Proclaim Your Identity

We find ourselves in our choices.  Out of challenges which force us to make decisions emerges who we are.  

Today we are encouraged to consider how, in our own choices we must realize who we are, as we celebrate the feast day of Saint Martin of Tours.  Saint Martin of Tours was a soldier in the Roman army in the fourth century.  He concluded he could not be both a soldier and a Christian.  He renounced his standing in the military, turned away from war and toward peace, and so courageously declared the truth of who he was.  

We must choose.  Do we realize who we are?  Do we proclaim our true identity?  

Give Him Honor

Who do we think we are?  What do we think we know?  What do we think we owe?  To whom do we think we owe it?  

In today's Gospel reading, Jesus speaks to us about what we owe and to whom we owe it.  In those verses we hear 

The Pharisees went off
and plotted how they might entrap Jesus in speech. 
They sent their disciples to him, with the Herodians, saying,
"Teacher, we know that you are a truthful man
and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.
And you are not concerned with anyone's opinion,
for you do not regard a person's status.
Tell us, then, what is your opinion:
Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?" 
Knowing their malice, Jesus said,
"Why are you testing me, you hypocrites? 
Show me the coin that pays the census tax." 
Then they handed him the Roman coin. 
He said to them, "Whose image is this and whose inscription?" 
They replied, "Caesar's."
At that he said to them,
"Then repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar
and to God what belongs to God."*  

When asked whether people had to pay taxes or not, Jesus asked for a coin.  He asked and was told that the emperor was shown on the coin.  Jesus then instructed us that we should give to the government what belongs to the government, and to God what belongs to God.  

In expounding upon Scripture, it has been written that we are to give to earthly rulers what is due to them, as long as it does not controvert what is due to God.**  With similar reasoning, some people conclude that they do not have to pay taxes, claiming that they need not pay taxes to a government which then uses taxpayers' money to fund warmaking.  The logic goes that since war is all too often unjust, citizens are not obligated to pay taxes to support unjust wars.  

However, Jesus did not teach us to pay taxes unless the government is waging an unjust war.  When he offered his reply on this question of whether we must pay taxes, the Roman empire was conquering and subduing many persons.  Jesus could have said that taxes should be paid, but not to the Romans since they were subjecting so many people to their forced imperial expansion.  However, he did not say so.  Despite the warmaking of the Roman empire, Jesus taught people to give to Caesar what was Caesar's.  

Elsewhere in Scripture we hear that we are to pay taxes.  Today in his sermon here at the hermitage, Father Cyprian reminded us that Saint Paul tells us, "Pay to all their dues, taxes to whom taxes are due, toll to whom toll is due, respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due."***  When taxes are due, we are to pay them.  We are to give the honor and respect to our leaders which is due to them as our earthly leaders.  We are to worship God since He is Our Heavenly Father, and we are to give Him the glory, praise, honor and adoration which is His due.  

Scripture tells us to pay the taxes we owe.  Jesus Himself directs us to give our earthly rulers what is due to them.  If we decide not to pay taxes, we turn away from Scripture.  We all have to decide whether or not to listen to Jesus.  

God tells us what we are called to do.  God has already chosen who we are.  Yet some people try to decide that they are someone other than who God made them to be.  Some people were born men but decide they want to be women.  God had already chosen their gender.  Some decisions have already been made for us.  If we try to ignore who God made us to be, we ignore the truth.  If we try to be people other than who God created us to be, we are living lies.  We all have to decide how we will relate to the truth.  

In deciding how we will relate to the truth, we either accept God or reject Him.  If we embrace who God made us to be, we welcome the truth into our hearts.  The truth is that God made us; He is our Creator.  We owe Him the respect due to Him as our Creator by respecting the choices He made for us when He knit us together in the womb.****  We pay him the respect and honor due to Him when we acknowledge our proper place before Him, that we are nothing without Him, that without Him we can do nothing.*****  To God be all glory, praise and honor, now and forevermore.  Amen.  

* Matthew 22:15-21 
** Jerusalem Bible, Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. (New York, 1990), p. 1646, note "d" to Matthew 22:21
*** Romans 13:7 
**** Psalm 139:13 
***** John 15:5 

Seek Her Intercession

October 13, 1917.  The town of Fatima.  Portugal.  The night before, it had rained torrentially; on October 13, the people there and the ground there were thoroughly soaked.  Seventy thousand people gathered in Fatima on October 13, 1917; they had heard that three little children had seen apparitions of a Lady there that year.  The Lady had promised that a miracle would take place when she appeared there on October 13.  

There, in Fatima, exactly one hundred years ago on this date, before 70,000 people, the sun danced back and forth in the sky, defying cosmic laws.  It fell toward the earth.  When the sun returned to its usual location and remained in its place, all the people there were completely dry, even though just a short time earlier, they had been drenched.  The ground too was dry, even though it had just been saturated.  

On October 13, the Lady identified herself as the Lady of the Rosary.  The three little children were Servant of God Lucia, Saint Jacinta and Saint Francisco.  

In her apparitions to them at Fatima, Our Blessed Mother Mary told them to pray the rosary everyday for world peace and for an end to the first world war.  She explained to them that Jesus wished to establish devotion to her Immaculate Heart.  

As we show devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Our Blessed Mother Mary, we welcome Jesus into our hearts, and thus are returning home to Our Heavenly Father.  When we pray seeking the intercession of Our Blessed Mother Mary, we are asking her to assist us in returning home to God.  She supports us in doing as Jesus told us to do because she loves her Son, because she loves God.  

Our Blessed Mother Mary, who is so kind and sweet and loving, who cares for us so tenderly, helps us to welcome Jesus into our hearts.  Just as she told the servants at the wedding feast in Cana, so she tells us about Jesus, "Do whatever He tells you."*  

If we beg Our Blessed Mother Mary to intercede with her Son Jesus for us, we request what we need to be able to do what Jesus commands us to do.  When we ask Our Blessed Mother Mary to intercede with her Son Jesus for us, we ask her to beseech Him that we may have all we need to do God's will.  Through her Spouse, The Holy Spirit, we are empowered to do the will of God.  Through her assistance, we are given the grace we need to do the will of Our Heavenly Father.  

Let us pour out our hearts to Our Blessed Mother Mary.  Let us implore her to come to our aid.  She loves us so tenderly and sweetly--indeed her will is love, since her will is the will of God, and we know that God is love**--that she will surely love us with great love.  

Knowing that Our Blessed Mother Mary loves us so much, we come to realize that we are tremendously aided in coming home to God, who is love, when we seek her intercession.  If we wish to return home to God, we have a powerful intercessor in Our Blessed Mother Mary to help us draw back to God.  Let us entrust ourselves to the loving care of Our Blessed Mother Mary, consecrate ourselves to her, and, greatly supported by her, thus return home to God.  Amen.  

* John 2:5 
** 1 John 4:8,16 

Presently Prayerfully Loving

Today is the anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki.  Today we also celebrate the feast day of Edith Stein, a nun martyred in Auschwitz.  One could think that these commemorations have nothing to do with how today I sat and talked with a recent college graduate.  Yet in all of these opportunities rests the duty of the present moment.  In every moment we are called by God.   
As we remember how a plutonium bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki exactly 72 years ago on August 9, 1945, killing tens of thousands of people, some of us might wonder what we can do to avert war.  I am convinced that in seeking world peace, the most effective step we can take is to pray.  I also strongly believe that we can take efficacious measures for world peace by praying the rosary.  One hundred years ago, at Fatima in Portugal, our Blessed Mother Mary instructed us to pray the rosary for world peace.  Had more people ardently implored our Blessed Mother Mary to intercede with her Son Jesus, the second world war would not have happened.  We fulfill the duty of the present moment when we pray.  

We also carry out the duty of the present moment, as was described in the eighteenth century by the Jesuit priest Jean-Pierre de Caussade, when we seek to do God's will.  Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, previously known as Edith Stein, was raised Jewish.  However, after voraciously reading the autobiography of Saint Teresa of Avila late into the night, she not only became Catholic, but eventually also became a Carmelite nun.  Due to her Jewish heritage, the Nazis arrested her and sent her to Auschwitz, where she died in a gas chamber, probably exactly 75 years ago, on August 9, 1942.  She said that we surely may pray to be spared, but that certainly we should add the additional prayer to God, "Not my will be done, but Thy will be done."*  We find God's will in the present moment, so when we submit to the present moment and what it demands of us, we obey God's will.  Wherever we are in the present, there may God's will be done.  Where we find ourselves, there we pray.  

Today I found myself sitting at the kitchen table here in the Catholic Worker House with a young woman who I heard speak at Mass this past weekend.  At the end of Mass she got up and spoke briefly about how she is devoting her efforts to helping other young people who have fallen away from their faith.  She indicated she would be happy to speak with anyone who would like to hear more about her work.  After Mass, I asked her to contact me.  We arranged for her to come here to the Catholic Worker House.  

In relating to me how she aims to get to know the persons she seeks to help, I felt indirectly guided in what she said.  It seemed to me that the Holy Spirit was speaking through her.  It occurred to me that perhaps Jesus was telling me that I must get to know the homeless people and other impoverished persons I aspire to serve as a Catholic Worker.  I believe that in hearing her story, I was being told how I am to live my life, how I am to love my neighbor as myself.**  I would want someone to care enough about me to get to know me, so as to understand me; thus I should get to know others so I can better understand them.  In better understanding others, I can more easily be compassionate towards them, and thus love them as I love myself.  When I find myself in the present moment, I am to listen as best I can to my neighbor.  In giving my neighbor my full attention, and learning about her, I love my neighbor, and thus I fulfill my duty to the present moment.  

We embrace the present moment when we love our neighbor.  We carry out the duty of the present when we pray.  We open our hearts to the present when we do the will of God.  No matter how disparate the circumstances, no matter what is happening, we are called to pray and to love our neighbor, and thus do our duty right now, and thus do the will of God.  Let us open our hearts, and love God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength,*** and our neighbor as ourselves, and thus do God's will.  Amen.  

* Matthew 26:39,42
** 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 

Peace Through Us

Jesus tells us first and foremost to love God with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our mind.  He tells us second to love our neighbor as ourselves.*  

In these two most important commandments, Jesus directs us to love.  We are to let love flow out of us to God and to our neighbor.  God asks us to open our hearts to the Holy Spirit, to help us to love Him.**  God asks us to consent to Him loving our neighbor through us.  

To love God, I must also love my neighbor.  Anyone who claims to love God but hates his or her neighbor is a liar.***  

To love my neighbor, I must not judge my neighbor.****  If I am judging my neighbor, there is no room in my heart to love my neighbor.   

We judge persons when we see what we do not like in them.  When I encounter thoughts, words and actions I dislike, I am to despise them in myself.  I am to be outraged at the appalling tendencies I notice in myself.  

I believe that the path to salvation is paved with despising my own horrible tendencies and begging God to forgive me out of His great mercy. We receive the infinite gift of God's immense mercy when we turn to look at ourselves, acknowledge our own sinfulness, and implore His mercy.  

Since I prefer to direct my energies toward how I need to improve, rather than on where other people might need to change, last week I made a choice reflecting this aspiration I have.  As I have previously mentioned, Catholic Workers regularly protest outside the facilities of a manufacturer of armaments here in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Last week I was asked to choose the short writings we would read before and after our protest.  

In line with the sentiments I have expressed about trying to focus on how I need to improve, for our brief reading just before the protest, I selected a composition in which the Trappist monk Thomas Merton wrote 

Instead of loving what you think is peace, love other men and love God above all.  And instead of hating the people you think are warmakers, hate the appetites and the disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war.  If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed--but hate these things in yourself, not in another.  

I strive to love my neighbor, though often I find it challenging, and although often I fail.  We love our neighbor by taking an honest look at ourselves and how we need to improve so we can better love our neighbor.  

Thus I prefer to focus on what I need to do to treat people better than I do.  To help work for peace, we can examine our own thoughts, words and actions.  As Gandhi suggested, "You must be the change you want to see in the world."  

Herein rests the reason why I don't protest more than I do and why I don't write about protesting more than I do.  While I find it important to speak out against injustice, I strongly contend that it is far more appropriate to try to improve myself than it is to point out why others are inappropriately acting. Since I wish to witness to peace, I want God to bring about peace through me.  For God to bring about peace through me, I must open my heart to God so He can transform me and thus create peace in the world, right now, in this very moment.  

Consequently, for our short reading together immediately after the protest, I selected the prayer commonly attributed to Saint Francis, which beseeches God 

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me bring love.
Where there is offense, let me bring pardon.
Where there is discord, let me bring union.
Where there is error, let me bring truth.
Where there is doubt, let me bring faith.
Where there is despair, let me bring hope.
Where there is darkness, let me bring your light.
Where there is sadness, let me bring joy.
O Master, let me not seek as much
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love,
for it is in giving that one receives,
it is in self-forgetting that one finds,
it is in pardoning that one is pardoned,
it is in dying that one is raised to eternal life.  

We can agree to God's plan to be channels of His peace.  We can consent to God bringing peace to the world through us.  

In every little fragment of time, in the present moment God is always extending His hand to us, inviting us to open our hearts to Him.  He is requesting that we assent to His will and open our hearts to Him, and love Him, so that He may enter into our hearts and love our neighbor through us, and thus bring peace into the world through us.  Let us open our hearts to God so He may abide in us,***** love through us and bring us peace.  Amen.  

* Matthew 22:37-39; Mark 12:30-31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Deuteronomy 6:5; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
** Romans 5:5 
*** 1 John 4:20 
**** Matthew 7:1; Luke 6:37 
***** John 15:7 

Gift Of Life

None of us would be here if God hadn't created us.  Our lives are gifts from God.  Owing all of our being to God, we are thus called to value and love our lives, and the life of every other person.  

If we realize that we have everything we have because they are all gifts from God, we treasure all that God gives us.  If we truly cherish what God gives, then we value all life, for all life is a gift from God.  

If we truly view all life as precious, then we seek to protect life which will come into being.  When we honestly consider all life valuable, then we seek to protect a fertilized egg which is called to be born as a human being.  

For a while now I have thought about how, once a woman is pregnant, if she takes no steps to intervene in what has already started, then she will give birth to a child.  A process has begun which will result in a human being in the world.  

And so, insofar as I hold dear and respect the sanctity of all human lives, whether they have already been born or will soon be born, for some time I have been wanting to protest against abortion.  Thus when I saw pro-life protesters outside an abortion clinic as I was driving home from Mass today, I pulled over and joined them.  

I walked up to some of the protesters and greeted them.  I picked up one of the spare signs they had resting in a box.  I held the sign as I alternately stood and sat on the sidewalk.  

We were gathered on a busy street.  In each direction three lanes of traffic were flowing.  The speed limit there is 35 miles per hour.  

It's a busier street than the one where I go with other Catholic Workers to protest at least once a month outside the facilities of a manufacturer of armaments.  Thus I suppose it's understandable that today in this pro-life protest, I witnessed more feedback, both positive and negative, than all the reactions I've seen in the dozen or so times I've protested outside the arms manufacturer's location.  

I am not the only Catholic Worker who protests both war-making and abortion.  I see a common thread in protesting both war and abortion, namely the sanctity of life.  I protest nuclear weapons because I value life so much that I do not want human beings to be vaporized by nuclear warheads.  I protest abortion because I value life so much that I do not want fetuses to be robbed of the life they will experience as human beings outside of the womb, which they are already on the path to experiencing.  

In short, I value life.  I oppose abortion.  I aim to stop the arms trade.  I am not in support of people executing anyone through the death penalty.  I do not favor physicians helping patients to commit suicide.  I respect and honor all life; I oppose all attempts to prevent and extinguish life.  

I want to encourage others to value life.  I am glad I was born; I am grateful to God for the life He has given me.  

Life comes into being when a man and a woman choose to share in the reproductive act and thus participate in the miracle of life.  If this process has started, it should be allowed to run its natural course.  What God has allowed to come together, let no person put asunder.  

God holds each life in the palm of His hand.  Let us trust in God to let each life unfold according to His divine plan.  

Let us value the life we have, in our bodies, and in the bodies of others.  Let us appreciate the gifts God has given us and others.  Let us value the lives others can live; let us give them the chances we have had.  Let us value others' lives as we value our own lives.  Let us love others as we love ourselves,* as Jesus has instructed us to do.    

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

Light In Darkness

This morning I walked out of the house and saw a particular young homeless man straightening up our front porch.  He's the same young man I mentioned in a post a couple of weeks ago.  Here I'll again call him "Brendon."  

As Brendon was organizing all of the free property that no one had yet claimed from the front porch, I greeted him, "Good morning, Brendon.  How are you?"  

He replied frankly, "I'm high."  After pausing briefly, he continued, "I've been trying to stop.   I only got high twice yesterday.  Three weeks ago I was using eighteen times a day."  

I said, "You're making progress.  This is great news."  I was so glad to have heard that he was taking steps toward taking care of himself, so I added, "Thanks for telling me."  

Once we had finished speaking with each other, I crossed the street to go over to the van I use.  As he left the Catholic Worker House, Brendon rode his bicycle over to me and we spoke a bit more.  As we talked, he admitted, "I've got to stop taking drugs.  It's going to kill me."  

Brendon admitted the consequences of his own actions.  He saw what he had been doing to himself through his own choices.  He saw where he was heading if he continued making similar decisions.  

He realizes he's got to change his behavior.  He knows it will take time to change.  He is changing his habits a little more with each passing day.  

On the road to recovery, we take little steps.  Through the little acts of love we perform for others and for ourselves, we follow "The Little Way" of Saint Therese of Lisieux, in the way she described as her way of getting to Heaven.  We can choose to take care of ourselves and others with every little choice we make.  

It truly made my day today when I heard Brendon express how he is trying to care for himself.  I felt so encouraged in hearing about his gradual efforts to reform his life, little by little.  In the last few days, I have felt as if a dark cloud has been pressing upon my soul.  Whether I have felt this encroaching darkness due to unfortunate events taking place in the world, or because my particular soul is threatened by spiritual warfare, I do not know; I only know I have felt more keenly over the last few days a certain darkness.  

With the choices Brendon has been making, he seems like a light shining in the darkness.  A light has been shining in the darkness, and the darkness has not put it out.*  The light has been shining, and the darkness has been receding.  He is progressing toward recovery.  As he emerges out of darkness, he is letting light shine out to others.  

As he takes responsibility for himself, he is taking responsibility for making the world a better place.  By caring for himself, he is making the world a better place.  In improving his health, and thus improving the world, he doesn't realize it, but he is encouraging me.  He is giving me more hope.  He is making me feel better about the state of affairs in the world, because I see valuable, concrete, healthy change occurring right in front of me.  I see him loving himself, and I see the love I want to see others displaying in the world.  

When we love ourselves, we love others.  We are reassuring others that we care about ourselves.  We are setting their minds at ease, and thus we are caring for them as we care for ourselves.  

In caring for himself by striving to overcome his addiction, this young homeless drug addict was consoling me, although he did not realize it.  This young man, living on the fringes, is considered a derelict by society.  Yet he was ministering to me.  

By our society's standards, he would be seen as someone to ignore and push aside.  Jesus has told us that whatever we do to the least of those among us, we do to Him.**  And in what the least among us say to us, we find Jesus ministering unto us.  We find the love we need from Jesus coming to us from those who are least among us.  

If we look to those who are least among us, we will find the love we need.  If we go to those who are least among us, we find Jesus.  In the midst of the darkness, we find the light we seek.  

* John 1:5 
** Matthew 25:40 

Fear Not Foreigners

Today we are faced with a fundamental choice: do we fear, or do we love?  Do we close our hearts to those in need, or do we open our hearts and our doors to people desperate for help?  

We face this choice each and every day.  At times this choice is brought into sharp relief by what is happening in our world.  

We have been encountering this tension since before we can remember our history as humans.  Two millenia ago, Jesus and His disciples were subjected to exclusion because people feared them as strangers.  In today's Gospel reading, we hear that 

Jesus and his disciples came to the other side of the sea, 
to the territory of the Gerasenes.  
When he got out of the boat, 
at once a man from the tombs 
who had an unclean spirit met him.  
The man had been dwelling among the tombs,
and no one could restrain him any longer, even with a chain.
In fact, he had frequently been bound with shackles and chains, 
but the chains had been pulled apart by him 
and the shackles smashed, 
and no one was strong enough to subdue him.
Night and day among the tombs and on the hillsides 
he was always crying out and bruising himself with stones.  
Catching sight of Jesus from a distance, 
he ran up and prostrated himself before him, 
crying out in a loud voice, 
"What have you to do with me, 
Jesus, Son of the Most High God?  
I adjure you by God, do not torment me!"  
(He had been saying to him, 
"Unclean spirit, come out of the man!")  
He asked him, "What is your name?"  
He replied, "Legion is my name. There are many of us."  
And he pleaded earnestly with him 
not to drive them away from that territory.  

Now a large herd of swine was feeding there on the hillside.  
And they pleaded with him, 
"Send us into the swine. Let us enter them."  
And he let them, 
and the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine.  
The herd of about two thousand rushed down a steep bank 
into the sea, 
where they were drowned.  
The swineherds ran away and reported the incident in the town 
and throughout the countryside.  
And people came out to see what had happened.  
As they approached Jesus, 
they caught sight of the man 
who had been possessed by Legion, 
sitting there clothed and in his right mind.  
And they were seized with fear.  
Those who witnessed the incident 
explained to them what had happened 
to the possessed man and to the swine.  
Then they began to beg him to leave their district.  
As he was getting into the boat, 
the man who had been possessed pleaded to remain with him.  
But Jesus would not permit him but told him instead, 
"Go home to your family and announce to them 
all that the Lord in his pity has done for you." 
Then the man went off 
and began to proclaim in the Decapolis 
what Jesus had done for him; 
and all were amazed.*  

Today I heard a brief sermon on this Gospel passage which provided new insight about it to me.  This morning here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, as we usually do on Monday mornings, we gathered with each other and with other Catholic Workers from around the San Francisco Bay Area.  After updating each other about our lives, we moved into the living room for our liturgy together.  Our dear friend Steve, who is a Jesuit priest, presided at our house Mass here.  In his brief sermon, Steve explained to us that in these verses, Jesus and His disciples had traveled out of Jewish territory.  During this story, they were strangers to the people they met.  

The residents of that area asked them to leave.  We are told that they were afraid when they saw the man who had been possessed by a demon, who used to scream and bruise himself with rocks, now sitting in his right mind.  

Why did they ask Jesus and His disciples to leave?  Jesus and His disciples were strangers to them.  Jesus had just performed a miracle, expelling a demon out of a man who had been hitherto known for his screaming and bruising himself with stones.  The people living in that area could not understand how this man had just been miraculously transformed from being a madman into a mentally stable, sane person.  

People fear what they do not understand.  People fear what and who they do not know.  People fear the stranger.  People fear someone else they haven't gotten to know, when they haven't spent time with that person.  

We make judgments about people based on little or no information.  We fear people when we know nothing about them.   

If we're busy fearing someone, we are closing our hearts to them.  If we fear our neighbor, we are closing our hearts also to God, for we are closing ourselves off from the love which God wishes to shower upon us through our neighbor.  If we fear our neighbor, we cannot open our hearts to be able to love our neighbor.  

In love there is no room for fear, for perfect love drives out fear.**  When we purely love, we do not fear the person in front of us.  If we purely love, we do not fear what might happen through our decision to love.  When we perfectly love, we simply extend the love which is needed by the person in front of us.  

Unfortunately people are often motivated by fear to exclude others they do not know, have never or barely met, and who they do not understand.  As the mayor of Philadelphia recently described, at the airport there this weekend, officials detained and then turned away Syrian refugees.  He related that by all accounts they had waited to obtain months to obtain the proper documentation to be able to legally enter the U.S.  He added that they were being sent back to a war-ravaged nation.  They will be endangered for various reasons.  

Jesus was similarly endangered.  When Jesus was a baby, He and Saint Joseph and Our Blessed Mother Mary were refugees.  They fled from their home country to Egypt.***  As if these details of their flight into Egypt were not enough to make us recognize Jesus in refugees among us, Jesus has told us that whatever we do to the least of those among us, we do to Him.****  Jesus has explained to us that when we fail to welcome the stranger, we reject Him.*****  When we turn away refugees, we refuse to welcome Jesus.  

When we fear what might happen to us from loving someone else, we cannot love that other person.  When we fear, we wall ourselves off from love.  In fearing our neighbor, we close ourselves off from what we might learn from our neighbor.  By fearing our neighbor, we refuse to learn from our neighbor.  

I have learned in my own life that we have much to learn from people of foreign cultures.  When I served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Morocco, I enjoyed the gracious hospitality of  Moroccans who were Muslim.  I had never before been offered such generous hospitality by anyone in the United States.  

Which of us living here in the United States would invite a stranger into our home to share lunch with us?  Many foreigners who visit Morocco receive exactly such a welcome.  After being treated to such a meal by Moroccans they have just met, guests are often told by their Moroccan hosts that if they would like to lay down, and even nap, they may do so.  Which of us here in the states would extend such hospitality to someone we had just met?  

While I was a Peace Corps Volunteer, another Peace Corps Volunteer asked me how my life would be different once I returned to the states.  I replied that I was looking forward to extending hospitality to others.  And so I was influenced in my decision to enter a reformed Benedictine monastic community, since Benedictine monks offer hospitality to visitors.  I was influenced in my decision to enter monastic life at the hermitage in Big Sur because Moroccans had implicitly encouraged me to extend hospitality to others through their own shining examples.  

Similarly, I was influenced in my decision to become a Catholic Worker, practicing hospitality, and reaching out to those who are homeless, because Moroccans had shown me the importance of providing hospitality.  They had provided me outstanding examples of how to extend hospitality to others.  

I learned how to extend hospitality from Moroccans, who are Muslim.  To exclude all people of certain religions, or of particular nations, as is current practice, is to wall ourselves off from what they have to teach us.  If we refuse to welcome entire groups of people, we refuse many opportunities to love, to learn and to grow.  If we reject whole groups of people, we reject Jesus many times.  If we refuse to welcome refugees, we reject Jesus in our actions, regardless of whether we claim to be compassionate toward refugees.  

We choose everyday whether or not we will welcome the stranger.  We decide each day if we will open our hearts to love our neighbor or if out of fear we will close ourselves off to our neighbor.  We must always be deciding whether we will choose to learn from our neighbor and grow as loving human beings, or if we will choose to exclude our neighbor and refuse to be taught by him or her.  

If we have humility, we will want to learn from our neighbor.  We will realize that even though someone is different from us, we can learn from that person.  

If we have humility, we will embrace opportunities to learn, and thus grow, and thus love better.  If we are not humble, we will reject chances to learn from our neighbor, walling ourselves off from how God seeks to teach us through our neighbor.  

Always we are presented with these choices on our spiritual path.  Everyday we must choose between love and fear.  

* Mark 5:1-20 
** 1 John 4:18 
*** Matthew 2:13-15 
**** Matthew 25:40 
***** Matthew 25:43 

Stop Trading Arms

Why do I protest?  I protest partly out of obedience to the Catholic Church.  

In a speech Pope Francis delivered to a joint session of Congress, the Pope told us, "It is our duty to stop the arms trade."  Therefore, I must do something to do my part to try to stop the arms trade.  I need not protest, but I must do something to try to stop the production, sale and transfer of armaments.  I try to fulfill my duty to stop the arms trade partly by protesting.  

Thus this morning other Catholic Workers and I protested on a street corner near the facilities of a prime producer of armaments here in the San Francisco Bay Area.  This particular manufacturer has developed intercontinental ballistic missiles as well as air-to-air missiles.  On the street corner, I was holding a sign which said 

IT IS OUR DUTY TO STOP THE ARMS TRADE 
- Pope Francis 

In standing on street corners outside the facilities of a major arms manufacturer, as Catholic Workers we seek to afflict the comfortable.  We aim to nudge out of their comfort zone those who are numb to the consequences of their producing armaments.  We invite those involved in the production of armaments to question the work they are doing, why they are doing it, who they are affecting and how they are affecting them.  

Dorothy Day, who founded the Catholic Worker movement in 1933 along with Peter Maurin, sought to afflict the comfortable in addition to comforting the afflicted.  She fed hungry impoverished people who stood in the breadline outside the Catholic Worker House in the Bowery neighborhood of New York City.  

As Catholic Workers we work for justice by feeding those who are hungry.  Pope Paul VI said, "If you want peace, work for justice."   Catholic Workers offer food and housing to those who are indigent, helping to respect these persons' basic human rights.  Catholic Workers labor for justice by striving to ensure that all of our brothers and sisters are treated with dignity.  In so working for justice, we work for peace.  

Yet we also realize peace by choosing peace rather than violence.  When the chief priests and Pharisees and guards arrived at the Garden of Gethsemane to arrest Jesus, Saint Peter drew his sword and cut off the ear of Malchus, the high priest's servant.  Jesus told Saint Peter to put his sword back in its scabbard.*  At that point, Jesus taught against resorting to violence, warning, "All who draw the sword will die by the sword."**  

Jesus told Saint Peter, the man who was to become the rock upon which His church was going to be founded, to put away his sword.  In so directing him, and in His coming, Jesus fulfilled the words of the prophets.  The prophet Isaiah prophesied 

In days to come, 
The mountain of the Lord's house 
shall be established as the highest mountain 
and raised above the hills.  
All nations shall stream toward it.  
Many peoples shall come and say: 
"Come, let us go up to the Lord's mountain, 
to the house of the God of Jacob, 
That he may instruct us in His ways, 
and we may walk in His paths."  
For from Zion shall go forth instruction, 
and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem.
He shall judge between the nations, 
and set terms for many peoples.
They shall beat their swords into plowshares 
and their spears into pruning hooks; 
One nation shall not raise the sword against another 
nor shall they train for war again.***  

Today we can beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks.  Today we can convert our spending on the development of missiles into spending on the development of the capabilities of human beings.  As a Christian, and as a Catholic, I am compelled to speak out against immense budgetary outlays for military spending.  When we have so many homeless people sleeping in bushes, we are not seeing justice realized, and thus we are endangering peace.  Rather than spending $582,000,000,000 on defense in 2015,**** in the United States we could have re-allocated some of that gigantic sum toward building low-income housing and to providing more mental health services and drug rehabilitation programs to care for our poor brothers and sisters.  Jesus has described that after we die, He will say, "In truth I tell you, insofar as you did this to one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did it to me."*****  By redirecting our funds from stockpiling armaments to caring for our poor neighbor, we turn our attention and energies to Jesus Himself.  

We are either caring for those who are poor or we are taking steps to make life more insecure for them.  Similarly, we are either directing our energies toward peace, or we are doing something to bring the world closer to war.  We bring the world closer to either peace or war through our deeds, our words, and our thoughts.  When Our Blessed Mother Mary appeared to the children Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta in Fatima, Portugal in 1917, she urged them to pray the rosary everyday for world peace.   

We are either doing what we can to strive for peace or to work for war.  As Albert Einstein noted, "You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war."  

When we stockpile weapons, we act out of fear.  In love there is no room for fear.******  When we truly have faith in God, we do not fear, for we trust in God.  With faith in God, we have sure confidence in Him.  Trusting God, we choose love rather than fear.  

With true faith, it is easy to have the imagination necessary to envision a better world.  Seeing what lies ahead for us, we know that we must love our neighbor, to care for those who are least among us.  

Then we are aware that we need not worry about protecting ourselves at the expense of loving our neighbor; if we were to choose to try to protect ourselves, we would harm both ourselves and our neighbor.  In choosing not to love our neighbor, we become less than what we have always been meant to be.  We harm ourselves when we refuse to love, for we deny our true potential.  

With faith, we open ourselves to the creativity God wishes to unleash on the world through us.  If we wish to be truly bold, we choose to love when others are not doing so.  If we want to be truly courageous, we will lead on the path of love when no one else appears willing to follow.  

If we would be profoundly brave, we would give up our defenses.  Then we let God work through us.  To have the humility to make ourselves completely vulnerable at the hands of God, to totally trust in God: that is true courage, the most heroic act one can possibly make in this lifetime, and one which will be richly rewarded in the next life.  

* John 18:3, 10-11; Matthew 26:50-51 
** Matthew 26:52 
*** Isaiah 2:2-4 
**** "The Federal Budget in 2015: An Infographic," The Congressional Budget Office 
***** Matthew 25:40 
****** 1 John 4:18