St. Thomas More Catholic Church
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Elgin, IL 60123
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February 28, 2010
Second Sunday of Lent

The biblical story cannot be told without the mountains. If you have ever been to the Holy Land, one of the things that you come away with is how small it is in relation to its historical and biblical importance. It is about the size of Vermont. It is five-hundred miles long and about ninety-five miles wide. It is a land of great heights and awesome depths. Mount Nebo in the north is about 9,200 feet above sea level, while the Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth, thirteen hundred feet below sea level. These extremes of highs and lows in a relatively small country make Palestine like the terrain of faith.

Abraham Maslow was a psychologist who described what he called peak experiences in the lives of productive, healthy and creative people. These are the times when we feel totally energized, filled-up inside, able to do anything we believe. Maslow believed that those same kinds of experiences, peak experiences, are necessary for religious conversion. Have you ever had a peak religious experience; a mountaintop experience? Many people have had these kinds of peak experiences that were so significant that they were impossible to forget. I remember one that comes to mind and it occurred at the Chrism Mass one year in Rockford. We were all together at the Chrism Mass with the bishop and we renewed, as we do each year, our priestly commitment to serve God's people in the Church. I had such an overwhelming sense of love of God at the moment. It lasted only a short time and then passed. That was a peak experience for me. Generally those peak experiences do not last and we have to come down from the mountains back into the valleys of real life. Life requires descents just as it does ascents.

We do no know exactly what happened that day on Mt. Tabor for Peter, James and John. It was a peak experience; one that the disciples wished would last forever. Peter even suggested that they remain there and build three dwelling places, for Jesus, Moses and Elijah. For Jesus, the experience on Tabor was different. Something happens on the mountain that helps Jesus to know what is his next step in his mission. Even Jesus does not remain on the mountain. He has work to do and that must be done in the valley of the world.

The valley has been as useful a metaphor as the mountain. At times this entire world has been seen as a valley. Recall the valley of tears, or an empty and meaningless valley. Yet it is here in our valleys that we live out our faith life. While they may lack the excitement of the mountain peaks, valleys tend to be growing places. This is surely true spiritually. Don't we grow more in the valley than on the mountaintop? As wonderful as it is to ascend the mountain, as priceless as the mountain view may be, isn't it in the valley where we are challenged to follow Christ?

If you have ever had one or two of those peak experiences it is good to thank God for them. They can sustain us when the times are rough. Of far more importance however, is our time in the valleys where we live out - day in and day out - our faith in Christ.

February 14, 2010
Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Last year at the Oscars a young eight year old girl names Rubina Ali received celebrity treatment as the movie she starred in Slum Dog Millionaire ran away with all the awards. As she stood on the stage, this little Indian girl from Mumbai was able to get a glimpse of the glamorous life she had only seen on television. All around her were celebrities dressed in clothing and jewels that would be worth a fortune. The post Oscar parties, all a far cry from the life she lived in the slums of Mumbai. Her real life was that she slept next to her parents in a one-room shack in one of Mumbai's most squalid slums. Her home had no windows, running water or toilet. No wonder the little girl was quoted in the weeks after the Oscars to have said that she wanted to be in more films and to travel the world.

The Gospel reading for today is Luke's version of the more famous Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's Gospel. Actually, that is the version we are more familiar with. The big difference is that Matthew adds the words Blessed are the poor in spirit. Luke simply says Blessed are the poor. He leaves off the in spirit part. That really seems to change the entire meaning. We have to remember that Luke's Gospel, among other things is often considered by scholars to be the Gospel of the poor. Matthew's Beatitudes occur on the mountain. For Luke that was the place of solitude and prayer for Jesus. The plain, which is the setting for Luke's beatitudes, is the place where Jesus is with large groups of people. The teachings here are not esoteric for a select few but are available for all. This list from Luke are much more practical and concrete than Matthew's list from the Sermon on the Mount.

The tension between earthly and spiritual concerns has been part of our faith from the beginning. This is not a bad thing because it keeps us balanced and honest before God. We just cannot offer the poor pie in the sky. Luke makes it very clear that the poor and hungry need to have their daily physical needs met here on earth. Perhaps those who have suffered during these economic times have discovered this kind of need for the first time. We never tend to think of ourselves when we hear this warning of Jesus because we all look up the ladder. There are always people who have more than we do.

This is one of the reasons why I look forward to the season of Lent, which occurs each year. It begins on Wednesday of this week. We can place far too much importance to amassing the good things in life so that our possessions and our way of life become an idol that we worship or build our lives around. What the season of Lent can do for us is that it can help us restore the balance in our lives. Putting worldly prosperity ahead of God in our lives does not lead to lasting happiness.

One of the great tried and true methods of penance during the season of Lent is that of almsgiving. Almsgiving implies that we need to unclutter our lives a bit. Literally it means giving to the poor. We do not have to look very far to find opportunities to share with the poor. Here in our parish each month we have the reverse collection where items are listed and we take them from the basket and then purchase those things for the needy. Saint Vincent de Paul Society does wonderful work in this parish. What about supporting them with a check during the season of Lent. When Jesus speaks of those who are rich and those who are poor, which do we think we are? We may not think of ourselves as materially rich but how do our lives compare with the children in the slums of Mumbai and so many other places around the world?

January 24, 2010
Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

This year, as many of you have already noted, we are reading the Gospel of Luke. It is the year of Luke. We will be reading Luke all the way until Advent. Luke's account of the Gospel is distinctive. The reference to most excellent Theophilus might refer to an actual person or it may refer to everyone who honestly is seeking God. The Greek word Theophilus means one who loves God. What is happening in the Gospel account? Luke is creating an eyewitness narrative of the life of Jesus. Luke's writing will be a bit more historical than that of the other Gospel writers. He is going to recount the central events of the life of Jesus and then let his readers judge for themselves. If we read between the lines, we also discover that perhaps Luke is dissatisfied with previous renditions of the Gospel. This Theophilus, whomever he might be, knows the events of Jesus' life, he knows the facts, but does he have the right meaning, the deeper spiritual knowledge of what happened? Reading events properly from a deeper theological meaning is an ongoing concern of Luke's Gospel.

As his ministry begins, Luke places Jesus in the synagogue, a place that was comfortable for Jesus, a place that he no doubt knew well. He has heard and been formed by God's word there. When he is handed the scroll with the text from the prophet Isaiah, it is not that he has never heard it before. He is, as I already mentioned, reading these events with a new perspective. Jesus is not simply doing an assigned reading but rather he is searching out those words that spell out the meaning of Son of God. In the Spirit-driven mission language of Isaiah, Jesus uncovers the mission of his own life and to put it in a single word, it is the mission of liberation. Wherever human life in impoverished, imprisoned or impaired, it will become enriched, free and enabled. Sitting in the position of teacher in the synagogue, Jesus is effectively saying that the time of waiting is over. When Jesus spoke these words they were no longer words of prediction, they were words of inauguration. Luke has made good on his promise. He has given to Theophilus and to us, the deeper knowledge, the meaning of the events of Jesus' life.

Now fast forward to our own lives and especially to our own experiences. When we learned the basics of our Christian faith, we learned them as a finished set of propositions or creeds and written beliefs. This is not a very good way to learn the faith. It can be argued that it is necessary as a beginning, but is surely cannot end there. Christianity was the first of all a way of living. People were drawn to Jesus, because they found meaning for their lives. They sensed liberation in their lives from all those things that were holding them in bondage. People followed Jesus not because he was scientifically accurate or logical. People found in Jesus Christ the power of love at work, the will of God and the way to live. They were actually able to verify these things in their own lives and in their own experiences. Life got better by following Jesus. That is why we say that the real truth of the faith is not found in books, but in the lives of believing people. The best argument for a Christian faith is a Christian life. When we observe a life that is devoted to loving God by loving the neighbor, we know that we are in the presence of the truth. The truth of Jesus is revealed in a life.

So how free are you in your following Jesus? What is it that enslaves you, make you fearful or alone? I think that just as Jesus experienced that sense of inner peace in the synagogue when he heard the scriptures, sang psalms and hymns and heard explanations of the scriptures, so we too must keep coming back to listen, to sing and hear, to celebrate. Then when we leave, we take Jesus with us. It becomes then not so much our work or our job, but Jesus' work in and through us. That is the reason why we continue to hope and it is ultimately what give us confidence and life.

January 3, 2010
Epiphany

There is a rather famous short story, which was written by O. Henry, the American short story author. It is called The Gift of the Magi. It is the tale of a young couple that was very much involve with each other but was very poor. As Christmas approached, they each wanted to give to the other a gift. They were so poor that the only way that they could give a gift to each other was to give to the other something they already owned. For the woman is was her long beautiful hair. In order to give her husband a gift of a gold chain for his prized possession, his beautiful watch, she had her hair cut and sold. Her husband, however, sold his beautiful gold watch in order to buy his wife a tortoise shell comb for her hair. In that way she could show off her long tresses to perfection. The result was that they both had gifts, which had no material gain, for out of their generosity they sold what the chain and comb would have adorned. Yet they are both content with their gifts because they presented their love for each other.

The feast of the Epiphany has often been viewed as the solemnity of the Christmas season. Surely the leitmotif is the gifts that the Magi offer to the Christ child. Yet the scriptures would have us focus on the deeper meaning of the feast as the manifestation of our Savior to the entire world. Christ reveals himself today to Jew and Gentile as the Savior of all people. The Gospel account is also highly symbolic. In the figures of the Magi and Herod, good and evil are represented. As I mentioned already, these stories are similar to an overture to a great symphony. The major themes of the Gospel are woven into these accounts. The mention of the chief priests and elders, in the Gospel today, along with the scheming Herod is something that we will hear about again as the Gospel unfolds.

Gift giving is central to our lives as believing people. The Magi help us to reflect on those gifts that come to us in hidden ways. While we may be put on guard at times from the color of a person's skin, or their language or their odd dress, we know deep down that this day calls us to accept all people. In today's Gospel, they are friends, co-heirs of the kingdom and the first to recognize the hidden plans of God. Would we welcome those strangers who reveal the hidden Holy One in our midst if they were to stay?

The month of January is named after the Roman god Janus. Janus was the god of gates and doors. Janus had two faces, one facing backward and the other forward. As we pass through the doorway of the year 2010, we also can look back and look forward. There is certainly good reason for remembering our dark experiences in life because we can learn from them and be receptive so as not to repeat them. Each of us is guilty of bad choices and regrettable actions. We have all hurt others by the things we have done or left undone. Epiphany beckons all of us to the Christ child. The star says to the whole world, come and behold him. As we pass through the gate of another year, what do you see in your future? We all know that there are no guarantees in life. Life is what we make of it. We will always be a checkerboard of successes and failures, of good and bad, of joys and sorrows. The biblical promise, however, is that the life of faith will always involve a pilgrimage toward the light. Most important of all, we must all remain on that pilgrimage of faith this year. They were true seekers who could not rest until they were able to prostrate themselves before the Christ child in adoration. You can - I can - have no higher aspiration this coming year than to pursue what is best in our lives and so come to God.

December 27, 2009
Holy Family

Amid the cycle of feasts that comprise the Christmas season is today’s Feast of the Holy Family. Always celebrated on the Sunday after Christmas, the Scripture readings are very poignant and practical. This is also the Sunday when family members sitting next to one another often have sore ribs from being poked by other members of the family.

What makes this incident described in the Gospel so real is that all families experience it. There are drama, pathos, and misunderstanding, characteristics that you all have experienced with one another in your own families. While we are not told all the details, it appears that Jesus at age twelve has earned the right to exercise some freedoms. He doesn’t have to travel with his parents, but supposedly is allowed to travel with other family members in the caravan. Or so his parents thought. We might imagine that it was the empty place at table that sounded the alarm for the worried parents. It was the nightly meal that revealed to them that their son was missing. Most families know what it is like to have an empty place at table – a place meant for a son or daughter who is absent because of estrangement or other duties or even a death which has claimed some too early. Sometimes the story ends happily. The soldier returns home for the next holiday, the sick child recovers, the alienated member becomes reconciled, a missing teen is found unscathed.

Shift now to the scene in the Gospel, the scene of discovery. Jesus is teaching in the temple. While there is a note of relief that Jesus is safe, there is an ominous note when Jesus declares that he must be in his Father’s house. The writer of the Gospel, Saint, Luke, already knows how the Gospel will end. Remember that these infancy stories of Jesus were probably the last part of the Gospel to be written. Jesus is building a new house for the Father. All will be welcome to abide in that house. Jesus will offend some of the religious leaders by filling in the places at the table in his Father’s house with people not considered to be part of the family. The family of Joseph and Mary do not understand, but there is no blame there. No one in the family deliberately caused this crisis. All that could be said was that it was breakdown in communication. Perhaps someone failed to talk or someone failed to listen. There could have been better communication. And could this not be said of all families? Perhaps Mary, Joseph and Jesus needed to have better communication, but they did not use words as weapons. Think how easy it would have been for Mary and Joseph to play the blame game. Throughout the human history of relationships, blaming has never been known to solve a single problem. But it does tend to create them. It drives a wedge between people who, despite being in the same family, need to be friends!

 The writer of the Gospel has portrayed the parents of Jesus are utterly law-observant and completely confirming themselves to God’s will. They follow all the prescriptions of Jewish law with their son. He is circumcised after eight days and then they present him in the temple. Every year they go to Jerusalem for the Feast of Passover. Mary and Joseph have taught Jesus how to recognize the call of God and how to be obedient to it. It is through his human parents that Jesus comes to understand how precious he is and that God has chosen him. When the Gospel says that Jesus went down to Nazareth with his parents and was obedient to them, it meant that he still had much to learn.

I hope that as members of a family, or living in community with others, you all understand that we have much to learn from each other. Every family on earth is unique and special, but we do often share common problems. When Christ is present and honored in a family there is honesty and love. On this Holy Family Sunday, I thank God for you, our parish family, and I ask that God reach out today and bless each one of you.

December 25, 2009
Christmas

Last year on Christmas day 2008, a group of some thirty officers and men from the British army traveled to France to play a football match against a group of soldiers of the German army. The reason why this was significant is that it was to reenact an event that happened early in the First World War. It was Christmas day, 1914, the first year of the Great War. The German armies and allies were quite close to each other, dug in their trenches. No one knows quite how it happened, but the Germans began first, singing Stille Nacht, Silent Night. The British soldiers responded with Good King Wenceslaus. A German officer emerged from his trench, with his hands open to show that he was unarmed, standing out there in no man’s land. Then something unbelievable happened. Both of the armies emerged from their trenches and embraced the other side exchanging chocolates, cigarettes and stories. And then they played football.

I mention this story to you on Christmas night to highlight the transforming power of this event of our Savior’s birth and what that birth means for our world. Here in our hemisphere we celebrate the winter solstice. The days are short. Darkness arrives early in the evening and lasts into the morning. We are fortunate in our hemisphere that our theology and calendar intersect. Darkness in the Bible is often a metaphor for a world without God, a world enmeshed in sin, a world blinded by its own selfishness. It is into this world of darkness and despair that Christ is born. Isaiah proclaims it in the first reading. A people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light. Remember the words that Jesus spoke, I am the light of the world, a light that overcomes the darkness.

What I might suggest to you is that tonight we all need to get back to Bethlehem. We need to allow the experience of the birth of our Savior to touch us deeply once again. Kneel in front of the scene; drink in its power in your lives. There is great peace there; there is meaning for life. Let us all get back to the spirit of Bethlehem. Saint Luke sets the Christmas birth against the darkness of a world that is too preoccupied to even notice. Mary and Joseph is a homeless couple who are giving birth to the Savior of the world in an animal stall. Saint Luke is echoing for us something he will later bring into his Gospel, that Jesus had no place to lay his head.

The word Bethlehem means house of bread. As such, when Mary lays the newborn child in a feeding trough for the animals, it is also symbolic in that it points to a future when Jesus will give himself to the world as food. He who was born in vulnerability and weakness will feed his people with the gift of himself. Over our crèche scene is the powerful symbol of the cross. Saint Luke knew well the end of the story. This child is destined for the rise and fall of many in Israel.  The wood of the manger suggests the wood of the cross upon which the Savior would one day hang.

I recently asked some of our people where they thought Jesus might be born if he were to come into our world today. Some suggested that he might be born at PADS. Others said maybe the Crisis Center, or in a soup kitchen, or in a mosque in Iraq. Should that have happened, I suspect that we would miss him again, because we would still be looking in the wrong places. The truth of the matter is that Jesus will always be found in those dark places of life. He will be with the broken, the sinful, those whose spirits are crushed. At times you and I are in those places as well. At this time of Christmas, do not be afraid of the darkness. Invite Christ into your lives once again. We can move from bedlam to Bethlehem any time we choose. There is global darkness that we do not have a lot of control over, but then there is also the personal darkness of our lives. We may be in the midst of real personal anguish or family suffering. Take the darkness to Christ as well and ask that he let you know his peace this Christmas in a deeply personal way. On behalf of our priests, Father Art, Father Plesa and myself, as well as the priests who join us here tonight, Monsignor Mitchell and Father Peck, we extend our wishes of Christmas peace and joy to you and to your families.

December 20, 2009
Advent IV

There are certain people in our lives who, when we see them or hear their voice, our heart skips a beat with delight. They have the ability to make us laugh when everything seems gray. They are the ones who can wrap us in a strong bear hug that makes everything seem all right. These are the ones who themselves have weathered many storms in life and whose assurance that all will be well can be trusted absolutely. This is the scene we just heard in the Gospel between Mary and Elizabeth.

Oftentimes we perhaps think that Mary’s visit to Elizabeth was motivated by her charity or her concern and generosity to help an older relative. While this no doubt had something to do with the visit, in reality Elizabeth is the wise figure of an elder mentor, who wraps the bewildered teenager in her arms offering her wisdom and strength in a difficult time. It is a difficult time for both women. How much easier it would have been for Elizabeth to have this child when her own body was younger, more limber and supple. How much easier for Mary had this child come after her marriage to Joseph. In the culture of the times, Elizabeth no doubt experienced plenty of whispers. Women were valued because of the number of male children they could produce. For Mary, it had not been easy nor would it be in the small town of Nazareth. Although she probably wasn’t showing yet, the gossip would start once her condition was known. What Elizabeth teaches Mary at that visit was most important. She teaches Mary to trust even more deeply the mysterious ways of God. It is never easy to say “Yes” to God.

The same thing might be said of us. You and I carry the same mysterious power of God within us. This enables us to be a source of life and blessing for others. We are not always appreciative of the power and sway that we have over others. Just as Elizabeth was for Mary, we also are meant to be someone’s rock. When we read these stories over the next couple of weeks, we read them not from a distance but as participants in the story. You and I must continually birth Christ in our midst and live with sure faith in that all of God’s promises will be fulfilled. As an aside, this is what the “Catholics Come Home” program is all about. You and I are giving the birth of Christ to others.

The Gospels continue to call us to total responsiveness and to the complete investment of ourselves. I read an article this week by Father Ronald Rohlheisser. He writes a syndicated column in many of our Catholic newspapers. He makes a point about prayer. How many of us can point to things that we prayed for which never come to pass? Yet Jesus says, “Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find.” Did Jesus make an idle promise when he said he would give us anything we ask for? In the Gospel according to Saint Matthew as well as in the rest of the New Testament, prayer of petition is linked to concrete, charitable action in the community. When we pray for someone it means that we also concretely reach out to help that person. To pray for justice and peace means that we also work for justice and peace. We need to be more involved in helping answer our own prayers.

I would like to leave you with a closing thought as we approach Christmas. How are you going to give birth to Christ in some way this Christmas? It is not enough for us to simply read these great stories of the birth of the Savior. We must be compelled and renewed by them. We must then engage in our world. We live in a world that is hungry for Christ but doesn’t know it. You and I can be what Elizabeth was for Mary. These women did not merely trust in the events we are anticipating. They trusted God. They knew that they could always trust God’s love.

December 13, 2009
Advent III

I have always wondered what it was that drew the people to John the Baptist. I am reminded of the cartoon picture of the fellow who carries the placard with the words repent the end is near. No one takes him seriously, but assess that he is just another fanatic. John the Baptist, they took seriously. Repentance sounds like a word from another time and place, but for John it was a very serious word as he prepared for the coming of the Messiah.

Today is Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete means joyful. I know that John the Baptist's remarks do not sound terribly joyful. In fact, you will never hear John the Baptist proclaimed the prophet of joy. (You will hear him associated, however, with fire and brimstone. Seldom does anyone come up to me and ask me to preach more fire and brimstone sermons.) What must be said about John is that he was surely eccentric, nonconformist, and radically God-centered. His preaching was always about repentance. He also went a step further as he does in the Gospel reading today. If a person understands and accepts the salvation of God in their lives it needed to be seen in behaviors. Some things needed to be changed. When the people heard John, their immediate response was: what do we need to do? What John answered was really a simple answer. He said: share what you have with those in need, stop cheating each other, stop taking what is not yours, quit lying and be content with what you have. John is saying that it isn't a great mystery. Start living like you know you are supposed to live.

John's prophetic mission was to alert the people that diving retribution was around the corner. John knew that Judaism was flawed. It had become racial and very self-righteous. The people believed that salvation was merely a matter of bloodlines. We have Abraham as our Father. Not enough he believed.

There was a big difference in the preaching of Jesus and the preaching of John the Baptist. The preaching of the Baptist was strident and accusatory. The preaching of Jesus, the good news of salvation, taught us that God loved us and that we need not fear him. Jesus taught us that grace is God's acceptance of us as we are, even in our failures and sin. God's love is always greater than our sin. Our salvation lies in accepting God's forgiveness. For Jesus too, however, there needed to be changes evident in us if we accepted the kingdom of God into our lives. In the end, John and Jesus were really on the same page. What gets us into trouble is a religion based on self-righteousness and pride. Jesus too implied a rather simple response to the question what must we do? If we have received the gift of God and we know it, then the only proper response from us is gratitude. We express this gratitude by the gift of ourselves in imitation of Jesus, to others. We do for others what God has done for us.

(The question that I asked earlier about what makes you joyful?) You will have joy in your life if you do for others generously and not grudgingly. Prayer also helps a great deal. People who engage in daily prayer will admit that two things generally happen. The first is that they find some measure of inner peace. I suspect that this has to do with the belief that someone else is carrying his or her burdens along with them. The second byproduct of prayer is a greater clarity of thought. The decisions that you face, and the direction that you are to take is no longer a mystery, but you know the direction through prayer. That peace that comes is something to be treasured as Saint Paul writes: May God's peace which surpasses human understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

December 6, 2009

Advent II

 If you or I were authors and we were writing a novel most probably we would not begin with the ending and work backwards. Yet this is what the writers of the Gospel did. Saint Luke knew well the ending of the Gospel before he began his work. Luke takes us, his readers, down the halls of royalty and down the corridors of power both civil and religious only to end up finally in the desert where a lonely, wild man claims to hear the Word of God. On another level, it is a scathing theological judgment on Roman and Jewish political leadership and the religious establishment. The Word of God has passed them all and instead lands upon a priest’s son, who is a prophet and finds him in the desert.

If you take the wilderness out of the Bible, the story cannot be told. Despite its threatening and menacing nature, the wilderness played a central role in the formation of the Hebrew people. I think that it is safe to say that without our personal wilderness experiences our own personal story of faith cannot be told as well. The terrain of every human life is composed of smooth highways and rough roads, of wide-open spaces and overgrown places. We are never far from our wilderness. Sometimes it encroaches upon our predictable and safe little worlds. I thought perhaps this morning it might be a good thing for us to reflect for a moment on our wilderness experiences. Wilderness experiences are occasions for openness and listening. I cannot think of a time when God does not send a voice of help and hope in our wilderness experiences. Perhaps you’ve got a best friend, or a spouse, or family member who seems to have the uncanny ability of knowing what you are feeling and knowing just what to say to pull you out of yourself. Then, too, it might be that still, small voice of God deep within us. The right voice and the right word might be the difference between hope and despair for the hearer. Did you ever think that you might just be that voice that God has chosen to bring someone out of their own personal wilderness, back to healing and life?

As many of you know, we are beginning the Catholics Come Home initiative before Christmas and then again during Lent. This program is primarily directed at former Catholics. I can throw lots of statistics at you, but suffice it to say that for every Catholic who is present today for Mass, there is another one who is at home. The largest religious body in the United States, some 45 million of us, is Roman Catholic. The second largest is former Catholics.

The process that the Catholics Come Home project utilizes is based on the Catholic laity. This is a chance that you have in your life to really become an evangelizer. Our baptism is what gives us the marching orders to evangelize. In your circle of family and friends, you no doubt know people who were baptized Catholic but who no longer practice their faith. You may want to start with your own family, with your own children. A word of welcome, of invitation may go a long way. I will admit that it is a difficult task, especially if they have been away for a while. They have adjusted to life without the Church and it may be a real challenge to take another look. All you can do is invite and welcome. I would ask that you do that especially as we engage in the effort to welcome them back. Think back on your own wilderness experiences, the times when, if you didn’t have your faith, you would not have made it. Can you articulate that experience to others? God seems to have a fondness for using lowly instruments, people like Mary and John the Baptist. Maybe he could even use us.

November 29, 2009
Advent I
 

 I spent Thanksgiving with my family in South Elgin. It seems that part of that day is trying to get the kids’ Christmas lists. My twelve-year old niece has the DVD Twilight on her Christmas list. That is the movie recently in the theatres that proclaims that the world will end in 2012. Even though the sixteenth century Mayan calendar runs out in 2012, I wouldn’t be terribly concerned.

With Black Friday now in our rear view mirror, we embark on the liturgical season of Advent. Advent is a beautiful season, albeit the shortest in the Church year. We are preparing for the anniversary of the birth of our savior. Advent is an important season because of its urgency. Time is short for us. There are things in our lives that need to be accomplished. The Scriptures for this weekend, the First Sunday of Advent, seem to reinforce that. We seem to find time for the things we value or really want to do.

I find that the season of Advent especially runs against the culture we live in. Advent is about the beauty of anticipation and waiting. Think of the Old Testament and how long the people needed to wait for the promises of a Redeemer to be fulfilled. We begin a season of waiting. We don’t like waiting, do we? We want what we want right now. Yet, there are things in life that come only to those who wait. Genuine faith and growth in Christ really takes time. There is plenty of God’s will to do while we wait.

Both in St. Luke’s Gospel and in St. Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, the people seem to be waiting for a catastrophic end of time. Saint Luke’s advice is not to allow one’s heart to grow drowsy during the long wait. Perhaps an illustration from our lives might help. Think of the time when you fell in love. If you were fortunate enough to marry that person you fell in love with, then hopefully your lives have been blessed and you have grown closer to each other over the years. How do you sustain that relationship over the years? Some relationships crumble quickly once the infatuation wears off. The delight in mutual commitment fades as routine sets in. Others weather that passage of time well and their commitments actually take on a new richness with the passing of the years. It seems that when crises come and are faced together successfully, the life-long bond is actually strengthened. I think that these experiences of human life and love also reveal how God interacts with us. God is married to us as his people. He is more faithful than any spouse in the best of marriages. We do not need to face the crises in our lives alone. He has promised that he will walk with us, that we can trust that we face these crises together.

Advent reminds us to get back to the practices in our faith life that truly nurtured us. Daily prayer and practices of loving outreach prepare us well for those crisis times, when disaster strikes, when jobs are lost, when illness or death turns our world upside down, when violence rips the fabric of our lives apart.

 Remember how excited you were at the prospect of a child coming into your marriage. The expectation of a child can re-ignite the ardor of a flagging love relationship. For one thing, there is a need now to be more other directed. You cannot simply find fulfillment in catering to your own needs. Something new and wonderful is growing in your relationship. So, too, with Advent. A baby is coming to us all. The hope and joy that this child will bring to our world will once again spark our enthusiasm, not only for the one who came as a child in our midst, but to all of God’s beloved children.

Dear Parishioners,

I don’t know if you would agree, but I sense a deep restlessness in many people these days. I come from a different era. I have mentioned before that I grew up in Chicago. It was a Chicago that is quite different from the city that is hopeful of being selected as the site of the 2016 Olympic Games. (I’m writing this on Tuesday so I do not know what the decision will be.) We lived in a very busy commercial area of the city, but not on Sundays. No stores were open on Sunday. I have vivid memories of how those busy commercial thoroughfares were ghost towns on Sundays. Back then people simply made do with what they had. No one expected or demanded the whole pie. Heaven was something that you anticipated after you died. No one honestly expected heaven on earth here.

I think that my parents lived out of this philosophy. It anchored them spiritually. This life is but a short time of waiting. Remember the reference to mourning and weeping in this vale of tears? That sober philosophy actually got them through life quite well. Their lives and their loves remained intact and actually, if the truth be told, they were really better prepared for life’s ups and downs. I think that in many ways they were better equipped for enjoyment and happiness than we are today.

Probably more needs to be said about the incompleteness of life, about the vale of tears. I am not suggesting that we do not need to be self-actualized, but simply that we be more realistic about ourselves and our lives. We need to give ourselves permission to be broken, to be in pain, to be lacking, ill, unattractive, aged, and unfulfilled. We mistakenly think that we can somehow be happy if only we can satisfy every hunger and longing in ourselves.

What this does is that it robs us of the capacity to live and to love in the present moment. We often stand before life in a greedy posture with unrealistic expectations of ourselves and others. We are exiles, pilgrims if you will, with a home that is not here. We are journeying toward home, but this is not it. We have God’s word on it. We need God’s word on it. Someone has said that in this life all symphonies remain unfinished. We tend to believe that we do not have to put up with frustration and the tensions of life. We convince ourselves that there are people out there who are already enjoying a redeemed life. That attitude leads to our restlessness and unhappiness.

The result is that we tend to make unrealistic demands on ourselves and others. We need to let other people off the hook. They are all too human just as you are. They are trying but are not yet perfect or redeemed either. So slow down, take time to enjoy that cup of coffee, and for heavens sake don’t feel guilty about it. Take time to smell the flowers too. They are all God’s gift to you.

Devotedly,

Father Geoff