PERSPECTIVE

December 20,  2011

Quote for Today

"Our latest moment is always our supreme moment.  Five minutes delay in dinner now is more important than a great sorrow ten years gone."



Samuel Butler  [1612-1680]

Questions: List 5 great sorrows of your life. Have they given you perspective? Have you ever stopped in a mess and said something like this, "Compared to my mom's death, this is small potatoes?"

OUCH!

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for December 19th, is, “Ouch!”

One of the words that I heard my god-child and niece Patty use is, “Ouch!”

When someone says something stupid or offensive or without thinking and it’s something that hurts or is the wrong thing to say, she says, “Ouch!”

I’m glad she does that, because now I find myself saying that to myself a few times - and if the dumb thing has already been flying out of my mouth and into and around the room, I say, “Sorry! That was the wrong thing to say. I apologize.”

But better, I have found myself saying, “Ouch” a bunch of times before I said something stupid. Then I say in-loud, “Thank you Patty. Thank you!”

NO CHILDREN

One of the instances where people do say the wrong thing is about people having or not having children - too many, too few or none. I’ve heard “Ouch” moments around that question from time to time.

We don’t know other people. We don’t know their story. We don’t know their situations. We haven't walked in their moccasins for a mile - or their sins - if that's what we think is going on for that matter.

In today’s readings we have two stories about women who wanted to have children - whom neighbors and perhaps even themselves - described that woman as “barren”. There are enough stories in the scriptures about this question - that we know in the Biblical world if you didn’t bring a child into the world, you were looked down upon - and people even looked down on themselves. [Cf. Judges 13: 2-7, 24-25a; Luke 1: 5-25]

Today’s gospel ends with Elizabeth going into seclusion - before giving birth to her child - in her old age - and she’s thinking and praising God saying, “So has the Lord done for me at a time when he has seen fit to take away my disgrace before others.”

So she felt it was a disgrace not to have had a child.

NOT BEING MARRIED

Or take Mary and Joseph - they weren’t married yet - and Mary was with child. Read these early chapters of Luke and you pick up this issue of comments about others in small town Israel.

Once more, we don’t know another’s story.

The same thing happens today.

Or take people who make “ouch” statements about those who never got married or people who were divorced or what have you - as well as those who are gay or lesbian.

I remember many a Saturday evening Open Forum session on weekend retreats when some guy ranted and raved about gay people - only to have some father speak up and say, “You have no idea what you’re talking about - till you have a son who is gay - and all the pain and struggle that brings about - till one makes peace with one’s son or daughter or family.”

Ouch!

Silence.

CONCLUSION

So this is a short sermon or reflection on the simple but powerful word, “Ouch!"

Before you shoot your shotgun on any issue: from abortion to zebra stealing - pause - take your finger off the trigger.

Before you shoot off your mouth off about other’s motives - pause. This would be include comments about clothes, length and look - or what have you. Haven't we all heard comments like, “Did you see her - what she’s wearing at her age - or her weight?”

“Ouch!”

Haven’t we all heard comments like, “Did you see who was talking to whom?” Or, “Did you see who was having lunch with whom? What’s up with them?” “Did you see who went to communion?” Or, “She never goes to communion. I wonder why?”

“Ouch!”

Pause! Sometimes guns backfire.

Pause! Otherwise you might cause yourself shame - or hurt - or both - as well as for the other - and when we hurt or are hurt we all feel, “Ouch!”

WHY?

December  19,  2011

Quote for Today

"The five most important questions a kindergarten child asks are:

             1) Why?
             2) Why?
             3) Why?
             4) Why?
             5) Why?"

Anonymous

SURPRISE! GOD IS 

A GOD OF SURPRISES!

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 4th Sunday of Advent, B, is, “Surprise! God Is A God of Surprises!”

Life would be very boring - if there were no surprises.

Life would be very boring - if we wrote the script - and that’s the way our life went.

Life would be very boring - if we could see around the corner, if we could see tomorrow and next year - and the rest of our lives.

Life could also be very nerve wracking, dangerous, depressive, if we knew how our marriages, jobs, our family, our future were going to happen.

Surprise!

God is a God of surprises.

Life is the surprises.

That’s why we put wrapping on the gift!

Question: How well do we do with surprises?

Question: How well do we do - when things don’t go our way?

Same question but phrased slightly different: What do I do when I want what I want and I don’t get what I want or get?

IF WE WERE GOD

If we were God, how would we create the world, the universe, life, death, change, that is, if we could create things any way we wanted things to be?

After all - we are made in the image and likeness of God and we are called to magnify the Lord.

Could we come up with a better plan than the present plan?

Would we make anything different from the way things are happening now?

How would we plan today? Would we plan it differently than what’s going to happen today? Who’s going to win today’s games? What happens if someone else was also God and they planned the other team to beat our team?

I remember thinking something like that while we just about to begin a high school basketball game. We were standing in a circle praying. I looked up from the prayerful head bowed down look and noticed the other team was also praying - and I thought, “God how does this work?”

If we were God, would there be life on other planets - besides earth? Maybe there is, but as of now, we don’t know if there is.

Would people get cancer, heart problems? Would there be deaths at 15 or 5 or 35 or 95?

Does God zap people? Does God know what our choices are going to be? Do our choices get God to change His plans? How does all this work?

If we were the Creator, would we have come up dinosaurs and Dalmatians? How come the dinosaurs disappeared and the Dalmatians still run through our fields? How about hippos and horses, mosquitoes and monkeys? Why did God create what God created?

Does God laugh at anything he created?

Was God in on how Danny De Vito, Lady Gaga and George Clooney look?

Does God laugh only at us humans?

We’ve all have heard the words: “Want to make God laugh, tell God your plans?”

We’ve all heard John Lennon’s words, “Life is what happens when you’re making other plans.”

We’ve all heard the Portuguese proverb: “God writes straight with crooked lines.”

We’ve all heard Garth Brooks song, “Unanswered prayers” - how he goes  to a hometown football game with his wife and how he meets his old flame - and he reflects on how he prayed to God every night that this high school sweetheart would be the one he’d spend his life with - and as he turns to his wife he sings, “Thank God for unanswered prayers.”

People think and have thought about this stuff “all through the years.”

If we were God, would we have picked Israel for the country to come up with One God? Would we have picked Mary? If we were God, say God the Father, would we have sent our Son at the time in history Jesus was sent? Some guy named, William Norman Ewer (1885-1976) wrote “How odd of God to choose the Jews.”

Was it odd that God chose the Jews?

Whom would we choose, if we were to choose some group to start the plan called “Salvation History”? The Navahos, the Eskimos, the people on the island of Crete?

Whom would we choose to be the Mother of his Son - if that’s the way we were going to do this?

PEACE

Do those who trust in God have more inner peace than those who want life to work differently than it’s working now?

What does it take for someone to be at peace with God - with oneself - with others?

What are the implications of our having freedom and free will?

TODAY’S READINGS

In today’s first reading references are made to David being chosen to lead Israel by God and God had expectations of David. It’s payback time. It’s calling in favors time. God is expecting David to build a temple. David is living in a nice big house made of cedar and the ark of the covenant is living in a tent. God is saying, “What’s wrong with this picture? Hello!” [Cf. 2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8b-12, 14a, 16]

As we know from the First Book of Samuel, Chapter 16, God tells Samuel to go to Jesse - who has lots of sons - to find the one whom God has chosen. Samuel sees 7 sons of Jesse - thinking surely the one the Lord wants is here. Nope. So he asks Jesse, “Do you have any other son?” I wonder if the 7 heard that question. Did one of them say, “Hey Jesse, are we chopped liver?” Jesse says to Samuel, “There is still one more, the youngest, he is out taking care of the sheep.” Samuel says, “Send for him. We won’t eat till he comes. The boy appears and God says, to Samuel, ‘Come, anoint him, for this is the one.”

Surprise! You never know whom God calls.

In today’s gospel God chooses Mary - a young maiden girl living in a small village far from the big cities. Surprise God chooses Mary. And like Eve - like us - she has the power of choice. She asks questions - then she makes the choice to choose to give us the fruit of the tree - the tree of life - the cross - Jesus. [Cf. Luke 1:26-38]

And we are given the choice every day to choose Christ: “Take and eat!”

In today’s second reading from Romans 16 Paul tells us about surprise. He calls it mystery. He calls it “secret”. Then Paul talks about listening - the call to listen - to listen for revealings, manifestations - from God. That’s the basic meaning of the word “obedience”. It’s to listen. It’s to hear the Word of the Lord in scripture. It’s to embrace Jesus - the word made flesh - who dwelt amongst us. [Cf. Romans 16: 25-27]

Mary - whenever an artist paints today’s gospel - pictures Mary listening - listening for annunciations.

Prayer is annunciation - but too often - our mouth is mouthing prayers - and we don’t hear.

Jesus calls that babbling - babbling prayer - be careful of that. [Cf. Matthew 6: 7]

As they say, we have two ears and one mouth - but that is applied more to everyday conversations. Jesus - watching people praying in his time - warned us and the Pharisees about babbling prayer.

CONCLUSION: CHRISTMAS

Christmas is a time for deep prayer.

Christmas is a time for deep pondering prayer.

Did you notice that verb - ponder - in today's gospel?

Christmas is a time for great listening prayer.

When the Christmas Stable is set up, watch the stable. Listen to the Christmas story. The shepherds are out there in the fields - caring for the sheep - and like David they are called to come to the meet the Lord - in a stable. Look at the animals, they are listening. Watch the Magi - they are searching and come in from the cold into the stable.

Listen to the songs, “Silent night, holy night!” “O come all you faithful….”

Christmas is a time to change your tent into a temple for the Lord.

In the meanwhile, laugh, because Christ comes to this world in a stable, which is filled with you know what - as a baby and welcomes us.

Surprise.

God is a God of Surprises.

Surprise! God came as a baby.

Who of us would have thunked up that one? Amen.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++



Painting: 1898 Annunciation by Henry Ossawa Turner [1959-1947]

AGGRESSION

December  18,  2011

Quote for the Day

"One day in an English class a boy was asked, 'What parts of speech are "my" and "mine"?'

"Quickly he replied, 'Agressive pronouns'."

Ruth Rosenberry

GRANDPARENTS

December  17,  2011

Quote for Today

"One of the most influential handclasps is that of a grandchild around the finger of a grandparent."

Herald, Azusa, California

WHAT’S THE BOTTOM LINE?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Friday in the 3rd Week of Advent is, “What’s The Bottom Line?”

One of the habits in Jewish religious tradition was to ask a Rabbi to present the bottom line - to sum up the whole of Judaism in one word or one sentence or with one basic message. “What’s the bottom line?”

One added thing was to keep their answer short - so sometimes a Rabbi was asked to do this while standing on one foot. How about that for homilies?

As you’ve heard in various homilies there were 613 commandments revealed to Moses. I have not done it myself, but if you comb through the Pentateuch - the first 5 books of the Bible - that’s how many laws you find.

365 were negative commands: thou shall nots - some say it’s 365 so there can be a law for every day of the year.

And there were 248 positive commandments: some say that corresponds to 248 parts of the body. I don’t understand how that works. I have 10 fingers and toes - 2 eyes, one nose, etc..

Now, all those 615 laws didn’t have the same importance - so over and over again people asked in various ways, “What’s the Bottom Line?”

ANSWERS

Rabbis answered that question in various ways. Let me give a few.

Some rabbis said David summed up the 613 laws with the following 11 principles. I found this in a Jewish book. I couldn’t figure out if these 11 principles were gleaned from the Psalms.

               1) Walk uprightly.
               2) Work with righteousness.
               3) Speak the truth from your heart.
               4) Practice no deceit with your tongue.
               5) Don’t do evil to your neighbor.
               6) Don’t do anything that your neighbor can reproach you for.
               7) Don’t be a vile person.
               8) Honor the person who fears the law.
               9) Don’t be like those who swear they are not hurting themselves, but won’t change.
             10) Don’t lend money to others out of usury.
             11) Don’t take a reward against someone who is innocent.

Some went through Isaiah and said he summed up the 613 with 6 principles:

               1) Walk in righteousness.
               2) Speak peacefully.
               3) Don’t make money by making fraudulent deals.
               4) Don’t take bribes when they are waved at you.
               5) Put your hands to your ears when people talk about people.
               6) Shut your eyes when you start to see evil.

Some said Micah the prophet summed up the 613 with 3 principles: Do justly, love mercy and walk modestly with your God

Others summed up Isaiah in a different way than above, so upon further examination Isaiah has 2 commandments. We heard them in the first sentence of today’s first reading:

               1) Keep justice;
               2) do righteousness.

Habbakkuk summed it up the whole 613 laws with 1 principle: The righteous shall live by faith.

CONCLUSION

How do you sum up life? What do you think life is all about? What would be your bottom line?

We know Jesus was asked that question several times and in Matthew 22: 34-40 he sums it all up with two quotes from the Old Testament. He quotes part of the Shema from Deuteronomy 6:5 - which every Jewish service begins with - and then something from Leviticus 19:18. He says that the Greatest commandment is, “You must love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and your whole soul, and your whole mind.” Then he says that the second commandment is like it: “You must love your neighbor as yourself.”

That’s his bottom line. And when we see Jesus’ life we know he practiced what he preached.

So the title, the theme, the point of my homily today is to ask, “What’s your bottom line?”

Speak up! Try answering that standing on one foot or in 25 words or less or what have you.