April 2, 2018

Thought for today: 

“None knows the weight of another’s burden.” 

George Herbert, Outlandish Proverbs, 1640

AMEN!

Sometimes spontaneously my soul

says, “Amen!” Most of the time it’s

an inner whisper - but sometimes

if it’s a spectacular staircase or 

chandelier or babies fingers - or

surprise sunset, my “Amen” is like

Handel   live - and in living color -

with a 100 piece orchestra. Amen.

Halleluia!  Halleluia!  Halleluja!

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

IT  FINALLY  DAWNED  ON  ME

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily is, “It Finally Dawned  on  Me.”

It dawned on me yesterday: Easter is like Christmas. It’s a moment of light.

At Christmas Jesus comes out of the womb into the light of the world - and slowly becomes the light of the world.  At Easter Jesus comes out of the tomb as the light of the world. The darkness of death did not put out the Light of the world.

NOTICE THE GOSPEL FOR THIS MORNING

Notice the gospel for this morning from John.  It begins, “On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and she saw the stone removed from the tomb.

Remember the 3 word sentence from Holy Thursday evening.  Judas leaves the Eucharist - the Last Supper. He  goes to get his money - the 30 pieces of silver - for betraying Jesus. Then he wants to bring to the garden those who want to have Jesus arrested and  killed.  The 3 words: “It was night.”

We all fall asleep.  We are all in the dark at times.

Not everyone wakes up at  the same time.  Not everyone wakes up the same way. We’re on vacation - at the beach. Some people get up early - like 5:46 AM - to head for the beach so they can stand at the water’s edge and see the sun rise.  Some get up at 10:30 AM.

Bacon - bacon - bacon - the scent of bacon sneaks and slides into their nostrils around 10:29 A.M.

For others - the scent of God sneaks into and slides into our brain at 5:15 A.M. God dawns on us early on some mornings.

It’s Easter Sunday Morning.

GOD IS A TRINITY

Not everyone knows this, but God is a Trinity,  the  Trinity.

God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit - are 3 Persons, 1 God.

Not everyone knows this…. Not every religion teaches this.  Not every Christian community proclaims this the same way - as we Catholics do.

God is a Trinity - three persons.

It’s an amazing awareness - to know this. It’s a gift of faith. It’s a teaching that some people pass onto other people - without knowing that’s what they are doing.  Did your mom or dad bring you into a church - take your hand and put it in the Holy Water - and then make the sign of the cross on you and say, “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit? Amen.

God knows persons.  God knows people.  God knows that faith - light - dawns on people at different times.  It all depends where we are and who we are.

God knows about people. God created us and gave us freedom. God knows fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, free spirits and not so free spirits.

And God made us so free - as free as God is - well to a degree - meaning that God doesn’t crush us if we don’t get this - or don’t accept this -  or grow with this -  that is - till this finally  dawns on us.

Hey, love and acceptance, awareness and connecting with each other - would be nothing, would be horrible, would not have its joy and it’s “pinchability” - if the other had to love us.

Think of a moment in our life when we felt and found out that another  likes us - another loves us. They  want  to find time to be with us. Pinch me. I’m recognized. I’m loved. I’m wanted to be with another. Woo… Woo…. Wow…. Wow.

So God is other and we are other and God wants us and sometimes this dawns on us - that God knows us and wants to be in a relationship with us.

Do we?

Hopefully, it dawns on us - that life is about mutual love - love that is freely given - one to the other - not out of obligation - but out of choice.

This is why I don’t like the term: “Sunday obligation” or “Holy Day of Obligation”.  I prefer, “Holy Day of Opportunity” or “Sunday opportunity.”

This means we want to be on the dance floor with God. We’re not dragged from our chair - but we get up. We  take God’s hand saying,  “Yeah - wow” to God. God wants this dance - this moment with me.”

Life: Father and Son dancing - and the Spirit of love between them dancing and hopefully, we want to join in this dance.

Amazing - amazing grace - amazing that God the creator of this whole spinning - moving universe - is on the dance floor and wants to dance with me - and all the people on this planet.

God is on the dance floor - dancing.

When does that dawn on us - that God is not alone - God is there on the dance floor - spinning, and spinning,  dancing and dancing, and is calling me and all the people before and now, onto the dance floor called existence.

And so many people are just sitting there saying, “I don’t dance!”

And the Lord of the dance - keeps dancing and laughing - and switching hands with billions of people - hoping all of us will enter into the dance.

God is Three - God is with billions - God is alive.

Oh, people might say they believe in God. People might  know with words that God is a Trinity. People might even make the sign of the cross - especially when in trouble,  asking help or praising God “In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

But God is more than words - talk, talk, talk.

God is a relationship. God is forever calling us into this relationship in and with God.

CHRISTIANITY

Christianity teaches that people were not getting this.

So God - in the fullness of time - went different.

God became one of us - so we can become one with God - actually enter into the Trinity.

Has this dawned on us yet?

Jesus became one of us.

What happened next - is what many who have tried Marriage dot.com - have discovered.

Sometimes the one we meet - is not the one we want.

People meet Jesus - but sometimes it’s a no go.

The gospel of John begins, “In the beginning was the Word; the Word was in God’s presence, and the Word was God.”

Then the Gospel  of  John says, “And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.”  [That’s Christmas.]

Then the Gospel of John tells us that Jesus did life as an us. That’s the life of Jesus - as part of the Trinity.

Then the Gospel of John tells us that people rejected him - but to those who accepted him - he gave them the power to become children of God.

The others killed him.

The gospel of John and the other gospels tell us that Jesus rose from the dead. [That’s Easter]

And for the past 2000 years Jesus has dawned on people - and they  became his followers.

CLOSING MESSAGE

Last night all kinds of people all around the world came into the dance, the community, called God, called Christian.

They just spent months and months - perhaps years and years - preparing for  that moment.

Christ dawns on people at different times as we heard in today’s gospel.

I love the line in the gospel for today that the beloved is the faster in the run to the tomb - and he’s the first to believe - but he lets Peter go in first. Most think this is John - he saw and believed.

I like to add: the power of the pen.

When you write your life - write down the moments - when Christ - the Risen Lord - dawned on you. Amen.

April 1, 2018 -- Easter

SHAKING HANDS

Nervous when you came into my
upper room and said, "Peace!"

I was still scared.  I was hesitant.

My hands twitched for a moment.
Then I itched my left wrist with

the nails of my right hand. Then
you reached out your hand to mine.
At that I knew all was okay with us.

Thank You God. I’m glad your hands

were freed from the nails on the cross.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

April 1, 2018 

Thought for today: 

“What reason have atheists 
for saying that we cannot rise again?  
Which is more difficult, to be born, 
or to rise again?  That what has never been, should be, or that what has been, should be again?  Is it more difficult to come into being than to return to it?”  

Blaise Pascal, Pensees, 1690

HOLY  SATURDAY: 

THE  SILENCE  OF 

SOME  SATURDAYS

The title of my reflection for this morning is, “Holy Saturday: The Silence of Some Saturdays.”

Saturdays are interesting days!

Some Saturdays we just want space, quiet, no interruptions.

Maybe to fix something - to  get a part for something that is broken.

Maybe to just relax, catch up, just be.

Or to break the day up: to do some shopping, some visiting, some different stuff. Then there are long weekends - like  the  Saturdays on Memorial Day or Labor Day or Presidents day weekends.

Then there is a Saturday with a wedding - or an anniversary.  Sometimes we look forward to those Saturdays; sometimes we don’t - depending on who’s getting married or whose celebrating their  25^th or 50^th anniversary. Feelings about time and money and others can be terribly subjective.

Then a funeral happens - and often it’s on a Saturday.

TITLE

The title of my reflection is, “Holy Saturday: The Silence of Some Saturdays.”

This day - Holy Saturday -  sort of mugs or dulls us - sort of like after a death in the family.

Funerals often make us more silent and more quiet - and often they are inconvenient - like  a funeral on a Saturday morning.

We do the whole funeral thing - with various types of emotions - and then people get moving back home - sometimes a good distance - and we’re all sort of alone - with post funeral feelings.

A funeral can be high energy, high maintenance, and then there’s the low after the high.

We met up with cousins, aunts, uncles, friends of our mom or dad or close friends of the one who died.

Or deaths remind us of other deaths - or selfie thoughts about our life.

If we were very close to the person who died - it’s then we need some private time, silence, space, to pull together what we just went through with a funeral of a close family member

This day, Holy Saturday, is just sitting there between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.

And we Christians are reflecting on Jesus’ death.

The whole world of the apostles and the disciples had  caved in.

Their Lord, their savior, their Messiah, has just been arrested - put on trial and then railroaded to death on the cross on Calvary.

They weren’t ready for this - anymore than any of us are with a family death - especially when it’s too sudden, too quick, too much of a surprise.

The disciples had guilt - that they panicked and ran. The apostles had to deal not only with the death of Jesus - but also the death of Judas.

What about Mary? Yes. And yes about the other Mary and the other women who were much better about being present with Jesus - under the cross - than the apostles.

What about us?  The apostles still feared, “Are they going to come after us?”

They hid in the locked Upper Room as the scriptures tell us.

Thank God for Joseph of Arimathea. He was a secret follower of Jesus as well as a member of the council who condemned him to death: the Sanhedrin. Luke and Mark and Matthew tells us he went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus. Good move. He got Jesus’ body and put the dead body of Jesus in a tomb that was never used.

So thank God for Joseph and  John and the Holy Women - they are like soft background music on Calvary and the next day Saturday till Easter Sunday morning.

We need the rest of Friday P.M. - after Jesus’ death - and then all day Saturday to get us to Easter and Resurrection.

John and his gospel tells us that John was pondering all this - in this mulling time called Holy Saturday.

We need pausing time. We need space after tragedy. We need silence after the noise.

We need the brief words from Hosea which we heard in this morning’s short reading: He will revive us after two days; on the third day he will raise us up to live in his presence.

We need cryptic Old Testament prophetic words like that - to get us through post funeral type days when we’re quiet - when we need to make great acts of faith in Jesus - the Risen One - who can get us through the pain and the quiet - of Holy Saturday type days. Amen.

March 31, 2018

Thought for today: 

“Do not leave my hand  without  light.” 

Marc Chagall [1887-1985],   Interview  [1977].