Archive for May, 2009

Wow, Now That’s Amore!

theophilus May 28th, 2009

Sometimes when St. John starts talking about “love” in his gospel, my eyes glaze over and I don’t even try to figure out what he means.  Yea, I know it’s something important and profound, but I tend to take all of this talk about divine love with the same attitude that I watch a Nicholas Sparks’ chick-flick with my wife – with unenthusiastic indifference.

So, it was to my surprise that this morning I really decided to dive into the gospel reading for today’s Mass (from John 17) and found some absolutely incredible passages from Jesus’ prayer to God as to what he wanted and desired -

“that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you”

“that they may also be in us”

“that the world may believe that you sent me”

“I have given them the glory you gave me”

“that they may be brought to perfection as one”

“that the world may know that you sent me”

“that you loved them even as you loved me”

“they are your gift to me”

“I wish that where I am they also may be with me”

“that they may see my glory that you gave me”

“I will make it known, that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them.”

All of these things are what Christ wants for us – for you, for me.  He loves us so much, he wants us to have unity with him and our God; he wants us to have faith; he wants us to have eternal, divine love; he wants us to JOIN him in eternity; he wants us to see his divine glory.  The most astounding passage of all is where he acknowledges to God that WE are God’s gift to him – think about it, he considers you and me to be a divine gift to HIM.

How can we walk away from such love?  How can we not soak in this love each and every day?  How can we not seek to do our best to return this love in every thing we do and every word we say?  How can we continue to commit the same sin over and over again, knowing we are weak but refusing his loving mercy and forgiveness which is there for our asking?

Christ gave us himself on the Cross; he gave us himself through the Holy Spirit; he gives of himself in the Blessed Sacrament.  He shows his love in the sacraments and the events of our daily lives.  He loves us.  He means those things in his prayer to God; they aren’t just empty words mouthed to hear himself talk.  They are pure, unadulterated, incredible love for all of his flock.

His love has been accepted and returned by Mary and the saints.  We should emulate them on a daily basis by offering our love to him.  What will you do today to show your love for him?  Think about it as you work, study, think, pray, play, interact with others; think about it as you contemplate giving into the temptation in front of you, or skipping out on a chance to spend some time with him.

Christ loves you; do you love him?  Do you show you love him?  Do you experience joy and peace from his love?  Do you show his love to others?

Soak in this amore; it won’t take long until you are doing things for Christ; living your life for Christ; doing so because you love him; showing his love to everyone around you.

Remember, Christ considers you to be a gift from God to him; so make sure you are proved worthy to be such an esteemed and divine gift.

Keeping Your Word

theophilus May 26th, 2009

If you are a man of honor and integrity (and most men are), you want to keep your word to others.  You want to have the reputation of getting the job done and being dependable; whether it’s your family, friends, community or job.  You don’t want to let others down.

But do you take the same attitude with Christ?  He has a plan for each of us.  He asks something of each of us every single day.  As a member of his body, we are called upon daily by him to do something, big or small, to help build his kingdom.

Yesterday for Memorial Day Mass, our priest talked about all of us being “Soldiers of Christ.”   He spoke about each of us having a duty to Christ to do his will; to stand up and join the battle.

Ask yourself these questions.  Do you strive to do your duty as a treasured son of God?  Do you strive to do his will?  Do you strive to keep your word to him in living your life?  Do you put your body, heart and soul at his disposition?

Today’s first reading is about a man who answered these questions with a resounding affirmative.  In Acts 20, St. Paul is giving one last sermon to the Ephesians.  He concludes by stating – “Yet I consider life of no importance to me, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to bear witness to the Gospel of God’s grace. . . . And so I solemnly declare to you this day that I am not responsible for the blood of any of you, for I did not shrink from proclaiming to you the entire plan of God.”

There you have it.  St. Paul had no regrets; he knew he had done what he was called by Christ to do.

How about today’s Gospel from John 17.  Here we have Jesus praying to our Father in heaven – “I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world.  They belonged to you, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.”

Talk about a great performance review -  “They have kept your word.”  His apostles and disciples had answered the questions the same as St. Paul.

How about today’s Saint of the Day – St. Philip Neri.  He lived in 16th Century Italy at the height of the Reformation and the start of the Counter-Reformation, when Catholic faith and devotion were rapidly declining and in need of someone to help reverse the plunge into the abyss.  St. Philip responded to Christ’s call as well by doing great things to reinvigorate the faithful throughout Italy, most particularly in Rome.  He enflamed the laity and fostered a great love among all for the Blessed Sacrament.

St. Paul; the Apostles; the first disciples; St. Philip Neri – all became worthy Soliders of Christ.  They kept God’s word and fulfilled their duty to Christ.  They gave their lives to be used according to the Lord’s will and then, more importantly, kept their word to him.

Can the same be said of us?

Beautiful Faces

theophilus May 22nd, 2009

Today is the feast day of St. Rita of Cascia.  She was a wife and mother in 15th Century Italy who, after her husband and sons died, entered an Augustinian convent.

She is known for being a patron saint for many things.  I looked her up on CatholicCulture.org and found she is the patron saint of abuse victims, against loneliness, against sterility, bodily ills, desperate causes, difficult marriages, forgotten causes, impossible causes, infertility, lost causes, parenthood, sick people, sickness, sterility, victims of physical spouse abuse, widows, and wounds.  I also happen to know that she is the patron saint of baseball.

But I think she should be the patron saint of another cause – facial deformities.

One day, St. Rita was praying before the Crucifix when a thorn became embedded in her forehead.  It would stay there the rest of her life; foul smelling and unsightly.  She was even ostracized by her fellow sisters.

When that thorn became a permanent mark on her forehead, St. Rita became one of many who live with a facial deformity.

I was born with a cleft lip and other cranio-facial deformities.  I’ve had surgeries to close the lip and make the other deformities less pronounced, but you can still see that my face isn’t quite right (or as I’ve had others tell me, “you look funny”).

But, my deformities don’t hinder my life in any meaningful way.  I look different, my eyes are screwed up and one of my ears is shot, but God left all of the important parts fully functioning.  And I know I am designed as God intended.

And I know that I’m not alone.  According to the CDC, cleft lips and cleft palates are the most prevalent form of birth defects in the U.S.  Approximately 6,800 babies are born every year with one or the other (Down Syndrome is 2nd with 5,500 babies).  These statistics do not include those who are born with other facial deformities.  These deformities can affect much more than appearance; they can drastically impact speech, eating, hearing, sight, breathing; basically any bodily function between the throat and the brain.  And then, there are the stares and double-looks; the snide comments from the malevolent and the innocent questions from the curious.

The good news is that these deformities can be minimized with surgery.  Lips and palates can be closed; other facial deformities made less pronounced; bodily activities for the most part restored.

For more information about facial deformities (or cranio-facial birth defects), go to AmeriFace.org and cleftAdvocate.org.

Of course, the U.S. isn’t alone in having kids born with these facial deformities.  There are kids in every part of the world who are born with some type of facial birth defect.  Except for them, these defects may not be treatable because of the medical care in their country.  Their only hope are organizations like Smile Train and Operation Smile who focus on repairing cleft lips and palates in the poorest of nations.

The work of these organizations is sorely needed.  They are doing the work of Christ.

And next time you see someone with some facial deformities or scars, think of what they must go through; and then say a little prayer to St. Rita.  I bet she already has the beautiful faces of these precious children in her sights.

Weeping or Rejoicing?

theophilus May 21st, 2009

Do you ever get the feeling that everyone is rejoicing; while you’re stuck with a feeling of anxiety mixed with a spark of hopelessness?  That somehow, you’re left on an island, solitary and alone, worried about the future; while everyone else is regaling in the excesses of the present?

Recently, I’ve actually been talking to a great number of people who share this view.  They fear that the world has gotten more dangerous, the economy more uncertain, their futures less promising, and their religious freedom less secure.

Yet, if we are to believe the polls and media, and many of our political and cultural leaders, things have never seemed more hopeful.  We are being told that we should embrace, not fear, the Teutonic shifts threatening to overthrow the way we live our daily lives; that we should join the chorus celebrating these shifts as great progress, just like everyone else.

If you’re one of these “unenlightened” folks, guess what?  Today’s (non-Ascension Day) gospel (from John 16) has a message for you.

“Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy.”

Jesus was talking to his disciples on the eve of his Ascension.  He was discussing with them the meaning of the words he had just shared with them – “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me.” I can’t blame the disciples for not exactly grasping what Jesus was trying to say there; but, his followup – “you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices” – is easy enough to understand.

There are going to be times when you will be on the David side of the fight; when you will stand up for what you believe in and will be laughed at, ridiculed, demonized and demeaned.  You will be told that you are a fool, short-sighted, unenlightened, hateful, counter-cultural.  You will watch others revel in their power, influence and good-feeling, while you are stuck wondering what can possibly come next.  You will grow especially wary when even those you think should be on your side line up with the rejoicers.

The question to ask yourself in these circumstances is – do you truly believe you are standing on the side of reason, faith and truth; that you are doing God’s will and serving Christ as he deserves; that you are living as you should as a son or daughter of God?  If the answer is “yes” than you can take comfort from John 16.  It doesn’t matter what everyone else is doing, even if everyone else is “rejoicing.”  What matters is whether your thoughts and actions are in uniformity with God’s will – even if it means that you are left to “weep and mourn.”

And if you hold onto Christ’s hope and God’s will for you, especially when it’s the unpopular thing to do, you will find that you are not alone.  Others feel the same way.  Even better, you will also find that one of two things will happen.  You will find out that you are wrong and you can join in with the happy crowd; or you will find out that you are right.  In either case, you will find that one day “your grief will become joy.”

Times of Ignorance

theophilus May 20th, 2009

There’s a passage in today’s first reading from Acts 17 that seems ripe for the times.

St. Paul was addressing the Athenians and commenting on their belief in an “Unknown God.”  The Athenians, as enlightened as they were, understood there was an all powerful God, but couldn’t quite get their minds to understand anything about him, thus he remained “unknown.”  They were comfortable with Zeus, Poseidon, Apollo, Athena and even Hades; but they couldn’t grasp the concept of the omnipotent, monotheistic Being who we too often take for granted.

Later on in St. Paul’s sermon, he stated something that seems especially applicable to our age:

“God has overlooked the times of ignorance, but now he demands that people everywhere repent because he has established a day on which he will ‘judge the world with justice’ through a man he has appointed, and he has provided confirmation for all by raising him from the dead.”

“Times of Ignorance” – are we living in them?

As I witnessed the totality of what occurred at Notre Dame on Sunday and on the Holy Father’s trip to the Holy Land last week; as I hear about the world’s response to Israel’s concern about its very existence and the attacks on a beauty pageant contestant who dared to honestly answer a question posed to her on national TV;  I get the sinking feeling that we are smacked dab in the middle of these Times of Ignorance.

We hold ourselves out to be the most enlightened, smartest, advanced, progessive people of all time.  Yet, we can be so ignorant.  We are ignorant when we’ve replaced the power of God with the power of man.  But, we’ve forgotten that God created the world and raised Jesus from the dead.  Based on these two facts alone, Man cannot be deluded enough to think that our power can ever be equal to His.   But when we relegate God to just another special interest or faith as just another past-time, we do just this – we assume our power is separate from His, instead of realizing that our power is derived from Him; to be used according to His will.

I always got the impression that the Athenians thought they controlled their gods.  I got the same feeling about the Romans and their stable of deities.  St. Paul succeeded in dispelling their ignorance and spreading the faith in both civilizations.  But, I wonder – what would St. Paul say to us were he physically in our midst?  What would he say were he writing “The Letter of St. Paul to the Americans”?

I bet he wouldn’t be subtle.

“An Axis of Secularism”

theophilus May 7th, 2009

This article – “An Axis of Secularism” - speaks for itself.  It’s from Carl Anderson, head of the Knights of Columbus, and published in Zenit.

Vivat Jesus.

Who is the Patron Saint of Runners?

theophilus May 3rd, 2009

I ran a half-marathon this morning.  Had a very strong run; a run I hadn’t expected to have because my training over the past few months has been sporadic and inconsistent as I’ve battled a wet and cold Midwestern winter and spring.

But on one of my final training runs this week, I realized that I was dwelling on all of the miles I hadn’t run, instead of the miles I had run.  And that is when I realized that I couldn’t do a darn thing about the miles missed; it was too late to make them up four days away from a race.  What I could do was focus on the miles I did put in and use them as the springboard for a good race.

And I couldn’t help but think; that is what Christ wants us to do in life.  He wants us to forget about the mistakes made and the opportunities missed; and focus instead on the things we do right and the future ahead.  We can either let the faults of the past weigh us down and keep us from doing his will; or we can ask for and accept his forgiveness and mercy and use him as the impetus for being the disciples we are supposed to be.  It’s why Christ gave us the Sacrament of Reconciliation; to accept and atone for what we did wrong and then to move on.

I also thoughts of two things in my race today.  The first is that the course passed three Catholic churches.  I said a little prayer and made the sign of the Cross as I passed each of them; thinking of Christ inside on this blessed Sunday morning.  I then noticed that I started running a lot faster; as if the Holy Spirit was giving me a little push.  The other thing I noticed is that I couldn’t think of a patron saint for runners; so I think I am going to start a movement to have St. Peter and St. John named as such because of their foot race to Christ’s tomb on Easter morning.

St. Peter and St. John pray for us; and may my muscles be able to move in the morning.

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