Thought for today:
“Bagpipes
(n): an octopus wearing a kilt.”
Monday, November 18, 2019
Sunday, November 17, 2019
CRUNCH TIME
INTRODUCTION
Today I’d like to talk about time - not just any time, but
judgment time, crunch time. If I had to give a title to this homily, it would
be called, “Crunch Time.”
CRUNCH TIME
Crunch time is judgment time.
It’s when a game is coming down to the wire.
It’s when there is one second left in a football game and
the field goal kicker is lining up for a long field goal - in hopes of winning
the game.
Or the basketball player has two foul shots to tie the game.
Sometimes this is the time the other team calls, “Time out”
if they have one, to make the kicker or the shooter feel the pressure.
Crunch time.
In sports the game teaches us about time - and about life.
We’ve practiced - but the game is what counts - and the game within the game - whether it’s the first game of a new season -
the playoffs - the regionals - or the championship game at the end of the
season.
It’s crunch time.
END OF THE YEAR
READINGS
Today’s readings contain these strange images of danger and
doom. We have these end of the world type readings this time, every time, at
the end of the year.
Next Sunday - November 24th - we’ll have the Feast of Christ the King, the
last Sunday of the church year. Then on the following Sunday, December 1st, we’ll have the beginning of a new Church year, the First
Sunday of Advent.
Time - as well as the Church’s Liturgies gets interesting at
this time of the year.
MALACHI
In today’s first reading from Malachi, the prophet, we have
the image of the oven. The oven tests the cook. The proof is in the pudding.
But Malachi is using the image of an oven or a refinery that
burns stubble and tests metal. There are things we need and want to get rid of
and there are precious things we want to save.
We’ve all heard the phrase, to test one’s metal. The fire burns off the
impurities. We find out what we really got when we put the metal to the fire,
to the test.
GOSPEL
In today’s gospel Jesus and his disciples go down to the big
city of Jerusalem. His disciples are fascinated by the temple, the jewelry in
it, the gold, the bigness and vastness of it all. But Jesus says that it’s all
going to be destroyed. It’s not going to make it in the test of time.
I’ve only been to a tiny bit of the Middle East: parts of
Israel, Turkey and Greece. I’ve seen a
few ruined temples. If you go to Israel, to Jerusalem you can go to the wailing
wall, the wall of the destroyed temple.
But the world has plenty of places that have not passed the test of time
and time is a great tester.
You can translate today’s gospel into many examples. We’re
driving down the road in a not so fancy car. It has lots of miles on it. A
fancy, very expensive, brand new car goes flying by. Envy. Fascination. Wow.
Then we see a tractor trailer truck of crushed old cars go by.
Fascination. What are we fascinated by?
Time tells us where the really valuable is - to us.
TIME IS FUNNY
Time is funny. Time is relative.
Take a minute.
A minute is 60 seconds every time. Look at your watch, clock
or cell phone, and take a minute to check it out - if I right about that.
I remember a digital watch I once had: a Timex. In time - after a lot of use - the little
buttons on the side were not working too well. I took some WD 40 and sprayed it
into the buttons on the side. Well, I ruined the watch. The face became a sea
of black liquid. Ugh.
So I had to go looking for an old watch. It’s a wind up
watch. It still works. It’s passing the test of time. I can see the second
hand.
A minute takes a minute, 60 seconds every time.
But time is also relative. I love the old saying. I use it
every time. “How long a minute takes depends on which side of the bathroom door
you’re on.”
How long a minute takes depends on who’s speaking or who’s
preaching.
How long a minute takes is whether you’re the one who
spilled the coffee on the restaurant
table and you’re hoping a waitress shows up any minute now.
How long a minute takes depends on whether you’re watching
the last minute of a football game or you’re playing Jeopardy.
Time is funny.
The nurse or doctor’s assistant puts you in one of those
small rooms at the doctor’s office and says, “The doctor will be in to see you
in a minute.”
Time is relative.
TIME TELLS THE
TRUTH
Time tells the truth. It might take time, but the wheel of
justice eventually balances.
Time tells whether what we bought was really worth it.
Time tells us the truth about whom we work with, whom we marry, whom we spend time with.
“Time will tell” as the old saying goes.
A NEW HIRE
How many times have we heard this? A person is hires a
person who looks great on paper. He has a great resume. He had a great interview.
The person was hired. A few weeks later the boss or the person who hired this
new person says: “Wow did we make a
mistake.” The guy was horrible with women. He couldn’t stand having a woman as
his boss. They had to buy him out to get rid of him.
MARRIAGE
It’s the same with marriage. He seems great on a date. He’s
so good looking. Wow. She is gorgeous. But can she cook as they used to say?
“The glances over cocktails that seem so sweet, don’t seem
so sweet over shredded wheat.”
What is he like after the honeymoon?
People forget they are marrying the father or mother of
their kids. They are marrying a companion for life.
Time tells all.
POEM
I like a poem by John Crowe Ransom. It’s a tough poem.
Woooo! Tough stuff. Judgment stuff. Truth stuff. Time will tell stuff. Ugh stuff.
It’s about a man and a woman. It’s about a man seeing a
group of beautiful school girls with beautiful hair. They are playing or
running in their blue school uniforms in a playground. There are a few words in
the poem that we don’t hear too often.
A sward is a grassy patch.
A fillet is a ribbon that holds one’s hair in place.
A seminary here is the girls’ school.
BLUE GIRLS
Twirling your
blue skirts, travelling the sward
Under the
towers of your seminary,
Go listen to
your teachers old and contrary
Without
believing a word.
Tie the white
fillets then about your lustrous hair
And think no
more of what will come to pass
Than
bluebirds that go walking on the grass
And
chattering on the air.
Practise your
beauty, blue girls, before it fail;
And I will
cry with my loud lips and publish
Beauty which
all our power shall never establish,
It is so
frail.
For I could
tell you a story which is true:
I know a lady
with a terrible tongue,
Blear eyes
fallen from blue,
All her
perfections tarnished -- and yet it is not long
Since she was
lovelier than any of you.
CONCLUSION: CHURCH
TIME
Let me make a conclusion.
Sunday mass is church time. Different time. It’s one hour
out of the 168 hours of the week. It’s judgment time. We come to church and we
look at the rest of the week.
How are we doing on our job? Putting in time or really doing
a great job.
How are we doing as a member of our family? Presence.
Listening with each other. Meals. Etc.
How are we doing in our primary responsibilities?
If I am a teacher, how am I doing?
If I am a student, how am I doing?
At Sunday mass time we take the time to review the week --
to check things out. Things might look
good on paper. A person might have lots of promise. But in the crunch time of
everyday life, we see reality. The proof is in the pudding.
Church time is often like that time in the doctor’s office.
We’re in the room waiting for the doctor. We felt a lump or our left side is
numb or we’re not feeling right. We sit there doing some serious thinking.
That’s judgment time. That’s crunch time.
We take tests and a few days feel like ages as we look at
the phone waiting.
Time will tell what is going on.
LEASH
Does every dog hate the leash -
that leather prison around one’s neck?
Does every human hate the leash -
that holds us back from running free?
Does anyone want government or
gulag or God to pen or hold us in?
Doesn’t everyone want
be like the dog -
head out the car window - enjoying the breeze?
Doesn’t every kid long for the day to
have the keys to one’s car and freedom to be?
© Andy Costello, Reflections 2019
Saturday, November 16, 2019
EVERYONE: A GOD SCULPTOR
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily for this 32 Saturday in Ordinary
Time is, “Everyone: A God Sculptor.”
A THEORY
I have a theory that everyone spends their life trying to
figure out who and what God is like - even atheists. We all do this in that
inner quiet room in the back of our mind. That’s the place we go to when we are
alone - when we are in the dark - or when we are alone on planes or buses or when
things have gone wrong.
If you were given clay or a canvas and paints - and you
were asked to sculpt or paint an image of God, what would your work of art look like?
Try it - when you have some doodle time. You have to have
in your house ball point pens, crayons, paints, clay or what have you.
Share your drawing or sculpture with each other.
It’s not too far-fetched.
Genesis has God the creator
sculpting us out of the clay of the earth and breathing life into us. Next time
you see a little baby - stop to see the baby and say to the parents and to God:
“Nice job!”
Mom and God have been sculpting that baby for some 9
months.
We’re made in the image and likeness of God, so if God
was an artist, so too us.
EULOGY
Next time you’re at a funeral of someone you know, when
there is an eulogy, listen to the eulogist and see if you say to yourself, if
you knew the deceased, “Wow the speaker really captured the essence of the
person.”
I just finished 17 years in a big parish in Maryland and
as a result I did a couple of hundred funerals.
I’d go to the funeral parlor - if they had a service the day before -
and look at all the pictures - and then ask folks - one on one - to describe who the deceased was. Then the next day I would try to tailor the
homily to the person who died. Sometimes people would say, “Thanks, you knew
that person really well; sometimes people would say nothing.”
BACK TO GOD.
If we told each other how we see God, how we picture God,
how we understand God, I guarantee you, we
would say of other people’s verbal sculptures, “That’s not my God.” or “That’s not how I see God.”
GOD IN SCRIPTURES
All of the above was triggered by today’s readings.
Jesus in today’s gospel describes God as a judge who will
answer our prayers, just to get rid of us.
Does any of us picture God like that?
In other gospel texts, Jesus pictures God, our Father,
giving everyone who works in the vineyard the same amount at the end of the day
and lots of folks screamed, “Not fair.” They’re saying, “That’s not how I see
God.”
My guess is that the first five minutes of heaven after
we die, when we see who’s there and who’s where, we’ll hear, “Not fair!” - a
lot.
Jesus broke a lot of bubbles telling us that God rejoices
over 1 lost sheep being found than 99 goody goodies just floating along in life
and in paradise.
Reflecting on these scripture stories and a lot more, we
might crumble up our pictures of God -
as we come up with new images.
OTHER SCRIPTURE READINGS
That’s just the gospels. Other scriptures will really get
us scratching our heads.
Take today’s first reading with the author of wisdom
painting God very dramatically like a warrior with a fierce looking sword
flying out of heaven in the dark - in dramatic silence - and chopping people
down.
Scary - and we might say, hearing that, “I find myself saying and thinking, ‘Not my God. Not my God.”
CONCLUSION
Then the recurring question: Who are you God?
November 16, 2019
4th GRADE DESK
It was my desk, my
observation point,
to see the front half
of the classroom -
to see the teacher
and all else - but ….
I liked the secret compartment
below
the brown wooden top of
my desk -
even though it was
open - semi-private.
The round ink well -
hole - was there,
but it had no ink
bottle in it. A moveable
Waterman’s ink bottle
had taken its place
I was still a me -
never once wondering
who else sat in my wooden
desk in years
gone by. I was just a
kid, still unconscious.
I never wondered who
J G was - two letters
carved in the upper
front edge of my desk.
Years later it would
be others - but not yet.
© Andy Costello, Reflections
2019
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