I saw this little incident on the bus the other day as I was returning from an errand. 

As I climb up the steep steps onto the bus, I immediately see this tiny lady, easily ninety years old, sitting in the first seat right behind the driver. In front of her is a four wheel upright shopping cart filled with all sorts of things.

Since I’m walking with my cane, I’m happy to plop myself into an empty seat nearby. After a few blocks we come to the bus stop at the corner of Broad and Market, and she gets to her feet and, pushing her cart in front of her, she makes her way slowly past the driver and stops at the edge of the steep steps.

Then the next thing I know she is starting to step backwards down the steps toward the street, leaving her cart at the top step, but holding onto it. Although I get the impression that she has done this many times before, this is starting to look like a potential disaster. She reaches up and starts to tug at her shopping cart. I feel helpless because I am in no physical condition to go over and help her.

Suddenly, a young passenger in his twenties steps forward. Putting both hands on the cart, he says something to the old woman as she continues to back down the steps holding on to it.

Here is where it gets interesting The more she holds on and tries to help, the less able the fellow is to be of any help to her.

Then she seems to realize that at this point she is better off letting him take the whole thing, and so she lets go. The young man then lifts the cart easily, as if it weighs nothing, and carries it down and places it gently on the sidewalk in front of the woman.

It was one of those lovely little moments that warms the hearts of everyone on the bus or waiting to get on. The Kingdom breaks in on us when we least expect it.

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In a few minutes the bus drops me off at the corner near the monastery in time for Midday Prayer. Right after that I have to celebrate the 12:15 mass. The gospel passage is Matthew 11:28-30, which begins:

“Come to me all who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”

As I proclaim these verses, the image of the old lady and her shopping cart comes to mind. And I remember the lesson that the woman learned: The fellow who was trying to help her with her burden couldn’t really do much for her until she let go of it.

I suppose I'm like that too. When I bring my troubles and burdens to Jesus I have to let go of them myself. It doesn’t do for me to come to Him with my problems but then still try to hold onto them.

Let's face it: It's hard to simply let go of these things and and entrust them to the Lord. Do I really believe that the Lord can lift these things from me as easily as that young man on the bus lifted that cart so easily down onto the street?

Jesus invites us in this gospel verse to hand over all of our problems to Him and let Him worry about them. That is such a beautiful offer, isn’t it? 

Yet I always have such a hard time letting go!

Not Yet!

My hour has not yet come

In the last sentence of this past Friday’s gospel passage, St. John tells us that the crowd in Jerusalem could not attack Jesus “because His hour had not yet come.”

He uses that phrase a couple of times in his gospel. First, we remember the scene at Cana when his mother asks him to solve the problem of the wine running out, and he explains “my hour has not yet come.”

Then, in verses skipped in the editing of Friday’s passage, from John Chapter 7, when “his brothers” encourage him to go up to Jerusalem, he replies “my time is not yet here;” and in the following verse he explains to them “I am not going up to this feast, because my time has not yet been fulfilled.” 

And then the verse in Friday’s gospel, “no one laid a hand upon him, because his hour had not yet come.”

In each of these passages, the same word shows up in the original Greek: oupo, a very common adverb meaning: “not yet.” 

As ordinary as the word  oupo, “not yet” may be, it is crucially important in all the passages we just heard: To say that the hour has NOT YET arrived indicates that eventually the hour WILL arrive.

It implies that Jesus' life is following the plan, but as of yet not all the stages of that plan have occurred. But they will. Christ’s earthly life is following a trajectory, heading in a single direction: it has significance, it has meaning.

And if that’s the case, then we who have Christ living in us and who are living in Christ, we are also living out that plan, following that same trajectory. This is especially important for you and me to remember when things are going badly. In times of pain and hopelessness we can hold onto that little word  oupo , “not yet,” that assures us that no matter what things may look like, our lives are heading in a certain meaningful direction, and therefore, everything in our lives has meaning, even and especially the seemingly bad parts.

Father, the hour has come

At the last supper, Jesus says, “Father, the hour has come, glorify, your son.” It is in his suffering and death that he finally reaches the hour, his goal: the Glory of the father. And we who have suffered with him will one day be glorified with him as well.

Each year during Holy Week and Easter, we celebrate the “hour,”  we remind ourselves how the story turns out:  Christ’s passion and death are oupo, not yet the end of the story. We know that the Easter mystery does not end on Good Friday: we live in the assurance that Sunday is coming.

The idea of oupo, “not yet” disappears early on Easter morning, when Christ is finally raised to a new life, and then in the ascension is brought to the fullness of glory at his Father's right hand. 

And we who are still suffering here in this vale of tears are on our way to join him there. It's just that our own hour of glory has not yet come. 

A final thought: Lots of times when when it seems that "God didn't answer your prayer," the Lord did in fact give an answer to your request -- the answer was oupo. 

Oupo -- Not yet!

WAIT! I HAVE A PLAN!

Authors of "thrillers" love to use this sort of crucial turning point in the plot: 

The four friends are exploring a deep, dark cavern armed only with knapsacks, flashlights and canteens. Suddenly  there's an earthquake that causes the surrounding tunnels to collapse. The four are safe for the moment in this large room; but after a thorough search reveals no exit tunnels they realize that they're hopelessly trapped. [Skip the dialogue here and the closeups of terrified faces, and cut to the scene some time later as all are lying around the floor of the cave, each lost in his or her own thoughts] 

Suddenly our hero stands up and starts rummaging through his knapsack.

"What are you doing?" a sleepy voice asks. Without looking up, he announces in a businesslike tone,

"I have a plan!"

"I HAVE A PLAN"

Dr. King's famous words "I have a dream" continue to inspire millions of people around the world, including me. But there's something just as thrilling when in the midst of a situation from which there seems to be no escape, and everyone has given up hope, the hero confidently announces, "I have a plan." Yes! Just when it seems that all is lost, the plot takes on a whole new dynamism, a fresh start. The story can now proceed -- and with a more interesting story line.

Today so many people rely solely on their senses and rational thinking to find the meaning in their lives. Unfortunately, the really important things such as the ultimate meaning and purpose of our existence don't show up on any measuring devices, and escape the entire array of  marvelous detectors in the physics lab. Speaking of physics labs, our Fr. Mark Payne, O.S.B., who died six years ago today, used to have a  sign posted in his physics lab:

"If you cannot measure it, it's not physics.

If you can measure it, it's not ultimately important"

Searching for answers in Surfside

There's the problem in a nutshell: We are are made for meaning, we want and need to know the ultimate significance of things, the gist, the plot of the story, of our story. When certain folks tell us that there is nothing beyond our material world, that there is therefore no larger plot, no gist, no ultimate meaning, we may be able to live with that for awhile, provided we can stop our minds from asking the very questions it needs most to ask. But when the roof of the cavern caves in, or the condo collapses, or you're told that you have COVID, your mind just naturally kicks back in and asks "Why?" 

Of course, people of faith know that in situations of suffering and catastrophe, we don't usually get nice clean answers when we ask "Why?" But the first reading in today’s mass (Genesis Ch. 50) assigned for July 10, shows Joseph in Egypt revealing his identity to his brothers who many years ago had sold him into slavery. The brothers are now worried that Joseph will avenge himself on them. Here’s the dialog. The brothers start pleading with Joseph:

"Please, therefore, forgive the crime that we,

Joseph forgives his brothers

 the servants of your father’s God, committed.”

When they spoke these words to him, Joseph broke into tears.

Then his brothers proceeded to fling themselves down before him and said, “Let us be your slaves!” But Joseph replied to them:“Have no fear.  Can I take the place of God? Even though you meant harm to me, God meant it for good, to achieve his present end, the survival of many people. Therefore have no fear. I will provide for you and for your children.”

Joseph clearly had figured out that the terrible experiences of being sold into slavery by members of his own family had some deeper meaning. "Even though you meant harm to me, God meant it for good,
to achieve his present end, the survival of many people." His attitude of trusting that God's loving plan was at work in his life is a gift that all of us pray for. 

Joseph, however, received a truly rare gift: a sense of what God's plan actually was.(Namely, "the survival of many people"). Most of have to walk by faith and not by sight, taking it on faith that in God's overall loving plan for the world, everything, including suffering and evil ultimately works for the good in the end. 

I'm sure that Jesus must have a special, warm place in his heart for people who are so overwhelmed by grief or anger that they cannot see how God could allow such a terrible thing to happen and consequently they no longer believe in God, and look someplace else for meaning.

Meanwhile, as we pray for people who see no meaning in their lives, we should also praise and thank the Lord for allowing us to believe his consoling voice when it whispers to us, "Do not be afraid: I have a plan!"  

Photo from Hubble telescope: A star "swarm" by the One with the Plan

NO SURPRISES, PLEASE!

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This past Thursday the lectionary invited us to reflect on this well-known episode on Jesus' life:

Jesus came to his native place and taught the people in their synagogue.

They were astonished and said,

“Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds?

Is he not the carpenter’s son?

Is not his mother named Mary

and his brothers James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas?

Are not his sisters all with us?

Where did this man get all this?”

And they took offense at him. (Mt 13:54-56)

The first thought that usually comes to mind as I read this passage is always the "scandal of familiarity," the notion that we tend to assume we already know everything about a particular person and have them captured securely in one or another box. So when Jesus performs miracles and preaches in ways that move people's hearts like never before, his townspeople can't figure it out because it doesn't fit their preconceptions of this man whom they've know for all these years and whose relatives still live among them. And since Jesus' behavior doesn't fit their preconception of the "carpenter's son" they take offense at him.

That's probably pretty close to what the gospel writer had in mind when he recorded the story. But I'd like to suggest a slightly different take that might make for a more profitable meditation for us who are hunkered down trying to hide from the covid-19 virus.

See if you agree with this thought from cultural anthropologists: the role of most religions is often to make sure that nothing changes. For millennia people have been sacrificing to their gods to make sure that the crops grow as usual, that the spring rains return as they're supposed to, that they and their families can live out their lives in peace. 

This seems to reflect our built-in preference for predictability (which means the ability to control things around us) and for understanding (figuring out the meaning of things on various levels). We don't like living with mystery, with events that lie beyond the reach of our senses and our intellect. To say that something is a mystery is to admit that we can't control it.

Now, back to the incident of Jesus in his hometown. The townspeople have been hearing about Jesus' miracles and now hear for themselves his incredibly powerful preaching. Their first reaction is to be "astonished"by Jesus' power, but their astonishment quickly turns to resentment and hostility. Why? Because they find themselves confronted with something that they cannot understand. God is doing something new in their midst, but instead of rejoicing and glorifying the Lord because if it, they feel threatened.

God is saying through Jesus "Behold, I am doing something new (Isaiah 43:19)!" An encounter with Jesus is an encounter with mystery. The incarnation, when you think about it, is incomprehensible: The infinite becomes finite, the Totally Other comes among us as a little baby, the Lord and Creator of the universe walks around Galilee as a simple rabbi. "Incomprehensible" is right!

Christians believe that this incomprehensible mystery is still going on at all times in every person, in every created thing and in every corner of the universe. Because of the incarnation, "God comes to us as our life," in every event great or small, pleasant or unpleasant, joyful or frightful. 

So, when God comes to us as covid-19, what is our prayer? Maybe it could be "Lord, take care of your people, keep us healthy and safe, and let us not lose hope in your loving care." Behind our prayer, whatever it might be on a particular day, is the underlying faith that God loves each of us infinitely and absolutely, and that everything is under God's control and God in Jesus Christ is in our midst to love and to save, to bring to the entire world healing and peace. 

"Behold, I am doing something new. Wear your mask!"

ROADBLOCKS OR GUARDRAILS?

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The first reading assigned for mass today (Saturday) is from the Acts of the Apostles.

They traveled through the Phrygian and Galatian territory
because they had been prevented by the Holy Spirit
from preaching the message in the province of Asia.
When they came to Mysia, they tried to go on into Bithynia,
but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them,
so they crossed through Mysia and came down to Troas.

If you look at a map, you can see a pattern: Paul and Timothy wanted to head back eastward to certain cities in Asia Minor, but "they had been prevented by the Holy Spirit from preaching the message in the province of Asia." Ever wonder what that's all about? How did the Spirit "prevent" them?

Then they finally came to Mysia. I say finally because Mysia is about as far west as you can go in Asia Minor -- it's on the sea. But the two missionaries still seem determined to turn back eastward to continue evangelizing Asia Minor: "When they came to Mysia, they tried to go on into Bithynia,
but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them." Foiled again! So, they decide to head northward, following the coast. "So they crossed through Mysia and came down to Troas." Now Troas, too, as you can see on a map, is also on the sea. It's like being in San Francisco, where the next stop is China.

As they stood at the waterfront in Troas, lamenting the fact that their plans for evangelisation were constantly falling apart, and thinking of themselves as inept missionaries, they would have been looking across at Macedonia, Greece -- that's Europe. They retire for the night, wondering what to do next.

Mosaic of Paul's vision at Troas

During the night Paul had a vision.
A Macedonian stood before him and implored him with these words,
"Come over to Macedonia and help us."

God's plan for their missionary journey had been staring them in the face. For weeks now, circumstances of different sorts had been being nudging and pushing them westward, in the opposite direction from where they wanted to go.

When he had seen the vision,
we sought passage to Macedonia at once, 
concluding that God had called us to proclaim the Good News to them.

They "concluded" that they were to bring the gospel to Europe for the first time. Their conclusion was helped, obviously, by Paul's vision, but it was still a conclusion based on events: They looked at those mysterious setbacks that had kept upsetting their own plans, and recognized how those circumstances had been pushing them westward toward Europe.

Although you and I don't normally receive visions to help us interpret the setbacks in our lives, this passage can encourage us by suggesting that God uses the seeming failures in our lives to move forward the plot of our personal history. Why not pray to Paul and Timothy that we'll be able to see God's mysterious will working itself out in the struggles and failures in our daily lives?

NEED A LITTLE ADVENT

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I don't know how you feel these days about the state of our world, our country and our families, but when I think about these and so many other topics I feel a deep need for Advent.

The name "advent" comes from the Latin word "adventus" which means "coming, arrival." Starting four Sundays before Christmas, it's a period of preparation for the coming of Christ. I've been pondering the theological meanings of the season, hoping to make advent this year as meaningful as possible in the face of all the worries that confront us. Here are some of my ideas so far.

The Crucible

The crucible: One of God's best tools

Advent reminds us of the thousands of years during which the just were waiting for the coming of a Savior. This expectant longing was especially evident in the Jews, whose prophets kept telling them that one day the messiah would come to deliver them. (No wonder the prophet Isaiah is given center stage in the liturgical readings during this season.) The prophets' message of hope was a very hard sell during periods of exile or foreign oppression, but it was precisely in the crucible of suffering and darkness that Judaism was formed into the People of God that the Lord had in mind. So here's a good reminder for me: No matter how grim or depressing things seem, the Lord's plan is working itself out in history, in the wide sweep of world events and in my own life. The period of advent-waiting is a good reminder that humanity's weakness and sinfulness cannot overcome God's loving plan for us -- and that in fact the Lord makes use of our weakness and sinfulness to achieve his final victory.

The Tension 

At the heart of advent is a contradiction: Christ has already been born years ago, yet we are anxiously awaiting his birth. A classical image the church uses to express this contradiction is that we are living in an in-between time, in the tension between the "already" of Jesus' birth in Bethlehem and the "not yet" of his final coming when he will return to set things right once and for all. Tension is a central element of the natural world: Think of the tension produced by the blood in your arteries pushing outward against the pressure of the surrounding atmosphere. If that tension is not there, and your have a peaceful BP reading of 0 over 0, you obviously are not alive. To use a rather playful image, I remember the advertisements in the back of comic books touting the body-building exercises of Charles Atlas, based on the secret of "dynamic tension:" The secret was that growth comes when you make the right use of tension. Advent is like that, I think -- a time for experiencing the tension between the fact of Christ's birth in Bethlehem and the not-yet of today's sin-sick world. The secret is to use this tension to strengthen our faith and hope.

Our Lady of Sorrows - Titian

Mary: The Advent Attitude

This is why the church has always made Mary a central figure during advent, seeing her as the first person to keep advent. Despite any confusion or wondering, despite not knowing clearly what was happening to her, Mary held steadfastly to her confident belief that God would take care of her, that "the Lord's words to her would be fulfilled." We sometimes honor her as "our Lady of Sorrows" who in the midst of all her trials never lost hope in God's promise. She'll be a good companion for me over the next four weeks.




Let's pray for one another and for our world that so badly needs Advent's message of Hope.

Amen! Come Lord Jesus!

WHAT THE LADY SAW

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WHAT THE LADY SAW

Early in July I wrote a post about a woman who came to advise us on designing a new cloister garden. I described how she seemed to see in her imagination the new garden long before it was even planted. Well, here’s a picture Brother Aziel took of our new cloister garden today -- what the Garden Lady saw last July is starting to take shape. Even I can picture what it will look like in the summer when  beds of flowers make it glow with bright colors.

WHAT THE LORD SAW

We’ve been praying for decades, asking the Lord to give us the gift of new members so that our monastery can continue to be a witness to the Gospel here in the middle of downtown Newark. Every eight years or so, we would get a new monk. Then, about two years ago, the Lord finally started to answer our prayers.

Thursday of this week the monks voted to admit Michael Woodruff into a period of temporary vows beginning of November 11, and to allow Mark Dilone to begin novitiate (date to be announced); we also have another young man staying with us for the month, who seems very interested in pursuing his inquiry into joining the monastery here. There are also two visiting monks who are both intending to join us eventually. If you’ve been watching the abbey’s Facebook page, you know that we have two newly professed 25-year old monks as well.

The Lord made us wait all those years, but the present situation is what He saw all along, the way the Garden Lady saw the new cloister garden months ahead of time.

Then, just today I heard that a dear and deeply prayerful friend of mine who has been praying for years to be able to have a baby is now pregnant. Finally! But this is what the Lord saw all along, just like the Garden Lady looking at the mess in our garden last July.

After last week’s post, I know better than to ask why the Lord does things the way he does, but at least this week the events have been good ones!  

WILDERNESS AGAIN

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A week ago today I gave four conferences to a group of adult Catholics on retreat. One of the topics was a favorite of mine -- the theology of the “Wilderness.” The metaphor of the Israelites in the wilderness speaks to me just as personally now as it did years ago when I first used it in a retreat conference. So, I wasn’t surprised when I found myself deeply moved by it again during last week’s conference. I’ve shared the bulk of this post before, but, I figure, if I’m still finding new messages for myself in the wilderness metaphor, it may have something more to say to you as well. I hope it will!

Wilderness as a Metaphor

We all know the story of how, after the tenth plague in Egypt, Pharaoh at last consented to

let the Israelites go into the wilderness to "offer a pilgrim-feast to the Lord." At that point Moses led them on a daring dash for freedom, through the Red Sea and out into the wilderness in what appeared to be a charge into the open jaws of death. In this wilderness there was little water and no food, only hostile tribes and poisonous snakes.

"Wilderness" translates the Hebrew word, midbar, which is sometimes incorrectly translated as "desert." My Hebrew dictionary says that midbar means "tracts of land used for pasturing flocks and herds; uninhabited land." The word conveys the sense of a land that is still wide open space, un-surveyed, unmapped, undomesticated by humans. The wilderness is land that is still relatively free of human control. In Exodus theology the wilderness represented divine presence, lack of human control -- and freedom.

In sharp contrast to the wilderness stood Egypt, which was very much under human control. In fact, the Egypt of the Pharaohs was famous for its order and neatness. So Egypt represented human rationality, human order -- and slavery. Thus in Israel's tradition the wilderness came to symbolize the unpredictable and unfathomable side of life, the mystery of God. This contrast between Egypt and the wilderness is crucial to a Christian view of troubled times.

The Wilderness as "God's Country"

We can use the word "wilderness" to refer to any and all of those difficult times we ourselves experience, as well as the times when we are experiencing the pain of others second-hand as I have been this past week. To live in the wilderness means living in mystery, where things are beyond my understanding and my control; it is to live in "God's Country."

There is another important dimension to the wilderness symbolism. In Hebrew thought, history is experienced as linear, not cyclical: it starts with creation and moves relentlessly toward its fulfillment.

We individuals are born into that flow and are called to shape it by our decisions. We are moving onward with the flow of time toward the future. God gives us the future and we accept it from his hand. When Israel was called out of Egypt, she was also called out of the past and asked to move joyfully and trustingly into God's future. The wilderness, then, was not only a symbol of divine mystery but also a symbol of the future. Each of us is called, like the Israelites, into an unknown future; but if we don't know God's goodness or trust in God's love, we experience the future as a threat. On the other hand, if we trust in God's goodness and love, then the future is transformed from a threat into a promise. The wilderness as the unknown future is in a special sense God's preserve, it is par excellence "God's Country."

So, if I had to say a word of comfort to any of the people I’ve been praying for, I’d probably say something like this:

"I see that right now events in your life are completely beyond your control, and the future is unknown and terrifying; you are in the land of darkest mystery. Well, take off your shoes, because you are on holy ground. Welcome to the wilderness -- welcome to God's country! This is where the Lord is expecting to meet you and love you and deliver you."

Let’s all pray for the people of the Caribbean, and Mexico, and Houston, and so on , and for victims of every mysterious kind of tragedy around the world who are right now wandering in a land of fearful mystery. May they experience the reassurance that comes from realizing that the trackless wasteland in which they find themselves is indeed God’s mysterious country, and that God fully intends to meet them there – and probably already has.

Pardon!

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I’ve seen some grieving people this week. 

Yesterday in class one of my sophomores in the course of a classroom discussion about parents shared with the whole class in a matter-of-fact tone “Yeah, my father used to care about me and do stuff with me when I was little. But he doesn’t give a s______ about me anymore.” (Could this explain why this kid keeps writing all over his forearm with a ballpoint pen? At least I know he’s involved in a support group here at school.) The sadness and grief in his voice were barely disguised.

In the past two days I’ve encountered two other people (one I spoke to personally, the other I know of by hearsay) who have been devastated by the death a loved one (a mother and a wife) in the past week. Both of them are having a terribly hard time, overwhelmed with the sense of loss.

At times like this people find their faith in God sorely tried. The existentialist

He pondered the problem in 341 B.C.

philosopher Albert Camus  saw in this kind of horrible grief a good reason to not believe in God. He spoke for millions of people when he asked how an all-powerful and all-loving God could allow such unspeakable suffering. Or worse, if such a God exists, Camus wants nothing to do with such a monster. There's a long list of thinkers who have pondered the problem, from classical Greek philosophers to St. Augustine to Leibniz to Elie Wiesel reflecting on the holocaust.

The ultimate brain teaser?

There’s even a branch of theology called “theodicy” whose purpose is to defend God’s goodness and omnipotence in the face of evil. If I may say it this way it tries to “make excuses for God” using intellectual reasoning.

I don’t know what your own response is to the question of God’s apparent cruelty in allowing evil to exist, but mine has always come down heavily on the idea that God knows best, so be quiet and deal with it. Sort of a call to heroism. Besides presenting a very grim and off-putting view of God, this stoical approach doesn't really help much and certainly doesn’t lead me very far down the road to holiness. 

But then coincidentally this week I came across the following passage by the French Catholic writer Charles Peguy. Let me divide it in half and offer the first part by itself:

There is at this moment, in the back of some forsaken church, or even ordinary house, or at the turning of a deserted path, a poor man who joins his hands and from the depth of his misery, without very well knowing what he is saying, or without saying anything, thanks the good Lord for having made him free, for having made him capable of loving.

There is somewhere else, I do not know where, a mother who hides her face for the last time in the hollow of a little breast which will beat no more, a mother next to her dead child who offers to God the groan of an exhausted resignation, as if the Voice which has thrown the suns into space as a hand throws grain, the Voice which makes the worlds tremble, had just murmured gently into her ear, “Pardon me. One day you will know, you will understand, you will thank me. But right now, what I am looking for from you is your pardon. Pardon.”

Have you ever thought of God that way? We’re acquainted with the Voice who is all powerful, who presides over all of creation and who supposedly loves us, even a God who washes our feet (cf. John Ch 13). But a God who apologizes? How amazing is that? No need to rack our brains trying to justify God’s actions through theodicy. 

Charles Peguy (1873-1914)

Sure, there’s still the option of shaking our fist at the Voice, or giving up believing in Camus’ God who allows for evil in the world. But what if we saw God as Someone who apologizes, who asks our pardon for the pain that we are going through and promises that one day we will understand and even thank Him for it? This asking of our pardon is more than divine politeness, it’s a pledge of ultimate victory. If you’re living Good Friday right now, it promises, then know that Easter Sunday must surely be coming.

The second half of the passage from Peguy offers a positive outlook on this whole question and gives it an ultimate meaning.

These -- this harassed woman, this poor man -- are at the heart of the mystery, at the heart of universal creation and in the very secret of God. What can I say of it? Language is at the service of intelligence. And what these people have understood, they have understood by a faculty superior to intelligence although not in the least in contradiction with it -- or rather, by a profound and irresistible movement of the soul which engaged all the faculties at once, which engaged to the depth their entire nature…

Yes, at the moment that this man, this woman, accepted their destiny, accepted themselves, humbly -- the mystery of creation was being accomplished in them.  While they were thus, without knowing it, running the entire risk of their human conduct, they were realizing themselves fully in the charity of Christ, becoming themselves, according to the words of St. Paul, other Christs. In short, they were saints.

As a person of faith I find myself captivated by the idea of a kind and gentle God who not only apologizes for the horrors of evil that are far beyond my poor powers of comprehension, but who then takes those very horrors and turns them into the means of my salvation. This is what we celebrate in the mystery of Christ on Calvary.

The Voice does not ask us to understand this arrangement let alone like it or (heaven forbid) enjoy it. Maybe the best we can do is to try to accept God’s sincere and infinitely loving apology for the fact that the human intellect is simply too small to grasp God's loving plan.

Meanwhile we can also do our best to stand beside people who are in the throes of deep grief so that they may eventually, through our little signs of love, be better able to hear the loving Voice gently whispering in their heart “Pardon me. One day you will know, you will understand, you will thank me. But right now, what I am looking for from you is your pardon. Pardon.”

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Are there some things that are just too big for us to comprehend?

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LESSONS WRITTEN IN STONE

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Today, October 19, is the anniversary of the dedication of Newark’s Basilica Cathedral of the Sacred Heart, an appropriate time to reflect on a book we recently read at table in the monastery.

Gothic Pride: the Story of Building a Great Cathedral in Newark, by Brian Regan (2012), gives plenty of historical context and biographical details to help the reader truly appreciate what a great work the cathedral is. 

What particularly struck me was the number of crises (some original foundations had been done incorrectly and had to be dug out and redone before the pillars could be built), human imperfections (the building contractor changing specs without permission to increase his profit margin), and even tragedy (the master architect was ultimately fired and left a broken man).

ONE KEY WORD

A word that summarizes this aspect of the book is “despite.” Despite all of these difficulties and others such as a couple of world financial crashes, the cathedral stands today as a monument to certain men’s passion for beauty, others’ commitment to detail, others’ steadfast faith that money could be raised to finish the project. The list of triumphs and tragedies fills 312 fascinating pages.

When we look at this marvelous building today we don’t see any of the wrangling, corner-cutting, pridefulness and so on. What we see is how it turned out – one of the greatest neo-gothic churches in the Americas.

There are some good lessons here. First, the cathedral is an encouraging lesson in perseverance. Bishops in other dioceses often trimmed back the design of their cathedral to make sure their project would get built. Newark’s bishops and others held on to their original vision despite all the setbacks and nasty surprises, trusting that the Lord would supply what their efforts could not.

A second lesson is this: Looks can be deceiving. Just as you can’t see the stress and struggles that lie behind the present beautiful cathedral basilica, so you can’t see what’s going on in another person’s heart. It’s a common temptation to look at someone and say “Boy, I wish I had her serenity, her calm way of being, her quiet life.” You don’t know the struggles and problems she is facing; in fact she may be looking at you and saying the same thing: “Boy, I wish I had her serenity, her quiet life.” The cathedral reminds me not to be envious of what I think is someone else’s interior life.  

A third lesson is related to the second: that imperfection is always part of human existence. The cathedral is a triumph of imperfect men overcoming their own imperfections and those of others to produce with God's help a work of lasting beauty. 

When we look at the cathedral we don't notice that the granite in certain places is not the granite specified by the designing architect; we may not even know that the two towers had to be shortened considerably compared to the original plan. 

OUR HIDDEN TOWERS

The design on the book jacket is a very clever depiction of this third point. Lurking behind the photograph of the present cathedral stand two pointed Gothic towers, a ghostly reminder of the way the facade was originally designed to look. 

I wonder if our own lives aren't a bit like that, presenting to the world who we in fact are, but only hinting at some things that could have been different. The trick is to learn to embrace and love who we are right now (this is what God does, right?) and not worry about those dark blue towers in the background, the me that might have been.

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FACES ON THE CROSS

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LISTENING TO THE ALMOND TREE
My morning meditation was provoked by the reading for today (Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent) in my book Pilgrim Road. Here are the excerpt I’m referring to and the reflection question from the end of the chapter.
I smile as I remember the story from the Fioretti, a collection of edifying legends about the deeds of the wonder-worker Francis. On a cold winter’s day not unlike this one, the tale goes, Francis stopped in front of a bare almond tree and said, “Sister almond tree, speak to me of God!” And with that, the almond tree burst into a mass of lovely blossoms.
......Francis was already in the habit of letting the creatures of nature or the events of daily life speak to him about God. This was his way of praying constantly, of staying in touch with God in every waking moment. So when the saint saw a bleak bare tree shivering in the drizzle, he just naturally asked it to say something to him about God. And in response, the Lord let the tree speak eloquently to Francis about the Lord’s fruitful, joyous, and overflowing love for the world.
......The practice of lectio divina teaches you to say, "Speak to me of God." As you read the sacred text, you keep asking yourself, "What does this word, phrase or story say to my life here and now? What is God trying to say to me through this word?” As you get in the habit of asking that question about scripture passages, you start asking it about events in your life: what is this particular experience saying to me? What is God telling me through this particular emotion?
......It's not easy to look at a bleak situation or a deep disappointment the way Francis would have, or to invite a piece of bad news to “speak to me of God.” When my carefully laid plans go awry, I don’t always remember right away to ask the calamity to speak a word to me about God’s care and concern."
For Reflection: Think of a recent event in your life and ask it to speak to you of God. See what it might teach you about the Lord's love for you or about your relationship with God.”

TALKING FACES
As I sat there in church in front of the Blessed Sacrament I decided to look for things in my life that might be considered negative so that I could ask them to “speak to me of God.” The question had barely formed itself in my mind when one answer burst on me like a whale breaching out of a calm sea: My back! My stupid lumbar vertebrae have been bothering me so much lately that two days ago I went to the doctor to find out what I could do about it. (He’s sending me for some tests.)
"Okay, then, stupid back, speak to me of God," I challenged. "Go ahead, I dare you!"
The response wasn't long in coming, and was both good news and bad news. My eyes wandered to the crucifix near the altar. There was the good news: I'd started to find a connection between my suffering and Jesus on the cross. Then Ouch! I got this nasty twinge in my back to remind me of the reality of His pain and my own. I don’t care what you say, back pain is bad news.
......Then before I got any further into exploring the connection between Jesus’s suffering and my own I started seeing these faces. The sad face of one of my favorite kids who is a “cutter” (“I did it again!” he wept recently). The blank-mask-faces of a couple of other students who are so full of rage that sometimes they can barely function. The hardened face of a young woman who roams the streets downtown asking passers-by for their spare change. It was a parade of faces of fear, of despair, of giving up -- all of them faces of pain.

......It got to be a little overwhelming. So in my mind’s eye I started placing each face one at a time on the crucified Jesus, gently substituting it for his own sacred face. But as I did so I got a beautiful surprise -- each face as I put it up there became a Sacred Face infused with the same mysterious meaning as Christ’s own.

......As the painful parade continued, I began to catch more hints of the connection I’d been looking for when I asked my painful back to speak to me of God. The tree was answering me. Not an almond tree but the tree of the cross.
......Then each of the Faces started speaking from the cross; it was always the same message, which was Jesus’ promise: “I will walk with you as you carry your cross. We will share each other’s pain on the cross. I’ll be with you through the very worst of times. But I promise you that through our pain, yours and mine, will come joy. Through our defeats will come victory, and I will even turn death itself in abundant, joyful Eternal Life.”

THE NEXT STEP
By then it was time for Morning Prayer to begin. As I slowly stood up I found that my back pain had not gone away. But as I walked gingerly toward my choir stall at least I felt I was bringing along with me a lot of people who knew suffering that was much worse than my discomfort. Yes, I was in good company. Great company in fact.
......The next step is scary, though, and may have to wait for the special graces of Good Friday. Namely, finding the courage to see MY face up there on that cross. .