Audio on Soundcloud!

Audio on Soundcloud.

Now my recordings will be uploaded to the parish Soundcloud account. Here is the address: https://soundcloud.com/stthereselittleflowersb


Also, see what else is happening at our parish: https://littleflowerchurch.org/

Finally, look to the right for links to Audio from other good resources!

Saturday, December 26, 2020

Holy Family

 GKC “Christmas is built upon a beautiful and intentional paradox; that the birth of the homeless should be celebrated in every home.”
– Brave New Family


Even though it was written 25 years ago, many Catholics in family life ministries believe that the Church is only beginning to see the fruits of John Paul II’s message to families.
Although he was a celibate priest like me, Wojtyla became very close to a circle of young people whom he pastored while serving as chaplain to university students in Krakow. As they married and had children, Fr. Wojtyla offered spiritual and pastoral guidance to their families that would inform his work well into his years as Pope John Paul II.
“He was able to support these young families, to help them live the faith at a time when Communist society was really trying to undermine the family, ordering work and school schedules in a way that systematically minimized their time with each other. The state, and not the family, was, according to the government, the ultimate good and end of society.
JPII was working in his own small way to fight this head on as a priest, then in a bigger way as a bishop, and finally, after being elected Pope, much of his wisdom about the sanctity and importance of marriage and family life can be found in his 1994 “Letter to Families.”
In his letter, John Paul II wrote that men and women, particularly in their roles as fathers and mothers in the family, are key to building up a “civilization of love,” in which families are able to give and receive love at individual and societal levels.
The history of mankind, the history of salvation, passes by way of the family.
we're not investing for the future of society or for the Church. We're just living for the present moment, and for our own selfish desires.
Who can deny that our age is one marked by a great crisis, which appears above all as a profound ‘crisis of truth?’” John Paul II wrote. “A crisis of truth means, in the first place, a crisis of concepts. Do the words ‘love’, ‘freedom’, ‘sincere gift’, and even ‘person’ and ‘rights of the person’, really convey their essential meaning?

It is in our hearts and in our homes that the Lord ultimately desires to reside as well - not just in this church. This is why Pope St. John Paul II called the home “the domestic church” – for children it is the first community of faith, and for all of us it is the first step in bringing God’s kingdom into the world.
The family needs the parish for support, and the parish needs the family for support. So our community is trying to build up the parish family by building up the domestic church. Prayer must become the dominant element of the Year of the Family in the Church: prayer by the family, prayer for the family, and prayer with the family,” John Paul II wrote. “Prayer increases the strength and spiritual unity of the family, helping the family to partake of God's own ‘strength.’    
Resources, workshops, and other avenues will be utilized throughout the year. Please refer to other parts of this bulletin for more information.
Goals: 1 - invest into our parish families of all types.  2 - We are in God’s family, adopted sons and daughters in Christ Jesus 3 - Christ must be at the center of our families 4 - support network for families in smaller communities within the parish called “households," starting officially in the fall.
If you are… this is for you.   recently married. married for years. empty nesters. widowed. divorced or in other difficult situations. unmarried, you still have a family! (I know I do!)
We can say that the family is the unit of the state; that it is the cell that makes up the formation. [...] If we are not of those who begin by invoking a divine Trinity, we must none the less invoke a human Trinity; and see that triangle repeated everywhere in the pattern of the world. GKC

Thursday, December 24, 2020

Christmas Homily

All your plans are stripped away. You can't do what you want. You are stuck in a room staring at a wall. You are separated from your friends. You barely get to go outside.

Fr. Alfred Delp: 1944 Munich Germany - Tegel prison
It is going to be a beautiful Christmas, despite everything, or perhaps because of everything. With the state setting on these days, it's real, without obstruction, and a person can stand in face ultimate reality.…I think that from all of this we're going to have a watchful and blessed time with the child. The contradiction of everything we take for granted, the setting aside of all our important matters. Powerlessness on the tight-rope is an education in understanding the child.
… I'd like to light some candles for you. You've been with me in my night, and you still have your own darkness to live through. We are all in this together, for sure. Together will pull through. And in the midst of the night, the light will shine. You'll see. Let's help one another, not we really, but singing and praying the old Carol's and prayers, more earnestly and soberly than before, but in a way that is closer to reality.

But [I am] always trying to transform these whimpers into the only two realities that make this place worthwhile: adoration and love. Everything else is false. Believe me, these weeks have been a kind of bitter and unrelenting judgment on my past life. It's standing right here as a big question demanding its final answer, its seal. … during these weeks I've learned and re-learned enough for years.

Pope Benedict XVI:  On every child shines something of the splendor of that “today,” of that closeness of God which we ought to love and to which we must yield.

With eyes of wonder. The eyes of a newborn child.

Wonder and awe at this great mystery: God in the flesh.

Eternity comes into time.

It’s like a full grown man trying to wear the clothes of a kindergartner. Growing up in my house, our favorite pajamas were to simply wear my dad's T-shirts that were in his closet from 5Ks and other races that he had participated in. Everyone loved dad’s “running shirts” because we could curl our legs up into the shirt and fit our whole self inside. But not once did my dad ever wear one of my T-shirts. If he did I wouldn't have worn it ever again because it would have been destroyed.

Here’s another part of this great mystery: Omnipotence is weak. The all-powerful who created the stars with a “big bang” as easily as saying “let there be light” cannot hold up his head. The one who knit you together in your mother’s womb before you were born nine months (or so) later, He cannot move his arms in His swaddling clothes - he’s stuck, and he can get cold and hungry and sleepy. WHA?!


Pope Benedict XVI: In Jesus Christ, the son of God, God himself, God from God, became man. God's everlasting "today" has come down into the fleeting today of the world and lifted our momentary today into God's eternal today. God is so great that he can become small. God is so powerful that he can make himself vulnerable, and come to us as a defenseless child, so that we can love him. God is so good that he can give up his divine splendor and come down to a stable, so that we might find him, so that his goodness might touch us, give itself to us and continue to work through us. God has become one of us, so that we can be with him and become like him.

This is a great love story. What do lovers do? They talk, a lot. They hold hands. They spend all kinds of time together. They do all this to get close to each other, trying to share everything they can with the one they love.
That’s why God does this. We needed salvation, but God could have done it another way. He chose this way for a greater purpose.
And that is what God wants. He wants you to get close to him, to share everything you can. How can we do this? Here’s a couple ideas for this Christmas.

SING CHRISTMAS CAROLS: Make the home a place of worship. This year has especially taught us how important and how challenging that is for living and passing on the faith. I encourage you to go and sing your favorite Christmas carols at home together, since we cannot do so here. Look up lyrics online for these songs. You may also like to read from the beginning of the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Talk to Jesus about your hopes for peace, your dreams for unity, reconciliation, and forgiveness, your longings for truth and justice and holiness.

END OF MASS?? The search of the shepherds. Sometimes it is hard to find God in our lives but that doesn’t mean He isn’t there.


homily - Advent 3rd (Gaudete Sunday)

This Sunday is called Gaudete Sunday because "gaudete" (the command to "rejoice!") is the first word of this week's Mass. The entrance antiphon begins the Mass with the words "Rejoice"!

This is echoed in our first reading today from Isaiah 61 v. 10: I rejoice heartily in the Lord. The Hebrew language uses repetition for emphasis, and thus the word rejoice is used twice in a row, as it is also picked up in the Latin translation St. Jerome gave us 14 centuries ago: "I rejoice rejoicing in the Lord."

In today's 2nd reading, it becomes clear what true joy is: holiness. And St. Paul makes it clear that holiness doesn't come from us.

May the God of peace make you perfectly holy and may you entirely, spirit, soul, and body, be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will also accomplish it.

However, this does not mean we do not cooperate, as I stressed last week from the message of repentance we hear from John the Baptist. (Gregory of Nyssa) He who climbs never stops going from beginning to beginning, through beginnings that have no end. He never stops desiring what he already knows.

In fact, St. Paul also gives us a recipe for joy. We can all probably think of a type of Christmas cookie or other special food that we really cherish around this time of year, and each one of these has a special recipe. If we don't follow that recipe, we won't end up with the same cookies or whatever it is that we remember so fondly. If we try to abandon that and do it our own way, we end up missing our goal, it's not right.

If you want to be joyful at all times, simply follow the recipe of St. Paul, the advice he gives us today. Try it for the next two weeks. See if it works. If you do nothing that goes against this, you will have joy. Rejoice always, he tells us, and then gives us the program: Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise prophetic utterances. Test everything; retain what is good. Refrain from every kind of evil.

 

CCC 736 By this power of the Spirit, God's children can bear much fruit. He who has grafted us onto the true vine will make us bear "the fruit of the Spirit: . . . love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control." "We live by the Spirit"; the more we renounce ourselves, the more we "walk by the Spirit."
(Basil the Great) Through the Holy Spirit we are restored to paradise, led back to the Kingdom of heaven, and adopted as children, given confidence to call God "Father" and to share in Christ's grace, called children of light and given a share in eternal glory.

Saturday, December 5, 2020

Homily - Advent 2

 The Jordan River was the “gate” so to speak by which the people of Israel entered the promised land, as told in the book of Joshua. Just like they went through the waters of the Red Sea to be set free from slavery 40 yrs earlier, the Hebrew people go through the Jordan River. When the Messiah is finally among them, hiding and waiting, John the Baptist begins his work of preparing the way at the same Jordan River. He message is clear: he is calling us to conversion from sin through a baptism of repentance.
The Church brings us these readings today to remind us that Advent is not a time to slouch around. That petitionary prayer: “Come, Lord and save us!” is not permission for us to be lazy because God is going to fix everything.

Think of a child sitting on a couch watching television and calling to a parent to go get them some food or drink. They don’t want to get up and do the work. Just bring me this please.

That’s not Advent, friends. “Couch Christianity” is fake Christianity. We need to cooperate with God’s grace, as a bride dancing with her husband must be attentive and responsive to the movements of his lead.

For the next two and a half weeks of this season, and truly for the entire Christian life, that means always hearing again and again the call of Jesus (and first also the call of John the baptist): The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand,  repent and believe in the Gospel.

Jesus, the long awaited Messiah, came to free us and save us, but from what? From our sins and the slavery it brings us. The only way to do this is to heal our hearts so that they can actually love. Every sin destroys a bit of the love and justice that the Lord’s kingdom is meant to embody and shine forth. We sometimes confuse sin with self-disgust, a sense of not measuring up to this idea of what we want to be. Sin is not the same as our human poverty - that we are creatures who need God every moment of every day. Jesus isn’t going to take away that need for Him, He only wishes to satisfy it for those who truly open themselves to it - precisely by turning away from sin and turning towards God. That is true conversion.

with the Lord one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day… he is patient with you, not wishing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. the day of the Lord will come like a thief. This is the second week in a row the readings mention the image of a thief, last week Jesus said it in the Gospel. This is a scary image. We won’t be ready. We will be surprised terribly if we aren’t trying to pay attention now. The urgency is clear.

In order that we don't become lazy in the spiritual life, it is helpful to make a daily practice of the examination of conscience or of some other technique for reviewing our lives. A different method, called the daily examen of St. Ignatius, is particularly powerful for finding God's hand at work in your life. I highly recommend this practice for "staying awake" and not turning into a "couch christian."

1. Become aware of God’s presence.
2. Review the day with gratitude.
3. Pay attention to your emotions.
4. Choose one feature of the day and pray from it.
5. Look toward tomorrow.

links to more info on the EXAMEN PRAYER: https://www.ignatianspirituality.com/ignatian-prayer/the-examen/

A DAILY EXAMINATION based on 7 capital sins: http://www.standrewsemporia.org/uploads/1/0/9/8/10980758/selfexamination.pdf


Monday, November 30, 2020

Homily - Advent 1

 


Advent – Starts with Christ’s coming at the end of time, then transitions towards Christmas as we get closer.

Prophet Isaiah – crying out to God and to His people. Here is a prayer that can really be on all of our hearts. Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, with the mountains quaking before you, while you wrought awesome deeds we could not hope for, such as they had not heard of from of old. No ear has ever heard, no eye ever seen, any God but you doing such deeds for those who wait for him.

Isaiah would never have expected his prayer to be fulfilled in the great mystery we remember in under four weeks, that God would rend the heavens and come down in human flesh. It is certainly unheard of, and for the Jews absolutely unimagined, undreamt. But this is how much God loves His people. Love does whatever it can to unite with the beloved.

Saint Paul himself experienced this in a profound way, when Christ Jesus revealed himself specifically to “Saul” on the road to Damascus, literally tearing the heavens open and crashing into his world. He made him blind temporarily so that Saul could finally see the entire universe from the right perspective: it was all centered around the Gospel of Christ Jesus. That’s why today in the 2nd reading, Paul is repeating the name of Jesus Christ again and again. In fact ten times in the first ten verses of 1st Corinthians. He knows who we must build our lives around, and he gives his entire life and his death to this message. A good question as we begin Advent is “How centered is my life on Jesus?”

Isaiah continues: Would that you might meet us doing right, that we were mindful of you in our ways! We know in humility that we are not “ready” for God to come, either at the end of time, or to come tearing through the shell of our lives now, unless we “stay awake” like Jesus asks us in the Gospel today. We “stay awake” by practicing what is right, or as we said in the opening prayer, by “running forth to meet Christ with righteous deeds at his coming.” The righteous deeds are outlined last week, from the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. The sheep and the goats are all surprised in fact, by the king who says to them: “I was hungry, thirsty, naked, ill, a stranger, and in prison, and you treated me well or poorly.” May we not let these four weeks of Advent rush by without us truly getting ready for Christmas by deeds of righteousness and a deeper life of prayer that centers around Jesus.

Saturday, November 21, 2020

Homily - Christ the King

Audio:  https://soundcloud.com/stthereselittleflowersb/nov-22nd-solemnity-of-our-lord-christ-jesus-king-of-the-universe 

 

The full title of today's feast is Our Lord, Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. Man that's a rather powerful title. Some of us act like they are king of the world, and many of us think we are king of our own lives, at least part of the time, but Jesus is King of the Universe - of literally every created thing. He is God and man, and the Father "will place all things beneath his feet," even death. We ourselves will also be placed  beneath Jesus' feet. We have no choice. Well, we do have a choice, but it's not what we would expect, the freedom-hungry and self-directing people that we are. Our choice is this: do we receive Jesus as our King now, or is it imposed on us later.

When our lives end, they will be wrapped up with one ultimate defining line in the sand. Everything we do: every action we take, every conversation with another person, every check that we write, every opportunity we take and every one that we turn down, every step toward chasing a goal, every decision for our careers and for our families, every friend we support in good or help steer away from evil, all the most important things in our stories and all the little moments of our lives that no one in the world notices - - all of it will come down to two simple choices: God, or myself. "I will serve" or "I will not serve" are the only two things our lives can say in the end.

St. Augustine outlines this in his masterpiece, the City of God: Accordingly, two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly [city] by the love of self, even to the contempt of God; the heavenly [city] by the love of God, even to the contempt of self. The former, in a word, glories in itself, the latter in the Lord. For the one seeks glory from men; but the greatest glory of the other is God, the witness of conscience. The one lifts up its own head in its own glory; the other says to its God, "Thou art my glory, and the lifter up of mine head." In the one, the princes and the nations it subdues are ruled by the love of ruling; in the other, the princes and the subjects serve one another in love, the latter obeying, while the former take thought for all. The one delights in its own strength, represented in the persons of its rulers; the other says to its God, "I will love Thee, O Lord, my strength." 

So which one do we want to be part of?

Although our lips and voices are important, our lives are the real answer we give to to this question. "I will serve the Lord, Jesus Christ, King of the Universe" or "I will not serve this king" is seen in how we follow Jesus' commands. As St. Augustine describes it, do we love God so much that we even despise our own selves (that is, forget ourselves entirely) when He demands it? (This is what Jesus means when He tells us to "deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow after Him") Or do we cling to ourselves so much that we end up despising God for "attacking" us.

Our lives show the answer to this question in a million different ways. But I want you to think about two this week: time, and service.

1. Time: How do I spend my time? Do I ever "waste" time for God? (It's never waste, but the worldly view sees it as useless, so we can say this not to agree, but to remind ourselves of the lie we need to reject). How much time to I "waste" for God? When looking at life from the perspective of our death, we may look back and say we "wasted" a whole lot of time on things that seemed important to us.

2. Service: Is my life mostly about building up "my life" in some way? (career, legacy, family, hobbies). When I say, "that was a good day / great day today," was it great because I spent it on others? because my life was saying "I will serve the Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe"? or for some other reason?

This is hard for me too. I just spend five days on retreat and I feel more than ever that I have a lot of room to grow in this. I have a lot more to give to Jesus. More of my heart, more of my time, more of my life.

As we face this task, Psalm 23 should strengthen us. The Good Shepherd will not abandon us. God will do everything He can to help us if we only ask Him, day after day, to do so. We cannot fail unless we rely on ourselves to do this. Ask Jesus for His help. He wants to hear your voice crying out to him. He loves you so much. He is only waiting for you to turn toward His face so that you can feel the warmth of His love.

Saturday, October 17, 2020

Last Sunday (Oct. 11) homily

 audio - click here

You may remember I talked about parables giving us glimpses of heaven, because Jesus wants to transform our minds to see life from the true perspective, and not from the lies that the enemy sows down here in the darkness. Today’s parable speaks to us about heaven, but it also works on another level, giving a sort of outline for how Christianity will spread throughout the world. You may recall Jesus telling his disciples to “shake the dust” off their feet and take the Good News to other towns whenever they are rejected – this is exactly what happens in the life of the early church, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles and beyond, where after proclaiming in the synagogues, Paul and others eventually bring the Gospel to the Gentiles.

This works also for us too: God is constantly inviting us to something great. But like the invited guests, we often do not listen to the invitation. Sometimes this is really our fault. Other times, it is because the enemy has flown in like a bird to snatch the seed away from us, having made our ears deaf to the word of proclamation.

Our society constantly, and often implicitly, promotes values that make us spiritual zombies, numb to the things that matter. In order to hear God’s invitation, what we need is a transformed vision of our world.

When someone asks you “How’s life?” “How are you doing?” “Are you happy with the way things are going?” what do you use to measure that? Surely such a complicated question has many ways to look at it. 1. Career. 2. Health. 3. Family. 4. Friendships. 5. Faith. 6. Legacy. 7. Fame/popularity/honor. 8. Wealth. 9. Pleasure (do what I want to do).

The way you measure it tells you what you value, and helps you to understand the story you are a part of.

Our vision needs to be transformed. We live in a society that makes us numb to the invisible by constantly throwing our face into the visible.

 

CS LEWIS’ Weight of Glory is like reading two or three chapters of the the Gospels. It is not long. But it is worth it. (Just like the Gospels are totally worth it!) And like the Gospels, this will help to change your vision of the world. Here are some highlights:

If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly to hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

---------------------

We have within us a desire for our own faroff country. I feel a certain shyness speaking about it. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both. We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience. We cannot hide it because our experience is constantly suggesting it, and we betray ourselves like lovers at the mention of a name. Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Another solution is to try to identify it with certain moments in one’s own past. But all this is a cheat. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but are ultimately dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited. Do you think I am trying to weave a spell? Perhaps I am; but remember your fairy tales. Spells are used for breaking enchantments as well as for inducing them. And you and I have need of the strongest spell that can be found to wake us from the evil enchantment of worldliness which has been laid upon us for nearly a hundred years. Almost our whole education has been directed to silencing this shy, persistent, inner voice; almost all our modern philosophies have been devised to convince us that the good of man is to be found on this earth. And yet it is a remarkable thing that such philosophies of Progress or Creative Evolution themselves bear reluctant witness to the truth that our real goal is elsewhere. When they want to convince you that earth is your home, notice how they set about it. They begin by trying to persuade you that earth can be made into heaven, thus giving a sop to your sense of exile in earth as it is. Next, they tell you that this fortunate event is still a good way off in the future, thus giving a sop to your knowledge that the fatherland is not here and now. Finally, lest your longing for the transtemporal should awake and spoil the whole affair, they use any rhetoric that comes to hand to keep out of your mind the recollection that even if all the happiness they promised could come to man on earth, yet still each generation would lose it by death, including the last generation of all, and the whole story would be nothing, not even a story, for ever and ever.

... A man’s physical hunger does not prove that that man will get any bread; he may die of starvation on a raft in the Atlantic. But surely a man’s hunger does prove that he comes of a race which repairs its body by eating and inhabits a world where eatable substances exist. In the same way, though I do not believe (I wish I did) that my desire for Paradise proves that I shall enjoy it, I think it a pretty good indication that such a thing exists and that some men will. A man may love a woman and not win her; but it would be very odd if the phenomenon called “falling in love” occurred in a [world without romance].

 

Paradise exists, and in the Gospel today it is described as a great wedding feast (imagine an endless Thanksgiving that is all joy and no awkward!) That feast is available to us in a foretaste on this earth. It reaches out and gently touches us in prayer. We catch a glimpse of it in the sacraments. We hear it whispering in the Mass.

Listen to the ache within you, the hunger, the desire for heaven. It is God’s invitation to the wedding feast.

Monday, September 14, 2020

Forgiveness in a "cancel culture"

 

Audio: click here


A not-so-new element in popular society has a newly minted phrase: “cancel culture.” 

 

EVERY WEEK at Mass, with the Lord Jesus truly present among us in the Eucharist, we say His prayer, which includes the words “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

 

Anger/unforgiveness is drinking poison and hoping the other will die.

 

Resentment: In choosing to chain the other, we are always and every time chaining ourselves.

Even worse, we only chain a false other.

 

CS Lewis - Great Divorce, which is set in the afterlife. One character meets an old friend who has repented of a murder, but the man cannot forgive the murderer.

This unforgiving spirit repeats again and again: “I just want my rights.”

(It’s a good thing we don’t get our rights. Otherwise we’d all be way worse off than we are in God’s providential design.)

 

Whoever was more righteously angry than Jesus on the Cross? And yet what did He do? We can’t match that.

 

FORGIVENESS turns pain into compassion.

 

It takes courage and faith in the cross of Jesus to forgive. He never said it is easy. He just said do it.

 

2843 Thus the Lord's words on forgiveness, the love that loves to the end, become a living reality. the parable of the merciless servant, which crowns the Lord's teaching on ecclesial communion, ends with these words: "So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart." It is there, in fact, "in the depths of the heart," that everything is bound and loosed. It is not in our power not to feel or to forget an offense; but the heart that offers itself to the Holy Spirit turns injury into compassion and purifies the memory in transforming the hurt into intercession.

 

Everybody needs to forgive somebody. Who is it for you? Who do you need to free? What are you chaining yourself to?

 

Saturday, August 22, 2020

Who is Jesus to you?

Last week we asked the question what does God think of us. But today, based on the Gospel story, we flip it and think about what we think of God.

Although this Gospel gives a great account of the authority Christ gave to Peter and the twelve apostles as the foundation of the Church, I want to focus on that question: Who do you say the Son of Man is?

The amazing thing is that God wants you to love Him, so he gives us absolute freedom, and here's the crazy part: Jesus will be as much or as little as you think He is.

So many people have different ideas of who Jesus is. The Gospel today shares just a few. I came up with some more.

To Pontius Pilate, He was an innocent victim sacrificed to the mob for starting such great unrest. To Caiaphas the high priest, He was blasphemer who made himself equal to God, the worst possible false Messiah who was leading the people astray. It was necessary that one should die instead of the whole people.

But to the woman at the well and to Nicodemus, He slowly became something more and more. And to John the Baptist, He was the lamb of God.

But to Herod Antipas, He was a crazy man, or John the Baptist come back from the dead to haunt him. To many in the crowds, He was a great miracle man, and probably nothing more.

But to those who listened well, He was a great teacher, one who spoke with a substantial authority different from the scribes. To Mary and Joseph, He was the one promised Messiah who would save the Lord's people from their sins.

But to Barabbas, he was a free ticket out of prison. And to the soldiers who scourged Him, He was just another pathetic Jew.

But to the centurion who oversaw the crucifixion, this man was truly a son of God. To even the demons who recognized Him, He was the Son of God. To the disciples, for whom Simon Peter speaks today, Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.

Many different opinions. Some very contradictory. So many of them want to put Him into a box so that He can be easily controlled, dealt with, and mostly just moved aside. This is no different from what people think of Jesus today. There are so many opposing answers to that question: "Who do you say the Son of Man is?"

The amazing thing is that until our end arrives, Jesus will be as much or as little as you think He is. After we die or He comes back as universal king, the Lord will not hide the truth, for He cannot deny Himself. He cannot lie about anything, especially his own identity. But until then, God gives us a dangerous freedom, just as Jesus gave to Pontius Pilate and Caiaphas and the soldiers and the crowds and the disciples: He lets us decide how we picture Him. And because He respects our freedom, often that means He does not show His power in our lives. If we push God out, He lets us. If we say, "okay God only this far," then He doesn't cross that line.

We show who God is to us by how we treat Him. If we treat our family like they aren't important to us except around holidays, or like someone we want to keep at arm's length (metaphorically - not a COVID reference!), or like intimate friends, then that is who they become to us. This goes for our friends and for all relationships, including Jesus.

What does my prayer life say about who God is to me?

What does my calendar say about who God is to me?

What do my bank statements and my bills say about who God is to me?

What do my hobbies say about who God is to me?

"What does God think when He looks at you?" (Aug 16th)

One of the things that ends up affecting us Christians more than anything else is how we would answer this simple question: “What does God think when He looks at you?” This really ends up being a strong driving force in our life.

Should be how God thinks of us.

How we think God thinks of us.

That can often end up being very different.  Like the father of the prodigal son, what we think God is thinking about us of often so much less than what is actually in His heart. A child may be ashamed of their mistakes when their parents punish them, but the parents still gaze upon them with a deep love.

If I imagine God like a harsh sports coach or a mean teacher or a demanding parent… I’m gonna live in fear of failing Him, of upsetting him, etc.

But as we saw in today’s Gospel, God doesn’t treat us that way. Jesus, in testing this woman’s faith, also gives his disciples a chance to see things from God’s perspective instead of their own fallen one. He helps us all to see, in the example of this woman, that no one is unimportant to God. All are his children.

God doesn’t think we are bad or evil; He doesn’t think we are damaged goods; He doesn’t define us by our mistakes, our failures, or our sins.

HOW DO YOU THINK OF GOD? WHAT BAD IMAGES OF AUTHORITY HAVE CORRUPTED YOUR IDEA OF GOD’S LOVE FOR YOU?

“What does God think when He looks at you?” If you don’t see Him gazing upon you with love, you have the wrong image. Ask the Lord to help heal that and transform it.


Saturday, August 1, 2020

Come and Drink!


2 quotes every Catholic should know and live by:

Augustine: You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.
Irenaeus: The glory of God is man fully alive, and the life of man is to see the face of God.
          Union with God is our true spiritual food. And with good habits, we grow to want this true and lasting food that actually satisfies.
          My sister Katie has three kids, two of them are at the toddler age. She probably wishes that they could just simply eat three times a day along with her and not need anything else, but the truth is they want more than just that. So she has to have them nibble on other things. This doesn’t replace the main meal but it is also important, and it also prepares them for the meal if done well. 
          God wishes to transform our minds with spiritual food. This food is above all found in the 
Eucharist, but God gives it to us in so many ways, and our daily prayer lives is an important one, no matter what form that takes.
(AQUINAS) Note on the words, all you that thirst, come to the waters (55:1), that divine doctrine is first called water: and this is first because it heals the sick: she shall give him the water of wisdom to drink (Sir 15:3) second, because it cleanses the filthy: I will pour upon you clean water, and you shall be cleansed from all your filthiness (Ezek 36:25) third, because it satisfies the thirsty: if anyone shall drink of the water that I will give, he shall not thirst for ever (John 4:13).994. Second, it is called wine: and this is first because it stings in argument, above: thy wine is mingled with water (1:22); second, because it inflames in exhortation: the word of the Lord inflamed him (Ps 104[105]:19); third, because it inebriates in consolation, below: that you may be inebriated with the breasts of her consolations (66:11).995. Third, it is called milk: and this is first because of its beauty: Nephthali, a hart let loose, and giving words of beauty (Gen 49:21); second, because of its sweetness: let thy voice sound in my ears: for thy voice is sweet (Song 2:14); third, because of the ease with which it is taken: as newborn babes, desire milk (1 Pet 2:2).

READ ALL OF ISAIAH 55! We heard half of it in two weekends this past month. You will love it.
Isaiah 55:1 All you that thirst, come to the waters: and you that have no money make haste, buy, and eat: come ye, buy wine and milk without money, and without any price. 55:2 Why do you spend money for that which is not bread, and your labour for that which doth not satisfy you? Hearken diligently to me, and eat that which is good, and your soul shall be delighted in fatness.
55:3 Incline your ear and come to me: hear and your soul shall live, and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, the faithful mercies of David. 55:4 Behold I have given him for a witness to the people, for a leader and a master to the Gentiles. 55:5 Behold thou shalt call a nation, which thou knewest not: and the nations that knew not thee shall run to thee, because of the Lord thy God, and for the Holy One of Israel, for he hath glorified thee. 55:6 Seek ye the Lord, while he may be found: call upon him, while he is near. 55:7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unjust man his thoughts, and let him return to the Lord, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God: for he is bountiful to forgive. 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts: nor your ways my ways, saith the Lord. 55:9 For as the heavens are exalted above the earth, so are my ways exalted above your ways, and my thoughts above your thoughts. 55:10 And as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and return no more thither, but soak the earth, and water it, and make it to spring, and give  seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: 55:11 So shall my word be, which shall go forth from my mouth: it shall not return to me void, but it shall do whatsoever I please, and shall prosper in the things for which I sent it. 55:12 For you shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall sing praise before you, and all the trees of the country shall clap their hands. 55:13 Instead of the shrub, shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the nettle, shall come up the myrtle tree: and the Lord shall be named for an everlasting sign, that shall not be taken away.
          First profession of the SSFPA. Three sisters made three-year promises to live fully the community life of the Congregation.  They have chosen Christ to be the center of their lives and have founded their sense of identity firmly in Him. They look at themselves through the reflection found in His eyes, and thus they are satisfied. They are not feeling, as the lies of this world tell us, that they are “repressed,” “stifled,” or “naive.” They have a joy and a peace that the world does not ever give, even for those with all the money and fame and health that they could ever want. They are fully alive because they behold the face of God in prayer. They are at rest because their hearts rest in God.
          This is what Jesus offers us. We don’t need to be nuns to have this, which is good news for me! God doesn’t rule out anyone. All who are thirsty are invited to come to the waters of baptism, that first water that begins the life that fills us. Through baptism, all of us have the voice of the Father spoken over us can now dare to say, “our Father,” at the savior’s command and formed by divine teaching. Through baptism, all of us have heaven open to us as it was to Jesus, who draws us into Himself. Through baptism all of us are forever carried in the Father’s heart.
          And the deeper you go into this reality, the more you see how the rest of the “food” the world is offering us is just rice cakes and cotton candy: flashy, zingy, sweet, but pretty empty. We end up not-so-fully alive, more just getting by or holding on or treading water.
          So what is that next step for you? How is Jesus calling you to come to the water more fully? What false satisfaction do you need to let go of as you replace it with more time beholding His face and resting in Him? Ask St. Therese to help you. Ask her to show you how to endure the gaze of love that God is showering upon you.


Sunday, July 19, 2020

Renewal (transformation) of the mind


Why does Jesus use parables? This is an important question, and in scripture Jesus gives us an answer Himself in scripture. But before looking there, it is good to look at the explanation on parables given by Pope Benedict XVI in his 1st volume on Christ titled "Jesus of Nazareth" - this is an absolute masterpiece that I highly recommend everyone read - where for ten or so pages he explains why the Lord uses parables. He says at all times, Jesus ultimately preaches to reveal Himself: the Son of God come in human flesh who also thus brings in his own person the Kingdom of God (heaven) down to earth. Thus the parables are "hidden and multilayered invitations to faith in Jesus as the "Kingdom of God in person'."
But another good and shorter answer is this: PARABLES are TO CHANGE THE WAY YOU SEE. He wants to shift how we look at the world, at our own lives, at the direction of where our lives are headed, etc. So that we aren't hyper-focused in our own perspective, but are conformed to God's perspective.
This change of how we see is also found in Jesus’ own words from last week’s Gospel, when He said: "Because knowledge of the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven has been granted to you, but to them it has not been granted. To anyone who has, more will be given and he will grow rich; from anyone who has not, even what he has will be taken away. ...they look but do not see and hear but do not listen or understand."
A sort of revealing and not-revealing way at the same time.
          Do you want more from God? Then be like the good soil from last week's parable, take in a receive whatever He gives you. We need to be humble, like that rich fertile soil, and let yourself be changed. Give God's word lots of room in your heart, in your life, and shape your life around it, and not it around your life. If we are doing these things more and more, then the parables will open themselves up to us.
Jesus says it is to the child-like that His Father has revealed the mysteries of the kingdom, not the wise and the learned. You must live from your identity as a child of God to receive the mysteries of these parables. If we presume that we have outgrown them, "even what we have will be taken away" from us.
          While with my family last week, I continued reading a book of conversion stories, one person quotes the late Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia "When you're reading Shakespeare, Shakespeare's not on trial -- you are." It is of course always the same with all of scripture, including even the simplest parable of Christ like the mustard seed and the yeast.
The parables are powerful because they simply test us. They put ourselves and our perspectives on trial and force us to see the world the way the parable sees the world, the way that God wants to see the world. Because these simple stories are given to us by the Word of God in the flesh, we do not get to say: "oh there is a mistake here. I see where it is wrong." No, when you gaze into the mirror of the parables of Jesus, if there is something wrong, the error we see is in ourselves reflected in that mirror. We need to make the necessary adjustments to conform to what these parables are saying. It may be a rude awakening, but it is a freedom. We may feel unsure and unsteady, but we are beginning to learn to walk instead of just crawl. So it's worth it.
St. Paul in Romans 12:2 (we will read it on Aug. 30th this year as we progress through the highlights of this letter) has a beautiful passage about changing the way we see, the way we think about thinks.  - "Do not be conformed to the wisdom of this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may know what is the will if God, what is good, and pleasing, and perfect."
This is the work of the parables: to transform and renew our minds. All parables force us to look through the lends of physical realities, so that we may see beyond them to the invisible realities that are more real, more true, than what is so constantly in front of us.
          The parables are glimpses of heaven. They are small visions of God's heart, God's mind, and God's plans for our lives and our futures. Jesus himself says, "With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it?" (Mk. 4) "The Kingdom of heaven is like..." (a man who sows good seed in a field... a mustard seed that is sowed in the ground
          He is trying to show us heaven. With the business of our lives, with the noise
It is forcing us to think about only what our eyes can see, to drag our attention only to the visible reality that is part of our lives and at the same time to ignore (and ultimately forget) the invisible realities that are also part of our lives, and realities that will actually endure - things that are really more important. So we end up getting sucked into the wrong story. We end up interpreting the world and every single part of our own lives and everything else, every way that we judge our lives and other people's lives, - all of that gets forced into this wrong perspective.
Jesus wants these parables help us to change our vision to focus on heaven, but it is too much for us to take in at once, and that is why we get parables. Heaven to the fallen human mind is like the sun to the eyes - or even just the full light of day when we walk out of a dark place -  our minds are simply overwhelmed and conquered by it.
          So let us allow these parables to work on our hearts.
weeds and wheat: (revealed in private because these disciples already live from their identity as children of God) Jesus explains that this is all about heaven. All of our lives need to be put in perspective of the end of things when we will be separated and those who are bearing good fruit will be taken into his barn. Everything in our lives - how much money am I making? Am I successful? how many friends do I have? have I been a good son or daughter? brother or sister? - all of this must be considered from the final perspective of where our life is headed, and thus we can live our lives every day more in accord with what we were truly made for. The message is: remember where we are headed.
mustard seed: He wants us to see the invisible power of his grace to work in our lives and transform it, and thus transform the world. Think of Therese - that "little flower" like the smallest of seeds, whose hidden life of 24 years (8 in a convent) simply has transformed the world more than Caesar Augustus or George Washington. So many have "nested" in this life and have found.
yeast: God's grace, and the Christian life itself, does not destroy the good of this world and our lives, but rather lifts them up to be more full.
Let us allow the Lord to continue to work on our hearts through these parables. We need to be transformed in our mind - and one way to do that is to pray through these parables of Jesus - here and many others.
This is how we may be renewed and healed from the false perspective of this world, from all of the lies that have been pushed on us. All those weeds that the devil has sown in our minds in our hearts - the Lord wants to purify us of that. We need to let Him work on us through praying with these parables, we need to spend time looking at heaven, and see the true reality that God wants us to live within every single day, the true story that He wants us to be part of.

Saturday, July 4, 2020

humility

The memorable prophecy that Jesus fulfilled in his entry to Jerusalem - “Riding on a baby donkey” – was first and foremost a testament to the truth that the Messiah comes in peace, not in war. If he was riding in conquest, he would enter the city on a horse. Jesus is indeed the prince of Peace. However, it also attests to his humility, his lowliness. The Messiah didn’t need any extra praise from others. He “humbled himself even to the point of death on a cross,” Paul tells us in Philippians 2. And thus he gives us all an example to follow.

The donkey is also a good image of the ministerial priesthood and indeed of all Christians, for “we hold this treasure in earthen vessels” and the Lord wishes to use us humble beasts to do something quite extraordinary: to bear His glorious presence within us and to bring him into other people’s lives.

“We are not debtors to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”

“Deeds of the flesh” = sloth, gluttony, lust, hedonism (maximizing pleasure, avoiding pain) self-preservation. Also, though less obvious are the other “deadly vices” or “capital sins” of vanity, envy, pride, and wrath. All of them look at life from a perspective of the flesh: whether to please the flesh or whether to simply forget that we have a life beyond the flesh, a destiny that is eternal, for good or for ill.

And in fact, if we look at all sins, we can see that pride is center of all sin. “my will be done.”

We must love what Jesus loved from the cross, and despise whatever he despised on the cross.

Fasting and other penance. It’s a training ground for saying “no, I’m in charge and I’m going to glorify God in my body.” It prepares us for when love demands something of us.

Litany of Humilty:  

O Jesus, meek and humble of heart, Hear me.

From the desire of being esteemed, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being loved, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being extolled, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being honored, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being praised, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being preferred to others, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being consulted, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the desire of being approved, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being humiliated, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being despised, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of suffering rebukes, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being calumniated, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being forgotten, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being ridiculed, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being wronged, Deliver me, O Jesus.

From the fear of being suspected, Deliver me, O Jesus.

That others may be loved more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be esteemed more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That, in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I may decrease, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be chosen and I set aside, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be praised and I go unnoticed, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be preferred to me in everything, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may become holier than I, provided that I may become as holy as I should, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.


Monday, May 4, 2020

4th Sunday of Easter - Repent and be Baptized, COVID edition


“Repent and be baptized”
Every single thing in our life, all the things that we used to do, and all the things we may soon be doing again - all of them need one of these two actions done to them.
Repent - turn your back on them. Do a 180, to face the right thing. Leave it in the dust. Scrap it. It is not of God or not what God asks of me specifically.
Be baptized - It needs to be consecrated to God. It is good in itself and is what God wants me to be spending myself on for one reason or another. Therefore I must do it. But I must do it for God. Given to God. Covered in prayer and discernment and guided by the wisdom of the Church.
Repent and be baptized. That is our whole life, before and after baptism.

We are called to make sacrifices for our faith, for this relationship.
But God did it first. This is one of the things Jesus is speaking of when He calls Himself the Good Shepherd. Every Good Shepherd is the first one out and the last one in. He led the way as a Good Shepherd. Jesus went through the gate of the cross. We must follow.
Sheep were kept overnight in caves. The shepherd would protect the sheep with his own life by laying down across the mouth of the cave. No wolves could come in without getting through him first. A good shepherd “lays down his life” for his sheep.
God did it first.
Now what are we going to do? Will we follow the voice of this good shepherd? Will we “repent” and “be baptized” in every single aspect of our life?
Will our new life on the other side of quarantine look identical to before? If so, we were either perfect before, or we didn’t grow. Clearly, things should be different for us.

Sunday, April 26, 2020

3rd Sunday of Easter - Witness is simple


Peter proclaims the Gospel. No special words. Just the basic message. He also shows how Old Testament is fulfilled in Jesus quoting Psalm 16. That’s the fruit of reflection on facts.
Learn for yourself the basics of the Good News. I’d recommend the book: Case for Jesus - Brant Pitre. Or listen to the 1hr lecture that is in Formed.org http://watch.formed.org/the-case-for-jesus
This spiritual reading would be a great use of your free time, or even as part of your prayer and meditation time, but not replacing it. Remember, God wants not just your mind, but your heart and soul as well. Getting excited and inspired by some part of the Good News, which this book or lecture could do, is an important part of being a strong witness to Jesus.
Slowly Peter’s understanding deepens through more praying and reflecting on Scripture and sharing with the other Apostles and other followers of Jesus. Our faith is deepened only when we use it. We can’t expect it to grow on its own.
This is what happens to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. Their faith is only deepened by encountering Jesus. They were open to letting God speak to them as indeed Jesus generously does even in disguise along the way. Their understanding grows through this sharing. Then when they finally realize the Lord is with them and not just a random traveler, they must run back and return to Jerusalem to bring the Good News to their brothers. They become evangelists these two disciples, Cleopas and the unnamed one. They simply tell their story. This is what God has done in my life.
All of us are called to do the same. Perhaps an easy thing is sharing how our prayer life helps us grow in love and peace each day. Or How God answers our prayers sometimes in big obvious ways. Or just sharing something that built up our faith.
It also means deepening our faith by being with each other as Christians or by sharing virtually with each other as these times require.
Finally, about this deep truth that Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of the bread. It is not a coincidence that Jesus disappeared from Cleopas and the other disciple when their “eyes were opened.” This isn’t a sign that Jesus abandoned them but rather a fulfillment of the word at the end of Matthew’s Gospel: “Behold I am with you until the end of the ages.” His presence was still there, but it is transferred into the Eucharist. nowadays when we are stripped from gathering for Mass and receiving the Eucharist, We are called to realize the same truth but in some ways in reverse: instead of realizing Jesus is among us and then having his presence vanish, we must see our hunger and longing for the Eucharist as a testament to the truth that Jesus is really here.
It was not until they recognized Jesus in the Eucharist did they realize that He had been present in all of their lives. I believe that deepening our faith and understanding of the Eucharist would be a profoundly fruitful use of our time away from the Mass. But above all, to know Jesus, alive and present in your lives, in your mess, redeeming it, restoring it. This is the primary role of the witness. And the world today needs witnesses. Let us learn from Peter and from Cleopas and the other disciple how to witness to Jesus present among us.

Monday, April 20, 2020

Divine Mercy Sunday - Tunnel Vision


See a video of the podcast on our YouTube page, click here!

Take a paper towel tube or a toilet paper one (if you can find it) and place it over your eye like a telescope. This simple toy really changes your perspective. In some ways it’s the definition of tunnel vision.
The apostles had Tunnel-vision. They were staring at one thing way too long, and that’s what got them locked up in the upper room as they were locked in their own minds. Just like the conclave that elected Pope Francis and every pope before him, the key was safely kept in the room that was locked to keep everything else (and everyone else) on the outside.
Their tunnel-vision was very understandable in many ways. They were following a rabbi who was publicly executed. And if it’s true today, it was true even more back then: who you hang out with can do a lot of good or can do a lot of harm. Thus, they saw themselves as next on the list for the cross, or perhaps some other minor punishments. Fear of public shame is a powerful thing. Fear of death even more powerful. Hence the tunnel vision.
Perhaps we could also say they had stone-vision or tomb-vision. All they could think of was that Jesus was dead. It was over. Like all of us today, any of their plans for the future were thrown out. They had to re –evaluate everything and say goodbye to so many things they enjoyed either for a month or two, or perhaps for the rest of their lives. Their vision was focused on the finality of death, on the immovability of that stone over the tomb, on the coldness and darkness of the tomb.
That’s the problem with a problem as big as a crisis. The shock gives you tunnel-vision, gives you stone-vision, tomb-vision. That new and debilitating thing becomes the only part of reality that you can see. Your mind gets locked-up on it. You get stuck inside your head as much as the Apostles were stuck inside that upper room.
But the truth is that life is bigger than the apparent finality of death. The truth is that reality is much broader than a stone or a tomb or a locked door. Tunnel-vision is a sort of lie. It looks at something as if its everything. The stone and the tomb were important parts of reality, but not the most important parts. When faced with a crisis, we end up narrowing our vision to the point that we forget the most important things.
The Apostles had forgotten that God was God. They had forgotten that Jesus had said this was going to happen. They had stopped thinking about the miracles. Their minds were blocked from considering that Jesus said “this is my body given up for you” just the past week in the same upper room. They forgot how God turned tragedy into glory for their ancestors at the Red Sea or with Abraham or with Joshua or Isaiah and Jeremiah.
If they could only take off their blinders and see the whole of reality, especially the reality of God’s providential care and his irrevocable claim on His chosen people, then perhaps they wouldn’t have been so locked-up in their own heads, their own fears, their stone-and-tomb-vision.
Thankfully, Jesus doesn’t wait for them, or for any of us, to get it all straightened out first. He breaks into the room. He reveals Himself, alive. He rips the paper towel tube right away from their faces so their vision is immediately broadened. As much as His death blinded them from so much of reality, so now His risen body, His presence re-open their minds and unlock the doors.  The stone is now rolled away from their hearts. They are coming out of their own self-made tombs. They have once again found hope, hope that God can bring good even out of the horrible tragedy that is their lives, or that their tunnel-vision said was their lives.
In our current crisis, we need the same transformation. If our eyes are too focused on the problem, then we forget that reality is much broader than just the problem. We don’t see the importance of human freedom, and the fact that if we use our freedom to love, to choose the good again and again (which is to choose God again and again) then we are changing so much around the problem, this crisis, that we may in fact even end up changing the crisis from the “disaster” that it can at times seem to be, downgrading it perhaps to what we might call a “hot mess” or even down to just a “situation.” Love can do such things, because God is love. And He is real. And He is here.
And that, my friends, is the most important truth we need to learn from the Apostles and from Thomas today. When He sees that Jesus is real, that He is here, he’s done. He’s not afraid. He’s at peace. All he has to do is worship, say “My Lord and my God,” and place Himself in the Lord’s hands. When the most important part of reality is that God is still God and still involved in all of my life, then why am I afraid? When Jesus’ wounds show the merciful love of God that is greater than my sin, that is greater than death itself, why would I be afraid? I may die, but I’ve already died in baptism. I already have one foot in heaven and one foot in this world. Now I can really live because I am not afraid. Now I can really love. Now God can change the world through me, and save others from their own tunnel-vision.