BAPTISMAL  CERTIFICATE

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Easter Sunday  is  "Baptismal Certificate".

One of the key themes for Easter Sunday is Baptism.

Last evening thousands and thousands and thousands of people around the world were baptized  - and became Christians.

How many I don’t know.  I’ll do my homework.

Christians:  meaning the Anointed Ones.

Anointing with sacred oil is part of the ceremony - as well as for those who were confirmed.

Baptized: meaning the Dipped - dipped into  the waters.

Today at all Masses we renew our baptismal vows.

MOM AND DAD’S BAPTISM CERTIFICATES

I’m the youngest of 4 kids.

My sister Mary and I are the last 2.

My sister Mary is sorting out family papers - saving some - getting rid of others.

Who has and where are your family papers?

When couples bring their babies to St. Mary’s for Baptism they are handed a baptismal certificate and I always say, “Do you have a fireproof safety box for your sacred and significant papers?” 

Where are your significant family papers?

For the sake of transparency I have stocks in Office Depot.  Just kidding.

Some files are saved somewhere electronically.

Father John Harrison when he was stationed here put all of St. Mary’s Baptismal, Marriage, Confirmation and other books into our computers. It took him a few years, but he did it.

The Archdiocese of Baltimore have all our books right now and are electronically storing them.

I keep wondering when we are going to get them back.

I have heard that records in some Catholic Churches in Ireland have been lost - through fires.

So when my sister Mary showed me about a month ago two baptismal records - my dad and my mom’s - handwritten - quite fragile and quite beaten up - from 1904 - I knew I was holding something  sacred in hand.

[SHOW AND TELL]

I XEROXED them and put them on my computer and hope to get copies to my nieces and nephew - with the secret agenda for all of them to think and feel the importance of their and their parents and their ancestors baptismal records and then hopefully they will look within and wonder about their baptism.

PAPERWORK - DEGREES - DIPLOMAS - CERTIFICATES

From time to time one hears that we are moving towards a paperless society?

I don’t know.  I still see copies of Doctor’s Degrees and certificates on office walls. Graduations are coming towards us soon.  What will happen to all those diplomas and degrees that people will walk up steps to stages to receive in hand? What about Marriage and Birth and Baptismal certificates?

Do you ever notice inspection papers on elevators?  How about clipboards in turnpike rest stops - that the bathrooms were cleaned 2 hours ago?  Aren’t  there  FDA rules and regulations on paper about food and medicines inspection?

What’s in your glove compartment?   License and registration please?

I remember reading in a newspaper years ago - during the horrible wars - in Bosnia and Herzegovina - how in some places,  the different sides would invade a small town and burn the town records - birth, marriage, what have you.  I remember thinking, “Now that’s a sin!”  I save newspaper clippings that grab me, but I don’t know if I saved that. Next time I have time, I’ll try to find that on computer. Google is great - but so too actual paper copies of our records.

CONCLUSION: EASTER HOMILY

Question: but is this the stuff of an Easter Sermon or Homily?

I wondered about that. A sermon is all words - that disappear pretty fast after it is given. Hot air …. Cold air …. So so words - that slide under benches and out of people’s thoughts.

I’m the only one with a copy of my homily - and I find lots of these old sermons folded in sixes - and then tossed out next week or so.

But I do put them on my blog - along with quotes and reflections - knowing that papers are tossed - but not all. I showed you two baptismal records from 1904.

Why not scan or photo your degrees and certificates - and send them on line to family members?  Maybe someone will save them without knowing it - and then future family researchers will go to your grave and say,  “Thank you” - facing your name and numbers in stone?

And maybe someone will look at their baptismal certificate and reflect upon being certified, “Hey I’m a Christian. Hey I was baptized 33 years ago in Topeka, Kansas.  Hey I got to wake up and really  walk this and really live this way of life. Amen.”

April    21, 2019 

Thought for today:  

“The entire character  of  a man’s life depends on whether he answers ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to the historic fact of the Resurrection.”  

John E. Large, The Small 

Needle of Doctor Large, 1992

April 20, 2019

BIRDS

Drones long before drones ….

Birds … drifting high above the waves,

above the  waters, above the woods….

Hunters:  hawks, ospreys, eagles,

spotting what’s below ….

totally focused on prey, food, capture …

somewhat different from backyard

birds - robins, sparrows, cardinals …

different too from blackbirds and crows -

those noisy brats, cawing, screaming.

with ready claws  over garbage dumps ….

There are lessons to be learned -

bird watching all birds - as Jesus told us

to see -  to be like kids at the shore -

to be like sandpipers dancing on the beach,

to be like hummingbirds - dart throwers

at the local pub. To open our eyes, to see,

to watch, to  listen, to catch: a lot is present.

 © Andy Costello, Reflections 2019

April    20, 2019 

Thought for today: 

“Life is an adventure in forgiveness.” 

Norman Cousins, 

Saturday Review, 

April 15, 1978

THE  BROKEN  CRUCIFIX

She could hear them tell each other -  that she - this lady - their mom - their sister -  in this deathbed - had only a short time to live.

She was happy they were there - at her bedside - her three kids - 2 sons and a daughter - as well as 2 brothers and a sister - whom she had not connected enough through the second half of their lives.

The priest had been there. At least a half-dozen of her closest friends - had been there. The priest had anointed her forehead and the palms of her hands with the sacred oil and the sacred prayers.  The friends had anointed her with their sacred stories - a few funny things that happened on a few bus rides - as well as when they worked together in the Altar Rosary Society - 2 terms - 6 years.

But what she really saw was the broken crucifix on the bare light tan wall above her bureau on the other side of the room from her bed.  It had fallen three times. It was broken three times. It was glued back together three times - each time by her.

The first time it fell was when she was 11 years old. Her father was dying and the emergency rescue squad was called to their house and in moving him out on a gurney - one firefighter got squeezed in the maneuvering - into the wall - his helmet hitting the crucifix. It fell. And the small 18 inch plaster statue of Christ on the wooden cross broke into 4 pieces when  it hit the wooden bedroom floor.

The rescue squad  kept moving - down the tight staircase - to the front door - with dad strapped onto the gurney - oxygen mask over his mouth - out to the ambulance - and off to the local hospital. The live body was more important than the broken body of Christ

Upstairs she picked up the broken crucifix - the broken Christ.

She kept it in her and her sister’s room.

That summer - after her father’s death - she put the pieces of Christ’s broken body - back together - with white paste glue - that she used in art class - at school.  It worked. She was meticulous and made the 4 broken pieces of the broken Christ fit exactly back together.

After two days - after it had dried - after she got it  firmly back together - the wooden cross with the plaster Christ - she put it back again on her parent’s bedroom wall.

Down through high school years, she would semi-consciously spot that crucifix many times when she got home from school or sports or work and walked up the stairs to her and her sister’s bedroom on the second floor.

When her mom died - when they were asking who wanted what from the house, she said, “Number 1:  I’ll take the crucifix in mom and dad’s bedroom.”

She got it and put it in her bedroom - in her house - on the wall - that she was facing when she was sleeping.

It fell two more times in the years to come. Each time she repaired the broken Christ - each time with better and better glue: Crazy Glue - then Monster Glue.

And now it was her time to die …. In a bed room - facing that crucifix.

She was happy she was dying at home - unlike dad and mom. Dad died in the hospital that night - the night  the rescue crew came to their house and the crucifix fell for the first time. Mom died in a nursing home - but only two weeks after she went there.  The plan was to bring the cross to the nursing home - but death was arriving too soon.

“Good thing,” she realized.  “Maybe it would have got lost in the events of  mom’s death.”

Now - those around here bed were  nervous quiet - making nervous comments - as she lay there dying in her own bed.

She felt joy and sorrow - not enough glory - some light - looking back at these series of mysteries called life.

They figured she was in a semi-conscious space and place - figuring the morphine had pretty much knocked her out.

She was talking to Christ - her broken and her mended Christ - on her wooden cross - on her bedroom wall.

She was saying and praying for her kids, “Father forgive them because they don’t know yet what they are doing.”

She figured only her youngest would want that cross like she did - when her mom died. This last one -  was still going to church - along with her 6 kids - sometimes reluctantly.

She knew her other 3 kids were not broken enough yet to know how Christ shows up in the pages and rosary beads of our lives.

“When we need him.”

She prayed for all 4 of her kids - hoping they will find the right glue - called redeeming healing  - when they realize their broken spaces.

She prayed for her ex - long gone - far away and she thanked our Lord for teaching her forgiveness. It took her at 10 years to move from Jesus words on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”  to her favorite prayer and words from the cross, “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.”

She opened her eyes one last time - before she died that Friday  afternoon - she looked at the broken Christ - her broken crucifix - and smiled - and every one of those around the bed told the following story for years to come.

“Mom opened her eyes one last time before she died. She smiled as she looked at me. Then she closed her eyes and died. She had such a peace filled look. Amen.”

April 19, 2019

THE ONGOING

FLOW OF  BLOOD

The blood dripped and dropped

off his body - hands, feet, side -

down to the hard dirt below….

The hard dirt below became mud

and rain as the blood sunk deeper

and deeper into the dirt and earth.

Does it ever end? Did it ever stop?

Is his blood somehow upon us

and upon our children?  Hope so.

So we walk up aisles. We walk up to

the cup and sip the blood of Christ and

then we bring ourselves to each other.

  © Andy Costello, Reflections 2019

Painting by

Matthias_Grünewald

1470-1528

April    19, 2019  - Good Friday

Thought for today: 

“What does the apotheosis of the Cross mean, if not the death of death, the defeat of sin, the beatification of martyrdom, the raising to the skies of voluntary sacrifice, the defiance of pain.”  

Henri Amiel, Journal, 1882

Painting on top:

Yellow Crucifixion

by Paul Gaugin [1848-1903]