Claire Smith

Scripture:

Sirach 48:1-4, 9-11
Matthew 17:9a, 10-13

Reflection:

During the first week of Advent, I could feel myself tempted to turn away from faith, from love, so stretched after having lost significant family members in these last two years. I had felt Jesus in their passing and yet in this moment I was deeply afraid of any further pain that might come in loving. The world of “what ifs?” arriving always viewed without present moment grace.

Then the scripture of Peter walking on water came Into my heart. Peter stepping out of a boat into turbulent seas looking straight into Jesus’ eyes. The wind distracting him and bringing fear back into play. Peter turning away from Jesus’ gaze and sinking. As I reflected on this scripture, viewing the emotions of grief as turbulent seas, faith and peace again found a soft place to land.  I need to keep my eyes fixed on Jesus.

But how? This personal God. This now invisible God. This Mystery. Unseen.

As we pray our prayers before communion, before the Blessed Sacrament, we come to know that He is seen. That we matter. Jesus did not spend His days breaking down the ins and outs of creation to prove the seed of its existence. His focus is fully on relationship. There was no question to Him who is at the center of it all. Through His Word and the Eucharist He comes to invite us, tell us, to love God and love our neighbor. We cannot see when our hearts become insular, small, protected, hidden.

His outstretched arms on the cross teach us the full stretch of love. Those unable to see and hear that love tried to pin Him in that pose as hate and fear-filled mockery. And yet, those same outstretched arms reflect what remains unseen without personally knowing him. His Heart, His Sacred Heart, that stretched beyond any human comprehension throughout His life and death.

His arms and heart opened wide to our suffering, to our sorrow, to our sins that harm love, pulling us into His love with His unfathomable consent to take it all. He cried out to His Father, as we cry out to His Spirit for the courage to live wider and deeper. To bear love, no matter how hard. To show how excruciating His anguish was we are told in Luke, that “his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground” at Gethsemane.

While the’ joy of Christmas is preferable sometimes the only true comfort comes from standing at the base of His cross covered in tears.

The gentle lyrics of a song rose as I finished this reflection:

“We have been told, We’ve seen his face,
And heard His voice alive in our hearts, Live in my love with all of your heart,
As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you.” -David Haas

As we move into this third week of Advent, may we ponder today’s Responsorial Psalm, “Lord, make us tum to you; let us see your face and we shall be saved.”

M. Walsh is a retreatant and friend of the Passionist community, with deepest gratitude for the charism and prayers for their vocations.

Scripture:

Isaiah 48:17-19
Matthew 11:16-19

Reflection:

Today’s Scripture comes from the section of Matthew’s Gospel where Jesus is beginning to get some serious opposition from the Jewish leadership. At the beginning of the chapter John sends his disciples to ask Jesus if he is “the one who is to come, or should we look for another” (v.3) I am willing to bet that they were looking for another because what we are treated to in today’s text is a resounding NO to Jesus’ message. It spells a rejection and a refusal to be moved to believe what they see and hear about Jesus.

How exasperating for Jesus. He has come to share his very self with humanity, even to giving up his life, and we cannot see our way to accepting his message of love. It was too radical for the Jewish leadership to accept then and even today. That is what it boils down to, at least it seems that way to me. If we think that this situation could only happen in Gospel times, then sadly we are very mistaken. Look around, look within!

Have you ever given your love only to have it thrown back in your face? It can be very hurtful and may leave a resentful attitude in our hearts. The miracle about Jesus here is that it doesn’t make him bitter. He willingly continues his mission. I admit to hearing his exasperation but then that is only the author putting those words on the lips of Jesus. I wonder what does the author wish us to understand today more than 2,000 years later at the close of the second week of Advent and on the feast of St. Lucy? The name Lucy means light. What beacon of light do you see and hear in this reading?

For me it is the last line of the text, “But wisdom is vindicated by her works” (at the end of verse 19).

Our first reading from Isaiah speaks to this wisdom and how both to recognize it and receive it. Although we are told how to achieve it, there is simply no earning it. It is a gift and it sets a beautiful future full of hope.

Over Thanksgiving weekend, our sixth grandchild was born—what joy is the gift of new life. This has been a year of babies in our family and among our friends. It fills me with hope to be surrounded by new life!

Psalm 1 also suggests that prosperity comes from being planted deeply in God. That will bear great fruit. Not like the wicked who ignore God’s commands.

How many times have we read these lines and judged those on the “wicked” side of Jesus? That is the easy default pattern. However, I believe the challenge for us is to go deeper with the text long enough to understand something new. The new here is to stay the course amid all the polarization and discouragement. To hope in new life for our future and trust in the divine plan for our world.

May we be firmly rooted in God so that we can stay the course. May we look to the future coming of Christ in our lives, daily. May we know what that looks like! Come, Lord, Jesus, come! Amen.

Jean Bowler is a retreatant at Mater Dolorosa Passionist Retreat Center in Sierra Madre, California, and a member of the Office of Mission Effectiveness Board of Holy Cross Province.

The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe

Scripture:

Zechariah 2:14-17 or Revelation 11:9a, 12:1-6a, 10ab
Luke 1:26-38 or Luke 1:39-47

Reflection:

This is not a meditation but a commentary which may inspire your prayer and devotion to Our Blessed Mother for our contemporary world. I share this with the help of the late, Fr. Virgilio P Elizondo, author and professor at Notre Dame University and the Mexican-American Cultural Center.

In the middle of our faith-shaping pilgrimage through Advent, we pause to celebrate one of the most dramatic, historic phenomena in the last 500 years in the Western Hemisphere – the visitation of our Blessed Mother to a simple Indian peasant, Juan Diego, a recent Christian convert. The encounter with Mary on the top of a hill known as Tepeyac, near Tlatelolco, once an Aztec center and the place where the final battle of the Spanish conquest had taken place just 10 years earlier.

Our Mary’s apparition is the entrance into the so-called “ ’New World’ which simply opened new territories where people could be segregated, dominated and enslaved; (from the perspective our Blessed Mother,) it is the entry into the real New World where men and women of all colors, ethnicities and backgrounds could live and work in peace, mutual respect, and harmony.” (Elizondo)

Our Lady is God’s special gift to America at the very beginning of the New World. Providentially, God would not allow the Gospel “to become an instrument of colonization and through Guadalupe” would assure that the Gospel would continue to heal, liberate and unite all peoples of this hemisphere. This new unity of peoples will be America’s true gift toward the formation of a real world community.” (Elizondo)

Such a grace-filled time in history! This appearance happens when the culture and the people were being annihilated. This divine intervention offered hope in the midst of one of the darkest moments in history.

It is amazing how in moments of great historical crisis, Mary has appeared once again to usher in the healing, liberating, unifying and saving presence of Her Son.

 “Truly she ‘lifted up the lowly’ (Luke1:52) as Juan Diego and millions after him are transformed from crushed, self-defacing and silenced persons into confident, self-assured and joyful messengers and artisans of God’s plan for America. (Elizondo)

Advent is God’s shaping of our lives, and the honing of our vocational commitments. Today Mary charges us with a mission. She spoke to Juan as the does to ourselves, “Am I not here, I who am your mother?”

She shows us how to meet our brothers and sisters where they are. Coming to know Mary comes with obligations. She claims us for God and asks us to do as she does. Through our encounter with those beyond or “safe zone,” we introduce others to Jesus. We “birth Him into the world,” where his presence is hidden. “Am I not here, I who am your mother?”

What is it Mary asks us to do in the “birthing of her Son?”

Fr. Alex Steinmiller, C.P., is a member of the Passionist Community in Detroit, Michigan.

Scripture:

Isaiah 40:1-11
Matthew 18:12-14

Reflection:

I’ve always struggled with the parable of the lost sheep. It’s partly because although it was everyday experience 2000 years ago, I’ve never tended sheep nor met anyone anywhere who would qualify as a shepherd. It’s also hard because it seems foolish to leave ninety-nine sheep at risk, just to find one that had strayed.

But then I consider families who have a seriously ill child. The parents don’t abandon their other children, but they make tremendous sacrifices to get the best care possible. They may, for instance, leave other children with relatives while they travel to a particular treatment center. They may rely on friends to drive kids to activities while they transport the sick child to appointments, chemo, or doctors. They forego family vacations, devoting all family resources to their child’s life and health. Of course, if one of the other children truly needed something, they would try mightily to address that need as well. But the entire family is willing to sacrifice in order to get the one child back, doing whatever they can to return their child to the “flock”. And if they are successful, there is great rejoicing indeed!

In this parable, we aren’t told what provisions the shepherd made for the safety of the 99 while he was gone, but that isn’t the point anyway. The lesson is about God, not us. We all stray (sometimes significantly) or we may be in tremendous need due to circumstances. Yet no matter what we do or how far we go, God intensely longs for us and actively searches to find ways to bring us back home. Like the parents of the ill child, God’s love knows no bounds, God will sacrifice anything, and God will follow us even when we refuse to follow God. And we are called to act in the same way, not just for a family member in need but for all.

The challenge: Am I part of God’s “search team”, or am I quick to give up on another person when they have gone astray, sinned, or abandoned the practice of their faith? How securely do I cling to my own abundance, rather than risking what I own for a higher good? Do I allow myself to even see the need? In what ways can I change to become the embodiment of the parable’s shepherd on earth, allowing God to use me to gather the lost, forsaken, and lonely persons of this world?

These are tough questions, but we dare not ignore them. As individuals and as faith communities, we are not called to remain within our private pastures. We are sent out into the world, to search for God’s beloved children, let them know they are loved, and bring them back home.

Amy Florian is a teacher and consultant working in Chicago.  For many years she has partnered with the Passionists.  Visit Amy’s website: http://www.corgenius.com/.

Scripture:

Genesis 3:9-15, 20
Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12
Luke 1:26-38

Reflection:

Thoughts on Mary’s Immaculate Conception

Imagine the experience of Mary being greeted by the angel Gabriel. A good translation says that Mary was utterly ‘confused’, terrified might also be appropriate because Gabriel responds with a strong, ‘do not go on fearing’. Mary hears, ‘you will conceive a son, his will be the throne of David and he will rule over the house of Jacob’. Mary, unlike Eve who acts without thinking, stops and asks, ‘how can this be?’ Conceiving a child, a Savior, God’s action, a leader for her people. How fast could she process this incredible information? Could a lifetime of thinking about this encounter make it easier to say, ‘yes’? This is the moment when God’s grace is reaching out. It is the beginning of ‘the irrational season when love bloomed bright and wild. Had Mary been filled with reason there would have been no room for the child’. (Madeline L’Engle).

St. Bernard stops time between the explanation of Gabriel, that the Holy Spirit will come upon Mary and the power of the Most High will overshadow her, and Mary’s answer. We peek into the mind of Gabriel. The angel is frightened Mary will say no. How great is this decision placed in the hands of so young a woman? If she says ‘no’, God will have to start the long process of preparing for a savior all over again. In this forever moment of waiting Gabriel, the angels of heaven, Adam and Eve, all creation hold their breath as they await the word of Mary. They pray, ‘Please say yes and save us!’ And Mary says ‘Behold the servant of the Lord. Let it happen to me as you say’.

Conceived immaculately, Mary is different than all the daughters of Eve. Mary didn’t receive from her foremothers what tilts us to put ourselves ahead of God and our brothers and sisters; to think our way or the highway, our will over the one who loves infinitely. Was Mary then in the same place as Eve in the garden? Both of them knowing God as they did. Was the new Eve more like Eve than any other of the daughters of Eve? Someone has offered an interesting meaning to the words, ‘Where are you?’, spoken to Adam and Eve who after eating the apple hid from God. God was not asking about a geographical location, but to Adam and Eve, ‘how do you feel now? Are you where you should be in our relationship? Are you where we should be together?’

Mary makes herself one with the will of God. How does that translate into her life? She brings her son into the world of the poor and will become homeless, a refugee. Mary the mother of the Savior is not just a bearer of life. Her grace is that of other mothers to guide their children and to sometimes launch them! ‘Do whatever he tells you’, she says to the waiters. Unwelcome in his hometown, ridiculed and rejected, Mary must have learned so much about suffering, power and forgiveness. She stands beneath the Cross and will receive her son into her arms. No one could have suffered the Passion so much as Mary because she is one with her Son, one in his suffering, in his love of the Father and all of God’s children, all of God’s creation.

As we celebrate Mary’s Immaculate Conception God’s gift to her is a gift to us all. We may be afraid of that gift. Mary will say to us, ‘Do whatever he tells you’. To drink of that wine, to do His will, is the yes to love God as God wants to be loved.

Fr. William Murphy, CP is the pastor of Immaculate Conception parish in Jamaica, New York.

Second Sunday of Advent

Scripture:

Isaiah 11: 1-10
Romans 15: 4-9
Matthew 3: 1-12

Reflection:

THE DESERT

Repentance brings hope to the dry and seemingly barren areas of our life, the desert. We get discouraged and weak by our sins and short comings. When the Lord enters these places we become strong. In the desert you feel abandoned and alone with no hope. But the Lord will come and feed you with his manna, the bread of angels, and make you strong again. This only comes through humility and prayer. We make straight his paths by saying “You must increase, I must decrease.”

John’s penitential life reveals his sincerity; he practices what he preaches. He detest sin and desire to please God, who is worthy of all our love. He offers up his body as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, his spiritual worship. He wore clothing made of camel’s hair and had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. Knowing and confessing our sins is a grace. “God’s greatest pleasure is to pardon us. The good Lord is more eager to pardon a repentant sinner than a mother to rescue her child from a fire” (Saint John Vianney). Repentance brings hope to the dry and barren areas of our life.

You must always come in the true spirit of repentance not in a public show of self-righteousness as the Pharisees and Sadducees are coming to John’s baptism? John is encouraging them to receive this Sacrament with the right disposition. Our confidence in every sacrament arises from faith in Christ’s power. It is Christ’s power that makes us strong and gives us strength when we are alone in the desert. Even if we fall Jesus does not abandon us: humility and contrition keeps us firm in God’s love.

John’s baptism inspired repentance and merely pointed to Christ’s baptism—the Church’s baptism—which, by the power of the Holy Spirit, forgives sins and fills us with divine life. Jesus frees us from sin, purifying our hearts so we can become like the pure wheat consecrated on the altar. He “bestowed on us the precious and very great promises, so that through them you may come to share in the divine nature, after escaping from the corruption that is in the world” (2Pt 1:4). We must become like a desert and empty ourselves of all our sins so He can come into our lives and make them whole again.

Deacon Peter Smith serves at St. Mary’s/Holy Family Parish in Alabama, a religion teacher at Holy Family Cristo Rey Catholic High School in Birmingham, and a member of our extended Passionist Family.

Scripture:

Isaiah 30:19-21, 23-26
Matthew 9:35-10:1, 5a, 6-8

Reflection:

On Tuesday of this week, the local AARP chapter which meets at the Lakeview Presbyterian Church where I go to lunch five days a week, hosted a Salvation Army Holiday Musical festival after lunch. Four Salvation Army Officers made up the familiar brass band I’ve and I expect you as well, have often seen on the street corners and malls at this time of the year, playing Christmas music and entertaining holiday shoppers. This day they entertained two dozen seniors in the Presbyterian Church sanctuary. It was beautiful and uplifting.

That experience made me wonder more about the Army, so I looked them up on YouTube where I watched a three-minute video. They were founded by a married couple, Catherine and William Booth in London 1865. This year, according to the video, they will serve 30 million people in the United States alone. Their centers are located in poor and crime infested areas where few of us are willing to serve. They have a worldwide membership of 1.7 million and are assisted in their work by 3.4 million volunteers. Wow!

I’m meeting with some young graduate students (I’m 74) today who have asked me to present a dream I’ve been talking about ever since I retired twelve years ago: affordable housing that welcomes people of all classes, young and old, rich and poor, churched and unchurched… I sometimes ask myself, why I do such crazy things. I can’t solve the homeless problem in my city of Chicago, let alone provide for the homeless people I see at my local McDonald’s. I even sometimes wonder where I am going to get the resources, I need to meet my own needs. That’s probably how the first followers of Jesus felt when he sent them out as we read in today’s gospel selection.

Jesus sent out these twelve after instructing them thus,

“Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.|
As you go, make this proclamation: ‘The Kingdom of heaven is at hand.’
Cure the sick, raise the dead,
cleanse lepers drive out demons.
Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give.” (MT 9 & 10)

I pray today to hear the calls of the needy all around me and to respond with the same faith and trust that those first apostles, Catherine and William Booth, and St. Paul of the Cross did, and their followers continue to do in our world.

Dan O’Donnell is a Passionist Partner and a longtime friend of the Passionists.  He lives in Chicago.

Scripture:

Isaiah 29:17-24
Matthew 9:27-31

Reflection:

“Let it be done for you according to your faith.” With these words Jesus, in today’s passage from Matthew’s gospel, opened the eyes of two blind men who had nagged him to have pity on them.

Have you ever nagged Jesus with a request? In desperate times such as life threatening illness, trauma, legal troubles and discord at work or at home, people of faith turn to Jesus, nagging him perhaps.

Nag as we might, however, often our pleas seem to go unheard.

Surely God will cure a young father of terminal cancer. And what about my alcoholic brother? Or the family business that’s about to go under? Can our child meet the academic requirements for the college she wants to attend in the fall? Will I deliver a healthy child?

The answer we want is the same answer the blind men received: “Let it be done according to your faith.” We want what we want on our terms.

But, in our deepest prayer, sitting alone with Jesus, we do get what we want according to our faith but maybe not as we originally imagined.

By uniting our wills to God’s, we find lasting peace, accepting what we are given, knowing in the larger vision and plan of God, all will be well.

The writer of the passage from Isaiah today gives us a glimpse of this larger vision and plan: “…out of gloom and darkness the eyes of the blind will see,” and “when his children see the work of my hands in his midst, they shall keep my name holy; they shall reverence the Holy One of Jacob and be in awe of the God of Israel. Those who err in spirit shall acquire understanding, and those who find fault shall receive instruction.”

The unplanned pregnancy gives joy beyond measure, the failing grades offer opportunities to tackle deeper issues that had been avoided, the death of a spouse deepens the faith in the resurrection, the drug overdose of the nephew leads the family to crusade for prevention and recovery programs to save hundreds of lives.

Do we pray for disappointments and tragedies? No. But carrying all of life’s joys and sorrows to prayer, totally surrendering ourselves to God’s will, always leads to new life…the resurrection…in ways we might never have anticipated.

“Let it be done for you according to your faith.”

Jim Wayne is a board member of the Passionist Solidarity Network (PSN), and author of The Unfinished Man. He lives in Louisville, Kentucky.