I need to be more generous

I have received so many material blessings that it is easy to become very selfish. What can you do for me? There are so many suffering people out there who have no one to look after them. open my eyes to them. Force me to notice their plight, to not turn my back on them.

A very blessed man am I

Last Thursday February 2 Supper at a family's home. Friday Supper and cards with a family Saturday Supper and KU basketball with a family Sunday Soup Supper with a family and a board game Today, Monday, lunch with a parishioner, paid for by another person and tonight a surprise meal.

The gift of Celibacy

St. Paul speaks about the benefits of celibacy in 1 Corinthians 6. He says the unmarried man is concerned with the pleasing the Lord. This is the primary benefit of forsaking the natural right to marriage. If celibacy makes you more selfish then it is a failure and a corruption of the purpose of human life. A single or celibate person who lives merely as a bachelor focused on his own needs quickly becomes a burden to others and most of all to himself. I would say that marriage is a safer way to the true gift of self. You have a spouse and children whose needs are obvious and trump your own selfish desires. We are made to give ourselves as a gift. It is only when we do this that we can find our true fulfillment. The person who embraces and accepts the unmarried state can make great advances in their prayer life. Fasting makes us stronger spiritually. So if a person joyfully accepts the state of fasting then he or she has access to spiritual resources that are not normally available. The fruit of this is that you come to see all people as your brother and sister. Looking first to God for your spiritual nourishment you do not have to take anything from your neighbor. This gives you great joy and freedom in your friendships, and it allows the person to show mercy and compassion. These good qualities are not impossible for the married person, but their concern is naturally for the good of the their family.

Sloth's offspring

Another bad thing about sloth is that in place of the movement towards Christ the soul then has to move toward something else. If I am not responding to God's grace then I am probably going to respond to some other false and temporary good. So once sloth is in place then greed, lust, gluttony, and a host of other distractions present themselves as ways to alleviate the dispondance(sp?) of the soul. Priests, and others, often complain of being burnt out. An incisive response is that one must have been on fire first in order to become burnt out. If I am burnt out it is probably that I have been seeking something other than the Kingdom of God. Sure I might be doing "holy" things for the Church and the people, but what is the source of my activity and work? Sloth cuts us off from grace and reality. Then we make ourselves busy with all sorts of things in order to avoid the presence of God. This activity can be often an escape from God, and eventually the soul becomes starved. Where is the joy? Where is the peace? The deception is to seek peace and joy in other place than in the heart of Christ.

New Year

Last Sunday I gave a sermon about the Deadly Sin of Sloth. This sin is essentially an avoidance of the grace that God wants to bestow on the soul. It seems to me that this fault comes from pride and fear. Out of pride I do not want to acknowledge that I need to engage with reality outside of me, that I do not need God. Out of fear I do want to go to the place that God is leading me. Holiness means getting outside of my current place of comfort. Holiness means suffering. The blessedness of the beatitudes strikes fear into my heart. This blessedness means living of a wholly different reality. Yes there is the promise of joy and fulfillment with each beatitude, but Sloth lays on my shoulders as a chain preventing movement towards this blessedness.

Celebrating Mass for the first time

Last Saturday we celebrated the Roman Rite with the revised translation for the first time. I had been practicing a little bit for a couple of weeks, but right before Mass I felt my heart racing. During Mass since then I have felt like I did when I was newly ordained. Hopefully this will restore in me a renewed sense of awe and reverence for the Mass. How does this feel to all of you in the pews? As a priest, I sometimes forget what it is like to attend mass for the people. So, what is your experience of the Mass over the last couple of days.

Funeral

Yesterday, Tuesday November 22, I concelebrated the funeral Mass of Mother Mary of the Angels. The sisters had to rearrange their chapel so that they could maintain their cloister, and welcome the 50 people who came to the funeral. Fr. Edmond Kline, their chaplain, gave a great sermon. At the end of the Mass the people had to leave so that we could carry her body outside and to the burial plot. Only priests are allowed into the cloister, so we had the privilege of carrying the casket through the gate and to the place of burial. It had rained the night before, so the ground was very wet. With every step we took we became a little bit taller as we collected mud on the bottom of our shoes. Mother is the first sister to have died, and her plot is the first on their property. There is no grass, there is no fence. It was bare earth with a hole in the ground. After the prayers we lowered the casket into the ground with ropes, and then we had to leave quickly. We were in the cloister as an exception to the rule, for this special occasion. We left the sisters there next to the grave of their mother. She had taken a vow of poverty many years before, so death took her body, but she had already given everything away a long time ago. She began to draw close to Jesus a long time ago, and death allowed her to realize the union for she has longed. For me, this experience is a reminder to get rid of those things that hold me back from Jesus. I pray for her soul, and when she enters heaven I ask her to pray for me.