The Heart of the Matter

Homily for Sunday, July 5, 2009

If you’ve had a chance to read my recent postings, below, you’ll know that I have been detailing the work the Pastoral Council and I have been working on, including setting the priorities of what we will work on for the future.  We have Vision-Inspired Priorities and Problem Solving Priorities and Developmental Priorities.  In light of today’s Scriptures I want to look with you at one of our Problem Solving Priorities: Create competent and confident Catholics.  What this means is that we will identify doubts and questions that separate Catholics from Christ and His Church. And we will determine and use what motivates people to be confident and competent Catholics to answer the identified doubts and questions.

            What is the issue of today’s Scriptures? It’s the prophetic role of the Church that leaves many Catholics scratching their heads, or doubtful, or even alienated from their Church.  In our Scriptures today we see that speaking the Word of God in truth is bound to upset people.   

            As inheritors of Jesus we, if we are to remain faithful to Him, are bound to experience rejection.  He spoke words that challenged the prevailing mindset of the age, and every age since.  Attempts have always been made to tame the Gospel, to compromise with the teachings of Christ, to make exceptions, and to flee from the demands of the narrow gate outlined for us in the teachings of Jesus, which are the teachings of the Church.

            Do we really think that Jesus would endorse the use of abortion, or would advocate for gay marriage, or would see unbridled greed as the way the world should work?  Do we really think that Jesus would support a culture that encourages us to seek after our own good at the expense of caring for the common good?  Do we really think that Jesus would see the world’s disregard for the poor of the world as an acceptable path for humanity?  And what about war, and capital punishment, and on and on?

            Jesus didn’t go about simply reassuring people and telling them things they wanted to hear. Neither does the Church.

            Yes, Jesus forgave sin; so does the Church in the Sacrament of Penance; but Jesus did not call sin any thing other than sin and was forever calling people to repent.

            Yes, Jesus was forever going about healing people and driving out demons; and so does the Church in every parish in the world and every office of Catholic Charities and Catholic Relief Services and in every effort to support society’s care and concern for the sick, poor and needy. But Jesus did not give a false healing for people caught in a web of faithlessness or destructive behaviors.  He delivered them from their demons and told them, “Go and do not sin again;” or “It is your faith that saves you!”

Jesus said, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, you will have no life within you.”  And, “Turn the other cheek.” And, “Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this faithless and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of when he comes in his Father's glory with the holy angels."

So, in case we are sometimes flummoxed by the Church, or by the statements that are made by the teaching authority of the Church, or by stands that Church has taken and will not let go of, then relax!  Are we embarrassed by the Church?  Then repent, let’s change our thinking.  The Church is simply being faithful to our Lord and Master who was rejected by men, ridiculed, insulted, spat upon, and crucified for the Truth that He taught.

Do we really think that His disciples should get off any easier, if we are to remain faithful to Him?

We, who are the Church, are the inheritors of the Son of Man; and we are sent into a world that is in full rebellion against our Judaeo-Christian inheritance.  We live in an age that has become hard of face and obstinate of heart, especially on matters of faith and morals. Do we really want the Church to be mealy mouthed and submissive to the tide of immorality that is sweeping our world? Or do we want us to be faithful to Christ, no matter what the cost might be?

Priorities for SHJ, Part 2

This is now my fifth posting to you describing the work of our Sacred Heart of Jesus Pastoral Council over the course of this year.

         

In my previous posting we looked at our Vision Inspired Priorities.  There are also Problem Solving Priorities and Developmental (or Organizational) Priorities that our Pastoral Council and I came to agree upon as our agenda for the coming year, and by which we will evaluate the endeavors of our parish a year from now. 

      

Now let’s look at the problems we face. One is that we need to augment our common sense of competence and confidence as Catholics, especially as our world is becoming more disengaged with God and religion.  The other problem we face is that sometimes it can feel like we have three parishes: those who attend Mass on Sunday and are English speaking; and those who attend Mass on Sundays and are Spanish speaking; and those who send their children to our school.  So, let’s see what we came up with:

Problem Solving Priorities

 

• Create competent and confident Catholics.

         

Identify doubts and questions that separate Catholics

from Christ and His Church. Determine and use what

motivates people to be confident and competent

Catholics to answer the identified doubts and

questions.

      

• One SHJ parish: English-Spanish-Church-School

             

Review successful examples of integrated

communities; assess existing barriers to unity and

parish efforts to promote unity. Prioritize next

steps in order to celebrate our unity in Christ.

Now let’s look at our Developmental (or Organizational) Priorities:

Developmental (Organizational) Priorities

  

• Harmonize parish processes with Archdiocesan processes.

Identify Archdiocese processes relevant to SHJ and

determine where SHJ is not in compliance.

Determine required changes in order to bring SHJ into

compliance.

   

• Improve facilities to be more conducive to Christian formation.

Review and evaluate the current SHJ Master Plan.

Prioritize improvements to support SHJ ministries and

to help people find God present in all SHJ facilities.

Sometimes we can have so many irons in the fire and so many aging elements of our facilities that we can not know where to begin.  With these priorities set, we can take some new leaps in being better how we serve each other.

Lastly, what are the next steps?

1. Subcommittees will be formed for each of the Priorities  
2. Each Subcommittee needs to identify specific tasks for its priority.

Tasks need to be SMART – Specific, Measurable,

Achievable, Relevant and Time-Based.

3. We need the help, wisdom and investment of all of our parishioners. In the coming months you will be notified of the specific areas for which we will be needing volunteers.

     

Please prayerfully review the priorities and see if there is one you would like work on.  Then, consider volunteering for one of the subcommittees. We need both specific expertise and a willingness to help.

Priorities for SHJ, Part 1

This is my fourth posting about the results of our Pastoral Council’s labors, specifically:

             

• Creating our Parish Purpose Statement
• Clarifying the values we want to inculcate among all of our parish groups;
• Defining the acceptable behaviors for living by these values;
• Establishing our parish priorities on which to focus in the coming months.

Yesterday we finished looking at the values we want all of our efforts to live by, and now we will look at the priorities our Pastoral Council and I came to agree upon for the coming year, and by which we will evaluate the endeavors of our parish a year from now. 

We created 6 priorities, two for each category:

  

1.       Vision Inspired Priorities

2.       Problem Solving Priorities

3.       Developmental (or Organizational) Priorities

  

We’ll look now at the Vision Inspired Priorities.  Before we look at them, think of a grasshopper, caught and put into a jar, with the lid on the jar, closing the top of the jar.  The grasshopper, which ordinarily can jump very high, but with the lid on, can only jump the height of the jar’s lid.  If you remove the lid after a few days, the grasshopper will only jump as high as if the lid were still preventing higher leaps.  When we have no vision inspired dreams, we will not leap as far as we could otherwise. So, here’s what our council’s dreams produced:

 

Vision Inspired Priorities

 

• Effective evangelization

Review existing programs, assess parish needs and

prioritize future direction by February 2010 to

provide a permeating effective evangelization.

  

• Develop a new way to fund our school

Determine annual cost and research models of

success in funding of parish schools. Identify next

steps to achieve greater accessibility for all SHJ

parishioners.

  

Quote: "We're at a point for our Catholic school system where we really need to hold on to what's a treasure. But we also need to look at new models of governance, of financing.” Sister Mary Paul McCaughey, Superintendent of Chicago Catholic Schools.

Homily for Sunday, June 21, 2009

Happy Fathers Day to all our dads. We'll have a blessing for you a little later.

Have you noticed how much we want to trust in ourselves even at the expense of common sense?  You know the old saw about how men trust more in their own internal sense of direction rather than ask for directions.  Well, it’s not just men who want to trust in themselves rather than ask for help.  We all are slow to ask for help, especially when the One we should be asking is the Lord.

            In our Gospel we see the seasoned fisherman in a state of terror as they try to cope with a storm at sea.  Surely, they know how to handle this! They have been storm tossed many, many times in their career as fishermen. And since they were so seasoned, they would have early on recognized the signs that a storm was brewing.  Just as we can tell when the sky becomes threatening, even more so would the apostles have recognized the signs. 

            Perhaps they didn’t awaken Jesus because they wanted him to get His rest.  But, men don’t think that way.  Maybe they didn’t awaken Him because they were full of confidence that “We can handle this and any storm that comes our way.”  Ah that’s much more like us men.  Only when things turn into a disaster do we call out for help.

            There is a serious theological issue here.  It’s our slowness to recognize the divinity of Jesus. 

It’s very understandable that the apostles were very slow to believe that Jesus was not only human, but divine as well. But the divinity of Jesus is the lesson for today.

We are in Chapter 4 of Mark’s Gospel.  So, by this point the apostles have already been chosen by Jesus, they have seen Jesus cure a paralytic, forgive sins, reinterpreted the true meaning of such laws of the Torah as the one about Sabbath rest, made a man’s mangled hand whole and expelled demons. They were slow to believe that Jesus is God as well as man.

            Now comes the storm at sea.  Because they did not yet grasp yet the divinity of Jesus, they didn’t think to ask for His help until it was almost too late. The boat was taking on water and was in danger of sinking.

            Isn’t that just like us? We face our own storms, our own crises, as if we can handle them ourselves.  We don’t ask for help until it’s very late in the game.  We get ourselves into terrible trouble because we leave the Lord out of our plans, our endeavors, our problems and our crises.  We try to handle things on our own.

            Like Job in the first reading.  He’s been wrestling with torment over why he, an innocent man, should have to face such suffering. It takes a long time for him to surrender enough to give in to the Lord.  In the midst of an internal storm Job encounters the Lord in such a compelling way, that he simply has to surrender to the obscure will of God.

What human being wants to surrender to trust in God while dealing with circumstances that seem impossible? Most want to fight God, or be bitter, or blame God, or desert God because: “He wasn’t there for me.” “He didn’t answer my prayers.”

What a shortcut we could take if we learned how to surrender to trust, how to be in such a close relationship with the Lord that we could call upon Him at the first sign of trouble instead of waiting until we’ve gotten desperate. What a blessing it is if we believe that the Lord is in our lives in such a daily, dynamic way, that we can begin our day asking for the Lord to nudge us into recognizing His hand at work in all the day’s events.

So, let’s today make a commitment to the Lord: if we face a crisis, let us hear Him say to us: “Why are you so terrified. Do you not yet have faith?”

Values, Part 2

This is the third posting detailing this year's results of our Pastoral Council’s labors, specifically:

• Creating our Parish Purpose Statement
• Clarifying the values we want to inculcate among all of our parish groups;
• Defining the acceptable behaviors for living by these values;
• Establishing our parish priorities on which to focus in the coming months.

In the last posting we looked at the first 2 values: Being Catholic and Inspirational.  Today we look at the other two values: Being people of Service and being Faith-filled. Here’s how we defined these values and here are the sets of behaviors we will look to inculcate in all of parish endeavors.

 

Value 3: Service – Equipping each other for every good work (2 Tim 3:17).

• Definition: Jesus came among us to serve; we are to do the same.
• Behaviors 
  • We actively form parishioners to discern their gifts in service to God and the community and to generously share those gifts. 
  • The virtue of Charity guides all our interpersonal relationships, decision making, and our actions. 
  • We create awareness of and engage in the Catholic teachings on Social Justice. 
  • We publish a monthly evaluation of parish spending relative to parish mission and goals.

Value 4: Faith-filled – So that we know the Lord, love the Lord and serve the Lord together.

• Definition: Having been given the gift of Faith in Baptism, we live in a vital and personal relationship with the living and true God.
• Behaviors 
  • We nourish our Faith through learning, prayer and participation in the Sacraments. 
  • As Saint Francis taught, we will proclaim the Gospel at all times, and if necessary use words.

Scripture: “For just as a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26)

Values, Part One

Yesterday I shared with you some of the results of our Pastoral Council’s labors, specifically our defining our Parish Purpose Statement.  In the upcoming postings I will share with you other fruits of the council’s deliberations:

• Clarifying the values we want to inculcate among all of our parish groups;
• Defining the acceptable behaviors for living by these values;
• Establishing our parish priorities on which to focus in the coming months.  

Now we look at two of the 4 values we agreed upon as the means by which to assess our progress in living by our Parish Purpose Statement. Here are the first two values and the behaviors we look for to see if these values are permeating everything we do in our parish;

 

Value 1: Catholic – Open to all in keeping with the whole.

 

• Definition: Accompanied by Christ, we are sent out by Him on a mission to the whole human race.
• Behaviors
  • We use all available means, including the latest technologies, to educate people about our Catholic faith. 
  • We celebrate and welcome all people.
  • We rejoice in our ability to provide a Catholic school to educate and inspire our young people.

Value 2: Inspirational – Living the truth in love (Eph 4:15).

 

• Definition: We are a joyous people of hope drawing all people close to Christ and His Church.
• Behaviors
  • The Eucharist is celebrated in such a way as to draw people into a greater union with God.
  • We share our stories of Faith with each other. 
  • We approach all challenges with the optimism that comes from Faith.

Scripture: “Where there is no vision, the people will perish.” (Proverbs 28:18)

Our Parish Purpose Statement

All year long our Pastoral Council has been meeting frequently and intensely to help me guide our parish in such a way that all of our parish efforts can be “on the same page.”  Together we cobbled together our Parish Purpose Statement.  This was important to do because too often the various pieces of our puzzle can be running off on their own and miss the need we have to all work together.  A purpose statement helps us discern whether or not every effort in our enterprise is helping us succeed with our purpose.  Having a clear purpose statement helps us keep our focus and helps us be the best possible stewards of our parishioners’ generosity.  Here is the statement we created:

Our parish purpose is to use our baptismal

gifts of faith, hope and charity to inspire

and serve the world so that through us

people will see that God is credible and

present in our time.

Creating this statement of our parish’s reason for being was a great challenge.  We could have simply have quoted as our purpose the Great Commission of Matthew 28: “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”  However, there are certain needs in our time that we want to emphasize as we continue to follow this Great Commission. Let me explain:

• “Use our baptismal gifts” – By the very act of our Baptism we were infused with the theological virtues of faith, hope and charity, so that everyone of us in the parish is being called upon to exercise these gifts given to us for a particular end, namely:
• “to inspire and serve the world” – Being parishioners of this parish (which is a part of the world-wide, 2000 year old Catholic Church) is not just for our own inspiration and consolation.  We are called to be Christ in the world, wherever our journey takes us. Many of us travel the world for business or pleasure.  Each of us is to exercise our Catholic faith, be an ambassador of hope, and electrify with deeds of charity whoever we come in contact with, wherever we are.  Why? This is why:
• “so that through us people will see that God is credible and present in our time” – This phrase was not one we dreamt up.  It comes from Pope Benedict XVI, who has pinpointed in this phrase the key problem of our time: that too many people no longer think of God as believable or as having anything to do with, or say to, us today. Our purpose, therefore, is to let the Lord’s grace work through us as a whole parish, and through us as individual members of this parish, to help people come to believe in God and find Him in their own lives.

In the coming postings I will share with you other fruits of the council’s deliberations:

• Clarifying the values we want to inculcate among all of our parish groups;
• Defining the acceptable behaviors for living by these values;
• Establishing our parish priorities on which to focus in the coming months.

By the way, the members of the Pastoral Council are as follows:

Neil Schiffhauer, President

James Cavanagh

Melissa Haapala

Betty Jancosek

Joe Kubler

Tommy Lorden

Catalina Mendez

Pat Palaich

Pam Jackimiec

Ex officio: Our pastor, our parish administrator and our school principal.

Corpus Christi

Corpus Christi - That's what we used to call today's solemnity, now known as the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ. It's the Catholic Church's celebration of one of the seminal doctrines of our faith, known as Transubstantiation. This scholastic word, "transubstantiation," captures a core belief we have that at the Eucharist the bread and wine become the very body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ.  In Chapter 6 of John's Gospel Jesus says, "Amen, Amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in you, . .  for my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink." (John 6: 53, 55)  Many of those who were following Jesus found this doctrine too difficult to accept and stopped following him.  He didn't stop them to tell them that they must have misunderstood him.  If they would not accept this teaching, he just let them go.

About a hundred and twenty years after the death and resurrection of Jesus, St. Justin Martyr lays out the very same belief that we have today. In describing what happens at the Eucharist in his day, he says, "We do not consume the Eucharistic bread and wine as if it were ordinary food and drink, for we have been taught that as Jesus Christ our Savior became a man of flesh and blood by the power of the Word of God, so also the food that our flesh and blood assimilates for its nourishment becomes the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus by the power of his own words contained in the prayer of thanksgiving [i.e. the Eucharistic Prayer].

About 800 years ago St. Thomas Aquinas gave the terminology for understanding this belief of ours, a belief we have held from the very "get-go" of the Church's history. He also wrote a hymn that has been a favorite ever since then.  It's the Pange Lingua.  Here is a different rendition than the more common one many are familiar with.  This one was composed by the Spaniard, Tomás Luis de Victoria (1548-1611).  Enjoy. 

">

My kind of doctor!

I don't know who wrote this, but it is a riot!  Read and enjoy.

 

Q: Doctor, I’ve heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true? 
A: Your heart is only good for so many beats, and that's it...  don't waste them on exercise. Everything wears out eventually.  Speeding up your heart will not make you live longer; that's like saying you can extend the life of your car by driving it faster.  Want to live longer?  Take a nap.  

Q: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables? 
A: You must grasp logistical efficiencies.  What does a cow eat?   Hay and corn.   And what are these?  Vegetables.  So a steak is nothing more than an efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system.   Need grain?   Eat chicken.   Beef is also a good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable).   And a pork chop can give you 100% of your recommended daily allowance of vegetable products. 

Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?  
A:  No, not at all.  Wine is made from fruit.  Brandy is distilled wine, that means they take the water out of the fruity bit so you get even more of the goodness that  way.   Beer is also made out of grain.  Bottoms   up! 

Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio? 
A: Well, if you have a body and you have fat, your ratio is one to one.  If you have two bodies, your ratio is two to one, etc. 

Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program? 
A: Can’t think of a single one, sorry.  My philosophy is: No Pain...Good!

 

Q:  Aren’t fried foods bad for you?  
A:  YOU’RE NOT LISTENING!!! .....  Foods are fried these days in vegetable oil..  In fact, they’re permeated in it.  How could getting more vegetables be bad for you?  

Q:  Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle? 
A: Definitely not! When you exercise a muscle, it gets bigger. You should only be doing sit-ups if you want a bigger stomach.  

Q:  Is chocolate bad for me?  
A:  Are you crazy? HELLO   Cocoa beans! Another vegetable!!! It's the best feel-good   food around! 

Q:  Is swimming good for your figure?  
A:  If swimming is good for your figure, explain whales to me. 

Q:  Is getting in-shape important for my lifestyle?  
A:  Hey!  'Round' is a shape!  

Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets. 

And  remember: 
'Life should  NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of  arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved  body, but rather  to skid in sideways - Chardonnay in one  hand - chocolate in  the other - body thoroughly used up,  totally worn out and   screaming 'WOO  HOO, What a  Ride'     AND.....

For those of you who watch what you eat, here's the final word on nutrition and health. It's a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.  

1. The Japanese eat very little fat
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.

2. The Mexicans eat a lot of fat
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 

3. The Chinese drink very little red wine 
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.

4. The Italians drink a lot of red wine
and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans.  

5. The Germans drink a lot of beers and eat lots of sausages and fats and suffer fewer heart attacks than Americans. 

CONCLUSION

Eat and drink what you like.

Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

For my little parish in the mountains

My little mission parish in the mountains is St. Rita's in Nederland, Colorado.  Since May 22nd is the feast of St. Rita, here is my gift to the parishioners named in her honor - a bit of her life's story:

St. Rita of Cascia (1381 – 1457) was married to Paolo Mancini, a good man though of strong and impetuous character. Their marriage was blessed with two sons, perhaps twins, and Rita’s days were soon filled with the typical concerns of wife, mother and housekeeper, while Paolo was employed as a watchman for the town. As a minor civil servant, Paolo often found himself drawn into the conflicts that existed between rival political factions, and this may account for the tragedy which eventually touched the Mancini family. One day as he was returning from work Paolo was ambushed and killed. The pain which this unexpected and violent death inflicted upon Rita was only compounded by the fear that her sons would seek to avenge their father’s death.

Her example of forgiveness, her words of instruction and pleading, her prayers for their change of heart, were unable to move the two boys to forego any act of retaliation, and so Rita entrusted the cause totally to God, asking him to handle the situation which was beyond her control. As it happened, both sons died within the year.

Now alone, Rita gave herself to works of charity and to a more intense life of prayer. Eventually the desire to enter the convent once more grew in her, but her request for entrance among the Augustinian Nuns of Cascia was refused, not once but three times. Though Rita was known to the nuns of the Monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene, her good character and religious spirit were outweighed, in the judgment of the community, by the violence that surrounded Paolo’s death. The nuns were afraid of tempting the peace of convent life, possibly because one of their members belonged to the family responsible for Paolo’s murder. But Rita felt deeply that this was the vocation to which she was called and she turned to her three patron saints to intercede for her. After the third refusal of the nuns, Rita recognized that she herself must put their fears to rest. She approached Paolo’s family as well as their rivals, and persuaded them to put an end to their hostility and to live in peace.

The example of her own forgiving spirit, no doubt, was an inspiration and - perhaps an embarrassment - to them. The families were reconciled. They signed a document to this effect, and when Rita presented the document to the nuns, they no longer had reason to refuse her. Rita Lotti Mancini now became Sister Rita.

Her feast day is May 22^nd.  For the rest of the story, click here.