YOU JUST CAN'T MAKE THIS STUFF UP #43

MY LIFE AS AN OLD LADY MAGNET

I have a reputation for being an "old lady magnet" - not just any "old lady," but the ones who have experienced life on a broad scale! Many have traveled. Some were professionals. A lot of them were readers. Most of of them have a wicked sense of humor. They could talk about a range of things. They never bored me, but made me laugh! 

I can remember presiding at the funeral of one of my "old lady" friends. I even mentioned in her funeral homily that I had a reputation for being an "old lady magnet." As they were loading my friend's body into the hearse, an old lady I had met previously, but did not know very well, tapped me on the shoulder and said, "I hear there's an opening!" I laughed out loud because I knew exactly what she was talking about! 

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Archbishop Kelly knew of my reputation of being "an old lady magnet." One day I was telling him about the death of another "old lady" friend. Without one bit of sympathy for my loss, he responded, "Well, I'm not worried! You'll have another one by Sunday!" 

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There was another one, who was a regular reader of my weekly column, who made contact with me to help out on one of my missions projects. I visited a couple of times. Then we moved to "having a drink" about 4:pm. One beautiful day, we decided to have our gin and tonics on the back deck. We had covered a host of topics when the topic of sex changes came up! Someone in the neighborhood had reported such a family situation to her. We talked about the subject from several angles. At one point I said to her, "Did you ever imagine when you were a little Catholic girl that one day you would be sitting on your back deck with your priest friend, talking about sex changes and drinking cocktails?" We both looked at each other for a second and burst out into intense laughter!  

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I am reminded of a joke I once heard about two old ladies standing at the casket of an extremely wealthy old lady friend who had just passed away. One woman whispered to the other, “How much money do you think she left?” The other one whispered back, “All of it, I would guess!”  

 

"OBVIOUS AS THE NOSE ON YOUR FACE"

     

GIVEN AT THE LITTLE SISTERS OF THE POOR

October 13, 2025

While still more people gathered in the crowd, Jesus said to them, “This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah.

Luke 11:29-32

 

The bottom line of this gospel is that God comes to us especially in the very ordinary, rather than the spectacular and dramatic, events of life. The Scribes and Pharisees were always looking for “signs” – dramatic and spectacular happenings and super-human personalities to “prove” that God was active in the world. Truly, God is to be found in the ordinary events, in the ordinary moments and in the ordinary people of this world. That is why so many people missed Jesus when he was here on this earth. He was so ordinary, while they were looking for something spectacular. While they were looking “out there” and “up there,” while they were looking among the famous and the powerful and the well-connected, God’s “sign,” Jesus, was standing right in front of them. They missed him because he was just “too ordinary.”

 

Our traditional Christmas story is a perfect example. That story is told by the evangelist, Luke. Luke wrote for the underdog, the little people, the left-out, the losers of the world. When he tells the story, he emphasizes the dismalness of Christ’ birth: a poor young mother delivering her baby in a barn amid the smell of dung and donkey breath; greasy, crusty, bumbling sheep herders; doves dropping their stuff from the rafters; the restlessness of cows and no one to care. Luke wants his readers to know that God comes, not just for the rich and famous and powerful, the young and healthy, but especially for the lowest of the low, in the most desperate of circumstances. God comes for, and loves, every human being who has ever lived on this planet no matter how insignificant they may be in the eyes of others.

 

Many of us are very much like the Jewish people of old. We want “signs and wonders” to prove that God is alive and active in our world! Even today, we have people running all over the world looking for those “signs and wonders!” They look feverishly for God working in our world today in places like Fatima, Medjugorje and Lourdes!  I am sure God has worked there, but we don’t have to go to those places to see God working. He is working right here, right under our noses, right now in this very place! We just have the eyes to see it!

 

Think about all the knee replacement surgeries, heart by-pass surgeries and cataract surgeries that have been performed on many of you!  Think of the kidney and heart transplants and even brain surgeries that have been performed next door. Think of this beautiful building - what it took to build and what it takes to operate it. This Home is a miracle itself, really!

 

To find God working in our world, all we have to do is look around us. We just need to look at this place, and the people in it, through the lens of faith! Miracles are happening every day, right here and right now! All we need do is wake up and pay attention. That’s what prayer and preaching are for - not to wake God up to pay attention to us, but for us to wake up and pay attention to the marvelous things that God is doing right under our noses.

 

As Jesus said, in another place, in this very Gospel of Luke (10:23-24)

 

“Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it."

 

 

 

 

ANOTHER LIFE-CHANGING MEMORY FROM THE PAST

Every day, Microsoft One Drive, sends me some of my old photos called "On This Day" in such and such a year. Recently, I received some of the old photos below from 44 years ago that brought back some very good memories.   

In 1979, while working in the Catholic Missions of Southern Kentucky, I was offered a full scholarship from McCormick Presbyterian Seminary toward a Doctor of Ministry Degree in "Parish Revitalization." I took courses for three years, defended my thesis entitled "Strangers in Town: How One Roman Catholic Mission Church Dealt Assertively With Its Environments (Internal Weakness and External Rejection)"  and graduated in 1981. Accepting that scholarship and finishing that degree may have been one of the smartest things I ever did ministerially! It helped me tremendously in the mission area of the state, in the Catholic area mid-state and eventually led to me being named pastor of the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville to lead its successful revitalization as a parish and spiritual center for the downtown community over fourteen years. 

McCormick Theological (Presbyterian) Seminary on the campus of the University of Chicago

My Doctor of Ministry Degree in Parish Revitalization was conferred by McCormick Theological (Presbyterian) Seminary in 1981

My D. Min. graduation took place at the Rockefeller Chapel on the campus of the University of Chicago

Lining up to go into my D. Min. graduation in front of the Rockefeller Chapel at University of Chicago. 

Interior of the Rockefeller Chapel at the University of Chicago where the graduation took place. I remember sitting on the right side about half-way back. 

 

PRAYER: LANGUAGE OF LOVERS, A BOND BETWEEN US AND GOD

Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who

Call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them?

I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily.

Luke 18:1-8 

The Gospel of Luke, that we have been reading this year, may have more of Jesus teaching on prayer than any other gospel. This gives me a chance to highlight four of his most basic messages about prayer in a nutshell.

(1) WE DON'T HAVE TO BEG AND CRAWL TO GET WHAT WE NEED FROM GOD. This week we read about a corrupt judge and a persistent widow. It is a parable of contrast. Other parables are parables of similarity. So instead of teaching us today about what God is like, he teaches us today what God is not like! By that I mean that in today's parable, Jesus teaches us that we don't have to be like a poor widow who had no power other than persistence before a corrupt judge who is used to being bribed. God doesn't need to be begged and hounded by our prayers. No, he already wants us to have what we need and is willing to give it to us at a time that is good for us. When Jesus tells us to "pray constantly," he is not telling us to recite endless prayers until we wear God down, but simply that we should never stop our intimate conversations with God who is already on our side. 

(2) WE DON'T PRAY TO INFORM GOD ABOUT WHAT HE NEEDS TO DO. In the Letter of James (4:3), we are told, "You ask, but do not receive because you ask wrongly." Here, I am reminded of something I read a few years back. It is a prayer that many of us pray, in various versions, all too often. "Lord, use me! Use me in some advisory capacity!"  When we pray like that, we pray as though God needs our advice, that we know best what needs to be done and that our plans are better than his!

The older I get, the more I realize that sometimes what I prayed for, and didn't get, was the best thing that ever happened to me. I prayed that I would be assigned to a nice Louisville parish as my first assignment as a priest. What I got, was an assignment to the southern Kentucky missions! As it turned out, I was happy not getting what I thought I wanted! I always prayed that my mother would outlive my father so I could spoil her. As it turned out, my mother dying first cleared the way for my being reconciled with my father - something that would not have happened if I had gotten what I imagined. The internet is filled with stories of people who had their lives ruined by winning the lottery that they thought would bring so many blessings! I could go on and on, just from personal experience!  

(3) WE CAN NEVER USE PRAYER TO REMIND GOD THAT HE OWES US SOMETHING NO MATTER HOW GOOD WE HAVE BEEN.  Those of us who are serious about doing what God asks of us are sometimes tempted to use the good we have done as a way of making God indebted to us. When we do that, our prayer tends to become like those of King Louis XIV of France after he suffered a serious military defeat by his troops. "God," he prayed, "how could you do this to me after all I have done for you?"  When we pray like this, we pray as if we are owed something because of all our pious efforts and good works. In reality, we can never make God indebted to us. When we do that, we may pray like the Pharisee in next week’s gospel who went up to the Temple to pray. Instead of humbly comparing himself to God's goodness, he proudly compares himself to a tax collector he spots in the back row. The Pharisee brags about how good he has been, what he has done for God and how much holier he is than most other people. The tax collector, on the other hand, compared his own sinfulness to God's goodness and simply beat his breast and asked for forgiveness.  No matter how much good we do, if it leaves us arrogant and prideful and self-righteous in our prayer, our prayer is bound to be ineffective.

(4) PRAYER FORMULAS AND METHODS ARE NEVER MORE IMPORTANT THAN WHAT'S IN OUR HEARTS. At times, we may dismiss the prayers of others simply because they do not use the right formula or posture.  This, too, reminds me of an old story.

There was a Shiek who heard about a holy man who prayed constantly. The Shiek decided to visit this simple fisherman on  his secluded island. When he arrived, the Shiek was shocked that the holy man's manner of saying prayers was all wrong. The Shiek corrected the holy man, who listened very patiently to his corrections.

As the Shiek left to go home, he was proud of the fine service he had done the poor fellow. As he looked back at the island, he was astonished to see the holy man walking on water toward the boat. When he got within hearing, the old fisherman yelled, "Excuse me, Sir, but I have forgotten some of your fine instructions on how to pray properly. Could you run them past me again?"

The Shiek could not believe his eyes when he saw the holy man walking on water. "No, no," he called out. "Forget what I taught you. Just go on praying as you are used to doing." 

Truly, when it comes to prayer, "Not as man sees does God see, because man sees the appearance but the Lord looks into the heart."  (I Samuel 16:7) In reality, prayer is impossible without an intimacy with God and that intimacy with God is strengthened by constant prayer. Prayer is the language of lovers - God with us and us with God.  If intimacy with God is really there, prayer will flow freely from our hearts, we will pray as we should and our prayer will strengthen our intimacy with God even more.