Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings: Sir 15:15-20; Ps 119:1-2.4-5.17-18.33-34; 1 Cor 2:6-10; Matt 5:17-37

Genuine obedience cannot be imposed. The root of “obedience” is the Latin verb obedire. Obedire doesn’t just mean to listen, it means to really listen so as to deeply hear what is being said.

According to Christ Himself, the first of the two Great Commandments is to love God with your entire being.¹ And so, before it is anything else, to obey God is to love God. Because obedience is a choice made from love, there is nothing legalistic about it. So, contrary to a common misconception, true obedience is not compulsory compliance for fear of punishment.

Our reading from Sirach shows us that God respects our freedom, which derives from being made in God’s own image. At least in part, respecting your freedom means not shielding you from the consequences of your choices. This stands in contrast to the rather pagan concept of God getting angry at your slightest misstep and then actively and deliberately punishing you.

When we confess our sins, receive absolution, and fulfill our penance, the eternal punishment due our sins is taken away. But the natural consequences remain. The sacrament of penance, while it is given to heal, isn’t magic. Healing comes through repentance, which means making a commitment to change, “to sin no more and avoid whatever leads me to sin.”

God is good and always seeks your good. Our loving Father is even able to use the suffering that results when you screw up (again). We are sinners in the hands of a loving God! As Saint Paul wrote, you can’t begin to imagine “what God has prepared for those who love him.”² So, the question for each of us is not “Does God love me?” It is, “Do I love God?” As in any relationship, love is best shown through actions rather than mere words.

This seems an important message as we stand on the threshold of the holy season of Lent. Let's be honest up front, in and of themselves your Lenten efforts and sacrifices will not make you holier. God’s grace is still needed. Far from being an effort to earn something from God or to place Him in your debt, spiritual disciplines are simply tried and true ways of opening yourself to receive God's grace.

Found this on SlideServe- liked it

As for our Gospel, it is important to grasp that in His life and ministry Jesus never denigrates the Law. Instead, He positively extols it. Of course, He is the only person who has completely obeyed the Law both in letter and in spirit, thus fulfilling it.

This is the third of four Sundays during Year A of Sunday lectionary that the Church normally reads from the fifth chapter of Saint Matthew’s Gospel. Due to the start of Lent this Wednesday, this year it’s for only three weeks. We do this because this chapter is the heart of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. What we hear today are the antitheses.

The theses with which these teachings are contrasted arise from the Law itself. These take the form “You have heard it said” [thesis] “But I say to you” [antithesis]. With these, Jesus shows us that real obedience is more than mere compliance to an outwardly imposed set of rules. He makes obedience a matter of listening with your heart.

Saint Benedict’s rule begins with this exhortation: “Hearken, my son, to the precepts of the master and incline the ear of your heart.”³ This is just what the Lord teaches us to do today. This is just what the Lord teaches us to do today. Like the Bible, at the core of which are the Gospels, Saint Benedict's regula isn’t a rule book.⁴

What the Lord sets forth is a mode of being, the way of becoming who God created and redeemed you to be. “This is the way we may know that we are in union with him,” scripture teaches, “whoever claims to abide in him ought to live [just] as he lived.”⁵

As Catholics, we embrace the efficacy of rules and precepts. A good example of this are the Church's five precepts, which are given “to guarantee for the faithful the indispensable minimum in the spirit of prayer, the sacramental life, moral commitment and growth in love of God and neighbor.”⁶

What you must be careful not to do is to mistake means for ends. This is the fatal flaw of the scribes and Pharisees. What Christ gives us through His Church are proven means for realizing the end of loving God with your entire being by loving your neighbor as you love yourself.

As for a just love of self, you can selflessly love because you were first selflessly loved. “In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins.”⁷ At root, every sin is a failure to love. We acknowledge this in the Act of Contrition: “In choosing to wrong and failing to good, I have sinned against You, whom I should love above all things.”

Don’t make Lent a time either to annoy yourself in some arbitrary way or a time for self-driven self-improvement. Make it a time to open yourself to God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Pray, fast, abstain, give to the poor, and serve others. Make it a time to heed the call made during the imposition of ashes: “Repent and believe the Gospel.”⁸

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1 Matthew 22:37.^↩
2 1 Corinthians 2:9.^↩
3 Rule of Saint Benedict, Prologue.^↩
4 Second Vatican Council. Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation [Dei Verbum], sec. 18.^↩
5 1 John 2:5-6.^↩
6 Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, sec. 431.^↩
7 1 John 4:106.^↩
8 Roman Missal. Ash Wednesday, Blessing and Distribution of Ashes.^↩

"I don't know where I am, but I know I don't like it"

Okay, now that I've broken the 60 barrier, I can go on about certain things. I promise I won't go on and on.

Electronic means of communication! Well, at least in my experience, these constitute a very mixed bag. Not included in this are voice communication, like an actual phone call. I believe most mobile phones still feature this capability (sarcasm).

On the one hand, it's nice to able to communicate with people directly, especially people I know very well whether they live near or far. These communications run the gamut from brief, insightful conversations about books, sports, music, movies, shared articles, etc., to the mundane, like "Hey, can you pick up some milk on your way home?"

Again, in my experience, such media are not built to be a relationship in toto. Communicating exclusvely via electronic means with someone, especially when you don't have the foundation of a well-developed personal relationship or any in-person interaction, is not only unsustainable, it's imprudent. In-person communication is often difficult enough under the best of circumstances. It becomes impossible when more than half of how human beings communicate is always missing.

So, what's missing? Easy. Body language, facial expression, tone of voice, eye contact or lack thereof, etc. Also, knowing someone, knowing how they "are" thus allowing you to filter what they write through your experience of the person. If you're limited to communicating with someone exclusively by electronic means (i.e., texting, Snapchat, WhatsApp, FB Messenger, Dm'ing on other platforms, etc.) and the two people don't know each other well it can be impossible to know what s/he is trying to say. "Words are very unnecessary, they can only do harm," as the song goes, even if in a different context. I kind of miss the days when, apart from sending a letter or card through the post or passing someone a note, communicating meant talking.

This past week provided me with a great chance to be gentler with myself. This always happens when I spend more time with the Lord. Many times, my impetus to spend more time in personal prayer is something going sideways, sadly. It's not always the case, just more often than it should be. Either way, Christ gazes on me with such tender gentleness. This enables me to be gentler with myself and, in turn, with others. It doesn't matter to Him that I am flawed and in many ways a deeply deficient person. I already know that and often pay the price for it, which leads to me to berate and shame myself. Like many people, I have some very deep insecurities. Insecurities are vulnerabilities.

It would be easy for me to choose not make myself vulnerable by keeping to myself. As an introvert, though not a shy introvert, I am perfectly content by myself. I don't get bored. But too much self isn't good. No matter how introverted you are, being human requires you to be relational. With no thou there is no I. By making myself vulnerable, I take the risk of having my insecurities exposed and my scabs ripped off. I am grateful to have recourse to the One who loves me best, always, without fail, warts, weaknesses, insecurities, deficiencies and all. Here's something beautiful: He is disposed the same way toward you!

Someone I knew well and who I helped return to the Church some years ago wound up taking his own life a few years after his return. Casey was a wonderful, kind, and creative person. At his memorial service, in which I was privileged to participate, cards were given to each person that read: Be gentle with yourself & with others (I have posted the picture above before). These remain good words for me to live by even if I can only strive to do so in my weak and forgetful way.

On the brink of the holy season of Lent, being kinder and gentler give me a focus. In his Lenten message, the Holy Father has invited us "to a very practical and frequently unappreciated form of abstinence: that of refraining from words that offend and hurt our neighbor."

In the tradition prevalent among Eastern Christians prior to Great Lent, if I have ever been less than gentle and/or patient with you, please forgive me. Not only do I bring these lapses to the Lord one-on-one but to Him through the sacrament of penance because, when I say the Confiteor at Mass, I mean it. . . "and you my brothers and sisters. . ."

I used to be a Utah Jazz fan. In response to a post about the franchise being fined $500K for tanking (i.e., losing games on purpose in the hope of securing a top draft pick), I wrote "They should be called the Utah Tankopotamuses. They've been doing this since [Ryan] Smith bought the team. This is why I retired as a fan." To which some stranger replied, complete with GIF, "No one cares." I initially responded with, "You know this because you're no one?" After several seconds, I went back and deleted my original comment, which automatically deletes all replies. I don't want to interact in that way with anyone. Neither do I want to be treated that way. The Golden Rule remains in effect.

The online exchange about the Jazz isn't what precipitated this post. I just helps make my point without getting too specific. To be clear, I still hold to my view about the Jazz and their cyncial approach to the game, despite promises to the contrary at the start of the season. Feel free to disagree or not care.

Anyway, our Friday traditio is General Public's "Tenderness." Indeed, "without tenderness, there's something missing." I must say, "Mirror in the Bathroom" was a temptation.

Monday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Readings: 1 Kings 8:1-7.9-13; Psalm 132:6-10; Mark 6:53-56

There is a great contrast between the way God is present in our first reading and in today’s Gospel. One way to see this contrast immediately is by comparing the length of these readings.

In our reading from 1 Kings, we read an account of the dedication of the First Temple, Solomon’s Temple. There is a parallel account in 2 Chronicles that runs to three chapters.¹ After the Temple was dedicated God manifested His presence there through a dark cloud. This cloud was so thick and dark that Temple service could not be conducted.

In our Gospel, while the people “immediately recognized” Jesus, it isn’t clear that they recognized Him as the Only Begotten Son of the Father, that is, as “true God from true God” in the flesh. Rather, they recognized the guy who had been going around Galilee healing the sick and performing other signs and wonders, like miraculously feeding five thousand people who followed Him and the disciples as they attempted to make a retreat after a busy time of ministry.²

It was while making their way back from their failed retreat, while Jesus stayed behind to pray, that the Lord came to His disciples walking on the water.³ Arriving back on the western shore of Lake Gennesaret (a different name for the same body of water also known as the Sea of Galilee), they landed in the town of Gennesaret, which, along with Capernaum (Jesus’s base of operations during the early part of the Galilean ministry), is located on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee. Geography plays an important role in Saint Mark's Gospel.

Gennesaret is a fertile plain about three miles long and one mile wide. It is delineated by the hills of Galilee on the west and the Sea of Galilee on the east. Gennesaret is not, therefore, a Gentile territory but a Jewish one. And so, it makes sense that this Nazarene who had been going around healing the sick and performing miracles would be recognized there.

During the dedication of the Temple, God is not the dark cloud. He is not incense. He is not the ark of the covenant. God is not the tablets inside the ark. Rather, God’s presence is mediated through these holy things. Something about which we, as Catholics, can grasp.

While this relatively non-descript Galilean peasant is God in the flesh, He is not recognized as such. He is recognized as a healer, as someone who might give sight to the blind, open the ears of the deaf, make the lame walk, etc.

Despite this, there doesn’t seem to be any talk among these Galileans that perhaps this is Messiah. One doesn’t have to be a New Testament scholar to notice that Jesus’ divinity wasn’t intuitively obvious to the casual or even to the engaged observer most of the time. There was no golden halo or shimmering glow as we see in so many artistic depictions of the events of His ministry.

It doesn’t matter who people say Jesus is. What matters is who you believe or maybe even know Him to be, based on your experience. A few chapters further on in Mark’s Gospel, as Jesus was making His way with His disciples to another region of Galilee- Caesarea Philippi- He asks those closest to Him who people are saying that He is. After listening to the various answers, spoken by Peter, the Lord asks him the most important question in the world: “But who do you say that I am?”⁴

And so, who do you say Jesus is? Is He merely someone you turn to in dire need, someone who can and just might, in His goodness, do what you ask of Him? Do you follow Jesus for what you think He will do for you? In other words, is your relationship with the Lord transactional? Keep in mind the reward for following Jesus is Jesus.

Bread and wine are very ordinary things. It isn’t intuitively obvious that these consecrated, transubstantiated elements become Christ’s body and blood. Nonetheless, He gives Himself to you wholly in Holy Communion. All He asks in return is for you to give yourself wholly to Him.

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1 See 2 Chronicles 5-7.^↩
2 See Mark 6:34-44.^↩
3 See Mark 6:45-52.^↩
4 See Mark 8:27-30.^↩

A very short take

Readings: Isaiah 58:7-10; Psalm 112:4-9; 1 Corinthians 2:1-5; Matthew 5:13-16

What Saint Paul is driving at in our reading from his First Letter the Corinthians is that the power of God isn't made known through the luminous demonstration of one's gifts and abilities, even though those are bestowed on us by God. Rather, God's power, manifested by the Holy Spirit, mostly happens through our weakness.

Something easy to glance over in the Incarnation of God's Son but made clear in the kenotic hymn is Jesus' vulnerability. In the Eucharist He makes Himself more vulnerable still. To genuinely love someone, not merely romantically but in that way, is to take a risk. Making yourself vulnerable is just a different way of saying "to take a risk." Embracing a certain degree of vulnerability is what it means to know Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.

As for the rest, stay salty and be lit.

But what does that mean? In answer, I urge you to revisit last week's Gospel, which consisted of the Beatitudes (See Matthew 5:1-12). Then, to complete the answer, see today's first reading from Isaiah. Sometimes short is simple and simple is good. It's easy to oversimplify things and it's also easy to over complicate things.

Blessings at the start of new week. Stay salty, be lit, different from getting lit! A fair reminder on Super Bowl Sunday, no?

Being human beings

Well, we're already in the second month of the first year of the second quarter of the twenty-first century. One thing I learned during the first quarter of this century is to never be so foolish as to think things couldn't get worse. Techology, it seems, has aided the transnational corporate entities in pretty much controlling everything. As the Epstein files clearly show, we're all subject to a dubious oligarchy. Dear Lord, even Noam Chomsky is in on this!

What is really at stake right now is our humanity. But Qoeleth is correct: there is nothing new under the sun. From our beginning, we have wanted to transcend our humanity with its concomitant mortality. This is precisely what constitutes the original sin, an element present in every actual sin. Yet, rather than making us freer, this impulse leads to slavery. "Transhumanism" is discussed not only as a genuine possibility but very often as something good, a goal to be attained.

Don't get me wrong, I believe in eternal life. I also believe that, like mortal life, eternal life is a gift from God and not a human technological achievement.

I am grateful Robert Prevost was chosen to be Pope Leo XIV. I eagerly await his first encyclical, which, I believe, will address these matters. I think the title of his first enyclical is going to be Magnifica humanitas (“Magnificent Humanity”). According to reliable media sources, it's currently undergoing a third revision.

It is the largely peaceful protests in different cities, like Minneapolis and earlier Portland, Oregon, and in Maine that I see something promising. Permitting one person or group of people to be dehumanized threatens our common humanity. As John Donne so eloquently stated it:

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main

We do well to always and everywhere bear these things in mind.

Homo curvatus in se- "man curved in on himself" is the way Saint Augustine described the unjustified human condition. Building on Augustine's metaphor, it is Christ who comes not to straighten us out but to bend us outward, toward God by bending us toward one another. Scripture is pretty plain. You can't say you love God and hate your brother (1 John 4:20).

This could easily veer off into a something of a economic discourse, but I will limit myself to Pope Saint John Paul II's exhortation that in a genuinely human civilization, people don't serve the economy but the economy is built for people. Simple enough, right? Well, obviously no. Practically everyone has become an economic determinist.

While this would've been a better post to end with Oasis' "Live Forever," our traditio is Pixies with "Gouge Away." Kurt Cobain has this to say about this underrated band: "When I heard the Pixies for the first time, I connected with that band so heavily I should have been in that band — or at least in a Pixies cover band."

Feast of the Presentation of the Lord

Readings: Malachi 3:1-4; Psalm 24:7-10; Hebrews 2:14-8; Luke 2:22-40

For old school Roman Catholics, including those in the Vatican, today marks the end of Christmas. Falling forty days after the Lord’s Nativity, the Church’s observance of the Blessed Mother and Saint Joseph presenting the infant Jesus in the Temple in accordance with the Law is a fitting end to the season of Christmas.

On the reformed calendar, the Church only observes two octaves: Easter and Christmas. The Christmas octave ends on New Year’s Day with the Solemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God. For many, Christmas ends at Epiphany, which remains in most places on the fixed date of 6 January.

The Twelve Days of Christmas run from 25 December to 5 January. Epiphany, of course, marks the arrival of magi, who represent God’s revelation to extension of the Covenant to the Gentiles through His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. For Roman Catholics in the United States, who observe Epiphany on the second Sunday after Christmas day rather than on the traditionally fixed date, Christmas extends to the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. As noted, for some, their observance extends to 2 February.

Biblically, Christ’s Presentation in the Temple, along with the note that closes this pericope noting that the Holy Family returned to Nazareth where “The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him,”¹ brings the Gospel of Luke’s extensive Infancy Narrative to a close.

The parallel between the Presentation happening forty days after Christmas day and the Transfiguration being forty days after the Lord's Resurrection should not be lost on us. Both are relevations of God in Christ.

Of course, Jesus’ Presentation in the Temple is the fourth Joyful Mystery of Our Lady’s Rosary. Lest we forget, the fruit of the mystery is obedience. Both Simeon and Anna recognize in the Holy Infant not only their hope, not only the hope of Israel, but as Simeon’s canticle, known by its Latin name the Nunc Dimittis, points out, the hope of the whole world.

Simeon's canticle includes the words, referring to the child: “a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel.”² As Jesus plainly tells the Samaritan woman in Saint John’s Gospel: “salvation is from the Jews.”³

In an era of rampant anti-Semitism, this merits foot stomping. Let’s face, in its early decades and probably into the second century, for many, Christianity appeared to be nothing other than a Jewish sect. Without Judaism, Christianity is rendered incoherent.

Simeon and Anna and the Infant Jesus

Being presented in the Temple in accordance with Torah, to include the prescribed sacrificial offering, indicates quite clearly that Jesus is a Jew.⁴ Throughout His life and ministry, Jesus nowhere denigrates or dismisses the Law. He reveres it.

Jesus Christ embodies perfect Torah adherence, letter and spirit, accomplishing in His own person what Israel could not do and you and I could never do without divine assistance: “be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”⁵ It was just yesterday that, listening to the Beatitudes, we heard Christ’s roadmap to holiness.

While not easy in itself, obedience, as Simeon warns our Blessed Mother, often (as in usually) brings suffering. This, too, the Lord mentions in the Sermon on the Mount. He calls “Blessed” those who suffer persecution for the sake of righteousness and urges those who experience calumny for His sake to “Rejoice and be glad.”⁶

Eerily predicting the Christ child’s gruesome death, Simeon tells the Blessed Virgin- “and you yourself a sword will pierce.”⁷ Obedience requires patience and perseverance. To persevere, you must have hope. Hope is realized through suffering. Joy is the fruit of hope because joy happens when suffering is overcome.

As our reading from Hebrews reveals to us, in Christ, we have “merciful and faithful high priest,” who expiates our sins and who is seated at the Father’ s right hand to intercede for us.⁸ Moreover, in Jesus Christ, we have a brother to help us in our trial because He “was tested through what he suffered.”⁹

Today is also known as Candlemas. Hence, it is a festival of light. Christ is the Light of the world. At baptism, each of us was entrusted with and called to carry forth Christ’s Light into the world of darkness. In the same Sermon on the Mount, the Lord tells His disciples: “You are the light of the world.”¹⁰

These candles are blessed to be lit in times of darkness, be it physical or spiritual. They remind you not only that Christ is the Light in some abtract way, but He is your Light and that “the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”¹¹ Given this, let us heed the Lord’s exhortation to let your light “shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.”¹²

As the next-to-last verse of a beautiful hymn written for today’s feast puts it:

Our bodies and our souls/
Are temples now for him,/
For we are born of grace,/
God lights our souls within¹³

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1 Luke 2:39-40.^↩
2 Luke 2:32.^↩
3 John 4:22.^↩
4 Exodus 13:2.12.^↩
5 Matthew 5:48.^↩
6 Matthew 5:10-12.^↩
7 Luke 2:35.^↩
8 Hebrews 2:17.^↩
9 Hebrews 2:18.^↩
10 Matthew 5:14.^↩
11 John 1:5.^↩
12 Matthew 5:16.^↩
13 Liturgy of the Hours. Volume III. February 2, pg 1207. Paulines Publication, Africa.^↩

Nobodies & Protagonists

Readings: Zephaniah 2:3.3:12-23; Psalm 146:6-10; 1 Corinthians 1:26-31; Matthew 5:1-12a

When preaching or commenting on the Beatitudes, I think there are three approaches available. First, a comprehensive approach through which you seek to say/write something about all nine of the Beatitudes. Second, the thirty thousand foot overview that is an attempt to draw a singular message from the nine distinct teachings of the Lord. Finally, one can zero in on one or two of these teachings.

Today, I am going with a combination of the second and third. I find even the thought of going point-by-point through all the Beatitudes exhausting. Before beginning, I heard two things today that I like a lot: "meekness is not weakness" and something like poverty of spirit means recognizing that you're not self-sufficient.

As to the second approach, contrary to Christianity in the contemporary U.S., being a Christian means having the courage to be a nobody. This does not mean refusing to be a protagonist. A Christian slogan from years ago presented just this false dilemma: Protagonists or Nobodies.

Let's stick with the dialectical tension inherent to the Catholic et/et (i.e., both/and) and go with being Protagonists and Nobodies. Isn't that Saint Paul's message in our reading from his First Letter to the Corinthians: you're all nobodies chosen by God to make God's glory known? Maybe we can be protagonists by being nobodies because, as we are seeing in real time, it takes solidarity and community to protagonize, as it were.

Be meek and merciful. Also, be a peacemaker, a protagonist. Our first reading from Zephaniah (there's a book that doesn't pop up often in the Sunday lectionary!) makes the point I am trying to make beautifully: "Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who have observed his law; Seek justice, seek humility" (Zeph 2:3).

As for the third option, let's focus on being peacemakers. It strikes me as a necessary preliminary to point out that peace isn't merely the absence of conflict. After all, you can have a truce, a ceasefire, and still not have peace. True peace requires justice. So, if you want peace, work for justice.

Daniel Berrigan, S.J.

In our present moment, we are seeing many peacemakers, people who, like me, are nobodies, banding together in the face of injustice to bring about peace. These nobodies have shown more courage and determination than leaders of our large institutions, including universities, which seem to only care about funding.

Inherent in justice is mercy and inherent in mercy is justice. Peace, therefore, once the conflict is over and justice has been realized, or a more just situation results, requires the hard work of forgiveness and reconciliation.

Peacemakers are God's children. While peace begins with me, the peace of Christ flows outwards, the love of Christ impels. Let's not kid ourselves, Christ is always on the side of the poor, the downtrodden, and the oppressed and might will never make right.

In his 2015 speech to a Joint Session of the United States Congress, Pope Francis invoked the figures of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, and Thomas Merton. In our present moment, I would add to that list the Jesuit, Daniel Berrigan. These people bore powerful witness, showing us what living the Beatitudes looks like IRL. It's radical, which is why Jesus warned about suffering for living in this perculiar way. Berrigan, Francis' fellow Jesuit, was probably too radical for that setting.

It is people like King, Day, Merton, Berrigan, and whole cloud of witnesses who rebut the devastating critique made quite a few years go by author Kurt Vonnegut:

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.

It should be clear, Jesus is not a or even the new Moses.

Break the existential plane

Life continues at an acclerated pace. Friday came and went with no opportunity to compose anything. It's funny, because one of the things I felt really good about last year was my consistency with the Friday traditio.

Not to be too hard on myself, that consistency has continued pretty much through the first month of this year. Hey, life is more than blogging. I am cool with this simply being a really late traditio to bring January to a close.

After my long discernment, which unfolded pretty much over the whole of last year, I am trying to wind things down on one hand and not start winding things up on the other until after I take a few weeks' break in between. Needless to say, this has been futile. Because things aren't winding down, I've started to realize how incredibly difficult the past three and a half years have been on me. What sane person would accept the levels of responsibility I have been shouldering?

When I have time, I've just been feeling exhausted. Lately, this is partly due to a stomach bug I've been battling. It's not bad enough to bring me to a halt but it's physically draining.

Perhaps the worst result of these past years is that it has made me very impatient and intensified my need to be in control. I am blessed that I have been able to recognize these tendencies and to make them a matter of prayer. True to form, I am most impatient and unyielding with myself. Msgr Giussani's exhortation to learn to gaze upon myself with the same tenderness with which Christ gazes upon me has very much guided me over the past few weeks.

Nobody talks much about the personal and emotional dimension of retiring from a career you've spent decades building. It's disorienting. This, too, has been a cause for deep reflection. In what or in whom do I find my identity. For a Christian, of course, the correct answer is in Christ. Finding my identity in Him is the center from which I am supposed to live. How am I doing in this regard? This question has given me a lot to reflect upon and converse with Him about. I look forward to Lent this year.

Pater Tom, a.k.a. Father M. Louis, O.S.C.O.

Today is the birthday of Pater Tom. Discovering one's true identity in God is at the center of Merton's spiritual theology. I have too long absented myself from Pater Tom's writings. One of my favorite books remains his Confessions of a Guilty Bystander. Rather than a long discourse on Merton's theology, I will just provide the summary, taken from his chapter on self-identity found in his book New Seeds of Contemplation: "The secret of our identity is hidden in the love and mercy of God." Of course, Jesus Christ is God's love and mercy incarnate.

Since the start of 2026, my preaching has been very much about the uniqueness, necessity, beauty, truth, and goodness of Jesus Christ. I feel impelled to preach the fundamental Gospel message: Be repenting and be believing, to use the literal translation of Mark 1:15. He is, indeed, the vine and we are the branches. Without the vine, the branches wither and die.

Last night, I attended a high school performance of Frozen in which my youngest son performed. It was amazing and the young women and men did a fantastic job. Never having seen the movie, I was struck by the parallels to C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia (as far as never watching Frozen, I didn't read the Chronicles of Narnia until I was in my forties!). Bending back to the previous paragraph, in Frozen, Aslan never shows up. Thinking this led me to realize how existential we've become. It gave the story a kind of Becketian feel for me.

Since the Gallagher brothers have made up and hit the road last year, I going with an Oasis song that has been on my playlist for several now- "Live Forever"- for our Friday traditio. Face it, despite our increasing refusal to recognize the transcendent dimension of being human, we all want to live forever:

That's a wrap for January 2026.

Memorial of Saint Timothy and Titus, Bishops

Readings: Titus 1:1-5; Psalm 96:1-3.7-8.10; Mark 3:22-30

. . . Timothy, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon/
To the Hebrews/
The Epistle of James/
Peter, Peter, John, John, John, Jude, Revelation/
These are the books of the New Testament

So goes the song I learned at age six or seven to memorize the New Testament for Sunday School class.

Today the Church collectively remembers Timothy and Titus. Both men were in the second generation of Church leadership. Both men were companions of the apostle Paul. It was Paul, who, by his apostolic authority (an authority received from Jesus Christ), installed Titus as bishop in Crete and placed Timothy at the head of the Church in Ephesus.

Whether the first reading selected is from 2 Timothy or from Titus (we went with Titus because we don’t often read from this book either in the Sunday or weekday lectionary- though it is the- usually ignored- “epistle” reading for Christmas Mass During the Night), Paul starts by identifying himself as an “Apostle of Jesus Christ” or “an Apostle of Christ Jesus.”¹

Timothy & Titus are not apostles. Rather, they were the immediate successors of an apostle. As Successors of the Apostles, bishops today exercise this same authority, which is the authority of Christ. Apostolic succession is indispensable to what it means to confess the Church as “apostolic.” Based on a close an accurate reading of our uniquely Christian scriptures- the New Testament- the Catholic Church understands itself to have a divine constitution. Her constitution is hierarchical.

Far from being a pejorative term, the word "hierarchy" in Christian theology, points to the Church’s divine constitution. Taken from Greek, hierarchy refers to a sacred ordering. Sacramentally, there is no higher office in the Church than that of bishop.

Pope Leo is the Pope by virtue of his being the Bishop of Rome, which makes him the Successor of Saint Peter. Note that the Bishop of Rome is not an archbishop. Like a Cardinal, an archbishop, who has some jurisdiction over a metropolitan area- the Diocese of Salt Lake City, along with the Diocese of Reno, is part of the Archdiocese of Las Vegas- is not part of the Church’s divine constitution but represents a legitimate development.

Saint Paul Consigns his letters, Mosaic, Cathedral of Monreale, Palermo, Sicily

Saint Paul starts his Letter to Titus not by asserting his apostleship, which was frequently challenged, given the highly unique circumstances of his call, but by calling himself “a slave of God.”² A diakonos is a servant, a minister. In Greek, a slave is doulos. Paul calls himself a doulos of God, not only a servant. This is the essence of apostolic ministry.

If you’ve ever spent appreciable time with a bishop, you know that he is not his own. His life, his duties, his responsibilities, the pastoral nature of his call are all-consuming. It is no exaggeration to point out that a bishop frequently puts in 14–15-hour days six and sometimes seven times per week. In his apostolic ministry, Saint Paul set this pace early on.

In terms of our Gospel, it is episcopal ministry that prevents the Lord’s house from being plundered. Again, this pattern is set early on in the Church. While it certainly develops over time, it is substantially complete before the end of the first century. We see this in Paul’s exhortation to Titus, after being set over the Church in Crete. He exhorts Titus to appoint presbyters, that is, priests in each town throughout what we would now call his diocese. Only a bishop can ordain.

Every diocesan priest and deacon, along with all religious or extern clergy who are granted faculties by the bishop, obtain their authority from the bishop’s apostolic authority. Our job is to extend the bishop’s ministry. Episcopal ministry has a threefold munera: to teach, to govern, and to sanctify.

As mentioned earlier, apostolic succession is a necessary but insufficient criterion of the Church’s apostolicity. An apostle is one who is sent. Mass, in Latin (and Latin-based languages, like Spanish) is Missa. Missa refers to both the verb of being sent and the noun of what we are sent to do: engage in mission. The mission of the Church is to evangelize. Apart from our mission, apostolic authority is just a kind of cool historical phenomenon.

Evangelization is not a program, a canned and repeatable set of words and actions that can produce reliable results at a predictable rate. To evangelize is to tell others what Jesus Christ has done for you, to let them know what a difference knowing Christ makes for your life.

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1 See 2 Timothy 1:1 and Titus 1:1.^↩
2 Titus 1:1.^↩

Following Christ

Matthew 4:12-23

This weekend was kind of a pile-up in terms of things going on at the parish level. As it has been for decades, this weekend was dedicated to pro-life activities, including the March for Life. In addition, was the kick-off of Catholic Schools week. And, not to be out done, we also had a focus on vocations. Frankly, the convergence of these attenuated all the messages. This is just an observation by a parish deacon.

In light of our Gospel reading from the fourth chapter of Matthew, a vocation message seems to flow pretty naturally. The word "immediately" as it applies to Simon and Andrew heeding Jesus' call to follow along with the words "at once" pertaining to James and John indicate something pretty powerful going on. After all, what might make these men abandon their livelihood and even their families to follow this new arrival in Capernaum?

This account of the Lord's calling men to be His closest followers is inspiring to hear and to read. But think about the response of these four men for just a moment. Without hesitation, they left everyone and everything and joined Jesus. They did so without asking even one question, like, "Where are we going?" I can't imagine such a response was any easier in first century Capernaum-by-the-sea than in, say, modern-day Ogden, Utah.

What this shows us is the uniquness of the call of Simon, Andrew, James, and John. We often seek to apply it broadly, that is, to everyone and anyone- because we are all called to follow Jesus. But the call of these brothers is a uniquely aposotolic calling, not merely a generic call to discipleship. The manner of the call conditions the response. In turn, the manner of the call flows from what the call is.

Isaiah's prophecy found in our first reading is applied by the inspired author of Matthew to Jesus in light His moving to Capernaum from Nazareth. Zebulun and Naphtali, talk about marginal Israeli tribes! Like Jesus coming from Nazareth, this light shining forth from the lands of Zebulun and Naphtali shows the ordinary-looking nature of the in-breaking of God's kingdom in the person of Jesus Christ, who is autobasileia - the kingdom in person.

In past years, one of my stock theological sayings was that during His life and ministry it wasn't intuitively obvious to the casual observer that this itinerant from Nazareth was the Son of God, the Only Begotten of the Father in the flesh. Clearly, Simon, Andrew, James, and John saw something, experienced something, when the Lord called them as He passed by. It seems pretty evident from what follows that what they experienced in that moment was something they could not articulate.

It seems equally clear that at times these four didn't understand their calling and on several occasions even misundertood it. But Jesus' word was enough to provoke them to what could easily be seen as a not very responsible response. The radicality of their response is far too easy to gloss over and is unique to their call.

It's true, isn't it, that when you follow Christ, He doesn't lead you along a straight path? Didn't the Israelites takes forty years to reach the promised land? Did Simon, Andrew, James, and John see clearly where Jesus was going to lead them? We're back to Eugene Peterson's "long obedience in the same direction."

While the call can be intoxicating (it isn't always), it is always disruptive in some way. Why? Because, as the Lord's other call (to everyone) in today's Gospel beckons "Repent!" To repent is to change and then recognize your need to change even more. Heeding Christ's call leads you to the Cross and beyond- the path to destiny. But this journey, this pilgrimage, which requires companions (i.e., those who share bread), is what gives your life, everything in your life meaning. It is your purpose, your raison d'etre.

While there are different ways to do it, arising from baptism, there is only one vocation: Follow Christ.

Diaconate: My Adventure Continues

In addition to being the liturgical Memorial of Saint Francis de Sales, bishop and Doctor of the Church, tomorrow is also the twenty-second anniversary of my ordination as a deacon. On Saturday, 24 January 2004, the then-Bishop of Salt Lake City (later Archbishop of San Francisco), George H. Niederauer conferred upon me by his apostolic authority the sacrament of orders. Along with my marriage, the birth of my six children, it is certainly one of the the top ten days of my life.

Bishop George Niederauer presenting me with the Evangeliary during ordination, 24 January 2004

Monday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time

Readings: 1 Samuel 15:16-23; Psalm 50:8-9.16-17.21.23; Mark 2:18-22

In His life and ministry, Jesus truly inaugurated something new. But this new thing is not completely untethered from what came before. It is an expansion, not a contraction.

What the Lord expands was God’s covenant. He expands it to include everyone who believes in Him as Savior and Lord. In a sense, God’s chosen people are those who choose God by choosing Christ.

As Christians, we certainly understand fasting to be one of the core spiritual disciplines taught to us by the Lord Himself. In context, why would His disciples fast while He, the Bridegroom, was among them? Christ’s presence is always a cause for rejoicing, even when it's experienced under horrible circumstances.

If obedience is better the sacrifice, then sacrificial obedience is better still. Liturgical rituals often become rote, something that is done more by sheer force of habit than a loving response to God’s grace.

It’s easy to be obedient when it doesn’t cost you anything or when it gains you something. When I was in high school, I figured out early on that if I came home from school on Friday and completed all my chores, seeking to make a really good job of it, when I asked my dad for $20 and to take the car, he was much more amenable to my request.

Too often, people see their relationship with God as transactional in just this way. But God is not transactional. Sure, bad choices usually result in bad consequences, but this is hardly God’s judgment. What about when, like Job, you do everything right and life still seems to conspire against you?

One scripture verse I have found personally informative, consoling, and useful over many years is from the book of the minor prophet Habakkuk:

For though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit appears on the vine, Though the yield of the olive fails and the terraces produce no nourishment, Though the flocks disappear from the fold and there is no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior (Habakkuk 3:17-18)

This completely relates to what is new in Christ. It is the difference between being a Christian and being a pagan. It is not a Christian mindset to worship a temperamental god who punishes you when he is angry and rewards you when you are good. A god from whom you can get what you want if you say the magic words, perform the prescribed ritual, make the right offering.

Such a god is not a personal God, one who wants to be in a close relationship with you. Yes, God wants you to obey Him. But He wants you to do so not for fear of punishment but for love of Him. In our Psalm today, God asks: Do you think that I am like you? It’s a rhetorical question, or at least it should be. The one who “offers praise as a sacrifice,” says God, “glorifies me” (Psalm 50:21).

God is referring to the one who offers praise as a sacrifice always and everywhere, regardless of fortune or circumstance. This is what means to be obedient to God at its most fundamental. This is what it means to be upright and see the salvation of God.

What is the salvation of God? Well, it isn’t a what but a who: Jesus Christ. The reward for following Christ is Christ. He is the end for whom we strive and not a mere means to any other end.

Today our country observes a day in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It is a day we recognize the importance of human rights. The very concept of human rights arises from the deeply Christian understanding that each person is an image-bearer of God.

Those who struggled long and hard for racial equality and succeeded did so non-violently. Non-violence requires much more courage than violence. Most of those who undertook this struggle were able to do so because of their deep faith in Christ. They were able to trust Him as they took the slings and arrows that came with their fight for justice. As the late John Lewis, a protégé of both Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy urged those who engage in action for justice:

Release all bitterness. Hold only love, only peace in your heart, knowing that the battle of good to overcome evil is already won

God loves your enemy and so should you. Easier said than done!

In his Letter to the Ephesians, written as he made his way to Rome to be martyred, Saint Ignatius of Antioch insisted:

These are the beginning and the end of life: faith the beginning, love the end. When these two are found together, there is God, and everything else concerning right living follows from them

For those who are are now Candidates for full communion, let the joy of the Lord be your strength (Nehemiah 8:10). Learn God’s love poured out for you in the life, death, and resurrection of His Only Begotten Son. Open yourselves to the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life. This will allow Christ to bring about something new in and through you.

John Robert Lewis on MLK Day

Sadly, this year Martin Luther King/Human Rights Day needs much more emphasis than any time in the recent past. Hence, I turn to one of my political heroes, John Lewis. In a 2018 interview with Vann R. Newkirk, II for the The Atlantic's issue on Dr. King commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of his assassination, Lewis humorously noted that Dr. King, from their first meeting, always called him "The boy from Troy." In this interview, Lewis spoke opening of Dr. King's influence on him.

Lewis, of course, went on to work for and closely w/ RFK (another of my political heroes) and then have his own distinguished political career. Referring to where his lifelong mission began, he remembered that "... in 1955, at 15 years old, I heard of Dr. King, and I heard of Rosa Parks. They inspired me to get in trouble." This what John Robert Lewis, elder statesman, would call "good trouble," which is not trouble for trouble's sake. Rather, it's standing up for what is right, good, and just in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. This what Fr Gutierrez dubbed has having hope.

In the photo, a young John Lewis is on the end of the row on the right