Always Joyfully Thanking

Today in front of the Catholic Worker House arrived a homeless woman who here I'll call "Janice."  She was moving slowly.  She noted how her hair was so knotted that she couldn't run her fingers through it.  Janice was wearing dirty clothes.  

Janice told my fellow Catholic Worker Susan and me of how she has been mistreated.  She has been beaten; she has been falsely accused of speaking with profanity; at times she has returned to the cart she uses only to find some of her items missing.  

Janice began crying as she spoke to me, under the stress she feels over her plight.  Yet she was quick to add that she knows that God loves her.  Aware that God loves her, steadfastly affirming and proclaiming this truth even in the face of being abused, she is set to give thanks to God always for all things.*  When we keep in mind that God loves us, we are joyful always,** no matter what happens.     

If we realize that God's love is infinite and thus is immeasurably more immense than how we love, we begin to see reality.  If we accurately perceive who we are, that we are nothing without the help of God, and who God is, that He always has been, is and ever shall be, we are humbled.  If we allow ourselves to be humbled, we open our hearts to the grace of God, for God gives grace to the humble.***  

By the grace of God, we become empowered to weather whatever storm befalls us.  Aware that God loves us and works all to our good if we love Him,**** we rejoice that God is always seeking our good.  

As we realize that God wishes the best for us since God is love,***** we can come to give thanks to God for all things.  As we become more conscious of the vastness of God's love, we become more joyful, becoming joyful always.  

With the love of God, being grateful and joyful always, we view all that happens in a new light.  We come to view occasions of suffering not as misfortune, but as opportunities to draw closer to God if we capitalize on such gifts as chances to more deeply thank God.  

So often we angrily discard such invitations from God to enter into deeper, more profound communion with Him.  Yet today I was instructed in this challenging endeavor by Janice, who is homeless.  Jesus told us that we find Him in those who are the least among us.******  Jesus comes to us in those who are poor and downtrodden.  He still comes to us, trying to keep instructing us.  

Often we find Jesus' teachings too much to bear.  If we try alone to carry the load of what He asks of us, we will find it to be too heavy.  For humans some things are impossible, but nothing is impossible for God.*******  With the help of Jesus, the yoke becomes easy and the burden light.********  If we turn to Jesus, and remain in Him,********* through His presence we will be thankful for all things and will be always joyful.  

If we pay attention to the poor person in front of us, we are paying heed to Jesus.  We can find Jesus right in front of us, instructing us.  We have opportunities to learn about suffering from the homeless person before us.  From her we can learn how to give thanks to God when we encounter hardships and to be joyful in the midst of adversity.  

From a homeless woman who has let herself be humbled, we can learn valuable lessons on how to become much more than we have been: those who become humble receive the grace of God, and with this transformative power they endure formidable storms, glorifying God through the strength they receive from Him.  Thus it is to the glory of God that those who humble themselves are raised up.**********  

Let us open our eyes to those before us, open our hearts to our neighbor, and thus open our hearts to the love of God.  As we open our hearts to love, joy abounds in our souls.  Amen.  

* 1 Thessalonians 5:18 
** 1 Thessalonians 5:16 
*** 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6 
**** Romans 8:28 
***** 1 John 4:8,16
****** Matthew 25:40,45
******* Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37
******** Matthew 11:30 
********* John 15:4,6,7,9,10
********** Matthew 23:12; Luke 14:11; Luke 18:14

Loving Is Becoming

I just got back from a memorial service for a dear friend.  I've told before about this friend I have cherished.  Years ago, after I had become friends with his daughters, he asked me to call him "Uncle."  

Uncle suffered a stroke nearly a year ago.  For almost a year, he was unable to speak, and could move much less than he used to be able.  He courageously endured these hardships while they were presented to him, and then a week ago, he passed from this life into the next.  

He lived his values, thus building a secure bridge from this life to the next.  In his tireless hope, in his tenacious faith, in his indefatigable love, he demonstrated to his youngest daughter the resilience she realized she wanted to study in her work as a psychologist.  In his eloquent musings he expressed in his poems, short stories and novel, he showed his eldest daughter the passion with which she realized she wanted to write.  In his silence, in his meditative pauses, in his carefully chosen words, speaking so mindfully that he seemed to be following a monastic practice, he implicitly and subtly encouraged me toward the monastic disciplines of silence and meditation which I have come to treasure.  

He showed us who we were to become.  He did not tell us who we were meant to be.  In being himself, he helped us to see who we were, and who we have been becoming.  

He loved himself, and so showed us how to love ourselves.  He loved himself, so he could love his neighbor as himself* as Jesus taught him to do.  

He could help others because he loved himself.  If we love ourselves, we can love our neighbor, and so we can become who God wants us to be.  Uncle loved himself, so he welcomed the invitation from God to become who God always meant him to be.  

In his life, he loved.  If we choose love, we welcome God into our hearts.  If we choose love, God welcomes us into Heaven.  

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

Truly Loving Life

If we sow love, we reap joy.  Our friends bring us joy as they love us.  We bring each other joy as we let God love others through us.  

When we reach the final stretch of our lives, we can look back on our lives either sorrowful or rejoicing.  Thus we do well to imagine, much like Saint Ignatius of Loyola suggests, being near the end of our life and looking back on the choices we are making today.  We can envision on how we will feel in the last days of our lives about the decisions we are making today.  

Similarly, we can find consolation at the end of a friend’s life if we consider what kind of life our friend has lived.  At the end of our friend’s life, we can look back on his life and feel joy at the love he has chosen to be manifested in his life.  In focusing on the love we have received from our friend, we can feel gratitude for the gifts God has given us through our friend.  Thus as a friend’s life draws to an end, we can celebrate, out of deep gratitude and appreciation for the numerous gifts God has given us through our friend who is about to move onward.  

We can realize that death is an opportunity to be transformed.  Certainly we mourn the passing of our friends.  Yet as we weep, we implicitly admit we have received the gift of love from God through our neighbor.  

Thus in the midst of pain and suffering, we are presented with opportunities to thank God for the love we have felt.  Even amidst anguish and torment, we are given chances to be grateful to God.  

Certainly we are deeply disturbed when those who witness to the truth suffer.  Yet in their witness to the truth, in how they have lived their lives, they have encouraged us, and have helped us to feel the joy which comes from loving and from welcoming the truth into our hearts.  

And so on this particular date on the liturgical calendar in the Catholic Church we feel distressed as well as encouraged.  Today in the Catholic Church we especially recall the death of Saint John the Baptist.  Saint John the Baptist had lived a life of witnessing to the truth.  He had heralded the coming of Jesus,* who is The Truth.**  Saint John the Baptist had encouraged people to reform their lives,*** and so welcome The Truth, The Word that Jesus was speaking and living.  Saint John the Baptist was also not afraid to proclaim the truth to those in power.  He had told King Herod that it was wrong for him to be with Herodias, who was his brother’s wife.  Since Herodias did not want to hear that moral truth, she told her daughter Salome to ask King Herod for the head of Saint John the Baptist on a plate, which Salome requested.  Saint John the Baptist was beheaded for witnessing to the truth.****    

I am disturbed when I go back and read of how Saint John the Baptist was decapitated for proclaiming the truth to a leader.  Yet death need not be reason only for sadness.  When someone dies for declaring the truth, such a person has lit a candle of truth.  When a person dies, the statement of the truth of the person’s life has been made.  Life may have departed from that body, but the statement of truth which that person has made, and the expression of love which that person has lived, cannot be extinguished.  The truth and the love that person has shown lives on in our hearts.  

And so, in the face of impending death, we are led to consider a profound question: what kind of a life has someone lived?  As this life ends, we are faced with the question of how the gift of life from God has been used by the person who is going to meet God who gave the person that life.    

In considering the type of life that Saint John the Baptist lived, we see that he witnessed to the truth.  He fiercely loved the truth.  He loved the truth more than his own life.  He was not afraid to proclaim the truth, and he was thrown in prison for doing so,***** and then murdered for doing so.  He kept witnessing to the truth all the way to the end of his life, and witnessed to the truth even at the cost of his own life.  

Although probably we will not be imprisoned or executed for stating the truth, nevertheless we are presented with opportunities to speak the truth tenaciously and to love fiercely, not capitulating to temptations to despair.  I have been blessed with a marvelous model who has demonstrated loyalty to the truth and to the love inherent in the truth.  I have written before of my older friend who I address as “Uncle.”  Through his words and actions, he has stayed on the course God has laid out before him, witnessing to the truth of who and what God has called him to be.  I have written before of how Uncle had a stroke nearly a year ago.  For almost a year, Uncle has been unable to move as he used to move, and has not been able to speak.  Yet he has patiently stayed the course laid out before him.  He has continued to demonstrate the truth of how God calls us to face the challenges which unfold in our lives.  Uncle has bravely endured the suffering he has felt, doing as God calls him to do until death.  

He has kept showing his family how to encounter challenges they face.  I think of someone I know who has suffered multiple major setbacks over the course of the year which has just passed.  If Uncle could speak, perhaps he would say to this other courageous soul, “I am right here with you, suffering along with you.  You and I are sharing pain together.”  Uncle has been encouraging others around him.  He has been demonstrating to them how to persist in the face of adversity.  To the end, Uncle is embracing the task of teaching his family and friends how to welcome the duty of this present moment, as Jean-Pierre de Caussade described.  All the way to the end, Uncle is showing those he loves how to love, by embracing the duty set before him.  

If our nearly departed friend has lived loving God and his neighbor, at the end of our friend’s life, we can rejoice with our friend, grateful for the love God has shown us through our friend.  Looking back on choices well made, through which a person has witnessed to the truth that we are called to love God and our neighbor in every little choice we make in every moment, then we feel the joy that loving others brings to us and to others.  

When we welcome this duty which God sets before us, we welcome God into our hearts.  As we welcome God into our hearts, we welcome love into our hearts.  Opening our hearts to God, God fills us with the love we need to do His will.******  Filled with the love of God, we are enabled through His grace to carry out His will.  Overflowing with the love of God, we can witness to the truth, no matter what the cost.  Empowered with His grace, we can endure whatever hardships we encounter.  With the love of God, we can suffer through our own torment so as to help others weather their own storms.  Through the love of God, we can love as God has loved us.  Amen.  

* Matthew 3:11; Mark 1:7; Luke 3:16; John 1:26-27

** John 14:6 

*** Matthew 3:1-2,8; Mark 1:4; Luke 3:3,8 

**** Matthew 14:3-10; Mark 6:17-28; Luke 3:19

***** Matthew 14:3; Mark 6:17; Luke 3:19-20 
****** Romans 5:5 

Love Patiently Endures

If you love someone, you are patient with them.  Love is patient.*  

When you love someone, you open your heart to Jesus, who is in your neighbor.  When you accept love from your neighbor, you embrace Jesus.  

As you love someone, you become able to bear all things with that person.  Love brings endurance.**  We endure with those we love.  

In the end, we end up with love.  In the end, love remains.    

* 1 Corinthians 13:4 
** 1 Corinthians 13:7 

Waste Not Tears

We are all faced over and over with the decision of whether or not we will love.  We all choose our relationship with pain.  We all decide whether we embrace suffering or reject it.  In what we accept or deny, we determine whether or not we love.  

We can cry out of hopeless desperation, feeling frantic, and convinced that all is lost.  Or we can profoundly weep out of great love for others.  

We can let tears fall from our eyes without realizing their value.  Or we can weep offering our tears as prayers to God.  

All we send out from our being echoes out into the universe.  As a tear falls from your eye, if you offer it as a humble prayer to God, when it drops into the liquid lake of spiritual solidarity we share, you can implicitly offer that tear to help others.  Your tearful prayers are effective when they are offered as the basis of humble and earnest prayer.  When such humble, ardent tears of yours hit the liquid lake of spiritual community we share, these tears send out ripples of love across that surface.  Thus through such tears you can seek to strengthen your spiritual brothers and sisters.  

I am not merely speaking in theoretical terms here.  Ever since earlier this week, when a dear homeless friend who I'll once again here call "Sally" shared with me how she views tears as liquid prayers, her statement of spiritual insight has been echoing in my soul.  Like a drop of water that falls into a pond and causes ripples outward, so her tender spiritual musing, coming into contact with my ears, has been echoing in my soul.  
Despite the struggle, Sally has chosen not to let her agonizing experiences dominate how she responds to life.  As I have mentioned in prior blog posts, Sally has endured domestic violence.  Despite having been hit hard many times by multiple men, Sally refuses to be enslaved by the pain she has felt.  Instead she offers up her tears to God.  Interwoven with her sensitivity and fragility, she also displays a courageous and admirable tenacity, and so she sends out a strong message of faith, hope and love, that pain can be the basis of a beautiful transformation of one's spirit.   

Knowing, then, that we can consent to our suffering being transformed into the joy that emerges out of service of others, we can come to experience a radical alteration of how we feel pain, see pain, and respond to pain.  Aware that God works all for the good of those who love Him,* we come to realize that even anguish can lead to joy, if we seize upon such opportunities to petition God.  Thus in all we experience we can be joyous,** if all we do is for the praise, glory and honor of God.  

Conscious that all we experience presents us chances to glorify God by assenting to call upon Him so He may show us His great love always, we come to give thanks always for all things.***  As we come to express such gratitude at all times, God comes to give us a deep, abiding and enduring peace, as, feeling His love, Jesus comes to abide in us, and we in Him.****  

Let us embrace every opportunity we have, then, including in the midst of our tears, to pray constantly,***** give thanks for all things always, and thus love God and love our neighbor.  Thus we come to live a life of love.  Amen.  

* Romans 8:28 
** 1 Thessalonians 5:16 
*** 1 Thessalonians 5:18 
**** John 15:4-7,9-10
***** 1 Thessalonians 5:17 

Always Welcoming God

God is constantly inviting us to welcome Him into our hearts.  At times God gives us pleasure: at these moments, we are to thank God for how He nourishes us.  At other times God tries us, and tests us through difficulties: at such junctures, we are to thank God that He is strengthening us.  At such times, we are to petition God that He help us to weather what we are enduring.  In any event, no matter what our circumstances, we are to thank God, aware that God loves us immeasurably.  As we welcome the love of God into our hearts,* we see the love we want there to be in the world.  Thus conscious that all we receive provides occasions to be grateful to God, we come to appreciate the value of both delights as well as pains.  

Here in this country so often we are given numerous material blessings.  In this way we have constant opportunities to thank God.  Through so many avenues I have witnessed the generous loving care of God, including through substantial amounts of food which caring people donate.  

Occasionally I've gotten calls from a certain supermarket, telling us that they had a lot of food to donate to us.  Amongst the food they gave to us, we received some particularly delectable desserts.  

Both a certain homeless friend of mine and I are fond of sweets in general, and also this one particular dessert.  So both she and I enjoyed this one certain dessert.  

Weeks after I'd picked up one of those large donations of food and we'd enjoyed some of those especially delicious desserts, my friend asked me, "Hey, you haven't gotten any more of that kind of dessert, have you?"  

I replied, "No, we haven't gotten any more of those.  We don't usually come across those."  

Ever since she asked for more of those particular desserts, from time to time I think of how her request reflects how we live in such a state of abundance in this country.  I've thought that if, as a homeless woman, and as a man who survives mostly on food donations, we can not only get all the sweets we want, but can express our preferences for types of desserts, it's a good reflection of how incredibly God blesses us with material benefits here in this country.  

Being incredibly blessed, we are called to give thanks to God always** for these material blessings.  God can draw us closer to Him by doting upon us.  We can be sanctified through comforts, we can be purified in our relationship with God due to luxuries, if such blessings lead us to thank God more fervently and more often than we have been thanking Him.  

Some people complain that there are many poor people who greatly suffer.  They demand how God can exist when such suffering is felt.  As we become increasingly desperate, we are presented with ever more precious opportunities to grow closer to God by depending ever more upon Him.  When we are faced with hardship, we are presented with a chance to call upon God to help us.  If we respond to adversity by praying to God to give us grace and strength, through an ordeal we can be sanctified, and our relationship with God can be deepened.  

Here in this country so often we are bountifully blessed by God with numerous material benefits.  We can become complacent in our acceptance of such blessings from God.  We can get used to not expressing our gratitude to God for how generously He blesses us.  If we start to take for granted copious blessings from God, and thus show a lack of gratitude to God, we come to resent trials and tribulations when they befall us, instead of recognizing them as the loving invitations from God that they are.  

When we come to realize that God is love,*** we come to see that God is always inviting us to welcome Him into our hearts.  Once we recognize that since God is infinite, and thus that God loves infinitely, we come to see that God works all for the good of those who love Him.****  As we open our hearts to all that God presents to us, we realize that God intends everything in our lives for our benefit.  

By thus coming to trust in God and have faith in Him, we open our hearts to His love.  In welcoming God's love, we come to be channels of His love.  In time we can bring peace to our neighbor, by helping to show to our neighbor through our loving actions that God is loving us in every moment, in all that happens.  As we welcome the will of God in our lives, and the love of God into our hearts, we become empowered to love our neighbor.  With God in our hearts, we love our neighbor as ourselves, just as Jesus taught us to do.*****  With God abiding in us,****** and loving through us, God gives us peace, and the world comes to be as we wish it to be.  

Opening our hearts to God, we welcome God into our lives, no matter what happens.  Opening our hearts to love, we love regardless of what occurs.  Fully open to God, and thus completely open to love, we become love.  Let us open our hearts to God, and thus to love, so that He may love our neighbor through us, and so we may become the love we wish to see in the world.  Amen.  

* Romans 5:5 
** 1 Thessalonians 5:18 
*** 1 John 4:8,16 
**** Romans 8:28 
***** Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
****** John 15:7 

Called To Respect

We are called to respect others the way we would like to be treated.  Otherwise, when we fail to respect others, we are telling them that they are not worthy of respect.  In time, they come to disrespect themselves, as they slip into a downward spiral in which they get used to abusing themselves.  We can think that we have no responsibility for others' actions, but when we fail to build up people, we choose not to lift them up, we keep them down, and we push them even further down.  

Often I think about the people who sift through the garbage and recyclables in the dumpsters in the parking lot outside my window.  They usually sort through it around 5:00 a.m.  I've imagined that they come at that time because they want to get what they can out of it before the garbage truck comes around 5:30 a.m. to empty the dumpsters.  

I've imagined talking with them when they are going through the garbage and the recyclables.  I've envisioned saying something to them like, "I'm not going to try to stop you from going through the garbage.  You can do so.  I'm not disturbed by the sound.  I am deeply saddened that human beings care for each other so little that some people are reduced to rifling through garbage.  I believe you were meant to be treated with more dignity.  We are supposed to treat you with more respect."  
Homeless folks have told me and shown me that they collect recyclables to exchange for money.  Earlier this week, I asked a homeless woman, who I'll call "Kelly" here, what she was going to buy with the money she was going to get from the recyclables she had.  She told me she was going to buy cigarettes.  

In addition to nicotine, homeless folks also fall prey to illicit drugs.  Kelly has confessed to me that she has taken methamphetamines.  Meth is inexpensive, so homeless folks can get it.  

Although meth doesn't cost much money, homeless folks pay a high price for it.  In using it, people become less than they were meant to be.  

When we do not acknowledge the presence of a homeless person, we treat them as less than they actually are.  By acting as if homeless people do not exist, we rip them down just like an illicit drug tears them down.  

In addition to meth tearing people down, people use it in the first place since they are down.  Kelly has identified her low self-esteem as the root of her problems.  She admitted to me that she does things which she thinks will make her feel better, but which don't help.  She has acknowledged too that she tries to numb herself to prevent herself from feeling what she doesn't want to feel.  Kelly does not want to feel the disrespect that has been shown to her.  She would rather turn aside from the pain inflicted on her.  

We cannot justify ignoring and casting aside those who are homeless or otherwise poor.  We cannot in good conscience tell them that they must accept their lot, for in doing so we reject our duty to love them.  

In loving homeless persons and showing them respect, we build them up.  We help them become more than they have been.  By treating homeless persons with dignity, we help them to rise above the suffering they have endured.  If any of us refuse to help our neighbor, whether homeless or not, we are ignoring the lessons of love presented to us.  

If any of us, whether we are homeless or rich, only try to escape from pain, and never embrace suffering, we are refusing to learn from what life presents to us.  Through life's hardships, God seeks to mold us, just as He does by way of life's blessings.  

God asks that we agree to become who He created us to be.  We are called to become who God made us to be.  

We find out who we are as we endure life's challenges.  If we reject what we have to learn in what unfolds in our lives, we refuse to accept what God is trying to give to us.  If we decide not to seize the chance to love our neighbor, we throw away the gift God is giving us.  

Yet God made us to learn and grow through endurance, which is a reflection of love.  To become more than we have been, by obediently submitting ourselves to the will of God, we show who we are.  By loving our neighbor, we demonstrate who we are.  

In the film "Restless Heart," Saint Monica says to her son, Saint Augustine, "Don't forget who you are."  As he continued to ignore the call from God to become who he really was, she admonished him to embrace his true identity, where he would find deep joy and happiness.  

God made us to be happy and joyous.  We find deep joy and happiness when we turn towards God, and submit ourselves to Him, and praise and glorify and adore Him, and love our neighbor.  We do not realize this is why God made us.  We must not forget who God made us to be.  

We are to use what God has given to us to bear much fruit to His glory.  We are to use the gifts God has given to us.  

Kelly told me that at one point she had been in college.  She has told me that she would like to go back to school and get her Bachelor's Degree.  

Kelly realizes that she is meant to be more than she has been.  She knows that she must respect herself.  In loving herself, she can become who God has always meant her to be.  In loving each other, we become who God created us to be.  

God calls us to respect each other.  When we respect others, we invite them to respect themselves too.  

We respect and love ourselves.  We wish to be respected and loved.  Thus we should respect and love others, since we wish to be respected and loved.  Seeing that we too would like to be respected and loved, we come to be able to love our neighbor as ourselves,* just as Jesus taught us.  

* 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 

Timing Of God

In what unfolds in our lives, there is a timing which is at work, even when we think the clock in our lives is broken.  God operates in His own timing, not on our timing.  

When we endure troubles, we need not fear, since we can do all things through God, who strengthens us.*  God won't give us more than we can handle, because God will give us the grace we need to do His will, if we humbly request it of Him.**  

* Philippians 4:13 
* 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6 

Humility Brings Strength

Yesterday I crossed paths with a particular homeless woman who I mentioned in a previous blog post.  Again I'll call her "Catherine."  

When I spoke with Catherine yesterday, she told me that months ago she had had cancer.  One day she was being seen by a doctor, who was discussing with her how she had cancer.  The next time she saw a doctor, she was informed that she had been cured of the cancer.  No trace of the cancer remained.  

Catherine attributes her miraculous healing to God.  There was no other explanation.  The doctors could not supply a medical reason for her inexplicable recovery.  Accordingly, Catherine testifies that God cured her.  

After Catherine had related to me how she had been miraculously cured, I recalled a man I knew who did not make a similar proclamation after narrowly missing death at a relatively young age.  He worked as a professional and earned a salary well into the six figure range.  At one point, he entered the hospital for an operation.  Due to complications during the surgery, he nearly died when he was still in the hospital.  As I later listened to him speak about how he had almost passed away, I heard him say nothing about God saving him from death.  

I heard about the saving power of God from a homeless woman who someone else once described to me as a drug addict.  From a high-earning professional, I heard nothing about how God delivers us from near destruction.  

Why do we hear about the remarkable saving power of God from someone living in the bushes, who society neglects and casts aside?  Jesus spoke of revelation to the unassuming when his disciples first heard His message.  At one point, followers of Jesus returned from a mission to proclaim His message, and they rejoiced that devils submitted to them when they invoked His name.  He told them not to rejoice that the spirits were submitting to them, but rather that their names were written in Heaven.  He then continued, "filled with joy by the Holy Spirit," and said, "I bless you, Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, for hiding these things from the learned and the clever and revealing them to little children.  Yes, Father, for that is what it has pleased you to do."*  

Why would it please God to reveal his glory to those whom society rejects and counts as worthless?  As Saint Paul explains, "God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong, and God chose the lowly and despised of the world, those who count for nothing, to reduce to nothing those who are something, so that no human being might boast before God."**  

To see the glory of God, we need not go and live in the bushes.  However, God calls us all to have humility, however we are serving Him.  If we have no humility, God will correct us.  Those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.***  How will the humble be exalted?  God gives grace to the humble.****  God gives the humble the grace and strength they need to endure what they are undergoing.  God also responds to the prayers of those who are humble.  A contrite, humbled heart, o God, You will not scorn.*****  

When someone who is afflicted is humble, he truly cries out to God.  A humble person sincerely pleads with God to respond to her prayer.  

A humble person admits that only God can help her.  Someone who is humble knows that only God can cure her.  

And so a humble person prays earnestly to God, offering prayers acceptable to God, since they are rooted in the knowledge that only God can save her.  In proper relation to God, admitting that one is nothing without God, one petitions God with due deference.  

Properly acknowledging and glorifying and adoring and praising God, such a person is heard and answered by God.  Having emptied himself of all delusions that he can rely on himself, such a truly humble person is able to be filled with the saving power of God.  Showing genuine humility, such a person is exalted by God, is given the grace to withstand intense trials, is miraculously cured, confounding those who are wise.  

Those who cannot understand such miracles refuse to humble themselves.  Those who grasp the meaning of such miracles realize that God is the only source of such wonders.  In this way no one can brag to God.  To God be all glory, praise and honor, now and forever.  Amen.  

* Luke 10:17, 20, 21 
** 1 Corinthians 1:27-29 
*** Matthew 23:12; Luke 14:11; Luke 18:14 
**** 1 Peter 5:5 
***** Psalm 51:19 

Trust Gives Strength

Here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, on Friday mornings a small corps of volunteers runs a program giving away food in our driveway.  They give away fruit, vegetables, bread, desserts and whatever other food happens to be available to whomever shows up asking for food.  

This past Friday morning, I was glad to see some of the homeless folks I know in front of the house here waiting to get some food.  I was so pleased to see them.  

As Jesus has told us, what we do for those who are the least among us, we do for Him.*  Thus when these impoverished friends of mine show up here, I remember and rejoice that Jesus is at my doorstep.  

I felt so joyous as I spoke with them.  My spirit felt light and my mood upbeat as I talked with them and walked amongst them on the sidewalk as they waited to receive food from our volunteers.

After they had received food and were getting ready to go, one of them, who I've mentioned in a previous post, and who I'll call "Roslyn" again here, asked me a question.  She said she has a relative who is suffering from stage four cancer.  She asked me if a person can ask God that someone else pass away so that that other person can be relieved of their misery.  Roslyn's boyfriend, who here I'll call "Sammy," said, "Sure.  You can ask God for anything you want."  

Sammy made a good point.  We can ask God for anything we want.  We are able to make whatever requests of God we wish.  We face different questions regarding the propriety and value of those requests, and concerning the likelihood whether God will grant particular petitions we make of Him.  

I replied to Roslyn, "Well, you can pray to God for a couple of things."  

I explained that we can ask God to end someone's discomfort.  Perhaps God wills that someone stop suffering; maybe God is just waiting for someone who is in distress to call out to Him, to ask Him to end the pain.  We can petition God that, if it be His will, that a particular person no longer be sick.  

I added that we can also ask God that He give us the grace and the strength to bear whatever difficulties may befall us.  We might still be undergoing torment, but with the grace and strength from God to endure it, we can go through it without it bothering us as much.  Sometimes, with grace and strength from God, we can weather intense tribulations almost without feeling strained at all.  

Would it be best for a particular pain to end?  Would we be better served living through that agony, with what we might learn from it? 

Since God is infinitely loving, and is all-knowing, God knows how each one of us, at each particular moment, may best make progress on our spiritual journey back home to Him.  If, at times, we wonder why God has not taken away our pain after we have persistently asked Him that He relieve us of it, perhaps we need to consider whether we are making the wrong request.  Maybe God sees that we are at a point where we may advance on our spiritual walk by asking for grace and strength to endure hardships, rather than by asking that we be rescued from trials.  
Thus one can ask God that if it be His will, that we be healed of particular ailments.  Then we can add that in any event, we would like the grace and strength to handle the adversity we are facing.  We might be encountering the apparent obstacle in front of us because God is allowing it to occur for our own good and for the benefit of others.  

At every particular juncture in our spiritual journeys, we must have faith in God if we are to let Him to work wonders through us.  We have to trust God if we want Him to deliver the best outcome in our lives.  We must have the humility to realize that God knows infinitely better what is best for us than we know ourselves.  To trust in ourselves is to turn away from God.  To trust in God is to consent to the will of God, even when it seems that God is abandoning us.  In such circumstances, we may be sanctified.  Thus we may in fact be drawing closer to God, when to us it seems that all is lost.  In reality, all may be found when all seems lost.  

Without God's help, we drown in the turmoil of stormy weather, tossed about on a turbulent sea without a firm vessel holding us, without a safe course to follow.  With our assent to God's loving direction, we rest secure in His loving arms, on our voyage back home to Him.  

* Matthew 25:40 

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