We continue with the theme of Captivitytoday – but here we see the epiphany of understanding. We experience the surprise which always springs upon the faithful when they are low. We live the promise of our God who loves us relentlessly, persistently yet gently. God loves us to the extent that he is willing to wait and abide infinitely while we find our way to God’s mercy, justice and joy.
5:7 – God makes all things level. God straightens all paths. God awaits us at every turning of the road.
5:2 – God creates us, names us, calls us his own. God yearns for the intimacy God has foreseen with us.
5:5 – God sends out the universal call. God will not leave a single sheep unbidden.
5:7 – God has in mind for us a place of beauty. God has brought forth life from the desert. God also brings forth life from the desert of our lives.
Look to the east, Jerusalem! Behold the joy that comes to you from God.
God has not forgotten a single hair on our heads.
God has felt each agonizing and joyful step of our journey.
And when we arrive it is God who welcomes us home.
Even with its times of Captivity,the journey is joy. The journey is our most intimate encounter with God.
May Christ’s presence and peace dwell within you.
May God’s Spirit and love abide with you forever.
And may you continue to celebrate your return from Captivity as one of God’s own, as one of God’s called, as one of God’s well-loved Easter Children.
“God is not withdrawn, waiting for humans to come begging, but is actively seeking those who are lost.” (Senior Reading Guide 431)
Today we read three parables that speak to us about how deeply God loves us; it is important for us to hear them often.
The parable of the shepherd who leaves the flock to search for the lost sheep is also told by Matthew (18:12-14) and it presents for us a perfect image of God as we begin our Lenten journey. He sets [the sheep] on his shoulders with great joy and, upon his arrival home, he calls together his friends and neighbors and says to them, “Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.” In this season of repentance we must remain faithful to God, calling on God for help when we realize that we can go no further alone down the road of life.
Luke tells us that God will call out continually for the lost.
The Woman and the Lost CoinThe parable of the lost coin describes the persistent search the housewife makes, searching carefully until she finds it. And when she does find it, she calls together her friends and neighbors and says to them, “Rejoice with me because I have found the coin I had lost.” In this season of hope we must continue to trust that God will abide, trusting that God will answer our cries for help when the buffets of life overcome us.
Luke tells us that God will search endlessly for the lost.
Rembrandt: The Prodigal Son (detail)The parable of the lost son is one we know well and we revel in verse 20: So he got up and went home to his father. While he was still a long way off, his father caught sight if him, and was filled with compassion. He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him. In this season of repentance we must continue to confide in God, telling God all that troubles us and all that blocks our successful completion of our journey.
Luke tells us that God will always welcome home all those who were once lost.
We draw strength from Isaiah 40:28-31 in which we are told that God always persists, God never fades, God never gives up. Do you not know or have you not heard? The Lord is the eternal God, creator of the ends of the earth. God does not grow faint or grow weary, and God’s knowledge is beyond scrutiny. God gives strength to the fainting; for the weak God makes vigor abound. Though young men faint and grow weary, and youths stagger and fall, they that hope in the Lord will renew their strength, they will soar as with eagles’ wings; they will run and not grow weary, walk and not grow faint.
And so we pray . . .
Good and gracious God, how is it that you never lose patience with us when we believe we do not need you in our lives? Why is it that you love us despite all our turnings away from you? When will we begin to understand the depth and the breadth of your love?
Great and loving God, we know that for you we are pearls of great price. We understand that because of you we are temples in which you hope to dwell. We believe that you will ceaselessly call us back to you so that like the sheep, the coin and the erring child, we are never truly lost.
Thursday and Friday evenings as I stepped off the church walkway and into the darkness I realized that the night sky was not as dark as usual. The large Paschal Moonhovered over the campus, challenging the brightness of the large, artificial, man-made lamp stands. Having stayed later than most worshipers to spend a bit of extra time reflecting, I was nearly alone on the campus. And I said a small, quiet prayer to the Creator for all the gifts I so easily use that God has so lovingly given. It was a sacred moment which I wanted to hold, much as the apostles wanted to hold the beauty and fullness of The Transfiguration. We who live in a place where food and peace are aplenty have much to be grateful for. We who are called to labor in the vineyard of the one who knows us intimately have much to be faithful to. We who are so well-loved and guided in the Spirit have much to be hopeful in. God’s justice, Jesus’ compassion and the Spirit’s fidelity can be counted on. Always. This we can predict. Just as Jesus’ predicted his own passion, so too can wepredict our own struggle with loved ones, colleagues and strangers. And our own struggle to follow Christ.
Hans Suess von Kolmbach: Mary Salome and Zebedee with their sons Janes the Greater and John the Evangelist
Perhaps the Sons of Zebedeetoday give us a picture of our relationship with Jesus, or maybe we better see ourselves as their mother, Salome. Like the early friends and relatives of Jesus, we often do not see the consequences of our requests; and we are surprised and even angry at the twists and turns of fate that seem to us to be capricious gods that play havoc with our hopes and dreams. We become bogged down and may even wallow in self-pity and indignation when events and people beyond our control disrupt our plans. We see that what we had predicted for ourselves is somehow not budding, is for some reason refusing to come to fruition. We blame all sorts of people and circumstances, all the while neglecting to give thanks for the one sure thing that we can all predict with ease: we will be loved always, we will be cared for and rescued always, and we will live in eternal union with our brother, the Christ. What a great, and awesome and marvelous God we have. What a sureness. What a constancy. What a greatness. What a God!
The full Easter moon rides high across the skies during this extraordinary season of forgiveness. Its cool light breaks through the darkness, telling us of the daytime sun that bathes the opposing side of the globe. The tin-tinted orb reminds us that even when we do not feel the warmth and brilliance of Jesus he is with us anyway.
The Paschal Moon rises just as expected, just as predicted. God guides and protects us, just as expected, just as predicted. Jesus sacrifices self and rescues us, just as expected, just as predicted. The Holy Spirit abides with us and graces us, just as expected, just as predicted. Discipleship will be difficult and arduous, just as expected, just as predicted. The reward for fidelity will be greater than we have ever imagined, just as expected, just as predicted. All of this we can foretell with certainty. The events of our lives, the time and manner of our dying, the size of our income, and the number of our days we cannot. So tonight, if the sky is clear, step outside your door for just a moment to search the heavens for the Paschal Moon and remember all that has been predicted. And in the hush and quiet of that moment let us recall all that we have requested and all that we have been given. And let us pray:
Jesus dies, Jesus rises. We are saved. We are loved. And all, just as expected, just as predicted. Amen.
Happiness is found in the pursuit of our vocation as an integral part of God’s plan in God’s time. Today’s reading tells us that we are to take individual responsibility for our actions, or lack of them. We remind ourselves that so frequently we become targets of anger when we work in God’s vineyard. We also remind ourselves that Wisdom serves a double function: it helps us in our search for our place in God’s plan, and she is also our bulwark in times of fear.
From today’s MAGNIFICAT Morning Prayer: John 15:18,20: “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. No slave is greater than his master.” Disciples who follow Jesus faithfully must expect to follow him into dislike, ridicule, even persecution from those who find the Gospel threatening to their ways of thinking and acting.
Psalm 31tells us that sometimes In the face of all my foes I am a reproach, an object of scorn to my neighbors and of fear to my friends.As my Dad used to say, You know who your friends are when it’s “stand up” time.
Wisdom 2:12-14 Let us beset the just one, because he is obnoxious to us; he sets himself against our doings, reproaches us for transgressions of the law and charges us with violations of our training. He professes to have knowledge of God and styles himself a child of the Lord. To us he is censure of our thoughts; merely to see him is a hardship for us.
Jeremiah 6:25: Do not go out to the fields or walk on the roads, for the enemy has a sword, and there is terror on every side.
As we know, so often when we are doing the work we are called to do we encounter huge opposition. When we stand to witness, a wave of resistance greets us. This is when we need to rest in Wisdom.
Mother-likeshe meets and embraces us. She shelters us from the heat and dwells in our home. We can lean upon her and not fall. We can put our trust in her and not be shamed. We will find joy and gladness and everlasting name in her.
Where do we find Wisdom?
We pursue her like a scout, peep through her windows and listen at her doorways. We encamp near her house and fasten our tent pegs near her walls. We build nests in her leafage and lodge in her branches.
We learn from scripture that Wisdom comes from patient and active waiting on the word of God. When we meditate on this word, we receive the answers we seek. These answers will come in God’s time and in God’s way, but they will arrive.
So let us pray for those who would terrorize us. Let us forgive those who wish us ill and bring them with us as we ask Wisdom to open her doors to us.
And let us pray.
Psalm 31: As for me, I trust in you, Lord, I say: “You are my God. My life is in your hands, deliver me from the hands of those who hate me.”
And grant us the Wisdom to see goodness in all things and all people, just as you see goodness in each of us. Amen.
A re-post from March 4, 2012.
Cameron, Peter John. “Prayer for the Morning.” MAGNIFICAT. 11.3 (2009). Print.
“The account of a single day’s ministry of Jesus on a sabbath in and outside the synagogue of Capernaum (21-31) combines teaching and miracles of exorcism and healing. Mention is not made of the content of the teaching but on the effect of astonishment and alarm on the people. Jesus’ teaching with authority, making an absolute claim on the hearer, was in the best tradition of the ancient prophets, not of the scribes.” (Senior 69 cf. 1, 21-45)
I am thinking of these two words that appear in opposition to one another: astonishment and alarm.
Jesus comes to each of each day; but in this season of Lent he comes to us in a special way. He urges us to come away from the temptation to be discouraged with our constant slipping into separation from him. We are to not regard these times as failures, but rather as opportunities to be healed. In a continual cycle of forgetting, regretting followed by an epiphany of self-awareness, we draw ever closer to the compassionate mercy with which we are loved by Christ. In this way we receive God’s fullness.
From MAGNIFICAT this morning: Receiving God’s word with a willing heart and returning it to him in prayer and praise is a work of Lenten transformation.We indicate to God that we have heard his voice, heard the Christ, by thanking him, by witnessing for him as best we can, and by telling the good stories about all he has done for us. This may be astonishing news to us. It may also be alarming when we think of all this implies, that we are called to greatness, we are called to our divinity. This is the promise of the season.
When we read this clipped and quick story by Mark, we might be tempted to run through these verses hurriedly; yet perhaps the impact of these words is all the sharper for their brevity.
The people were astonished at his teaching, for he taught as one having authority and not as the scribes.
This is wonderful news; yet it can be alarming. If we are so loved by such a one, are we ready to live up to this promise? This duality of amazement and apprehension pulls us into an intense and deep self-awareness, one into which we might not otherwise enter if it were not for this soul piercing encounter with God. We err, yet still we are loved. In our astonishment and alarm, we move forward in hopeful expectation, just like the people of Capernaum two millennia ago.
From the MAGNIFICAT evening prayer: Answer us, Lord our God!
Your love is unfailing: may our trust in you not fail us. Answer us, Lord our God!
Your mercy is boundless: may our hope in your forgiveness grow. Answer us, Lord our God!
Your desire for our salvation knows no limit: may our willingness to repent and be converted deepen through this season. Answer us, Lord our God!
When we call, the answer from our God is, as always, yes!
A re-post from March 3, 2012.
Senior, Donald, ed. THE CATHOLIC STUDY BIBLE. New York, Oxford University Press, 1990.69. Print.
A number of months ago we looked at Ezekiel 2 and focused on the image of the scroll. Today as we watch Jesus’ triumphant entrance into Jerusalem we look at just a few of the verses. From the Jerusalem Bible: The[y] are defiant and obstinate; I am sending them to you to say, “The Lord Yahweh says this.” Whether they listen or not, this set of rebels shall know there is a prophet among them. And you, son of man, do not be afraid of them, do not be afraid when they say, “There are thorns all around you scorpions under you.” There is no need to be afraid either of their words or of their looks, for they are a set of rebels. You must deliver my words to them whether they listen or not, for they are a set of rebels.Jesus knows that he is about to settle into the thorns; he is aware that scorpions lie in wait; yet he goes willingly to do as the Father asks.
In today’s reading from Philippians (2:6-11) Paul describes for us Jesus’ manner before God. Perhaps when we spend some time reflecting on these verses we will be better able to do as God asks. We know that this obedience will lead us from time to time to sit among thorns and be surrounded by scorpions; yet we obey as Jesus obeys, knowing that we are led and loved by God.
And so we pray . . .
Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped . . .
If Christ himself does not try to supersede the creator, why do we?
If Christ himself does as the Father asks, why cannot we?
He emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness . . .
If Christ empties himself so that the Spirit may enter, why cannot we?
If Christ enslaves himself to the will of God, how might we?
Found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross . . .
If Christ humbles himself and bows to the creator, when can we humble ourselves as well?
If Christ obeys unto death, even death on a cross, when do we?
Because of this, God greatly exalted him.
If Christ settles into thorns to sit among the scorpions, why don’t we also?
If Christ calls us to follow even into the thorns and among the scorpions, why don’t we go?
What do we fear when we know that we are led and loved by God?
Let us place our cloaks on the ground to make a passage way for Christ. When Palm Sunday arrives, let us take up the fronds of palm to wave them in joy. And let us follow the one who leads and loves so well – even knowing that we go among the thorns and the scorpions. Amen.
Carl Bloch: Christ Healing at the Pool of Bethsaida
If ever we are in doubt as to how to serve as a role model when in community, Paul’s letters to Timothy are a mine of wealth. Regarding slavery, the rights of women and children, and respect due to non-heterosexuals, we understand the thinking of the times. We take all of this in its ancient context and shift it to the twenty-first century, adding all that has been revealed to us over the millennia about these topics. Despite the change in science and understanding, this is still good advice for us to consider, and it is the only way to build community – the only way to build Christ’s kingdom.
Call everyone to unity through diversity.
Remove contempt and profanity from our thinking.
Walk away from silly myths.
Demonstrate trustworthiness by our actions.
Express respect for all in everything we think, do and say.
Persevere, work on ourselves, mark progress.
Nurture the gift of self that we bring to the world.
Paul advises Timothy that the best way to form and build community is by persisting in performing these simple tasks which come together in such a big way. We are to look for the joy which awaits, usually hidden in some conflict.
This all reminds me of a verse from today’s Gospel (John 5:1-16) when Jesus asks the crippled man at the pool of Bethesda: Do you want to be well? Despite the fact that Jesus knows all our unspoken thoughts, he asks this man if he wishes to be new? This particular man replies in the affirmative, and he is healed. This having happened on a Sabbath, this man must work to defend his cure. This causes conflict. Usually, as Paul tells Timothy, celebration is accompanied by grief, and this is something we must expect; however, our sorrow may turn into dancing if we follow the advice given to Timothy. This is often difficult to understand.
Do you want to be well?Jesus asks us this frequently, yet are we prepared to take up our mat and walk, despite the pain? We, like Timothy with Paul and like the man in today’s Gospel, are free to answer either yes or no.
Do you want to be well?Paul calls Timothy to ask this question of his fledging congregation, despite the conflict.
Do you want to be well?We are likewise called to ask this question of one another, to seek common ground amidst our differences and look for unity, despite the barriers.
Do you want to be well?We are called to rise to this challenge, despite the fact that we often wish to wallow for awhile in our tears.
Today we pray: Paul describes to Timothy and to us how we might allow God to enter our lives in order that we become a beacon for the community. When we hear Christ’s voice how will we reply to his call?
Do we want to be well? Let us shed our paralysis and persist in outrageous dreams and hopes.
Do we want to be well? Let us transform our addictions and self-satisfaction through the fire of the conflicts we are willing to share.
Do we want to be well? Let us redeem broken promises with forgiveness.
Do we want to be well?Let us turn from our idols to the one true God.
Do we want to be well?Let us be willing to allow God to exchange our sorrow for joy.
Do we want to be well? Yes!
Amen.
Adapted from a reflection posted on March 26, 2019.
The faithful will always have a priest willing to intercede for them. Today we read about Aaron who intercedes as a spiritual leader for the Israelites; every day we have Jesus who intercedes for us in all that we petition.
Bridge-building is important to a Christian community for without the lifelines that we toss out to connect ourselves to one another, we run the risk of sinking into oblivion. Just as camel caravans link the living water and sheltering palms of desert oases, we reach out to one another so that we do not become stranded in the lonely desert parts of life. We must celebrate life where we find it, and build bridges to call together the limbs of Christ’s Mystical Body.
Forgiveness – both the asking and the granting – is the essential construction material that we will need for these Jesus bridges. There is no one among us who has not needed to ask and to give forgiveness and so we pray.
The world is rent asunder by our refusal to forgive, we pray: Bring us, Lord, your perspective of hope.
For the hardness of heart we have shown toward those we have hurt, we pray: Bring us, Lord, your openness of heart.
For the breaches in relationships we have allowed to live and grow, we pray: Bring us, Lord, your depth of wisdom.
For the resentments we have accumulated, we pray: Bring us, Lord, your counsel and courage.
If the Lord rescues me from the snare of my faults, should I not extend the same hand of rescue to my neighbor? Resentment, grudges, retaliation do not help the one who offends me. They merely confirm the breach between us. Bridge-building is costly, as the cross demonstrates, but the people stranded on both banks are all freed by the bridge.
These prayers and thoughts are adapted from yesterday’s MAGNIFICAT, and as always, when I think about bridge-building, I am aware that there is a difference – although small – between pardoning behavior and allowing abuse to continue. There is a reality that exists in bridge-building that comes into being when we empower people – they are freed from a former unhealthy behavior that has stunted growth and dried up life. When we enable people to continue in an unhealthy behavior, we become part of the problem. When we gently confront people, we set into place the pillars of the bridge.
When we allow Christ to show us what tool to use next, what material to bring out of storage for use as the struts and cables of the bridge, we begin to make links, we will see that we are building a bride that will last for all time. We will also see that it is a bridge of and to salvation.
This work does not happen without physical and spiritual exertion; but when we have the Master as our project planner, the work becomes less arduous and less frightening.
When we find ourselves stranded in a small, backwater oases, looking through the burning sun in the day and the cold darkness of night, waiting for something to appear on the horizon, we will know that it is time for bridge-building. Let as ask the Master Planner to intercede for us. Now. Today. And all days.
Adapted from a Favorite written on March 18, 2009.
Cameron, Peter John. “Prayer for the Morning.” MAGNIFICAT. 3.17 (2009). Print.
The Noontimes 