I DON'T GET IT?
Quote for the Day - May 29 2010
"One man's 'simple' is another man's 'huh?'"
David Stone, Omni, May 1979
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Friday, May 28, 2010
LOVE IS ....
Quote for the Day - May 28, 2010
"A lady of 47 who has been married 27 years and has 6 children knows what love really is and once described it for me like this: 'Love is what you've been through with somebody.'"
James Thurber [1894-1961] Found in Life magazine, March 1960
Picture on top of a long married couple from California whom I met on my Panama Canal Cruise in 2007.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
ENTERTAINMENT
CAN BE TELLING!
CAN BE TELLING!
Quote for the Day - May 27, 2010
"The analysis of character is the highest human entertainment."
Isaac Bashevis Singer [1902-1991] New York Times, November 1978
The picture on top is of a street comedian in the Covent Garden area of London, summer, 2009. He was making fun of me for taking his picture.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
READY OR
GETTING READY?
GETTING READY?
Quote for the Day - May 25, 2010
"Harpists spend 90 percent of their lives tuning their harps and 10 percent playing out of tune."
Igor Stravinsky [1882-1971]- recalled at his death April 6, 1971 - that's a photo of Igor on top.
Is this true or was Igor just being cute - or was he a complainer? I don't know.
Monday, May 24, 2010
Sunday, May 23, 2010
THE ROOMS WE’RE IN
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily for this feast of Pentecost is, “The Rooms We’re In”.
Since today’s first reading and today’s gospel both take place in a room – actually the same room – but at different times – it hit me to wonder about the rooms we spend much of our lives in.
What are the main rooms in our life – and how are we in these rooms?
Living room, dining room, bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, the room with the TV we watch, the room with the computer, or at work, the office, the main office, our car, the bar, the coffee break space, church, a meeting room in an organization we belong to.
Are there others? Of course.
Take a few moments and wonder about all these different rooms we spend our lives in. Make a list!
THE UPPER ROOM
If you take a trip or make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, one of the regular spots for Christian tourists is “The Upper Room” in Old City Jerusalem.
It’s not the original Upper Room – but the tour guides will say – it was here in Old Jerusalem – and it would have been something like this.
When I went there with a group of priests in the year 2000, we spent a good hour in this room. The tour leader, Father Stephen Doyle, a Franciscan, read a reading – maybe even today’s first reading. I don’t remember. There are many New Testament texts that take place in the Upper Room. And then we became quiet and reflected on the importance of the Upper Room.
I remember writing an article on the Upper Room years ago and I don’t know if anyone read it – got an insight or two from it – but in writing it, it gave me several insights. I came up with 5 things that the Upper Room was: a place to eat, a place of fear, a place of prayer, a place of decision making, a place where our Spirit is renewed.
We too have these places – and we go to them from time to time.
Where do you go when you have fears? Where do you hide? I remember hearing about a mom of 4 boys who used to hide in the cabinet under the kitchen sink. How did she ever fit in there? My sister-in-law, when her daughters were small, said she had to lock herself in the bathroom for some moments of peace and she could hear her 7 daughters finger nails scraping the bathroom door. Where’s your man cave or woman’s space? Where is your place of decision making? Where do you like to pray? Where is your Spirit renewed? Where do you enjoy eating?
PENTECOST
Pentecost means 50 days after Easter.
It’s called the Birthday of the Church. It’s called the moment when the Holy Spirit rocked the room where the disciples were – filled with fear – and they were given new gifts – that would fill them – fire them up – emblazon them – and get them to open those doors and face the challenge of building a better world – as the disciples of Jesus.
The title of my homily is, “The Rooms We’re In?”
The hope of my homily is that each of us will look at the places and spaces of our life and have a rebirth in one of them – or all of them.
Let me just pick out three rooms – three spaces. I came up with 7 - but let me just give 3 - otherwise we'll be here forever.
FIRST ROOM: MEALS AT THE FAMILY TABLE
When we see pictures of the Upper Room we usually see Jesus at a table with his disciples surrounding him.
As kids we ate 90 % of our meals at our green and white metal kitchen table. We had a dining room – but that became our parent’s bed room when the four of us got bigger and they needed two bedrooms for the 4 of us kids in the back of our small house.
I remember that table with fond memories. I don’t know how we all fit in that tiny kitchen, but we did – inches away from the stove and sink and refrigerator – and each other.
Sunday afternoon meals were the best – 3 PM and then my dad would give us a dollar to go up and buy a gallon of ice cream at the drug store – which was open on Sunday afternoon and bring it back for the 6 of us.
How are we all doing with family meals?
I was just on a 3 day retreat with our junior h.s. kids and Ginny Dauses, our youth minister, had the movie, “The Blind Side” for the second night. I had seen it last Thanksgiving week with my sister-in-law and 6 of her daughters – and some of their kids – at Rehoboth Beach.
There is a scene in it where Michael Oher – now of the Ravens – sees the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. It’s a Norman Rockwell scene of a family all together enjoying Thanksgiving Dinner. He never had such an experience – finding food in Dumpsters or in the stands after a volley ball game in a gym. He’s invited into the Tuohy Home and it’s Thanksgiving and it’s dinner time and the two kids and dad take their turkey and stuff onto their plates and head for the couches and a football game on TV. Sandra Bullock as mother, Leigh Ann Touhy, sees Michael load up his plate and he’s not at the TV – she sees him sitting at their dining room table all alone. She gets the message – goes over – picks up the clicker and shuts off the TV and there are screams and yells but the next scene has them all at that dining room table – saying grace and enjoying a family meal together.
I was wondering if it hit those junior high school kids. It certainly reminded me once more of the importance of family meals together. “The family that eats together stays together!”
What about couples, marriages? I’ve run into couples who are married 18 or 38 years – who still try to go out at least once a month – for a meal together – a date night – sacred moments together. We priests here in our community try to go out on Sunday night for a meal together. We better practice what we preach. It’s different than weekday nights.
SECOND: PRAYER ROOMS
Where do we pray? My dad prayed in the cellar. I often saw him with his prayer book – the one with the rubber band – sitting there in a fold up beach chair – saying his prayers. My mom used the green marbled vinyl chair in the sun porch or on the edge of the big couch in our living room.
Where is your prayer room? Prayer space? Prayer moments?
When people tell me they want to pray more, I tell them to name some chair in their home as their prayer chair. Baptize it that with a prayer or hit it with some holy water if you have any. For the first three months I say only sit in it for 5 minutes at a time for prayer. Do not go longer than 5 minutes. 5 minutes. Next when is a good time for you to grab 5 minutes in your prayer chair. Discover that. Then just sit there and listen to the sounds in your home or where you are. Or have a Bible with a few of your favorite prayers in it. Read a psalm or if you don’t know where to begin in the Bible, go to the Letter of James. If you don’t get James, you’re hopeless. Pray for hope. Then get out of that chair after 5 minutes. You’ll soon find yourself liking that moment of renewal and refreshment. If you want, go to ten minutes after those 4 months. If ten minutes works, continue for 4 months more – if not, go back to 5 minutes. Then jump to 15 minutes for the last 4 months – but don’t go more than 15 minutes. Otherwise prayer will become a burden – rather than a delight.
THIRD ROOM: CAR TALK
One of the best rooms for many people is the space in their car – long peaceful escapes – sometimes in the worst of traffic.
Some people get refreshed with quiet time – just no nothing – peace and silence in a car.
Some enjoy music or CD’s of books or NPR or what have you.
My niece Patty discovered that picking up the kids at Catholic School – Maryland doesn’t allow school busing – like some states – has its advantages. She said just sitting there silently – her sons and two other kids she would pick up at school up in Glyndon and then Calvert Hall – they would talk to each other and she would pick up all they needed to know – without them knowing she was taking it all in.
I also discovered that some of the most memorable conversations I have had in my life – were in long car rides with just one person. So when I was a novice master in charge of future Redemptorists, if someone had to take a long trip somewhere I always suggested going with someone else. There was a kid whose mom was dying in Baltimore and we were in upstate New York, near Kingston, and I told him to go see his mom every other week – but take one other guy with you on Saturday morning for the long 6 hour drive there and 6 hours back on Sunday evening.
CONCLUSION
Come Holy Spirit – fill the rooms – the spaces and places – we spend our lives in. Breathe into us fresh air, so we can be fresh air, present new ideas, insights, wisdom to each other. Amen.
THE PEACEFUL ROOM
Once upon a time a woman who worked at the United Nations had a dream. She went to bed around 11 o’clock at night after a long day of work at the United Nations. All day long people were going to the microphone and yelling at other people. Nobody was getting along with anybody. It was a very frustrating day at work.
However, there was one peaceful moment during the day. It was around 12 noon - when she went down to the Day Care Center at the United Nations 1st floor – in the back – which lead out to a neat garden and a small park with swings and see saws and slides – a sand box and even a skate board section, etc. etc. etc. It was raining outside so all these kids of all kinds of colors and looks and languages – had to be indoors in the big Day Care Center Room and they were all getting along with each other. It was a moment of peace for this lady – and she had lunch with her 4 year old daughter, Maria.
Then she had to go back up stairs – to all the arguing and yelling and word fighting about what’s going wrong all around our world. It reminded her of family fights in the van when she was a kid.
So that night she had her dream – and dreams after long days of stress or long worries about stress for the next day – sometimes pull together hopes for what might be. Sometimes they are worse nightmares.
Her good dream was about the Day Care Center at the United Nations Building. She saw all the kids there all understanding each other – even though all the kids were speaking different languages. She didn’t understand them – but these little kids all understood each other as they were playing their games and eating lunch and snacks together.
Now remember this was just a dream – one of those interesting movies in our mind that play in the middle of some nights.
In her dream every kid in the room was getting along with every other kid in the room – when suddenly all the kids could hear screaming upstairs in the big General Assembly Room.
So in her dream all the kids made a long chain of hands – and they marched out of the Day Care room in the back of the first floor of the big United Nations Building and were heading upstairs.
The teachers and guardians who were there to supervise this big room full of kids were dumbfounded – but they didn’t stop the kids. They had never experienced anything like this before.
The kids continued on their way to the big hall filled with their parents and people from every country in the world – and they marched into the hall – a big long chain of kids holding hands.
The adults were still yelling and fighting till suddenly everyone caught sight of the human chain of kids.
The kids then made a circle around all the adults and then they let go of each other’s hands – all at once – as if they had practiced this for days – and then every kid put a finger to their lips as if they practiced this till they got it perfect. Then they all went “Shush!” and then each said the word, “Peace” in their own language.
Paz, Rahu, Nabada, Rafi, Taika, Paci, Samaya, Santi, Mir, Beki, Nagaya, Lumana, and on and on and on – till every kid finished saying, “Peace” in his or her own language.
And the adults began to cry. Then they smiled. Then they clapped their hands. Then all the adults said in their own language to the kids, their word for “Thanks!” Spasibo, Rumba, Danke, Asante, Otetela, Sha Sha, Tiki Hoki, Dalu, Tak, Toda, Salamot, Tau, Arigato, Gracias, Merci, Dzieki, Fo Fo, obrigadu or obrigada and on and on and on – till every adult said, “Thank you” in their own language.
And then the all the kids clapped for the adults.
At that the Lady woke up from her dream – crying tears of joy – with a great smile on her face. She got out of bed and went to her daughters room. Her little girl was asleep – so she went over to her daughter – and put a big kiss on the top of her head and said, “Paz y gracias”. “Peace” and “Thanks”.
The next day when she went to the United Nations for her job there – after dropping off her kid in the Day Care Center in the back on the first floor – she sat there wondering about her dream. She knew that dreams often are puzzles of pieces of things that happened to us.
That afternoon it was her turn to go to the microphone. Once more everyone was fighting about this and fighting about that.
It was her turn to give a speech and she said the following, “Last night I had a wonderful dream” and she described her dream – and told the whole story about the little kids coming up from downstairs all holding hands in a human chain and then telling us to “Shush” and stop the fighting and bring “Peace” to each other.
Then she said, “There was one piece of the puzzle, one piece of the dream, that was missing – that I was trying to figure out as I sat here today.
“Suddenly it hit me. It was the reading I heard at our church the other day – a dream that someone in the early Christian church had – so I went on line and found the reading from last Sunday, Pentecost Sunday, in so many of our churches. It went like this and I’d like to close with this:
A reading from the Acts of the Apostles 2:1-11
On the day of Pentecost
all the Lord's followers
were together in one place.
Suddenly there was a noise from heaven
like the sound of a mighty wind!
It filled the house where they were meeting.
Then they saw what looked like
fiery tongues moving in all directions,
and a tongue came
and settled on each person there.
The Holy Spirit took control of everyone,
and they began speaking
whatever languages the Spirit let them speak.
Many religious Jews
from every country in the world
were living in Jerusalem.
And when they heard this noise,
a crowd gathered.
But they were surprised,
because they were hearing everything
in their own languages.
They were excited and amazed, and said:
“Don't all these who are speaking come from Galilee?
Then why do we each hear them speaking
our very own languages?
Some of us are from Parthia, Media, and Elam.
“Others are from Mesopotamia,
Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt,
parts of Libya near Cyrene, Rome, Crete, and Arabia.
“Some of us were born Jews,
and others of us have chosen to be Jews.
Yet we all hear them using our own languages
to tell the wonderful things God has done.”
Amen!
This was a story I wrote last night for today's feast of Pentecost. It was for our 8 AM Kids' Mass - and the 4th grade was the class "in charge" for this Mass. I had different kids holding a colored piece of paper with one word on it - the word for "Peace" in the various languages as indicated above. They were to hold it up when I said that word. I had adults holding a white peace of paper with the word "Thanks" in various languages and they too were to wave that word when I said it. The story is total fiction. I assume there is a Day Care Center at the United Nations for employees - but I have not idea what it is like.
The photo on top was taken off the Internet.
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