Transfigured

I am ready.

I have seen His glory,
His radiance,
between the Law and the Prophets,
above them,
He shines.

I am ready.

Let's build those tents,
one for each,
perhaps the best
for Him.
But let's get building,
for we must remember
this moment.

I am ready.

No.
Not yet.
You might build,
but they would remain
your tents.

What place can you build
for My glory?
What tent can contain
all that I Am?

No.
The tents will have to wait -
until they are truly Mine.
We must descend again.
There is work to do;
there is suffering too -
for Me,
and for you.

This moment,
this place,
is indeed special.
Carry it in your hearts.
Remember the Voice:

This is My beloved Son.
Listen to Him.

It will take you far.

Let's go down the mountain
together.

Now, you are ready.

Making Sense of Things

Next week the new Alice in Wonderland movie will come out. The story of this film will be a bit different than the Lewis Carroll tale. Alice, however, gives us an image of a "curious" girl who has not yet settled into her "serious" society life. She remains youthful, playful and seeking. The childlike quality of this girl is a good example of so many people - searching and wandering through life. So much seems like "nonsense" and it is difficult to find any reason to "settle down."

However, for us who watch her, there is a certain joy we see in that youthfulness. An openness to engage things as they are and not as we think the should be is the mark of that childlike faith that Jesus himself praises. But, as we watch, we also know that there is a reality that must be encountered too. It is not naivete to think that we can change the world. It is not wishful thinking or fantasy to believe that God can bring happiness and good out of even the worst situations. The good news for us is that our relationship with Christ does make a difference in our lives and the lives of others. That is faith.

Alice's original adventure brings her through the chaos and nonsense of Wonderland and sets her back at home in the "real world." This was a place that she so often dreamed of leaving, however, now, there is a new appreciation for it. That is what a real examination of our faith can bring to us too. It's the blessing of faith.

Sometimes, we just have to go down the rabbit hole to find that out.

Yabba-dabba-luia

A friend posted this on Facebook the other day. It's cute - and goofy - and, since we don't say "the A word" during Lent, this might be a nice substitute for today. Enjoy!

What Are You Gonna Do Next?

I can't remember when Disney started getting athletes to do these bits, but they have become very much a part of our popular culture - a way of celebrating big events and achievements. "I'm going to Disney World!" is a cry of victory, a celebration that Americans recognize as easily as the Golden Arches. So, I wasn't surprised to see Drew Brees cheerfully announcing his post-Super Bowl travel plans.

But it also got me thinking. In the midst of all that celebration, at the pinnacle of football achievement, that winning quarterback was able to turn to Disney's camera and clearly pronounce what we was undoubtedly paid to say. So, what about us? Can we be that ready?

Our lives are filled with so much excitement, so much business, so much chaos. There are trials, yes, but there are also triumphs. Much of what we accomplish, we do through a lot of personal effort, but all that ability comes from Somewhere. Are we as in touch with God as to give Him the glory when we are in the midst of our chaotic triumphs? Are we as ready to thank and praise Him as we are to beg Him for help?

Drew Brees is going to Disney World - or maybe he isn't. Someone at the Disney Corp. gave him an incentive to say what he said if he won.

We are on a journey too. There are victories for us along the way too. Do we have the incentive to joyfully announce, "Thanks be to God!"? When I wish upon a star tonight, my wish is that we all can.

Tempting

I know you are hungry;
I know your appetite.
I know your needs -
your very
human
needs.

There.
The rocks.
You can do it -
if you are Him.
Are you?
Prove it
to me.

You want to reign;
you want control.
I know your ambition -
a very
human
desire.

There.
All the world
can be Yours.
Just take a knee
here
before me.

You want proof;
you want to know
how special you are.
I know the need,
the very human
need to
be sure.

Look.
There.
Throw yourself down.
You'll see...
He will protect you -
if you are Him.
Are you?

I am.

Because He is.

That's all
I
need
to know.

Just in Time for Lent

One of my friends on Facebook became a fan of a site that caught my eye the other day. It's called "The Divine Office," and it is a link to a website that offers the Liturgy of the Hours in podcast format, so that you can sit at your computer and pray with the virtual congregation. There is a sung hymn and all. I actually prayed Evening Prayer the other night on the site. Very cool. You can even find links to the iPhone iBreviary application. Check it out here.

Justice and Lent

Today begins the great season of Lent. Each of us is called upon to open our hearts and bear them to our Lord, who is the only one who can make us whole. This is the meaning of the "justice of God." In it, we are restored to that proper relationship with God, and with one another, which is the fullest sense of the Hebrew concept of sedaqah. The Holy Father, in his Message for Lent this year, reflects on this idea of justice and how it can guide us through these next forty days:

First of all, I want to consider the meaning of the term “justice,” which in common usage implies “to render to every man his due,” according to the famous expression of Ulpian, a Roman jurist of the third century. In reality, however, this classical definition does not specify what “due” is to be rendered to each person. What man needs most cannot be guaranteed to him by law. In order to live life to the full, something more intimate is necessary that can be granted only as a gift: we could say that man lives by that love which only God can communicate since He created the human person in His image and likeness. Material goods are certainly useful and required – indeed Jesus Himself was concerned to heal the sick, feed the crowds that followed Him and surely condemns the indifference that even today forces hundreds of millions into death through lack of food, water and medicine – yet “distributive” justice does not render to the human being the totality of his “due.” Just as man needs bread, so does man have even more need of God. Saint Augustine notes: if “justice is that virtue which gives every one his due ... where, then, is the justice of man, when he deserts the true God?” (De civitate Dei, XIX, 21). [...]

What then is the justice of Christ? Above all, it is the justice that comes from grace, where it is not man who makes amends, heals himself and others. The fact that “expiation” flows from the “blood” of Christ signifies that it is not man’s sacrifices that free him from the weight of his faults, but the loving act of God who opens Himself in the extreme, even to the point of bearing in Himself the “curse” due to man so as to give in return the “blessing” due to God (cf. Gal 3, 13-14). But this raises an immediate objection: what kind of justice is this where the just man dies for the guilty and the guilty receives in return the blessing due to the just one? Would this not mean that each one receives the contrary of his “due”? In reality, here we discover divine justice, which is so profoundly different from its human counterpart. God has paid for us the price of the exchange in His Son, a price that is truly exorbitant. Before the justice of the Cross, man may rebel for this reveals how man is not a self-sufficient being, but in need of Another in order to realize himself fully. Conversion to Christ, believing in the Gospel, ultimately means this: to exit the illusion of self-sufficiency in order to discover and accept one’s own need – the need of others and God, the need of His forgiveness and His friendship. So we understand how faith is altogether different from a natural, good-feeling, obvious fact: humility is required to accept that I need Another to free me from “what is mine,” to give me gratuitously “what is His.” This happens especially in the sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist. Thanks to Christ’s action, we may enter into the “greatest” justice, which is that of love (cf. Rm 13, 8-10), the justice that recognises itself in every case more a debtor than a creditor, because it has received more than could ever have been expected. Strengthened by this very experience, the Christian is moved to contribute to creating just societies, where all receive what is necessary to live according to the dignity proper to the human person and where justice is enlivened by love.

In our Lenten journey, may we too be embraced by this grace - the love of God which alone can do all things, including bring us into right relationship with our God, our world and ourselves.

He Knows Something

Throughout the Harry Potter books, Harry is convinced that there is something ... off ... about Severus Snape. From the get-go, the young wizard doesn't like him, and the feeling is mutual. In the unfolding of the story, we learn that Snape has his own reasons for not favoring the boy - his father was sort of a jerk to the now-professor. However, throughout all Harry's (and others) protests about Snape's fitness and trustworthiness, Professor Dumbledore continues to express his absolute confidence in Snape. The old headmaster knew more than those others did.

In the end, as Snape is called upon to end Dumbledore's life, it seems that the old man's trust has been betrayed and Harry's suspicions are validated. But, as we learn in the end, Snape was acting in accord with Dumbledore's grand plan. Imagine Snape's struggle to accept everyone's hatred and the aspersions of the young people of Hogwarts.

Several times in the story, professors and Hagrid tell the young people that if Dumbledore trusts Snape that is good enough for them. Trust. That is what it takes to accept the plan, and that is what it takes to live a life in keeping with our true relationship with God. Just because we see something that we do not like or agree with, it does not mean that we are to take things into our own hands. It takes trust to assert that God knows what he is doing - and even more to actually allow God to do it.

Power and Choices

"There is no good and evil, there is only power, and those too weak to seek it..."

- Professor Quirrel, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

Quirrel's words (which in the film are transferred to Voldemort's lips) say much about the nature of morality. The trick of the devil is to convince us that all choices are equal, that right and wrong are matters of power, rather than matters of serving Truth. The Dark Lord's emphasis on power as the measure of all things is at the heart of his quest for immortality and domination. He misses the value of discovering that Truth that guides decisions and brings us all into relationship with others. There is no relationship for Voldemort - there is only a matter of power, weakness, and those who can be useful to him.

In our society, there are parallels - particularly in the realm of science and technology. We have become so preoccupied with those things that we can do (power) that we have forgotten the important question of should we (good & evil). Our choices - which serve to shape who we are and who we become - must be guided by Truth. There is right and wrong, and there is power to be drawn from realizing that the world of choice has a guide.

It's Time

Blessed are we who are poor...
Yes!
That's more like it!
Blessed are we who are hungry...
Sure!
I'll take that!
Blessed are we who are weeping...
Of course!
Now,
the Kingdom is coming,
and we are part of it.

Now,
we take our turn
having control,
honor,
joy,
rule.
It's our time now,
and He has made us so.

Blessed are we,
indeed.

But,
what's this?
Woe?
To us who are happy?
To us who are filled?

Woe?

Surely, He means
them.

Not us.

We are the ones.
We have waited,
and now it is our time.
This Kingdom is
ours.
Time for us to reign.

Ah,
but no.
It is not our time.
It never has been;
it never will be.
Unless,
we allow it to be
His time.

So,
we are poor
and rich;
hungry
and filled;
weeping
and laughing -
not because it is our time,
or theirs,
or anyone else
but His.

Snowed-In?

So, we are now digging out from the wild, double blizzards of 2010. I have been pretty much housebound since last Friday. However, while one might think that this would be a blogger's best friend (i.e., the time to sit and randomly expound on whatever), I have not really focused on that area of my life. But, for future reference, here are some ideas that I have come up with for the next time you or anyone is snowed-in. Maybe you have your additions, and, as always, I welcome them. Here's my list:

• Read a book
• Pray the Rosary
• Color (it's surprisingly therapeutic!)
• Watch movies together
• Play games (I'm not a fan of many board games, but Scrabble is nice)
• Wii (Guitar Hero is my new favorite)
• Organize your iPod playlists
• Clean the house
• Bake or cook
• Watch the snow, for Pete's sake!
• Come up with cool monikers for the blizzard of '10 (like "Snowpocalypse," or "Snowmaggeddon," or "The Big Blow of One-Oh," or "Jerry")
• Really think about your vocation
• Call a friend and talk
• Call your mother
• Build a fort out of the couch cushions
• Draw
• Blog (ahem)
• Organize photographs
• Chase your Associate Pastor around the rectory with a hatchet (probably a bad idea, but a possibility after day four)
• Do a puzzle
• Write letters, stories, or haikus
• And for goodness' sake, SHOVEL!!!
  

Adventure

I was socked in this weekend, and Fr Michael was on a movie kick. On Saturday, we watched Up again. When Carl Frederickson meets his boyhood idol, Charles Muntz, he learns something about searching and adventure. The famous explorer was obsessed with finding the bird "Kevin." He was consumed with that search, so much so that he believed the bird belonged to him already. His goal was to take it home and have his fame restored. It was a selfish quest - one that led him even to evil, bringing other explorers to their sad ends.

By contrast, Carl learns through his wife, Ellie, that the adventure is the search and not necessarily the destination. Simply because their dream of reaching Paradise Falls together was never realized, Carl assumed that Ellie's life was tragic and disappointing. Only when he opens the "adventure book" does he realize that every moment they spent together was the adventure for her.

For us, as people of faith, we can learn that the faith we share is also an adventure. Belief in the Carpenter from Nazareth brings us into contact with great mystery and adventure. It is not a matter of "solving" that mystery - or even of having all the answers. Rather, it is a life lived in relationship with Christ, which brings us into relationship with each other. The "search" is the search for that relationship, and the adventure comes along the way.

Snowmaggeddon, Part 2

Like the rainbow after the flood, the sun even came out before it set.

Mary kept her head up!

We'll be digging out for a while...

Views from Snowmaggedon

Immaculate Conception Church, where I live

Don't worry - Jesus is nice and cozy in the tabernacle

That's what a "blizzard" looks like

The plows can't even keep up

This is the view from my bedroom window - on the third floor!

Get Your Faith Off the Ground!

General Larry Platt had a message: He was tired of seeing kids walking around the streets with their "pants on the ground."

So, what did he do about it?

He went on American Idol and performed his now-famous tribute to pulling one's pants up. You can just see him, sitting at home, watching young people walk by with their jeans around their knees and their multi-colored boxers for all the world to see, and he thought, "Someone has to put an end to this nonsense! STOP WALKING AROUND DOWNTOWN WITH YOUR PANTS ON THE GROUND!!!" And a song (and a star) was born. Larry performed (rather athletically) his tune for the judges, and millions of Americans heard his message loud and clear. He seemed unfazed by the rule that he was too old for the show - his message was out: "Gitcho pants off the ground!"

We too have a message. It is the Good News of Christ - a message of love and forgiveness and of meaning. Maybe we sit and see the world go by and know that it can only benefit from knowing that God is real and loves them very much. "If only there was some way," we might wonder. No, I am not saying that we should go in front of Simon, Randy and the Ellen, but we are in front of our peers. That's all the stage we need to witness to our faith - in what we say, what we do, how we speak, and even how we dress.

Yeah, we have a message.

So, what are you going to do?

We Need Haiti

The cries from the rubble are quieting down, but the people of Haiti continue to need our help and we continue to remember them in our prayers. The outpouring of care and concern for these poor people has been wonderful. After the star-studded telethon a couple weeks ago, I bought the iTunes album Hope for Haiti Now, and as i was driving yesterday, listening to Beyonce's version of "Halo," I was moved again by the words, "Haiti we can see your halo..."

Haiti's halo is what we are looking for. We need Haiti. Why? Because that is where God is; He is with His people who suffer. He is with those "poor in spirit," with "those who mourn." We need Haiti, because their need reminds us of our purpose as a human family. Without this need, we can continue on in our lives, unaware that others have needs that can affect us, that can draw that charity from us.

As I watched that telethon, I will admit that I did so with a little cynicism, thinking that all these stars found a great photo opportunity. However, after some reflection, I see something else. They needed that halo too. Haiti's need drew good out of Hollywood and music stars. It is that poverty, that suffering, that need of Haiti that can transform us from a bunch of individuals to a united human family that shares concern for one another.

Yes, we need Haiti - maybe even more than they need us.

Brought to You by the Letter "B" and the Number "16"

Over forty years ago, the Children's Television Workshop launched Sesame Street as an effort to harness the power of TV to help teach children basic skills, such as counting, reading and cooperation. It was an experiment that has paid off tremendously. Recently, Pope Benedict has urged his priests to take hold of the versatility of the Internet and use it as another tool in evangelization. As you know, this is actually nothing new to a lot of us, but it is again an example of how culture and the sharing of the Gospel go hand in hand for the benefit of both.

So, ask your priest if he might consider blogging - at least to put his homilies online. It's a great way to bring the Church to places that people already are - especially if they aren't always where we are.