HE WHO WATERS OTHERS WILL HIMSELF BE WATERED

BISHOP FILBERT MHASI

Diocese of Tunduru-Masasi in Tanzania, East Africa

Bishop Mhasi would like to thank all the donor-friends of Father Ronald Knott and Father John Judie, who have helped finish his new Cardinal Polycarp Pendo Primary School which had been sitting half-finished for the last few of years. This new Catholic school is scheduled to open this July (pictures of the school opening will follow in an upcoming blog post). The school will open with the first four of six classrooms this July - with the final two classrooms opened next year hopefully.  The school now consists of a classroom building, an administration building, a library/kitchen/lunchroom building, an outhouse toilet, some cows to provide milk and meat for the school kids.  I have also gathered, and have ready to send, some desperately needed school supplies which many parents cannot afford.   

This school will address three major problems in his Diocese of Tunduru-Masasi: generational poverty, early Christian-Muslim relationships and the reduction of the need for migration into other countries. Interestingly enough, in a predominately Muslim diocese, some of the Muslim parents approached Bishop Mhasi about building a school for their children to attend along with the children of his diocese. Even some of the local Muslim leaders showed up at a Third Sunday of Advent Mass (notice the rose vestments of the day) celebrated at one of Bishop Mhasi's many mission stations. 

                                                        

On May 30th, I got another bit of good news about a funeral for one of his priests - Father Joel Tindawa. Among the 300 attendees were some Muslims, the Anglican Bishop and the Lutheran Bishop. His effort to build good interfaith relationships, starting in early childhood, will surely produce more great results in his predominately Muslim diocese of Tanzania with this new school.   

Our goal is to finish the last two classrooms by next school year. If you would like to help with the last two classrooms which will complete this school, please send your tax-deductible checks, made out to Father John Judie Ministries, to me for deposit in that account:

Rev. Ronald Knott 

1271 Parkway Gardens Court

#106

Louisville, KY 40217

 

 

 

GIVE AND IT WILL BE GIVEN TO YOU

Whoever gives only a cup of cold water to one of these little ones to drink will surely not lose his reward.

Matthew 10:37-42

I have tried to live that Old Testament Proverb (11:25) that says, “He who waters others will himself be watered.” I was reminded of it when I saw the first reading and the gospel reading for today. Both readings teach us about God rewarding people for their generosity. The first reading tells us about how a woman, who built a little guest room in her house for the Prophet Elisha to stay in, was blessed with the baby that she had longed for over the years. In the gospel, Jesus promises a reward for every good deed, from welcoming a prophet to giving a child a cup of water.

All my life, I have had experiences of having my generous gestures come back to me a hundred-fold. Let me tell you just one story from my days down in the home missions of the diocese back when I was a young priest.

As the first Catholic priest to live in Wayne County, Kentucky, I was stationed at a mission church down along the Tennessee border. We had a handful, less than a dozen, of parishioners and money was very tight. In fact, one of my first jobs was to raise my own salary. Often it was a strain to even pay the church’s electric bill. I lived in the basement of the church to save the parish money. One of the ministries we had was a used clothing store for poor people who needed access to cheap clothing. One day, we got a load of clothes from the family of a man from Louisville who had died. I was going through his stuff, trying to organize it, when I came across a box of old shoes. In the bottom of the box, under the shoes, was a stack of $20 bills that amounted to about $400.00. I knew in my heart of hearts that the old man had hidden it there before he died and that the family was not aware of it. I stood there holding the $400.00, knowing that we could really use it, but also knowing that the family did not know what they had given us. I finally decided to send it back to the family who thanked me for my honesty. A few months went by and then one day a letter came in the mail. The family sent us a $1,000.00 check from his estate because we had been so honest!

That kind of thing happened all the time down there. We would get down to almost nothing, be generous to someone even needier than we were, only to see an unplanned donation come in from some unexpected source, often on the same day! It happened when I was a volunteer missionary in the Caribbean Missions a couple of years back. It happened during the St. Theresa Family Life Center and Guest House project that I just recently finished down in my home parish in Meade County. It is happening in my mission projects in Africa. In fact, this past Christmas Eve, I was short a few hundred dollars of my goal to finish the school building I was working on by Christmas! I went to the mail box that Christmas Eve and opened a letter that had a check in it that miraculously met our goal. I stood there amazed because I thought we would be short! It was a very last-minute miracle for sure!   

I first learned this "give-and-receive" dynamic from my mother. She had very little money, but she was a serious “giver,” from things out of her vegetable garden to loving compliments and kindly gestures, which always seem to come back to her in abundance. I have seen that dynamic play out over and over again in my 56 years as a priest. It has happened so many times that I was moved to have these words engraved on my new tombstone: "Simply Amazed - Forever Grateful!"  That’s probably where I got the idea of writing a column every week for fifteen years called An Encouraging Word. In it, I doubled-down on the spiritual practice of blessing people, not necessarily with material things, but even more so with encouragement which cost me nothing to give.  

"He who waters will be watered!" I was paid nothing for my fifteen years of writing those weekly columns, but nothing brought more blessings into my life than the practice of looking for people to compliment and encourage and then expressing what I had seen in that column. The idea was simple. I looked around for goodness to affirm rather than evils to condemn. Indeed, “He who waters will himself be watered!” Jesus put it this way, “Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap.” (Luke 6:38)

Ever since I have adopted this spiritual practice in a serious way, I have also noticed in an ever-sharper focused way how many people, consciously or unconsciously, engage in the mean and ultimately self-defeating practice of withholding compliments. There may be even more people who stick their heads out a bit and then pull them back in giving praise, which may actually be even more cowardly. Henry Ward Beecher nailed it when he said, “The meanest, most contemptible kind of praise is that which first speak well of a man and then qualifies it with a “but.” Here is how that goes! “Your hair looks great, but you need to lose some of that weight!”  "That was a good homily, but it was much too long! 

Why is it so hard for some people to offer a direct, clear and unconditional compliment? Why does it seem like an “ascetical” practice that goes against our nature? I guess it goes all the way back to Cain and Abel. Cain became “resentful and crestfallen” because God looked with favor on his brother’s offering. This sin is alive and well even in clerical circles. Father Andrew Greeley once wrote (probably about the withholding he felt from his fellow priests in Chicago) that “the worst thing a diocesan priest can do is to get good at something.” I have felt what he was talking about. Several years into writing my column, I overheard one of my brother priests say loud enough for me to hear, "Oh, that Knott! He's never had a thought he hasn't published!" 

We have all heard the old saying, “What goes around, comes around.” Paul expands on that wisdom when he wrote to the Galatians. “A person will reap only what he sows. Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up. So then, while we have the opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who belong to the family of the faith.” (Galatians 6:7-10)

If we need to be loved, need to be appreciated, need to be noticed or need to be honored, the best way to get it is for us to extend love, to show appreciation, to pay attention to others and to honor them. Writing that column, looking for opportunities to bless others, brought me more blessings than I could ever have imagined. Hardly a day went by that I did not get a note, an email, a call or a greeting of appreciation in public places by people I had never met. I still receive encouraging words from people who remember it, even though I quit writing that column nine years ago!

For me, writing that column was a spiritual practice. I still try to carry on that practice of blessing people in various other ways. By watering others, I have certainly been watered! I have learned the truth that if you give to others what you need, it comes back to you multiplied! I know that those of you listening to me today know exactly what I mean. You have been generous and you know your generosity always comes back to you!   By watering others, you have been watered! My only prayer at this time is that God has abundantly rewarded all those people who have reached out to help us personally over the years --- and there have been many! They have our deepest gratitude and my prayer is that God has rewarded them a thousand times over for their generosity to us!     

 

 

 

CHURCH CHAT #34

 
The newly elected Pope Leo praying at the simple tomb of the recently deceased Pope Francis. 

I CAN'T HELP IT! MY ANCESTORS CAME FROM ENGLAND!

I ran across this cartoon a few weeks ago. It grabbed my attention because, being a descendant of immigrants from England to Maryland to Kentucky, I enjoy a good "Gin and Tonic" on occasion. That cartoon ultimately gave me an idea for a blog post and a chance to share my history of drinking - or the lack of it!  

First of all, we never drank alcohol in our house growing up. My Dad had a bottle of bourbon hidden in a closet to share with a cousin of his who visited from Louisville maybe once or twice a year. My uncle Bob did own a tavern a few miles away. We would stop in quite often, but I can't remember my Dad ever ordering a beer. He liked to "hang out" with neighbors and friends, chat with my uncle and talk about his lumber and building material business. 

Don't ask me why, but I asked another local tavern owner, and fellow parishioner, to be my Confirmation sponsor. I just thought both he (Edwin Lee Rhodes) and my uncle (Bob Knott) were wonderful people that I liked and admired! 

When I was in my early years of seminary, we could get "kicked out" for having a beer or any alcohol in our possession. After Vatican Council II, a lot of seminary rules changed. One of those changes was being allowed to own our own cars on campus. Another change was being allowed to go to the local taverns in the evenings since we were all over 21 by that time. The thinking was that it would be good for the staff to see how we could handle alcohol before being ordained. The second change was even more dramatic. They begin to worry about us drinking and driving back to the seminary on those country roads. Sometime during the years leading up to ordination, St. Meinrad Seminary was the first college in Indiana to get a liquor license! They opened a pizza pub on campus called "The Unstable" in one of the two gyms. It got it's name for the old barn wood and decorations that came from an old barn that lined its interior walls.  A newer version was built when that old gym was torn down. The new "Unstable" is still in existence.  

The summer before I was ordained a Deacon, and two summers before I was ordained a priest, I worked in Crater Lake National Park for the United Church of Christ as its first Catholic "student minister" preaching two ecumenical campground services each Sunday. I also served Mass each weekend. My weekday job in the main Lodge, where I lived, was Night Desk Clerk. Because I was one of the few students over 21 working in that National Park, I filled in as a part-time "wine steward" in the dining room and a part-time "bar tender" in the lodge's bar. (I was also the Master of Ceremonies for the Miss Crater Lake Beauty Pageant, but I digress! That is another whole story in itself!)   

Even with that history behind me, I don't drink a lot personally. I never have and I never drink alone. I never drink bourbon, scotch, rum, tequila or beer! I never drink bourbon because I got sick on it in college and never got over that bad experience. I used to drink wine when I attended a special dinner, but I seldom do that anymore because wine makes me groggy. When I have a choice of drinks when I go out to dinner, I usually order a gin and tonic "tall" (meaning a little gin and lots of tonic - enough to last through the whole meal).  

I am certainly not against drinking any of the above for religious reasons. I just don't really enjoy drinking alcohol all that much. However, I  do have most of the drinks mentioned above, including wine, available at my condo for guests who might enjoy a drink with dinner or maybe just when they drop in for pizza or may want a drink out on the deck! 

Here's a very short video you might enjoy about the joys of Gin and Tonics for us English men!  (Click on arrow and then open "Full Screen" to see bigger image)

Even though I gave up cigars several years ago, I would still rather have a nice cigar than a drink! Cigars are still tempting after all these years! 

Myself and some great priests on June 10, 2019 in the Diocese of Crookston, Minnesota, having an annual cigar at one of the 140 priest retreats I led during those years.  Two of those priests were students of mine at St. Meinrad Seminary (left to right #1 and #3). Both of them are pastors in the Diocese of Crookston today.  

An Indianapolis seminarian (now a priest) and myself at a "field day" celebration at St. Meinrad School of Theology and Seminary when I was on the Staff there @2013.

Now, if I could just get off my serious craving for sugar, I might live to be 100! 

 

 

SAVING YOURSELF WHEN EVERYONE ELSE SEEMS TO BE DROWNING

"THERE IS NO RESCUE PARTY OUT LOOKING FOR YOU!"

We're living through the most disorienting societal moment since World War II. Some one referred to this generation as the "Rattled Generation." Almost nobody in a position of power is explaining very adequately just why we are rattled, much less what to do about it.

You could say that I am also a victim of this chaotic government and our disoriented society, but from my own past experiences, I do have a couple of suggestions about what you can do about surviving the present chaos and disorientation in which so many seem to be drowning! 

I believe you need to have what I call "your own fire escape experience!" When I was in college, I was bashful, backward, scared and unhappy. I thought that if I could just find a way to change the world, I could become a happier more confident person. One day, on a fire escape, I remember reading something that changed my life. I realized that I had become, in the words of George Bernard Shaw, "a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world would not devote itself to making me happy!" I decided that day to "grab the bull by the horns" and do something about it even if it killed me! I decided that I needed to change me and quit waiting to be rescued by somebody else! I started doing just that and I am still working my program! 

I realized soon afterwards, in the words of Al Franken, the comedian, that "it is easier to put on slippers than it is to carpet the world." In other words, it is easier to control oneself than try to control everybody else! The realization that there was no rescue party out looking for me hit me right between the eyes. If there was to be a rescue party coming to save me, then it was up to me! I had to be that rescue party!

You control you! Those are the three most important words I can recommend to you. Say them to yourself every morning. You don't control the economy. You don't control AI. You don't control the president! You don't control the stock market or group chat! However, you DO control YOU!

You control when you wake up, what you eat, whether you exercise, whether you pray, whether you meditate, whether you take five minutes to think, what you read, watch or listen to, how you treat the person in front of you, whether you send a text, make a call, apply for the job or show up for your friend.

Every one of those is a decision. Every one of your decisions makes you a little better — or a little worse. Nobody else can make your decisions for you. So when it gets hard, control what you can control. AI can't do that for you! I can't do that for you! You can do that for yourself! That realization is quite liberating, even empowering.

You can choose where you get engaged in life and how you get engaged. Nothing can make you feel better than being with others and especially with helping them. Find people who also want to help others and throw yourselves into action. If you are truly worked up about politics, don't vent! Volunteer! Vote! Use social media to spread your smarts and your sanity. Worried about poverty? The environment? Homelessness? Decide to make a difference. You can do something, even if it's small. Don't wait till you feel like it, just go ahead and start doing it and then you will feel better! 

Not too long ago, I woke up one day thinking that there was little I could do about generational poverty, Christian/Muslim relations and immigration issues all over the world, except to feel bad and frustrated. Then an opportunity came to help finish a grade school for a Catholic Bishop in Tanzania that I was introduced to one day. He wanted to address all three of those problems in his diocese in Tanzania through offering education at a very early age by opening a new primary school for local Christian, as well as Muslim, children. All of a sudden, I realized that I could do nothing about those issues on a global scale, but I could do something to change the lives of a few children, in one small place, in one African country, on the other side of the world!

I went into action, using my blog! In a few months, I had accepted enough donations, from sharing details online about the project and its goals with enough others, to finish the school. It is scheduled to open with four of its six classrooms in July 2026 - and hopefully the other two in early 2027.

Worst case? If I failed, I realized that I would be too busy to fixate on the craziness around me that I hear about every night on the evening news. Best case? I realized that I had an opportunity to change the lives of a bunch of children I will never meet. Their lives will be changed through the education they will receive, their children's lives will be changed maybe for generations into the future, that little community will be changed for the good because the individual lives of the people living there will have been changed for the good! Through education, families will be able to escape from the cycle of generational poverty. Muslim children will remember the people who gave them an education and maybe local Christians and Muslims, at least, will live in peace with one another going forward. Then no one from that area of Tanzania will need to migrate, but can thrive right there in that community. I was right! I could change the world of a few people at least in one small spot on the other side of the world!

In conclusion, I offer a few more simple tips: live simply, monitor your intake of social media, realize that modern media is full of falsehood, anger and poor examples of success so don't believe everything you hear or read, test everything for truth, don't blindly follow the herd and, lastly, decide on the tried and true values you want to live by and stick to them regardless of what everybody else is doing! Even if you are part of "the rattled generation," you do not have to be rattled! Just change you and the way you look at things and help yourself  become "unrattled!" 

DON'T BE AFRAID

 

 

Jesus said to them: "Fear no one! Do not be afraid! Have no fear!”
Matthew 10:26-33

Last week, we heard about Jesus picking the twelve apostles from among his disciples! This week we hear some of his instructions to them as he sends them out!  We’ve got to give Jesus some credit! After calling his disciples to follow him, he certainly did not promise any of them a rose garden! In today’s gospel, part of a longer passage we are reading over several Sundays, Jesus tells his disciples “not to be afraid,” not once, but three times! He speaks about “killing the body,” not once, but twice! It is part of a longer instruction to them before he sends them out to preach and to heal! 

I don’t know about you, but if I had been there, I would have smelled a rat, big time! Who needs to get involved in that kind of bad news? I hate to admit it, but I may have run like hell! However, in spite of all the mistreatment that Jesus warns them about, he also tells them that they will be taken care of! “Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge. So don’t worry; you are worth more than many sparrows. Even the hairs of your head are numbered.” He sums up his instruction by telling them to be sure to acknowledge God before others during the best of times and the worst of times!

Faithful Catholics, as a member of his church, Jesus sends us out as well and asks us to acknowledge our faith in the best and worst of times. For the church today, these are some of the most unsettling of times we have seen for a long time, which makes acknowledging our faith very difficult on some days! These are rough times, yes, but one of the good things that has come out of this time of trial is that it has forced every Catholic to reevaluate his or her faith! 

Embarrassed, some Catholics have no doubt, thrown in the towel on the church! Even though I find that tragic, I can understand their response - and I don't find it surprising! What really surprises me is the fact that many of you are staying and are working through all of this uncertainty! You are the people who keep me going! I have said more than once, I can see that your faith is well placed. Your faith is not, nor has it ever been, in the church's messengers!  The church has always referred to you as “the faithful,” and so you are!  You have loved your priests, no matter how quirky and weak they have been, and I believe that most of you still do! That’s what makes this so painful for you: the realization that someone that you have loved so much could, in their sickness, do harm to children!  The revelation of these events has no doubt shaken some of your faith, but not destroyed it. Your faith is built on solid rock! It will stand! Jesus asks you today to acknowledge your faith to others in the best and worst of times just like he asked his original followers to do!

Jesus has sent me out, as well as you, and has asked us to acknowledge our calls in the best and worst of times! I can still remember the days right after the sexual abuse scandal broke into the open here in Louisville. I caught myself one day putting my hand over my Roman collar at a stop light so nobody could see it. I was embarrassed to be a priest! My feelings were published in America Magazine in 2002 in an article I submitted called "Collateral Damage: How One Priest Is Feeling These Days." It still saddens me to remember how I felt writing it in just about an hour on my front porch!  

In my 56 years of priestly ministry, I have also seen some great times. As a priest, I have experienced some incredibly marvelous things, things I could not have imagined being part of when I was growing up! Yes, I have a few set-backs that I thought I would not live through, but they have been so few compared to the numerous wonderful things, even incredible things! As I trudged through that sexual abuse scandal a few years ago, everything went through my mind. For the very first time, I caught myself imagining what I would do if I were not a priest! It was only momentary, but still it is significant that my mind even went there to begin with! What was shocking, even to me, is that I had even felt a twisted kind of envy, yes envy, of those who were forced out! I knew that some of my brother priests who had lost everything because of their twisted behaviors and were dismissed also experienced a great freedom: with their whole lives exposed, they were finally free of the heavy burden of other people’s expectations, something that those of you who have never been in our shoes as a public person, may not understand.  In spite of those painful days, when all was said and done and when I came to the end of a day’s worrying, I always returned to the fact that that pain was good pain! Children must be protected! Priests must be trusted and those of us who remain must, as St. Paul puts it: “Preach the gospel in season and out of season, whether convenient or inconvenient!” As for me, I am hopefully here to stay, even though I cannot say that I have always been without fear. I am trying to carry on and not be afraid. With God’s help and with the finish line in sight, fear will hopefully not overwhelm me the rest of the trip!

I served the archdiocese as the Vocation Director during the height of that scandal. When I was the local Vocation Director, what did I say to those who might feel called to priesthood? To them, I simply said this. "The church needs you now more than ever!"  To any would-be-priest, in all honesty, I would say this even today! "If you fold in face of every crisis and you collapse every time you face a set-back, you probably should think twice before getting into this way of life!" It has always taken some kind of courage to be a priest. I believe that it will take even more courage in the future. As scripture says, “My son, if you seek to serve the Lord, be ready for a battle!” As one-about-to-be-ordained seminarian was quoted in NEWSWEEK magazine a few years ago when a reporter asked him if he was hesitant about going into the priesthood, he said this. "This is the priesthood today - to suffer for things you did not do!" If he was ordained, that young man is no doubt making a fine priest somewhere! Going into it, he was obviously aware of the warning Jesus gave the first group of disciples that he sent out in today's gospel! 

I learned a long time ago that priesthood, whether it is your baptismal priesthood or my ordained priesthood, is actually healthiest when it isn’t a bed of roses! As the old saying goes, “Whatever doesn’t kill you will make you stronger!” For me, priesthood has seldom been a bed of roses, but in my book, it has definitely been worth it! Many of you could say the same thing about being a parent. It may not have been a bed of roses every day, but it has certainly been worth it!

My friends, we live in trying times when it comes to remaining faithful Catholics. Many have simply walked away from the church. Being faithful Catholics, we are sometimes attacked and ridiculed for our fidelity. There are indeed many thorny issues dividing us, but in spite of our fear I have met so many fellow Catholics who are trying their best to hang on! They inspire me to hang in there with them! 

I once heard a great preacher compare the church today to being a gigantic egg. I have shared that story with you many times before. He said that some days we wake up and that egg is covered with small cracks - ever widening cracks! Many simply run away for the ensuing mess. Others are running around with tape and string and ladders yelling that it is falling apart and we must do something to hold it together.

That great Catholic preacher suggested, on the other hand, that when the egg starts cracking like that, we need to stand back and let it hatch! We are not dying! We are giving birth! I grew up on a farm and I know that he was right. I know that the dumbest thing you can do when an egg is about to hatch is to try to prevent it! In trying to prevent it from cracking, you can actually smother the new life that is struggling to get out!  

Sending them out, Jesus said to them: "Fear no one! Do not be afraid! Have no fear!