LEARNING TO HOLD YOUR OWN HAND

Back in 2018, I did a "whole life review" of my own life. When finished, I put it in a book (cover picture below) and titled the book "BETWEEN COURAGE AND COWARDICE: Choosing to Do Hard Things for Your Own Good." It traces the choices I have made, for good or for bad, unconscious and conscious, that have resulted in the person that I had become back when I was 74 years old. All that reflecting back and self-examination helped me realize that when I chose courage over cowardice, I was actually choosing to do hard things for my own good. It helped me realize the wisdom of many of the things on the list below and it inspired me to tell others about the wisdom behind this list in hopes that it would inspire them "to make the daily hard choices that could eventually lead to a better life tomorrow."  

AVAILABLE at AMAZON BOOKS
ronknottbooks.com 

HEADED TO HEAVEN WITH OUR DIGNITY UNSTAINED

 

I had a vision of a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation, race, people and tongue. They stood before the throne (of God), wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands.

Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14

Most of us, immediately after we were baptized, we were dressed in a white robe. (You may have that white dress or even some photos of you dressed in it!)  When it was placed on us, the priest or deacon addressed us by name, saying these words, “You have become a new creation and have clothed yourself in Christ. See in this white garment the outward sign of your Christian dignity. With your family and friends to help you by word and example, bring that dignity unstained into the everlasting life of heaven.” 

In our first reading today, St. John gets a glimpse, across many generations to come, of a “great multitude which no one can count, from every nation, race, people and tongue, dressed in white robes, standing before the throne of God.”    Today’s feast reminds us that all of the baptized, including you and me, are called to stand someday before God with that great, uncountable throng of people from every part of the world, from every age!  According to St. John in our second readings, we are already God’ adopted children! As children of light, we were called at our baptisms to become saints! Yes, you heard me! We are heaven-bound! We are called to become saints!

What is a saint? Most of us have developed our ideas about holiness from a well-intentioned, but narrow, view of canonized saints. In its effort to hold up before us models of holiness, the church has sometimes elevated some saints to the point that they have sometimes become super-human! Some saints come off as life-hating masochists.  Mostly virgins and celibates, some might admire them, but most people do not see themselves imitating them!  My favorite definition of sanctity comes from Kentucky’s famous Trappist monk, Thomas Merton. This is the definition of holiness that guides me personally. “Sanctity,” he writes, “is not a matter of being less human, but more human that other men. This implies a greater capacity for concern, for suffering, for understanding, for sympathy, and also for humor, for joy, for appreciation of the good and beautiful things of life.”   This is the same message as the Beatitudes in today’s gospel! To borrow an idea from an old commercial, holiness is about “being all that you can be.”  Holiness, then, is not about being perfect, but about becoming the very best human being we can become: the best spouse, the best parent, the best church member, the best student, the best doctor, the best teacher, the best politician, the best artist, the best social worker or the best priest! The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us that married couples and priests are not only called to become holy, but they are called to lead others to holiness. Married couples are called to lead their spouses and children to holiness. Priests are called to lead the faith communities entrusted to them to holiness. It goes on to say that if we do it right, it will make us holy in the process!

In other words, we become holy, not by mimicking the saints of old, but by answering our own unique calls.  We become holy, not by wearing sandals, a hair shirt and living on bread and water, but by living out our own unique call, not somebody else’s call.  We hear our calls by listening to our hearts.  While it is true that some people in the Bible received their calls in visions and dramatic events, most of us receive our calls in a simple, quiet knowing, the proverbial still, small voice within us.  To hear our call we do, however, have to shut up long enough for God to get a words in edgewise!  It helps to spend some quality time with God. Most of the time, calls are not shown to us directly, but are mediated through other people, symbols, dreams, symptoms, happenstance and synchronicities. We need to recognize that our calls can come in many disguises. Our unfolding as human beings requires that we be in constant dialogue with God who has called us to co-create ourselves, to do something with our lives and to contribute to the world God has given us.   

Someday, after we have done something with our lives, after we have become all we can be, God will call us home to be with him forever. At our funerals, we will be carried into church, one last time. Our bodies will be sprinkled with baptismal water and we will be covered over with a large white pall, a huge reminder of our white baptismal robe.  At the end of our funeral Mass, dressed in that white robe, our family and friends will commend us to God with these words, “May the angels lead you into paradise; may the martyrs come to welcome you and take you to the holy city….May choirs of  angels welcome you…..”  Then, we too, will be on our way to sainthood!  Some day, in the not-too-distant future, the church will gather on an All Saints Day, like this one, to honor us!

 

 

 

"CHURCH CHAT" #52

 I thought this cartoon was a good way to celebrate the end of this year's "Saturday CHURCH CHAT Column." Next Saturday, I will begin another year with my new "QUESTIONABLE ADVICE COLUMN."

REFORMERS HAVE A HARD LIFE

 

ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO "ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE?"

 

 

JESUS: ONE TO BE IMITATED OR ONE TO BE WORSHIPPED?

Let me be clear about two things as I wade into probably a very touchy subject for some people. (1) I know what I believe and, as a retired priest, I am now freer than ever to write about my beliefs in my own blog! (2) I believe in the "real presence!" I accept the words of the Catechism of the Catholic Church where it teaches us what to believe about the "real presence" of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist.    

However, I am not one to spend a whole lot of time making "Holy Hours" in front of a monstrance! My "holy hours" consist mainly of working with deliberate intensity on inspirational homilies in hopes that people will be inspired to imitate the Jesus that they have just received at Mass, especially in their daily lives and when they get home from church! Yes, I believe in the "real presence" of Jesus at Mass. I believe that he is truly present there, mainly for the purpose of becoming our "bread for the journey and strength for the trip" - our spiritual nourishment for the upcoming week - as we grow deeper in discipleship through our conscious implementation of the teachings of Jesus! 

Cardinal Thomas Collins, retired Archbishop of Toronto, Canada, validated my belief and practice one day when I was responsible for getting him invited to lead a Prayer Day for the opening of the seminary school year when I was a staff member at St. Meinrad Seminary. I had just led him and his nearly 800 priests for two weeks of retreat (nearly 400 priests each week), for two years in a row. The last year I was asked to  add an additional fifth week for his seminarians at St. Augustine Seminary in Toronto. 

During his Prayer Day presentation, one of the local seminary students, during the question and answer time, asked Cardinal Collins what he thought of making "Holy Hours." His response was memorable and insightful. "Yes, I think "Holy Hours" are a good thing! However, if you get a call as a priest to go to the hospital to see a person who wants you to come, "go!" Leave your Holy Hour and go!" 

I think I heard several of them gasp out loud in shock! Personally, I wanted to applaud! I believe in the "real presence," yes, but I believe even more in the fact that Jesus is more of a model for our living than he is one who wants to be worshipped! Did he not say, "Come, follow me!" "Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." "If you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar. First, go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift." "Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me." I remember these words, but I can't remember Jesus saying, "Come, worship and adore me!" As the hymn "Lord, Whose Love in Humble Service" reminds us in verse #4, "Called from worship into service, forth in your great name we go, to the child, the youth, the aged, love in living deeds to show, hope and health, good will and comfort, counsel, aid and peace we give, that your children, Lord, in peace we give, that your children, Lord, in freedom, may your mercy know and live." 

It was that day that I realized that seminary training had seriously changed. Over the next several weeks it became clearer and clearer to me just how much it had changed. I was running a post-ordination program parallel to an initial-formation program at the same seminary. The seminary training that I grew up with focused mainly on "preparing us to do ministry." It seemed to me that the seminary training program that I saw when I came back had morphed into a training program focused much more heavily on "personal piety." In my programs, seasoned priests would say things like, "Father, by the time I do all the ministry that I am required to do every day, I don't have time for prayer." During their deacon year especially, when seminarians were getting a taste of ministry, I would hear things like, "Father, by the time I finish my rosary, my Liturgy of the Hours, my Chaplet of Divine Mercy, my Holy Hour and my Stations of the Cross, I don't have time for ministry!"  What I was hearing was a lot about "my" personal piety! As a pastor several times, this worried me greatly. I could imagine that "future priests" might soon understand Christianity as having more to do with "believing in Jesus" and "worshiping Jesus" and less to do with "imitating the example of Jesus" in a world that desperately needs some inspiration for modeling the ministry and actions of Jesus! Our job is to promote "serious discipleship," not merely "personal piety." Personal piety serves discipleship! It can never become a substitute for discipleship! 

Is being a Christian really more about worshipping Jesus or more about modeling his example? I worry about this new zeal for "Eucharistic Devotion" and whether it is now almost replacing a zeal for service to the poor and marginalized! It has never been about one or the other, but about the first serving the second! For one thing, if adoration of the eucharistic presence does not lead to helping people turn their gaze toward helping others become mature - spiritually, ethically, emotionally and relationally - then what is the point? Jesus does not need to venerated as much as he needs to be imitated! For another thing, adoration of the eucharistic presence and having Jesus safely secured in a monstrance and simply carrying it through the streets, where we can take him out and put him away at will, is not as messy as carrying him within us when we are out in the streets serving our communities by trying to imitate his ministry! As I used to tell seminarians fixated on their own personal piety, "Your job as a priest is not just about you seeing to it that you have golden light coming out of the rectory for all to admire, but for you to drive through the parish and be able to see golden light coming out of the homes of your parishioners!" It was a way of reminding them that if their presence doesn't make an impact, their absence won't make a difference.  

For me, "personal piety" practices are fine, but so that I can "help the People of God exercise faithfully and fully the common priesthood which it has received," (Pastores Dabo Vobis #17) preaching has always been much more pressing and important to me! That is why I will be buried holding a Lectionary, rather than a Rosary. As Vatican II taught us in Presbyterorum Ordinis (I,4),"Priests have as their primary duty the proclamation of the gospel of God to all." As the Catechism of the Catholic Church says clearly in #1534, 'Holy Orders is directed toward the salvation of others. If it contributes as well to personal salvation, it is through service to others that it does so.' When the Lectionary was placed in my hands at my ordination to the deaconate by my bishop, here is what he said; "Receive the Gospel of Christ whose herald you now are.  Believe what you read, teach what you believe and practice what you teach."  

 

Even when it comes to Christianity, this is the question I have always liked to ask myself! Is Christianity just about believing in Jesus and venerating Jesus or is it even more so about imitating Jesus? Who cares whether I believe in Jesus or whether I venerate Jesus if I fail to live like Jesus, treat people like Jesus would treat them and yet still do not have the ability to inspire others to do the same?    

 

THE HEART OF IT ALL: LOVE OF GOD, SELF, OTHERS - EVEN ENEMIES

 

You shall love God with all your heart, all your soul,

all your mind and your neighbor as yourself. The

whole law depends on these.

Matthew 22:34-40

For the last few weeks, we have been reading about the battle between Jesus and the religious teachers of his day in the Gospel of Matthew. Since Jesus was very popular among the ordinary people on the streets, these jealous religious leaders could not attack him directly so they resorted to trying to trap him in his speech so that they could have something to accuse him of should there be a religious heresy or political sedition trial. They are determined to “get” Jesus, one way or another, and they eventually succeeded in having him killed!

Last week, we read that they thought they had Jesus cornered. First, they schmoozed him with false flattery to get him to open up. “Teacher, we know that you are a truthful man and you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth.” They then asked him whether it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not. They thought they Jesus had boxed in with their clever “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” dilemma. If he said “Yes, it is lawful” he would offend and lose his followers who hated Caesar and his taxes, but if he said “no it is not lawful” then the Roman government would come after him for sedition.   Jesus outsmarted their trickery by answering, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s!”  

Today they are back for another try. The trick question today is: “What is the greatest commandment?” They knew that scripture scholars could not agree on this so they thought they could discredit him with somebody no matter what answer he gave. Again, Jesus outsmarted them again by placing the love of God and love of neighboring on the same plane - making them equal - rather than prioritizing them as they were hoping.    

There you have it! Basic Christianity is about fully and completely loving God, oneself, one’s neighbors and even one's enemies. Does that mean I have to love God, myself and others with all my heart, soul mind and strength if I dare to claim the name “Christian?” You mean I am supposed to make God and others the most important considerations in my life, even while truly loving myself? To be honest, most of us can’t say that God is that important to us, much less ourselves and those around us!

I would love to be able to say that God is always at the center my life, that I truly take care of myself and that I love all people all the time, but sadly I quite often put myself ahead of God and the needs of others. Some days I do better than others but, thankfully, God is very patient with me and loves me anyway.  He is always giving me as many second chances as I need! I have always taken great comfort in knowing that my best is good enough for God.

Today, I want to say a few more words about taking these two commandments seriously. None of us will ever measure up completely to the Great Commandment – the one that summarizes all other commandments - but this is the brass ring for which we all should reach out for! To take God seriously, to seek to love him, ourselves and others with all we have, there are things we must do. To call ourselves “Christians,” there are some basic things we must strive for! Let’s all examine our consciences as I list some of them! As that famous quote asks, “If you were accused of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?”

1.     We must want what God wants. To be able to even want what God wants, means we have to understand the Scriptures, listen to the Spirit within us and stay consciously connected to God through prayer.

2.     We must remember who we are. We are holy. We are holy, not because of what we have done, but simply because we are “created in the image and likeness of God” and, through our baptism, we are adopted permanently as children of God. If we are to love ourselves properly, we must accept our holiness, neither exaggerating who we really are nor denying who we really are!

3.     We must want to live by the same values Jesus lived by: having a loving kindness toward everyone, especially the most weak and vulnerable, even our enemies; striving to do God’s will no matter the consequences; using Jesus’ own life as a pattern for our own.

4.     We must be in command and control of ourselves, have a handle on our addictions and our passions, so that we can go in the way that God wants us to go. We must constantly question our own motives, making sure that we not only do the right thing, but also do it for the right reason.

5.     We must never give into hopelessness, whether it is about the future or about other people because we know that the war against evil has already been won. Even though we may continue to lose many more painful battles, the war is already won! God’s kingdom will come and nothing we do, not even the gates of hell, can stop it.

6.     Regardless of our failures, loving God and each other with our whole heart, soul, and mind is something we should strive for, even though it is something we will never accomplish completely. God wants a relationship with us as long as we live, even if it is off-and-on, rocky and imperfect!    

Today, we are challenged to get serious about God, not in some loud, noisy, fanatic and superficial way, but in a long haul and to the core-of-one’s-being kind of way. Loving God and one’s neighbors with all our hearts, souls and minds does not translate into noisy religious fanaticism. I, for one, cannot stand in-your-face religious fanatics! The loving that Jesus talks about is about knowing that we are loveable to God and about a simple way of living that places that love back onto God, ourselves and everybody around us. That is the spirit of these two commandments and that is what the spirit of God’s whole law is all about!   

How can we possibly hope to love this way? We can do it only with God’s help! Let us therefore go to that table to be fed and strengthened on the Body and Blood of Christ! With God’s help all things are possible!