12:46-50

    We may hear today’s gospel and wonder how any son could treat his mother like that, let alone the Son of God. Hearing that his mother is outside he doesn’t stop speaking and invite her in; rather, he uses her appearance to make the point that everyone who does the will of God is his mother. Shouldn’t Mary be insulted?

    No. She is doubly honored.

    First, remember that this is not just any son; this is Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God. Engaged in the mission for which he was sent, the salvation of souls, he was speaking about radical fidelity to the will of God. Faith binds us to Christ and to each other with a love born not in the blood of kinship but in his own precious blood. If his teaching shocked people, so be it. His point was not about Mary’s faithfulness, it was about ours.

    Indeed, faithfulness is her first honor. As St. Augustine said, Mary conceived her Son in faith before she conceived him in her womb. We think of her as his mother and rightly so for it was by her fiat that he came into the world, but we must also remember that she was his first and best disciple. Mary is the only person to appear in the gospels from before his conception until the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

    It may seem ironic that from the faithful dwelling of her motherhood Mary invited him in yet he, her Son, refused to return the favor. But again Mary loved him as both mother and disciple. As mother she might feel the sting of his words as he broadened “family” from the ties of blood to those of faith, but as disciple she knew and lived their truth. Despite whatever personal pain the truth may cause it is always the source of joy, for joy is happiness in pursuit of the good and Mary lived her life in hope of attaining the greatest good: Eternal union in heaven with God who is love.

    Love is the second honor of Mary. Only through love do we live life to the full and this necessarily includes all the joys and sorrows that go with it. We might think that in his mercy Christ would spare his own mother the pain of suffering but actually the opposite is true: He loved her too much to deprive her of it. What kind of love knows no sorrow, feels no pain, and never suffers? Rightly is Mary the Mother of Sorrows for in her great love she suffered many times over, from the mystical sword that pierced her heart to her Son’s burial in the tomb. Yet as Scripture reminds us, love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things (1 Corinthians 13:7) and is as deep as death (Song of Songs 8:6); Mary’s love for Jesus could not be broken by any boundary of space or time, but did reach perfection in his love for her: her own glorious Assumption.

    stained-glass-4506616_640The two themes of fidelity and love are interwoven in the feast of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The presentation of oneself to God is an act of great faith and deep love. Whether Mary demonstrated her faith and love in a formal consecration to God in the Temple as described in the ancient non-biblical documents is irrelevant. Every day of Mary’s life was a presentation, a self-offering, an abandonment to the divine will made possible by the movement of grace within her. Long before he dwelled within her womb, indeed from the moment of her immaculate conception, our Lord dwelled within her soul and bestowed upon it the fullness of grace, his very life. By her response to that grace, Mary most truly defines what it means to be a Temple of the Holy Spirit.

    What does all this mean for us? It means that as Mary has done so we are invited to do. St. Paul said, “Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? … Therefore, glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 3:16, 6:20). May we never forget that every time we receive Holy Communion we present ourselves to God in an act of faith and love like Mary his handmaid, that we too may glorify God in our bodies.

    Blessed Mother intercede for us, that like you we may be among those to whom Christ says, “whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother” (Matthew 12:50).

  • The Miracle of the Nuns: Saturday of the 32nd Week in Ordinary Time

    Wisdom 18:14-16; 19:6-9; Luke 18:1-8

    In November 1950, three nuns found themselves in the Arctic Circle, in a Russian gulag (or prison camp) named Vorkuta. Found guilty of proclaiming the gospel of Christ, they were assigned to work in a plant there that made bricks.

    The first verses of today’s reading from the book of Wisdom come from Chapter 18, which recalls another prison camp, where Hebrew slaves made bricks for their Egyptian masters. Yet, as the reading says, the Lord, a fierce warrior, bore into the doomed land the sharp sword of his inexorable decree, filling every place with death.

    No one saw Vorkuta as doomed, and death already filled it; more prisoners died there than in Auschwitz. Further, no one had mistaken the nuns for fierce warriors, but perhaps they knew a different art of war. All the camp’s commandant knew was that these nuns were troublesome. They refused to work, claiming that anything they did to support Communism was tantamount to working for the anti-Christ.

    Dead nuns make good martyrs but poor slaves, so the commandant did not want them killed; he wanted them to change their minds. After various ghastly tortures failed, he had an idea; if he couldn’t change their minds, then perhaps the Arctic winter would. He commanded that the nuns be brought outside every day for 8 hours and forced to watch the other women work.

    The first day, the guards led them to the top of the windy hill below which the women worked. In the bitter cold, the nuns knelt and prayed. The next day, their gloves and hats were taken away; again, the nuns knelt and prayed. The third day, their scarves were removed; just as before, the guards returned after 8 hours to find them once again kneeling in prayer. Not only were the nuns very much alive, they had no trace of frostbite at all. Word spread throughout the entire camp about the miracle of the nuns. The next day, the guards refused to take them out again and the commandant ordered them to be left alone; these nuns had some sort of power over which he had no control. They never worked a day of their sentence. Awhile later, in 1953, the entire camp followed suit. Their refusal to work led to the gulag of Vorkuta being declared a failure. The myth of Soviet invincibility suffered a blow from which it would never recover.

    No one reported that a cloud had overshadowed the gulag; then again, perhaps no one asked the nuns. Like the Hebrew slaves long before them, the nuns were preserved unharmed, sheltered by the hand of the One to whom they prayed. Like the Egyptians before them, the Soviets could only stand by helplessly and behold the stupendous wonders of God.

    In the gospel, Jesus exhorts us to pray always without becoming weary. Even as unjust a judge as the commandant of Vorkuta was powerless when confronted with the faith of the three little nuns who understood the power of persistent prayer.

    winter-1565442_640.jpgPersistence in prayer does not test God’s patience or change his mind; rather, it tests our faith and changes our attitude. Through his life and the Scriptures he has given the world, Jesus has told us that God loves each of us with a love beyond our understanding and knows our needs before we ask. That being so, God wants our prayer to consistently express the trust we have in him and his providence; that is the faith that Christ wants to find upon his return.

    We will have reached perfection in prayer when it expresses the same total abandonment to God as that of Jesus when he prayed: “Father, not my will, but Thy will be done.”

  • True Wisdom: Thursday of the 32nd Week in Ordinary Time

    Wisdom 7:22b-8:1; Luke 17:20-25

    In college one of my classmates was a man who it seemed was always a step ahead of me. While I was still learning one computer technology he was onto whatever was replacing it. I couldn’t keep up with him.

    One semester we took the same class and it became clear to me that he wasn’t far ahead at all; he was actually much further behind. The problem was that he didn’t stick with anything long enough to finish it. He’d start a book, paper, or project but move on when something else caught his attention. When it came time for our final class presentations he was totally unprepared; he had nothing to say. He ended up dropping out of school. I felt very sorry for him.

    Had I been wiser I would have stopped and contemplated the many ways I am that man. For one thing, my shelves are lined with books that got my attention for awhile but which I put down as soon as I found something else. For another, I catch myself tuning out a Scripture passage because I’ve heard it before and think I understand it. As if that isn’t bad enough, I sometimes pay the least attention to the people closest to me, assuming that they know I care so I don’t need to say it or act much like it.

    Maybe this describes all of us to some degree. We begin a spiritual article on the internet and abandon it as soon as a flashy image catches our eye; scroll past bible verses and quotes from saints without contemplating them; spend hours searching for God online but miss finding him in our own families.

    These are the modern-day equivalent of the behavior discussed by Jesus in today’s gospel. Expectations about the flash and bombast of the Messiah and his Kingdom, scant attention paid to the meaning of our Lord’s words, and eagerness to scan the spiritual horizon for something new combined to give the Pharisees and even some of our Lord’s disciples a kind of spiritual farsightedness; they looked at but couldn’t see either the King or his Kingdom there among them.

    They did these things for the same reason we do: To gain the wisdom that will bring us closer to God and other people. The irony is that instead of bringing us closer they overwhelm us and keep us away. Discouraged by lack of results, some of us even abandon the attempt, drop out, or fall away.

    directory-229117_640No wonder. Internet scans, scrolls, and searches cannot bring the wisdom we need. As the first reading tells us, Wisdom is a spirit… Firm, secure, tranquil, all-powerful, all-seeing… the spotless mirror of the power of God, the image of his goodness (Wisdom 7:22, 23, 26). Wisdom is Christ, and his gift to us is wisdom as the fruit of the Spirit. A fruit born of the love of God, wisdom desires not only to be one with God but to see things as God sees them. Like any fruit, wisdom takes time to mature; its development a function of our life experience as seen through the lens of long-suffering that strengthens us to finish what we start, docility to listen as God speaks, and humility to remember that we are servants of God and each other.

    Spurred on by these, spiritual wisdom helps us find the proper balance between searching for the Kingdom yet to come and living in the Kingdom here and now. We must do both, for the Christ who tells us today that the Kingdom of God is among us is the same Christ who teaches us to pray “Thy Kingdom come.” The balance can only be found through prudence, the virtuous midpoint between the extreme of finding too many paths to take and the other extreme of looking for none at all.

    So let us pray for prudence, and that whatever path to God we find ourselves on we do what prudence dictates: Prepare for the coming of the Kingdom by tending to the Kingdom among us, and anticipate the glorious return of Christ the King by seeing and serving him in everyone we meet.

  • The Light of a Single Candle: 32nd Sunday of Ordinary Time

    2 Maccabees 7:1-2, 9-14; 2 Thessalonians 2:16-3:5; Luke 20:27-38

    In 1968, Chicago mayor Richard J. Daley was questioned about allegations of police brutality during the riots. He famously responded that “the policeman isn’t there to create disorder; the policeman is there to preserve disorder.” Although we can laugh at the mayor’s confused language, we understand the thought behind it. The common good of every society demands order. In fact, order means so much to us that from capital punishment to the military draft, we allow the government even the right to take life to preserve and protect it.

    However, leaders can presume too much on this right, as the first reading shows. The story takes place about 170 years before the birth of Christ. The king is not named but is known to be Antiochus IV Epiphanes. Unlike other successors of Alexander the Great, the king took exception to the Jews’ refusal to adopt Greek culture. In his anger he desecrated the Temple by erecting a statue of Zeus in it and, as we heard, commanded that the Jews either learn to live with a pagan diet or die with their own.

    Although the king was certainly a tyrant, at least he was honest; he never pretended that what he was doing was good. More recent tyrants hide their brutality behind euphemisms. Less than a century ago when the National Socialist party came to power in Germany they arrogated to themselves the legal right to define the mentally and physically handicapped as “unworthy of life” and their extermination a “mercy.” They later redefined mercy as ridding society of Jews, to “purify the race.” They weren’t alone; think of the genocides in China and Cambodia and the “ethnic cleansing” in Bosnia and Rwanda.

    Even worse, the latest attacks on life target the weakest and most defenseless. Consider the elderly and infirm. When euthanasia was legalized in parts of Europe, it was hailed as a “mercy” and critics were reassured that strict safeguards defined who could be terminated. Once again though, mercy was redefined; now a physician can legally terminate anyone over 70 or those of any age who say that they are suffering mentally or physically and no longer want to live. Those declared mentally incompetent have someone else decide for them. In the United States, physician-assisted suicide is legal in two states and under consideration in others. At the other margin of life, abortion advocates defined person-hood beginning at birth but did not foresee the redefinition proposed by the bio-ethicist Dr. Peter Singer who wrote: ‘Human babies are not born self-aware, or capable of grasping that they exist over time. They are not persons…(T)he life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee.’ Singer wrote that in 1979. To atheists such as he, humans are just another animal; nothing more. As atheism has continued to grow, Singer’s ideas have gained a foothold. The cause for redefining what it means to be a person has begun. Again. We may well live to see a society where it is perfectly legal to declare an infant as “unworthy of life.”

    The fatal flaw of every tyrant is that they see the worth of the human being as beginning and ending with the mortal body. Like the Sadducees’ misguided argument, this fantasy dissolves in the light of Christ who in the gospel defines the body not in terms of mortality but of eternity when he says that those who are deemed worthy to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead … can no longer die, for they are like angels.. they are the children of God because they are the ones who will rise. Society may arrogate to itself the right to manipulate, control, even destroy the human body but they are powerless to define its worth or control its destiny.

    The martyred brothers and their mother from the story in Maccabees knew this, and it is the power behind the hope given in the second reading when St. Paul speaks of the endurance of Christ. This is the power that drives the good to endure, to hold onto the promise of resurrection in the face of a tyrant who promises only death.

    hands-1926414_640We who have inherited this faith must never forget these two lessons from the readings: First, the worth of the human body was not, is not, and never will be ours to decide. God has given us freedom, so we can define and re-define who is and who is not worthy to live, but in the end these are just words; our laws  are meaningless when not based on divine law and their power stops at the same death long since conquered by Christ. Second, silence that allows such deadly evil to go unchallenged is complicity in it and as such is a breakdown of the moral conscience. Even if it seems too powerful, even if it seems that everybody else agrees, even if it hides behind euphemisms such as “mercy killing” or “reproductive rights,” Christ asks us to stand – alone if need be – call evil what it is despite the consequences, and do whatever we can to bring light into the darkness, for as St. Francis of Assisi once taught, all the darkness in the world cannot extinguish the light of a single candle.

  • Love Without Measure: Thursday of the 31st Week in Ordinary Time

    Luke 15:1-10

    A man with 99 sheep safe and sound leaves them all to recover a lost one and, finding it, rejoices as if it is all he owns. A woman with ten coins loses one of practically no value but like a miser turns the house upside down until she finds it, then throws a party when she does. If you find this behavior strange, surprising, or even mystifying, know that you’re not alone.

    Also know that our Lord is delighted to hear it.

    That’s because parables aren’t supposed to make sense on the surface. They’re meant to sound strange, to surprise, and even mystify us. Their unexpected behavior or surprising twists should give us pause, make us stop and reflect, prompt us to ask questions, and look beneath the surface for answers. The question for today’s parables is obvious: What is it that would make someone go so far out of their way to recover something it seems they could so easily do without?

    The answer is the infinite, overwhelming, passionate, mysterious, all-consuming love of God.

    This is a love that sees as we do not. We tend to value people not only for who they are but also for what they can do for us. On those terms what is one sheep compared to 99 or one nearly worthless coin compared to the other nine? In contrast, God’s infinite love values people not just for who they are but because they are. Thus, even one lost soul is of infinite importance. This overwhelming love assures us that even if we were the only person ever created God still would have suffered and died for us. Not only that, he wants his standard of love to be ours as well; to make the world a place without hatred, bitterness, resentment, or injustice, where we rejoice not when an enemy dies but when they repent, come to a knowledge and love of God, and live as he intends.

    That brings us to the second point of the parables, which is that God’s love brings the joy of conversion. Again in human terms, we tend to equate joy with an emotional high; a good feeling. But true joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, the happiness that comes as we pursue and come to possess our greatest good: Eternal union with God. This is what lies at the heart of the parables – the passionate joy that comes from finding what was lost but so priceless; the joy we too will know as we attain more and more perfect union with Almighty God.

    jesus-3499151_1280Finally, the parables teach us that the love of God works mysteriously through the process of conversion so that no matter how hard we search for Christ, it isn’t we who find him but he who finds us. Our life stories are a testament to the truth of the parables and Isaiah’s words that we have all gone astray like sheep (Isaiah 53:6). It’s who we are in the self-centered weakness of human love; left to ourselves we drift, fall into habits that may be comfortable but lead us further away from God. And it is who Christ is in the glorious strength of his all-consuming love that he comes to us like the shepherd and the woman in the parables, seeking out and saving what was lost (Luke 19:10) no matter the cost. This is the love that literally consumed him, leading him to the cross and beyond.

    It is always there that such infinite, overwhelming, passionate, mysterious, all-consuming love leads. None can possess real love without giving it away, know its deep joy without plumbing the depths of its sacrifice, or attain its life without letting our own life go. It’s very hard to comprehend that kind of love but that’s good because it gives us yet another question to contemplate. Ask yourself, what is the measure of my own love? Consider in your contemplation the answer given by the great saint Francis de Sales centuries ago, who perhaps had in mind these very parables.

    The measure of love is to love without measure.