The grace we are asking of God: a deeply felt awareness of how God in all of history and most powerfully in the Word made flesh draws us into the unfolding of the mystery of… More
Sursum corda—Upward, hearts!
My friends, look up! Look up not in imitation of the apostles who watched Jesus leave them as he was lifted into the heavens.
Look up to see his coming! The feast of the Ascension “is the ever-new ‘moment’ of Christ’s coming,” says Jean Corbon in his masterful text Wellspring of Worship.
The early Christians, who commissioned great mosaics of the ascended Lord in the apses of their ancient basilicas, knew that when they gathered to manifest and become the body of Christ in the liturgy, Jesus Christ was manifested as both present, here among them, and as coming. He, who ascended to the Father’s right hand, was constantly drawing us, his body, after him.
Translated that means, the ascended Christ brings humanity into the very heart of the Godhead.
In a recent class on liturgical theology the professor said it this way: The divine persons of the Trinity have invited created persons into the home in which they live in their perfect communion of life. Everyone’s “home address,” in a sense, will one day be the Holy Trinity.
These next few weeks we will immerse ourselves in the mysteries of the Ascension, Pentecost, the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity, the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, and the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Entering the life of the Trinity
In these day reflect upon the most momentous moment of your life: your baptism. In this sacrament you experienced an event, the action of the holy Trinity that changed the course of your life forever.
Through your baptism you were incorporated into the love of Christ and the life of the Church. In being washed by the waters of Baptism, you were forever changed and are sealed with an indelible spiritual mark, or character, that enables you to participate in a full sharing in the life of the Church.
The Catechism states that this sacrament “signifies and actually brings about death to sin and entry into the life of the Most Holy Trinity through configuration to the Paschal mystery of Christ.” (CCC 1239)
Start reflecting on your baptism here >
Sanctified and divinized by the Spirit
From the very beginning of Christian history, holy men and women have reflected on Christ’s presence in the Eucharist and have taught that the sacred transformation that occurs in the eucharistic liturgy is a sign and a cause of the transformation that should occur in the lives of all those who receive this great sacrament of Christ’s love.
It is the Holy Spirit who sanctifies and changes the bread and wine during the Eucharistic Prayer at Mass into the body and blood of Jesus. It is the divine Holy Spirit who sanctifies and divinizes people through the Eucharist. Cyril of Alexandria testifies to this when he wrote: “The holy body of Christ then gives life to those in whom it is […] being commingled with our body.” And also, ultimately, the aim of partaking of the Eucharist is for believers to be made partakers of the divine nature, to be made holy (On John).
Deepen your reflection on the Eucharist here >
10 ways to live a more contented life
“I am definitively loved and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.”
These are the words of Saint Josephine Bakhita, who as a young girl had been sold into slavery in the Sudan and had suffered indescribable suffering, torture, physical and psychological abuse.
Knowing that she was loved and always had been loved through her whole life led to great happiness for Bakhita. Knowing ourselves to be loved we can surrender ourselves to Love even in the unfairness of life because we are certain that Love is with us. “I am awaited by this Love.” This Love is a person who deeply cares about me. His love alone is what makes my life good.
We most probably will not live through as destructive an experience as slavery and human trafficking as did Bakhita, and yet trauma does touch in many ways our spirits and sear our souls. For some of us more than others. But all of us in some way bear wounds that bring tears to our eyes.
Often it can take many years, often well into our adult life, until we can settle into a deep awareness of being loved. Encountering Jesus in the sacraments chips away at our fears and heals our wounds so that we can so gradually begin to sense that our spirits live on the very Breath of God.
Read Josephine Bakhita’s incredible story and 10 ways to live a more contented life >
My friends, remember: Sursum corda—Upward, hearts!
Image Credit: Benjamin West, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
10 Ways to live a more contented life
“I am definitively loved and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.”
These are the words of Saint Josephine Bakhita, who as a young girl had been sold into slavery in the Sudan and had suffered indescribable suffering, torture, physical and psychological abuse.
In her earliest years, Bakhita was surrounded by a loving family of three brothers and three sisters, living a very happy and carefree life. However when she was 7 or 8 years old, she was abducted by Arab slave traders. She who had never known suffering in her life, was forced to walk 600 miles to El-Obeid barefoot. Twice on the way she was sold and bought by a new master. She was forcibly converted to Islam. In the next twelve years she would be sold three more times before she would finally be given her freedom.
In El-Obeid, Bakhita was bought by a rich Arab who used her as a maid for her two daughters. She was treated relatively well until one day, she accidentally broke a vase, and the son of her owner beat her so severely that she spent a month unable to move from her straw bed.
She once recalled one of her most terrifying experiences when she along with other slaves were marked by a process resembling tattooing. With a razor patterns were cut into her belly, breasts, and right arm, and the wounds filled with salt. Throughout the ordeal, Bakhita would recall, she felt a mysterious strength sustaining her.
Finally at the end of 1882, Joseph Bahkita was bought by the Italian Vice Consul Callisto Legnani. For the first time since the day she was kidnapped she was treated in a loving and cordial way. In the Consul’s residence, Bakhita experienced peace, warmth and moments of joy. When political situations forced the Consul to leave for Italy, Bakhita made the trip with him and with a friend of his, Augusto Michieli. On arrival in Genoa, she was left with Mr. Michieli’s wife and eventually became their daughter’s nanny.
In 1988 Mr. Michielli returned to Sudan to take possession of a large hotel he had acquired, followed later by his wife. She left Bakhita with her daughter in the care of the Canossian Sisters in Venice. It was here, under the care and instruction of the Sisters, that Bakhita encountered Christianity. Here she came to know the God she had experienced in her heart as a child without knowing who he was. “Seeing the sun, the moon and the stars, I said to myself: Who could be the Master of these beautiful things? And I felt a great desire to see him, to know Him and to pay Him homage….”
When her owners returned for her in Italy, she refused to leave the sisters, and the Italian court ruled that because Italian Law had never recognized slavery as legal, Bakhita had never legally been a slave.
Bakhita remained with the Canossians, embraced Catholicism, and was baptized, taking the full name of Josephine Margaret Fortunata (the Latin translation of Bakhita). She was confirmed and received Communion on the same day, entered the novitiate of the Canossian sisters the following year and pronounced her vows in 1986 in the presence of Archbishop Guiseppe Sarto, the future Pope Saint Pius X.
During her 42 years of religious life, immensely happy years for her, Bakhita carried out the roles of cook, sacristan, and doorkeeper. She was known for her gentleness, calming voice, and her ever-present smile. She became known for her holiness by the local townspeople and among her own sisters. The first publication of her story in 1931 made her famous in Italy.
A young student once asked Bakhita: “What would you do, if you were to meet your captors?” Without hesitation, she replied: “If I were to meet those who kidnapped me, and even those who tortured me, I would kneel and kiss their hands. For, if these things had not happened, I would not have been a Christian and a religious today.”
In 2000, she was declared a saint, the first Black woman to receive the honor in the modern era.
“I am definitively loved and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.”
Josephine Bakhita
Knowing that she was loved and always had been loved through her whole life led to great happiness for Bakhita. Knowing ourselves to be loved we can surrender ourselves to Love even in the unfairness of life because we are certain that Love is with us. “I am awaited by this Love.” This Love is a person who deeply cares about me. His love alone is what makes my life good.
Once Josephine Bakhita discovered this love radiating within her, she began to radiate this love to others. The simplest roles of service were assigned her: cook, doorkeeper, sacristan, and in these simple tasks she was able to give to those around her an extraordinary love.
We most probably will not live through as destructive an experience as slavery and human trafficking as did Bakhita, and yet trauma does touch in many ways our spirits and sear our souls. For some of us more than others. But all of us in some way bear wounds that bring tears to our eyes.
Often it can take many years, often well into our adult life, until we can settle into a deep awareness of being loved. Like Bakhita, it may be the kindness of others that begins that journey to discovering the ever-present surrounding love of God in our lives. Encountering Jesus in the sacraments chips away at our fears and heals our wounds so that we can so gradually begin to sense that our spirits live on the very Breath of God. Let these words from the hymn Nothing Is Lost on the Breath of God by Colin Gibson wash over you:
Nothing is lost on the breath of God,
nothing is lost forever,
God’s breath is love,
and that love will remain,
holding the world forever.
No feather too light,
no hair too fine,
no flower too brief in its glory,
no drop in the ocean,
no dust in the air,
but is counted and told in God’s story.
Nothing is lost to the eyes of God,
nothing is lost forever,
God sees with love,
and that love will remain,
holding the world forever.
No journey too far,
no distance too great,
no valley of darkness too blinding;
no creature too humble,
no child too small for God to be seeking and finding.
Nothing is lost to the heart of God,
nothing is lost for ever;
God’s heart is love,
and that love will remain,
holding the world forever.
No impulse of love,
no office of care,
no moment of life in its fullness;
no beginning too late,
no ending too soon,
but is gathered and known in its goodness. (Words © 1996 Hope Publishing Company, 380 S Main Pl, Carol Stream, IL 60188)
Josephine Bakhita shows us that when we are loved we are content, and we are able to become love for others. Here are 10 simple ways to live a more contented life and radiate love to those around you that are easy enough to work into your everyday rhythm:
- Gratitude: Deliver a letter of gratitude in writing or email to a person you are grateful to, but have not thanked appropriately.
- Counting kindness: Count the acts of kindness you receive every day.
- Three good things: Write down three things that have gone well for you this week and offer a prayer of thanks to God.
- Surrender: Release one thing over which you have no control. In your imagination wrap it in a box and hand it to Jesus. Watch what he does with it.
- Gift of contentment: Find five things you are already content with about your life, your appearance, your relationships, your work and family. Now try to find something you are discontent with. How can you become more content with this thing?
- Offer compliments: It’s easy to criticize and complain. Rise above criticism, and see how many compliments you can offer in a day.
- Shift your expectations: Write down five positive outcomes that you’re expecting throughout the day. Making these positive outcomes part of the fabric of your life is a key to combating fear and depression.
- Count your blessings before your sleep: Keep a gratitude journal by your bed. Each night write at least three blessings for which you are grateful before you turn out the lights.
- Let it go: See how many small things during the day you can just let go.
- Love unconditionally: See others and events through gentle eyes, focus on the person and their feelings and needs rather than situations and issues.
Image Credit: Public Domain via Rawpixel
Get up, take the Child, and run! (Horizons of the Heart 21)
The grace we are asking of God: a deeply felt awareness of how God in all of history and most powerfully in the Word made flesh draws us into the unfolding of the mystery of his love which always is extravagant and which is always seeking to save us. We desire that in doing this we enter into a process of healing that we might love Jesus and follow him more intentionally, completely, and wholeheartedly.
Horizons of the Heart is inspired by the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius and my own notes from my thirty-day Ignatian retreat in 2022.
Entering Prayer
Offer your prayer to God, desiring that in every way it will give him glory. I pour myself out in worship. You could use a few lines from the following Psalms if this helps you enter into prayer:
Psalm 100:1-5
Psalm 34:1-9
Psalm 111:1-5
Psalm 95:1-7
Psalm 92:1-8
Psalm 7:17
Ask of God what you think you need. (It could be later that God will show what you truly need and what you should be asking for, but begin now where you are.)
The flight into Egypt
Over several periods of prayer, linger imaginatively over the events narrated in Matthew 2:13-18.
The Holy Family were settled in a house (we know this because the Gospel says the Magi found Mary, Joseph and the child Jesus in a house). Since everyone of the tribe and lineage of Judah had returned to Bethlehem for the census, both Mary and Joseph may have found relatives there that they could stay with in the weeks directly after Jesus birth.
One night, Joseph is awoken by a dream. An angel prods him awake, telling him to leave right then and there and flee to Egypt. He had to run, waste no time, if he was to save the Child’s life.
One could imagine Mary and Joseph’s hopes to take Jesus back to Nazareth. After all, their home was there, a home totally prepared for Jesus’ arrival. Family and friends would have been a comfort. Joseph’s workshop and tools and unfinished jobs were in Nazareth.
But no, God’s plans were otherwise.
“Get up, now, take the Child and flee in the middle of the night through the desert to another country and wait there until you are told it is safe to return.”
Joseph could have thought of at least a couple reasons why this might not be such a good idea. It was night. It was dangerous. They had never been there before. He didn’t have his tools and had no way of making a living. It would be hard. The child was just born.
We don’t know exactly how old Jesus would have been when Joseph shook Mary awake and urged her to gather everything quickly and come with him. Together they left the house of their guest and vanished into the night.
Imagining Yourself Present
Over several days, imagine yourself present to this story of intrique, faith, and sorrow.
In Gospel contemplation you attempt to grasp something of Jesus’ human existence and as you do this, the Spirit begins to grasp you in your existence. This prayer gives us contact with Jesus, the risen Lord, who is present now, influencing my life now. The historical events of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, his healing and his preaching, transcend time and place. The THEN of Jesus’ life becomes NOW. It is important to allow oneself to become part of the story-event.
I found myself drawn to be the woman who had hosted the Holy Family in her house.
I watched them as they gathered their things to leave. “We need to leave now,” Joseph was saying quickly as he looked around for anything they had left behind. Something about a message of angels and keeping Jesus safe.
Quietly I watched them leave. Wondering. A couple hours later I was awakened again. Thundering horses. Yelling. Screaming. The banging of doors. Torches illuminating the streets. Babies crying. I ran to the window and my heart froze. There, banging on my door, was my daughter with her lifeless son in her arms.
“We need to leave now,” Joseph was saying. Something about a message of angels and keeping Jesus safe.
Not knowing how to find the Christ Child, King Herod gave the disastrous order to kill all the children that were in Bethlehem and its surroundings from two years old and under. This type of cruelty was typical of Herod who eliminated any who opposed him, including his wife and two sons.
Herod hoped that among these children would be killed the child who was the Messiah. How many children were killed? According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, “The Greek Liturgy asserts that Herod killed 14,000 boys (ton hagion id chiliadon Nepion), the Syrians speak of 64,000, [and] many medieval authors of 144,000.” Since the population of Bethlehem would have been about 300 people, that would put the number of children two years old or younger at about six or seven. However, the number of people who had travelled to Bethlehem for the census could have meant that the population at that time had grown much larger.
Jesus’ earthly life was bracketed by the maneuvering of two power-players to keep their grip on positions of power—King Herod and Pontius Pilate, the vacillating governor.
I spent a lot of time in prayer, as this woman who had hosted Joseph and Mary who had escaped the murder of their son through God’s intervention and who know rocked her own daughter who wailed in agony over the loss of her own baby boy.
This passage from the Gospel of Matthew is about faith all the way around. The faith and sacrifice of Joseph, the trust and willing cooperation of Mary, the struggle of every member of Bethlehem as they watched the Roman soldiers kill their youngest boys.
Imagining the Gospel events in the present
Over time, allow these stories in the gospel of Matthew to become current as if Mary and Joseph were fleeing with the Child Jesus to escape death. Sit with the many mothers mourning the loss of their children…. So many mourning broken dreams, a future without promise, a present in which they cannot flourish because of situations outside their control.
Sit beside fathers and mothers trying to bring their families to safety. Pray with those who are struggling to understand what God is asking of them in difficult situations.
In Gospel Contemplation, Ignatius takes advantage of the way in which spiritual growth, like so many other aspects of maturing that we experience, takes place primarily when our affectivity is engaged. It is the shift in one’s deeper emotions and feelings that leads to a change in one’s behavior. We reach these deeper levels through metaphor, image, and symbol—the work of the imagination.
Observing attractions and resistance
Notice any interior reactions that you experience: comfort, discomfort, being lifted up, struggle, joy, sadness….
Observe the actions, words, emotions, sensitivities, attitudes of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus and to which of them you feel more attracted. Which of them arouse more negative feelings or resistance? Return to aspects of these meditations that seem more personally meaningful.
This story raises more questions than it answers, immerses us into pain and sorrow and vulnerability. We stand in awe of God himself made to flee before the pompous vanity of one of his creatures. Yet even this seems to be unable to destroy God’s plan of unfolding love and mercy.
Entering the Mystery of the story
As you begin to enter the mystery of the story more deeply, you will begin to see or hear or touch, the pain, the mystery of your own life. You will enter into the event and interact more deeply. Flee with Joseph and try to let him teach you why he left without a word, why he trusts even what he can’t understand. Sit beside Mary as she longs for home even as her little one begins to grow up in Egypt. Watch them as they face fear, danger, suffering, struggle, loneliness. Little by little you will become more present to the mystery and the mystery will be present to you.
As you become more and more involved in the event of Jesus’ mystery that you are contemplating, your life and your choices are affected. You find yourself changing and desiring to change.
Conversing as with a friend
Continue in quiet—or even silent—intimate conversation with Mary, Joseph and Jesus. Ask them what is the grace that you should be praying for. Beg this grace of the Father. Then beg this grace of the Son, your Savior and Shepherd. Finally, beg for this grace from the Holy Spirit who is the source of all holiness.
If you wholly lived this grace that you are begging for, what would your life look like? Your relationships? Your prayer? The way you work? The way you love? The way you serve? What about you would make you the most happy?
Ask Mary, Joseph and Jesus to show you one specific gift they wish to give you. Receive it and remain in stillness and quietly relaxed presence under the influence of the Holy Spirit.
Reviewing the graces of prayer
When you finish praying, write down the main gifts and discoveries from this time of intimate contemplation. What is one concrete thing you can do to solidify these gifts in your life?
Image credit: The Flight into Egypt (1647-1650) by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo via Wikimedia
Eat and Drink the Full Presence of Christ (Contemplating the Easter Mysteries IV)
In the Easter season, we the baptized reflect on how we have the amazing grace at each Eucharistic celebration of being brought to the table to eat and drink the full presence of Christ. Saint Gregory of Nyssa wrote: “Faith is the womb that conceives this new life, baptism the rebirth by which it is brought forth into the light of day. The Church is its nurse; her teachings are its milk, the bread from heaven is its food” (Oratio 1 in Christi Resurrectionem),
Jesus “addressed these words to us: Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will not have life in you. Daily it is before our eyes as a representation of the passion of Christ. We hold it in our hands, we receive it in our mouths, and we accept it in our hearts” (from a sermon by Saint Gaudentiu of Brescia, Tract 2).
To break open just how amazing this is, I want to share with you an image that comes down to us from Cyril of Alexandria. In the 5th Century he was the Patriach of Alexandria and is considered a Church Father and Doctor of the Church. This great bishop and teacher used the image of melted wax to help people understand their union with Christ through the Eucharist. Imagine that you are making homemade candles. After setting the pot over a heat source, you would add wax, sometimes different pieces of wax, and then allow the wax to melt. The resulting candle is a new piece of wax. The first piece of wax is now in the second, and the second is in the first. In the same way, when you receive holy Communion you are truly partaking of the flesh and blood of Christ. When you nourish yourself on the Eucharist you are now found in Christ and Christ is found in you, as we see in the image of the two pieces of wax that have been melted together. Saint Cyril of Alexandria said it this way: “For as if one should join wax with other wax, he will surely see (I suppose) the one in the other; in like manner (I deem) he who receives the flesh of our saviour Christ and drinks his precious blood, as he says, is found one with him…so that he is found in Christ, Christ again in him (On John 4.2).
One hundred years earlier, Saint Cyril of Jerusalem taught the faithful of his diocese about the Eucharist. What we believe about the Eucharist today is exactly what this great Saint taught the newly baptized in the 4th Century. We know this because his teaching is recorded in a very important document called The Jerusalem Catecheses.
On the night he was betrayed our Lord Jesus Christ took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples and said: “Take, eat: this is my body.” He took the cup, gave thanks and said: “Take, drink: this is my blood.” Since Christ himself has declared the bread to be his body, who can have any further doubt? Since he himself has said quite categorically, This is my blood, who would dare to question it and say that it is not his blood? Therefore, it is with complete assurance that we receive the bread and wine as the body and blood of Christ. His body is given to us under the symbol of bread, and his blood is given to us under the symbol of wine, in order to make us by receiving them one body and blood with him. Having his body and blood in our members, we become bearers of Christ and sharers, as Saint Peter says, in the divine nature (St. Cyril of Jerusalem, From the Jerusalem Catecheses, Cat 22 Mystagogica).
Through our partaking of Jesus’ body and blood in the Eucharist, Jesus dwells in us. The theological doctrine for this ontological change of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus is transubstantiation. This word began to be used in the twelfth century and was accepted by the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) and approved by the Magisterium. The word transubstantiation indicates that “once the substance or nature of the bread and wine has been changed into the Body and Blood of Christ, nothing remains of the bread and the wine except the Species—beneath which Christ, whole and entire in his physical ‘reality,’ is even corporeally present” (Paul VI, Mysterium Fidei, no. 47).
From the very beginning of Christian history, holy men and women have reflected on Christ’s presence in the Eucharist and have taught that the sacred transformation that occurs in the eucharistic liturgy is a sign and a cause of the transformation that should occur in the lives of all those who receive this great sacrament of Christ’s love.
It is the Holy Spirit who sanctifies and changes the bread and wine during the Eucharistic Prayer at Mass into the body and blood of Jesus. It is the divine Holy Spirit who sanctifies and divinizes people through the Eucharist. Cyril of Alexandria testifies to this when he wrote: “The holy body of Christ then gives life to those in whom it is […] being commingled with our body.” And also, ultimately, the aim of partaking of the Eucharist is for believers to be made partakers of the divine nature, to be made holy (On John).
We can see, then, why St Cyril of Jerusalem taught that Christians truly receive in the Eucharist a share in Christ’s body and blood, become of one body and one blood with Christ, and thus have become Christ-bearers who share in the divine nature through the Eucharist (cf. D.R. Hawk-Reinhard, “Cyril of Jerusalem’s Sacramental Theosis,” Studia Patristica, LSVI, pg. 248). Through partaking in the Eucharist we participate in life, because Christ is Life by nature.
With the concluding hymn of Mass, our attention could get captured by figuring out how we will maneuver our way out of the Church parking lot or arrive at the next event for the day on time—perhaps athletics or brunch or a project at home. Saint Gaudentius of Brescia teaches us that the heavenly sacrifice instituted by Christ, the Eucharist, “is our sustenance on life’s journey; by it we are nourished and supported along the road of life until we depart from this world and make our way to the Lord.”
The Eucharist supports us on our life’s journey through the rest of the week!
Jesus in the Eucharist teaches us how to walk through life’s maze of joys and struggles and tears. Diognetus wrote in a letter in the 2nd or 3rd Century state that there is something extraordinary about the lives of Christians, about our lives, yours and mine.
“And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. …Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. … They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law. Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many; they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything. They suffer dishonour, but that is their glory. They are defamed, but vindicated. A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult. For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life (The Letter to Diognetus).
We are encouraged to live on this earth as if passing through. Saint Gregory the Great opens up our hearts to the joy of the heavenly feast to which we are called:
Beloved brothers, let us set out for these pastures where we shall keep joyful festival with so many of our fellow citizens. May the thought of their happiness urge us on! Let us stir up our hearts, rekindle our faith, and long eagerly for what heaven has in store for us. To love thus is to be already on our way. No matter what obstacles we encounter, we must not allow them to turn us aside from the joy of that heavenly feast. Anyone who is determined to reach his destination is not deterred by the roughness of the road that leads to it. Nor must we allow the charm of success to seduce us, or we shall be like a foolish traveller who is so distracted by the pleasant meadows through which he is passing that he forgets where he is going (From a homily on the Gospels by St Gregory the Great, pope).
Saint John Chrysostom, however, speaks more directly to the Eucharistic life that we are called to live after receiving Jesus in the Eucharist at Mass. He comments on St. Paul’s words: “Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread” (1 Cor. 10:17). Helping us dig more deeply into the meaning of this verse of the Bible that we hear–and even sing–often, Chrysostom explains how amazing these words of Paul are. It is true that in the Eucharist we have “communion in the body of Christ, as Paul stated in the previous verse. But now, the great Apostle goes further by stating that we are this very body of Christ. “For what is the bread?” Saint John Chrysostom asks. “It is the body of Christ. And what do the communicants become? The body of Christ. Not many bodies, but one body. For as the bread consists of many grains, so united that they are no longer distinguishable, and as they still subsist, though their individuality is no longer apparent to the eye because of their intimate union, so are we united one with the other and with Christ. … And so Paul adds: ‘We all partake of the one bread.’ If therefore by eating of the same body we all become that body, why do we not manifest to one another the same charity, and become on in this respect as well?”
O charity beyond all telling!
We have been loved with an endless outpouring of God’s charity. We have become through our partaking of the Eucharist one body with Christ and with each other. And we are called to live in this world a Eucharistic charity that is also beyond all telling! The first Christians were visible to the world around them only because of their love for one another and so should we be known for this same selfless outpouring of love.
Direction for prayer this Easter Season:
- At Mass, use images and phrases from this article that you have most resonated with to help you prepare more deeply for receiving the body and blood of Jesus in the Eucharist in Holy Communion and in your thanksgiving.
- Reflect slowly on the words of Saint Gregory the Great: “Let us set out for these pastures where we shall keep joyful festival with so many of our fellow citizens. May the thought of their happiness urge us on! Let us stir up our hearts, rekindle our faith, and long eagerly for what heaven has in store for us.” How could your love for the amazing gift of Jesus in the Eucharist bring you greater happiness the rest of the week?
- Read the challenging words of Saint John Chrysostom and ask Jesus: What more can I do? “For what is the bread?” Saint John Chrysostom asks. “It is the body of Christ. And what do the communicants become? The body of Christ. Not many bodies, but one body. For as the bread consists of many grains, so united that they are no longer distinguishable, and as they still subsist, though their individuality is no longer apparent to the eye because of their intimate union, so are we united one with the other and with Christ. … And so Paul adds: ‘We all partake of the one bread.’ If therefore by eating of the same body we all become that body, why do we not manifest to one another the same charity, and become on in this respect as well?”
Image Credit: Blessed Sacrament Chapel in the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, Washington, D.C.
Pin Pricks and Pet Peeves
This is the third article in a short series on forgiveness. We have explored the dramatic and traumatic stories of Saint Rita and Corrie Ten Boom. In this article, we’ll be thinking about the million-and-one pin pricks that we receive and give to others every day. Though these aren’t dramatic or traumatic in themselves, when not attended to they can lead to drama and trauma and to the need for forgiveness in order to restore peace in a relationship.
These pin pricks never show up in the biographies of saints. We certainly don’t expect to read about Saint Rita’s frustration when her husband left his socks on the floor every morning or how Corrie was driven crazy by the way her father repetitively tapped his pencil on the desk. But, honestly, we have to face the fact our lives are full of these pet peeves that get under our skin and in the way of our relationships…and probably our saints had a few pet peeves themselves.
A quick Google search for pet peeves reveals that there are lists of pet peeves about just about everything: Wikipedia defines a pet peeve as “a minor annoyance that an individual finds particularly irritating to them, to a greater degree than would be expected based on the experience of others.”
One list of 70 pet peeves includes: chewing sounds, interrupting during a conversation, texting during a meal, throat clearing, leaving cabinet drawers open, not screwing the lids onto bottles and containers all the way, cutting lines, talking during movies, being late, cracking knuckles, and, well, you get the point…. I have to admit I do some of these things myself and am probably driving at least one sister I live with nuts.
One evening I learned a really important lesson. I was washing the dishes and had accidently left the sprayer option on the water faucet. When I turned on the water to rinse the dishes, I sprayed not only the dishes but also my superior who was standing next to the sink to get water for the coffee pot. There was no response. No surprise. No disgust. No anger. No running to clean off her habit. Nothing. “It’s okay,” she said. “Don’t worry.” And that was the end of that. I learned two things that night, however. One: Always check to make sure you don’t have the sprayer left on when you turn on the water. Two: You don’t always need to give a dramatic reaction to make your point.
Back to my Google search for “pet peeves.” There are office pet peeves, driving pet peeves, as well as pet peeves particular to flight attendants, and teachers, and doctors, and veterinarians, and admissions counselors. There are annoying trends that drive us crazy about email, about social media, about sports, about teams. Pet peeves are a part of daily life.
When minor annoyances are not addressed over time, they can have serious effects on a relationship. The way someone who lives or works close to us chews, or piles things on their desk, or hums while they work, or leaves the newspaper on the table, or insists on giving their opinion rather categorically about just about everything, can make us feel misunderstood, not appreciated, unimportant. And we so often do things that make others feel the same way or worse.
Practices for addressing pet peeves
Here are some practices you can develop that will keep those pet peeves from ruining your day and your relationships:
Practice expressing respect actively and frequently throughout the day. Get in the habit of noticing what you like about other people and telling them what about them delights you. Tell others, in their presence, how great they are in a particular area. Build up a groundwork of trust and respect for each other.
Share behaviors that could be pet peeves that bother other people. Keeping things light and humorous, take some time to share with the people who work or live nearest you your own behaviors that could bother others. “I know I talk to myself at my desk here. It’s a habit I’ve had since childhood and one I picked up from my dad when he worked at home. Just let me know if it is bothering you because I honestly don’t even hear myself do it anymore. I promise not to be offended, at least not most of the time.” Your sharing not only lets others know you are aware that something you do mindlessly could bug them, it also tells them why you do it and gives them permission to ask you to tone it down if it is becoming obnoxious to them.
Have a dialogue about pet peeves with people who work or live close to you in different settings. Go around the room or table and let everyone share one pet peeve that bothers them in the office or home or team. Go around the room till everyone has three opportunities. Sometimes we have no idea that something we do or don’t do drives another crazy. At times, it requires just a simple adjustment. Religious sisters get transferred often from one assignment to another. In each community, we begin to live with different sisters who like things done a certain way. “My mom always told me to…. That’s why I…” Well, my mom didn’t really care that much about the item that is Sister’s pet peeve. I have to admit, however, that most of these things are small and I can adjust the way I do many little things in order to not bother the others as much as possible. The benefit for me is that I take on new habits that are actually really helpful. The pet peeves become my teachers!
Engage in anti-pet peeves. “An anti-pet peeve is the opposite of a pet peeve: a tiny thing in life that brings you an exponential amount of joy.” This site provides themed collections of anti-pet peeves. Readers contribute activities that bring them great joy, so much joy that they make sure they enjoy them every chance they get. For example, one reader described how he loved bringing a cup of coffee to his wife first thing on Saturday morning and seeing her react as if it were Christmas morning. Every time. Another loved watching her dog on her back while she was on video calls.
Focus on what you love not what you hate. My dad loves thunderstorms. Nothing makes him more happy than to sit in a room and watch out the window as a thunderstorm rolls in. My mom hates thunderstorms. Dad shared with me one evening how he and mom were at a Bed and Breakfast in the mountains. They went to bed for the night and a thunderstorm broke out in the sky overhead. He, being nearest the window, was delighted as he watched the lightening and heard the thunder roll across the sky. In a few moments, mom got up and closed the blinds. He just rolled over and went to sleep. That story will remain in my heart forever. Dad’s love for mom far surpassed his frustration at not being able to watch thunderstorms. He loved her too much to fuss over something so small. I’m sure he sneaked out and watched storms when he could be alone. But he respected her fears and her wishes when they were together. Again and again my siblings and I hear our father say, “I love your mom so much!” The pet peeves couldn’t embitter a heart so full of love to the point that he made a big deal about insisting on what he wanted. Being in a good relationship was more important to him than indulging his desire to relish in thunderstorms.
Respect where another person is at. A pet peeve that bothers us about another person may actually just be a temporary stage of growth. Maybe at this point in the other person’s life they need to know they are important, valuable, smart, popular. Sometimes we just need to let another person alone as they grow through things. We can embody behaviors that correspond to our values, and these might have an influence on the other person as they notice there is another way to act. But just as you will only kill a seedling if you force the seed open to hasten its growth, stuffing another person into your own mold only leads to frustration and hurt.
Don’t waste your time with stupid stuff. Everyone has pet peeves, just as everyone has weaknesses. Be the person who has the wisdom to distinguish between what is worth fighting for and what isn’t. What’s important and what can pass. What’s serious and what is not. Be the wisdom figure who can think things through instead of blowing up. Who can work on themselves to be great-hearted rather than being petulant and demanding. The more we feed our pet peeves the stronger they will become and the more they will affect our relationships.
Learn to accept the fact that we are all imperfect Someone has the habit of putting wet dishes on top of the dry dishes in the kitchen. It doesn’t bother them, but it certainly bothers you because you have to put them away. You may be trying to finish a project and the rest of the team is behind you chatting about their plans for the weekend. A customer loses their temper and causes the scene, demanding to speak with your manager. There are so many things that can annoy us and drive us up the wall. Before pet peeves begin to take control and people become disgruntled, simply ask yourself if a situation is worth getting upset over. The question itself can give you a change of perspective. Some things are big and need to be addressed, but most things are small. We are all imperfect, and learning to accept this can go a long way toward being able to work together with charity.
When clashes and resentments break out between people over pet peeves forgiveness is a necessary path to healing. Next we’ll be presenting a prayerful exercise for forgiveness.
Baptism: becoming God’s beloved one Part 2 (Contemplating the Easter Mysteries III)
Your baptism was the most momentous moment of your life! In this sacrament you experienced an event, the action of the holy Trinity that changed the course of your life forever. Our feelings can tell us things that are not true about ourselves and about God. The action of God, however, reveals to us the truth of how we are loved by our Father, and God cannot lie.
Through your baptism you were incorporated into the love of Christ and the life of the Church. In being washed by the waters of Baptism, you were forever changed and are sealed with an indelible spiritual mark, or character, that enables you to participate in a full sharing in the life of the Church.
The Catechism states that this sacrament “signifies and actually brings about death to sin and entry into the life of the Most Holy Trinity through configuration to the Paschal mystery of Christ.” (CCC 1239)
Indeed, by our Baptism, we are initiated into an eternal sharing in the Divine Life of the Trinity and participate fully in the life of grace.
Cyril of Jerusalem said of Baptism, “You go down dead in your sins, and you come up made alive in righteousness.”
St. Augustine wrote, “Baptism washes away all, absolutely all, our sins …. This is the meaning of the great sacrament of Baptism, which is celebrated among us.”
St. Gregory of Nazianzus wrote, “Baptism is God’s most beautiful and magnificent gift … We call it gift, grace, anointing, enlightenment, garment of immortality, bath of rebirth.”
Nicholas Cabasillas wrote in The Life in Christ:
“They are no trifling gifts he bestows [in Baptism], nor are they trifling benefits of which he counts us worthy! … When we come up from the water we bear the Savior upon our souls, on our heads, on our eyes, in our very inward parts, on all our members—him who is pure from sin, free from all corruption, just as he was when he rose again and appeared to his disciples, as he was taken up, as he will come again to demand the return of his treasure. Thus we have been born; we have been stamped with Christ as though with some figure or shape. … He makes us his own body and he becomes for us what a head is for the members of a body. Since, then, he is the Head, we share all good things with him, for that which belongs to the head must needs pass into the body.”
We are truly God’s beloved, because we are one with Christ his beloved Son. In an ancient homily read every Holy Saturday in the Office of Readings, the author pictures the King seeking out our first parents who sit in darkness, to free them from imprisonment and pain. Jesus is often shown in icons depicting this event grasping the hands of Adam and Eve, pulling them toward himself, raising them with him, and with them, each of us:
“‘I command you: Awake, sleeper, I have not made you to be held a prisoner in the underworld. Arise from the dead; I am the life of the dead. Arise, O man, work of my hands, arise, you who were fashioned in my image. Rise, let us go hence; for you in me and I in you, together we are one undivided person….
“But arise, let us go hence. The enemy brought you out of the land of paradise; I will reinstate you, no longer in paradise, but on the throne of heaven. I denied you the tree of life, which was a figure, but now I myself am united to you, I who am life. I posted the cherubim to guard you as they would slaves; now I make the cherubim worship you as they would God.
“The cherubim throne has been prepared, the bearers are ready and waiting, the bridal chamber is in order, the food is provided, the everlasting houses and rooms are in readiness; the treasures of good things have been opened; the kingdom of heaven has been prepared before the ages.”
Entering deeply into the Easter mysteries through liturgical catechesis (also called mystagogy) is meant to stir things up for us, to unsettle us, to break open the tired and static meaning of our life, to push us out with radiant joy to share the mission of the Church and all those who have risked “entering into the life-altering mysteries of faith” (Geraard F. Baumbach, Eucharistic Mystagogy, 25).
What has been stirring in your heart as you’ve entered more deeply into the mystery of your baptism?
God wants you to become a living force for all mankind, lights shining in the world. You are to be radiant lights as you stand beside Christ, the great light, bathed in the glory of him who is the light of heaven. You are to enjoy more and more the pure and dazzling light of the Trinity, as now you have received – though not in its fullness – a ray of its splendour, proceeding from the one God, in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be glory and power for ever and ever. Amen (From a Sermon by Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop, Oratio 39 in Sancta Lumina).
Directions for your prayer this Easter:
- What would be different in your life if these words of St. Gregory of Nazianzus guided your life: “God wants you to become a living force for all mankind, lights shining in the world. You are to be radiant lights as you stand beside Christ, the great light, bathed in the glory of him who is the light of heaven.” What would change? What would you renew? What would you begin? What would you relinquish?
- How is Jesus calling you to enter more deeply into the life of the Church, the celebration of the sacraments, and the missionary imperative to share what you have received with others?
Image: baptistry St Theresa’s Church in Ashburn, VA
The Bread of Life (John 6:22-29)
The thirst for God is present in every person on the face of the earth. The yearning for fulfillment beats in every human heart. The women and men in today’s Gospel had experienced being fed, completely satisfied, miraculously, in the presence of Jesus who had multiplied the bread and fish brought by a small boy. From a few loaves and fish, five thousand people had been more than amply provided for. This did not escape their notice.
When the people saw the sign he had done, they said, “This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world” (v. 14). Jesus, knowing what was in their hearts, fled because he knew they were coming to take him away and make him their king. These children of Israel, with their homeland occupied by the Romans, with all the humiliation and indignity that goes with being an oppressed people suddenly flickered with hope. They believed they had found a way out of their problems in the person of Jesus who had provided for them beyond their wildest imagining. If they could just keep him for themselves, like being able to make three wishes that would change the circumstances of their life forever. When they sought for Jesus the next day, he said as much to them.
“Jesus answered them and said, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for food that perishes’” (v 26-27).
In order to live, we need to nourish ourselves, we need dignity and peace. The hearts of the people in this crowd were hoping against hope that things could change for them on a temporal level. They just didn’t realize that things had already changed. With the radical newness of the incarnation of the Son of God, everything had already become new. A greater hope of a more eternal promise was being fulfilled before their very eyes. Yet they could not recognize it. They were enamored still of the loaves of bread they had eaten. They were still looking for the food that perishes. Their imagination was too small.
In the document Verbum Domini, Benedict XVI writes:
What the Church proclaims to the world is the Logos of Hope (cf. 1 Pet 3:15); in order to be able to live fully each moment, men and women need “the great hope” which is “the God who possesses a human face and who ‘has loved us to the end’ (Jn 13:1)” (no. 91).
When we have found him, when we have let ourselves be seen by him, when we have allowed ourselves to be saved by him, we will no longer be absorbed by what we can get for ourselves, but in how we can tell others about Jesus.
Again, in the words of Benedict XVI:
We cannot keep to ourselves the words of eternal life given to us in our encounter with Jesus Christ: they are meant for everyone, for every man and woman. Everyone today, whether he or she knows it or not, needs this message. May the Lord himself…raise up in our midst a new hunger and thirst for the word of God (cf. Am 8:11) (no. 91).
“Do not work for food that perishes,” Jesus admonishes the crowd, with an ardent desire to expand their hearts and deepen their hope. “Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.”
This food by which they will truly be fed is “the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world” (v. 32-33). It is the food on which we ourselves, thousands of years later, are weekly and even daily nourished if we so desire. In the first line of Panis angelicus, the famous Eucharistic hymn written in the 13th century by St. Thomas Aquinas,we sing, Panis angelicus fit panis hominum. (“The bread of angels is made the bread of mortals.”) Then St. Thomas leads us to cry out in wonder: O res mirabilis! Manducat Dominum / Pauper, pauper, servus et humilis. (Oh, wonderful thing! The Lord becomes our food / poor, a servant, and humble.)
With as much intensity and effort as the crowd sought out the Lord who had multiplied the loaves and the fishes, satisfying their needs that day, may we seek out the Bread of Angels, the true bread from heaven, the Eucharist to be nourished on the body and blood of the Lord. And having been fed with the Bread from Heaven may we become Eucharistic missionaries to all those who feel no need, no urgency, no desire to be fed with the Bread of Angels that lasts unto eternal life. As Pope Benedict XVI has said: “It is our responsibility to pass on what, by God’s grace, we ourselves have received” (no. 91).
Praying with this passage of Scripture
Lectio Divina is a way of listening to God as he speaks in his Word. It is a practice of communicating with God through Scripture and attending to God’s presence and what he wishes to tell us. In this slow and prayerful reading of the Word of God, we allow ourselves to be transformed by the Spirit who forms us into the image of Christ.
There are four movement in Lectio Divina: Read (lectio), Meditate (meditation), Pray (oratio), Contemplate (contemplation).
Begin by finding a still space to pray. Breathe deeply and become quieter within. Abandon any agenda, worries or thoughts you bring to this prayer and entrust these things to the merciful care of God. Ask for the grace to be receptive to what God will speak to you through this Scripture reading. Grant me, Jesus Divine Master, to be able to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God and your unfathomable riches. Grant that your word penetrate my soul; guide my steps, and brighten my way till the day dawns and darkness dissipates, you who live and reign forever and ever Amen.
Read (lectio)
Begin by slowly and meditatively reading your Scripture passage out loud. Listen for a particular word or phrase that speaks to you at this moment and sit with it for a time.
The next day the crowd that had stayed on the opposite shore of the lake realized that only one boat had been there, and that Jesus had not entered it with his disciples, but that they had gone away alone. Then some boats from Tiberias landed near the place where the people had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. Once the crowd realized that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum in search of Jesus.
When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”
Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.”
Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”
Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
Meditate (meditatio)
Read the passage a second time. As you re-engage the text, let the word or phrase that stood out become your invitation to speak from your heart with God who wishes to share his heart with you. Allow this word or phrase to wash over you and permeate your thoughts and feelings. You may wish to repeat this phrase quietly and gently for a period of time.
Pray (oratio)
Read the text a third time. Listen for what God is saying to you. Speak heart to heart with God. Notice the feelings that this conversation with God raises up within you. Share with God what you notice about your response to this conversation. You may wish to return to repeating the phrase quietly and gently, allowing it to permeate you more and more deeply.
Contemplate (contemplatio)
Read the text a final time. Now be still and rest in God’s embrace. Ask God to give you a gift to take with you from this prayer. You might ask God if he is inviting you to do some action, for instance, make some change in your thoughts, attitudes or reactions, in the way you speak or how you treat others. Thank God for this gift and invitation as you conclude your prayer.
Photo Credit: Fr. Fernando via Cathopic
Facing the unjust bits of life (Horizons of the Heart 20)
The grace we are asking of God: a deeply felt awareness of how God in all of history and most powerfully in the Word made flesh draws us into the unfolding of the mystery of his love which always is extravagant and which is always seeking to save us. We desire that in doing this we enter into a process of healing that we might love Jesus and follow him more intentionally, completely, and wholeheartedly.
Horizons of the Heart is inspired by the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius and my own notes from my thirty-day Ignatian retreat in 2022.
Looming large in my 30-day retreat was a decision that was in a certain sense, due to forces outside myself, forced upon me.
Nothing strange there!
Doesn’t this happen to just about every one of us?
Even if we think we can control ourselves and mastermind our success, either materially or spiritually, we soon find out that we can’t control others, we can’t control the forces of nature, and we can’t control the randomness of incidents that could affect, break, and change the direction of our lives.
But still, when we need to do an unexpected about turn, when we are blocked and forced into a right or a left hand change of direction at what turned out to be a dead end, we at times suffer indescribable pain.
I remember standing at the end of the outdoor Stations of the Cross at the retreat house and reading the inscription taken from the second chapter of Paul’s letter to the Philippians: “Jesus did you deem equality with God something to be grasped at, but rather humbled himself taking the form of a slave.” Every injustice I had ever received, little ones and big ones, came back with powerful force and left me breathless… and angry.
How ashamed I felt, but there it was. Who Jesus was and what he invited me to, I was not, and at that moment I clearly refused to follow him. It was just too hard…by myself. I needed God’s help, a lot of help.
The natural reaction to injustice is hurt or rage or bitterness because something we deemed to be our own or somehow necessary to our living and thriving is suddenly changed and taken away.
As we enter into the next mystery of Jesus’ life, the flight into Egypt, we are entering into this sacred mystery of why bad things happen to good people. We certainly won’t be answering this age-old question, but instead offering the wisdom of Ignatius and the Scriptures to help us enter reverently ever deeper into the mystery of God’s loving us even in times that are difficult.
I randomly opened my notes from the retreat and discovered something that was pivotal to my finding peace:
God decides which alternative in our life is of value to me and my life in the world, what will make me more loving towards other people and more open to God’s love flooding my heart. God is the one who know which of two alternatives will ultimately make me more selfish and which will make me more selfless. Which ultimately will make me unhappy and which will result in my unending happiness which may or may not begin on this earth.
God knows….
I don’t really ultimately know which of two alternatives before me will give God the most glory and bring me and others true joy and peace. If I have fixed my attention on one alternative, and stick with that no matter what, unwilling to see or try what God is making apparent to me right before my eyes, if I try to force God to agree with me, what will I ultimately lose? And really what is it that I would gain in the end?
I can only live true to myself if I live true to who I am as I am in God’s plan and to all that he hopes in me.
This reminds me of another great quote from St. Paul, this time from his letter to the Romans:
If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself. Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us.
Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.
And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:33-39 NLT)
Our desire in these next meditations is to enter courageously into life as it is and to discover right there the unfolding of the mystery of God’s love which always is extravagant and which always is seeking to save us. How healing will be this discovery when we are embraced by Love. How we will desire out of sheer gratitude to follow Jesus more intentionally, completely, and wholeheartedly.
Blessed Dina Bélanger, a heavenly friend I found while on retreat, leads the way here, “My only pleasure is to let you have your way. I have abandoned myself completely to Your action, so that, without hindrance, You may be able to fulfill your designs in me, poor as I am, to act freely, always, and in everything.”
Baptism: becoming God’s beloved one Part 1 (Contemplating the Easter Mysteries II)
Ever wondered what God sees when he looks at you?
Wait. God looks at me?
You mean God sees this big hole I have in my heart? He knows that I can’t sleep for the worry that is nagging at my thoughts? He cares about how tired I feel from the endless responsibilities that keep me scurrying through my day?
Yes. When God looks at you he sees his daughter, his son. He also sees how often you—as children so often do—try to take care of things yourself without relying on your Father.
I’ve read about God’s love. I’ve heard people talk about it. But I don’t feel it so how can I know it is true? How can I know I mean anything to God?
In the beginning of the public life of Jesus, when he was around thirty years old, there is recorded a mysterious event. Jesus had gone down to the River Jordan where his cousin John was baptizing in the water. All Judea was flocking to him to be baptized by him and to learn what they needed to do to return to God.
Jesus not only watched, he got in line to be baptized himself.
John is baptising when Jesus draws near. Perhaps he comes to sanctify his baptiser; certainly he comes to bury sinful humanity in the waters. He comes to sanctify the Jordan for our sake and in readiness for us; he who is spirit and flesh comes to begin a new creation through the Spirit and water. From a Sermon by Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop
(Oratio 39 in Sancta Lumina, 14-16, 20: PG 36, 350-351, 354, 358-359)
But John tried to deter him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”
Jesus replied, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” Then John consented.
As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”
Jesus knows what it is like for his Father to look at him, to hear the love that is in his Father’s voice as he spoke to him, calling him Son, the Son in whom he was well pleased, his beloved Son.
When someone talks about a child or friend as their “beloved,” they mean to say, “I have a real special liking for this person. I prefer them. I love being around them. I give them gifts to show them my love. I take them into my confidence. They are closer to me than all others. I can’t live without them.”
The baptism of Jesus has everything to do with your baptism and mine. It has everything to do with our becoming God’s beloved one.
Saint Maximus of Turin tells us: “Christ is baptized, not to be made holy by the water, but to make the water holy, and by his cleansing to purify the waters which he touched. For the consecration of Christ involves a more significant consecration of the water.”
Christ is bathed in light; let us also be bathed in light. Christ is baptised; let us also go down with him, and rise with him. (From a Sermon by Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop, Oratio 39 in Sancta Lumina)
I have spent so many decades of my life wondering if God saw me, if God cared about me, if God was going to be there for me. Isn’t it true that so often we measure the gift of God by what our feelings are telling us? We don’t “feel” God’s presence, so he must not be here. We don’t “feel” lovable to ourselves and we project that on to the way we think God must feel about us. We “feel” alone and isolated and we act as though God has no power or interest to help us.
Notice that at the baptism of Jesus, we are not told about Jesus’ feelings. We witness an event. Jesus goes down into the water, is baptized by John, emerges from the water, and hears his Father’s voice calling him Son.
Jesus rises from the waters; the world rises with him. The heavens like Paradise with its flaming sword, closed by Adam for himself and his descendants, are rent open. The Spirit comes to him as to an equal, bearing witness to his Godhead. A voice bears witness to him from heaven, his place of origin. The Spirit descends in bodily form like the dove that so long ago announced the ending of the flood and so gives honour to the body that is one with God. (From a Sermon by Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, bishop, Oratio 39 in Sancta Lumina)
The Baptism of Jesus is the moment in which the Lord sanctified the waters. By immersing his holy body in them, Jesus made them fitting for conveying the grace of the sacrament of Christian baptism. Jesus makes it possible for us to be reborn to new life through the sacrament of baptism. Saint Maximus of Turn in the fifth century explains: “Christ is baptized, not to be made holy by the water, but to make the water holy, and by his cleansing to purify the waters which he touched. … For when the Savior is washed all water for our baptism is made clean, purified at its source for the dispensing of baptismal grace to the people of future ages. Christ is the first to be baptized, then, so that Christians will follow after him with confidence” (Sermo 8: De sancta Ephiphania, 2).
It was in Christ’s own baptism by John the Baptist in the river Jordan that this sacrament of initiation was instituted to enable us to share in the Divine Life of the Trinity.
Most of us probably don’t remember our baptism if we were baptized as infants. Our “feelings” at the moment were probably surprise or discomfort as water was poured on our heads three times while the priest called us by name and said the words: “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
Directions for your prayer this Easter:
Underline in this article every reference to a gift God has given you through your baptism. Notice how your soul responds to this litany of love. When you hold your experiences of sorrow and loss and doubt together with God’s action to bring you to the “pure and dazzling light of the Trinity,” what new things do you notice?
Image credit: Baptism of Christ fresco by Giotto di Bondone, c. 1305 (Cappella Scrovegni, Padua, Italy) via Wikipedia, Public Domain
How to make forgiveness a part of your life
Early in the morning on October 2, 2006 in Dacula, Georgia, twenty-year-old Matt Swatzell was driving home from a twenty-four-hour shift as a firefighter and EMS and had had only 30 minutes of sleep. Less than four miles from his home he fell asleep at the wheel and collided with another car, killing thirty-year-old June who was driving and injuring her nineteen-month-old daughter, Faith.
It was in the hospital that Matt learned that June was pregnant and that both she and the baby did not make it.
June’s husband Erik Fitzgerald was heartbroken. He was a full-time pastor. Close family and friends stood with him as he grieved his wife’s death and that of his unborn child. One day, one of his students said that she couldn’t help but think of how the driver of the car was feeling. Eric immediately asked the group to pray for the driver of the car. With this simple prayer began a journey of forgiveness that has inspired hundreds of thousands. Their story was recounted in Today and People among other outlets.
In the face of the tragedy, Erik recalled a message he heard in a sermon: “In moments where tragedy happens or even hurt, there’s opportunities to demonstrate grace or to exact vengeance. Here was an opportunity where I could do that. And I chose to demonstrate grace.”
To start, Erik attended Matt’s sentencing and extended his forgiveness. As a county officer, Matt was facing a felony and harsh time. But Fitzgerald pleaded for a lesser sentence.
“I didn’t see why this accident and tragedy needed to ruin any more lives,” said the pastor. Matt paid a fine and did community service.
Although Matt wanted to thank Erik for all he had done, he couldn’t legally speak with him during the two-year criminal investigation.
The day before the two-year anniversary of the accident, however, Matt went to the grocery store to purchase a card to send to Erik. When he returned to his car in the parking lot he was just about to turn on the engine when he saw Erik walking into the same store. Not sure what to expect, Matt approached Erik and introduced himself. Matt burst into tears and Erik told him that he forgave him.
“That was the biggest relief I’d ever felt. He just said from the start that he forgives me,” Matt recalled. “Just hearing him say those words, it just impacted my life completely.”
Then Erik told him, “I have a desire to want to be in your life.”
“You forgive as you’ve been forgiven. It wasn’t an option. If you’ve been forgiven, then you need to extend that forgiveness.”
Erik Fitzgerald
The men stayed connected by meeting at least once every two weeks, attending church together and eating meals at the Waffle House and other restaurants, just the two of them.
“We recognized that when we first started meeting it was unusual. We knew it was God,” said Erik. “You forgive as you’ve been forgiven. It wasn’t an option. If you’ve been forgiven, then you need to extend that forgiveness.”
“Part of the draw I felt to befriend Matthew was he was a good guy. He wasn’t a convict or on drugs. He was just a guy who got off a shift,” said Erik. “I felt it was my responsibility to encourage him and see the big picture.”
So Erik was there for Matt when he married and at the birth of their first child, who shares a birthday with Erik’s own daughter. Matt’s anxiety and guilt were still so overwhelming that he feared something would happen to his wife and child. After many meetings with Erik and a counsellor, Matt was able to move past the hurt.
“I can honestly say that without this friendship I don’t know where I’d be,” said Matt. “I can’t say, ‘This is a beautiful story and it’s got a great ending.’ It doesn’t,” he told Today in an interview. “It’s nasty, it’s real, and it’s something that I’m going to struggle with for the rest of my life.”
A Process for Forgiveness
Forgiveness can be difficult, particularly when our inner resources are depleted. It’s difficult for anyone to rise above the pain of being hurt by another or the guilt we feel when we have hurt someone else. We feel we were justified. Or perhaps we can’t admit that we were responsible and that hanging on to being in the right is somehow hanging on to the last shred of our sense of self. Unforgiveness creates a tremendous weight of bitterness, rejection, and broken relationships.
When I am hurt I have trouble being near the person until I have worked through my anger and released them from my demands that they be different than who they are at this time. Forgiveness doesn’t mean forgetting or even pardoning an offense. It means changing our response to the offense. Some ways to practice what I call “everyday forgiveness” are: forgive yourself, forgive the “stupid stuff” that happens every day, forgive the people and institutions that have hurt us, forgive the unmerited suffering that seems so unfair like an illness or failure. Instead of bitterness, choose to offer compassion and empathy to the person or institution or event that wronged you.
People who forgive tend to be more satisfied with their lives and to have less depression, anxiety, stress, anger, and hostility. People who hang onto grudges, however, are more likely to experience severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as other health conditions. That doesn’t mean that they can’t train themselves to act in healthier ways. Here is a method of forgiveness that you might try:
1.) Reflect and remember the event that has wronged you. How did you react? How did you feel? How has your anger and hurt affected you since?
2.) Empathize with the other person. Try to understand what could have led the other person to do what they did to hurt you. You may begin to realize that the one they are truly hurting is themselves. How much they must be suffering from their own negative behavior.
3.) Forgive deeply. We are not talking here about behavior that is abusive and destructive. Ultimately no one is perfect. In this exercise we are addressing how annoying, hurtful, broken people hurt us all the time. The choice to forgive is ultimately the choice to love and to release the other from the obligation to pay you back because of what they have done. It is a choice for your own happiness, when you let your grievances go.
4.) Let go of expectations. An apology may not change your relationship with the other person or elicit an apology from him or her. Forgiveness needs to be offered with no strings attached. It is a gift of compassion, offered because it is the right thing to do, because God has invited us to live in forgiveness, and because it makes us happy. If you don’t expect apologies or changed behavior, you won’t be disappointed.
5.) Decide to forgive. Once you make that choice, seal it with an action. If you don’t feel you can talk to the person who wronged you, write about your forgiveness in a journal or even talk about it to someone else in your life that you trust.
6.) Forgive God and forgive yourself. The act of forgiving includes forgiving God if you are angry with him for what happened and how your life has turned out because of the offense. We often need to forgive ourselves also for any way in which the wrong we have received has affected us or our other relationships.
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