Trust Gives Strength

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

* Matthew 25:40 

Discerning My Vocation

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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 

Protestors Seek Truth

Why do I write?  I write because I feel called to write.  I write because I seek to reveal the truth.  I write because I cherish the truth.  

I protest because I value the truth.  In the film "Paul VI," Pope Paul VI is about to meet with a discontented young man who is politically disenchanted.  Someone asks the pope, "Why are you meeting with him?"  The pope replies, "He who protests seeks the truth."  

In protesting as a Catholic Worker, I am supported by a nationwide community of other Catholic Workers who also protest.  We seek to reveal the truth, to call attention to the truth, and to cry out with loud disapproval, that injustices are occurring.  

People protest because injustices occur.  When injustice occurs, the perpetrators deny the truth that all human beings were created by God with certain rights which may not be denied to them.  God created us to love and adore Him and to love and respect each other: He created us to glorify Him and praise Him and serve Him and love our neighbor.  We are to love our neighbor as ourselves.*  Thus all persons deserve to be treated with respect, so that we all may flourish and grow as individuals.  When people protest, they object to people being denied such basic rights.  

When the leader of a nation mocks a disabled reporter whose job is to report the truth, we are not encouraged to value the truth.  When the chief executive of a country speaks about being able to grab women's genitalia, women are treated as if they were objects.  When people are demeaned in these ways, the truth of each person's dignity is trampled.  Since an injustice against one person is a violation against everyone, protestors take to the streets to demand respect for people's basic human rights.  

I have been distressed at how someone elected to lead a country has deemed it acceptable to debase others in such flagrant ways.  However, I find it far more disturbing that so many people implicitly approve of such degrading behavior.  

Yet we have been long encouraged to lower our standards for who is fit to run our country.  We live in a country in which it has become increasingly evident that our leaders do not value honesty.  We also live in a country in which it is apparently acceptable for our leaders to drift further and further from the truth.  When our leaders lie to us, we are shown that they do not honor the truth.  Years later, when government officials counter the truth with what are then called "alternative facts," we see that we are governed by people who do not value the truth.  

We live under people in power who implicitly encourage us to ignore the truth that all people deserve to be treated with dignity.  And so protestors take to the streets.  We march and we protest to witness to the truth that all human beings must be accorded their basic human rights, that all persons are to be treated with respect.  

And in such circumstances, how are we to treat the duly elected leader of our country?  We are told, "Honor the king."**  If someone was elected to run the country, we acknowledge that that person was indeed elected to that office.  

Furthermore, we are called to repay disrespect with love.  Jesus directed us, "Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you."***  For if we do otherwise, we become what we despise.  

Jesus instructed us, "Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God."****  What belongs to God?  We owe God our allegiance to the truth.  We must be willing to defend the truth.  We must defend all of the truth.  If we defend only part of the truth, then we are defending a half truth.  Since we are not defending all of what we know to be true, we are not being true to ourselves.  We are being half of ourselves.  Then we fail to love either ourselves or our neighbor as ourselves.  

Would we cry out at injustice done to ourselves?  Then we must cry out at injustices committed against others.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  

* Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 
** 1 Peter 2:17 
*** Matthew 5:44 
**** Mark 12:17 

Love Your Neighbor

Once again I feel the time is ripe to write.  What do I have to say?  I write about who is right in front of me.  I relate what is happening right in front of me.  Although they might seem ordinary and unremarkable, all our interactions are opportunities for making the world a better place.  When we interact with each other, we are invited to make choices in which we love each other.  

As I've pointed out before, in the end all we will have will be the consequences of our own actions.  After we have died, the time for action will be over.  Therefore, the time for action is now.  

And so I urge you to consider what you can do right now.  How do you feel you can best act right now?  As I've previously encouraged, and as Gandhi suggested, "You must be the change you want to see in the world."  

Do you feel there should be more compassion in the world?  Then be more compassionate.  

Do you feel people should be more tolerant?  Show the tolerance you would like to see.  

Do you believe persons should conduct themselves with more decorum and should respect others more?  Show the respect you would like others to show.  

Model the behavior you want to see being displayed.  Show how you feel people should act.  

Recently someone described to me how he envisioned meeting someone holding drastically different political views than he holds.  He said he imagined embracing the person.  Now I am not suggesting that we should always make such a gesture toward such a person.  However, there are other loving ways of responding to someone with whom I am at odds.  I am recalling situations where a person was yelling at someone else and the recipient of the anger replied in a calm, soft, gentle voice, and the tone of the conversation shifted.  We are responsible for what we bring to every interaction we have.  If we respond with love to someone, we can cause the overall tone of the exchange with that person to be more loving.  Do we want love to reign in the world?  Jesus told us to love each other as He has loved us.*  And so we are called to do our best to love our neighbor.  

Love the person who is right in front of you.  Each of us has responsibilities to each other.  Each of us has responsibilities to ourselves.  

I am remembering a young man who often shows up here at the Catholic Worker House.  Here I'll call him "Brendon."  Brendon is probably in his mid to late twenties.  When I saw him earlier this week, he was taking refuge here at the house from some of the rain.  

As we talked, Brendon admitted to me that he takes illicit drugs.  He looked pale.  As he often does, he seemed to have difficulty focusing.  

He asked, "I don't look good, do I?"  

One of the Catholic Workers here replied, slightly softly, shaking his head, "No, you don't."  

"Thank you for your honesty.  I appreciate that."  

"You're welcome.  That's one of the things I'm supposed to do for you, is be honest with you."  

We began to talk with him about how he could enter a drug rehab program.  He said he was getting someone's help to try to get into a program.

I pointed out to him, "You've taken an important first step.  You've admitted you need help.  You've admitted you can't do this without someone else's help."  

We have the responsibility to ourselves to be honest with ourselves.  We have the responsibility to be honest with each other.  

We are called to love ourselves.  We are called to love each other.  

Love yourself.  Love the person right in front of you.  Listen to the person in front of you.  Even though it may be difficult, especially when someone is saying things we find inconsiderate or hurtful, we can choose to try to show that person the love we wish that person would show to us.  

If we respond to hateful behavior with hate, we show the same offensive behavior we abhor.  We create more pain in addition to the pain we already feel.  We become what we hate.  We become hate.  

Instead of continuing the cycle of hate, Jesus calls us to love our enemies, and to pray for those who persecute us.**  Then, by refusing to be like those who distress us and disturb us through their exclusionary and unwelcoming behavior, we can choose to respond in an inclusive, respectful and considerate way.  Then we create the world we want to see.  By modeling the loving behavior we wish to see in the world, we indeed make the world the kind of place we want it to be.   

* John 13:34 
** Matthew 5:44 

Wonders Far Beyond

For a few weeks now in my mind has been reverberating part of the Gospel reading from the Mass on Christmas Eve.  There we heard 

Now this is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.  
When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, 
but before they lived together, 
she was found with child through the Holy Spirit.  
Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, 
yet unwilling to expose her to shame, 
decided to divorce her quietly.  
Such was his intention when, behold, 
the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, 
“Joseph, son of David, 
do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home.  
For it is through the Holy Spirit 
that this child has been conceived in her.  
She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, 
because he will save his people from their sins.”  
All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said 
through the prophet:
Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, 
and they shall name him Emmanuel, 
which means “God is with us.”  
When Joseph awoke, 
he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him 
and took his wife into his home.  
He had no relations with her until she bore a son, 
and he named him Jesus.*   

Before Our Blessed Mother Mary and Saint Joseph lived together, he found out that she was pregnant.  Perhaps from his perspective he felt that what he had been expecting had been ruined.  Maybe he had been looking forward to a life of marriage with a devoted partner, and then was disappointed to discover that his wife was pregnant, seemingly by another man.  He very well may have felt that his hopes had been dashed and shattered.  

And so he planned to divorce her.  He decided to end his and Mary's marriage.  

Then God spoke.  When Joseph was about to act, in effect God stepped in front of Joseph.  God sent his angel to Joseph.  The angel explained to Joseph that all was not lost.  All was far from lost.  Rather, through this unexpected pregnancy God came to save all who otherwise would have been lost.  

Rather than all being lost, just the opposite was about to come true: all were about to be saved.  Instead of a pregnancy unmasking a betrayal of infidelity, Mary, in her obedient and submissive fidelity to the will of God, had humbly assented to the miraculous intervention of the Holy Spirit, and thus had come to be expecting a child.  The child in Mary had come to be through God Himself, through the Holy Spirit.  

When Joseph thought that all he had come to expect had been ruined, in fact it turned out that God had a plan which was immeasurably glorious.  God had a plan which was far better than anything that Joseph or anyone else could have conceived.  God Himself was going to pay the infinite debt we owe to Him.  As God explained to Saint Catherine of Siena, in committing sin, we offend God, who is infinitely good, and thus commit an infinite offense against Him, which none of us as finite beings could ever pay.  God was setting in motion a chain of events, with the conception of Jesus in the womb of Mary, which would lead to our redemption, through the suffering and death on the cross of His Son, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  

When events seemingly take a turn for the worse in our lives, what do we think?  One friend of mine recently went through a painful breakup with someone who is now her ex.  When we part ways with someone, of course we feel pain.  We feel the pain of separation.  I do not mean to suggest that we should not feel sorrow at parting with others.  It is only human to feel sad when we part with others.  When there is a parting of the ways in our lives, whether it be through a breakup, or the passing away of someone we love, in that separation we naturally feel pain and sorrow. 

Yet we are also called to seek and find meaning in the pain we feel.  God is always seeking to teach us, to help us learn, so that we may grow.  God is always calling us back home to Him.  He seeks to help us get there in a variety of ways, through pleasure and joy, pain and sorrow, depending on the need of each of us at particular junctures in our lives, according to His infinite wisdom.  Are we open to learning what God wants us to learn, to become better people, to become more than we have been, to become who and what God has always intended us to be?  Do we trust God to lead us to the knowledge of who we are meant to become?  

To accept this invitation from God, we need to gain true self-knowledge.  We must realize that we are nothing, a fact that is true for every person alive: without God, each and every one of us is nothing.  In realizing our true identity, we simultaneously realize our actual identity in relation to God's true identity: none of us can reach God without His help.  

To reach this point of realizing who we really are, and how we must completely trust God and rely on Him, we are called to much humility.  We need to cast off the shackles of pride which separate us from God and from the plan He has for us which is far better than anything we can envision on our own.  

When events unfold in our lives which we were not expecting, which seem to us to be ruining our lives, do we think of our own plans?  I think right now too of another friend of mine who became homeless last week.  Literally he has not had a place to call home since then.  Yet since then he spent two days enjoying the generous hospitality of some thoughtful, kind and compassionate hosts in free accommodations with ocean views.  There he enjoyed complimentary food as well.  Having such blessings abundantly bestowed on him, perhaps he is seeing the beginnings of how God cares for us when we expect that all is lost.  

Do we think about how God not only can, but in fact does, plan steps for us which lead us in ways far better than we could ever imagine?  To admit and embrace how God can plan much better for us than we ever could, we are called to be humble.  When we allow ourselves to be humbled, God assists us.  God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.**  Selah.  I intentionally utilize that particular word, in that particular language, right now.  Selah, used in Scripture, means to meditate upon what has been said.  Again I say that God gives grace to the humble, which empowers those who are humble not only to survive, but, through the grace of God, to thrive in conditions which would otherwise break and crush the human soul.  Thus, for souls who are humble, such persons are positioned to be at their best in the midst of inordinately stressful trials.  

For someone who realizes that when life circumstances seem to be at their worst, the best can occur, such a person not only decides to endure severe and intense tribulations, but gladly welcomes them.  This kind of person is joyous in the midst of what many would view as horrible misfortune.  Such a person is grateful for such a fate, which many others would view as a sentence that one has been forsaken by God.  Such people rejoice at such a turn of events because in their sure faith in God, they totally trust in Him.  They know that God can do wonders far beyond what we could ever imagine in such circumstances.  Selah.  

* Matthew 1:18-25 
** 1 Peter 5:5; James 4:6 

Questioning Our Fears

On Sunday this week we celebrated the Epiphany of Our Lord Jesus, when the Wise Men came looking for Him and visited Him as a newborn baby.  That day in the Gospel reading we heard that 

When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, 
in the days of King Herod, 
behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, 
"Where is the newborn king of the Jews?  
We saw his star at its rising 
and have come to do Him homage."  
When King Herod heard this, 
he was greatly troubled, 
and all Jerusalem with him.  
Assembling all the chief priests and the scribes of the people, 
He inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.  
They said to him, "In Bethlehem of Judea, 
for thus it has been written through the prophet: 
'And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah,
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
since from you shall come a ruler,
who is to shepherd my people Israel.'"  
Then Herod called the magi secretly 
and ascertained from them the time of the star's appearance.  
He sent them to Bethlehem and said, 
"Go and search diligently for the child.  
When you have found Him, bring me word, 
that I too may go and do Him homage."  
After their audience with the king they set out.  
And behold, 
the star that they had seen at its rising preceded them, 
until it came and stopped over the place where the child was.  
They were overjoyed at seeing the star, 
and on entering the house 
they saw the child with Mary His mother.  
They prostrated themselves and did Him homage.  
Then they opened their treasures 
and offered Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  
And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, 
they departed for their country by another way.*  

When King Herod heard that Jesus, thought to be the King of the Jews, had been born, Herod was very troubled.  Herod was king, yet he heard of a king being born.  

Herod wanted to find out where the Messiah was to be born.  Keep in mind that the prevailing conception of the Messiah back then was in stark contrast to how today we view Jesus, as Messiah, as saving us through His dying for us and His rising from the grave, triumphing over death for us.  However, back then, the Messiah was expected to be a nationalistic and bellicose ruler who would liberate Israel from its enemies.**  

In this context, Herod wanted to know where the Messiah was going to be born because Herod viewed the Messiah as a threat to Herod holding onto power.  Thus Herod asked where the Messiah was to be born.  Who did Herod ask?  He asked the chief priests and the scribes.  He asked the people who were most knowledgeable about the sacred Scriptures.  He asked the people who were most likely to know where the Messiah would be born.  

Herod was king of Judea, Idumaea and Samaria.  Jesus born in Bethlehem, which was in Judea, where Herod governed as king.  
From Herod's point of view, the Messiah had just been born where Herod was governing.  Herod thought that the new king was going to become king right where Herod was king.  

Herod saw Jesus as a threat to Herod's power.  Herod thought that Jesus would grow up and rule as king right after Herod.  However, as Jesus told Pontius Pilate just before Jesus was sentenced to die on the cross, Jesus' Kingdom is not of this earth.***  Rather, Jesus' Kingdom is in Heaven.  

Herod feared Jesus since he was convinced that Jesus would take over Herod's kingship.  However, Herod actually had no reason to fear that Jesus would usurp Herod's kingship.  
Yet a little later in his life, Herod had much reason to fear Jesus for a different reason.  When Herod realized that the magi decided not to return to him and inform him where the Messiah had been born, Herod was furious.  Then Herod had slaughtered all the male children in Bethlehem and the surrounding countryside who were two years old and younger.****  Having ordered such widespread murder of innocent children, then Herod had much reason to fear Jesus, who will judge all people at the Final Judgment after we die.  

Yet when Jesus was born, Herod incorrectly judged Jesus to be a threat to Herod's ruling power.  Herod was mistaken in his assessment of the situation.  Herod feared when he should not have feared.  

Who does each of us fear?  Who do we see as a threat?  Are those people we see as dangerous actually not cause for concern?  

Often we see the stranger as a threat because the stranger is someone we do not know.  As humans we fear who and what we do not know.  

Yet might the stranger actually be someone who has been helping us?  I think of poor people who have come here, often illegally, from Mexico and nearby countries.  Impoverished migrant farmworkers come to the United States from Mexico and Central American countries to work in fields in the United States.  They pick and pack vegetables and fruits, valuable and indispensable work, which is also exhausting and demanding labor, yet for low wages.  Then those of us living here in the United States go to grocery stores and supermarkets and buy fruits and vegetables which have been picked and packed by these very immigrants.  If we propose building a wall along the border between the United States and Mexico, do we think in the same instant of the immigrants who cross that border and of how they do the painstaking work to harvest the fruits and vegetables we eat?  

Jesus instructed us to welcome the stranger.*****  He added that insofar as we welcome those who are the least among us, we are then welcoming Him.******  

Who do we fear?  Who do we welcome?  We will have to explain to Jesus why we did not welcome who we feared.  Let us not fear Jesus; let us welcome Him wherever we meet Him, however He seeks to help us; let us welcome Him into our hearts.  

* Matthew 2:1-12 
** Jerusalem Bible, Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. (New York, 1990), p. 1661, 1663, note "m" to Mark 1:34
*** John 18:36 
**** Matthew 2:16 
***** Matthew 25:35 
****** Matthew 25:40 

Keep On Guessing

Here at the Redwood City Catholic Worker House, often we extend hospitality to families.  Currently a family which includes a couple of young girls is staying here.  This weekend, when it has been so rainy here in the Bay Area, at one point the mom was reading to her girls in the living room.  

She read out of the book, "Who was the first President of the United States?"  

One of the girls replied, "George Wilson!"  

The mom replied, "No!  That's not his name!" 

The girl contended, "I can't say his name!"  

From the kitchen, I called, "When you want to clean your clothes, you put them into what?"  

The girl responded, "The washing machine."  

I continued, "OK.  Now take off that second word."

She asked, "Machine?"  

I explained, "Right, since that's not part of his name.  You've just got 'Washing.'  Now, for the second part of his name, when you've got 2,000 pounds, what do you call it?"  

The mom added the clue, "It's three letters long."  

The girl exclaimed, "Fat!"  

Keeping Valuable Knowledge

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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