Hopefully Move Forward

The last year has been lovely.  God has shed His grace upon me.  Through His grace, He has empowered me to do His will.  I feel that I have done what He sent me here to do.  And so it seems that the time has come to move on from here.  

And so on January 1 I will move back to the hermitage.  I feel God is calling me back there. 

I imagine you are wondering how this conclusion intersects with my previous discernment to leave the hermitage.  

Although I did not explicitly say so, when I left the hermitage to serve poor persons, I was overwhelmingly focused on rejoining the Peace Corps.  I re-applied to the Peace Corps near the end of 2015, and in early 2016, Peace Corps informed me that they could not offer me a position.  

I applied or at least inquired with other organizations serving impoverished people abroad.  Either I didn't hear back at all, or at other times it didn't work out with those other organizations.  
Thus in time I came to realize that one reason I left the hermitage, to serve poor persons overseas, was not materializing.  I let it go, and so the path I thought I was following turned out to be taking me not as far away as I had envisioned.  

Since it started becoming clear I wouldn't be moving to another country again, I began to ponder serving poor folks here in the states.  Having been a Catholic Worker in San Jose before I moved into the hermitage,  I began to think about once again being a Catholic Worker.  

After a brief stint last summer filling in for my friends at Casa de Clara, the San Jose Catholic Worker House, I moved in here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House.  After not too long, I began to get to know homeless folks here in Redwood City.  I came to witness the sense of community amongst those living on the streets here.  I became much closer with them than I had ever felt with homeless folks anywhere else.  And so I have felt much fulfillment as I have served people living on the streets here.  

And yet I have gradually, steadily, increasingly felt more and more spiritually malnourished despite how I have continued the spiritual practices I deepened at the hermitage.  I read Scripture.  I attend Mass.  Yet I have consistently felt that God has been calling me back into more solitude, more silence, more stillness, more contemplation.  I have felt that God has been calling me back into the deep prayer which monastic life fosters, and then will flow whatever service to poor folks naturally, organically arises out of monastic life.  

I feel too that God has given me the grace to make vows to Him.  I know that I can make vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to Him.  If I were not to do so, I would be wasting graces God has given to me.  If you know me well, you know well that I cannot stand wasting what God has given to us.  God has given us marvelous gifts: we should not only appreciate and use well His gifts, but thank and praise and adore and glorify God who gives us such magnificent gifts.  Out of gratitude to Him, I do not wish to be the servant who buries in the ground a coin or coins he has received from his Master.*  I do not wish to be the servant who wraps up in a cloth the coin He has received from His Master.**  

I used to think that God had not empowered me to make a vow of chastity.  Perhaps I was correct.  What I do know is that at times I have prayed to God for grace, and He has given it to me.  I have recalled how Our Blessed Mother Mary told Saint Catherine of Laboure that so many people do not receive certain graces because they do not ask for them.  I have seen for myself how it is true that you can receive a grace you have not had if you but ask for it.  

And so I will be moving on with a desire to use well what God has given to me.  I wish to invest well the talents God has given me, so that I may make more,*** just as Jesus teaches us to do.  

I look forward to trying to use well the gifts God has given to me.  I face forward into the future, though parting under these circumstances is bittersweet, and not just for me.  

I think of the homeless woman who once again I'll call "Kimberly."  She has shared her pain with me, and so she and I have come to appreciate each other.  Despite her sorrow, she has expressed to me that she wants to understand my reasons for leaving, and the goals I hope to reach, so that she can better support me in my decision to leave here.  

I think too of the homeless woman who again I'll call "Anna."  As she has been considering my moving away, in the context of how she has been well aware that she must repent and do her best to sin no more, she has confidently proclaimed that at the very least, she will see me again in eternity.  

I am greatly consoled by these mature words of faith, hope and love.  I am encouraged by the spiritual growth these words of sureness convey.  I am comforted as I adjust to leaving here, knowing that such faith resides amongst those who are homeless here.  

Thus I know that I am not deluding myself when I say that I have seen homeless persons rising up here.  I can move on since I have seen real growth and progress among them.  

I am reminded that recently a certain homeless woman who I'll once again call "Jane" showed up here at the Catholic Worker House.  She had rung the doorbell, and in speaking with a Catholic Worker here, she expressed gratitude, saying, "Thank you for helping me to rise up."  Jane too has been rising up from where she had been, to a better place, proven by the gratitude she has expressed.  

I have also seen with my own eyes how a certain woman, who I'll call "Helen," has also moved forward in her life.  Helen used to be homeless.  Now she lives in her own apartment, which I have seen.  I need not doubt her progress, which is evident.  

I hear and see all this proof of rising up with my own ears and with my own eyes.  As my time here draws to a close, I am encouraged by what I hear and see.  

And so, as night has fallen today, so too the twilight of my time here as a Catholic Worker is also upon me.  Yet as this night is upon us, I am not in despair, for a new dawn is rising up in homeless friends I have made here.  This dawn I have been seeing break open in them gives me hope, a hope which stretches beyond them, into the wide community of humanity.  This hope extends beyond this lifetime, into the limitless expanse of eternity.  The fruits of this faith, hope and love will be seen in eternity.  In eternity, we will see the consequences of our faith, hope and love.  

Let us move forward in faith, hope and love now, so that we may live in love for all eternity.  Amen.  

* Matthew 25:18,25 
** Luke 19:20 
*** Matthew 25:20,23 

Love With Mercy

Everyday we are presented with chances to love.  We are repeatedly faced with the choice of whether we will stop what we are doing so we can love others.  Thus we are called to love rather than to fear.  When we fall prey to fear, we fall away from love.  We decide to love when we listen to our neighbor.  We choose love when we are willing to learn from our neighbor.  

Today as we celebrate the feast day of Saint Matthew, once again we hear how Jesus calls us to love and to be merciful and thus to open our hearts to our neighbor.  In today's Gospel, we hear that 

Jesus saw a man named Matthew sitting at the customs post.  
He said to him, "Follow Me."  
And he got up and followed Him.  
While He was at table in his house, 
many tax collectors and sinners came 
and sat with Jesus and His disciples.  
The Pharisees saw this and said to His disciples, 
"Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?"  
He heard this and said, 
"Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do.  
Go and learn the meaning of the words, 
I desire mercy, not sacrifice.  
I did not come to call the righteous but sinners."*  

When Jesus told Saint Matthew to follow Him, Saint Matthew got up and followed Jesus.  As a wise person once pointed out to me, Saint Matthew didn't ask Jesus what his invitation entailed.  Saint Matthew simply got up, left everything, and followed Jesus.  Saint Matthew didn't have to discern what he was going to do; it was clear to him that he was going to follow Jesus, so immediately he did so.  

God presents all of us with chances to love.  When God gives us the gift of an opportunity to love, get up and follow Jesus wherever He calls you to go.  We find Jesus in our neighbor, and for however long our neighbor is next to us, we can choose to love our neighbor in every single instant.  Jesus calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves.**  If our neighbor requests love from us, then we are to give that love to Jesus who we find in our neighbor.  When the duty of the present moment requests, then we get up and follow the call of Jesus to love our neighbor.  
When we choose fear over love, we ignore this call from Jesus.  When we succumb to fright, then we are turning away from loving our neighbor.  When we want to run away from what we have to do, then we turn aside from Jesus and from the duty to love our neighbor.  When we run away from our duty, we fail to love ourselves.  

I felt this pull of fear, and I was taught by a friend how to properly respond to such fear months ago.  This friend, who here I'll call "Anna," had done something wrong.  She needed to set it right again.  

She went to set things back in their proper place, and I accompanied her.  When she got to where she needed to restore things, she asked me how she was to do so.  Panicking, I stammered, "Just be done with it, and let's get out of here."  Calmly, she replied that she felt it was more appropriate to speak with the people who she had wronged.  She tried to speak with them, but it turned out that they were not there when she arrived.  She could have just departed, yet she not only left a voice message apologizing to the people she had wronged, but she also left her name.  She did her best to make amends for how she had inappropriately behaved.  

What else can I tell you about Anna?  Anna is a homeless woman who is addicted to methamphetamines.  

It is easy and convenient to declare that the homeless drug addict is the sick one.  Jesus suggests that those who are morally lacking are sick.  I was the morally deficient one in that situation: I was the one who wanted to hurry up and leave so we could avoid an uncomfortable confrontation, rather than see my friend partly spiritually healed through making the appropriate reparations to the people she had wronged.  In demonstrating to me how to begin to responsibly set right one's mistakes, this homeless addict was like a physician to my sick and troubled soul.  

When we see how we can learn from others who we had previously thought were below us, it becomes easy to realize the meaning of the words, "Mercy is what pleases Me, not sacrifice."***  If we realize that we can learn from people who we think are worse off than us, then it becomes easy to be merciful toward them.  

Jesus explained that He came to call not the upright, but sinners.  It is more comfortable for me to think of myself as upright than to realize that I am a sinner.  The truth hurts.  The truth is that I am a sinner.  Yet all is not lost, for Jesus calls me and all of us sinners to repentance and to restoration with God.  
Jesus calls us.  Jesus asks us to get up, leave everything and follow Him.  Jesus asks us to leave our conceptions of ourselves, to realize we are sinners, to give up our sinful ways, to make amends for what we have done wrong, and, having renounced our sinful desires, to follow Him.  Jesus calls us to such renunciation since He wants us to love ourselves and stop destroying ourselves.  He wants us to love ourselves so we can love our neighbor as ourselves.  We are called to love so that we can love each other as Jesus has loved us.****  We are called to show great love, to give up everything, and to follow Jesus.  When we do so, we finally become who God has always meant us to be.  Amen.  

* Matthew 9:9-13 
** Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
*** Hosea 6:6 
**** John 13:34; John 15:12 

Littleness Can Teach

Usually once a week I take a day of silence.  On such a day, as much as work allows, I aim to speak as little as I can.  In deliberately being quiet on certain days, I aspire then on other days to fall silent more often than I used to be.  

I practice silence to help me discern and say and do what God wills.  I enter into silence to help me be attentive to the guidance of the Holy Spirit.  

I resort to silence to prevent me from sinning.    My Lord and my God, put a curb on my lips, so that I not sin with my tongue.*  

Last week, on my silent day, at one point I was in the kitchen when one of our current long-term guests entered the room.  She's an eight-year old who lives here at the Catholic Worker House with her mom.  She began making regular conversation with me, perhaps about how my day was going, or what food was on the counter, or something else which naturally came to mind.  After not too long as I continued to respond without words, she asked me why I was not speaking.  In such instances, when I can't respond by nodding or shaking my head, I write my response.  Yet in this particular case, almost immediately she began to think about a possible answer to her own query.  She asked, "Are you quiet so you can listen better to others?"  Frankly, I hadn't been consciously taking silent days as a means to help me to better listen.  Nevertheless, when she so inquired, I pondered her question and realized that through regularly falling silent, I can improve at listening to others, which I wish to do.  I nodded in reply.  

Our neighbor can teach us if we are willing to listen.  We can learn even from little children. If we let little children come to us, we can be led by them to the Kingdom of Heaven, for the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as them.**  Amen.  

* Psalm 39:1; Psalm 141:3 
** Matthew 19:14; Mark 10:14; Luke 18:16 

Presently Loving Others

It turns out I'm going to stay here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House.  A few months ago the other Catholic Workers here told me they'd been more pleased with my work than when we'd previously spoken months earlier about my work and about whether or not I'd stay here.  Consequently, they said I could keep living and working here long-term.  

Larry, who founded the Redwood City Catholic Worker House dozens of years ago, wondered if I'd been throwing myself more into the work simply because I'd become more comfortable and because I had relaxed.  In our work, we pick up donations, including of food and clothing and toiletries, and people come here to the Catholic Worker House and get what they need.  Apparently I have been immersing myself more in this work, although I haven't been aware of any change in myself.  

Susan noted how I've been connecting with homeless folks and other persons who are especially in need here in Redwood City.  She talked about how homeless folks come to our front porch to get items that are donated and left there, and how they know me.  

Both Larry and Susan were receptive to my continuing to live and work here at the Catholic Worker House.  They expressed how they felt it could be beneficial if I were to stay.  

I've felt and heard the gratitude my homeless friends and my other impoverished friends have shown to us Catholic Workers here.  I enjoy when they give thanks, and I feel their thankfulness is a reward, but their gratitude is not the reason I do this work.  We are to serve our neighbor because we are to love our neighbor as ourselves,* as Jesus has instructed us to do.  

In the love I feel for them, and in their appreciation of our presence and our ministry, I find indications that love is blooming in their hearts.  Love can bloom in our hearts if we welcome every little chance we get to plant little seeds of love in our lives.  Saint Therese of Lisieux was named The Little Flower, for she had this little way of doing little loving acts for others.  In the little acts of love we can strive to perform for others, and in joyous gestures of thanks people give us in return, we can see the fruits of love flowering out of the little seeds of love that have been planted in each others' hearts.  

And so I cannot help but suspect that I am where God wishes me to be.  God calls us to the duty of the present moment.  Thus the Jesuit priest Jean-Pierre de Caussade counsels us to open our hearts to what we are being called to do in the present.  Indeed, when you embrace the duty of the present moment, and love your neighbor who is right in front of you, you please God.  

Sometimes in various ways we can find surprising this duty that has been placed in front of us.  We can become blinded to what God is asking us to do if we become too attached to our own notions of ourselves.  If we are not detached from our own conceptions of ourselves, we are not opening ourselves up to God to allow ourselves to conceive what God wants to bring to birth through us.  

We can come to overvalue realizations we've had about ourselves in the midst of discernment, such that we can unwittingly let such knowledge about ourselves come to dominate us and unduly influence our decisions.  We do well to temper our self-knowledge against the backdrop of our current circumstances, in the context of where we currently find ourselves.  Right now, who are we being asked to love?  As we love our neighbor, we witness the fruits of that love in the joy we feel.  Love and joy are two signs that we are accurately discerning our vocation, which is what God is calling each of us to do.  

We do well to try to cultivate gardens of love in our hearts.  We can evaluate the health of what is growing in our hearts by means of the joy we feel.  

Thus we can check our relying too much on our self-knowledge, and we can prevent ourselves from letting it drive our actions too strongly, by looking at the love and joy in our hearts.  The love and joy in our hearts is threatened by the selfishness that our egos tend to inflict upon ourselves and on others.  We should not discard our self-knowledge, but also we should not let it control our discernment so much that we use it as an excuse to ignore what God is calling us to do right now.  

As I'd mentioned in a previous blog post, I'd come to find that I do better where there is more structure, and when I am specifically directed what to do.  Yet I've also found that we do well when we don't cling rigidly to our expectations of what we think our ministry is supposed to look like.  Yes, I do well with structure and direction; yet even though I know I have these tendencies, I don't have to be closely directed in a highly structured environment.  Yet I should be conscious of these tendencies, and let these insights influence how I structure my day.  If I am obedient to the duty of the present moment, then I can find the direction I crave by lovingly serving my neighbor when she asks me to do so.  

So, in time, I have been coming to discover that I find the direction I seek coming directly from my neighbor.  The Holy Spirit speaks to us through others.  When we love and serve our neighbor, we submit to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.  As we embrace the duty to give lovingly what our neighbor needs right now, we obey the will of God.  

And so, submitting to the demands of the present, and obediently acquiescing to what God is asking me to do now, I find the direction I seek.  As I open my heart to give the love that my neighbor requests of me, my day becomes structured by what I find the Holy Spirit asking me, through my neighbor, to do for my neighbor.  

And so I am here.  I do not know how long I will be here.  Indefinitely I will be here.  There is no clear indication that the Holy Spirit is guiding me elsewhere.  In contrast, I feel community and connection and warmth and love with these homeless and other needy people here.  I am grateful to God that I can be with them here.  And so I embrace these lovely opportunities with these people in need right now, who are right in front of me.  Amen.  

* Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 

Fruits Of Discernment

This month I have reached some clarity in my discernment of my vocation.  At the same time, some questions remain.  

For the last few months, I was discerning whether or not God was calling me to serve poor persons in the context of consecrated religious life as a religious brother.  I have discerned that it appears that God is not calling me at all to consecrated religious life.  

I have come to this conclusion since I have discerned that God does not seem to be calling me to make a vow of chastity.  As best as I can see with my imperfect vision, indications are that God is not calling me to make this vow.  

In prior stages of discernment, I had focused on other vocational questions.  While I was at the hermitage, as I was discerning whether I would become a monk there or whether I was called elsewhere, I directed my discernment more prominently to my strong desire to return to ministering to poor persons.  Ultimately, I left the hermitage and returned to serving impoverished people.  

Once I had come back to being a Catholic Worker, the question arose whether I would not only serve impoverished people, but whether I would do so in the context of making vows in a religious order.  

I have felt strongly called to make vows of poverty and obedience.  For the first few months of this year, I felt like I was a piece of rope in a tug-of-war.  On the one hand, I felt as if I was being pulled by a desire to make vows to God.  On the other hand, I have felt an inclination to intimacy and affection with others.  

I have been driven with the desire to make vows to God because God has given me so much.  There is no way I can ever repay Him.  Since I feel so grateful to God, I want to give as much back to Him as I can.  We are called to love as much as we can.  Each of us is to love as much as we can within the context of the specific vocation each of us has.  Our fate will depend on how much we have loved.  Saint John of the Cross wrote that "At the evening of life, we shall be judged on our love."  

For a while I endured the stress of feeling like I was being pulled in opposite directions, as I grappled with yearnings that were both undeniable yet irreconcilable.  I reached a point where I realized that I feel empowered by God to make vows of poverty and obedience, and those longings are part of me.  I acknowledged that I also desire intimacy and affection, which is also a part of me, and which I cannot ignore.  When I admitted that both of these desires are part of me, I felt great peace and calm.  I no longer felt tension.   

I had been feeling strain over this question since I had been trying to accept something that was not mine to have.  At times in the midst of thinking about this facet of my vocation, I have pondered words of Jesus which have been invoked regarding celibacy.  Jesus said, "Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so; some, because they were made so by others; some, because they have renounced marriage for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. Whoever can accept this ought to accept it."*  If this is yours to accept, then accept it.  If this is not yours to accept, do not try to accept it.  

In connection with this vocational question, back when I was still living at the hermitage, one of the wise monks there counseled me that you can't give what isn't yours to give.  If God hasn't empowered someone to be celibate, then such a person can't give that gift of celibacy back to God.  Similarly, if God hasn't endowed a person with the gift of a vocation to married life, then such a person is not equipped for such a life.  

Since making vows in a religious order involves three vows, namely poverty, chastity and obedience, and I feel I can do two of them but not all three, I will be making none of these vows.  I do not know of a religious institution in which members make vows of poverty and obedience but not chastity.  

However, just because I will not be making a vow of chastity, it doesn't mean I'm going to get married.  I like the idea of getting married, but that doesn't mean it's going to happen.  

It's not a question of "when."  It's a question of "if."  If God wills that I be married, then let it be so.  I am asking: what is God's will for me?  

It is not a question of improbability.  There is the temptation to think that, because I feel called to live in such simplicity, the potential population of compatible partners has been drastically reduced for me.  It is not a question of casting a line into the sea and hoping to net the perfect fish against the unpromising odds in such a large sea.  Rather, I hope I can listen, hear and follow Jesus when He tells me to cast my net into deep water or over the other side of the boat,** in whatever context He is telling me to do so.  I aspire to follow God's will in all matters, trusting in Him and having faith in Him.  If God wills that I be married, then let it be so.  For now it is in question whether it will be so.  

Similarly, the rest of my vocation also remains in question.  I continue to discern where God is calling me, to what ministry He is calling me, and with whom He is calling me to work.  In the meantime, I continue to enjoy a life of prayer and work amongst the homeless persons I have come to know and love, who I find right in front of me.  

* Matthew 19:12 

** Luke 5:4; John 21:6 

Abandoning Our Plans

We do not see what we are offered.  We are standing inside of a grand tale.  It is much larger than we are.  We cannot see how we fit into it.  We cannot even see where we are in it.  And yet we propose to determine our own place in this great drama.  However, the Master Storyteller knows and assigns the role each one of us is to play.  He will tell us, in the midst of our discernment, if we only ask Him.  We will hear Him if we merely listen.  When He tells us, we must choose if we accept the role he offers us.  In this decision, we determine our own destiny, which is inextricably interwoven with that of others.  

So Joseph, the husband of Mary the Mother of Jesus, had to decide.  Earlier this week, when we celebrated the Solemnity of Saint Joseph, we heard in the Gospel reading of the day 

Now this is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.  
When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, 
but before they lived together, 
she was found with child through the Holy Spirit.  
Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, 
yet unwilling to expose her to shame, 
decided to divorce her quietly.  
Such was his intention when, behold, 
the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, 
"Joseph, son of David, 
do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home.  
For it is through the Holy Spirit 
that this child has been conceived in her.  
She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, 
because he will save his people from their sins."  
When Joseph awoke, 
he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him 
and took his wife into his home.*  

In how he began to relate how the birth of Jesus came to be, it is as if Saint Matthew was saying, "Let me tell you the full story."  Within this story, Saint Joseph had an idea of what he was going to do.  It was his own scheme.  It was not God's plan.  

In our lives, we are living a story larger than we realize.  We have our own plans.  Are our limited conceptions the same as God's boundless immensity?  

Our minds are finite; God is infinite.  God can, and wants to, and does devise and execute plans far greater than what we can ever possibly envision.  

Joseph and Mary were betrothed.  They were engaged to each other.  They were not living together.  She became pregnant.  

When we have committed to a course of action, sometimes does something unexpected happen?  How do we react?  

After Joseph learns that Mary is expecting a child, he devises his strategy.  He is going to divorce her, but quietly, because he doesn't want to disgrace her.  

We come up with our own approach to what unfolds in our lives.  Are we trying to stray from where God wants to lead us?  

God told Joseph that He had intended that Mary had come to be with the child within her.  Through His angel, God told Joseph not to be afraid to take Mary his wife into his home.  He explained to Joseph that the child had been conceived in her through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Joseph was to name Him Jesus, since he was destined to save people from their sins.  
Do we trust God when God tells us not to fear?  Do we rest secure in God?  Do we welcome how the Holy Spirit seeks to work in our lives?  

God seeks to give us gifts.  If humans, as evil as we choose to be, know how to give our children good things, how much more will God give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?**  God wants the best for us.  God wants such good for us, and so loves us that God sent His Son, Jesus, the Messiah, to save us from our sins.***  

If we abandon our own plans, then we can welcome what God has store for us.  If we empty ourselves, then we can be filled with what God wants to give to us.  

This week I've heard from both Larry and Susan, my fellow Catholic Workers here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, that when one is discerning one's calling, one does well if one is indifferent.  That is, if you are detached from all vocational possibilities, then you can dispassionately evaluate the courses of action which rest in front of you.  When you're unattached to any particular choice, then your mind is clear enough to be well-disposed to hear and listen to what God is trying to tell you.  

If we stop clinging to our ideas about where we think we are supposed to be, and what we think we are supposed to do, then we are turning onto the road of objectivity.  When we let go, and stop trying to demonstrate our strength, instead admitting we do not know, allowing ourselves to be humbled, then we are given the strength we need.  Then we are able to discern well-reasoned, wise decisions.  

Saint Joseph gave up his plan, which he had formulated without understanding where he stood in God's master plan.  After he had been told what he was to do, he let go of the idea he had had to divorce his wife Mary.  Joseph did as he was told.  Once the angel had told him to take Mary his wife into his home, he did so.  Upon being told to accept Mary as his wife, he offered his own fiat.  He awoke and proclaimed through his actions that it should be done to him as he had been told by the angel.****  

For his obedient submission to the will of God, Saint Joseph was rewarded.  For his acquiescence to the will of God, Saint Joseph became the foster father of the Savior of Humanity, inextricably and intimately linking his destiny with that of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.  

Do we cling to our own ideas?  Will we open our hands and let go of our own plans?  If we merely unclench our fists, then we are able to open them to what God wants to hand us.  In what God wants to give to us, we will receive what is far better than anything we can even imagine.  

We do not see what we have been promised, for we cannot see it this side of eternity.  As Saint Paul wrote, we fix our hope on what is not seen.*****  Yet as Saint Paul also wrote, we strive toward this goal.******  We are able to make this progress since The Way we follow is illuminated by the light of faith, as Pope Francis has told us.  And so we are encouraged as we move forward, knowing that we are bound in love as part of a communion of brothers and sisters stretching out over centuries.  We are inspired by the examples of faith our brothers and sisters have provided to us over the centuries.  Encouraged by their witness, we are confident that we too can hear and listen to how God is also calling us to abandon our own plans and turn to Him so we can be who and what He has always intended each of us to be.  

* Matthew 1:1-18, 24 
** Luke 11:13 
*** John 3:16 
**** Luke 1:38 
***** 2 Corinthians 4:18 
****** Philippians 3:14 

Discerning My Vocation

Sometime before the end of the summer, I'll be moving on from the Catholic Worker House here in Redwood City.  Both the other Catholic Workers here and I have agreed that it's not a good fit here with me.  

Recently I've realized that I have performed best in my life where there has been more rather than less structure.  Here at the house the day unfolds in a fairly unstructured way, even relative to other Catholic Worker Houses where I've lived or visited.  

I've also known for a while that obedience is a strength God has given me.  I don't have a problem with work where I am told what to do; in fact, when I'm instructed to do something, I work well.  At Catholic Worker Houses, workers may function in an egalitarian fashion or may take direction from a worker who exercises more authority.  Here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, it's decided in an unregimented way who does which work.  Each person is free to autonomously decide on what tasks he or she is going to work.  

Going forward, as I discern my vocation, I am being reminded that God has blessed me with many traits and strengths with which God has prepared me for my vocation, for the specific ministry to which God has been calling me.  I feel that God has led me to maintain certain spiritual practices and disciplines to help me seek Him and to love and adore and glorify and praise Him and to help me to love and serve my neighbor.  

I feel nourished when I silently sit still in solitude trying to listen to God.  I cherish the spiritual practices I learned from the warm, wonderful monks at the hermitage where I lived for a year and a half.  I still try to live out these monastic practices, continuing to embrace the inner monk dwelling within me.  

Yet I have been enjoying spiritual community, including while attending Mass daily, worshipping God and celebrating His blessings, praising Him, and often I have been sitting in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament.  I feel joy these days, including when I aim to serve my neighbor, especially those amongst us who are the most impoverished, including people who are homeless.  I am grateful to God that I can offer to hospitality to others here, especially to those who are sorely in need.  I revel in living simply.  It seems to me that I am being myself, I am being who I am, who God created me to be when I strive to live in this way.  

So how am I to live out these spiritual disciplines?  What is my vocation?  Recently I started meeting with a new spiritual director.  While speaking with him, we discussed how I am to aspire to have a blank slate in my spirit.  In talking with Jesus about who I am, and how I am to live and to be, I am to do my best to remain totally open to what Jesus is trying to help me see about myself.  I strive to have the humility to be a simple servant, ready to carry out the will of God in my life.  I want to open my heart to God, so that God can work through me.  I want God to do His work through me.  

And so I wait to see where God is inviting me.  God is leading us into all Truth, including The Truth of who He is and the truth of who we are.  If we have faith, and thus are open to God leading us, Jesus, as The Way, will lead us into Himself, into The Truth, and we will have Him, The Life.*  If He abides in us and we in Him,** we will have life, and abundantly have it.***  If we will but listen to God, and follow Him, we will have true joy, borne of the truth of who we are in relation to God.  No one can take this joy away from us.****    

I seek the truth of who I am and who God is.  This is the way to true life.  This is true joy.  

* John 14:6 
** John 15:4 
*** John 10:10 
**** John 16:22 

Keeping Valuable Knowledge

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of Our Blessed Mother Mary, the Mother of God, the Mother of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  In the Gospel reading today we hear that, after angels announced to shepherds tending their flocks in the fields that Our Savior Jesus had been born, 

The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem 
and found Mary and Joseph, 
and the infant lying in the manger.  
When they saw this, 
they made known the message 
that had been told them about this child.  
All who heard it were amazed 
by what had been told them by the shepherds.  
And Mary kept all these things, 
reflecting on them in her heart.  
Then the shepherds returned, 
glorifying and praising God 
for all they had heard and seen, 
just as it had been told to them.  

When eight days were completed for his circumcision, 
he was named Jesus, the name given him by the angel
before he was conceived in the womb.*

Upon reading this Gospel passage this morning, I pondered the approach that Mary took in her life.  In this part of the Gospel we are told that Mary kept all these things in her heart.  She kept them.  She did not discard them.  What things did she keep?  What things did she not throw away?  Among other things, she kept and cherished the knowledge she had of how God had abundantly blessed her and her husband Joseph.  

When we keep awareness of God's blessings, we keep valuable jewels of wisdom which, properly used, lighten the burdens we carry.  In contrast, so often we hang onto physical property which often weighs us down.  Years after I acquired certain items of property, I realized I had only those articles of property once, or that I had never used those possessions at all.  In retrospect I saw that I could have gotten rid of such things long before I did.  

So often too we discard valuable insights which are given to us as gifts.  We fail to recognize the true, abiding, lasting treasure contained in such pearls of wisdom.  There have been times I have learned invaluable lessons, only to forget what I had learned.  

We are called to continual discernment.  We are called constantly to discern what we should keep and what we should discard.  We should ask ourselves what we value and what we find of little or no enduring worth.  We are called then to keep accordingly and likewise to discard.  

God will sift us too, separating all of us from each other like wheat from chaff,** like fruitful, nourishing harvest from nutritionless, worthless waste material.  We too should sift and sort in our own lives right now, discerning what to keep and what to discard, according to what will and what will not help us to love God and our neighbor.  

As we discern, and consequently retain what benefits us and others, as well as reject what harms us and others, we will find that we have what we need and what others need.  We will find what we need right in front of us.  We will be nourished and in turn we will be equipped to nurture others.  

I am led to share some circumstances from my day today which seem to illustrate this truth.  In a blog post a few weeks ago, I mentioned that I was about to go on vacation.  A few days ago I returned from visiting my parents and my sister back east.  I very much enjoyed visiting them.  I've also enjoyed being back here in Redwood City, returning to the ministry here that I find fulfilling.  I've enjoyed reconnecting with people here who I've missed.  

Due to certain responsibilities here at the Catholic Worker House, I have to be here at the house most of today.  Thus I've found myself wanting to spend time with people here in the larger community of Redwood City, but constrained from doing so due to duties here at the house.  I'd been looking forward to seeing many of these warm, welcoming people in the wider community who I've come to know while living here.  

So I felt as if God was answering my prayer this morning when the doorbell rang.  Upon opening the door, I received a robust, energetic and warm greeting from someone I'll again call "Ben," a homeless man who periodically stops by here at the Catholic Worker House.  

He shared with me how one day, upon returning to where his tent and the rest of his property had been, everything which had been there was gone.  Yet he also related to me how he recently had his bicycle fixed, but didn't have to pay anything for the repairs, due to the generosity of the repair person.  Later I considered how, in the midst of his disappointment over having lost almost all of his possessions, he kept in his heart how he had been treated to free repairs on his bicycle.  In keeping the memory of this magnanimity in his heart, he cultivated seeds of gratitude in himself.  Remaining grateful, he made a conscious choice how he would respond to his apparently unfortunate circumstances.  Through his choice, God strengthened him.  

As Ben was about to bicycle away, I thanked him.  Missing him and others I've gotten to know here in the wider community of Redwood City, I was pleased he had stopped by the house here.  He had made me feel better in the midst of my longing to see him and other people who I've come to cherish here.  Despite his recent apparent misfortune, he was ministering to me.  In the midst of his pain, he was the one showing love and comfort: he was implicitly consoling me through his very presence.  I had called out to Jesus to comfort me, to come to me, to minister to me.  In response, Jesus, who is in those who are least among us,*** came to my door in the homeless man who rang my doorbell.  

Just as Jesus came to me, Jesus comes to Ben, and to each and every one of us.  Soon before Ben bicycled away, I reminded him that Jesus always welcomes us to Him.  I added that Jesus is always with us.****  

God calls us to keep and cherish in our hearts the knowledge that He is always with us.  When we hold onto this precious knowledge, we can recognize Him when He comes to us.  When we remember this vital truth, we are set to open our hearts to Jesus.  As Saint Paul puts it, then no longer are we living; then Jesus is living in us.*****  Then we humbly submit to the will of God; then we obediently allow Jesus to love our neighbor through us.  Then the Kingdom of Heaven is right here, right now, in this very moment.  Amen.  

* Luke 2:16-21 
** Matthew 3:12 
*** Matthew 25:40 
**** Matthew 28:20 
***** Galatians 2:20