Spiritus Sanctus

8th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C)
Ecclesiasticus 27:5-8 | Psalm 91(92):2-3,13-16 | 1 Corinthians 15:54-58 | Luke 6:39-45

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In a shaken sieve the rubbish is left behind,
  so too the defects of a man appear in his talk.
The kiln tests the work of the potter,
  the test of a man is in his conversation.
The orchard where a tree grows is judged on the quality of its fruit,
  similarly a man’s words betray what he feels.
Do not praise a man before he has spoken,
  since this is the test of men.

Ecclesiasticus 27:5-8

All through this past week, I was metaphorically biting my tongue till it bled, pondering for hours on my response to various messages, from a minor misunderstanding to tricky arguments on spirituality and faith.

One of those disagreements was face-to-face, which ended with both parties unmoved…and me mentally exhausted from a dance of polite discourse that wasn’t returned.

It’s easy to see why many folks take on strident tones when conversing online, angrily pounding virtual tables with passionate and sometimes vulgar assertions. When we can’t see faces or hear voices, “cold objectivity” takes over with an attendant “YOU SHALL HEED MY WORDS, FOR I AM RIGHTEOUSLY CORRECT!“

And after quiet reflection, it’s become clear just how preachy I can get with my own choir members, insistently driving home the message of love and faith that I received from God…without taking into consideration that most everyone else, pained by their post-practice hunger pangs, were probably not in a receptive mood.

I really should ask myself the same question I imagine a thousand folks I face over my life ask me in their silence…

Why should I listen to you?

When I’m hungry and tired, and you’re standing there with yet more words, why would I be interested in what you have to say?

When I’m worried about my next meeting, or my buggy computer code, why would I care about God’s message from anyone, least of all you?

When my beloved mother/lover/pet is dying by painful inches, why would I believe your arrogant nonsense about how God loves us all?

I’d been wondering of late why I should continue my daily blogging. Today’s first reading just gave me new motivation to test myself, to keep sharing my faith and God’s love with others…but with an eye and ear inclined towards those with whom I communicate, carefully considering the message I’m sending…

…and not standing between a hungry horde and their lunch.

Chinese New Year 2019
Numbers 6:22-27 | Psalm 90:2-6, 12-14, 16 | James 4:13-15 | Matthew 6:31-14

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Here is the answer for those of you who talk like this;
“Today or tomorrow, we are off to this or that town;
we are going to spend a year there, trading or make some money”.
You never know what will happen tomorrow;
you are no more than a mist that is here for a little while, and then disappears.
The most you should ever say is:
“If it is the Lord’s will, we shall still be alive to do this or that”.

James 4:13-15

Today’s second reading is worth quoting in its entirety, because it presents both a disturbingly accurate microcosm of our daily concerns, and the appropriate way to set those concerns in their proper context.

After five decades on this earth, I’ve noticed a pattern: In everything I do, I succeed or fail according to the will of God. It matters not whether I prayed about it beforehand; an unknowing rush down His Holy Path succeeds about as much as as a considered series of actions, and a carefully-plotted scheme plods to the same sticky end as a pickpocket running headlong into police, just a lot slower.

In hindsight, I sometimes wonder how on earth I managed to get a certain task done, rushing in like a blind fool, knowing nothing about what lay before me ahead of time. I realize only after much pondering that both the journey and the end result are what God wanted me to experience, out of all the other possible paths that I might have careened recklessly down, and the awful crashes against hard reality I might have suffered.

Of course, an unconsidered journey is never smooth, and I could probably have saved myself a boatload of physical and spiritual aches and pains with some careful forethought, but either way, His will would’ve been done…whether or not I’d explicitly intended it.

The mountain remains in my path; I can choose to trust that the Lord will show me how to climb it like a proper mountaineer…or I can choose my own route, with its bumps, scrapes and heart-stopping falls. One way, I get to reach the summit with enough energy to appreciate the journey; the other, I curse and swear and crawl breathlessly up to the top, only to behold a pair of sandaled feet and a voice gently chiding, “What took you so long?”

So, brothers and sisters, let’s take advantage of this convenient milestone in our lives, a day when everyone traditionally blesses each other with good fortune. Let us instead resolve to spend time pondering God’s will for us, that we may consciously align ourselves in His direction, placing all our hope and trust in Him, and thereby enjoy a relatively smooth journey to our final rendezvous.

For as I’d like to think: All who hope in the Lord…huat (gain great fortune) in the Lord!

3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C)
Nehemiah 8:2-6,8-10 | Psalm 18(19):8-10,15 | 1 Corinthians 12:12-30 | Luke 1:1-4,4:14-21

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If the foot were to say, ‘I am not a hand and so I do not belong to the body’, would that mean that it stopped being part of the body?

1 Corinthians 12:15

Excuse the pun, but…my foot! (In polite company: “I say, my dear chap, I find your assertion to be rather hard to believe.”)

It’s so easy to think that we’re not as good as some other person at a specific task, and therefore decide not to even try. Whether it be cooking, publishing an original work, or climbing Mount Everest, it’s always tempting to say “why bother, I can’t be perfect?” (Though, to be sure, that last activity is definitely not for the faint of heart or body.)

Since this is a Catholic blog, you can probably guess what I’m about to say next, and you’re probably right: That’s no excuse for not bothering to spread God’s Word.

We listen to our local priests delivering homilies on a daily basis, and think to ourselves, “That’s so hard! I’ll never be able to reach that level of spiritual enlightenment.” That may well be true, but if we then just stop dead and limit our Catholic activities to appearing reluctantly at mass, and consuming a small wafer while mentally planning our next meal or destination, we’re selling ourselves way short.

For we are indeed different parts of the body of Christ, and while not all of us can be eloquent mouths, there’s more to sowing God’s love than talk talk talk (or write write write for folks like me).

Some of us make excellent hands, laboring in charitable and life-giving activities.

Other are sturdy feet, shuttling needed supplies and laborers to each Christian harvest.

Still others are eagle-eyed or bat-eared, uncanny in their ability to find opportunities for showing and telling others about the Way, Truth and Life.

Whatever our talents, there’s surely a way to employ them in God’s mission here on earth. We just need to commit our time and attention, pulling together with the whole body of the faithful.

And since everyone’s spirit will flag at one point or another, we should heed St. Paul’s instruction to the Thessalonians:

So give encouragement to each other, and keep strengthening one another, as you do already.

1 Thessalonians 5:11

For as the hymn goes:

We are one body, one body in Christ
and we do not stand alone.

Amen.

Thursday of week 2 in Ordinary Time
(Saint Francis de Sales, Bishop, Doctor)
Hebrews 7:25-8:6 | Psalm 39(40):7-10,17 | Mark 3:7-12

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And he asked his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, to keep him from being crushed. For he had cured so many that all who were afflicted in any way were crowding forward to touch him.

Mark 3:9-10

NOTE: As I wrote this blog, news broke that local actor Aloysius Pang had died from injuries sustained during a reservist training exercise. The unfortunate reference to “being crushed” in my chosen Bible passage is entirely coincidental, but I decided to keep going with the general tenor of this post.

Today’s Gospel speaks of Jesus gaining great fame. Like many a modern celebrity, thousands flocked to see Him, and His disciples probably found themselves having to learn “crowd control” on the job.

I see two modern parallels in the above passage. The first is the need for an “escape hatch”, a mental bolt-hole to which one can retreat when the cares of life become too much to bear. Jesus the God could’ve swept aside the oppressive crowd with but a thought and a word to His heavenly Father; Jesus the man chose not to apply such brute force, and instead prepared to retreat to a place of calm and serenity, out in the middle of the lake.

The second…is the crowd’s eagerness to be near Jesus, to touch Him. We’ve mostly lost this eagerness in modern times, spending our limited time and attention instead on worldly goods and vices. Even in our escape, we’ll fill our “panic rooms” with secular entertainment, choosing hedonism over quiet contemplation with the Jesus who’s always beside us.

Brothers and sisters, let’s make Jesus the #1 celebrity in our lives, yeah?

Amen.

Monday of week 2 in Ordinary Time
(Saint Agnes, Virgin, Martyr)
Hebrews 5:1-10 | Psalm 109(110):1-4 | Mark 2:18-22

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No one sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak; if he does, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and the tear gets worse.

Mark 2:21

Every Sunday at mass, when the celebrant elevates the host and chalice, and declaims Behold the Lamb of God, there will inevitably be a few folks in my line of sight bowing their heads instead of focusing on the Body and Blood of Christ. If asked, some of them might argue that it’s the appropriate posture when we respond with “Lord, I am not worthy”, but that seems more like retroactive rationalization.

I think it’s actually an attempt to excuse force of habit, formed from our early years being taught to always humble ourselves before our Saviour, and tacitly encouraged by the older and more casual invocation: “This is the Lamb of God”. This is Jesus, folks, no big deal really.

But with the new missal translation, already several years old, the intent couldn’t be clearer, especially since a key word is repeated:

BEHOLD the Lamb of God,
BEHOLD him who takes away the sins of the world.

A less-tactful priest might even go:

Behold the Lamb of…BEHOLD, people! That means LOOK UP AND SEE!!! Jesus is RIGHT HERE!!! Why are you all groveling?!?! LOOK UP, DAMN IT!!!

The new translation, it seems, is like the unshrunken cloth in today’s Gospel. The many meaningful tweaks, meant to focus our minds and hearts on this sacred celebration, are instead being ignored in favour of “the old way was better” or “we’ve always done it this way, why change now?”

Thus, the “old cloth” of habit and unthinking rote pulls away from the “new patch” of awareness and understanding, leaving the old faith to further rip, rot and crumble.

Few things are sadder than going through the motions at Mass. I know this from experience, having drifted alone in my faith during my college days, half-listening to the words of scripture in a dark mental fog, receiving a mere white wafer on my tongue each week, waiting for this hour-long ritual to end.

God help me, I never want to go back to those awful days again.

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Brothers and sisters, what can we do, as individual parts of the one body of Christ, to avoid falling into such a faith-based rut?

We could start by “preparing ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries”, not just through the Penitential Rite (from which those words above were taken), but also by simply picking up the missal and reading the Order of Mass. From the rubrics (literally “red ochre”), to the priest’s words, to our responses, there is a deeper meaning hidden in it all. We should spend time pondering the rites we use each Sunday, thinking carefully about how they tie in with sacred scripture, and taking inspiration from the quiet words for the priest alone, that are nevertheless profoundly meaningful for us all.

Only by consciously reminding ourselves of the what, how, and most especially the why, can we draw meaning and strength from our weekly celebration at the Lord’s table.

It’s time to take ourselves off autopilot at Mass, to make good on the words we sing:

We remember how You loved us to Your death
And still we celebrate, for You are with us here
And we believe that we will see You when You come in Your glory, Lord
We remember, we celebrate, we believe.

Amen.