CHRISTMAS GREETINGS
Saturday, December 23, 2017
December 23, 2017
SOMETIMES GOD
Sometimes God winks through
a morning cloud in the east - in
a shaft of light - dawn, “Here I am.”
Sometimes God waves to us with a baby’s
hand and a smile from a shopping cart
in the bread aisle at the supermarket.
Sometimes God seems to be hiding
in the hospital waiting room or in the
dark night of my soul - way past midnight.
Sometimes God, I doubt your presence,
that is, till I kneel there at the Christmas
crib and it dawns on me: you are… I am.
© Andy Costello, Reflections 2017
Friday, December 22, 2017
Thursday, December 21, 2017
Wednesday, December 20, 2017
December 20, 2017
EDGES
Rocks, water, woods, walkways,
along the edges of our lives -
remind us that there are limits.
Fences, walls, rules and regulations,
signs, saying “Closed” or
“Dead End,”
tell us there are edges beyond
which we cannot go.
Not yet ….
Yet our eyes and our minds see
what's on the other side of fences
and the beyond - beyond our boundaries.
and the beyond - beyond our boundaries.
It’s then we know we are made
in your image and likeness, O God.
It’s then we know these are only the
edges of endings which never end.
© Andy Costello,
Reflections 2017
Tuesday, December 19, 2017
HEROES
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily for December
19th is, “Heroes.”
“Heroes.”
Today’s two readings give us two big bible heroes: Samson
and John the Baptist.
They are placed together here in our readings for today,
because both have similar stories.
Both readings begin with moms who were barren - without
a child - and then there is a promise of a child. After their birth, the story
of Samson and John the Baptist growing up have incidents of surprise and
strange patterns of eating.
And if you put both readings side by side you can see
Luke knew the story of Samson in the Book of Judges. For example Samson’s mom is told to be
careful and take no wine or strong drink and to eat nothing unclean. John the
Baptist in turn is described as drinking neither wine nor strong drink.
Then we read in the Book of Judges and the gospel of Luke
what made them heroes.
QUESTIONS
Do we all have heroes?
In growing up do we all need heroes?
Who have been our heroes?
Then the big question: have we ever done anything heroic?
HEROES
The bible presents us with some amazing heroes.
Our Catholic church presents us with many heroes,
especially the saints.
Our sports world and our world history provides us with
outstanding examples of presidents like Abraham Lincoln and Nelson Mandela.
Of course there are degrees and disagreements about heroes.
Heroes are big sandwiches with the right ingredients:
integrity, leadership, security, saving others, giving hope to others.
Heroes provide
support, hope, victory, and courage.
They give us nerve. They embolden us. They help us to be unafraid.
They are givers not takers.
They are movers and they are shakers.
They are movers and they are shakers.
They teach us how to live and how to die.
MOVING TOWARDS
A CONCLUSION
The title of my homily is, “Heroes.”
It used to be a title just for men - and heroines for
women. Now the title, "heroes" works for both men and women.
Thanks for listening. I want to do some more thinking
about the topic - especially the question, “Who have been my heroes?”
I grew up as the youngest and my brother was the oldest
of us four. Like most younger brothers I lived in my brother’s shadow - but it
wasn’t till his cancer - which began with a doctor giving him the news - ironically - on a Good Friday, “You
have 18 months to live at the most.” I asked him then and there, “How are you going to
deal with this?” His answer: “I’ll let
you know.”
It was how he dealt with death and his cancer treatments
that I realized he was a hero to me. Near his death, he said to me, “You asked
me how I would deal with this. Well, thank God for mom and dad who gave us
faith.” Then he added, “Besides faith, I tried humor. I tried to think only of
others. Also I did my exercise and whatever the doctors told me to do.”
CONCLUSION
So give the idea of heroes some thought.
Check out Davie Bowie’s song, “Heroes” as well as Bette
Midler’s song, “Wing beneath my wings.”
Monday, December 18, 2017
BETHLEHEM
INTRODUCTION
The title of my reflection for today is, “Bethlehem.”
Bethlehem is a Christmas word. It’s the traditional place
where Jesus is born.
SOME DATA
Mathew and Luke have the so called infancy narratives and
that’s where we find mention of Bethlehem.
Bethlehem is also the traditional place where David was
born 1000 years before Christ.
The distance between Jerusalem
and Bethlehem is more or less 5.52 miles.
The distance
from Nazareth to Bethlehem is 68 Miles.
Bethlehem
has been a place of pilgrimage down
through the centuries.
It has been
a place of looting, burning, and violence down through the centuries. Right now
at this time there have been some shooting and protesting - like the burning of
signs of Vice President Pence.
The
Christian community keeps getting smaller - because of push back.
Jews,
Christians and Muslims inhabit the place.
When I was
there in the year 2000 the bus had to park in a big bus depot up a bit from
where the so called birthplace of Jesus is.
You walk
from the bus depot a few streets and
then you can enter the so called birthplace through a low door entrance - built that way to block horses
from entering - or carts for looting.
Poets would say it’s to stress humility. In fact it's called, "The Door of Humility." Tour guides like to mention the
meaning of having to bend down - to have
access to the place of Jesus’ birth.
There’s a silver star on a spot where they say
Jesus was born. St. Jerome didn’t like
it - and said the reality of the place was rich without the need for silver.
Jerome
settled in Bethlehem and did some of his writings there and translations of the
Bible into Latin.
Its
population today is about 25 thousand people.
There are 3
big celebrations around this time: December 25 for some Christians; January 6th,
for some Christians - the epiphany; - and
January 19th for Armenian Christians.
MEDITATION POINTS
Make sure you
meditate and pray at this holy time - by stopping at the crib in every church
you enter during the Christmas season. Bring the kids to the crèche in your church. Say a prayer and take a piece of straw.
Have a crib
under your tree. I hear people complaining about others blocking Christmas
crèche in city spots. I respond: it’s reality. Not everyone is a Christian.
Have one in your home or front or back yard or wherever.
Have an
opinion - but think first - about public messages about bringing Christmas
back. One person in the news is implying
that Christmas has been disappearing and we need to bring it back. Another person in the news, is saying, “Christmas
has never gone away.” How do you see it?
I like to
meditate on the word background of the
word “Bethlehem”. Beth is the second
letter of the alphBETH. The letter B is formed in the image of a house. In Hebrew, Bethlehem means house of Bread. Lehem is the word for bread. In Arabic, it's Beth lahem. House of meat. Lahem means meat. So Christ is the
bread and Christ is the meat. Christ is
the lamb sacrificed. Christ sits at our table - breaking bread with us -
hoping to be in communion with us.
December 18, 2017
FOUND KEY
I spotted a key on the sidewalk.
Just a key - with a hole in it, but
no key chain, no nothing on it.
Is someone searching right now
for a lost key or saying a prayer to
Saint Anthony or are they locked out?
I’m still looking for the key to God
and how to be happy and how to
not be a pain in the butt to others.
How about you? Have you lost any keys?
What have you figured out so far in life?
What's your number one key to ______?
you lost?
How about you? Have you lost any keys?
What have you figured out so far in life?
What's your number one key to ______?
you lost?
© Andy Costello, Reflections 2017
Sunday, December 17, 2017
DOWN SYNDROME
DANCE
INTRODUCTION
For a homily today and for a reflection, I would like to use a homily that I heard on the
radio by a Rev. Rosemary Wakeland. She preached it for this Sunday -- the third
Sunday in Advent.
DOWN SYNDROME
She began her homily this way.
She once worked with young people who were handicapped:
mentally, physically, etc. She said that every Saturday night they would have a
social: games and dances - barn dances, group dancing, etc.
And she said that the kids with Down Syndrome had a good
sense of rhythm and enjoyed the beat. They were good dancers and really enjoyed
the dancing.
And she said that every once and a while in the midst of the
dance, when she was dancing with the kids, in the midst of the joy, and the
celebration, the rejoicing, a wave of sadness would come over her. It would
wipe her out, because she would begin to think about these kids. Wouldn’t it be
great if they were normal? Wouldn’t it be great if they could be out there on
the dance floor enjoying life like normal kids? Wouldn’t that be great? If only
that one chromosome or whatever it was, was okay. As well as the other handicapped
kids. Why do they have to suffer this hell? Couldn’t they be out there enjoying
a normal life? That would be heaven.
SECOND THOUGHTS
And then another thing would hit her, perhaps later on in
the evening, when she was alone. She would begin to think about people who have
everything, especially people who lord it over other people, who step on
people, who make life miserable for other people. Then she would say to
herself, “You know someday they are going to have to face judgment and they are
going to get their hell.” They are going to be judged. Just as these kids will
get their heaven. When all will be right. Everything will be righted someday in
heaven, while there will be judgment on us.
THIRD THOUGHTS
And then it would hit her, Me? What about me? Look at the
ways I cause hell for other people. And there will be judgment on me.
FOURTH THOUGHTS
And she said that at that point it would become too much for
her. She would then fall into prayer because she knew she wasn’t right. She
knew she couldn’t make things right by herself or straighten out the hell and
the hurt she had caused in others. Only God could make things right. Only God
could save her.
She was feeling and thinking about some powerful thoughts
and feelings there.
Well, what she said really hit me.
THIRD SUNDAY OF
ADVENT
Then Rosemary tied her thoughts and feelings into today’s
readings.
Today is John the Baptist Sunday. She said that John the
Baptist saw hell all around him. And he began to proclaim heaven. He wanted to
make things right. He preached judgment on his people, the Israelites. He preached hell and judgment against the
Romans. They were living on occupied land. He preached that someone was going
to come and make things right. Someone was going to come and make things right.
The Messiah.
Then he added, that he, John the Baptist, was not the Messiah.
And we’re going to hear the readings this week about John the Baptist, He
points to Jesus. That Jesus is the one. He’s the one who is going to redeem Israel
Wow.
A few months later John is in prison and everything has gone
wrong. And in prison he hears about Jesus and Jesus is not living up to his
(John’s) expectations. So he sends messengers to Jesus, “Are you the one to
come or should we expect someone else?” Someone else who will make it all
right. And we know what Jesus tells the
delegates.
Aren’t we like John the Baptist? We want things right now.
And in our mind we know the way that things should be. It’s our vision, our
scenario, our plan, our model, our dream. That’s the way things should be.
And we think that someone out there can come in here and make things right. If only we had the right person, the right people, we could make this the right community.
What we are doing is picturing the solution to be out there.
The messiah is out there, the answer is out there, the plan is out there, the
secret is out there.
Rosemary says that if that is our vision and our way then
Advent is still taking place for us. Christmas has not taken place yet.
Christmas can have happened already.
Christ was a baby a long time ago.
The kingdom
of God
Heaven is already here.
The kingdom
of God kingdom of God
In our minds.
And Jesus and the whole body of Christ, can make things
right according to the plan of Jesus. Not with the love of power, but with the
power of love. Not with a power from outside that will come in and make things
right, all straightened out with power, no, but with the power of love, which
is a horse of a different color. It takes in patience, understanding, hope,
prayer, all. The kingdom of heaven is here.
TODAY’S READINGS
Looking at today’s readings, we are the lowly whom Jesus
brings glad tidings to. We are the broken hearted whom Jesus heals. We are the
captives who hear the proclamation of liberty.
We are prisoners who are being released. And this year, this moment is a
year of favor from the Lord. And when we realize we’re it Jesus way is it, then make things right to bring about heaven
where there is hell.
Then we can begin to rejoice heartily in the Lord, because
God, like Mary, said is the Joy of our soul. And he is clothed us with the robe
of salvation wrapped in a mantle of justice. We’re like a bridegroom and bride
adorned with jewels and this earth will bring forth its plants and this place
here is the garden, springing up and the Lord’s justice and peace will spring
up here before all the nations, that we’ll rejoice in the Lord always as Paul
says in today’s second reading, without ceasing. We’ll make this real because
it’s taking place now. Heaven is here.
ORIGINAL SIN
So to return to the original story, when Rev. Rosemary in a
moment of joy saw sorrow, so too we in the moment of sadness, can see
joy. Heaven in hell. In moments of wanting power, to straighten it all out
there to see Jesus in the dance, the dirge, of hell, glimpses of God in the
sadness, the Kingdom
of God
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Here is her homily:
CHRIST’S WAY,
NOT JOHN’S,
NOT OUR’S
3 Sunday Advent B
Some years ago I worked with
mentally handicapped young people.
Once a week we had a social
evening. We shared, friends and staff, with the young people. It was great fun.
We played games, but mainly we danced: country dances, group dances, square
dances, and barn dancing.
A lot of young people had Down
Syndrome. They usually loved music and had a good sense of rhythm. So it was
good to dance with them.
I had my favorite partners and got
to know some of them fairly well, especially in the dancing when they often or
not were knocking me in the knee.
Sometimes, when I looked at them, I
would get a certain vision of what it would be like if they had not had that
extra chromosome.
It used to make me catch my breath
and fall away in anger.
They should be so disfigured.
But that was usually followed by an
irrational thought that one day it would be all right. They would appear as
they should be.
I suppose I was caught up in the
common human experience of believing that something better is coming, that one
day wrongs will be righted, that there is some sort of justice at the heart of
things.
My hope of seeing them as they
should be was all mixed up with thoughts of heaven, a belief in a time or an
another world when all ills will be healed and at last we shall be whole.
And mixed up with that is the hope
that people who deliberately make other people live in hell should at least be
caught up with and that is when it starts to get uncomfortable, because I knew
that there had been times when I’ve made life hell for other people.
And if there is justice for them, there will be for me too.
JOHN THE BAPTIST SUNDAY
This is the Sunday in Advent when
we remember John the Baptist.
The Jews believed that tomorrow
could be different.
It was not just wishful thinking,
but firmly based in the promises of God.
And the promises included the
coming of a special person, who would establish God’s rule of righteousness on
earth.
John came to get things ready for
the coming of this special person, who was going to get life right, the way as
God meant it to be.
John was quite uncompromising.
Everyone had gotten it wrong.
Everyone must repent or it was
going to be the worst for them.
The coming one was coming in
judgment with God’s full authority to sort the good from the bad.
So the expectation was high.
The trespassers, like the Roman
occupying force, were going to get their come uppance.
And there was a general drive to get one’s house in order
to escape the coming judgment.
So it all seemed a bit odd that it
was only a few months after Jesus had appeared on the scene and John had
recognized him as God’s special person that John is in prison.
Shortly to be executed and he is
sending messages to Jesus asking him if he really was the right one.
The problem was that Jesus had not
come up to expectations.
Those people hoped for someone who
would reestablish Jewish sovereignty and get rid of the Romans.
John possibly had in mind a high
profile judgmental person, who would wade into sinful humanity, stamping out
sin and promoting the righteous.
Instead they got Jesus who had his
own ideas.
He certainly had no doubt that
things could be better, that the sick could be healed, that the prisoners could
be released, that sins could be forgiven, that the sinner could start again.
And that all this was not some far
off day, but now. God’s kingdom was already happening right there in an
occupied territory of the Roman empire without
a sword being drawn.
The new kingdom was not about the
love of power but the power of love.
Human behavior and reactions have
not changed much through the centuries. Millions pay lip service to the Gospel
of Jesus, but actually trusting the power of love and risking the suffering
that might follow is too risky. Usually we prefer the bomb and the bullet.
Trusting the power of love means being vulnerable. That’s hard. People in Jesus
day couldn’t cope with it any more than we can today.
Plenty have risked it individually
and in groups but never at institutional level. The gospel story is the end of
the beginning. The kingdom is within you. If not, Advent is still the time of
hope.
THE FIRST LETTER
OF SAINT PAUL
TO THE THESSALONIANS
INTRODUCTION
The title of my comments for today is, “The First Letter
of Saint Paul to the Thessalonians.”
Instead of a homily for this Sunday’s readings for the Third Sunday of Advent [B], I just
want to say about 10 things regarding today’s second reading - something about
Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians - from which we get a section for our
second reading: Chapter 5, verses
16-24.
NUMBER OF BOOKS
IN THE BIBLE
The Old Testament
has 46 books - none of which is a letter. We only get letters in the New
Testament. However, there are mention of
letters in the Old Testament and parts of letters. Moreover there are in museums and
libraries and archives around the world, lots of letters of all sorts from B.C. For
example in Egypt there are thousands of Greek letters and parts of letters.
Human beings send letters, e-mail, faxes, twitter, etc. etc. to communicate
information to each other. [Cf. The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, p. 769 #4.]
The New Testament consists of 27 books. Different from the Old Testament, it has 19 letters. Paul has the
most 13, but there are letters from John, Peter, James, Jude.
The Old Testament is in Hebrew. The New Testament is in
Greek.
The Catholic Bible - has both the Jewish Scriptures and
the Christian Scriptures, These are the so called, Old Testament and New Testament. The
Catholic Old Testament has more books than the Protestant and the Jewish Bible's Old Testament. 46
Old Testament and 27 New Testament books was the standard number for the Bible till
the Protestant Reformation. Reason: Way
back before Christ the Jews in Alexandria - which was Greek speaking for
starters - chose more books to be in the Bible than the Hebrew Collection in
Israel. Broadly speaking that Greek text from Alexandria was translated into Latin and it became
the so called Vulgate. At the time of the Protestant Reformation the King James
folks chose the Hebrew text to translate into English and the Roman Catholics
chose the Greek and then the Latin Vulgate text.
COMING UP WITH
THE BEST COMMON TEXT
A goal in the last 150 or so years among Christians was to come up with the best Greek text as opposed to force a text to say
something that would support a theological position. Catholic and main stream
Protestant communities have for the most part come up with an agreed upon Greek
text. Within this century some believe
Jews, Catholics and Protestants will have come up with an agreed upon common
Hebrew Text.
In time - mistakes were made in copying the scriptures for the next generation - that is before the printing press. Scholars by studying all the texts that they could look at - as well as texts that quote the bible - can come up with an agreed upon common text. Then we work together to come up with the best translations - into the various languages. Translations differ because of different styles and word selections.
In time - mistakes were made in copying the scriptures for the next generation - that is before the printing press. Scholars by studying all the texts that they could look at - as well as texts that quote the bible - can come up with an agreed upon common text. Then we work together to come up with the best translations - into the various languages. Translations differ because of different styles and word selections.
As already mentioned the New Testament has 21 letters.
The rest of the New Testament is the 4 gospels, Mathew, Mark, Luke and John.
Then there is the Acts of the Apostles and the Book of Revelation.
OLDEST NEW
TESTAMENT DOCUMENT
The oldest New Testament document is Paul’s First Letter
to the Thessalonians. That’s some 20 years earlier than Mark, the earliest of
the Gospels.
LETTER AND
EPISTLE
Scholars like to make a distinction between a letter and
an epistle. I heard this after we finished our scripture studies. A letter is
more like a personal letter we would write.
An epistle is more polished, more worked out, more like an essay or a
magazine article than a letter.
I would put Hebrews in this category. It’s been called a
letter - but if it’s a letter, it’s certainly a different kind of letter than the other New Testament
documents. I was taught it’s more a sermon - a long sermon. Others say that James and a few others are more epistles than letters. [Cf. The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, p. 771, #16.]
FORMATS FOR
LETTERS
Letters have formats. Then there are business letters,
love letters, personal letters, etc. etc. etc.
We put an address or letter head on top of some letters. Then
we put the date. Then we put Dear John or Mary or whoever.
Then we give the purpose of the letter or what have you.
My sister Mary recently handed me a plastic bag of all my
letters home from the seminary. I looked
at them. They are all almost the same. “Dear Mom and Dad, How are you. I am
fine. Hope you are fine as well. Weather is cold. We had 6 inches of snow. All
is well. Your loving son, Andy.”
We were told we had to write home every week. Recently a marine told me said that they were
handed a post card every week and told to write home.
I don’t know if they offer guided tours of the U.S.
Military Archives in Carlisle Pa, but that would be interesting.
Well, New Testament times letters had a different format.
NAME
TO WHOM
ADD CO-SENDERS AND WRITERS.
GREETINGS: GRACE AND PEACE....
A WISH
A THANKSGIVING
A COMPLAINT
AN URGING
A CONCLUSION AND FINAL BLESSING
SOMETIMES A PRAYER OR A HYMN IS PUT INTO THE LETTER.
OFTEN THERE WERE SOME EXHORTATIONS OR NAGGING.
Letters were self written, dictated, given to someone else to compose but with the content from the author, or have given to someone else to even come up with the content.
Letters were also cut and paste at times.
13 letters are attributed to Paul - but there are
arguments about that - based on research. Computers catch plagiarism in term
papers in college - so we know now, this section of an ancient letter could
not have been written by the person who wrote another section of that same
letter.
CHAPTER AND
VERSE
The Old Testament has 929 chapters and the New Testament
has 260 chapters. In other words the Bible is 2/3 Jewish Scriptures and 1/3 Christian Scriptures.
As you know chapter and verse were not put into the Bible
till way after the Bible was together.
Chapters were put in by the Archbishop of Canterbury around 1227.
Verses for the Jewish OT were put in by Rabbi Nathan around 1448.
Verses for the New Testament were put in by Robert
Estienne in 1555.
CHERRY PICK
Some people start reading the Bible from page 1, Genesis 1: 1 -
which begins “In the beginning” - Hebrew for Genesis and go from there.
I suggest you do a book at a time - starting with the
Letters - and I would always suggest the Letter of James. If something in there, doesn’t grab you,
forget it.
Or just play Bible Bingo, just turn to a page and read
and ponder.
Or read the scripture readings in the Missalette for the
Sunday. Today’s reading from 1st Thessalonians might get you praying
about prayer, joy, gratitude, don’t quench the Spirit, test everything, do good
and avoid evil.
Pick - like at a smorgasbord. Pick and choose and pick
and chew and then digest.
LOCATION,
LOCATION, LOCATION
Many Bibles have color maps.
Check them out.
Study where places are and who’s from where, and all
that.
For example, Thessalonica is a port city north of modern Greece. It was also on a main Roman Road across the Balkans. It was founded in 315 BC by Cassander - one of Alexander the Great’s generals - who named the city after his wife, the half-sister of Alexander. It had a synagogue, something Paul looked for while traveling, but the Christian community there were mostly Gentiles.
CONCLUSION
The catholic approach is that we don’t take the Bible
literally. It’s a library with all kinds of different types of literature.
So we don’t take some of the types of literature in the
Bible literally, just as we don’t take little kids books literally. Snakes and
donkeys talk, but in real life they don’t, but the stories have great
messages. Be careful of snakes in the
grass.
There’s a lot more that all of the above - besides how to
interpret the Bible. There are different translations, geography, customs, but that’s enough for a start.
Do self-study. Take courses. Deacon Tony Norcio gave a
short course here. So too Father Joe Krastel. There is a bible study group at
St. John Neumann on Monday night and I think Monday morning. Check out google
and go from there.
December 17, 2017
SURPRISES
Do you really want a straight,
flat highway from here to there?
Do you want life to be that easy?
Think about the consequences.
No mountains. No valleys. No twists
and turns. No snow. No ice. No winter.
Okay, you’ll accept some surprises.
Okay, you’ll accept bumps and potholes.
But you won’t accept accidents or tie-ups. Sorry.
© Andy Costello, Reflections 2017
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