Today, the 50th Anniversary of Vatican  Council II, begins a Year of Faith announced by Pope Benedict XVI.  Our faith in Jesus Christ, the second person of the Blessed Trinity, is being challenged in today's world, it seems to me.  The question is: am I being swept away by this world's denial of the existence of God and more specifically by the world's rejection of Christ, the Son of God, sent into the world, not to condemn it but to save it?  When I was baptized into Christ, I was put on a path of  communion with Christ. I began a journey of being transformed--body, mind and spirit--into the Body of Christ and into the mind and heart of God.  Each day is an opportunity for me to put on Christ, to become Christ, that is, to be salt for the earth and light for the world, illuminating the path to union with the Trinity.  Each day, through grace and my cooperation with grace, I am being transformed into the image of Christ--a transformation that will take place until my birth into eternal life when my union with God will be complete.

God's Work Environment

“Be still and know that I am God” (Ps 46: 10).  Every morning I begin my hour of prayer in stillness, using the mantra: “Listen to the stillness. God is at work” or “Be still and know that I am God.”  This morning the thought came to me that when I am talking—sometimes incessantly, rambling on and on, as in the case of political issues—I need to tell myself to be still in order to know that God is God.  As in the Old Testament--through Exodus, the wanderings in the desert, through the divided kingdom (The Northern and Southern Kingdoms of Israel), through the Exile, the Return from Exile, the Maccabbean Revolt and  in the New Testament through Jesus’ death-- God prevailed in building His Kingdom and remaining true to the covenant He made with Adam and Eve, namely that the serpent’s (Satan’s) head would be crushed. Sin would not prevail. God’s plan will be accomplished and no one will stop that from happening. Even in our day, in our present circumstances, as we listen to the wrangling of the Democratic and Republican parties, the debates, God’s will shall prevail.  I may not realize it but God is at work.  I simply have got to be still and listen. God says to me in Jeremiah 29:11 I have “plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope…”  God has those same plans for the United States, for the world, and it cannot get worse than it did for Israel in Egypt, in Exile, or during the Maccabbean Revolt, nor for Jesus in His passion, death, and resurrection. God has a plan that will not be impeded.

Do I believe that?

The Good Samaritan's Example

In today’s first reading, Gal. 1:6-12, Paul challenges the Galatians and us to remain true to the Gospel that is preached to us, that which we read and reflect upon in the daily and/or weekly liturgies and that which we ponder as we personally open the  Scriptures in our private prayer. Paul describes himself as “a slave of Christ” and for that reason does not seek to please people.     In today’s Gospel, the story of the Good Samaritan, Luke 10: 25-37, the person who stops to help the man who fell victim of robbers is one who seeks to please God. The priest and the Levite, on the other hand, seek to please themselves. They pass by the injured man, ignore him. In fact, they go to the very opposite side of the road in order to avoid him and keep themselves pure according the Mosaic Law. They are slaves to the letter of the law.  They do not show compassion and mercy. They do not heed the words in today’s Gospel to “love the Lord your God with your whole heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”

We, too, on a daily basis, are challenged to love as Christ’s loves. To show mercy as Christ shows mercy.  When we tenaciously cling to the letter of the law, we are striving, most times, to please ourselves, not God. “Look how great I am doing,” our egos boast to ourselves, even if that boast remains in our unconscious, that is, we remain blind to what we are really doing  and why we are doing it. Obeying the letter of the law kills the law of the Spirit. How easy for us to live on this superficial level!  And how difficult, but obviously not impossible, to live according to the Spirit. “Good Samaritans” throughout history show us the way. Who are the “Good Samaritans”—the most unlikely of persons—in your life who show you  how to love, how to show mercy, in short, how to be the hands and feet, the mind and heart of Christ in your world?

Replacing Entitlements with Blessings

All week long the first reading of the Liturgy centered on the story of Job.  Job lost everything: all of his possessions, his sons and daughters and even his own health.  Through all of this, Job maintained his faith, his trust and his respect of God. Never once does he speak disrespectfully of God or abandon God.  His friends confront him, believing that he must have seriously and severely offended God.  “God must be punishing you,” Job’s friends reason with him.  Job does wonder why God is allowing so much evil to happen to him.  Satan, we learn, has challenged God concerning Job, saying: “Of course, he is loyal to you . You have blessed him and protected him from evil. If calamity strikes, he will not remain reverend and faithful.”  So God gives Satan his wish to try Job. Job wins out and God stops Satan from continuing to torture him.

How easy it is when tragedy strikes to believe that the country, the nation , the people, the person or even ourselves as individuals deserve to suffer.  This belief runs through both the Old and New Testament. When Jesus heals the man born blind from birth, for instance, the Pharisees insist that either the man or his parents sinned gravely and deserved this hardship. “Not true,”  says Jesus. The physical impairment, in this case, is an opportunity that will reveal God’s greatness, God’s power, God’s mercy and God’s love, as is the potential within all of the tragedies of this life. Magic does not remove the vicissitudes of life, the difficulties and challenges of being finite human beings. Not even Jesus escaped life’s traumatic, problematic situations nor death itself.

In Job’s case, his response was: “Naked I came forth from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I go back again. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”  What if I, when confronted with suffering, hardship, disappointment and of a situation that denies me what I want or what I think is my right, I  would respond with “Blessed be the name of the Lord,” instead of ranting and raving of how unjust life is and how unfair people can be. Maybe, sometimes,  I need to try Job’s way instead of the way of entitlement.

The Awesome Charity of God

In the Franciscan Office for today, one of the readings is St. Clare’s Fourth Letter to Agnes of Prague, who became a poor Clare, leaving all of her wealth to follow Jesus. St. Clare writes:   “At the surface of the mirror [of the Cross], consider the holy  humility, the blessed poverty, the untold labors and burdens that Jesus endured for the redemption of the whole human race. Then, in the depth of this same mirror, contemplate the ineffable charity that led Jesus” to suffer excruciating pain and unutterable torture throughout his passion and death.  Consider God’s charity in hanging naked on the cross dying a shameful and humiliating death for our sakes.

As I contemplated God’s charity, poverty and humility, I was brought to my own knees.  Here is the Creator of the Universe nailed shamefully and cruelly on this tree of torture, giving up His very life for my sake, for the salvation of us all. What do I do when I am asked to give up something for the sake of the other, for the common good of the family, the community, the mission of the Church? I had to admit my own shortcomings, weaknesses, and, yes, even sinful selfishness when it comes to letting go, not of my very life as Jesus did, but of my addiction to work, my clinging to my way, my unwillingness to sacrifice for a good greater than myself.

What about you? Ever find yourself face to face with this challenge of selfless giving, of being poor for the sake of the other, of needing to ask forgiveness for a pouting stubbornness and entrenched selfishness that reveals itself in your withholding love, being unwilling to turn off the TV, put down the cellphone, turn off the computer, be flexible to accommodate another person's need?

A Questioning Job Meets the Almighty One

Today’s readings, Job 9: 1-12, 14-16 and Luke 9: 57-62, may leave us with a lot of unanswered questions.  Job is left floundering and saying, in effect, who am I to question the Almighty or to argue with the One who “is wise in heart and mighty in strength? Who am I to argue with the One “…who removes mountains before they know it…[who] shakes the earth out of its place…[who] commands the sun, and it rises not…[who] alone stretches out the heavens and threads upon the crest of the sea.”  Why would God “hearken to my words,” Job wonders.

We know that God did speak to Job (cf. Chapters 38-41) but not in the way Job may have expected.  God confronts Job with more questions, brings him to his knees in awe and repentance and opens his heart  to grace.  God also answers our questions in a way that our faith is strengthened.  We, too, fall on our knees in awe and repentance. We, too, have our hearts opened to God’s grace and power when we are honest with God about our situation, not pretending that everything is okay when it isn’t.  When we ask God for what we think we  need,  the answer we get is not usually that for which  we asked but much more and of a different caliber.  Our vision is limited. God’s is not. What we want is earthbound, tangible and visible to the naked eye. What God wants for us is heaven bound and of the heart.  We see dimly. God sees clearly.

In the Gospel, Jesus’ response to those who express a desire to follow Him is also esoteric to our human ears and mind-boggling to our finite intelligence.  Jesus, who reads the hearts of his would-be disciples, knows exactly what is impeding their wholehearted discipleship. So He challenges them in a way that leaves us clueless.  “What,” we ask, I can’t even say good-bye to my family?” and “ I need to leave the dead bury their dead?  How can a dead person bury a dead person? How ridiculous can Jesus be,”  we may wonder!  “Does He know what He is talking about?” we quip arrogantly.   When we ask those questions we are forgetting that the meaning of Jesus’ responses are only known by the person to whom Jesus is speaking, much the same as an inside joke  is only known by the insiders. 

What is Jesus saying to me that I know for certain in the depths of my heart , though others may not have a clue?

The Gift of a Guardian Angel

“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.”  What a gift! God, out of His infinite love, has assigned one of His angels to guard us day and night. This messenger from God does not ever leave our side.  Those whispering messages,  which our Guardian Angel sends  us often,  warn us, protect us, and shield us from harm. It is this Angel that encourages us to resist temptation and choose the good. It is our Guardian Angel who prompts us to take care of ourselves and others. It is that same angel who invites us to love with our whole being, our whole mind, our whole heart and our entire will, holding nothing back. Today, let us give thanks for God’s awesome love in the gift of our Guardian Angel.