February 20, 2018

Black History Month Thought for today: 

“I don't want a Black History Month.  Black history is American history.”  

Morgan Freeman

HOLINESS - CHOICES

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this Monday of the First Week in Lent is, “Holiness -  Choices.”

Today’s first reading from the Book of Leviticus begins, “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Speak to the whole assembly of the children of Israel and tell them: Be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy.’” [Cf. Leviticus 19:2.]

Did the person who put that in there have in mind the great statement of Genesis: “We are made in the image likeness of God”?

So if God is Holy - we are challenged to be holy as God is holy.

In the lead Document of Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, Chapter V is entitled, “The Call of the Whole Church to Holiness.”

So a few words about holiness in this homily.

TWO CHOICES

When it comes to holiness - there are various choices - various understandings on what holiness is.

Let me present two choices.  There are a lot more and then some. Holiness is mentioned all through the Bible and many times in religious talk.

Someone stands there with two fists like this and says, “Choose one.”

FIRST CHOICE: HOLINESS AS SEPARATION

A major understanding about Holiness is separation.

God is up there - out there - apart from us.

To be holy is to choose the sacred as opposed to the profane. [1]

To be holy is to go up there, out there, apart from others - and enter into the presence of God.

Churches, temples, holy places have the sacred door - that separate us from the non-holy and they take us into the sacred place and space.

Once inside there are even more sacred spaced.

There are steps, there are areas, there are doors and special books.

There are titles: priests, deacons, popes,  bishops, ministers in special robes.

Then there are Holy Days.

Then there is the Sabbath. Sunday is to be different than the other days.

It is good to celebrate the Sabbath.

It is good to go to Church.

Jesus went into the desert to pray.

Jesus went into the garden to pray.

Jesus went into his inner room to pray - in lonely, alone places.

Temples had the women’s section, the men’s section, the Gentiles outer court. Temples had the Holy of Holies - where the high priest went.

Notice that this understanding of holiness has the major idea of separation.

Some food was unholy.

Some people were holy and some people were not.

We all know the parable of the Pharisee  and the Publican. Two men went to the temple to pray. One man went up front and said for all to hear, “Thank God I am not like the rest of people. I do this and I do that and I’m not like that guy back there - that sinner - that unholy person. And the man back there said - with head bowed, “Be merciful to me Lord, for I am a sinful man.” Cf. Luke 18: 9-14.]

And Jesus said that the second guy went home from the temple that day - blessed - exalted in the eyes of God.

No wonder they killed Jesus.

No wonder they arrested and killed him outside the city - almost naked or naked - thrown on a cross like a criminal.

And the veil in the temple  that closed in the Holy of Holies was torn in two - from top to bottom. [Cf. Matthew 27: 51.]

So that’s the first idea of holiness: separation.

It has its gifts - it has its meanings - it has its values - it has its dangers.

SECOND CHOICE: HOLINESS AS WHOLENESS

The other choice is to see the holiness of all the whole world.

The second choice is to see the holiness of all people.         

Today’s first reading calls us to be holy - in how we see all people - to respect, to love, to treat the whole of humanity as ourselves. It calls for no lying, no falsehoods, no defrauding, no injustice, no dishonesty.  If you see someone about to take the life of another, reach out and try to save your neighbor. Have no hatred, no sin against your brother or sister, no revenge, no grudges. It closes with the second commandment - with the Golden Rule,  you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Today’s gospel calls us to be a sheep and not a goat - to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to vist the sick, the stranger, those in prison. [Cf. Matthew 31-46.]

That’s holiness. That’s heaven. That’s the opposite to being in the hell of selfishness, me, me, meism.

It’s the opposite of separation. It’s a stress on out there in the temple of the world.

Listen to this quote from Tim Chester. It’s from his book: Everyday Church: Gospel Communities on Mission: “Holiness is as much about what you do on a Monday morning on the factory floor as it is about what you do on a Sunday morning in a church gathering. Holiness is as much about the kind of neighbor you are as it is about the kind of church member you are. It is as much about who you are when you are holding a steering wheel as who you are when you are holding a Bible.” 

CONCLUSION

There’s two choices.

Choose one.  Better: Choose both. Best: Chose many ways of being holy.

Let me close with an imaginary example.

Two friends decide to go to McDonald’s.

They walk in and one guy says, “I’m treating. What do you want?”

“Oh, okay,”  the other guy says. “I’ll take a Bic Mac, fries and a chocolate shake.”

“Grab a table, get some napkins, and I’ll bring our meal over.”

4 minutes later the guy who was paying, brings over to the table, a tray with 3 meals on it. Then he says, “I’ll be right back.”

He takes the 3^rd meal, walks out the front door, and crosses the street.

The other guy stands up and watches his buddy cross the street and bring that 3^rd meal to a homeless guy sitting against a building on the street.

He comes back and says, “Let’s eat.”

They say a prayer - and the other guy says, “What was that all about?”

The gift giver says, “I see that guy there at times and I get him a meal. No big deal.”

Now a return to my question about holiness.  Which is the greater sacrament?  Being at Mass, breaking bread, eating the Eucharist, with a church filled with people or breaking bread with a homeless man on the street.

[P.S. Sometime during the Mass, it hit me heavy a question: “Why didn’t I put in my imaginary story about holiness - that the guy invited the homeless man into McDonald’s - to have lunch with a threesome?”]

February 19, 2018

TABLES AND CHAIRS

If tables could talk and chairs could

scream - every restaurant would be

as good a play as anything by Arthur

Miller, Anton Chekhov or Harold Pinter.

At  this table we said it, we thought it,

it, for the first time: “We could have a

great life together. Do you have any

thought as good as that this evening?”

Sitting on these chairs, in this place

called, “The Cozy Corner,” we talked

to each other as brothers for the first

time in seventeen years. And we cried.

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

February 19, 2018

Black History Month Thought for today: 

"Laundry  is the only thing that should be separated by color." 

Author Unknown

40 - 40

The title of my homily is, “40 - 40”.

Imagine if the following happened in the year 2020?

It started in France - which in a lot of ways - had lost the Catholic faith -  along with a lot of other places. It once was a very Catholic country - giving us great saints like St. Therese of Lisieux - the Little Flower - and St. Vincent de Paul - and various other wonderful saints - as well as spiritual movements.

It was in Paris - in the 13^th century - where St. Thomas Aquinas - a brilliant Italian teacher flourished - and gave the world and Catholicism - a great philosophical and theological system and synthesis and summa - called in the long run - Scholasticism. He took parts of what he learned from Aristotle - when Aristotle’s thoughts -  came to Europe through poor translations from the Arabic - which were made from the original Greek.

It was in  Paris - while studying - 1528 to 1535 -  that Ignatius of Loyola grouped with a handful of other young men - mostly from Spain - and they planned  to change the world for and with Christ. The result  - the Society of Jesus - the Jesuits - helped do just that. It took Ignatius a while to rope in St. Francis Xavier. Ignatius kept saying to him, “What does it profit someone if they  gain the whole world but lose their  soul.”

Ignatius gave the world the Spiritual Exercises which can be a short retreat or a long retreat of 28 to 30 days. A person steps back and looks at what’s giving him or her life - more - and what’s draining one’s life - less. It started with Ignatius’  unplanned retreat while recovering from being hit in the leg in battle by a cannon ball. He wanted romantic books - but all they had where he was recovering - were the lives of the saints and a life of Christ by Ludolph of Saxony.

Ignatius - a soldier, the youngest of 13 kids, an expert dancer,  a fancy dresser, very sensitive, addicted to gambling - a leader, He was good with the sword and with the knife - once killng a Muslim in a duel - in an argument and a fight over whether Christ was divine.

Ignatius  almost died from his leg surgeries.  He lived. He traveled with a limp - one leg shorter than the other - for the rest of his life - through, Italy, Spain,  the Holy Land, and France where the Jesuits started.

So maybe it was very significant that the 40 - 40 movement started in France.

The plan was quite simple - easy to imagine - but it would prove to be difficult - to put into practice. It takes work to grow and to know life and God in our lives and Jesus Christ in our lives.  But if put into practice, it can bring great results.

Religious orders - nuns, priests and brothers - with vows of poverty, chastity and obedience - had gone down big time in numbers - in the 20^th century.

People - for the most part - were having 2 or 3 kids - so family size was down - so too the number of religious, priests, deacons, what and who  have you - and parents want to see their kids’ kids more than would want to see their kids as nuns and priests and brothers.

These are general statements - but the numbers seem to back them up.

So the time was right for the 40 - 40 movement to start.  It was 2020 on the calendar.

It went like this.  Every Catholic - if and when they reach the age of 40 - got 40 days off. And they had to leave home - family - spouse - job - and go off alone to  somewhere else and do this Catholic Spiritual Program called 40 - 40.

In the 40 - 40 movement it could be the wife first or the husband first.

They were to do this in memory of Jesus - who did  his 40 days at a much earlier age than 40 - perhaps when he was around 30 years of age. He left the carpenter shop in Nazareth - went down to the Jordan River - was baptized by John the Baptist - as a moment of renewal and a fresh start.  Then Jesus went into the desert to pray for 40 days.

In time the 40 - 40   movement became accepted and understood. The more people did this - the more people did this. The more people did this,  the more deeper in spirituality and Christian living the Catholic Church became. In fact, lots of Protestant Christians did this as well.

Hey! 40 days off is 40 days off - especially as Dante discovered in his mid-life insight - as we read at the beginning of his Divine Comedy which he started writing at the age of 35, “In the middle of the journey of our life, I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.”

People would start saving money  for this in their 30’s - so they could have this 40 day period away when they hit 40.

People would go away to some silent place of their choice - somewhere on the planet.  It could be the ocean. It could be the desert. It could be the mountains.

The bottom line was to do what Jesus did: to go to some deserted place for 40 days - experience the Spirit -  the rush of God - the experience of God our Father - and to do this with and in and through Jesus Christ.

Literature - small books - memoirs - gave hints on what to do and possible ways on how to live this 40 day retreat.

It was like what various people did in the early part of the 21^st century. They would start in France  and walk the Camino - the way - the pilgrimage -  the 500 mile walk to Santiago de Compastela in Spain.

That’s like walking the Appalachian trail for some people. If they do it, they finish an experience of a lifetime - walking deep through the woods outside and inside one’s being..

It was like what Muslims do - when they make the Hajj - the pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia. It’s a once in a lifetime pilgrimage to the sacred rock. That sacred pilgrimage can be done with others - but it’s a very personal and individual experience at the same time.

Well the 40 - 40 was to end up - after many years what every Catholic - was to do in his or her lifetime around their 40^th year of life.

Some made the 40 - 40 in Lent. They would begin by reading the story of Jesus being driven  by the Spirit out in the desert and remain there is the desert for 40 days.

Some people lasted only a few days. They would give up - but the more folks who did it, the more folks tried and finished it. Some people stayed - because they would be embarrassed if they came home early.

Most picked a room or a place - like a small rent apartment in a basement or at the beach in February or in Lent. They brought their Bible. They brought their rosary. They brought their note pad.  They brought spiritual reading books like The Seven Storey Mountain by Thomas Merton or The Imitation of Christ or The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck. Some would bring the Divine Comedy by Dante - with a guide book - and discover that their life was a comedy - a divine comedy at that - as they went through the inferno - hell, purgatorio -  purgatory - and Paradiso - the heavenly parts of their lives.

They were warned that there would be temptations. They would  happen more than they could imagine  in a time of deep prayer.  They were told that Jesus had had very heavy temptations during his 40 days in the desert - like Israel did in their 40 year trip through  the desert between Egypt and the Promised Land of Israel.

Books about the 40 - 40 - said you could spend one week on the 7 Deadly Sins in our lives - but be careful.

Books about the 40 - 40  - said you could do the top 7 Parables out of the 20 or so parables of Jesus - like the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the Great Judgment where we find out whether we were a sheep or a goat - at the end of time, and on and on and on.

Books about the 40 - 40 said you could spend the 40 days learning the Sermon on the Mount by Jesus  - in prayer and reflection. It’s just 3 chapters in the gospel of Matthew - Chapters 5, 6 and 7. Scholars think that’s exactly what the Sermon on the Mount was in the early church - a good listing - of key teachings of Jesus.

Books about the 40 - 40 said you could spend the 40 days with the Gospel of John - or what have you.

If possible no phones - but bring one just in case.

People came home a new person.

Most were quiet about what happened.  Deep rivers are very deep.

People came home with insights into their life so far and what they want to do with the rest of their life - because they had just spent 40 days in the desert with Jesus.

People came home - slowly sharing their experiences with their spouse - especially if their spouse had already gone through this 40 - 40 experience.

Marriages improved. Families improved. Parishes improved. Our church improved.

People talked to family members whom they hadn’t talked to in years.

Single people - in their 40’s - decided on the priesthood or to become nuns.

Rumors about a married clergy increased - without the signs and the placards and the protests.

People asked for more theology and church history and bible studies in their parishes.

Because the 40 - 40 program - plan - way of spirituality was so flexible, it took root in our cultures.

Companies saw it as a sabbatical, which it was, as well as seeing workers giving their companies a better worker than before.

The title of my homily was 40 - 40.

Then I woke up.

Then I said to myself, “I can dream, can’t I?”

February 18, 2018

WORDS SOMETIMES ___

Sometimes the wink ….

Sometimes the smile ….

Sometimes the silence ….

Sometimes the lightning bug ….

Sometimes a bowling ball ….
Sometimes the ball of cotton ….

Sometimes the door bell ….
Sometimes the obituary column ….

Sometimes the “Hmmmm!”

Sometimes the prayer ….

Sometimes the curse….

Sometimes the “Hello ….”

Sometimes the “Good bye ….”

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018

February 18, 2018 

Black History Month Thought for today: 

"One day our descendants will think it incredible that we paid so much attention to things like the amount of melanin in our skin or the shape of our eyes or our gender instead of the unique identities of each of us as complex human beings." 

Franklin Thomas