Saturday, January 6, 2018

January 6, 2018 - 

Thought for today:




                  “Then the sea
And heaven rolled as one  and from the two
Came fresh transfigurings of freshest blue.”



Wallace Stevens [1879-1955]  
in Sea Surface Full of Clouds [1923], II
January 6, 2018

ENORMOUS

To understand what  enormous means,
poets might say, “Count the stars of
the heavens”  or “Count the grains of
sand on the shores of the sea.”

Obviously, sand and stars cannot
be counted. So is there another way
to understand and to discover just
what enormous means?

To see enormous, how about looking
out at night through a telescope into
outer space or through a microscope
at just one grain of sand.

How about experiencing forgiveness
from another whom we hurt with an
enormous mistake? Or how about the

love involved in a 50 year marriage?

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018



Friday, January 5, 2018


ST. JOHN NEUMANN: 
SOME COMMENTS ABOUT HIM

Today,  January 5th, is the feast day of St. John Neumann - so I would like to simply make a few comments about him.

It would be nice to have this mass at St. John Neumann Church out on Bestgate Road - but then again I don’t have to clean the snow off my car to get out there.




Next time you’re at Mass out there, take a good look at the bronze statue of John Neumann in the church plaza.   I understand it’s pretty much his size and his look. He was a short man - and as solid as bronze.

It is good to know John Neumann was here on Duke of Gloucester Street for the blessing of the cornerstone of this church in 1858. I assume there was the understanding that he would be here for its completion as well  - but he was to die too soon.

I like to reflect that he visited Most Holy Redeemer on 3rd Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan - which was my first assignment. Some factual questions hit me last night. I have to see in print if that actually happened. I know he was at St. Nicholas Church on East 2nd Street in 1836. I came up with a question last night - did he by any chance do any baptisms in his short time there after his ordination on June 25th 1836? Those baptismal records are at Most Holy Redeemer on 3rd Street.



John Neumann was born in Prachatitz, Bohemia - part of the Chech republic on  Good Friday, March 28th, 1811. He was baptized that same day.

He died January 5, 1860. While walking on Vine Street near Thirteenth he collapsed with heart failure and was carried into a nearby house. He died almost immediately at the age of 49. He was going to the Post Office or from the post office to send a chalice to a priest.

He was the 3rd child of 6 born to Philip and Agnes Neumann.  His dad was a stocking weaver.



His mom and dad were good Catholics. His mom went to Mass every morning.

In those days the practice as Catholics was for parishioners to go to communion once every 3 months - and confession every 3 months.

John wanted to be a diocesan priest. He went to the seminary with that in mind - but they had so many priests in his diocese of Budweis - so he had to wait. When he saw notice that priests were needed for people in the United States, he applied and headed for New York - with the hope of being ordained over here.

 He landed in Staten Island, New York. Then he sailed the short distance to Manhattan on June 1, 1836. He got accepted for the diocese of New York.  That June he was ordained sub-deacon, deacon and then priest on June 25th. He was then sent to the Rochester NY area where there was only 1 priest - Father Pax. Then he was sent to Buffalo - where his field of work was some 900 miles.

He was quiet, an introvert, a hard worker, dedicated, and smart.  He spoke German and French for starters and in time learned English and several other languages - including some Gaelic. He's listed as speaking 6 modern languages.

Fortunately, he wrote a sort of journal - not for others  - but to put into words his struggles with faith, purity, envy, depression, the pits, and how things often went wrong for him.  This was done between 1830 and 1840 - when he was 22 to 31.

He also was asked to write his life quickly - the night before he was made a bishop. That document is around.  He wrote that short document in one evening.

That’s it for any writings he did - except for business correspondence, etc. etc. etc.

If you want to read a good biography of John Neuman read the one written by Father Mike Curly - a Redemptorist. It is loaded with details, footnotes and research.

After four years in the northwest corner of New York State, John Neumann realized life as a priest was too tough all by himself up on the Niagara, New York frontier, so he joined the Redemptorists.

He wanted companionship and community.

His novitiate didn’t work out as a year of novitiate should. He was often on the road. He was always being asked to do this and to do that. He was an ordained priest.  He worked in Baltimore and Pittsburgh. 

After taking vows, he quickly became the superior and boss of the Redemptorists in North America and then he was quickly made bishop of Philadelphia.

People knew this priest was the real deal as well as being very real.

Yet, he often felt inadequate. He suffered from put downs by others who spoke English and comments that this priest didn’t have the right foreign accent.

He was a bishop who went to the outposts of the diocese - all over the place, to little mining towns and what have you. He writes somewhere that when he was a kid, nobody ever saw a bishop - except at a confirmation every couple of years.  Well, the people of the enormous diocese of Philadelphia saw their bishop - especially in the tiny spots.

I’d make him patron saint of travel - the patron saint for those who suffer from feelings of inadequacy and self put downs - and also regrets.

I’d also make him the patron saint of those who do a lot quickly. As bishop of Philadelphia 80 churches were built under his auspices. He helped the Sisters  of the Third Order of St. Francis to begin - so as to teach in the many new Catholic schools in the diocese. He helped get two catechisms and in 1849 a Bible History published.



He was a real busy priest and bishop - and gave every situation and person he met, his best.
 January 5, 2018 - 

Thought for today:

“Everyone in the world is Christ and they are all crucified.”  

Sherwood Anderson, [1876-1941] In Winesburg, Ohio [1919] The Philosopher
January 5, 2018



YOU  NEVER  KNOW
                               
We never know what’s on
another’s channel - inside
their inner room - so we
better stop assuming -
that they are even watching
TV or they are playing solitaire
or praying - or whatever they 
are doing. They might even be 
taking a nap or writing a poem.
God only knows what’s
going on inside another.
They might not know either.



© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018
Cf. Matthew 6:6
Cf. Matthew 14: 14; Luke 22: 11





Thursday, January 4, 2018

TEST: 
LOOK AT THE  
FACES IN THE CROWD 

Which kid in this class picture is Hitler?

____________________________________________________________


About the top picture - here is what is written in the book, Photoanalysis by Robert U. Akeret. "Find the Fuhrer in this photograph.  One of the children in this school picture is Alois Schicklgruber, or Adolf Hitler, as he later became.  It's a typical fourth-grade class, like the kind any of us might have been in if we had attended an all-boys school. The difference is that one of these boys as an adult tried to dominate the world.

"Study the faces, the body postures, the positioning.  Imagine for a moment that your are Hitler as a fourth-grader, and you already have some mind-blowing plans.  Where would you place yourself as this class photo was about to be taken?  Holding the fourth-grade sign?  Close to the teacher?


"Hitler is in fact in the exact center of the top row, not only central, but also slightly higher than anyone else in the photo.  "Deutschland uber Alles" was the German World War II battle cry, and in this early photo it''s "Hitler uber Alles!"  What the photo shows, in all too chilling dimensions, is that Hitler's personality was set at a very early age." [Page 143]  Further question: agree or disagree or undecided?

__________________________________________________


Do you often find yourself looking back?

_________________________________________________________



Have you ever folded your arms, disagreed, but didn't say anything?
_________________________________________________________



Can you find the 7 nuns in this picture?
____________________________________________



Can you find the 2 sisters in this Sunday School photo?


In the book, Photoanalysis, by Robert U. Akeret, we read the following about this picture which has the 2 sisters. "This is a group of Sunday school girls with their teacher. Look carefully at each student.  Which two girls would you pick as being sisters?  What clues would you use as evidence?


"Parents frequently dress siblings alike, even when they aren't twins, and here the two girls with the same tilt of the hats, and the same coat with white collars, are sisters. Now that you know, you can also tell that their facial features are similar." [pp. 64-65]


January 4, 2018

FACES IN THE CROWD

Whose face will you see
among all the faces in
the crowds you'll see today?

Who stops to look into
your eyes and asks you about
your attitudes and your moods?

Who wonders and worries
about you - where you are
and where you’re headed?

Who looks back over their
shoulder making sure
you’re okay this very day?


© Andy Costello, Reflections 2018