Tuesday, May 1, 2012

WANT  HEAVEN, 
EXPECT   HELL!


May  1,  2012

Quote for Today

"A lifetime of happiness!  No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth."

George Bernard Shaw [1856-1950], Man and Superman [1903], Act 1

What's your take on George's comment?  Does happiness have to have the possibility of unhappiness within reach?  What does the Book of Genesis in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Happiness have to say about this? Does there always have to be a catch? Would marriage be marriage - if a couple didn't have temptations? Would love be as powerful as it is, if we could chose not to love?  Does there have to be the tree of the knowledge of  good and evil in the garden of our soul?  How about the cross? Does that tree have to be there as well?

Monday, April 30, 2012




RECOGNIZING HIS VOICE

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily  for this 4th Monday of Easter is, “Recognizing His Voice.”

Last Thursday evening - give or take a day - on the evening news they showed a scene from the front lawn of some house in the United States. A soldier was just back from Afghanistan and the family is waiting for him to get out of a car. He does and the family dog breaks loose and runs towards the soldier and he gets down on his knee and the two embrace.

As I watched that I wondered how long is a dog’s memory?

I also wondered do we have voice memory - and how does that work? We get a phone call and the other doesn’t tell their name. They know whom they are calling  - but we don’t know the caller - but the voice we know from the past.

We don’t want to ask, “Is this Tricia?” or “Penelope?” or “Horatio?” Yet the voice sounds familiar and we probe our memory till we find out whom this voice belongs to.

TODAY’S GOSPEL

In today’s gospel, John 10:1-10, Jesus talks about sheep recognizing the voice of the Shepherd.  Where did Jesus learn that? 

I love to picture Jesus from 12 to 30 wandering and wondering in fields and marketplaces, in synagogues and vineyards. I like to read the gospels and try to picture when Jesus observed and came up with his parables and images and pictures.

I remember hearing in a talk about a Jesuit priest who taught at Creighton University in Omaha. He went up one summer to Montana to work on a sheep ranch. Then he told his students in Scripture Classes what he learned about sheep and shepherding from his experience. He said that the image is very much part of our Scriptures.

When sheep are born they end up on the ground - unable to stand. They bleat till someone hears them and helps them to stand for the first time. He said the first voice the new born sheep hears is that of the shepherd. Later on they’ll hear the sounds of the shearers and then the sound of the ones who lead them to slaughter.

The Jesuit talked about how fragile newborn sheep legs are. The  shepherd has to be very careful in standing them aright. One little sheep’s leg broke and the shepherd took him in the front seat of his truck to the vet to set it right. He didn’t mention if he used a seat belt. But then the Jesuit teacher said he noticed that sheep always came running right towards the voice of the shepherd they knew. They would rub up against his lets with affection for his shepherd.

CONCLUSION: THE VOICE OF JESUS

Obviously, we who come to church - when we’re playful or when we are broken - we get to know Jesus and his voice. That’s prayer.

Beginning prayer is talking prayer - saying prayers.

Deeper prayer is quiet prayer - listening prayer.

Those of you who come here to this 12:10 Noon Mass might come early because it’s nice and quiet in here. You might feel blessed - because nobody has pushed to say the rosary before or after Mass. We all need to be aware that some people want talking prayers and some people want quiet prayers.

May our “baa’s” be authentic - and from the heart - and not just baaaaaaaable from our lips.

May we know the Master’s Voice - may we learn to hear his calls.
IDENTIFYING 
MYSELF 




April 30,  2012

Quote for Today

"Without a shepherd sheep are not a flock."

Russian Proverb

Questions: Do I identify with any particular or specific leader, philosopher, writer, speaker, religious leader?  Do I identify with any groups? Have I grown out of any group? Please explain.



SUMMER  NIGHTS 
AND  ICE  CREAM  CONES


On a summer night, everyone loves to go for ice cream.

Two boys, one seven, the other nine, stood there that hot summer night eating their ice cream cones. The ice cream was leaking fast. They were experiencing a melt down. The boys were finally “grown up”: mom and dad gave them total control over the choice of what flavors their two scoops of ice cream could be.

Dad always chose two scoops of vanilla.  Cone in hand, he loved to step back to observe the scene. “Great ice cream. Great wife. Great kids. Could anyone be  in a better place, on a clear summer night, than the parking lot of ‘Ice Cream Delight’?” He was at peace. Ice cream can do that. Inwardly he was also thinking, “These last four months at work have been too stressful. Thank God, the project is finally over. The orders are all filled. Things will slow down now -- at least till September.”

Mom was more flamboyant. Maybe that’s why they married each other. They were “order” and “disorder”, vanilla and thirty-seven different flavors. She stood their enjoying the taste of chocolate-chocolate chip. And that was just the top scoop. Underneath was her second scoop: raspberry sherbet-twirl with raisins! The kids loved this about their mom: she ordered different flavors every time. And she always ordered last. She loved surprises, last minute, spur of the moment choices She knew her sons stood there waiting to hear her choices at the sliding window.

Mom was smiling “big time”. She was enjoying the summer night sky. Summer. Vacation. Her boys. Her husband. But she also loved September when the house returned to quiet with the boys back in school. She had  a computer and was back to writing while the boys were at school and her husband was at work.

Back to the boys.

One stood there delighting in his pistachio and peach cone. He too enjoyed the night sky. And after each twirling lick of his ice cream, he would close his eyes. He loved to feel the cold ice cream against his teeth and tongue and then to feel it slide down his throat heading for his tummy.

His brother wasn’t happy. He usually wasn’t. He was hardly tasting his ice cream. Once more he felt that he made the wrong choices. Seeing the delight on his brother’s face, he was wishing he too had gotten pistachio and peach. And it dug deeper into his pain, especially when his Dad said to his brother, “You really seem to be enjoying that!”

“Yeah, dad, I really am. U-m-m-m good!”

And that’s the way the four of them were for the rest of their lives.

© Andy Costello, Down to Earth But Looking Up, p. 61



EARTHS  COLORS


As black as an all season blackbird on the first snow ....

As black as the lettering on a yellow school bus ....

As blue as Caribbean water and Caribbean sky almost all the time ....

As blue as coolness, calmness, peace and tranquillity ...

As blue as the Los Angeles Dodgers lettering on their home white uniforms ....

As blue as the top of a Bic Pen -- 10 for 89 cents in a pre-school August special ....

As brown as cocoa or coffee to start the day ....

As brown as Hershey kisses after taking off the silver wrapper ....

As brown as the bottom of the Grand Canyon in the early morning light ....

As brown as Mother Earth ready for the Spring seeding ....

As dark brown as Coca Cola bubbling in a tall glass with plenty of ice on a hot summer day ....

As gray as the sky on the first day of winter ....

As orange-red as an October sun through the autumn leaves ....

As green as pine trees all year long ....

As green as late spring, all summer and early September ....

As green as Vermont or Ireland or Oregon or northern Brazil during the rainy season ....

As yellow-green as light green grapes ....

As light blue as the lettering on a baby boy’s birthday cake ....

As orange as an orange ....

As orange as a crossing guard’s vest ....

As purple as Ash Wednesday vestments ....

As purple as solemnity, seriousness, pausing ....

As light red as the inside of a watermelon on a hot summer day ....

As red as the delicacy, richness, fragility, of a rose ....

As red as fire, passion, love, excitement, freedom ....

As red as the red of a STOP sign ....

As rust-red as Arizona earth and Utah rock most of the year ....

As almost lobster-red as a sunburned back on a summer beach ....

As speckled red as a just-boiled lobster ....

As sudden-red as a person’s face caught gossiping about someone and seeing them walk into the room ....

As tan as sand, old army uniforms, paper in a diary from long ago ...

As white as a cloth napkin in an Italian restaurant, -- but before the spaghetti ....

As white as new, just before, not yet, almost now ....

As yellow as a banana ....

As yellow as a lemon ....

As yellow as a school bus ....

As yellow as mustard on a hot dog in a ball park on a bright summer day ....

© Andrew Costello - Reflections, 1999

THE BIG TABLE

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       all the food
       is on one side

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       people have problems
       passing things.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       people have difficulties
       stomaching each other.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       the first are first
       and the last are last.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       people don’t like
       the seating arrangements.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       people seem to want
       separate tables.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       nobody realizes
       the table is round.

The whole world is seated
       at one big table,
       but the trouble is
       the next generation
       is waiting for the leftovers.

© Andrew Costello, Listenings, p. 64 



CREATION ACCOUNT

In  the beginning
all was God.

In the beginning
all else was silence,
all else was darkness.

And God burst
through the dam
of silence and darkness
with his word,
“Let there be light!”

And God’s power,
and God’s spirit
exploded into creation.

Molten lava,
red rivers of fire,
huge stones and planets
rolled down the dark hills
of space, down the empty
halls of the universe,
crashing, splashing,
noise and sound.

Creation had begun ,
bursting, splattering seed
into the empty holes
of barren time.

“Let there be life!”

And the fertile egg
of earth began.

And in time
the naked baby
came forth
crawling towards
the Father,
standing, falling
rising, trying
again and again
to stand up to the Father.

And gradually
it too learned
the words,
“Let there be light!”

© Andrew Costello, From Cries …. But Silent, p. 168