Tag: <span>Hope</span>

June 10, 2021June 9, 2021

The Veil

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Today’s psalm tells us, “The glory of the Lord will dwell in our land,” and, “Near indeed is his salvation to those who fear him.”

The utter fullness of God’s might and glory is near indeed, just a breath away from us. But, as St. Paul tells us in the first reading, it is veiled to most people–but not to those who choose God’s path, and thus live in the Spirit.

It is veiled to those destined to perish, Paul tells us; thus, the glory of the Lord is veiled to those who choose not to strive to fulfill God’s challenging demands. They live in continual spiritual darkness.

Conveniently, in today’s gospel Jesus gives an example of just how challenging those demands can be. God does not tolerate angry name-calling or ongoing resentment toward neighbor, for He cherishes charity and unity.

This is what living up to God’s challenges means: It means a daily intimate prayer life, and striving to cooperate with Him in an effort to displace the center of our objectives from ourselves to others. Quite a challenge; quite an undertaking.

But the reward is incalculable. Even in this life, the veil is partially removed, and we sense God’s immediate closeness, His guidance, His love, and a we receive a small foretaste of the joy that eternal life with Him will bring.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Tell Jesus that you choose Him with all your heart. Ask Him to come and transform the focus of your life from your own earthly needs to the needs of others. Tell Him how daunting this challenge is for you, and ask Him to take charge.

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June 2, 2021May 27, 2021

One Bride for Seven Brothers

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Who knew: There are two passages about seven men marrying the same wife in sequence, each dying in his turn. And they’re both found in today’s liturgy.

Love between a man and a woman is considered by many the height of happiness. In both of today’s readings, though, there is a lesson to be learned about the fleeting and unreliable nature of what humans tend to rely on for happiness. In the first reading, poor Sarah’s husbands keep dying immediately upon wedding her, and in the gospel, the Sadducees cite a hypothetical example of a woman marrying seven men in sequence.

In both readings, we see that the ultimate bringer of reliable happiness is God. In the first reading, God remedies Sarah’s plight after she moves from despair into hope and prays to Him; and in the gospel, the source of eternal happiness in the resurrection from the dead is God.

Still, we must not divorce our view of God’s Providence from the ordinary realities of life. We are body and spirit, and God cares for us lovingly in both. Sometimes we suffer, but even this suffering is curated caringly by God, for those who trust in Him.

And He often manifests His providential love in simple details in everyday life: Unexpected blessings, positive outcomes.

Perfect trust involves detachment from any particular gift or outcome, and at the same time, certainty that God will ultimately bring about the best possible outcome.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to transform your life such that it is led by perfect trust. Aware that you cannot trust this way yourself, ask Him with confidence for the gift.

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May 25, 2021May 11, 2021

Hundredfold

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

If we strive to live the Christian life sincerely, with all our hearts, without compromises, we align our lives to the teachings of the first reading. It tells us to give freely to God, without holding back; to make sacrifices to Him out of the full generosity of our hearts. This can mean restraining the impulses within us that could lead us to sin, or fasting at appropriate times, or striving to give cheerfully to our neighbor when we least feel like it.

It is a good way to live, but it can be exhausting. Sometimes, in the midst of the beatings this world deals out to us, it can seem that we just don’t have anything left to give.

It is thus well to remember that this isn’t the whole story: Giving to God freely, out of gratitude for all we have been given. The other part of the story comes to us in today’s gospel, which offers us a great promise: That those of us who give everything for the Gospel will receive back thirty, fifty, a hundredfold in this life, and eternal life as well.

We don’t yet understand what the eternal portion of this promise will be like, for, as St. Paul tells us, “What eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and what has not entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love him.” (cf. 1 Cor. 2:9)

But the hundredfold on earth: This comes from God’s providential curation of every moment of our lives. God would love to curate everyone’s life this way, but when people recede from Him, He respects their freedom. He still gives them good things, “for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.” But He does not take up the management of their path in the same way that He does for those that fully, freely, and completely give their paths to Him. And His management of one’s path, and all that befalls one, brings the utmost of fulfillment and joy.

While He allows suffering to impact these beloved disciples of His, He uses that suffering, along with countless tender acts of the most personal and attentive love, to build their overall peace and happiness. Indeed, a hundredfold in a sense is an understatement, for no fraction of the interior happiness that God concedes to the heart given over to Him is attainable to those who withhold from Him.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Tell Jesus that your whole heart is His, and that you want with all your heart only the happiness that He can give. Tell Him that you trust Him, that if He leads you through the dark valley, He does so to bring that much more happiness, to you yourself as well as those you love.

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May 22, 2021May 10, 2021

Happy in House Arrest

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

In a sense, Paul would have every right to be frustrated with his life. He was imprisoned in Jerusalem, and wound up having to appeal his case all the way to Rome. When he was sent to Rome for the appeal, he wound up under house arrest for a full two years. This, all at the urging, not of the Romans, but of his brother Jews. His own countrymen and brothers in the Jewish faith were urging for him to be put to death. And the effect on his ministry was real: He was severely limited geographically for an extended period, with consequent drastic limitation to the reach of his message.

But the first reading presents his situation in a tone that shows that this is all just “part of the story.” It even portrays his reality in a positive light: “He remained for two full years in his lodgings. He received all who came to him, and with complete assurance and without hindrance he proclaimed the Kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Because of the positive tones of the whole book of Acts, we can superficially think that everything was easy, exciting, productive, successful in the nascent Church. But in reality, it was setback after setback after setback. What made for the positive outlook, then? Simply this: The apostles saw everything–logical and random, helps and hindrances–everything as coming from the hand of God for the furthering of His Kingdom. In their eyes, He was the author, the protagonist, and the driver; they, merely the willing vehicles of His grace.

In today’s gospel, we see Peter curious about the fate of John the Evangelist. As Peter went out and fed Jesus’ sheep, and ultimately died for Him, what would happen to John? Jesus essentially responded that it was none of Peter’s business. But it was more than an admonition not to be overly curious about others. When He said, “What if I want him to remain until I come? What concern is it of yours?”, Jesus was also affirming that the circumstances of the mission are not what matters–but rather fulfillment of God’s will, that is, a continuous “yes” to God. God takes care of the rest.

Filled with a sense of the power of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, the early apostles were filled with joy and optimism. What difficult circumstances are you enduring right now? With that same sense of Jesus’ sovereign power, are you able to be similarly optimistic?

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to fill you with joy and optimism in the most bewildering and difficult of circumstances, certain that He is curating with tender care every aspect of your life–the life you have given to Him freely to care for.

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April 21, 2021April 1, 2021

A Duality

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

From the beginning, the story of the Christian Church has been an interplay between the operation of the Holy Spirit for the transformation of the souls of believers, and persecution in various forms from those who do not want to center their lives on Christ.

In today’s first reading, that full duality plays out: A severe persecution of the Church breaks out in Jerusalem; as the disciples scatter throughout the countryside, rather than hunkering down and slowly disappearing, they bring many more to believe in Christ.

In our Christian effort to create in the world a just society in line with the principles of the Gospel, we often can become so idealistic that we forget that this duality of conversion and persecution is willed by God; it is His plan for history. We should not shy away from the persecution side of the equation, because the other side of that coin is the effectiveness of the Holy Spirit in bringing souls to Himself, as He has for all ages of the Church.

Jesus did not come with the objective of winning every single heart on earth to Himself, but rather those who would freely accept Him.

But in today’s gospel, He makes a beautiful pledge to those who do accept Him:

And this is the will of the one who sent me,
that I should not lose anything of what he gave me,
but that I should raise it on the last day.
For this is the will of my Father,
that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him
may have eternal life,
and I shall raise him on the last day.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Tell Jesus that you accept Him with your whole heart, unconditionally, and ask Him to work through you the transformation in souls that He worked through the apostles, in the midst of glorious conversions and of persecutions.

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April 7, 2021March 18, 2021

Anticipation

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

There is something beautiful and exciting about anticipation.

Peter told the cripple in today’s first reading, “Look at us.” The man looked at them, full of excited anticipation, thinking that he was going to receive alms, perhaps something generous, given Peter’s response to him. What he received exceeded his wildest expectations–he immediately experienced strength in his limbs, and the ability to walk. He was fully cured.

It is interesting to note that the man did not expect this. In the gospels, the people whom Jesus cures seem always to expect it, to see it coming. To cure is a native trait, as it were, of Jesus. It is simply something that He does; in a sense, something that He is.

Not so for the disciples. They are mere creatures, with the same human limitations that we all endure. But the Holy Spirit gives them the divine power to accomplish what He asks of them, when He asks it of them. It is a borrowed power, in a sense; not native. But this is what makes our role as Christians, with all our humanity and limitations, particularly exciting. God will not hesitate to “lend” us the power, not to do what we think good, but to do specifically what He asks of us through promptings of the Holy Spirit.

Indeed, there is something beautiful and exciting about anticipation. We see it in today’s gospel, too. As Jesus explains the fulfillment of the Scriptures in the life of the Messiah, the disciples feel a burning excitement of anticipation. They don’t know what’s coming. But they can sense it is something spectacular having to do with Jesus. Even when He is revealed to them in the breaking of the bread, they are left in a state of excited anticipation, as He is immediately removed from their presence, in the most mysterious way.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to fill you with the joy, not of glorious enjoyment, but of anticipation that comes with the Resurrection. Ask Him to apply that excitement to everything that forms part of your life, the highs and the lows–all of which are filled with the promise of your own resurrection from death, and opportunity to offer your life for the resurrection to life of your fellow humans.

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April 6, 2021March 18, 2021

Are We There Yet?

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

The Resurrection of Jesus is beautifully mysterious. In its monumental power, it holds an air of great expectancy: There is an “already” aspect to it, and a “not yet” aspect.

The “already” aspect can be seen empirically in today’s gospel; Jesus has clearly “already” risen. And yet, the “not yet” aspect is there too. “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father.” It’s as though Jesus’ earthly resurrected embodiment is just a way station on the path to the definitive glory He will enter, and which we will one day enjoy with Him.

We see this dichotomy likewise in the first reading. The power of the resurrected Christ is “already” present, leading to the conversion and baptism of three thousand persons in a day. And yet, what the apostles are “selling,” so to speak, is described as a “promise,” not as a “fulfillment” in the here and now.

Because of the “not yet” element, the Resurrection, perhaps like few other mysteries, provides us with the opportunity of a glorious faith and hope. Even though there will be no joy like definitive possession of God, there is also a special pleasure in the anticipation we can enjoy as we await the full revelation of the Resurrection in which we believe.

Heightening this anticipation is another mystery that we see in today’s gospel: Mary at first does not recognize Jesus, just like the two disciples on their way to Emmaus in another passage. Jesus is Jesus, He is real, He can eat and be touched…but there is something gloriously different about Him, which the Gospel does not fully describe to us.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to fill your heart with the joy of hope, even though you do not yet experience the full joy of eternal revelation.

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April 4, 2021March 17, 2021

Quiet Night

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

The Cross was loud; the Resurrection, silent.

The Cross was public; the Resurrection, private.

And yet the Cross was weakness; the Resurrection, strength.

The Cross was impotence; the Resurrection, power.

“My Kingdom is not of this world,” said Christ to Pilate on Good Friday.

The power of His Resurrection came to bear in this world, but there were few witnesses in this world, and those there were, immediately fainted to unconsciousness.

And after the Resurrection, as St. Peter says in the first reading, God “granted that he be visible, not to all the people, but to us,” His intimate friends.

Understand, Christian, that however much joy God may give you in this life, He is jealously guarding the full manifestation of His glory and your glorious destiny for eternity where, as St. Paul says in today’s second reading, “your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Easter will be a day of disappointment if we expect all our earthly problems and sufferings to go away. For us, it is a day of hope, not of fulfillment. Thank Jesus for dying and rising from the dead for you. Tell Him you do not expect fulfillment now, but that you exult in the hope that He has given you this day: hope that you will one day imbibe the fullness of His glory.

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March 17, 2021March 17, 2021

Remember Death

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

In many respects, Christianity is an earthy religion, staring the less savory aspects of human existence straight in the face.

One of these realities is death. “Memento mori” is a Christian expression dating back into the mists of time: “Remember [your] death.” It is a fitting expression for meditation during Lent. At our death, all the pleasures we have heaped upon ourselves will be for nothing; all the praises of men, mere vanity. “You have lived on earth in luxury and pleasure; you have fattened your hearts for the day of slaughter,” says St. James in the fifth chapter of his letter. This is quite an image: To the extent that we focus our lives on passing pleasures and vanities, we fatten ourselves for the slaughter of eternal condemnation.

We should remember our death, not in fear, but in hope. Christianity is able to face death because death does not destroy the source of the Christian’s joy.

In today’s gospel, Jesus faces death head on. He associates the essence of His work with and for His Father with the calling of the dead to life.

Consider in passing how His enemies were so deaf to His message, that they did not pick up on this key lesson for their lives, but rather only on the claim that inflamed their envy: The claim that God was Jesus’ Father.

Just as occurred with the envious Pharisees, in our smug modern time, when the travails of life have been beaten back a bit by medical advancement and technology, there can be a vain, academic tendency to reduce all Jesus’ words to allegory and metaphor, to read into them too much out of mere academic curiosity.

But when speaking about the resurrection, Jesus was not sitting in some ivory tower classroom in the halls of academia, pontificating vainly about overcoming our little challenges in life and assuaging our psychological boo boos.

He was talking about real death–the kind that comes to us all, putting our bodies six feet underground as food for maggots. And He was talking about resurrection, real resurrection, from that death.

And in similarly plain language, He makes it clear that some rise to life, and some to condemnation–the latter, those who have “fattened their hearts for the day of slaughter.”

Memento mori. Remember death. It comes soon; live with an eye to ensuring resurrection to life, for yourself and as many others as possible.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Imagine the stage of your own death. Maybe quietly in your bed at home, maybe in a hospital bed, maybe in an accident–one way or another, one moment you are here, and the next, you are standing before the Lord, rising either to life or to condemnation. As you look at yourself there, beg Jesus to protect you in His mercy and Providence from sin, and ask Him to make your life fruitful according to His wishes for the salvation of others.

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February 17, 2021February 2, 2021

Even Now

This is a reflection on the Mass readings of the day.

Lent strikes us as a dreary time, and with good reason. We make sacrifices, spend more time in prayer, and give more alms to the poor–none of this is fun.

So, we would expect today’s readings to tell us essentially to buck up, to brace ourselves, to jump into the cold water of sacrifice and purification.

The first reading, however, which is all about fasting and repenting, is full of joy. It would appear, even, that the weeping mentioned is not driven by sorrow, but rather the people are weeping out of relief and hope.

“Even now, says the LORD, return to me with your whole heart,” is how the first reading begins. Even now. The people have been procrastinating that return. The context of the reading suggests that they are thinking they may be too late to repent. But the prophet assures them that it is not too late. Even now, if they turn back to Him, God will have mercy on them.

We are weak human beings, full of sinfulness and selfishness. Like Judas, we have sold Jesus for thirty pieces of silver–we have chosen sin over Him for some silly, passing satisfaction that makes no sense in the greater scheme of things.

Yet even now, at whatever age we find ourselves, even if our prior attempts at conversion have been half-hearted, even now, He is waiting to forgive us and transform us, if we return to Him with all our heart.

Lent is not a dreary season. It is another chance, even now, to convert our hearts fully to the Lord.

Ideas for conversation with the Lord: Ask Jesus to help you to take advantage of this Lent, every single day of it. Ask Him to show you your sins and give you a repentant heart. Tell Him that you want Him in your life above every single other priority, and that He has carte blanche to manage your life as He sees fit–even if this means that you will go through some suffering for your own good and that of others.

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