Thoughts on Stewardship

You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and abiding word of God  1 Peter 1:23

Stewardship is a privilege, an honor for those who are faithful followers, for those who are true believers of Jesus Christ. Within stewardship rests a call for charity, humility, obedience. Within stewardship rests a formula for being a good Catholic, a good Christian, a good human. Within stewardship rests a call to be merciful with your neighbors and yourself. Stewardship asks each one of to be gracious and merciful. Stewardship asks each one of us to be humble. Stewardship asks each one of us to share our love of God in our own unique way.

There are no time limits, there are no restrictions. There are no rules. There is only a request that you share goodness, kindness, and holiness. 

Avoid feeling pressured to do something, to say something.

The best examples of stewardship are often spontaneous, unplanned, natural. How you greet a stranger, how you answer your spouse can all be signs of stewardship in your life. I am often walking somewhere, often in a hurry to get somewhere and at those times someone will ask a question like "How do I get to Union Station from here?" or "Is the Zoo close? Am I going the right direction?" or "What's the best way to get to Georgetown from here driving?" I have any number of choices starting with ignoring the person, suggesting that they buy a map, suggesting they ask either a policeman or bus driver, or I can take the time and try to explain how to reach their destination.

Human interaction, face to face communication is becoming more and more rare as technology keeps creating new ways for us to communicate that can also keep people apart. As Christians we are asked to be vigilant, to be aware. We are asked to be active participants of our faith, active participants within our faith community. We can be observers. We can be doers. We can wait to be asked. We can ask others to help.

Being Catholic starts with an interaction between God and the individual. Being Catholic is not a membership. Being Catholic involves answering the call to love and serve the Lord. Stewardship provides an avenue to love and serve the Lord in our day to day existence. 

Although the Church wants some of your stewardship activities directed toward strengthening, nurturing of the Church community, stewardship is an act is best when done out of love, compassion, and mercy. All acts of stewardship are welcome. All acts that show the power and glory of God are necessary and good. We should do as many good deeds as possible both inside and outside of our Church community. Our deeds and words can spread our belief in God, can share our love for God.

Stewardship is a way for us to share the Good News with others, to proclaim our love for God.

Christians Share the Good News

Each day in each month in each year is a time for prayer, for remembrance, for hope. When Nazi Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, World War II began. Will any event today be remembered in seventy years?

Spreading the Good News is the responsibility of all believers of Jesus Christ. The Gospels are to be shared with all human beings.

Each day there are births, deaths, doctor appointments, weddings, dinner parties. Each day there are opportunities to serve the Lord by sharing and living the Gospel.

How great it is that equable and equitable sound alike and resemble each other to confuse people.

Christians are often described as being equable, as sharing the same views and opinions.

Life is filled with many suppositions. Christians are all human beings with a mixture of misadventure and happiness. With prayer and discipline it is possible to avoid the advance and seduction of sin and vice.

Curiosity, innocent and pure, can lead to serving God, to loving God. The best affliction that a Christian can have would be the love of God above all things. The best support that a Christian can have would begin with forgiveness.

Parish life is both inspiring and challenging. Trying to find the best way to serve the Lord is difficult. The need for good deeds, for compassion, for mercy increases each day. Prayer is always needed. Kindness in human interaction is needed. These things I learn each time I go to Mass. I am reminded of my vulnerabilities and I try to improve.

My spiritual life is filled with questions, allusions, metaphors. There are clear skies, smoking candles, crashing waves, soft harps. My spiritual life is filled with great motion as I try to be obedient to God, try to move closer to God. There are moments when I move two steps away from God, then five toward God and then four away and six toward.

It is natural and healthy to want an intimate relationship with God. The knowledge of each person’s life contains both happiness and unhappiness. Each day presents an opportunity for education, an opportunity to serve the Lord. It is natural and healthy to want to use Jesus Christ as a role model, to consider sacrificing your life in the name of God.

Life in a parish reinforces the responsibility of all parishioners to become involved, to do a little more than attend life once a week. The more you allow yourself to become involved the more you can learn about God, about serving God, about loving God, about loving your neighbor.

Parish life inspires me to want to spread the Good News.

Prepare before Mass

To proclaim the Good News involves both reading and understanding what you are listening. Holy Scripture is more than a narrative. The words are  beautiful yet immensely public, inspiring sentences and speeches to be shared with others.

and he might send them forth

How did Jesus want to share the Good News with the people? Did he create a Facebook page? Did he create an Youtube channel? Did he create a blog? As Christians we must remember that we have been summoned by God. We each have a special purpose, some special task which God asks us to do. We each will struggle with our task from time to time. We all need to pray to God. We are reminded to praise and give thanks to God. We also are asked to look inside ourselves, to search for and then to share all of our goodness, holiness, kindness, and love. Our daily existence does have significance. Our daily actions, how we choose to live our lives can be a silent sermon of hope, social justice, love, fairness. When we live with truth, kindness, and mercy in our souls we can preach without saying a word for God can be seen in each movement, God can be felt, faith inspired. We must choose to live our lives with that special purpose of love, unconditional and universal. We must choose to think of pleasing God with all of our decisions. We must remember that we are all asked to do something in the name of God. We must listen for the request. We must have patience. We must pray. Prayer is essential for the spiritual growth of all Christians. The more we pray and listen to God, the closer our bond will be with God, the closer our relationship will become. By Baptism we are appointed. We must decide whether we are going to take the challenge and follow the footsteps of God. With patience, humility, and prayer we can achieve all types of good works in God's name. We all are asked to try. How did Jesus want to share the Good News with the people? Did he create a Facebook page? Did he create an Youtube channel? Did he create a blog? Jesus did it simply by living his life, obeying the Ten Commandments, and treating everyone with fairness, social justice, love, and understanding. The miracles may have motivated people to seek him out but the miracles were done with love. Christianity is not just reserved for the churches and cathedrals. Christianity must be nurtured, must be allowed and encouraged to grow in the coffee shops, subway platforms, street corners, gin joints. Christianity must be everywhere that each Christian goes.
The image of Jesus on the mountain suggests that he took time to reflect on what was happening and that he took time to pray. He gave himself time to breathe, time to organize his thoughts as he decided upon the Apostles and summoned each one of them to join his ministry.
How wonderful it would have been to hear Jesus speak, to hear him speak Aramaic. How wonderful it is to hear that he renamed Simon. How amusing it is to hear that he renamed James and John Boanerges which translates as sons of thunder. Even as the Apostles are being organized to preach and given the authority to drive out demons Jesus provided a glimpse of his humanity, of the humanity he hopes that each Christian will continue to share.

Know the Lord

What is the reason that we are all Christians? What are we trying to do? How are we trying to do it? As Christians we are all asked to love and serve the Lord. We are given the Ten Commandments and asked to obey them. We are given the Beatitudes. We are given one additional request to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. We are asked to praise and give thanks to God. We are encouraged to pray to God. What is the real purpose for all of this activity? What will happen to each of us if we do it with love in our hearts, kindness in our souls, honor and holiness in our minds? Our entire being as Christians is a preparation for our eternal life with God. Each moment of each day we are asked to work for our salvation. Each moment of each day we are asked to be compassionate, humble, merciful. Each moment of each day we are asked to work to please God. Our daily lives give us opportunities to serve God. We must work to establish, nurture, and protect a relationship with God. The most important relationship for a Christian is his/her relationship with God. Wanting salvation by itself is meaningless, completely worthless unless we want to know the Lord. Prayer is essential to this. We must learn how to pray. We must make time for prayer in our lives. Prayer filled with kindness, truth, goodness, love, holiness and hope can lead us to closer relationships to God. As Christians we must take time to listen for God's voice, God's gentle call. We are all living, breathing, articulating, gesticulating members of God's ministry. We must understand this with the entirety of our being and then use our lives to share the Good News with everyone with whom we interact. Our actions as Christians are often more important than our words. Each generation searches for something new, something improved. Each generation listens to the campaign promises. Christians have been given a better covenant with better promises. We simply have to believe. We simply have to remember our baptismal promises and try to live a better, more loving life of charity, humility, and obedience. Our purpose here is not to purchase the biggest house, wear the trendiest clothes. Our purpose is to love and serve God. Our purpose is to prepare ourselves for eternal life, to prepare ourselves for salvation.

he would withdraw to deserted places to pray

Listening to the Liturgy of the Word should be an active process, the entire mind should be engaged with each word that is spoken during this time. The Bible is filled with activity. People are always moving around, obeying God, disobeying God. The people in the Bible are always up to something. Although the Bible does not mention texting, email, smart phones, the people of the Bible knew how to communicate with one another without using a telephone or Facebook or Twitter or Youtube. The People of the Bible were good at getting the message.

Jesus was a very busy person. He was always on the go, moving from town to town. His ministry involved motion, involved going to the people, involved listening to the people, involved serving the people. Jesus did not limit his ministry to one neighborhood in one town. He was in Nazareth, Capernaum, Bethabara, Cana, Galilee.

Two Thousand years later there is something magical, something powerful in the names of these places and the connection to Jesus. His ministry moved from the countryside to the synagogue to the countryside. His ministry moved along country roads and city streets.

His message was simple love God and love each other. His message was radical then, and is still radical now.

Even with all the moving about from town to town Jesus always found time to pray.

Christianity asks each believer, each Christian to spread the Good News, to share their blessings and gifts with others, to praise and love God each day. Christianity asks each believer to join a journey of goodness, holiness, kindness, to join a journey of faithfulness and loyalty to God.

It is important to always be attentive, to always be listening for the voice of God. Being Christian often involves a period of discernment, of contemplating, praying reflecting on how to move closer to God, on how to serve God.

Each day there are signs of the Holy Spirit in our lives, encouraging us to pray, encouraging us to help others, encouraging us to avoid temptations and distractions. Each day there are signs of the Holy Spirit directing us toward God, directing us to the path of Jesus. Each day there are signs of the Holy Spirit asking each of to be active Christians, loving and serving God, loving each other unconditionally.

Even with our busy lives of work, family, friends, volunteer activities, each Christian should find time to pray.

Each day I wonder what Nazareth, Capernaum, Bethabara, Cana, Galilee were like when Jesus was alive and moving from town to town. Each day I wonder if there is something more that I could be doing to love and serve God.

A sense of courage is needed. A sense of humor is required. Simplicity is needed. Love is required. Being Christian requires active listening, active participation. Being Christian requires gracious words, loving deeds.

your redeemer is the Holy One - December 9, 2010

Whoever has ears ought to hear. Matthew 11:15

Different generations have had different people that they have listened to, followed, imitated, and been entertained by. Each of us have both the responsibility and the ability to share the Good News with others, to use our lives to evangelize. This does not mean fire and brimstone oration on street corners or in parks on Saturday afternoons. Each choice we make, each word we speak is important when it is done for the Lord. Each of our little decisions when done with charity, humility, and obedience to God’s rules can lead others to follow us, to deepen their relationship with God.

Our goal is to nurture and grow the grace of Lord in our daily lives. We must always remember to proceed with faith and love in Jesus Christ.

Our goal is to trust in Jesus Christ and to allow ourselves and our faith to be strengthened by the grace that flows from Jesus Christ.

As we search for salvation we must also want our neighbors to find and experience salvation. Our prayers are always inclusive, our hearts are always open, our souls are always filled with hope, love, compassion.

When you attend Mass listen attentively, actively with all your senses, participate actively with all your senses. Allow yourself to be vulnerable, allow yourself to listen and feel the words of the Good News. Allow yourself to be God’s “Beloved.” Understand and accept the responsibility of being God’s servant.

The Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist feed and nurture our minds, our souls.

As Christians we are encouraged to find our individual way to examine the beauty of living life following in the footsteps of the Lord Jesus Christ. There is so many things happening within our lives, so many opportunities to evangelize, so many questions to discern.

We each can and must create our own snapshot of our life with Christ.