Lent Is Not About Weight Loss: Homily for Ash Wednesday 2023

 Fasting, ashes, and sackcloth have signified sorrow, mourning, penitence, atonement, and humility since the Book of Genesis.   We read in the Bible’s opening book how, when Jacob was told that Joseph had been killed by a wild animal he "tore his garments, put sackcloth on his loins, and mourned his son for many days."  In Jonah we learn how, when the prophet proclaimed that which was to befall Nineveh, the people . . . proclaimed a fast  "and all of them, great and small,  put on sackcloth . . . and the king sat in ashes."  And, as we will hear in Sunday's gospel, Jesus fasted for forty days in the wilderness. Only at the end of that time did the evil spirit tempt him. 

 

We are not called to fasting and penance for the sake of fasting and penance.  Fasting is not meant to be its own goal.  If undertaken without the desire for interior conversion or divorced from prayer it is nothing more than Weight Watchers without the points or Oprah's exhortations.  We read in Isaiah:  "This is the fast I desire . . . to unlock the chains of wickedness . . .to let the oppressed go free . . . to share your bread with the hungry . . .  and not to ignore your own kin."  

 

Lent’s fasting, prayer, and alms giving must be accompanied by inner conversion.  In his book God or Nothing  Robert Cardinal Sarah of Guinea wrote: "The relief we must bring to the poor and to afflicted people is not just material but spiritual."  He goes on to quote Pope Francis' exhortation Evangelii Gaudium "I want to say, with regret, that the worst discrimination which the poor suffer is the lack of spiritual care."

 

One proof of that discrimination was obvious in the sins committed by hospital administrators, nursing home administrators, public health officials, and many others, and medical amateurs who forced the critically ill and dying elderly to die alone, terrified, uncomforted by the presence of even one family member at the bedside. How many were deprived of confession, absolution, and last rites for no good reason.  Hysteria and health care do not mix well.  As was true of the prophets before Him,  Jesus' call to conversion and penance is not to be seen only in outward signs such as ashes, sackcloth, and fasting.  

 

All three are hypocritical when divorced from interior conversion, when they are nothing more than a form of virtue signaling.  Lent is not meant to be a season of 'give ups.' It is more important that it be a time for taking on. Taking on extra time for, prayer, reading the gospel, or contemplation.  The time required need not be dramatic.  Ten or fifteen extra minutes are perfectly adequate in the context of overly busy lives.  Our ability and desire to care for others, our willingness to attend to the needs of others, can only grow from prayer and meditation on scripture.  

 

As the late Jesuit Father Stanley Marrow wrote in his commentary on John's Gospel:  ". . . loving with utmost generosity and utter selflessness, even to laying down of one’s life, is not uniquely Christian.  What distinguishes, or must distinguish, Christians is:  when they love, they love as Christ loved them and because he loved them."  

 

Before washing your face tonight look at the smudge of ashes on your forehead, no matter how faint it has become. Ask what it means to you.  What does it mean for the next forty days. And then pray the words of the responsorial psalm, the great Miserere.

 

"A clean heart create for me, O God,
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.  

Cast me not out from your presence 

and your Holy Spirit take not from me.”

Indeed, reciting this psalm—Psalms 51—daily  

for the next forty days

would be a most excellent Lenten practice

that would yield much fruit. 

 

O Lord, open my lips

and my mouth shall declare your praise."

__________________________________

The photo is from several years ago on Ash Wednesday at Campion Center in Weston, MA.

A Homily for Physicians at the University of Chicago

 Sirach 15:15-20

 

Many of the novels, memoirs, and scripts written about the world of  physicians, illness, and medicine are schlock.  A small few, however, accurately capture the unvarnished reality of the demands, sacrifices, and pain that are part of a vocation to medicine.  Among this small number is a novel with particular relevance today as the covid pandemic appears to be on the wane.  It is relevant to all of us who have had to cope with the biological, psychological, social and spiritual crises emerging from the covid pandemic.  Written seventy-six years ago it seems prophetic when read in the light of contemporary events. 

 

Albert Camus’ novel, The Plague, should be required reading for anyone studying medicine, practicing medicine, or working in any form of ministry, vocations in which one must confront the most vexing problem in the universe, since Adam and Eve discovered Abel’s lifeless body.

 

Dr. Rieux, the book’s narrator, identified the mysterious infection spreading through Oran as bubonic plague. He approached it courageously and with unflinching commitment to his patients despite his own personal pain. In a scene midway through the book Rieux is speaking with Tarrou, an enigmatic character who became a friend.   

At the end of the long conversation that cannot be summarized easily one reads: 

 

“Tarrou, who was staring at the floor suddenly said, ‘Who taught you all this Doctor?’   

 

The reply came promptly, ‘Suffering.’”

 

If we allow it,--and it is much too easy to run from it--suffering teaches the physician, 

the priest, the patient, and all others. But, it takes time, demands courage, and requires a willingness to recognize and endure one’s own pain, feelings of impotence, and rage, so as to help the one who suffers. None of us, physician, priest, nor anyone else,  

emerges unchanged from the confrontation with suffering, our own suffering and, most particularly, the suffering of our patients in whatever form they experience it.  With time we learn the truth described by Aeschylus, 

 

“He who learns must suffer, 

and, even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget 

falls drop by drop upon the heart, 

and in our own despair, against our will, 

comes wisdom to us 

by the awful grace of God.”

 

Benedictine Basil Cardinal Hume, the late Archbishop of Westminster, England was the son of a physician.  He accurately described the vocational overlap between priest and physician in a short meditation: 

 

“The doctor and the priest have much in common.  Both are concerned with people and their well-being. Our starting points are different but inevitably we discover that our interest converges.  The experience of people tells us, priest and physician, that many are still bewildered, indeed haunted, by the perennial problems of pain, suffering, and death.”  

 

So it was for the characters limned by Camus, and so it is for all of us today as we struggle with the same perennial problems in the aftermath of covid.  

 

Jesuit Father Ned Cassem was Chief of Psychiatry at the Massachusetts General Hospital for thirteen years.  He was the consummate physician. As he had been ill for several years his death on July 4, 2015 was not so much a shock, as it was an opportunity to remember and reflect on the wisdom he imparted through lecture and example. 

 

He was a man with tremendous empathy for, and sensitivity to, the suffering of others, 

Fortunately, throughout his career Ned kept reflections, meditations, and notes in journals as well as on random pieces of paper jammed into file drawers,  The day after his death Barbara McManus, his long-time administrative assistant, thought to email several pages of Ned’s reflections in case I wanted them for the funeral homily.  One page was titled CREED.  Three tenets of creed flesh out Hume’s writing as if Ned were writing midrash: 

 

"As clinicians our responsibility is to always protect the patient."

 

"The secret of care for the patient is caring for the patient."

 

"The core of the doctor's healing role is loving the patient as the doctor loves himself."

 

Cardinal Hume’s wisdom and Father Cassem’s insights  reflect the reading from the Book of Sirach, 

 

“If you choose you can keep the commandments, they will save you.”  

 

“Before man are life and death, good and evil, whichever he chooses shall be given him.”  

 

“No one does God command to act unjustly, to none does he give license to sin.” 

 

Every physician is presented with the option to sin, the option to destroy life that should not be destroyed, and the ability to desecrate and mutilate the human body—surgically, endocrinologically, and psychiatrically—in ways and for reasons unimagined in the past.  

 

In December the Massachusetts Supreme Court once again rejected legalization of physician-assisted suicide.  It was not the first time the ban was upheld.  Unfortunately, there will be other attempts to normalize the planned and intentional killing of the sick and elderly. 

 

We all experience, however fleetingly,  the thought of killing a suffering patient during our careers. Not all thoughts, however, should be put into action. Robert Twycross founder of Sir Michael Sobel House, a hospice in Oxford, England.  strenuously opposed euthanasia.  He wrote: “Any physician who has never considered killing a suffering patient is either very new to the profession or singularly lacking in empathy.” He then went on to explain why what is now being euphemistically called physician-prescribed death must not be an option for us.  

 

Both priests and physicians suffer in concert with the patient, it cannot and must not be otherwise, unless, as suggested by Dr. Twycross they are totally devoid of empathy. Each must confront  the awful and angry one-word protest  “WHY?” A protest raised by the patient as well.  Each may nurture the desire to end the perceived meaninglessness STAT. Each looks toward the heavens and screams that same WHY? But the answer never comes. The answer never will come.   As physicians we can only slog away, trying to diminish suffering as much as we can, in whatever manner we can,  and when we can, patient by individual patient.  

 

In his 1984 encyclical, Salvifici Doloris St. John Paul II wrote that: “(suffering)  is a universal theme that accompanies man at every point on earth: . . . it co-exists with him in the world, and thus demands to be constantly reconsidered.”  He went on: “Man suffers in different ways, ways not always considered by medicine, . . . Suffering . . .  is wider than sickness, more complex . . . more deeply rooted in humanity itself. A certain idea of this problem comes to us from the distinction between physical suffering and moral suffering.”  Camus outlined and elaborated on that distinction throughout his novel in ways too complex to summarize.  

 

Neither physician nor priest can answer the WHY? of suffering but each is obliged 

to offer understanding and care rather than death to the one who suffers, each is obliged to share in the patient’s burden in whatever way possible.  Hippocrates’ classic injunction is succinct:  “To cure sometimes, to relieve often, to comfort always.” The ministerial and medical interlace at “to comfort.”   

 

Just as the plague in Oran was being declared over and just before the city gates were set to open, Tarrou died of an atypical presentation of plague. Rather than send his friend to the hospital upon the appearance of the first symptoms, and knowing the inevitable outcome if it truly were plague, Rieux, with the help of his mother, kept him in his own home. The description of Tarrou’s death is a very difficult part of the book to read.  In just a few words, Camus summarized the suffering that accompanies physicians throughout their lives, the suffering that returns,  even deep into retirement, when memories arise unbidden.   He wrote: “The doctor could not tell if Tarrou had found peace, now that all was over, but for himself he had a feeling that no peace was possible to him henceforth, any more than there can be an armistice for a mother bereaved of her son or for a man who buries his friend.”

Midway through a conversation with my consultation fellowship director a few weeks before he dropped me off at the novitiate in Boston, Jesuit Psychiatrist George B. Murray asked “What’s my favorite prayer?”  I admitted I had no idea.  He spun the chair around, reached into a file drawer, and pulled out a wrinkled paper.  It was my first exposure to a prayer that I would come to say daily.  

 

The Prayer for Generosity attributed to St. Ignatius of Loyola is a fitting and necessary prayer for physician, priest, and indeed, anyone in health care. 

 

O Lord, teach me to be generous

To serve you as you deserve

To give and not to count the cost

To fight and not to heed the wounds

To toil and not to seek for rest 

To labor and not to ask for reward

Save that of knowing I do your holy will

____________________________________________________

Gave this at the University of Chicago to physicians and med students.  It was a good experience.  Got to catch up with friends while there.  Just back this AM and crashed.  Thus the late post.  

Fr. Jack, SJ, MD

Salt of the Earth: Homily for the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time

 Is 58:7-10

Ps 112:4-5, 6-7, 8-9

1 Cor 2:1-5

Mt 5:13-16

 

Something important is missing from the first reading.  That something is the first six verses of Isaiah chapter 58.  It is unfortunate because those verses put the reading into its proper context and reminds us that human nature and human behavior have not improved over the millennia since Isaiah was written.  

 

The prophet denounced the people  in the missing verses not because they had adopted pagan customs but because they enacted religious practices, such as fasting, prayer, and penance, insincerely without true conversion of heart.  They were in fact hypocrites.

 

The Jewish Study Bible comments on the first six verses of the chapter by noting  the people observed rituals such as fasting not out of true devotion but for their own benefit.  People prayed for divine intervention in their quarrels against each other rather than praying for others.'  Isaiah denounced the people because they fasted and did penances so as to manipulate God into giving them what they wanted. The reading only makes sense if one knows the first six verses  because, after criticizing the people Isaiah instructs them on proper action.  

 

Fasting does not mean starving one's body.  That's dieting or anorexia.  True fasting means sharing what one has with others and thus having less for oneself.  Humility is not bragging about one's inadequacies.  True humility means quietly doing what needs to be done without a public show of it.

 

"You are the salt of the earth.  But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned?"  Jesus' image of 'the salt of the earth' is part of common English usage.  It is a compliment to the person described as such.  It means a good or worthy person, a person who places the needs of others first.  Describing someone as salt of the earth implies actions free of underhanded dealings or shady behaviors that mostly benefit oneself. 

 

Salt is critical to life. It preserves food, and adds exquisite flavor to it.  Indeed, without salt some foods are inedible.  Unsalted pretzels are an abomination and unsalted potato chips violate basic laws of the universe.  But add a few grains of salt and flavor explodes.  Salt’s importance to the normal functioning of the human body can never be overestimated.

 

The second part of Jesus' saying about salt is not easy to interpret.  "If salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned?"  How can salt lose its taste?  

 

Thanks to my maternal grandmother I pondered that point until my mid-20s when I got the answer.  Grandma came to dinner every Sunday.  Almost every week she would announce,  "They don't make salt as salty as they used to." That didn't make sense to my sixteen year-old mind, though I didn't know why. 

 

Flash forward to my fifty year-old self helping my eighty-three year-old mom make dinner.  "You didn't add enough salt to the mashed potatoes.  And remember, they don't make it as salty as they used to."  (OK, count to ten.  She is your mother).  By then I’d had thirty-five years of medical training  behind me. Her complaint about lack of saltiness made sense, not because the anonymous "they" or the Morton family had messed with salt.  She had changed. 

 

Salt does not lose its flavor, unless it is cut with something or not enough is added in the first place.  Aging changes our ability to perceive or taste saltiness. Salt is as salty as its always has been. However, with age, especially after seventy-five, the tongue is less able to detect and taste salt. What seems to be salted just right to an 85 year-old may be experienced as a salt lick by a 30 year-old.

 

Just as salt cannot lose its flavor unless something is done to cut it putting a light under a basket, makes no sense. In telling us, "your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father."  Jesus reinforced Isaiah's instruction, "If you remove from your midst oppression, false accusation and malicious speech; if you bestow your bread on the hungry and satisfy the afflicted; then light shall rise for you in the darkness, and the gloom shall become for you like midday."

 

Jesus said, "I am the light of the world . . . whoever follows me will have the light of life."  Our vocation is to have that light and reflect it to the world, not through what we say but through what we do and how we do it. Jesus, light of the world, and true salt of the earth, guides, preserves, purifies and protects us, just as salt preserves food and protects it from contamination, just as light shows us the way.  We cannot afford to lose our taste for the salt that is the Word of God or to allow it to diminish as we age.  

 

Ultimately, we pray with St. Paul, 'that our faith might rest not on human wisdom 

but on the power of God.' 

_____________________________________

Photography allows a degree of being whimsical when desired.  I took these in Sevenhill, South  Australia during the tertianship long retreat.  One of the best experiences in the Society.  

Fr. Jack, SJ, MD

Blessed Are They Who . . . Homily for the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Zep 2:3, 3:12-13

Ps 146:6-7,8-9, 9-10

1 Cor 1:26-31

Mt 5:1-12a

 

Sometimes the only response to the editors of the lectionary, the book of  readings and gospels for every day of the year, is why?  What is the rationale for editorial decision that cut out the middle of a particular text and change its meaning? Today's first reading is a case in point. 

 

The reading from Zephaniah is not continuous.  The editors joined chapter 2 verse 3 to chapter 3 verses 12 and 13.  The result is consoling.  It is almost idyllic.  That is the problem.  The twenty-three deleted verses comprise a long list of prophecies of doom, death, destruction and punishment.  Only when much of the world is destroyed do we hear of the protected remnant, only then do we learn of the promised consolation.  Peace doesn’t just happen.  It is preceded by turmoil and strife.  

 

Peace and comfort preceded by turmoil and chaos  is an accurate description of life as we live it, of life as it was lived during the writer's time, and of life as it will always be lived. Turmoil followed by consolation.  One hopes post-covid consolation gets here soon. 

 

Psalm 146, the responsorial, is the first of the five hymns that bring the magnificent Book of Psalms to an end.  Psalms 146 to 150 are unlike anything 

that precedes them.  Nothing follows them.  We do not hear "Why, O Lord?" 

We do not hear  “How long O God, how long?” or “Out of the Depths I Cry to You.” The last five psalms are songs given to praise.  

 

Each begins and ends with Hallelujah: Praise the Lord; the Lord who keeps faith forever, who gives sight to the blind and who sustains the widow; the Lord who promises that those who mourn shall be comforted . . . . 

This, after 145 psalms lamenting the past and praying for a better future. Psalm 146 prepares us for the Gospel. 

 

One challenge when preaching on Matthew's Beatitudes is the common misperception that the beatitudes are the entire Sermon on the Mount.  They are not.  They are only part of  a very long and wide-ranging teaching.  The beatitudes are as ambiguous as anything ever written. 

 

They have been used and misused, interpreted and misinterpreted, updated and bowdlerized to push social agendas by both the left and the right.   One can justify almost anything through skillful use of words and concepts in relation to the beatitudes. . . . With one exception.  

 

The exception is the beatitude that is mostly ignored by preachers, activists, and social revolution types. “Blessed are they who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” 

 

Poverty, peace, hunger, and persecution are headline grabbers. They offer a chance to mount the political soapbox, or politicize the pulpit,   so as to rail, rant, or speak in bumper sticker language.  They are an opportunity for inflammatory and passionate sermons in the manner of Elmer Gantry.

 

Mourning does not garner headlines.  Grieving doesn't make it to the front page 

unless the ridiculous concept called "closure" is included somewhere in the story.  

Mourning doesn't get headlines because it is personal, private, and solitary. 

 

Those who are mourning make those who are not uncomfortable.  People are poor together.  Groups suffer injustice.  Persecution is systematic.  Mourning is solitary. Mourning is solitary even when the loss is shared.  No two people grieve in the same way, even for the death of the same person.  

 

Those who do not mourn will say or do anything to push aside the pain the other is experiencing.  "There, there, you'll get closure real soon.  Let's go out for dinner and a movie.  It’ll help you get there." 

 

Mourning is among  the most lonely and isolating of human experiences.  While most people who hear the words mourning or grief will ask “Who died?,” mourning and grief are triggered by any loss:  The loss of friend through death,  

the loss of a spouse or parent through Alzheimer’s disease, the loss of independence upon moving from home into a nursing home. The loss of one's driver's license can trigger severe mourning given the secondary losses a sudden inability to drive. 

 

Grief and mourning can be triggered by the loss of a part of oneself,  either a physical loss such as a breast or a limb, or a more abstract loss such as retirement or one’s health.  

 

The difficulty with mourning and grieving is that no one can do the work of mourning for another. There are no substitutions or pinch-hitters allowed. 

Oftentimes attempts to comfort those who mourn fall somewhere between clumsy and damaging.  

 

There is no rallying cry for those who mourn.  There is no social justice solution for mourning.  There is no preferential option for those who mourn.  There is no answer except compassion and willingness to listen on the part of the other.

 

Mourning is the great leveler. It brings both peasants and dictators 

to their knees in pain, rage, fear, and sorrow.  It sets off  deep hunger in the one who can barely afford bread as well as the obese celebrity chef  on TV.  

 

Those who mourn do not know peace.  Unlike the poor or persecuted who can be challenged to act there is nothing for those who mourn except to hope for comfort while trying to get from day to day. Those who mourn are alone. Those who weep in sorrow are isolated from the rest of society.  

 

No writer ever described grief and  mourning as effectively as C.S. Lewis  when he wrote the opening sentence of A Grief Observed, the small journal he kept 

after his wife’s death from bone cancer .

 

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.  

I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid.  

The same fluttering in the stomach, 

the same restlessness, the yawning.  

I keep on swallowing.”

 

Lonely.  Hungry.  Isolated.  Overwhelmed.  

 

Blessed are they who mourn. 

May they be comforted. 

______________________________________________________

The photos are from Loyola, Spain in the summer of 2019.  I presented two talks at the conference on Ignatian Spirituality.  Loyola is almost visually overwhelming.  

Shape, pattern, shadow, and texture are among the characteristics is look for, particularly in black and white.  This fulfilled all criteria. 

The stained glass in this particular chapel is non-figurative, composed of irregular shapes of blue, purple, and magenta.  The sun splashed the walls with color. 

A delicate blossom.  Amazingn how a camera can capture such details so quickly. 

See texture, shape, and so on criteria.  Nothing like the weather to create beauty. 

I took multiple shots of the roses growing  adjacent to this wall. 

The Basilica

Mass.  I chose not to concelebrate.  

+ Fr. Jack, SJ, MD

There Never Was a Golden Age: Homily for the 3rd Sunday of Ordinary Time

Is 8:23-9:3

Ps 27:1,4,13-14

1 Cor 1:10-13,17

Mt 4:12-23

 

In its introductory essay to the Book of Isaiah, the Jewish Study Bible notes: 

"Isaiah is perhaps the best-loved of the prophetic books.  It is cited more than any other prophetic text in rabbinic literature."  The same is true of the importance of Isaiah for the Catholic Church.  

 

There are questions. Was Isaiah speaking of Christ?  Was he speaking of someone or something else entirely?  Biblical scholars are all over the place on the answer. Agreement is unlikely.    

 

The same introductory essay explains two important things about Isaiah. The first his name.  Semitic names often consisted of sentences that described God; In Hebrew the name Isaiah means "The Lord saves." Secondly, it clarifies why the reading we just heard was in the past tense.  Recall:

 

"The people who have walked in darkness, 

have seen a great light; . . . 

 

You have brought them abundant joy . . . ."  

 

The use of the past tense in prophecies is an example of the  "the prophetic past tense."  The prophetic past predicts future events using the past tense to signify that those events are already as good as done.  The prophetic past tense

is rooted in the faith and hope that what we ask of the Lord and what the Lord has promised, is as good as done, even if the present is not as we would want it to be, even if the present bears no resemblance to what God has promised.  

 

Paul was unhappy with the Corinthians when he wrote in response to reports about abuses in the Church at Corinth.  He addressed those abuses in the first six chapters of his letter. They included: divisions among the faithful, a case of incest, lawsuits among Christians, and sins against chastity.  Apparently, the more things change, the more they stay the same.

 

"I urge you . . . in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that . . . you agree in what you say . . . that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose."  Paul is not suggesting that Christians cannot disagree on earthly affairs:  say politics, covid vaccinations, or the merits of the Patriots vs. the Jets.  

 

Paul is referring to the unity of Church teaching and the belief of her members.  He is decrying the divisive sectarianism that today is oftentimes driven

by idiosyncratic attempts to fashion a Jesus who fits the speaker’s or group’s desires and personal agenda. The letter is an important corrective to myths of a golden age of agreement and concord even in the earliest days of the Church

and the unrealistic, if not delusional possibility, of agreement and concord in the future. 

 

Jesus’ call  “Come follow me”  seems simple on the surface. It is terrifying in its implications.

 

In his Dictionary of Biblical Theology Jesuit scholar Xavier Leon-Dufour writes:  "A calling supposes a change in being. . . . God's call catches a man at his ordinary work, interrupts him in the midst of his friends, and involves him in a project known to God alone."  

 

Think about it. There they were, Peter, Andrew, James and John, hauling in the nets, perhaps grumbling about the catch or the weather. Their backs were sore. 

Their fingers ached. They were cold and wet.  And then they heard Jesus words: 

“Come follow me.  And I will make you fishers of men.”  

 

That last is not a very specific job description either for them or for us today. When we heed Jesus' summons we enter into an open-ended project without much of a description.  But through this call to follow Him Jesus surrounded himself first, with the apostles and then with other disciples, Some accepted immediately and without equivocation.  Some rejected the call for the flimsiest of reasons. Others initially followed but then said “I’m outta’ here.”  

 

To be called by Jesus is to be called into His mission.  That mission is mediated and supported by the Church  It is not supported or helped by the feelings of the cafeteria Catholic who picks and chooses what he or she will believe while rejecting other dogma, the type who may invoke vague generalities about Jesus and love to push an agenda but assert, “I really can't get into that Real Presence stuff.” The type who will rationalize the meaning of thou shalt not kill. 

 

The call to follow Jesus does not mean insisting, in the manner of the former speaker of the house, that I am a good Catholic on one hand while proselytizing abortion on the other, the same former speaker who hysterically protested the recently passed Born-Alive Act that ensures that infants born alive following an attempted abortion receive the same protection of law and same degree of care as any newborn, rather than having the execution completed  outside the womb.

 

March for Life two days ago on Friday—the 50^th since Roe—was a needed reminder of how far we have to go before life, particularly vulnerable life at its very beginning in the womb and at the very end in old age, is protected from premature and intentional termination.  Alas, a 51^st march will be necessary next year.

 

Paul’s letter reminds us that the Church is not perfect.  It never was and never will be perfect.  It is, after all, made up entirely of sinners from top to bottom. However, it is what has come down through two millennia by preaching the salvation found in Jesus, the same Jesus who is present in the midst of the assembly, who is found in the words of Scripture, the same Jesus whose Real Presence in the Eucharist is a gift offered to us daily. 

 

We heard in the psalm:

"One thing I ask of the Lord, this I seek: 

to dwell in the house of the Lord

all the days of my life, 

that I may gaze on the loveliness of the Lord

and contemplate his Temple"

 

Sit with that prayer. Meditate on its those images. They will yield much fruit. 
  

____________________________________________________

After finishing tertianship in Australia I had the opportunity to visit Vietnam for ten days.  Indeed, I turned 62 in My Tho in the Mekong Delta not too terribly far from Saigon.  It was a remarkable and, in some ways, transformative experience.  The heat and humidity were killers.  I was a bit concerned about the camera but I had no problems.  The photos below were taken along to coast south of My Tho at what I think was Go Cong beach.  

At low tide the distance from shore to waterline was enormous.  

Scanenging for mussels at low tide.  I had instant flashbacks to picking mushrooms in the woods with m dad as a child.  

The colorful fishing boats alone made having the camera a blessing.  Don't know when the tide was to come in but they were going nowhere at the moment.  

More of the fishing boats

It was a Saturday.  I assume school was in half-session.  As soon as he saw my camera this young boy began mugging for it.  Wonder how tall he is now?  What is he doing? 

This was at my place at breakfast on birthday morning.  Fr. John and I concelebrated Mass for the sisters at 5:30 AM.  It was relatively cool then. 

A "monkey bridge."  Note, I crossed first. which was the only way to get this shot. 

Only drivers have to wear helmets in Vietnam. 

Today is lunar New Year.  Have a good one. 

+ Fr Jack, SJ, MD

What Kings? Homily for the Feast of Epiphany

 Is 60:1-6

Ps 72:1-2, 7-8, 10-13

Eph 3:2-3a, 5-6

Mt 2:1-12

 

One of the challenges to getting through the Christmas season is the amount of sickly sweet imagery that clings to the celebration of Jesus' birth.  These challenges include images of a toddler-sized newborn and depictions of Mary dressed in blue and white watered silk 

encrusted with pearls and rhinestones. Morbidly obese Santas, reindeer, and elf cards are beneath contempt. Overall, the images imposed on Jesus' birth are frequently painful and embarrassing.  Much too often we hear about "The Magic of Christmas" or how "Christmas is for Children."  

 

Christmas is not a holiday for children.  

Christmas is a holy day for all peoples of the world.

 

Christmas is not magic. It is not a panacea for sorrow.  No one is required to be happy at Christmas.  Too often the sorrowful, the dying, and those who are struggling with the realities of life,  are told that if they surrender to the magic of Christmas they will feel better.  Families, friends and neighbors of those grieving the death of another 

oftentimes insist that a large dinner at someone else’s house will make all cares disappear, or, at the very least, begin the pseudo-psychological non-existent process called closure.  Unfortunately,  

Epiphany is not exempt from the gooey sweetness.  

 

Epiphany derives from the Greek:  epi:  forth and pheinein: to show.  

Thus Epiphany:  to show forth.  Among the dictionary definitions one finds, "a sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something, . . .a sudden intuitive realization."  An intuitive realization of Jesus as Messiah is the perfect description of this feast. But, then there is the problem of "the kings."  

 

The word "kings" does not appear in Matthew's Gospel.  Those who bore the gifts are called magi.  Some translations use wise men.  No matter the translation, they were not monarchs. The word kings did not come into use until the sixth century.  

 

Matthew used the plural but did not give a number. There could have been as few as two or many more than three.   Because the gifts were described as gold, frankincense, and myrrh, tradition holds that there were three magi.  Despite the custom of Kasper, Melchior, and Balthazar their names are not included in scripture. 

 

In the end, the number of magi, their names, and their kingly or non-kingly status, are irrelevant distractions to understanding epiphany. The true significance of the magi is their journey, their pilgrimage in search of Jesus.  

 

Pope Benedict XVI described the significance of that journey:

 

“The journey of the wise men…is just the beginning of a great procession that continues throughout history. With the Magi, humanity’s pilgrimage to Jesus Christ begins. It is a journey toward God who was born in a stable, who died on the Cross and who, having risen from the dead, remains with us always, until the end of the world.” 

  

The Magi are important not because they brought symbolic gifts 

of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. They are important because they were the first Gentiles to worship Jesus.  They were the first Gentiles 

to recognize Jesus.  That epiphany, that moment of recognition

was not exclusive then nor is it exclusive now.

 

We will hear of more epiphanies in the cycle of readings throughout the year. There will be many epiphanies scattered throughout our own lives if we are willing to notice them. The true meaning of Jesus’ incarnation and birth is found in a verse in today's Gospel. 

 

"When King Herod heard of this he was greatly troubled and all Jerusalem with him."  

 

Herod's jealousy and the duplicity underlying his conversation with the magi gets closer to the reality of Christmas than do the lyrics of  "O Little Town of Bethlehem"   or "We Three Kings of Orient Are." 

We see the first shadow of the cross in Herod's  jealousy and evil desires. We see the path from Bethlehem to Calvary in Herod's malevolence. "Go and search diligently for the child.  When you have found him, bring me word, that I too may go and do him homage."  This, from a crazed cruel megalomaniac. 

 

The first reading from Isaiah assured Jerusalem that the glory of the Lord would shine upon her.  In the context of Isaiah’s prophecy, the reading from Ephesians is consoling because it assures the Gentiles 

that they are included in the promise, that they are part of a new covenant.  We are reminded of that daily in the words of consecration 

that you will hear in a few minutes: 

 

"This is the chalice of my Blood, 

the Blood of the new and eternal covenant 

which will be poured out for you and for many 

for the forgiveness of sins."  

 

"poured out for you and for many." 

 

Once we wash away the treacle, once the sloppy sentimentality is discarded, once the word magic is forever disassociated from Christmas, we can begin to understand its true meaning.  Once we get rid of all the gooey stuff we can begin to understand that what we call the  "Christmas story" did not end when the magi returned home, 

wherever that might have been.  It does not end when the tree is kicked to the curbon December 26 or, at the latest, January 2.

 

Dag Hammarskjold, the second secretary general of the U.N., was murdered in 1961 while on his way to what was then Northern Rhodesia.  A small journal discovered in his apartment after his death  

has been in continuous print since it was published under the title: Markings.

 

A number of the later entries are haiku, the Japanese poetic form 

limited to twelve words totaling seventeen syllables.  One haiku captures the true meaning of Christmas. There is nothing gooey, sticky, or treacly about it.  There is no magic in it. It does not suggest a celebration of food, booze and consumer insanity.  It has nothing to do with a holiday. It has everything to do with a holy day.

 

"On Christmas Eve 

Good Friday was foretold them 

in a trumpet fanfare."

 

We cannot and must not separate the wood of the manger from the wood of the cross.  Neither event was magical.

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The photos below are black and white reworkings of some taken in Bašlej, Slovnia at a mountain farm.  All were taken in the span of a few hours on the same day.  

Fr. Jack, SJ, MD