My Grandmother, Irene - HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!

Today marks the 33rd anniversary of my Grandmother’s passing, when I was 8 years old. She died suddenly in the parking lot of Roosevelt Field mall on a bright cold Christmas shopping-type morning, with my mom at her side. It was the first time I became acquainted with “Sister Death”. I thankfully still carry glimpses of her in my heart – her soft Bohemian-tinged accent, the dark blue cardigan she wore in the winters, the housecoats she wore in the summers, her smell, the warmth of her embrace, the priceless stories she weaved out of thin air for us. She shared with me, my sister and my cousins that fierce and primal love I think is only reserved for grandmothers and their grandchildren.

Gramma, I thank God every day for having been your grandson; I know my fellow grandchildren say and pray the same. You helped make my first years on this earth beautiful, magical, full of wonder and love. I feel your presence and I know you watch over all of us. You are just about my favorite person ever, and I am happy to be your grandson…still.

Pax,
Thomas

The Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception
of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Daily Mass Readings
Isaiah 35:1-10
Psalm 98:1-4
Ephesians 1:3-6,11-12
Luke 1:26-38

First Saturday Devotions and Mary - Some thoughts

I've admittedly not given much thought to "First Saturdays" devotions. I see them on my Church Calendar and mentally "pooh-pooh" them as archaic rituals meant to give older women in altar veils something to do with their weekends. However as time goes on, I'm learning that following the example of older women in altar veils isn't the worst thing in the world!

The Devotion originated as a recommendation from Our Lady to Sr. Lucia Santos, one of the Fatima visionaries, as follows:

Look, my daughter, at my Heart encircled by these thorns with which men pierce it at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You, at least, strive to console me, and so I announce: I promise to assist at the hour of death with the grace necessary for salvation all those who, with the intention of making reparation to me, will, on the first Saturday of five consecutive months, go to confession, receive Holy Communion, say five decades of the beads, and keep me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary.
- Our Lady of Fatima to Sr. Lucia

Sometimes it is difficult for me to envision my prayers as an actual consolation to Mary's Sorrows. However, Brother Ed (our Fraternity's spiritual assistant) emphasizes that we must embrace our "pilgrim" soul, and seek out God with new eyes and new ways. Paradoxically this has led to to "old" ways; traditional Catholic devotions I may have dismissed or been unaware of in the past, like the Rosary, Novenas, Scapular, and First Fridays and Saturdays.

So, I begin my own First Saturdays devotion tomorrow. Though the prayer may be difficult, I can imagine the suffering of Mary between the Crucifixion and Resurrection - the First Holy Saturday. How her faith must have been tested! How anguished she must have been! She was no wispy, ethereal entity as she is sometimes portrayed in art. She was a middle-aged mother who had just witnessed her only Son arrested, ridiculed, abused, beaten, and executed in one of the most horrid ways ever devised. I can imagine her pain. The focus of my prayer will be to remember how I personally can hurt others - mentally and spiritually - with my actions and inaction, and to make prayerful reparation to them with the help of Our Mother through her Son.

God Love You!
Thomas

Feast of St. John of Damascus
First Friday
Daily Mass Readings
Isaiah 29:17-34
Psalm 27:1,4,13-14
Matthew 9:27-31

BARRED from Heaven???

http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=91852264-3048-741E-9870142928939885

(Forgive the lack of a hyperlink...tech problems)

This is one of those things that make me ashamed for my Church. In the face of all evidence that sexual orientation is NOT chosen (and given the general treatment of homosexuals in our society, who would choose such a thing?), this Cardinal Barragan states unequivocally that "gays will never enter into the reign of God."

No one...not my parish priest, not Cardinal Barragan, not the Holy Father himself, can judge the state of another's soul. To do so is arrogant, prideful, and the height of uncharitable, un-Christian thought. To do so against an entire chunk of the population is far worse and smacks of blatant discrimination and ignorance. How do we build up our Church when our leadership is so concerned with keeping people out that they forget to let people in???

A blogger who commented on this story quotes Hillaire Belloc's description of the Church

"...an institution run with such knavish imbecility that were it not the work of God it would not last a fortnight."

Amen, Hillaire. Amen, indeed.

Pax,
Thomas

Daily Mass Readings
Isaiah 25:6-10a
Psalm 23:1-6
Matthew 15:29-37

What is it about "reality TV"?

I had the displeasure of pausing on a cable channel with a show called "Bridezillas". The show's purpose is to highlight how absolutely horrid, shallow, and cruel some women can be during the ramp up to their wedding day. I guess it might be something different if the majority of these women even FEIGNED embarrassment at some of their actions. Some of them are proud of it...WALLOW in it even. Then it gets to the point of witnessing a train wreck...you just can't turn away and wind up gawking.

It's hard being this beautiful...I wouldn't be your friend if you were poor...I wouldn't be your friend if you were ugly

And perhaps that is the key to these kind of shows' success - our collective desire to feel better, superior to other people. Speaking for myself, I am almost gleeful watching these shows sometimes, thinking "Hey, it's not like I'm like HER!" Basically I use the people on these shows as a tool for my own self esteem...there's always someone I can feel I'm better than as long as shows like BRIDEZILLA are on the air.

Perhaps if my (and I guess millions of other people's) emotional well-being didn't need a boost from the perceived miserable lives of others, these kind of shows wouldn't have this kind of traction. But there's the old chestnut...are we affecting the content of these shows, or is the content of these shows affecting us?

This was sort of a wake-up call for me at this beginning of Advent; part of preparing for the coming of the Christ Child is to stop watching shows like this. Enjoying the ugly behavior of other people in order to minimize my own shortcomings is not living in the vein of being faithfully watchful, as we are called to be in this season of waiting and vigilance.

Pax,
Thomas

First Sunday of Advent
Daily Mass Readings
Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:4-5,8-10,14
1 Thessalonians 3:12-4:2
Luke 21:25-28,34-36

Gossip

I had the opportunity to again view the excellent movie DOUBT starring Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour-Hoffman last night. What struck me this time was a sermon that Hoffman's Father Flynn gives during Mass around the middle of the film:

A woman was gossiping with a friend about a man she hardly knew - I know none of you have ever done this - that night she had a dream. A great hand appeared over her and pointed down at her. She was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day she went to confession. She got the old parish priest, Father O’Rourke, and she told him the whole thing.

‘Is gossiping a sin?’ she asked the old man. ‘Was that the hand of God Almighty pointing a finger at me? Should I be asking your absolution? Father, tell me, have I done something wrong?’

(Irish Brogue)
‘Yes!’ Father O’Rourke answered her. ‘Yes, you ignorant, badly brought-up female! You have borne false witness against your neighbor, you have played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed!’

So the woman said she was sorry and asked for forgiveness.

‘Not so fast!’ says O’Rourke. ‘I want you to go home, take a pillow up on your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me!’

So the woman went home, took a pillow off her bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to the roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then she went back to the old parish priest as instructed.

‘Did you gut the pillow with the knife?’ he says.

‘Yes, Father.’

‘And what was the result?’

‘Feathers,’ she said.

‘Feathers?’ he repeated.

‘Feathers everywhere, Father!’

‘Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out on the wind!’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘it can’t be done. I don’t know where they went. The wind took them all over.’

‘And that,’ said Father O’Rourke, ‘is GOSSIP!’

This made me think hard about the power of words and the damage they can do to someone's feelings and/or reputation. In the context of the film, it also highlights the inability to take back certain words after they leave your mouth...as the sermon indicates, they are feathers on the wind. You don't know where or to whom they will be carried next, the countless directions they can fly. Once out, there simply is no way to contain them.

I need to remember about this when I "tell my tales of blarney" as Irishmen are wont to do. Would I want the person I'm telling tales about to be right behind me in the telling? Would I want anyone telling tales of ME, true or untrue, and let MY feathers take to the wind and fall where and with whom they may?

I've let loose many a collection of feathers in my day. I wonder how many collections of my own feathers still fly...

Peace,
Thomas

Memorial of Blessed Miguel Augustin Pro
Daily Mass Readings
Daniel 1:1-6,8-20
Daniel 3:52-56
Luke 21:1-4

One Solitary LIfe

Father Jerry read this poem during his homily this evening, on the Solemnity of Christ the King. Never was there such a King as this:

One Solitary Life
He was born in an obscure village,
The child of a peasant woman.
He grew up in still another village,
Where he worked in a carpenter shop
Until he was thirty.

Then for three years
He was an itinerant preacher.
He never wrote a book.
He never held an office.
He never had a family or owned a house.
He didn't go to college.
He never visited a big city.
He never traveled two hundred miles
From the place where he was born.
He did none of the things
One usually associates with greatness.
He had no credentials but himself.

He was only thirty-three
When the tide of public opinion turned against him.
His friends ran away.
He was turned over to his enemies.
And went through the mockery of a trial.

He was nailed to a cross
Between two thieves.
While he was dying,
His executioners gambled for his clothing,
The only property he had on Earth.
When he was dead,
He was laid in a borrowed grave
Through the pity of a friend.

Twenty centuries have come and gone,
And today he is the central figure
Of the human race,
And the leader of mankind's progress.

All the armies that ever marched,
All the navies that ever sailed,
All the parliament that ever sat,
All the kings that ever reigned,
Put together have not affected
The life of Man on Earth
As much as that

One Solitary Life.

~~Dr James Allen Francis, © 1926~~

And in the words of Forrest Gump, "That's all I have to say about that."

Peace and All Good,
Thomas

The Solemnity of Christ the King
Daily Mass Readings
Daniel 7:13-14
Psalm 93:1-2,5
Revelations 1:5-8
John 18:33b-37

The day or the hour

"But of that day or hour, no one knows,
neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

- Mark 13:32

As we approach the end of the liturgical year, the Daily Readings turn toward not only the Nativity of the Christ, but the Second Coming of Christ. That we are to be awake and live our lives ready for the coming of our Brother Jesus. Today's Gospel is especially apt for me. I've recently allowed an unwanted complacency take over my family life, going hand in hand with my prayer life, explained in the previous blog. Hmmm...could they POSSIBLY be related?

For various reasons, I have not been awake. I have not been ready. I have been living my life in tomorrow, as in, "Ahhhh, it'll keep. I'll play soccer or chess with the kids tomorrow. I'll take my wife out tomorrow. I'll help around the house tomorrow. I'll get to the gym tomorrow" Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Tomorrow.

Living in tomorrow (as well as in yesterday, which augments this problem) leaves no time for today. Today, which is the only time we have actually have; yesterday is gone forever, tomorrow never comes. My boys, 9 and 12, are going to get to the point where they're not going to WANT to hang out with me anymore. I have a brief window between my children being fully dependent on me, and thinking they don't need me at all. THIS is my time with them and I am letting it get away from me. By the same token, I am letting my time with Lori, and my responsibilties at home get away from me as well.

And, perhaps herein lies the "water" for the dryness in my spiritual life; to follow the wisdom on the Scriptures and remember that none of us know the day or the hour. I forget sometimes (more often than not recently) of the sacredness of the everyday, the beauty and vocation of being a husband and father. I can't change a thing about yesterday, and I haven't a clue what tomorrow will bring. Part of the awe of the early Christian community was that they believed Christ's Second Coming was imminent; they fully understood not knowing the day or the hour.

Today's Gospel tells me I need to delight more in the bounty of blessings have right in front of me rather than be preoccupied with days/years/decades past or what I will be tomorrow or whatever time left I've been allotted.

Thank you Father Chris for your eye-opening homily this evening.

Peace,
Thomas

Daily Mass Readings
Daniel 12: 1-3
Psalm 16:5,8-11
Hebrews 10:11-14,18
Mark 13:24-32