Monthly Archives: May 2024

The Core Meaning of All Reality

Dear Folks,
Today is the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity, a feast day that should get more acclaim than it does. Fasten your seatbelts; we’re going deep.
Catholics should, at a minimum, know that there is one God who is three divine, coeternal persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Unfortunately, almost all just stop there and never give it another thought.
Folks, this is the core of all reality and makes all the difference.
As we look at the basic questions of existence and consider what to believe, there are some primal questions. Is the ultimate reality personal or impersonal? If we accept the atheist materialist view, then it is impersonal, and personhood is just a blip in the dance of matter- energy in the universe. I experience consciousness, but don’t know why (there is vague talk about a byproduct of electrical activity of the brain, but I don’t think that explains much). I experience good and bad feelings, and I want to maximize good feelings, and that’s about it. In this scenario, when I die, nothing of me is left, and the race will die, and it won’t matter that we existed at all. I don’t find this very inspiring.
If the Christian point of view is correct (and, in case you are wondering, I believe it is), Then personhood is the foundation of all reality. Beyond even the universe. Furthermore, God is the perfect community of love all by Himself. The Father is eternally giving Him- self in love to the Son, who is eternally receiving and returning that love, and the love that passes between them is the Holy Spirit. Though God does not need anything, love by nature is fruitful, and so God created the universe, including us. We are meant to receive His love and give ourselves as gift to Him, and that is the fullness of the meaning of being human and the fullness of joy. Unfortunately, sin inhibits this gift, and we become centered on our own desires (classically: power, pleasure, wealth, and honor). Only by be- coming one with Jesus in His perfect gift of self, which culminated on the cross, can we be saved from it. In Him, we can learn how to give ourselves as gift, and receive the strength to do it. The more we grow in Christ, the more we receive His love and the more we give ourselves in love. In heaven, that flow of love becomes perfect and complete. See John.16:20-24 and John 17: 20-26.
We must be careful about self-deception. In our sinful condition, it can be easy to tell our- selves we are loving God and others when we are actually at our center serving our de- sires. Matthew 6 (the middle chapter of the Sermon on the Mount) is all about that danger. Our scribe and Pharisee friends are the poster children for this.
The big question in life is: are we at our center about serving our own desires, or about giving ourselves in love with our own desires as a side dish? Everything starts from this.
May Almighty God bless you, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Fr. Jim

Praying for Vocations

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Dear Folks,

Today we celebrate the Ascension of the Lord. Jesus, after His triumphant resurrection, ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He left us with homework: “Go make disciples of all nations (Matt 28:19),” “Go into the world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature (Mark 16:15).” I suggest a critical question for our time is, do people in church see themselves as customers or coworkers in mission?

We have begun praying a prayer for vocations to the priesthood, deaconate, and religious life. The number of priests and religious have been declining for decades, and God willing, we hope to ordain one priest this year, but next year there will be no one. Meanwhile, the rest of us are getting older.

I read from a couple of authors “Never work harder to help someone than they are willing to work to help themselves.” I have had occasions where someone was demanding that something be done, but were unwilling to put forward any action to help make it happen.

What would God think of such petitions?

When we talk about action, many immediately focus on encouraging young people to consider vocations. I would suggest a much more critical task is giving them reasons to believe that such vocations are not only worth doing, but worth giving their lives to. What do they see when they look at the people of the Church today? What messages do they receive?

One youth minister said, “Never ask people to choose between God and sports, because God will always lose.” One youth minister said that they had asked the confirmation students, “Why do you want to affirm your faith?” One young man said, “You can be Catholic without it affecting your life. If you’re Baptist you can’t drink or dance, but Catholics can do anything they want.” What messages are they getting?

What do young people see in the adults around them (yes, parents play a huge role, but kids see more than their parents) that tells them that God and the Church are important enough to be worth giving their lives to serve? Do they see a people who dearly love the liturgy, and participate like it is the most important thing they do? Do they see people hungry to learn more about their faith and thirsty to grow in holiness? Do they see people zealous for the mission of the Church, and dedicated to helping the Church accomplish great

things?

What if, as we ask God for more vocations, we each examine ourselves? How might we better show in our lives that vocations in the Church are important, worth dedicating one’s whole life?

I believe God has given us what we need to flourish as Church. If we respond well to this

moment in history, I’m convinced we can have a bold future.

Blessings,

Fr. Jim

What is Love?

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Dear Folks,

Our first reading this Sunday from Acts 10 shows St. Peter dealing with a major issue in the first century Church: whether righteousness (being in right relationship with God) comes through works of the Law of Moses or through faithfulness to Jesus (spoiler alert: faithfulness).

In our Gospel from John 15, we see a major emphasis on how to be faithful is to love one another. A temptation is to respond with “now I know what I need to know; this is simple.”

Not so fast. In theology, I read a book called “Situation Ethics” by Joseph Fletcher. He insisted that there should be only one law, the law of love, because any other law, any other ethical principle would sooner or later conflict with the law of love. As I kept reading, I realized that he was presuming that anyone who looked at a given situation would know what was the loving thing to do. Studying history and philosophy should show us that what seems obvious to us now was unthinkable in ancient times. Looking at modern discourse we can see that many people have opposite positions and are sure that their position is true, right, and obvious.

“Love” is a word we use so much it is easy to overestimate how well we understand the challenge. There are some major issues we must tackle:

1. What is love? Christianity teaches that it is not a feeling, but a decision to seek the good of others, even at a cost to oneself (the greatest act of love is “to lay down one’s life for one’s friends [John 15:13]).”

2. What is the good? Is it getting what we desire when we desire and how we desire? Or is there a good that is more profound, and that is to be discovered and that we are to grow into seeking? Such a good involve virtues being encouraged and incentivized by a healthy society.

3. How do we achieve it? Lenin, Stalin and Mao murdered tens of millions of people insisting that this would serve the greater good, but they brought about enormous misery instead. If we agree that we want an end to gun violence, we must still ask if a given gun control legislation will make people safer or less safe? Are there other things we can do? If we agree we want to help the environment, we are left with questions: does switching to electric cars help or hurt the environment? Does less drilling for oil in the U.S. help ore hurt? Does the benefit outweigh the harm? In Ann Garrido’s wonderful book “Redeeming Conflict” talks of “undoing the knot of intention.” Good intentions don’t necessarily produce good results.

4. How can we, a sinful people, do better? Christians know that we cannot overcome temptation by our own strength. It is only in our union with Jesus that it becomes possible. With His grace, however, we can do great things. With prayer, sacraments, and penance, we can open ourselves more and more to His presence so we can have

the humility to see where we fall short, and the wisdom and strength to move forward.