Recognize Afflicting Blessings

If we are wise, we can recognize the blessings in our afflictions.  If we truly are grateful to God, we thank Him for the adversity we face as well as the comfort we receive.  As we embrace those who are different from us, we are positioning ourselves to learn from them.  If we have faith in God, we welcome all God sends us.  If we have faith, we are saved.  

We are reminded of these truths in today's Gospel reading for Thanksgiving Day.  There we hear that 

As Jesus continued his journey to Jerusalem,
he traveled through Samaria and Galilee.
As he was entering a village, ten persons with leprosy met him.
They stood at a distance from him and raised their voices, saying,
"Jesus, Master! Have pity on us!"
And when he saw them, he said,
"Go show yourselves to the priests."
As they were going they were cleansed. 
And one of them, realizing he had been healed,
returned, glorifying God in a loud voice;
and he fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him. 
He was a Samaritan.
Jesus said in reply,
"Ten were cleansed, were they not?
Where are the other nine? 
Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?" 
Then he said to him, "Stand up and go;
your faith has saved you."*  

These lepers may have anticipated that the apparent misfortune of their leprosy would provide the vehicle through which God would be glorified in them.  In their anguish, they cried out to Jesus to have pity on them.  Jesus, full of compassion and love for others, cured them.  The returning man recognized that God had had mercy on him, so he went back to Jesus, giving the glory and praise and honor due to God.  When we are suffering from what would usually be viewed as a malady, we can thank God for the apparently ill fortune which has befallen us, if we consider that our dilemma provides an avenue through which God can be glorified.  In our pain, we can capitalize on the excellent opportunity to earnestly call out to God to deliver us from what afflicts us.  God likes to hear us offer up ardent prayers to Him.  God hears and responds to fervent prayers.  Then when God saves us from what torments us, all the glory is due to God.  We can thank God not only for being delivered from agony, but also, realizing that trials supply opportunities for God to be glorified, we can also thank God for tribulations.  

At times we are well instructed in thanking and praising and glorifying God by those who are different from us.  The one leper who returned to thank God was a Samaritan.  Normally Jews did not associate with Samaritans.**  The foreigner demonstrated well the need to give thanks to God.  If we dismiss those who are unlike us, we run the risk of refusing to learn from them.  People dissimilar to us may have much important to teach us.  

The Samaritan, the excluded one, was saved by his faith.  Although he was a social outcast, he had the gift of faith from God.  Through that faith, he was saved.  

When we have faith, we welcome the apparent misfortune God sends us as well as the comfort He gives to us.  Having faith, and being cured, we thank God not only for the relief but also for the affliction.  With faith, we welcome into our hearts people who are not like us, aware that they can teach us since we are open to what they have to say.  Being so receptive through our faith, we are saved.  Amen.  

*  Luke 17:11-19
** John 4:9 

Accept The Invitation

Suffering is an invitation to prayer.  When God allows us to suffer, God invites us to pray.  

If we are agonized, we are poised to present our petitions earnestly to God.  In anguish, we pray with deep feeling, and thus effectively, when we beg God to help us.  

O God, come to my assistance.  O Lord, make haste to help me.*  
When we are tormented, we pray fervently to God.  How we pray matters.  

We also show what we most value in what we request from God.  In the midst of excruciating discomfort, we can do more than merely implore God to stop the pain.  We can choose to ask God to give us the grace and the strength to bear the trials we are undergoing.  

In beseeching God to grant us the grace and the strength to endure our tribulations, we are asking God that he let us be vehicles for Him to be glorified.  When we seek from Him the composure we need to bear our suffering, we wish it to be that we weather our storms only by His grace.  Then all glory and honor and praise is due to God, as it always has been, as it is, and as it ever shall be, to God, to ever has been, is, and ever shall be.  Amen.  

* Psalm 40:14; Psalm 70:2 

Lovingly Choose Life

Earlier this week a homeless woman who I'll call "Katarina" told me that a homeless man who I'll call "Zack" had brutalized her.  Soon after she had shared this raw wound with me, again we crossed paths.  Then Katarina told me that Zack had come to her, repentant and regretful.  Zack, a tall, burly, muscular man, had stood before Katarina, his lip quivering with remorse, and had apologized to her for how he had grossly mistreated her.  

God can soften hardened hearts.  God can transform brutality into repentance.  

Just as God can lead us sinners to repent by guiding us through the Holy Spirit to forsake our hurtful behavior, so God can heal our wounded neighbor.  I have already seen how Katarina has been healing, since she has been forgiving Zack.  We heal ourselves and our neighbor when we forgive our neighbor.  

To heal ourselves, also we must forgive ourselves.  To heal ourselves, we must love ourselves.  So that we may be restored to health, sometimes we must recognize that we are not responsible for how others have harmed us.  Some people who have been abused blame themselves.  We are not responsible for others' actions.  However, we are responsible for how we respond to others' actions.  God calls us to love ourselves, such that we do not blame ourselves for what others do to us.  

God calls us not to perpetuate the suffering that others have inflicted on us by abusing ourselves.  God calls us not to cling to our pain.  God calls us to let go of our anguish by not fostering it through inaccurate images of ourselves.  

God calls us not to recreate our torment by continuing to live in our pain.  Some people who have been traumatized choose to relive the harrowing experience by putting themselves back into the same situation with the same person who abused them.  Rather than live in past abuse which binds us to death, God calls us to new life.  Jesus has told us that He came so that we might have new life, and have it to the full.*  

We find life in Jesus, who is The Way to The Life, which is The Truth.**  We find life when we love others as Jesus loves us.***  
God calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves.****  Since God calls us to love others, we must also love ourselves.  We must accord ourselves the same love we bestow upon others.  We owe ourselves a duty to love ourselves.  

If we love ourselves, we choose life.*****  As we love ourselves, we move toward having life to the full.  When we love ourselves, we move toward God.  In loving ourselves, we start to become who God has always meant us to be.  

As we become who God has always intended us to be, at the same time we are praising God and glorifying Him.  When we open our hearts to who God made us to be, we acknowledge His rightful place as our Creator, and thus come to love our Heavenly Father with all our heart, with all our mind, with all our soul, and with all our strength.******  

As we become who God made us to be, we draw back home to God and toward Heaven.  Let us love ourselves, our neighbor, and thus become who God created us to be.  Amen.  

* John 10:10 
** John 14:6 
*** John 13:34; John 15:12 
**** Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
***** Deuteronomy 30:19 
****** Deuteronomy 6:5; Deuteronomy 10:12; Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27 

Joyfully Thank Always

This morning a friend of ours came here to the Catholic Worker House.  Here I'll call him "Stan." Stan is homeless and suffers from various ailments.  He moves very slowly; it seems like one might be overstating his degree of mobility if one were to say that he hobbles along.  On his legs and his fingers, his skin has become scaly and is peeling off in large flakes.  This morning, it was clear that his sores had broken open and were bleeding.  

Despite his misfortune, at one point this morning, Stan proclaimed, "The Lord is good."  Stan could lament his medical condition, but instead he chooses to give glory to God.  In the midst of his discomfort, Stan praises and adores and glorifies God for His great goodness.  

Amidst suffering, just as during times of ease and comfort, we are to give thanks to God.  Knowing that God is good, we are to be joyful always, pray constantly, and for all things give thanks.*  

I am reminded and am told that we must do so by the suffering homeless man who shows up at my doorstep.  Jesus, in the impoverished individuals** in front of us, comes to us to continue to teach us how to love God with all our heart, with all our mind, with all our soul, and with all our strength.***  

As we open our hearts to the poor persons who are before us, we open our hearts to God.  When we truly see the impoverished man in front of us, we recognize Jesus here with us.****  As we welcome the homeless person here with us into our hearts, we welcome Jesus into our hearts.  

As we welcome God into our hearts, we see that God is infinitely good.  When we realize that the Lord is good, we give thanks always.  We never stop expressing gratitude to God once we see that God infinitely loves us.  

When we recognize that God is love,***** we welcome the truth that God loves us always.  Aware that God loves us infinitely, we rejoice at all times.  Ever joyful, we give thanks for all things.  Amen.  

* 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 
** Matthew 25:40,45 
*** Deuteronomy 6:5; Deuteronomy 10:12; Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27 
**** Matthew 28:20 
***** 1 John 4:8,16 

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 

Dying For Others

July 1941.  Auschwitz.  A prisoner escapes.  In retribution, the Nazis condemn ten prisoners to death.  At roll call, they announce the names of the persons who they will send to their deaths.  One of the ten sentenced to death, Francis Gajowniczek, cries out that he has a wife and children.  Another inmate there at roll call, a Franciscan priest named Maximilian Kolbe, steps forward and says he would like to take the place of Gajowniczek.  

The Nazis agreed to the switch.  Kolbe and the other nine were subjected to forced starvation.  Despite dehydration and starvation, after two weeks Kolbe still had not died.  Kolbe was executed by a lethal injection on August 14, 1941.  

Gajowniczek later described how he could only thank Kolbe with his eyes.  He added that it was the first and the last time such an occurrence transpired at Auschwitz.  

Beauty and warmth and compassion can spring forth in the midst of horror and atrocities.  Kindness can be shown when brutality is all around us.  Love can be offered in reply to hate.  

Often we cannot control what happens to us.  However, we can always choose how we respond. When we are convinced that our freedom has been taken away from us, we can realize that we still have the free will that God has given to us because He loves us so much.  When we ask in disbelief and misunderstanding how God can allow such pain and suffering in the world, we can realize that God loves us so much that He gives us our free will.  God loves us so much that He will not force us.  God loves us so much that He lets us make our own decisions.  

Today as we celebrate the feast day of Saint Maximilian Kolbe, we can be led through the remembrance of the bravery of this saint to carefully consider our own choices.  We might never be given the chance to sacrifice ourselves courageously by physically dying for someone else.  However, in every fleeting moment of time, we can decide to die to ourselves so we can live for our neighbor in little ways.  Over and over again, we can put our neighbor before ourselves as we perform little acts of love for others, as Saint Therese of Lisieux did in her little way.  In every little action we do, we can decide to give away our lives for our neighbor, and thus save the life of our neighbor.  In each and every moment, we can choose to love our neighbor as ourselves,* as Jesus taught us to do.  

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

Loving Poor Treasures

When we love, we choose to be humbled.  As we give of ourselves, we let ourselves be humbled, since we are choosing someone else over ourselves.  When we allow ourselves to be humbled, God gives us the grace to love our neighbor, including those among us who are marginalized.  By the grace of God, we can come to see how persons living on the fringes of society are more like us than we had thought, and thus come to love and cherish them.  Thus, since we come to see we are more like others than we had thought, we necessarily give up our conceptions of ourselves so that we can become who God has always intended us to be.  We let go of our images of ourselves so we can see God made us in His own image.  We relinquish our false ideas of ourselves so we can love.  As we empty ourselves of our untrue conceptions of ourselves, God can fill us up with the love* we have seen our brothers and sisters demonstrate for us over the centuries.  

Sometimes we might think this love is out of our reach.  Yet God gives us opportunities to open our hearts and choose this love.  

We can think that saints have nothing to do with us.  We can decide that we are far removed from them.  In addition to saints inspiring us through their outstanding examples, they point out to us to consider what we value, and to act accordingly.  Thus, although at first they might seem distant and unreachable, by pondering their choices, we can come to realize they are closer to us than we had thought, since like they have done, we too must decide everyday who and what are important to us.  Through our choices, we can embrace the types of people the saints treasured.  In how we opt to act, we can show we wish to love others like the saints have done, and thus be close with the saints, honoring their memory.  

Today we remember Saint Lawrence as we celebrate his feast day on this particular date.  He was a deacon in the city of Rome in the third century.  He was charged with giving aid to those in need.  Saint Lawrence loved impoverished people so much that he gave all of the money in his care to poor persons.  He even sold expensive items to be able to give more to those who were indigent.   

Since Saint Lawrence was one of those in charge of funds for the church, Roman officials ordered him to bring them the treasure of the church.  As the priest explained during his sermon today at Mass, in reply to this demand, Saint Lawrence said it would take him a few days to gather this treasure.  Then he brought disabled, blind, ill and needy individuals to the Roman officials.  Saint Lawrence maintained that these outcasts were the treasure of the church.  

In response, the Roman authorities killed Saint Lawrence.  He died while he was tied to a grill set above a fire so that he was roasted alive.  Although Saint Lawrence suffered much as he died, God gave him grace.  He had been so strengthened by God that he made light of his plight.  At one point he told those torturing him to turn him over because he was done on the side that had been cooking.  

Saint Lawrence received grace from God.  Saint Lawrence had humbled himself by cherishing those who were impoverished.  Those who are humble receive grace from God.**  

Those of humble heart are close to those who are least among us.  Jesus told us that whatever we do to those who are least among us, we do to Him.***  People who are humble welcome Jesus into their hearts.  Jesus stands at the doors of our hearts and knocks.  If we open to Him, He can come into our hearts and dine with us.****  The poor stand at our doors and knock.  Jesus, in the poor, stands at our doors and knocks.  If we let the poor in when they knock, they can come in and dine with us.  If we let them into our homes, we let Jesus into our hearts.  

Last week a young couple, interested in volunteering here at the Catholic Worker House, came here to the house, and, over coffee, said that they have let homeless persons sleep in their home.  This man and this woman have opened their hearts to those who have no place to rest their heads.  They have welcomed impoverished individuals into their home, and thus have embraced Jesus.  They have clearly demonstrated that they consider those who are poor as treasures to delicately and gently treat.  

Jesus told us, "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be."*****  Seeing who and what we value, there our hearts reside, in community with them.  As we demonstrate to others that we appreciate them, we welcome them into our hearts.  We can embrace those who are poor and treat them with dignity, helping them to see that they are treasures to be valued, rather than treating them as if they are trash to be discarded.  We can choose to show warmth and tenderness to those who are often cast aside, and thus truly love them.  

If we truly love, we will allow ourselves to be humbled.  As we consent to being humbled, God will give us the grace we need to love our neighbor.  At times in our lives, we might misperceive our neighbor and mistakenly believe she is nothing like us.  Through the grace of God, we can come to have much compassion for our neighbor, once we recognize that our neighbor is much more like us than we had thought.  Seeing our neighbor is more like us than we had thought, we come to love our neighbor as ourselves.******  As we open our hearts to love, we open our hearts to God.  As we seek to always do the will of God by always loving our neighbor, we come to love God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength.*******  Amen.  

* Romans 5:5 
** 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6 
*** Matthew 25:40 
**** Revelation 3:20 
***** Matthew 6:21; Luke 12:34 
****** Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
******* Deuteronomy 6:5; Deuteronomy 10:12; Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27 

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 

Proclaiming Our Dependence

Today is a day when people especially think of, give thanks for, and celebrate their independence.  Here in the United States on this particular day, we celebrate the independence of our nation.  We commemorate how we declared our independence from the British.  

It is often said, and quite rightly, that we must remain vigilant to preserve our democracy and the freedom that comes with it.  Some people especially crave power, and oppress others in order to keep it.  When people abuse power by using it to mistreat others, we witness a misuse of freedom.  

When we make choices which cause us to become enslaved to anything, we misuse our freedom.  Unfortunately we can decide to use our freedom to become slaves to many things.  We become slaves to possessions, to money, to power and to prestige.  We can even become slaves to food and drink if we do not remain in right relation to it.  If we become gluttons with food and drink, we have become slaves to our own desires for excessive amounts of food and drink.  When we allow our desires to rule us, we have lost our freedom.  

If we become addicts, we have become enslaved to our desires.  If we have become addicted to drugs or gambling or sex or anything else, we are no longer free.  As addicts, our desires rule us.  

I am not only speaking about others.  I am speaking about myself and about others.  I am addicted to sugar.  I do not lightly say that I am an addict.  If I go too long without sugar, my perceptions become severely skewed.  My outlook on life becomes dismal.  

Such is the state of an addict.  For one who is addicted, being deprived is being tortured.  

Some would respond to such circumstances by demanding how God could let people devolve into such a state.  They ask how and why God could let this happen to people.  

God does not wish anyone to stray from him.  Yet God gives us our free will.  Sometimes people make decisions which harm themselves.  Yet even in the midst of such debilitating situations in which there seems to be no hope, we can use our freedom for our own good.  When we feel trapped, we can use our freedom to declare our independence from what enslaves us, by confidently proclaiming that we will steadfastly rely on God.  If we utilize our freedom to proclaim our dependence on God, God will free us from being held in chains.  

Thus in such situations of suffering, there is a profound opportunity, if we choose to open our hearts to it.  When we are faced with challenges which we cannot overcome on our own, we are to pray to God to deliver us from evil.*  If we tell God, with all our heart, mind, soul and strength, that on our own we cannot surmount the obstacles we encounter, then God will come to our aid.  When we let go of our egos, then we make the room for God to work in our souls, then we welcome God into our hearts.  Once we admit that we must have God's help, then we can begin to love Him with all our heart, with all our mind, with all our soul, and with all our strength.** 

When we pray in such a way, we pray with true humility.  If you truly pray, you have humility.  To the humble, God gives grace.***  With the help of God's grace, we can conquer what for us alone would be impossible.  As Jesus reminded us, everything is possible for God.****    

And so, with all credit for our success going to God, God truly is glorified.  When we admit that all glory, praise and honor is due to God, then God delivers us from evil and brings us into true life.  Amen.  

* Matthew 6:13 
** Deuteronomy 6:5; Deuteronomy 10:12; Matthew 22:37; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27 
*** 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6 
**** Matthew 19:26; Luke 18:27 

Giving Up Ourselves

We are to give of ourselves.  We are to pour ourselves out for our neighbor.  Out of love for our neighbor, we are to die to ourselves so our neighbor can more fully live.  We are reminded of how we are called to such death and rebirth through how Jesus lived, died and rose from the dead for us.  In emulating and following Jesus, we are to model such love for each other.  I have seen a dear friend live out this love, throughout the whole time I have known him, and especially over the past year.  

Yesterday I visited this dear friend.  Years ago he asked me to address him as "Uncle," so here in this blog post I'll call him "Uncle."  Uncle is much older than I am.  He's the father of two friends of mine who were in college with me; I've known them for over twenty years.  Since we've been good friends for so long, years ago they introduced me to their father, who is Uncle.  
About nine months ago Uncle had a stroke.  He has been slowly recovering from this stroke: he cannot speak; he can move much less than he used to move.  He has been recuperating in long-term care facilities.  I have been struck by his tenacity and his determination.  Although he has faced significant challenges as he tries to regain his functioning, he has not been deterred.  

He has not given up.  He has kept trying to get better.  Although his body is broken, still he gives of himself.  

Jesus' body was broken for us.  Jesus gave of Himself for our sakes.  

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ.  Today we especially honor how Jesus gave up His body and His blood for us.   

When Jesus celebrated the Last Supper with His disciples, He broke the bread and gave it to His disciples, telling them, "This is My Body, given for you."  With the cup of wine, He told them, "This is My Blood, poured out for you."  As He gave them the bread and the cup, He instructed His disciples, "Do this in memory of me."*  Thus we celebrate the Eucharist when we celebrate Mass.  

Jesus has told us to do as he has done.  Give yourself up for your neighbor.  

Uncle is still giving of himself for the sake of his children and grandchildren.  By facing physical pain and incapacitation with resolve and fortitude, he is showing his children and his grandchildren how to respond courageously to formidable challenges.  In how he stays his course as he bravely grapples with his physical challenges, he is continuing to teach his children and his grandchildren about persistence, a labor of love to be honored today on Father's Day, and everyday.  

Uncle is embracing the duty God has placed before him.  Yesterday when I saw Uncle, I read to him an excerpt from "The Sacrament of the Present Moment" by Jean-Pierre de Caussade, which I felt he would find inspiring.  In it, de Caussade asks us, 

Is not a picture painted on a canvas by the application of one stroke of the brush at a time?  Similarly the cruel chisel destroys a stone with each cut.  But what the stone suffers by repeated blows is no less the shape the mason is making of it.  And should a poor stone be asked, "What is happening to you?" it might reply, "Don't ask me.  All I know is that for my part there is nothing for me to know or do, only to remain steady under the hand of my Master and to love Him and suffer Him to work out my destiny.  It is for Him to know how to achieve this.  I know neither what is best and most perfect, and I suffer each cut of the chisel as though it were the best thing for me, even though, to tell the truth, each one is my idea of ruin, destruction and defacement.  But, ignoring all this, I rest contented with the present moment.  Thinking only of my duty to it, I submit to the work of this skillful Master without caring to know what it is."  

God calls us to the duty of the present moment.  God seeks to shape us through means we would not have chosen on our own.  God speaks to us in ways we don't expect.  

I think of Father Bruno, one of the Camaldolese monks I met at the hermitage in Big Sur, and how he found encouragement in his monastic vocation in a way some might see as unlikely, as described in the book "Adam: God's Beloved" by Henri Nouwen.  Once Father Bruno had stopped serving as prior, or head, of the monastic community in Big Sur, he took a sabbatical to help him to transition from holding authority to once again being a regular monk.  During his three months away from the hermitage, Father Bruno stayed at one of the L'Arche homes for disabled people founded by Jean Vanier.  While caring for a young intellectually disabled man named Adam at a L'Arche home, Father Bruno related how this disabled man, who essentially could not speak, was helping him to be a better monk.  Father Bruno explained that he had known that he "had to become empty for God, gradually letting go of thoughts, emotions, feelings and passions" that prevent deep communion with God.  Father Bruno described how silent Adam was helping him to delve into deeper solitude and thus deeper communion with God.  

We find encouragement in our relationship with God through people we don't expect, and through circumstances we don't expect.  God speaks to us both through pleasure and through pain, both of which can help us to welcome God into our hearts.  

When we encounter hardship, it might not seem like a blessing to us.  In the moment, all we see and feel is our own misery.  Yet we can come to realize that by pouring ourselves out for our neighbor, we can help our neighbor more fully live.  If we embrace our suffering, we are well-positioned to love our neighbor.  If we consciously embrace our afflictions so that others can live better, we can witness our pain being transformed into a sacrifice of love.  A sacrifice lovingly given can bear beautiful fruit, which can be seen in how others come to love better through the example provided to them.  

Once we see that our suffering can become an occasion for us to better love our neighbor, we come to see that God allows us to encounter adversity for our own good.  And of course God allows us pleasure for our comfort.  And so we can come to see God in all things.  We can come to welcome ordeals once we see that God is working all for our good, if we just love Him.**  

Realizing that God works all for the good of those who love Him, we come to thank God always.***  Seeing that God is always loving us, since God is love,**** we come to ever more open our hearts to God.  Welcoming God as love, we welcome whatever God sends to us.  Out of love, we welcome God into our hearts.  Amen.  

* Matthew 26:26-28; Mark 14:22-24; Luke 22:19-20; 
1 Corinthians 11:23-25 

** Romans 8:28 

*** 1 Thessalonians 5:18 

**** 1 John 4:8,16 

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