USEFUL WISDON FOR 2024 #40

 

MORE AND MORE NOISY CHATTER EVERYWHERE

 

Rising very early before dawn, he left and

went off to a deserted place, where he prayed.

Mark 1:29-39 

When I was a young boy, we lived across the road from my grandparents. We simply ran back and forth all day, as if we had a home and a branch office across the road. One of the things I remember clearly is going in the front door of their house after dark, knowing they would be sitting side-by-side in the dark in their rocking chairs.

They sat down in their rocking chairs after supper and, even though the sun had gone down and it had gotten dark, they didn’t bother to turn on a lamp. They just sat there in silence, rocking. I always knew where my grandfather was sitting because I could see the red dot of his unfiltered Camel cigarette glowing in the dark. It never crossed my mind whether they thought my arrival was a nuisance or a relief. I guess I thought I was doing them a favor barging in uninvited and relieving them of the quiet!

I read somewhere that couples who can enjoy their time together in silence will always stay together. A child, however, probably cannot imagine anyone enjoying silence.

Today we read about Jesus getting up early in the morning to go off by himself for some silent prayer. Notice some of the things it says right before he got up early, before dawn, to be by himself in silence. “Everybody was looking for him.” “The whole town was gathered at the door.” “They brought to him all who were sick or possessed.” “He cured many of the sick and drove out their demons.” After all that, it says he rests, prays for direction and then moves on to another town to minister to the people there.

This is the pace and pattern of Jesus’ ministry – frantic activity, withdrawal and rest, prayer for clarity and then back to work! We see it here and we see it again and again in his ministry. In chapter six, after an especially busy time, it says that Jesus took his apostles to a deserted place to rest and pray before going back to work. It says, “People were coming and going in great numbers, and they had no opportunity even to eat!”

For many people today, this kind of silence can be downright scary. There is a term for it – sadatephobia - fear of silence. This “fear of silence” was relatively unheard of fifty years ago, but today psychotherapists are seeing large numbers of individuals with can't handle silence and they believe the numbers will continue to rise in the coming decades. Many experts believe that technology has given rise to the constant need for sound, therefore producing a greater number of people suffering from sadatephobia.

My problem is the opposite. I am among a few who suffer from a condition called “misophonia,” "hatred of noise" (also known as selective sound sensitivity syndrome,) in which negative emotions, thoughts, and physical reactions are triggered by specific sounds. Fingernails on a blackboard is only one of many sounds that send people like me up the wall. Several years ago, because of a NIGHTLINE program about people who suffer from misophonia, I finally realized that there are many of us who “manage” this condition by avoiding occasions where certain sounds will occur. Watching that program, I literally came out of my chair yelling, “I’m not the only one! I am not just imagining this!” The condition was only recognized by the medical community around the year 2000. Even my doctors were skeptical. Most had never heard of it. Now it's talked about a lot. Amazon has over a dozen books on the subject of misophonia, the hatred of noise.

For many more people, not just the young anymore, it is impossible to sit in a quiet room for even a few minutes without noise - smart phones, head phones, blaring music on the car radio, having the TV on even when no one is watching it or even the noise of traffic blaring around them. Newer restaurants, I believe, are deliberately designed to encourage noise. As a result, a parallel market for gadgets that drown out noise is also booming: noise cancelling earbuds, white noise machines, noise reducing triple pane windows and the like.

I have suspected for a long time now that there is, as well, a connection between the noise level of today's world and the loss of our sense of the divine. Simply put, it seems to me that the world is so noisy today that even God can’t get a word in edgewise! As the old Chinese proverb puts it, “Outside noisy, inside empty.”

There is a beautiful moment in the Bible when the prophet Elijah feels God’s presence. The Scriptures say that a powerful wind tore the mountains apart, but God was not in the wind. After the wind, there was an earthquake, but God was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. It was the whisper of God. God doesn’t yell, he whispers. Maybe that is why we can’t hear him all that well these days.

Silence today is looked on as odd, something to be avoided at all cost. In reality, it may be dangerous to do without it. “We need quiet time to examine our lives openly and honestly - spending quiet time alone gives your mind an opportunity to renew itself and create order.” (Susan L. Taylor).

The noisy world of social media, constantly being bombarded with external stimulation, seems to be having a detrimental impact especially on the young. Teens’ use of electronic devices including smartphones for at least five hours daily more than doubled, from 8 percent in 2009 to 19 percent in 2015. These teens were 70 percent more likely to have suicidal thoughts or actions than those who reported one hour of daily use.

In 2015, 36 percent of all teens reported feeling desperately sad or hopeless, or thinking about, planning or attempting suicide, up from 32 percent in 2009. For girls, the rates were higher — 45 percent in 2015 versus 40 percent in 2009.

In 2009, 58 percent of 12th-grade girls used social media every day or nearly every day; by 2015, 87 percent used social media every day or nearly every day. They were 14 percent more likely to be depressed than those who used social media less frequently. All that information is several years old. By now, it is probably much worse.

Besides avoiding quiet at all costs, several years ago we dumped the idea that we need to honor the third commandment that tells us that we should stop every seventh day to rest and pray. Thinking that the whole idea of regular day of rest was outdated, thinking that we know better than God, we created the endless-loop workweek. Now we are dealing with the results of such arrogance: stress related diseases, alienation among spouses and children and the rise of the drug culture to kill the pain and to help us sleep. Thinking that the whole idea of a regular day of prayer was outdated, thinking that we can do without God’s guidance and input, we replaced regular prayer time with recreation, shopping, more work and, yes, noise, noise, noise. God only knows how many Catholics skipped Mass this Sunday to get things set-up for the Super Bowl, an annual “holy day” of screaming and yelling! Those of us who could care less and would rather be a hundred mils away from all of it, are looked down on as “pathetic introverts.”

Is it a sin not to observe the Sabbath, not to rest and pray with the community once a week, like they used to say it was many years ago? After thinking about it to some length, I believe it is! Does it hurt God not to observe the Sabbath? Yes, but only because God loves us and not resting and praying hurts us! God gave us the third commandment, not because he needs our worship and he needs rest, but because we need to express our gratitude and we need to rest, because we need to quieten down and listen for God’s direction in prayer before we go back into our frantic lives on Monday and because we need to spend some quiet “down time,” on a regular basis, with our families and friends. When I was a kid, Sundays were about going to church, having a big family dinner and visiting relatives - that was it! Maybe we weren't so dumb after all!

The world tells us that the secret to success is to do more and more. God tells us that the secret to success is to sometimes do less. Who are you listening to?

WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF PRAYING, ANYWAY?

 

Lord, teach us to pray!

Luke 11:1-13

 

What we have here is a gold mine – a gold mine of basic teaching on prayer. With so many contrasting beliefs about prayer going on in the minds of Catholics, it might be a good idea to listen closely to what Jesus has to say about prayer as he teaches his disciples, as well as us, in this gospel.  

 

The first thing Jesus teaches us about prayer is the kind of God we pray to!  If you believe that God is distant, cold, moody and disinterested in the human race, you will approach that kind of God in one way. If you believe that God is gracious, interested and loving toward us, you will approach that kind of God in another way. It is important to know what God is actually like, instead of what you imagine him to be!

 

Jesus teaches his disciples in this gospel to call God abba. Abba is the word a son or daughter would use at the time of Jesus to address their beloved biological fathers. It is a term of closeness. Just as you can tell what kind of a relationship a person has with his or her father by the name he uses to address him, we are told what kind of God we have, by being told to call him abba. Like any good father, who wants the best for his beloved children, our God is our abba who already wants the best for us. 

 

The second thing Jesus teaches us about prayer is that God does not need to be buttered up, nagged, bribed or bought because he already wants us to have what is best for us. Some of the parables are comparisons and some are contrasts. The parable that Jesus uses here is a parable of contrast. Jesus tells us that we do not have to be like a persistent neighbor who has to beg again and again for what he needs or like that whining, nagging, persistent widow before a cold-hearted judge. Our God wants to give us the best before we ask or whether we ask.  

 

The third thing Jesus teaches us about prayer is that God will not give us things that only look good to us.  Even the best parent in the world would not let his child have a bottle of Drano just because his child cries for it, God will not let us have something we want if it is not really good for us! Sometimes our God actually protects us from harm by not giving us what we ask.  

 

If this is who God is and this is how God operates, then God doesn’t need to do the changing, we do! We need to do the changing so that we will want what God wants for us!  The bottom line in this teaching on prayer is that when we pray, we need to pray that God will change us and open us up o receive what he wants to give us, rather than approaching God in an attempt to change him!  For this reason, Mary’s “be it done to me according to your word” should be a model for our prayer because God is always loving and always generous toward us.

 

There is one man in Scripture, in particular, who has been a role model for prayer in my own life and that man is King Solomon.  Given an opportunity by God to ask for anything, he does not ask for things that would benefit him personally, wealth or fame or the life of his enemies, but simply for the ability to be a good king for his people.

 

Like Solomon, my prayer has gotten simpler and simpler over the years. Once I discovered that God is gracious, already on my side and will not give me things that simply look good to me, I have come to believe that the best prayer for me would be to stop a few times a day and simple ask, “God help me be a good priest.”  Anything more, I believe, would be unnecessary. 

 

Those who would like to learn to pray, try this for a few weeks. Just stop and ask God, as often as possible, “God help me be a good student, friend, spouse, doctor, patient, teacher (or whatever you are)!” To be able to do that, you must believe that God is already gracious, already on your side, and already wants to give you what is best for you!  With this kind of prayer, you will be able to relax and be at peace with whatever happens, knowing that God is directing your life down the right path whether you can see it at the time or not!  

 

Finally, let’s not forget that asking for more is not the best way to pray anyway. The best way to pray is to offer God gratitude for all that he has already given us. “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you,” is even better than “Give me! Give me! Give me!” That, my friends, is what we do around the altar at every Mass.  We celebrate the Eucharist. The very word “eucharist” means “thanksgiving.” At the Eucharist, our prayer is simply: "Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! You, who bestow on the world all that is good!" To be prepared to get the most out of the Eucharist, it is good to count your blessings before you arrive! 

 

 

 

BLAMING WOMEN

 

The different versions of the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) often tell the same stories, but tell them in different ways. We have one of those examples in today’s gospel reading. In Mark’s version, the first gospel to be written down, the one we read today, James and John make the request personally for the closest two seats in Jesus’ new kingdom.

James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Jesus and said to him, “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” He replied, “What do you wish me to do for you?” They answered him, “grant that in your glory we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.” 

Mark 10:35-45

By the time Matthew wrote his gospel, several years after Jesus had ascended into heaven, the apostles had been elevated in respect in the Christian community – elevated so much that when Matthew tells the story, he could not bring himself to picture James and John being so brazenly ambitious. So, what does he do? He blames it on their mother! He says their mother is the one who made the request! Here are the exact change of words in the gospel of Matthew.

 The mother of the sons of Zebedee approached Jesus with her

sons and did him homage, wishing to ask him for something.

He said to her, “What do you wish?” She answered him,

“Command that these two sons of mine sit, one at your right

and the other at your left, in your kingdom.”

Matthew 20:20-21

In the Bible, blaming and demeaning women starts in the very first story – the first story of creation. We are told that Eve was only created as an afterthought and that was simply to be man’s “helper.” Far from being his “helper,” she is presented as the cause of his “downfall.” She is blamed for being seduced by the serpent   into eating the forbidden fruit and then for dragging poor innocent Adam into the mess by giving him a bite of it which led to their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. (Of course, that whole story was composed from a male perspective!)

That story, transmitted from generation to generation among the Jewish people into the time of Jesus, led to a negative view of women as a dangerous source of temptation and sin. For centuries, because of the story, Jewish men were taught that it was wise to treat women with great caution and keep them submissive otherwise they could not be trusted. (We were warned more than once in the minor seminary at St. Thomas out on Brownsboro Road about this possibility. Good thing I didn’t believe everything I was told back then!)

Over time, women were more and more dominated and controlled by men. They were seen first as the property of men; first their fathers, then their husbands, then if they were widowed, they became the property of their sons or their brothers. We see remnants of this tradition when Jesus gives his widowed mother to John from the cross. He understood well the danger Mary would be in, in that culture, without a man to look out for her!

We see remnants of this domination even in our own time in a typical American wedding. Most brides dream of walking down the aisle with their fathers, but they are often mortified when they find out what that tradition really means. When the bride and her father walk down the aisle, her father “gives her away” to the groom standing there waiting to “receive” her. There it is! One man gives his property, his daughter, to another man as his property!

The mistrust of women that was canonized in the Garden of Eden story had several other tendrils besides being treated as property. Besides being a temptation and occasion of sin, women were viewed as frivolous, sensual, lazy, gossipy and disorderly. Men were seen as guided by reason, but women were seen as carried away by emotions and sensuality. According to Jewish Scriptures, women were inferior to men in everything. In fact, a Jewish man thanked God every day during a morning prayer that "God didn't make me a Gentile, that God didn't make me a woman, that God didn't make me an ignoramus." There was a popular quote that said that "the words of Scripture should be burned rather than being given to women." Sadly, in many cultures, even today, I have noticed that men often do most of the talkin’ while women still do most of the doin’! 

It is obvious in the Scriptures that Jesus had a lot of women friends. Without challenging the customs and traditions that excluded and demeaned women, Jesus basically ignored those customs and traditions. He approached women without hesitancy and related to them openly, without being affected by any prejudice. Women, on the other hand, were attracted to his presence. For many of them, it meant being free, at least for the moment, from the life of marginalization and work they experienced at home. Some even dared to follow him on his Galilean trips. These were probably single, unfortunate women who saw traveling with Jesus’ as a way of living with greater dignity.

Certainly, women saw in Jesus a different attitude from that of the predominant culture. They never heard those disrespectful views from Jesus that the rabbis regularly expressed. Jesus never exhorted them to be "submissive" to their husbands or to be subjected to some one-sided patriarchal system. Jesus showed no animosity toward them, only respect, compassion and unexpected sympathy.

It would be worth our time to carefully study the relationship Jesus had to women, who were among the many “excluded and marginalized” people that Jesus called “friends.” For Jesus, the “inclusion” of women among the marginalized was a symbol and foretaste of the Kingdom of God. For Jesus, the excluded and marginalized would be among the first to enter the Kingdom of God!

We need to know that 1,165 women now work in the Vatican, compared to only 846 women in 2013. Their numbers are growing and they are being welcomed into higher and higher positions - thanks mostly to Pope Francis. In parishes, that number is much, much higher, with most parish staffs being made up of women and some of them are even leading some of our parishes! We certainly could use more of the help, expertise and insights of our talented women, both in our country and in our church! It's coming and it's coming faster and faster. I, for one, welcome it and celebrate it whenever and wherever I can!