FAMILY

Quote for today - December 30, 2012

Family: "The we of me."

Carson McCullers

WHAT WOULD IT TAKE 

FOR YOU TO SAY OR PRAY 

YOUR NUNC DIMMITIS?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “What Would It Take For You To Say Or Pray Your Nunc Dimittis?”

As you know the Nunc Dimittis are the first two words in Latin of the prayer of Simeon in the Gospel of Luke 2: 29-32.

“Nunc dimittis

servum tuum,

Domine,

secundum verbum tuum

in pace.”

           "Now you can dismiss
            your servant,
            Lord,
            according to your word
            in peace."

In the Christian Church it became a traditional night prayer for folks before they went to sleep. It’s part of the Big Three prayers: the Benedictus for Morning Prayer, the Magnificat for Evening Prayer and the Nunc Dimittis for Night Prayer.

WHAT DOES IT TAKE FOR YOU TO HAVE A GOOD DAY

The title of my homily is, “What Would It Take For You To Say Or Pray Your Nunc Dimittis?”

Before we get to the end of one’s life - as the prayer was said by Simeon when he met the Messiah in Mary’s arms, why not begin by asking that question of one’s day?

When saying our night prayers, we pause and reflect upon our day. What was it like? Did we do anything to make life sweeter for those around us? We might know mistakes and say we’re sorry, but why not concentrate on the positive things we did that day - the good dids more than the didnots - the positives instead of the dumb things or hurtful things?

What makes a good day for us? I’ve met lots of people who are getting married. Then sometimes tell me they didn’t realize till they met the right person, that they had a check list or what have you. Do we all unconsciously have a check list for what makes a good day?

We could ask that of a movie, a meal, a book, a vacation, a meeting - maybe some people have a check list for a sermon as well.

At the end of a day, can we go to bed in peace, grateful that we made the world better that day because we were there?

WHAT DOES IT TAKE FOR YOU TO HAVE A GOOD LIFE?

Do we all have a list about what it takes to have a good life?

I strongly believe that we do. Moreover, for starters, we go through that check-list without even knowing we’re doing it - for others when we are in the funeral parlor or at a funeral service - concerning the person who has died?

Somewhere in Simeon’s life he came to the realization that he would not see death, till he saw the Messiah.  So every day when he came to the temple, he was watching. It was #1 on his bucket list - before he kicked the bucket.

What’s on our list - that if it happened - we could say and pray our Nunc Dimittis?

For many people it’s that someone in the family comes back to the family. For many it’s that we see our children who have dropped out of church back in church - for real. If I got a dollar for every time someone asked me the question: what happened that my son or daughter or 4 of them have dropped out or gone to another church - and they went to Catholic school? It’s usually a person - a relationship - a relative - that would get us to say Simeon’s prayer.

CONCLUSION

Sometimes folks see their dream and their prayer come true. A kid comes home. A kid comes back to church.

Some folks realize what Simeon came up with, that it is Jesus who is the Savior and Messiah who helps make this happen - especially when we put it into his hands.

Ooops! And there is often a catch: often, most of the time, this takes a lot of waiting and a long time before it happens - please God - soon!  

PROCRASTINATION

Quote for Today - December 29, 2012

"I could give no reply 
except a lazy and drowsy, 
'Yes, Lord, Yes. 
I'll get to it right away; 
just don't bother me 
for a little while.'  
But 'right away' 
didn't happen right away; 
and 'a little while' 
turned out to be 
a very long while."

St. Augustine

HOLY AND  INNOCENT: 

IT’S DIFFICULT TO BE BOTH

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “Holy And Innocent: It’s Difficult to Be Both.”

As we reach this feast of the Holy Innocents - December 28^th - every year - we reflect upon the death of children - innocent children - whether it’s here in the time of Christ as in today’s gospel or whether it’s today in school shootings, or drone attacks, violent ruining, raping, and destroying homes and villages around our world - during which innocent children are killed - as well as the many abortions that happen each day.

Okay - in a way - it’s easy sitting here - to look at all that and make disapproval sounds like, “Tch … tch…tch!”  - because we are so far from Syria and Somalia - and in that way it’s easy to be against the slaughter of the innocents.

We all know it’s easier to rant about abortion and homosexuality - till we discover these stories in our own families - or when friends tell us how they feel when these issues were made paramount in the voting season.

BUT

But if we want to be challenged today, here is a challenge: climb high above the territory and look at the killing of innocents that me, myself, and I do, in a multitude of unholy - not-so-innocent  ways.

Where the tire hits the road - at least for me - is the way I abort others by my judgments - by my neglect of others - by my not listening - by my avoiding of others - by the way I kill a tiny bit of the spirit of another - by a put down, a dig, a way I want the other to be other than they are. I can be standing there listening to another - but in reality,  I can’t wait to run back - to escape back to my warm, “liquidy” safe womb - room - inside my mind - to hide in my own quiet personal inner space.

To be holy - Jesus told us to notice - to stop - to help - the hurting and wounded on the road.

To be holy - Jesus showed us that he noticed who touched the hem of his garment - those who were tugging at him for life - for attention - for recognition.

To be holy - Jesus made us aware of who’s really putting their whole self into the basket - their 2 cents - while others are putting in the not of their being, the fluff and foam off the top.

To be holy - Jesus showed us he was aware of life within - the others - reading their hearts and minds.  He certainly knew the kick in the womb - of  the unborn - unheard from - those who were sent packing to leave the community because of leprosy or sin - those who tend to be pelted by rejection rocks.

To be holy - Jesus showed us he was aware of cemeteries - not so much the ones - along our roads - or those on the edge of cities - but he was aware of cemeteries inside people's minds and hearts - or those garbage dumps within - the hell on this side of hell.

That's some of the holy; here are a few ways of the innocent.

To be innocent is to be childlike - to have a sense of play - and not to be the one who is always so, so, so serious.

To be innocent is to be childlike - and to know whether the other is aware of me - or others - not by the color of our skin or the amount of wrinkles we have - or perfume or aftershave on - or the cost and quality and look of our clothes - but because we and others are all are children of God - so we put down our papers or we stop our babbling and give all little ones our love and attention.

CONCLUSION

So on this Feast of the Holy Innocents, we can picture that scene in the scriptures in Bethlehem when Herod tried to kill all future opposition - by killing all the little baby boys  - or we can look at our everyday encounters, meetings, experiences with each other - and be challenged to give life to one another and not ignoring or cutting off the presence of life just in front of us.  Tough stuff. 

OOOOOOO

Painting on top - one of the graphic abortion paintings by William Kurelek [1927-1977]

HARDENING  THE  HEART

Quote for Today - December 28, 2012

"Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart."

William Butler Yeats  [1865-1939], Michael Roberts and the Dancer [1921], stanza 4

Questions:

When is it time to take a break?

When is it time to scream?

When is it time for the divorce?

When is it time to disappear?

ST. JOHN:

THE GREAT UNDERNEATH

Quote for the Day - December 27, 2012 - 
Feast: St. John the Evangelist

"There is, one knows not 
what sweet mystery about this sea, 
whose gently awful stirrings 
seem to speak of 
some hidden soul beneath;  
like those fabled undulations 
of the Ephesian sod 
over the buried Evangelist St. John. 

And meet it is, 
that over these sea pastures, 
wide-rolling watery prairies 
and Potters' Fields of all four continents, 
the waves should rise and fall, 
and ebb and flow unceasingly; 
for here, millions 
of mixed shades and shadows, 
drowned dreams, 
somnambulisms, reveries; 
all that we call lives and souls, 
lie dreaming, dreaming, still; 
tossing like slumberers in their beds; 
the ever-rolling waves 
but made so by their restlessness."

Herman Melville [1819-1891], Moby Dick [1851], Chapter 111



Comments:

Read this piece from Moby Dick slowly and go underneath the words. Has anyone else called the ocean a pasture or a prairie or a Potter's field? Read the Gospel of John as looking out at the ocean from the deck of a ship - and think about what's underneath the surface of the words. 

The top picture is of the Atlantic Ocean last September and the middle picture is that of St. John's possible grave in Ephesus from 2011.

ST.  STEPHEN’S  OR 

FORGIVENESS DAY

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “St. Stephen’s Or Forgiveness Day.”

Today can be called just that. I’m assuming that this first day after Christmas, because St. Stephen was the first martyr,  the Church decides to use it for the first  feast after Christmas.

FORGIVENESS

I read somewhere - I wish I remember where - that the really unique message of Christianity is forgiveness. The writer said it’s unique among world religions that this is our primary stress - even more than love.

Love is certainly a central theme in world religions. Every group has the Golden Rule in some form - but forgiveness: no,

For some reason, out of the many things I read, I remembered that - but don’t remember the source.

Question for all of us Christians: is forgiveness central to our way of believing and seeing and being?

Translation: do we practice unconditional forgiveness?

ST. STEPHEN

Today’s first reading from The Acts of the Apostles ends at verse 59.  It leaves our verse 60.

Verse 59 reads as we heard, “As they were stoning Stephen, he called out, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’”

Then verse 60 - which ends the 7^th chapter of Acts - goes like this, “Then he fell to his knees and cried in a loud voice, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’ and when he said this, he fell asleep.”

The turkeys. They left out that key verse. Ugh. Yet, I forgive them, for whatever reason they were asleep and missed the message.

And Bibles that give cross references - give at verse 60 the cross reference to Jesus on the Cross - who said just before he died, “Father, forgive them they know not what they do” Luke 23:34.

FORGIVENESS: ONE OF THE GREAT SECRETS OF LIFE

Jesus gave great teachings about how to live life to the full.

Core to many of his teachings is to be aware and care about the impact that our thinking does to our thinking. He tells us to not only put down the rocks - but to unearth and get rid of  those sharp angry rocks that roll around in our memory. If I’ve learned anything about life I’ve learned that people have memories. We remember our hurts and our mistakes - our sins and our disasters.

Learning the message of forgiveness - and unconditionally accepting God’s love for us no matter what we have done or what has been done to us - is very liberating.

Whenever people hear this the but’s butt in. But she knew what she was doing. But he did something horrific. But if you only knew what really happened. But how can I be forgiven on what I have done.

NEWTOWN, CONNECTICUT

We’re still feeling and reeling from the Newtown, Connecticut story. When I read the comments and commentaries in the newspapers or comments on TV,  I notice whether the speaker or writer says, 26, 27 or 28,

I say 28 died that day. I don’t know why folks leave out the Mom. I can understand leaving out Adam Lanza, but 28 were shot that day. Horrible. Horror. Pain. Craziness.

Father forgive him - them - some blame the mother - for they don’t know what they were doing.

With Jesus on the Cross, with Stephen on the ground, both bleeding to death, I say the words of Luke in both Luke and Acts, “Father forgiven them for they don’t know what they are doing” and “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

CONCLUSION

On the day after the Newtown, Connecticut killings, I was reflecting on all this and I wrote a small poetic piece that I put on my blog. Nobody noticed it, so let me conclude by reading it out loud.

                        HOW DOES IT HAPPEN?

            How does it happen when we die?

            Do we all move in a crowd towards God?

            Thomas Merton pictured crowds of people

            like prisoners or displaced people being

            moved from station to station from far

            countries - all those people who died this

            night from all around the world. He

            pictured Hemingway - walking that walk -

            shuffling those steps - after he shot himself.

            How does it happen? What happens next?

            Do all these little kids crowd

            around Adam Lanza and hold him till he

            lets go of whatever it was that killed him

            and them. I don’t know how all this

            horrible stuff happens. Like everyone

            I don’t know how someone could kill a child

            or anyone else, including themselves.

            How does it happen? How, God, how?

OOOOOOO

Painting on top: The Stoning of St. Stephen [c.1780] by Rembrandt. Notice Rembrandt with stone in hand right above Stephen's raised right hand.