No matter what anybody says, our lives are all incomplete. We are all dreaming of something, hurrying pass something. With cursory eyes we look, glance, gawk at our neighbors; sometimes we are filled with compassion and empathy; others we are indifferent and icy.
Our lives contain their own individual tempos and natural rhythms. We are pulsatile beings. Our lives are governed by the simple hopefully regular heart beats.
When we accept God into our lives, we are moving toward completeness. When we believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we are moving toward an union with God.
It is important to protect our belief in Christ and in God; this belief must be carefully nurtured, constantly nourished; this belief needs to be shared.
As Christians remember to develop and allow the synchrony of our lives to reflect our love for God, our desire to be humble, loving servants. Simultaneously remember also that this is a continual trial and error; we will make mistakes, we might fail. Our success is not what is important; it is the constant trying again and again and the honest, natural emotions within our hearts.
We live in both a natural and an artifactual world. We bounce between being random, being rigid.
Let your relationship with God always be extensive, always be limitless, always be loving.
The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ can give coherence and meaning to our lives.
We simply have to believe it with an entirety of being, a totality of emotion. All our senses, our complete imagination must exude this belief, this beautiful love for God.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Collection
My life is a collection of ideals and disillusionments. It is a spasmodic collection of thoughts, recycled and reused. Prayers are sprawled here and there, huddled together sometimes. There are hundreds of random icy thoughts. There is a malignant promenade of good intentions. I am a solitary figure, a lonely sinner wanting to do good.
Life provides many cursory eyes to observe us; we each are both victim and victimizer with a cursory eye. Each glance that we observe, each breath that we intake changes us. Each thought, each prayer can have an effect on our behavior, on our desire.
We are often enmeshed in all types of rhetorical traps. Secular life is nothing more than an ever growing set of webs waiting for us to collide with it and be caught by the sticky strands of conceit, deceit, selfishness.
Being Catholic means believing in the living God, accepting the death and resurrection of Christ, believing that Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist of the Mass.
Such a belief has to start somewhere in the heart and slowly grow. Such a belief simply is. It is a given. It is an accepted fact. It forms the basis of an identity, of understanding.
Each action I take reflects upon this central belief in Jesus Christ. Each moment I live is defined by my belief in the living Christ.
Life provides many cursory eyes to observe us; we each are both victim and victimizer with a cursory eye. Each glance that we observe, each breath that we intake changes us. Each thought, each prayer can have an effect on our behavior, on our desire.
We are often enmeshed in all types of rhetorical traps. Secular life is nothing more than an ever growing set of webs waiting for us to collide with it and be caught by the sticky strands of conceit, deceit, selfishness.
Being Catholic means believing in the living God, accepting the death and resurrection of Christ, believing that Jesus Christ is present in the Eucharist of the Mass.
Such a belief has to start somewhere in the heart and slowly grow. Such a belief simply is. It is a given. It is an accepted fact. It forms the basis of an identity, of understanding.
Each action I take reflects upon this central belief in Jesus Christ. Each moment I live is defined by my belief in the living Christ.
Remember
These are my first days of life in examination, full of change, full of wonder, but the fatigue and exasperation that develops in my mind is completely opposite of how I imagined that I would feel.
My mind is concerned about the rising anger, apathy, angst in our society. The world that I see tries to hide its fear and despair behind all types of psychobabble. Nervous tension rules; common sense and decency wait in the wings with sleep and exercise. This is a time of opinion, of complaining; this not a time of discovery, of truth. Our society wants us to lead a life of a marionette, controlled by different puppet masters at different times. Free will is best when directed and influenced by Madison Avenue or some other nameless hidden individuals.
As Catholics we are Christians. We are both God’s children and God’s believers. Prayer is not a sedentary activity. Prayer leads us to the streets where we show our concern for the oppressed, the forgotten, the dying.
Our society presents us with all types of social justice gaps, potholes which we try to mend with hands and hearts.
As Christians we are asked to love our neighbors; our society suggests that we love ourselves, pamper ourselves, forget our neighbors, forget the world for a little while and only concentrate on ourselves, our self perception, our self image, our self worth.
Eventually all of this self appreciation is destined to lead us into dangerous places, to create a sense of over confidence. The real war that we all should fear is a simple one of moderation versus excess, humility versus decadence, morality versus indulgence. Free will is easily perverted and directed toward every vice and sin. Free will is not always free; there is a price, a responsibility to be awake to the different forces in our lives, to be cognizant and involved in our communities.
What we need is prayer; what we need is silence; what we need is love; there are so many people using so many words to influence us that we need time to analyze each word, put everything into context.
Remember Christ. Remember love. Remember prayer.
My mind is concerned about the rising anger, apathy, angst in our society. The world that I see tries to hide its fear and despair behind all types of psychobabble. Nervous tension rules; common sense and decency wait in the wings with sleep and exercise. This is a time of opinion, of complaining; this not a time of discovery, of truth. Our society wants us to lead a life of a marionette, controlled by different puppet masters at different times. Free will is best when directed and influenced by Madison Avenue or some other nameless hidden individuals.
As Catholics we are Christians. We are both God’s children and God’s believers. Prayer is not a sedentary activity. Prayer leads us to the streets where we show our concern for the oppressed, the forgotten, the dying.
Our society presents us with all types of social justice gaps, potholes which we try to mend with hands and hearts.
As Christians we are asked to love our neighbors; our society suggests that we love ourselves, pamper ourselves, forget our neighbors, forget the world for a little while and only concentrate on ourselves, our self perception, our self image, our self worth.
Eventually all of this self appreciation is destined to lead us into dangerous places, to create a sense of over confidence. The real war that we all should fear is a simple one of moderation versus excess, humility versus decadence, morality versus indulgence. Free will is easily perverted and directed toward every vice and sin. Free will is not always free; there is a price, a responsibility to be awake to the different forces in our lives, to be cognizant and involved in our communities.
What we need is prayer; what we need is silence; what we need is love; there are so many people using so many words to influence us that we need time to analyze each word, put everything into context.
Remember Christ. Remember love. Remember prayer.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
This Season
During this season of Lent our conversion can never be to far from our minds. Our sins are in our minds. We ask God for pity, mercy. This is the season of the little critics reminding us of original sin, reminding us that we are made of dust, reminding us of our weaknesses. The little critics reside somewhere within us and encourage us to examine our conscience.
Lent asks us to take a moment and examine our lives, to examine our reality. We live in an era of computer generated images. It is often difficult separating truth from fiction. This liturgical season helps us learn how to express our faith and love in God, to encourage faith and love in God to others, to encounter God.
Distractions and diversions attack us all the type. We must learn how to avoid them. This season provides a way for us to learn about goodness.
We must remember Christ in the desert; remember that our lives contain tests, moral, ethical, spiritual.
As Christians, our conversion teaches us the necessity and relevance of having God in our lives, guiding us, teaching us to do good. Our conversion teaches us to always have reverence for God. This reverence will help us move closer to God.
You do learn how to love by experiencing your failure in love. You do learn how to pray by being silent, by listening, by finally saying “Father,” the emotion in your heart shall guide you to God.
Secular forces encourage us to approach each day feeling a little vague, tentative, inconclusive. Uncertainty waits for us in the secular world. Beauty and serenity can be created with all types of algorithms and generated by super computers. Our senses might be seduced by the superficial appearances.
This season asks us to look beneath superficial, to uncover the truth.
I have enjoyed the homilies that I have heard during this season. In each there has been something which has made me question myself, my status quo.
My life does contain some failures, but also moments of fine humility, charity, and hope. My conversion is leading me in the right direction. I am working to follow. First I want to learn humility and then live it daily from the moment when I wake up till I go to sleep. For once I learn humility then that practice will help me with charity and obedience.
Each day I do examine my moral and physical state; I acknowledge that it is impossible to conquer sin but I can learn how to avoid it.
True life begins with love, begins with prayer; when our hopes and prayers are for the well-being and peace of everyone, unconditionally, freely then we are following in the footsteps of Christ.
Above all I want my life to reflect and inspire a love in Jesus Christ that will never perish.
I frequently think about God, helping others. I am developing a spiritual point of view which is in contrast to my intellectual point of view. The atmosphere of Lent creates compassion within me, moving and changing my thoughts and actions. My confidence in God grows when I pray, when I am quiet in front of the Blessed Sacrament, when I hear the Eucharist prayers.
Lent inspires a perpetually recurring hope for love, for goodness in myself, in others.
Lent asks us to take a moment and examine our lives, to examine our reality. We live in an era of computer generated images. It is often difficult separating truth from fiction. This liturgical season helps us learn how to express our faith and love in God, to encourage faith and love in God to others, to encounter God.
Distractions and diversions attack us all the type. We must learn how to avoid them. This season provides a way for us to learn about goodness.
We must remember Christ in the desert; remember that our lives contain tests, moral, ethical, spiritual.
As Christians, our conversion teaches us the necessity and relevance of having God in our lives, guiding us, teaching us to do good. Our conversion teaches us to always have reverence for God. This reverence will help us move closer to God.
You do learn how to love by experiencing your failure in love. You do learn how to pray by being silent, by listening, by finally saying “Father,” the emotion in your heart shall guide you to God.
Secular forces encourage us to approach each day feeling a little vague, tentative, inconclusive. Uncertainty waits for us in the secular world. Beauty and serenity can be created with all types of algorithms and generated by super computers. Our senses might be seduced by the superficial appearances.
This season asks us to look beneath superficial, to uncover the truth.
I have enjoyed the homilies that I have heard during this season. In each there has been something which has made me question myself, my status quo.
My life does contain some failures, but also moments of fine humility, charity, and hope. My conversion is leading me in the right direction. I am working to follow. First I want to learn humility and then live it daily from the moment when I wake up till I go to sleep. For once I learn humility then that practice will help me with charity and obedience.
Each day I do examine my moral and physical state; I acknowledge that it is impossible to conquer sin but I can learn how to avoid it.
True life begins with love, begins with prayer; when our hopes and prayers are for the well-being and peace of everyone, unconditionally, freely then we are following in the footsteps of Christ.
Above all I want my life to reflect and inspire a love in Jesus Christ that will never perish.
I frequently think about God, helping others. I am developing a spiritual point of view which is in contrast to my intellectual point of view. The atmosphere of Lent creates compassion within me, moving and changing my thoughts and actions. My confidence in God grows when I pray, when I am quiet in front of the Blessed Sacrament, when I hear the Eucharist prayers.
Lent inspires a perpetually recurring hope for love, for goodness in myself, in others.
Forty Days
A bright orange light crashed through my windows this morning waking me, reminding me that I was still alive, reminding me to say a prayer of thanks.
Lent is a time of preparation for Easter; it, also, is a time of education as we learn how to sacrifice, how to love each other, how to love God. These Forty Days teach us that we are human beings reaching for goodness, reaching for holiness, reaching for the Divine. We fast, we pray, we give. Each year Lent is a halting point, a beautiful time of purification when we should examine our conscience and determine if we are on the path that God wants us to be on. We must be on guard against allowing any sin or vice to cloud our view, to settle within my mind. We are preparing our hearts and souls, preparing our hearts and souls for God. He will appear before us, within us; if our gaze is direct and our hearts are pure we will see him. The literature of Lent encourages each Christian to increase their prayer, fasting, almsgiving in the name of the Lord. There are volumes of prayer books to help with our daily reflections. Lent is a time for each of us to personally supervise our prayer and repentance; we must look within our hearts and ask God for forgiveness for all our sins. The Church provides a wonderful backdrop for penance and reflection. Each Mass has special readings which provide many good things to contemplate about obedience, sacrifice, humility, charity. During these Forty Days our attention to God must gradually increase each day as we learn more about ourselves and how to be God’s humble loving servants. Catholics have the distinction of noticing their sins and then asking for God’s absolution. Lent is a time when we can review our lives, summarize our successes and failures and try to move closer to God.
Lent reminds us of the wilderness, of haunting and taunting sin. How each of us pray and serve God during Lent can be supremely lyrical, gently poetic, imaginative, passionate. I hope that we each remember that Lent is a deeply spiritual time. There is a real reason why we are not eating chocolate, watching television. We must always remember Christ in the desert. We must always allow Lent to inspire our thoughts, our prayers, our love. The Church asks us, reminds us to move beyond the trite and decorous and clamorous, to take a breath, to seek silence, to yearn for the deepest unity with God, to pray, to hope, to love. Lent is a musical season of heroic, lyric verses performed within each of our minds hopefully, we are able to hear the simple melody, to find our private place in the desert to reflect upon our lives, to find God. Our Spiritual lives need these Forty Days to help focus us on God.
When possible stop by the Cathedral, kneel before the Blessed Sacrament. Just walk into your parish church and sit in silence. Say any prayer that you can remember or think of or just simply say hello to God. Lent is time when hopefully we are able to slow down, give thanks for our baptism, give thanks for the Eucharist, give thanks for our continuing conversion.
Lent is a time of preparation for Easter; it, also, is a time of education as we learn how to sacrifice, how to love each other, how to love God. These Forty Days teach us that we are human beings reaching for goodness, reaching for holiness, reaching for the Divine. We fast, we pray, we give. Each year Lent is a halting point, a beautiful time of purification when we should examine our conscience and determine if we are on the path that God wants us to be on. We must be on guard against allowing any sin or vice to cloud our view, to settle within my mind. We are preparing our hearts and souls, preparing our hearts and souls for God. He will appear before us, within us; if our gaze is direct and our hearts are pure we will see him. The literature of Lent encourages each Christian to increase their prayer, fasting, almsgiving in the name of the Lord. There are volumes of prayer books to help with our daily reflections. Lent is a time for each of us to personally supervise our prayer and repentance; we must look within our hearts and ask God for forgiveness for all our sins. The Church provides a wonderful backdrop for penance and reflection. Each Mass has special readings which provide many good things to contemplate about obedience, sacrifice, humility, charity. During these Forty Days our attention to God must gradually increase each day as we learn more about ourselves and how to be God’s humble loving servants. Catholics have the distinction of noticing their sins and then asking for God’s absolution. Lent is a time when we can review our lives, summarize our successes and failures and try to move closer to God.
Lent reminds us of the wilderness, of haunting and taunting sin. How each of us pray and serve God during Lent can be supremely lyrical, gently poetic, imaginative, passionate. I hope that we each remember that Lent is a deeply spiritual time. There is a real reason why we are not eating chocolate, watching television. We must always remember Christ in the desert. We must always allow Lent to inspire our thoughts, our prayers, our love. The Church asks us, reminds us to move beyond the trite and decorous and clamorous, to take a breath, to seek silence, to yearn for the deepest unity with God, to pray, to hope, to love. Lent is a musical season of heroic, lyric verses performed within each of our minds hopefully, we are able to hear the simple melody, to find our private place in the desert to reflect upon our lives, to find God. Our Spiritual lives need these Forty Days to help focus us on God.
When possible stop by the Cathedral, kneel before the Blessed Sacrament. Just walk into your parish church and sit in silence. Say any prayer that you can remember or think of or just simply say hello to God. Lent is time when hopefully we are able to slow down, give thanks for our baptism, give thanks for the Eucharist, give thanks for our continuing conversion.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Of Sacrifice, Of Suffering
I sometimes think that the morning is the most innocuous time of the day.
All talk on sacrifice and suffering, by people who know, ends with dragging in Lent somewhere. As a liturgical season there is a fluidity, a moral reflectivity, a hint of moribundity. Lent begins as a private cerebral moment and transforms into some type of activity, either giving up something, or doing something else. Before Ash Wednesday we may be wanton chocolate eating, coffee drinking, gum chewing, gossip telling couch potatoes, Metro riding mockers, park bench poseurs. Lent provides each of us a moment to reflect upon our lives, reflect upon our individual conversion, and hopefully make changes. God offers us love, hope, grace and so many other things. And we sometimes are too busy to listen, to respond as all the modern noise and other distractions fill our minds today. We sometimes downgrade or momentarily push aside all the prayers and lessons of the preceding epoch. The point is, Lent provides both an invitation and a memory.
This is a simple statement of fact. It also is my personal interpretation of this liturgical season based upon the homilies and readings that I have heard. But though Lent is well known and practiced, even having believers with ashes on the foreheads on television shows and newspaper pages, it should not automatically be assumed that the reason for this season is thoroughly known or understood. There are two hundred people who have their opinion of this season based completely on this or that Scripture verse. Of those two hundred, there will be some who advocate prayer, some who promote almsgiving, some who encourage fasting, some who talk of giving up something, some who talk of doing something. It will probably be the two hundred first person who will remember to mention God, remember to explain that this liturgical season exists as preparation for the Easter season, remember to mention that hopefully the changes effected during this season will make us better Christians, move us closer to God. Lent is a time when our lives should reflect our love and admiration for Christ more brightly, more vibrantly; we should be outraged at the sin in our hearts and around us. The forty days allow us to become scholars, translators for God. There is something mischievous within Lent, the very public acknowledgment of our sinfulness and unworthiness which lets each and every one know that at one time or another we have been childish, selfish and yet God still shows us mercy and forgives us. Within our hearts as our love and trust in God grows stronger we are able to perceive God’s presence and grace; we are able to increase the goodness in our lives with a natural, gentle consistency.
We must always have appreciation and admiration for God in our hearts. We must train ourselves to willingly yield to him, be his humble, obedient servants. I know that this is often hard for us to do; we are human beings. However, we must remember that God has a plan for each one of us.
All talk on sacrifice and suffering, by people who know, ends with dragging in Lent somewhere. As a liturgical season there is a fluidity, a moral reflectivity, a hint of moribundity. Lent begins as a private cerebral moment and transforms into some type of activity, either giving up something, or doing something else. Before Ash Wednesday we may be wanton chocolate eating, coffee drinking, gum chewing, gossip telling couch potatoes, Metro riding mockers, park bench poseurs. Lent provides each of us a moment to reflect upon our lives, reflect upon our individual conversion, and hopefully make changes. God offers us love, hope, grace and so many other things. And we sometimes are too busy to listen, to respond as all the modern noise and other distractions fill our minds today. We sometimes downgrade or momentarily push aside all the prayers and lessons of the preceding epoch. The point is, Lent provides both an invitation and a memory.
This is a simple statement of fact. It also is my personal interpretation of this liturgical season based upon the homilies and readings that I have heard. But though Lent is well known and practiced, even having believers with ashes on the foreheads on television shows and newspaper pages, it should not automatically be assumed that the reason for this season is thoroughly known or understood. There are two hundred people who have their opinion of this season based completely on this or that Scripture verse. Of those two hundred, there will be some who advocate prayer, some who promote almsgiving, some who encourage fasting, some who talk of giving up something, some who talk of doing something. It will probably be the two hundred first person who will remember to mention God, remember to explain that this liturgical season exists as preparation for the Easter season, remember to mention that hopefully the changes effected during this season will make us better Christians, move us closer to God. Lent is a time when our lives should reflect our love and admiration for Christ more brightly, more vibrantly; we should be outraged at the sin in our hearts and around us. The forty days allow us to become scholars, translators for God. There is something mischievous within Lent, the very public acknowledgment of our sinfulness and unworthiness which lets each and every one know that at one time or another we have been childish, selfish and yet God still shows us mercy and forgives us. Within our hearts as our love and trust in God grows stronger we are able to perceive God’s presence and grace; we are able to increase the goodness in our lives with a natural, gentle consistency.
We must always have appreciation and admiration for God in our hearts. We must train ourselves to willingly yield to him, be his humble, obedient servants. I know that this is often hard for us to do; we are human beings. However, we must remember that God has a plan for each one of us.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
During Lent and Beyond
Lent reminds us that the Light is always on, that the Word is always waiting to be read. This liturgical season invites everyone to open our hearts, open our souls, open our minds. Lent is simply a time of hope and conversion.
Each Christian may dream new dreams as they try to see the world through God’s eyes. Each Christian may pray new prayers as new experiences may make the presence of the Lord more visible in our lives.
Lent is a time of renewal; we should answer the call of Lent with enthusiasm, youthfulness.
This is a time of penance. It is also a time for us to be creative, to learn new ways to become more faithful disciples of Christ. We must remember that this is the time to start finding ways to do the will of the one who sent us.
Look beyond the chocolate, soda, and other things given up for forty days. Look within your heart. Look at how you interact with others. Look at how you pray, when you pray, what you pray for. Look at your strengths, your weaknesses. Look at all of the things within your life that you freely choose to offer up to God. Look at the things that you do not offer to God.
How do you serve God? with enthusiasm, youthfulness? Every day our lives should be pleasing to God. Prayer should always be a part of each day. We must allow Christ to live through us. We have faith; we have hope; we have free will to surrender our hearts to God.
What we begin in Lent will hopefully continue beyond Lent, for the rest of your life.
Each Christian may dream new dreams as they try to see the world through God’s eyes. Each Christian may pray new prayers as new experiences may make the presence of the Lord more visible in our lives.
Lent is a time of renewal; we should answer the call of Lent with enthusiasm, youthfulness.
This is a time of penance. It is also a time for us to be creative, to learn new ways to become more faithful disciples of Christ. We must remember that this is the time to start finding ways to do the will of the one who sent us.
Look beyond the chocolate, soda, and other things given up for forty days. Look within your heart. Look at how you interact with others. Look at how you pray, when you pray, what you pray for. Look at your strengths, your weaknesses. Look at all of the things within your life that you freely choose to offer up to God. Look at the things that you do not offer to God.
How do you serve God? with enthusiasm, youthfulness? Every day our lives should be pleasing to God. Prayer should always be a part of each day. We must allow Christ to live through us. We have faith; we have hope; we have free will to surrender our hearts to God.
What we begin in Lent will hopefully continue beyond Lent, for the rest of your life.
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