God as Protector and Guide of our Families

In today's  Gospel, Matthew 2: 13-15, 19-23, we are told that the magi completed their visit to Mary and Joseph and the infant Jesus.  The holy family was, at that point, in danger, as Herod was seeking a way to kill Jesus. Why? Because he perceived Jesus, the Messiah King and Savior of the world, as a threat to his power and kingship. Watching over the holy family,  God sends an angel to direct Joseph: "'Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you'....Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night, and departed for Egypt....When Herod had died, behold, the angel of the Lord [again] appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, 'Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the the land of Israel, for those who sought the child's life are dead.'"

Just as God protected the holy family, so, too, does God protect our families!  God is as solicitous for us made holy by Jesus' death and resurrection as He was for the biological holy family of Jesus, Mary, His mother, and Joseph, his foster father! God elicits the help of each parent, grandparent, and other relatives to secure the protection of His children. How sad when we let Him down. God, I believe, weeps when we abandon our responsibility to secure the well-being  of a child, including a child in its mother's womb.  God, I believe, weeps over immigrant children in cages, separated from their parents or when families are turned away from countries in which they are seeking asylum so as to raise their children in  in what they believed would be safe places. He weeps over children who are trafficked and/or sold to slave labor camps and abused in so many other ways. 

God, help us, as you helped Mary and Joseph protect Jesus. May we, like Joseph, be listening to Your instructions. May we let You be our Guide and Protector and use us as your reliable and responsible partners. I ask this in Jesus' name.

Our Guardian Angels

Today we celebrate the feast of our Guardian angels. God has given every human person a guardian angel, a messenger from heaven.  As a child, I was taught the following prayer:  Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom God's love commits me here. Ever this day be at my side to light, to guard, to rule and guide. Amen.

When I think of my guardian angel, I think of the many times I hear the words: "Watch out." "Do this!" Don't do that." "Good job!" "Try harder." "You can do it!"  I also think of the times that I was saved from death, as happened one night out on a dessert road with no lights anywhere around.  I car was following me (I had two other passengers in my car).  Frustrated that the car being me left its brights on, I let it pass me. A short ways up the road, coming over a small hill, was a car in our lane. We were traveling about 60 miles an hour. There was no way for the driver in front of me to get out of the way. They hit head-on and two women in the car were killed outright.  My guardian angel and those of my passengers, I believed, were at work that night!

Other people have told me similar stories of "miracles" that occurred as the result, they believed, of their Guardian Angel protecting them.

Lord, thank you for giving each of us a Guardian Angel.  May we be more aware of your generosity and that of our Guardian angels, who are at our sides "to light, to guard, to rule and guide.

Oneness with God

In today's Gospel, John 17: 11b-19, Jesus, shortly before giving up His life to evil persons who killed Him, prayed for you and me.  His prayer, in part, was: "Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me."  You and I are included in the ones the Father gave to Jesus.  Jesus asked the Father to keep us in His name "so that [we] may be one just as [God the Father and Jesus] are one." Jesus reminded the Father that we "do not belong to the world any more that [He] belong[s] to the world. I do not," He said to His Father, "ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the Evil One....Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth....I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth."

There is no way that the Father said "no" to His Son, Jesus. Jesus' prayer, definitely, is being answered day by day as we journey through this "vale of tears," where Satan prowls seeking souls to   devour.  "[K]eep them from the Evil One," Jesus prayed. And God does just that in and for those who seek God, a seeking obvious in those who practice their faith and live by truth. As we look around we see men and women becoming one in love, a possibility made real because Jesus prayed: "May they be one just as we are one."   The ability to give of ourselves in self-sacrificing love each day and the courage to rise when we fall and ask forgiveness of each other is the effect of Jesus' prayer!

May you and I rejoice in the abundant love and mercy that is poured into our lives each day by a gracious God working through our family and friends, fellow religious and creation itself.

The Angels' Assignments

Today we celebrate the feasts of Sts. Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael.   St. Michael, we know took on Lucifer and his followers who rebelled when it was revealed in heaven that the Son of God would become man. In a war in heaven St. Michael fought Lucifer and his followers and  cast them out of God's presence forever.  St. Gabriel was the messenger God sent to Mary to announce the incarnation of the Son of God. He was also the angel who counseled Joseph in a dream to take Mary home as his wife, as she had become pregnant by the power of the Holy Spirit. Gabriel also warned Joseph in a dream to escape to Egypt to protect Jesus from Herod's murderous rage and counseled him when it was safe to return to Nazareth.  Rachel was the angel who healed Tobias blindness.

In today's Gospel Acclamation, we pray: "Bless the Lord, all you angels, you ministers who do his will" (Psalm 13:21).   In today's Gospel, John: 47-51, Jesus tells Nathaniel that he will see greater things than what he saw the day Jesus called him to follow him.  "Amen, Amen, I say to you you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of man."

The angels continue to do God's bidding protecting us, counseling us, healing us, directing us in what God is asking of us.  They also stand in God's presence praising God and can to whatever God wills here on earth or in heaven, having the ability to be in several places at one time.

Lord, may I listen to your angels as did Mary and Joseph. May I accept healing as did Tobias. May I call upon my Guardian Angel every day, knowing that you send  angels to be at my side day and night, watching over me, counseling me, directing me to make right decisions, correcting my mistaken conclusions, as you did for St. Joseph, revealing God's will to be as you did for Mary, healing me as you did Tobias.  Thank you Jesus for the angels ministering to us here on earth as in heaven!

Independence Day: Its Spiritual Dimension

INDEPENDENCE DAY

IN You, O Lord, is our independence from the evils of the world in which we live, where Satan prowls seeking the ruin of souls.

No other way are we safe from Satan’s deceitfulness but in the Lord Jesus.

Deliver us, O Lord Jesus, from compulsively pursuing ideologies that replace our freedom and the freedom of all peoples.

Examine our minds and our hearts, Lord, and cleanse them of that which enslaves us to non-loving, non-caring, non-compassionate thoughts and behaviors.

Please, Lord, show us the way that leads to true freedom.

Expurgate/cleanse our hearts of hatred and prejudices; give us clean hearts, O Lord.

Never let us depart from You, O God, in pursuit of worldly pleasures as a God-substitute.

Deliver the world, Lord, from the evils of human trafficking, slave labor, drug trafficking, abortion and all kinds of criminal behaviors.

Enlighten our minds, O Lord, to know Your ways of love and mercy and compassion toward all and, first of all, towards ourselves.

Never allow us, O Lord, to boast of our accomplishments, as any good we do is done by You at work within our being.

Cancelling the debt we owed You, O God, because of our disobedience to You, we are now free to serve You in love and service to our neighbor, addressing wrongdoing and making right injustices that enslave the world in which we live.

Expand our hearts to embrace the poor and needy of this world: immigrants  and anyone fleeing persecution, abuse (physical, emotional sexual), and death (including death of the spirit by verbal and emotional abuse).

Day in and day out, Lord, the poor and needy cry out to You for deliverance; may we be your hands and feet and heart that offers them deliverance from extreme poverty that deprives them of their basic human rights.

Always precious in Your sight, O Lord, are your sons and and daughters; You wait for each of us to turn to You as our Savior and God.

Yearning for You like a deer yearns for running water, we, your sons and daughters await the day of salvation gained for us by Your death and resurrection: our true independence!

Appointed as Overseers by the Holy Spirit

“Keep watch over yourselves and over the whole flock of which the Holy Spirit has appointed you overseers, in which you tend the Church of God that he acquired with his own Blood,” Paul says to us in Acts 20: 28-38.  He adds: “I know that after my departure savage wolves will come among you, and they will not spare the flock.”  In the Gospel, John 17: 11b-19, Jesus says to His Father and ours: “When I was with them I protected them in your name…and I guarded them…But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely. I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the Evil One…Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth.”

Our first responsibility is to “keep watch over ourselves.”  The Evil One, “savage wolves” from within will attack the weakest part of our human nature, that part of ourselves where sin abides: pride, lust, narcissistic tendencies, sloth, selfishness, deceitfulness, wickedness.  The Holy Spirit has appointed each one of us an overseer of this side of ourselves that Jesus “acquired with his own Blood.”  The “world” within us hates the holiness within us that is there at the price of Jesus’ blood.  We live in this world of sin and darkness but do not belong to it by virtue of being adopted as sons and daughters of God. We are now, by virtue of dying and rising with Christ in our baptism, citizens of heaven. While here on earth, while living in this world, however, as Jesus does not ask the Father to take us out of the world, but to “keep us from the Evil One,” to “consecrate” us “in the truth,  we are also citizens of heaven to which the Risen Jesus has returned, sitting at the Father’s right interceding for us and waiting for all of His enemies, and ours, to be destroyed.

Am I aware that I have dual citizenship: that of this world, in my case, of the U.S.A, and that of heaven and that one will last forever and the other come to an end? For which am I building up treasures? This world or the world to come?  

Signed for and by Christ

In today’s first reading, Ez 9: 1-7, 10; 18:22, we are presented with the fact that those who were faithful to the Lord and who lamented the abominations practiced by some of the Chosen People were marked on their foreheads with a “Thau” cross and were spared from being wiped off the face of the earth. In Baptism, you and I were marked on our foreheads, as well, and sealed for Christ in our Confirmation. We belong to the Lord and He will never abandon us. The Lord God will protect us in all of the vicissitudes of our lives. The day will come, as with Ezekiel, when we will see the glory of the Lord above us in eternity, where a place is prepared for us as well. Truly, as we pray in today’s responsorial psalm, “From the rising to the setting of the sun is the name of the Lord to be praised. High above all nations is the Lord; above the heavens is his glory. Who [we ask with the psalmist] is like the Lord, our God, who is enthroned on high, and looks upon the heaves and the earth below?”

What am I doing to ready myself to see the Lord in my midst when God chooses to reveal Himself? What am I doing as I await the Lord’s appearances? As Satan prowls the earth, will the Lord say to the evil spirits: “See the Thau cross on her/his forehead; do not touch her/him?” And finally, what am I doing to prepare myself for that day when the heavens will open and the Lord escorts me into paradise?  Am I keeping my focus on Jesus each day, each hour, as I live my life for God alone, as I strive to become one the Trinity?

Remaining Tranquil

In today's first lesson, Isaiah 7: 1-9, we read that "when the word came to the house of David that Aram was encamped in "Ephraim, the heart of the king and the heart of the people trembled, as the trees of the forest tremble in the wind."  The Lord sends Isaiah to King Ahaz, encouraging him to remain calm in the face of an invasion from the North.  "Take care you remain tranquil and do not fear; let not your courage fail...." The "blazing anger" of the northern kingdom "shall not stand, it shall not be!....[W]ithin sixty years and five, Ephraim shall be crushed, no longer a nation. Unless your faith is firm you shall not be firm!"

"It shall not be!" "This shall not stand."  How often do you and I "tremble like trees in the wind," not remembering that every hair on our heads is known to the Lord. And, yes, He protects each strand.  He knows when disaster looms, when Satan is about to strike, hurling boulders of temptations at us, rocks that could destroy "houses" not built on faith.  "Take care you remain tranquil," no matter what!Why? Because the power of redemption, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, is at work in the world, in you and me, in our families, in our loved ones, in our parishes, our workplace, in areas that seem about to fall to Satan's deceptive snares.  "It shall not be" because God is in charge. God took possession of us in our baptism into Christ Jesus. We belong to Him, not to the world, not to that which is not-God. 

Do our actions in the face of "invasions of the tempter" reveal the strength of our faith?

God's Directions!

In today’s first reading, 1 Kings 17: 1-6, the Lord tells Elijah to “go hide in the Wadi  Cherith, east of the Jordan. You shall drink of the stream, and I have commanded ravens to feed you there.” Elijah does just as  the Lord’s commanded.  “He went and remained by the Wadi Cherith, east of the Jordan. Ravens brought him bread and meat in the morning, and bread and meat in the evening, and he drank from the stream, safe from his pursuers who were seeking to harm him.

Elijah certainly had the freedom to go his own way and not seek shelter in Wadi Cherith and believe that ravens would feed him there.  That sounded, I suspect, pretty outlandish.  God is that way, though. Some of the things the Spirit  directs us to do may sound outlandish, irrational, in fact. “Do what?” we may ask.  Especially when it comes to a vocation to priesthood or religious life and, maybe in the choice of a spouse or “the command” to begin serious dating or, even, to choose to remain single.  Or it may be in choosing a major or a minor in college or which college to attend. Or, again, it may be in choosing a job offer. “What,” our friends may ask, “are you thinking? That’s not a good fit for you, “ and on and on. Yet, in our heart of hearts, we go the “Wadi Cherith” of our lives, to the place the Spirit is directing us to go, even though our family or friends do not understand our choice.

What we do know in faith is that the Lord is directing us!  When we feel the Spirit’s gentle nudge, nothing else matters.  And many times we are as surprised, as I believe Elijah was, “ravens” bring us “bread and meat in the morning and bread and meat in the evening.”  And we “drink from the stream” of grace that pours into our believing, trusting hearts.

The Tenderness of Our God

Today’s Scriptures speaks of  the tenderness of our God! I love to watch  parents hugging a child, stoking its hair, holding a child close to their bosom.  The tenderness between loving parents and a child reflects God’s tenderness toward each of us. The first reading of today’s liturgy, Is 49: 14-15, asks us: “Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb?” And, “even should she forget, I will never forget you.”

The Gospel, Mt 6: 24-34, echoes this same theme of God’s tender, loving care, inviting us to ponder the flowers and the grasses of the fields, the birds of air, and how God watches over each of them and provides for all of their needs.  Certainly their splendor and their beauty does not come close to the beauty of any one of us created in God’s very image, male and female.  And if God provides adequately and sumptuously for every bird, every fish of the sea, every flower that graces our landscapes, every blade of grass that blooms in the morning and fades at night, how much more does God provide for us..  “Why,” Jesus asked, “are you fraught with worry? Your heavenly Father knows…[what] you need…”  Besides, he says, “tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.”And no matter what today’s or tomorrow’s “evil” is, God, like any good parent,  knows how to help us deal with it.  Do I have the faith of a child who, no matter what, trusts its loving parents to provide what is needed as he/or she faces the day’s “evil”?  No wonder Jesus says to us,  in Mt 18: 3, that unless, we become like a little child, we shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.  Only when we face today’s “evil” with the trust of a little child do we experience  the presence of God’s Kingdom of Heaven right here and now.

How trusting am I? How believing am I that God will provide?

Salvation from the Pursuing Enemy

In today’s first reading, Exodus 14: 21-15:1, we read about the mighty hand of God protecting the Israelites from the pursuing Egyptian army.  The Israelites, who just passed through the Red Sea on dry land, see the Egyptian warriors coming to take them back into slavery.  As they panic, God says to Moses:  “Stretch out your hand over the sea, that the water may flow back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and their charioteers.”  Moses does so and the Egyptians  die in the rushing waters. 

 In the Gospel of today, Matthew 12: 46-50, Jesus is told that his mother and brothers are outside wanting to speak to him.  Jesus stretches out his hand toward his disciples and proclaims that all who do the will of His Father is His newly formed, close-knit family of mothers, brothers and sisters, a family as significant to Him as His Mother Mary and his biological “brothers”.

You and I entered this family at our baptism, entering the “Red Sea,” of baptismal waters, in which God becomes a powerful warrior in our lives, warding off the “Egyptians” of our lives that want to enslave us to a life of sin and selfishness, slaves of evil forces that lure us into doing our own wills over the will of God, following our own plans and ignoring God’s plans, as did Adam and Eve, as did the people gathered at the Tower of Babel, and the Israelites worshipping pagan gods.

As then, so now, God does not abandon us.  He sent His only begotten Son, who is obedient to His Father throughout His life, death and resurrection, modeling for us perfect trust in the Father’s will for our salvation.    In whom do I trust? To whom am I obedient?  Am I mother, brother, sister to Jesus? Am I included in Jesus’ proclamation:  “Here are my mother and brothers [and sisters]. For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother.”

Jesus: God's servant

In today's Gospel, Mt 12: 14-21,   Jesus withdraws from the area where He had been doing ministry because the Pharisees were plotting "to put him to death."  He continues elsewhere quietly going about the work His Father had given Him to do.  "I have come, not to condemn the world, but to save it,"  Jesus tells us in Jn 12:47.  As quoted by Matthew in today's Gospel, Isaiah prophesied about the Messiah, saying that He "will proclaim justice to the Gentiles. He will not contend or cry out, nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets.  A bruised reed he will not break, a smoldering wick he will not quench,  until he brings justice to victory. And in his name the Gentiles will hope."

Jesus comes as our servant, showing God's love, compassion and mercy as we see in His response to the woman caught in adultery, in the parable of the prodigal son, from His first words on the Cross ("Father, forgive them"), and his response to the good thief ("This day you will be with me in Paradise") as well as through His total ministry here on earth.

You are I are called to follow Jesus, to do as Jesus did, to serve others, to show others God's compassion, mercy, love and forgiveness; in short, to carry on His mission of reconciliation.  Do I protect the "bruised reed," the "smoldering wick," show mercy to the sinner (including myself), welcome back a prodigal son/daughter (including being welcoming to myself when I make a mistake), bring "justice to victory," and hope to the situation in which I live?

Protection from Satan's Traps

In today's first reading, Acts 20: 28-38, St. Paul tells his fellow Christians that, after he leaves them, he knows that "savage wolves" will attack "the flock."  That message had got to have been terrifying for those whose faith may not have been all that strong.  Jesus, at the Last Supper, less that 24 hours before leaving us in death, prays for us, asking His Father, and ours, to keep us in His name. He reminds the Father that while here he "guarded" us. "But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely" (Jn 17: 11b-19).  He reminds the Father that He has given us the Father's word and that the world hates us, as the world hated Jesus, because neither Jesus nor we belong to the world.  He then says to the Father: "I do not ask that you take them out of the world but that you keep them from the Evil One."

What a promise, a promise that Jesus continues to keep. Yes, you and I are shielded from the Evil One. He has no more power over us. Jesus crushed his head from the tree of the cross.  For those of us who believe and rely upon God, evil will not overtake us eternally and eternity is NOW!  Jesus is NOW and where Jesus is, so, too, is the Father and the Spirit. And where the Trinity is, so, too, is eternity--a life beyond this world's reality. If I live by faith, then, when I encounter evil, I  will ultimately triumph over it, no matter from whence it comes. The resurrection is NOW. Rocks are rolled away from our tombs NOW as we rise with Christ to the new life of grace, to the power of the Spirit at work in the depth of our souls.

Mary, Mother of Sorrows

Mary, Mother of Sorrows:  This week we are reflecting on the second sorrow of Mary, the flight into Egypt to protect her infant Son from harm.  Mary listened to Joseph when he told her that they needed to leave the placed they called home and flee into Egypt, a foreign country, unknown territory, separate from friends and family and that which felt familiar to her.  Her heart must have been heavy with grief. Displacement, under any circumstances, is discombobulating, painful and difficult.

Mary, like Jesus, knows and understands our pain when we are displaced, feel abandoned, misunderstood, isolated and left alone to fend for ourselves with no tangible support. She is an advocate for refugees, persons dislocated because of civil unrest, war, violence of any kind, natural disasters, transfers to new locations by virtue of marriage, job promotions, or, as a member of a religious community, transferred to a new mission, a new ministry, a new local community, a foreign mission. Mary goes with us! Mary knows the way through this maze of unknowing, of reaching out to strangers, of making our way in unfamiliar territory, “swimming” in uncharted waters (uncharted for us, that is). Let us tap her as a resource, as someone who can help us when we are unsure, scared, and anxious.

With her, may we have the faith to believe in others whom God provides as protectors, as persons who will lead “our donkeys through the wilderness,” will find us a place to take root and help us tap into our inner strength and creative energies to, not only survive, but thrive and discover opportunities we never would have had if we had refused to “relocate” physically, emotionally, spiritually, psychologically.