For Love of the One Who Loves Me

Point of OMC Rule:

•Whatsoever little or much thou possessest of anything, whether clothing, or food, or drink, let it be at the command of the senior and at his disposal, for it is not befitting a religious to have any distinction of property with his own free brother. 

Look upon all possessions as loans from God and let them be used for the honor and glory of God and at the service of Charity.

Reflection:

This point of the Rule is lived differently by each of us according to our state in life, as most of us do not live together.  Before I retired, the money I made by working went to support myself, and after that to my ministry.  I never felt a need for more than my share of the world’s goods.  That was not a virtue of mine, it was simply the result of having lost everything so many times that they were just things.  I never feared having nothing, having been there before.  Nor did I ever lack anything essential during my ministry.  I have come to believe that in serving Christ, I am supplied by God with all that I need to do just that.

Now that I live in community, I pay the bills I have to pay, and the rest of what I have is for the community’s needs.  It isn’t a lot, but so far amongst ourselves, we’ve had enough to keep on keeping on. 

I have no illusion that God needs honor and glory.  I have no doubt that Christ needs everything I have to give and more.  And because he is my first, best, and last love, I give it with great joy.

The Need For A 21st Century Testament

If you can find a copy of Corpus Reports (September/October 2013), you will see therein a gem:  John Shelby Spong’s address regarding “A Need to Reform Christianity?  A New Language for God.”   My dear Bishop Joe loaned me his copy to read and I must recommend it to anyone who is seeking to reconcile their experience of God and their experience as a 21^st Century human being.  He avers that Christianity is not dying; the explanations of antiquity are dying. 

We have an Old Testament and a New Testament.  What we need is a Current Testament.  The experience of the Christ is not the same thing as a description of that experience.  The descriptions of that experience which we have are rooted in the times they were written.  This is interesting in light of an ongoing discussion regarding the future of the church. 

As a member of a small Independent Catholic Church (the Celtic Christian Church), I sometimes wonder what will happen to us when the present generation of leaders dies.  The roots of the Celtic Church are not buried in the Old Testament, but in the Old Religion, which considered creation as good, and humanity not as fatally flawed, but glorious.  Our leaders are chosen by our members, not imposed by a hierarchy.  Our relationship with God is about relationships and service.  We love one another in a way that others find attractive and want to share.  It is my prayer that we will not lose these characteristics. 

As time moves on, we Christians are beginning to realize that the Christ experience removes all artificial tribal barriers.  Like Paul, we begin to see that in Christ there is no male or female, slave or free, just and unjust, saved and unsaved.  Rather than justifying exclusion, we find the experience demanding the inclusion of all.  A result of the Christ experience is an urgent need to pour out that experience on all who still experience life as suffering, broken, unforgiven and other in any way.  One who has the experience of Christ cannot sit idly by and not feel the injustices of predatory behavior. 

This is my current understanding, at any rate, of the way in which conscious contact with God has changed my life.  It has brought deep peace in the face of my own mortality.  It has brought deep pain in the oneness demanded between myself and the other, who is not truly separate from me, but is another unique expression of the Ground of Being. 

If you find Spong challenging, good!  Keep reading and thinking and most of all, keep on serving God in the People of God.  If you seek the Christ experience, stay in the Silence with the One.  Stay and be loved.  Stay and be changed.  You will find yourself.  And then you will give yourself away. 

Imitation of Christ

OMC Rule – Point for Today

•Be always naked in imitation of Christ and the Evangelists.

In total humility imitate Christ as you proclaim the Good News of God’s Love which is our salvation from our self-centeredness.

Reflection:

The Imitation of Christ  is one of the best ways I can think of to serve God.  So, what did Jesus do and how do we do that in today’s world?  

Jesus spent time with God.  No matter what else was going on, from the time he ditched his parents to go to the teachers in the temple until his arrest and after, he spoke with His Father pretty much all the time.  How can we live in conscious contact with God?  We are instructed to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.  How can we achieve that renewal?  By means of prayer and meditation. 

It has been said that prayer is talking to God and meditation is listening for the answers.  After over 35 years of practice, I can say that it is not easy, but it is very simple.  Be alone in a quiet place.  Don’t do anything else.  Notice your thoughts, let them pass by, and live in the moment, the only place God can be found.  

Because of Jesus’ close relationship with the Father, he constantly reached out to others.  In AA we say, “You only get to keep what you give away.”  I would add that dwelling in constant, conscious contact with God results in an upwelling of love that has to be passed around.  We must give out of the abundance of our love…which can only increase the more we give.  "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He anointed Me to preach the Gospel to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of the sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed and to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord."  (Luke 4:18-19)

Jesus taught his closest friends to love each other deeply and well.   “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another."  (John 13:34-35)  If we love one another enough to abandon our agenda in favor of the good of others, we will be on our way to imitating Christ.  If people can look at our lives and conclude that we are humble people of peace who love each other….if we love each other enough to make other people want what we have, we are on our way to being Christlike.

Loving each other is hard.  It can’t be done at the same time we are being self-centered.  Curiously, the more selfless we become, the healthier we are spiritually.  So we plunge into the messy, hard-edged business of community and treat everyone as Christ.  It will, in the end, cost us everything, and that’s fine.  The servant is not better than her master.  Funnily enough, along the way, we get to be happy, joyous and free!

Stonekettle Station: Wright Answers The Mail, Accidentally Destroys The Free World

Stonekettle Station: Wright Answers The Mail, Accidentally Destroys The Free World

I love this guy.  What can I tell you?  My dad was a Marine.  I love his humor.  And the fact that he can think from Point A to Point B without going all the way around the alphabet first.

Order of the Merciful Christ

I am beginning a series of meditations on the Rule of the religious order to which I belong.  Each one will give first the point of the rule, as modified for life in our times, and then my reflection on that point.  The first one is rather short.

•Be alone in a separate place near a chief city, if thy conscience is not prepared to be in common with the crowd.

 Whether in a city or not, choose a solitary place, physical or mental and pray.  Do not neglect the masses.  Serve them with corporeal and spiritual works of mercy.

 Reflection:

I do a lot of praying staring out the dining room window at the back yard, full of trees and sometimes deer and birds, and always full of God’s beauty, whether full of sunlight or snow.  I also pray alone in my room.  For many years, while I was working and raising a family, I prayed mostly on the bus during my commute, or in the bathroom!

It is important to note that our Rule reminds us we are here to serve, and not just for ourselves.  It took me a lot of years to realize that I serve God every time I give someone a hug or a smile, or do a good thing of any kind.  Usually, we are called not to great things, but to small things done with great love and generosity. 

Hey, God!

As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.  ~John Fitzgerald Kennedy

I have been thinking about gratitude.  I can choose gratitude for my old age rather than complaint.  My mother’s sister had rheumatoid arthritis and no medication to keep her from becoming crippled.  I live in a time and a place and with enough money to purchase medical care and medication to keep me mobile. 

I am not sure what is meant by aging gracefully, but I know about aging gratefully.  I appreciate living in a beautiful forest within a congenial and loving community.  I appreciate having a wonderful daughter and a grandson of whom I am so very proud.  I am grateful for what health I do have.

Most of all, I am grateful for my relationship with God.  Because of it, I am sober today.  I have friends and a host of acquaintances.  I know how to live through hardship and how to laugh with joy.  I know how to say that I’m sorry and how to forgive.

I don’t know how to fix the world’s troubles, but I can and do pray for them when I sit with my Beloved in holy silence.  I am grateful for the confidence I feel that although the world may be facing terrible times, in the end all will be well.  I’ve no idea how, but I am not God and don’t have to know. 

What I do have to do, and I am grateful for the ability to do so, is to love those that God puts in my path and in my heart and to try to give them some inkling of the depth of joy and peace that fills my heart.  As I look back, I can see what a jagged, crooked path I took to finding God.  I regret none of it.  I no longer suffer from it.  I even look forward to eternity with a sense of adventure yet to come.

So, thanks God, for never giving up on me.  Make me ever more grateful, and ever more giving.  Show me your way and give me the power to do your will.  And hey, God, have I told you today that I love you?

Spirituality and Religion

I read a bit of a discussion on Facebook about spirituality and religion.  The argument’s thesis was that spirituality is emotional and religion is about obligation.  I have to disagree with that.

For me the purpose of practicing a religion is to achieve union with God.  One can have emotional experiences along the way, and there is nothing at all wrong with that.  However, in my opinion, a real spiritual experience changes one forever.  If it does not,  then it was just an emotional experience.

Religion includes emotion, because it includes the whole human being.  But to me, spiritual practices are intended to achieve personal transformation, not emotional highs, or even certainty of salvation.  Enlightenment, if I may use the term, is not achievable by emotional excess.  Nor is it reached by intellectual exercise, in my opinion, though there is nothing wrong with that either.  The study of theology is important, if we are to be able to articulate what we believe and what leads us to those conclusions.

What I understand of God has come by way of diligent, daily practice of prayer and meditation, graced from time to time with the sheer, pure gift of contemplation.  I am a committed Celtic Christian, and if you want to know what that means, go to the CCC website and read the Statement of Belief. 

I am also a recovering alcoholic and I know from personal experience that there is no easy path up the Mountain of God.  Anyone who tells you it’s easy is lying or just doesn’t get it.  On the other hand, it is very simple:

            -- There is a God.

            -- I am not it.

            -- I daily turn over my will and my life to God as I understand God.

Everything else is details, such as putting God first in life to make everything else fall into place.  Such as telling the truth even if it costs me a friend, because not telling the truth makes me uncomfortable in my own skin, and then I have to make amends, which I do not like to do.  Such as living the Rule of my religious order because I have found a call, and the Rule helps me live that call to service and to prayer for the church and the world.  Such as giving my brother anything I have that he needs and I do not. 

Religious practices are just fine.  But the sacraments are not for God, they are for the people of God.  The rules are not to be worshipped – only God is worshipped.  Clericalism is a cancer and should be avoided at all costs.  Yes, I am a priest, but that only means I am the least and lowest servant of God.  I am here to serve Christ in my brothers and sisters.  Not because I am special or different, but just because I can’t help it.  He did something profound in me, and now I have to try to help everyone else see that he sees them as the beloved as well…that he aches to love and to help them; that he suffers with them when they are unhappy.

Maybe I am all wrong.  But these are the things I believe.  And when I live them, I am happy.

The Teacher Will Come

It has been said, “When the student is ready, the teacher will come.” 

Many people have been my teachers.  Not all of them worked for schools.  Some of the best teachers I have ever had were people I hated – or just couldn’t stand for one reason or another. 

I was always fortunate in my school teachers and later in my college professors (I went back to school in middle age).  I had wise men and women who challenged me to work as hard as I could at learning to think.  They taught me not just facts, but to realize that I didn’t know everything, and for the things I didn’t know, how to find out, and how to check sources of information for reliability. 

The one or two professional teachers I had that were not good at teaching taught me something else…patience, and how to glean what I could from someone who knows a subject but not how to teach it. 

Many of my teachers taught me to love learning…I still love it.  My curiosity will probably die after I do….and maybe not even then. 

But back to those people I hated…or simply couldn’t stand.  What did they teach me?  One of the most important lessons of my life…they taught me the things I hated and couldn’t stand about myself.  I saw reflected in them things I did not like seeing in me.  It is very hard to remember that in the midst of dealing with someone who drives me up the wall.  When I am in fit spiritual condition, my sense of humor rescues me and I can put together in my mind a cartoon of myself overacting in the manner the person I am dealing with acts.  With my perspective restored, I have choices:  withdraw, ignore, or engage.  I can act upon life, rather than reacting to it. 

I once attended a seminar entitled “Working with Difficult People.”   At the time, I worked for litigation attorneys, some of them … ah, “difficult.”  The teacher was an amazing person who stalked out on the stage, threw back his head and whinnied like a horse.  He then stomped his “hooves” and stared at us as if he were about to jump off and pound us into the ground, huffing and blowing and pawing the wooden floor.  Just as suddenly, he relaxed and smiled.  He then said, “That is all I have to teach you.”

We stared at him.  We had just paid this guy over a hundred dollars each so he could imitate a horse?  We looked at each other.  We looked at him.

He said, “The next time someone bullies you, picture them doing what I just did.  You will be amazed at how your reactions to them change.”  We then spent a couple of hours practicing being the horse and being the grown-up.  It was great fun.  And my bosses never knew why their tantrums didn't get to me. 

Obviously, there is more to working with difficult people than just picturing them as ridiculous.  Obviously, there are more kinds of difficult people than just bullies.  What about emotional “vampires?”  Or actual, physical abusers?  What about people who won’t let you get a word in edge-wise?

My point is that you can’t let yourself get sucked into your own emotional reactions to the detriment of your peace of soul.  Let me restate that:  I can’t let myself do that.  If I do, sooner or later I will act badly and need to make amends.  Worse, sooner or later I will want to take a drink.

I could hide all alone in a hermitage, I suppose.  But I would never grow up.  I would never have to have my sharp edges knocked off by living in the real world with real people in real situations.  And I do from time to time retreat to the hermitage of my “cell” in St. Ciaran’s House of Prayer. 

But no one gets to the Kingdom of God alone.  We all go together.  And so I take my silly self out and act the fool and laugh at myself, we all have a little fun, and we all get to be happy all the way to the Kingdom.  Sometimes we worry together or weep together or whatever seems appropriate.  We teach one another to live and to love.  And we hope we can be more than a bad example. 

So here’s to all the teachers in my life.  May God richly reward you and fill you with happiness, joy and peace. 

Pain and Suffering

 "We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses." -- C. G. Jung

It has been said that pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.  That sounds glib, if you are suffering from chronic pain of any kind.  As a sufferer from rheumatoid arthritis, I have personal knowledge of this truth.  However, because I have been a practitioner of daily prayer and meditation and a seeker after the Beloved for many years, I have learned the difference. 

So:  Pain is an experience.  Suffering is a perception.  If I hurt, I hurt.  I can choose whether to suffer.  I can choose to make my life about the pain or not.  I  can choose to accept that pain is a part of my life, but it is not who I am.

I can take whatever palliative measures are available to me in accordance with my doctor’s instructions and get on with my life, or I can make my life (and the lives of those around me) miserable by focusing on my pain. 

This is true whether the pain is physical or psychological.  I may have lingering scars from a crappy childhood.  I can make that an excuse not to grow up, or I can do my therapy and get on with it.  I will never have the perfect childhood, or the perfect relationship or whatever I may be deluding myself will “make me happy.”  First I have to learn how to be happy just exactly as I am. 

How do I do that?  Oddly, it is by staying in the moment with the pain and discovering that it has edges and limits and that there are many things I can do in spite of it.  It is by realizing that I do not have to be the pain or even be about the pain.  Instead, I can be “about my father’s business.”

The secret weapon I have against suffering is that because I am loved by the Beloved, my life is not about me anymore.  It is about God.  It is about love.  That is where my focus lies when I am in what I think of as “fit spiritual condition.”  I stay in that condition by doing whatever it takes to maintain my conscious contact with God.  And that contact only happens in the present moment. 

Yeah.  Sounds impossible.  Sometimes it is.  If I need to have a little private “pity party” I just go to bed and have it.  Sometimes RA or any other pain is so exhausting we are left with nothing but self-pity and tears.  That’s okay.  I just do that until I am tired of it.  Then I get up and do the next thing. 

So, yes.  Suffering is optional.  Choose happiness.  Every time it crosses your mind, choose the Beloved.  Choose love.  Be happy, joyful and free!

A guest post today from Rev. Dolly Ryan

Is God…

Recently, I received an e-ad with the subject line: “Is God Anti-Gay?”  The words slapped me in the face, poured ice cold water down my spine, and caused me to start scurrying through my mental Bible in search of my own security against the torrents of prejudices.  I wasn’t “stuck” where many might suspect.  I am not dismissing the seriousness of acknowledging the error of discrimination based on sexual preferences.  But my reaction wasn’t to the word “gay”.  I barely noticed the word sitting there at the end of the sentence like a signal flag on a yacht which silently flaps in the wind hoping to catch attention.  I barely read the sentence at all.  I was stuck in my core by “IS GOD ‘ANTI’”!  It is almost as if God and “anti” should never be used in the same breath. 

Thus began my search for a scriptural “anti”.  Show me “anti” my mind echoed.  My brain’s search engine began looking for times when Jesus was anti-somebody.  According to the culture of his time, Jesus must have been anti-Roman?  Instead I found him greeting and praising the centurion who wanted his servant healed.  He eagerly healed the son of a royal official.  Well then, surely Jesus obeyed the Jewish tradition by being anti-gentiles? Again the answer was no.  He took a moment to speak with the Samaritan woman at the well and he accepted the criticism from the Canaanite woman who wanted the crumbs from his table of miracles for her daughter.  Maybe Jesus was like so many of us, maybe he hated mindless followers.  Yet he continued to teach his apostles even though he got frustrated when they repeatedly misunderstood his lessons. 

Perhaps he was anti-criminals and wrongdoers.  Yet, over and over again I discovered him in their midst; the woman caught in adultery who was positioned to be stoned and the paralyzed man who was lowered through the roof, to name two.  Possibly he was against strangers. Then I find the parable about the Good Samaritan.  My thoughts continue to search, did he think that women were inferior to men, a rather common idea. But I remember that although women were often not permitted in the same room with a gathering of men, he revered the woman who washed his feet.  Likewise, as he was preparing to die he worried about the women who were weeping and the welfare of his own mother. Also, the first person he chose to visit after his resurrection was a woman.  No, he was not anti-feminist.

Wait, I remember!  During his lifetime it was forbidden to associate with someone who was considered unclean.  So, Jesus must have been against anyone who was sick or dead.  However, he touched lepers and blind men; the woman who was hemorrhaging; the lady who was bent over in the temple; the man who was demon possessed. And wasn’t he the one who called Lazarus from the tomb?  I discovered he wasn’t even against those who were plotting to kill him.  He never even became anti-Judas who traded loyalty and friendship for pieces of silver.  Nor, was he opposed to those who caused his crucifixion.  As a matter of record, he begged that they be forgiven.  Try as I may, I can’t find a single case where Jesus was “anti” anyone.

So what did Jesus preach against?  He preached anti-hate.  He set the standards of socially acceptable behavior. I know that he was anti-hunger, anti-homeless, anti-judgmental, anti-callousness, anti-hate…  In other words, Jesus was anti-“anti-love”. He preached against pre-judging who God loves.  He warned us to stop telling God who he must reject.

I presume the authors of the book that the ad was promoting want to talk about gay issues.  I have no idea whether they are prompting a pro or con viewpoint but I am sure that they are implying that their stand is God’s stand.  I know that gay-issues are tremendously important: socially, politically and spiritually. I know so many people who have suffered from the prejudice generate by ugly misplaced fears and misinformation on the subject.  And there are so many, who for so long, have suffered terrible indignities.  I do not want any of you to misunderstand.  I do know this discrimination is wrong and that it continues to promote more hate.  I am not trying to downplay the significance of this issue.  But, what is disturbing to me in this moment are all the things upheld as wrong in the name of God.  If we listened to the Word of God we should be unable to endorse anything that did not love.  We would not fight the truth that everyone is loved by God and this should be enough for us.  But we focus on searching the Rule of Love hoping to find the flaw that will allow us our prejudices.

In conclusion, my answer to the question asked by the ad is God is not “anti-gay”.  Nor, is God anti anyone.  If we truly practice Christianity, we would not have labels that build fences.  We would offer dignity and respect to everyone. We would obey the command to Love one another and we would be tripping over each other trying to do this.

Talk to me.  Can you find an incident where God rejected someone? Is God anti-?  As the old hymn says:  If God is for us, who can be against?  Therefore let us stand with God by being pro-everyone.

May we always know the comfort of God who loves us unconditionally.  May we love our neighbor as our self.  And, may our prejudices be revealed, forgiven and healed. Amen.

 

Your forever servant,

Dolly+

Living With Uncertainty

We must develop a deep confidence in God in order to lose our anxiety over the future.  We must live in the now to avoid “paying dues” of worry about things beyond our control.  Trusting our own wisdom and planning may satisfy our need for control of our circumstances, but how realistic is it, and how surrendered is it?  How can we achieve this deep confidence in God?  I am not referring to some shallow “Oh, it’ll be all right” positive thinking practice. I am talking about the kind of assurance that a child resting in her mother’s arms knows. 

How do we order our priorities to facilitate a life of contentment and confidence in the providence of God?  HHHow should our thinking and our activity differ from those of unbelievers? 

Perhaps it begins with putting God first.  We should not worship the American idols of money, property, power, prestige, etc.  We worship the ground of reality, our source, our Beloved.  If God is first, all else will fall into proper place.  But how?

Just as when I was first getting sober, I find I must keep watch on my thoughts, my emotions, and the state of my body.  I must not get too hungry, angry, lonely or tired.  If my body is tense, I must take a walk, or punch a pillow, or yell at God for a while.  Simple breathing exercises work best for me.  If I have given my day to God, and find I have taken it back to worry about something, I take a prayer break.  A “red light” should go on for me if I succumb to worry.  My first recourse at that point has to be to God. 

I must do whatever is required of me in my state in life.  I don’t expect God to pay my bills for me, or magically remove my health problems, or the results of years of suffering from my own sins.  But once I have done all I can do, I can safely leave the past behind me and the future to its own devices.  I will not be given tomorrow’s strength today.  I will not be given tomorrow’s peace today.  But I will lose today’s strength and today’s peace if I miss today by dwelling in the past or future.

Mother Cait talks about balance.  This is rare, I think.  I strive towards it and try to give myself a break for not being perfect.  I have a vocation to live out the charism of mercy.  I pray God that I will receive mercy and that I will pass it on.  That can only happen right here, right now.  Let me live in the now, Lord, where You dwell.

I know one thing with certainty:  I am my Beloved’s and He is mine!

The Spiritual Works of Mercy

Let us approach the spiritual works of mercy, which we are taught are:

                To admonish sinners.

                To instruct the ignorant.

                To counsel the doubtful.

                To comfort the sorrowful.

                To bear wrongs patiently.

                To forgive all injuries.

                To pray for the living and the dead.

I suggest that in the 21^st century we should consider these works globally as well as individually.  What are the global sins that should be admonished?  What systems of power and domination should be challenged that maintain people in ignorance of their beauty and their personal value, indeed of their rights as human beings?  How can we help those who are bound by doubt of their own rights and responsibilities, or by the way their wounds make them act out?

Note that we are admonished to bear wrongs patiently…where is the line between that patience and abuse?  How do we learn to forgive in a way that heals us, even if the other party does not care about forgiveness? 

Praying for the living is fairly obvious; we regularly do this and ask others to do it.  Prayer for the dead in this day and age should include the spiritually dead, and extinct species and other living things of the world. 

We are works in progress, we Christians.  We can only begin to glimpse the Kingdom during our lifetimes…let us work at the spiritual works of mercy with a view to uncovering more and more of the Kingdom within ourselves and in our world.

The Corporal Works of Mercy

Jesus told us, “Whatsoever things you do to the least of these, my brothers, you do it unto me.”  This post is about the corporal works of mercy, which are listed in the catechism as:  to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to clothe the naked, to harbor the harborless, to visit the sick, to ransom the captive, and to bury the dead.  (Matthew 25:41)

We can serve Christ in one another in these ways, thus giving out of the abundance of our love for God to any who have such needs, and thereby building up the Kingdom.  We don’t do these thing to rack up spiritual “points” in our favor.  We do them because we love one another as Christ loved us.  We do them because we get so full to bursting with the love of God that we just have to do something to share the love. 

Not everyone is physically capable of carrying out these corporal works of mercy.  There are those who are called to do them as a way of life, however, and we can support them by donations of money or in kind, to further their ministry.  And there is always the chance someone will ask us personally for help.  We do what we can with the gifts we have.

When I was young, and my brother was about seven, I was doing my homework when someone rang the doorbell.  I wasn’t paying much attention, but when I saw Steve take a couple of hot dogs to the door and come back without them I asked, “Who was that?”  He replied, “I don’t know.  Some hungry guy.  Might have been an angel.”  He just shrugged and went back to his television show.  It stuck in my mind because I remember thinking, “Wow, Mom sure taught him right.”  To a child it is a matter of a simple need being met.  If I have more than my share of the world’s goods, it is important to me as a Christian to share with those who have less.  Oddly, it is the poor who are most generous. 

If I am poor, I can share what little I have.  I can also practice the other works of mercy.  Visiting the sick or housebound is a precious gift of time we can give.  We can visit prisoners with a local chaplaincy program.  We can volunteer in a homeless shelter or soup kitchen.  We can find hundreds of ways to serve just by looking at our local church or on line. 

Doing these things makes us better people.  Doing them without blowing our own horn about it is the most valuable way of all.  My Mom used to say that if you got caught doing a good deed, it didn’t count.  I think my Mom was much more spiritual than I ever gave her credit for being.

Most of us are not called to do all of these works all of the time.  But if we pay attention, we will find the opportunities that have been sent to us….like an angel at the door who needs a couple of hot dogs.

 

Some Thoughts About Love

“Love is patient, love is kind.  It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.  Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”

            1 Cor. 13: 4-8

In other words, love is as love does.  Love is an action word.  It concerns itself with the other, not with the self.  When we are a channel of the love of God, we get out of the way and let God love through us.  In so doing, we are changed utterly. 

Loving someone may mean telling them no.  It may mean speaking truth to power.  It may be risky.  But it is our great joy as well.  It is love that keeps us going when we can’t go on.  In the end we realize it is God’s love that is and has been doing that all along. 

This kind of love is not shallow or sentimental.  It is not romantic love as the teenager would have it. It is not even erotic love.  This is the love that is stronger than death.  This is the love that throws itself into the fray with joy knowing that the battle is with powers and principalities, and will cost us everything we are.  Knowing that in dying to self, we are born to joyful life. 

Because he first loved me, I can dance in the rain, laughing at illusory fears.  Because he rescued me, I can leave it all on the field when I pass through the veil, knowing that there too, I will be available to love all in all. 

Don’t believe me?  That’s all right.  Take the actions you would take if you did believe it.  Moment by moment, day by day, you will come to see that the hard work is being done in you by the One who loves us all.  Bit by bit you will realize you have become happy, independent of all the people, places or things around you.  You will know peace.  You will become the change you would like to see in the world.  See you there!

Hope

Hope is not a momentary flicker.
Hope is Eternity's slow, steady,
Illumining and fulfilling height.

--  Sri Chinmoy

Hope, I think, is that which keeps us moving forward in spiritual darkness.  It is born of faith and fed by sacrament.  It grows with praxis and makes gentle the spirit.  Not a mere dedication to “positive thinking,” hope survives the most horrific events because faith gives meaning to life. 

Hope is that which permits us to ask, at the end of our rope, “Help me.”  Hope grows in light of the knowledge that we are loved by the Beloved.  It makes us get up one more time and try again. 

Hope is fed by love.  Love that is given by us and love that we give both nurture hope.  Hope is a great gift, best grown within one’s self by giving it away.  We can be utterly helpless and still have hope. 

Hope understands that the One Who loves loves us utterly and entirely and wants us to be happy.  Hope dances in the dark, laughing at illusory fears, knowing that with the dawn, the King is coming and all will be well.

Wolf in Sheep's Clothing

A certain Bishop of an Independent Catholic Church was in the news today because he was arrested for falsifying government papers.  Specifically, he was signing off on community service hours for probationers who would give him “hugs” of a rather intimate nature.  This same man has apparently also served federal time for mortgage fraud.    

I write of him because his web site shows a picture on its Vocations page of my own Bishop, Joseph A. Grenier, Ph.D., ordaining a woman priest of the Celtic Christian Church, of which Bp. Grenier is the Presiding Bishop.  Another priest of the CCC is also pictured.  The implication is that the CCC has something to do with the church presided over by Charles Leigh.  It does not.

I find it deeply offensive that this picture is presented on a page Mr. Leigh presumes to copyright in his own name.  It is not captioned, nor properly attributed.  It is therefore fraudulent.  There are far too many people out there who prey on the marginalized in our world. 

As a Board Member of the Celtic Christian Church, as well as a priest owing obedience to Bishop Grenier, I intend to demand that the picture be removed.  Bishop Joe is a holy and prayerful man.  The CCC cannot permit any suggestion that it is in any way associated with this wolf in sheep’s clothing.  I will pray for this man, but I will not legitimate his claims to holiness in any way, shape or form.  It is an insult to our many truly good priests, who have, by the way, passed a police background check and a psychological evaluation prior to ordination.

I delayed all day long in writing this because it so infuriated me and I do try not to speak in anger.  After praying all day and consulting my Abbess, I have decided that not to speak would be wrong.  May the High King of Heaven protect those who sincerely try to serve the People of God.  Amen.