Reflecting on John 10: 11-18

This world is lousy with bad shepherds. I’m thinking especially of those people who make their fortunes herding desperate people onto overloaded boats, and locking hundreds of them in steerage, knowing they will drown when the leaky ship capsizes. I’m thinking of “coyotes” who take a year’s pay to load people up in vans, and then leave them, with no water or food, in the desert to die.

Those are the bad shepherds. But the world is also bursting with great shepherds. I’m thinking of those who work to get Congress to pay more attention to poverty at home and abroad. Visit them at www.results.org.

I’m thinking of Harvard grad siblings Riley and Nick Carney, who began their life’s work breaking the chain of illiteracy by helping to build three schools in Africa, and organizing groups who donated more than 25,000 books to American inner-city schools, before either of them reached the age of twenty-one.

The good shepherds at www.againstmalaria.com buy anti-malarial bed nets for needy families. The website at GlobalGiving lets you browse, and contribute to, life-saving projects being done around the world. And at www.one.org you can join petitions backing evidence-based spending on global health.

The list goes on. I know you can add your own good works to it. I don’t know one single person who isn’t making sacrifices in order to help lighten the load of someone else. So, on this Good Shepherd Sunday, resolve to maintain your energies for good, and take courage against the terrors of this world. For behold, we have a Good Shepherd who has overcome the world.

In what good works do you find energy and strength?

If you love scripture, chances are, in the mysterious ways in which the Spirit works, Sr. Macrina Scott, osf planted the seeds that found a welcome home in your heart.

She entered Religious Life as a cloistered Benedictine, where she studied the works of the great scholars writing at the time of the Council. She went to God on Holy Thursday an active Franciscan, who took to heart the Council’s call to make the Word of God alive and active in the hearts of the Catholic laity.

It doesn’t matter where you live. Her brilliant model, the Denver Catholic Biblical School, was adapted and re-worked to fit the needs of Catholics around the world. Magazines reflecting on the daily scriptures began to thrive, and flourish today with large subscriber numbers, in part because of the educated Catholic laity which she helped create.

From the start, publishers from around the country began begging her for more. I would have said, “I don’t have time.” She said, “I’ll write a book.”

She wrote three. Her beautiful, funny, insightful treatments of the Old Testament, and the Gospel of Luke/Acts of the Apostles, remain the gold standard for bible study groups. You can find them at Tau Publishing.

She went on to create a brilliant program―the Wisdom Center―that encouraged those in the second half of life to pay attention to the spiritual adventures of aging.

When she flew home to him whom her heart loved, the news spread the old fashioned way―through communities of people who were once strangers but, like those disciples to whom Jesus appeared on Easter night, were forever bonded together because, like Jesus, she opened their minds to understand the scriptures.

Below is my reflection on her life and death:

Oh Macrina, it’s been sixteen days now since you flew to Jesus on Holy Thursday, the Marriage Feast of the Bridegroom and his Bride. Oh, what a meeting that must have been. I love to think of you and Jesus “leaning in” together, talking it all over, remembering your early years of learning how to read and tell stories in that famous red chair of your childhood. And, of course, you talked about those years of scholarly and liturgical formation at Regina Laudis. I thank God that you spent those early years of religious life leaning in to the scriptures, and the great books about how to read them that were written in those years.

I’ll bet you and Jesus HOWLED at the remembrance of that first week when the DCR ran the story about a new Biblical School being offered. You were in Berkeley (for graduation, I think) while everybody who worked at the Chancery fielded the 600 calls from earnest Catholics who had waited all their lives—-and in the spirit of all who had waited for a couple thousand years before that—for some inspired educator to teach them how to read the scriptures.

I think of Jesus tenderly speaking to you about that awful surgery you had on your neck many years ago. That was a terrible experience for you, mostly because you were shocked that, in the midst of all that suffering, you couldn’t feel his nearness. You had felt his companionship in every other journey of your life, but when you most needed to sense his closeness, he was silent. I long to know what he said to you about that dark night. But I know this: you recovered in every way, and your intimacy with him picked up right where it left off. Once again, you were teaching us, this time about  how a Christian suffers, and how a Christian remains faithful even when God is silent.

I love thinking about your reunion with your dear Sr. Antonia. I imagine the two of you embracing in the most joyful hug, and then Jesus holding you both close as you remembered together the terrors of the car accident, the painful days before Antonia flew to heaven, and the sacred and sad time that followed, when you had to go on without her.

Macrina, I had been meaning to ask you about the redness in your face, especially under your eyes and above your cheek bones, which started around the same time as your terrible fatigue, and then nausea, and then loss of appetite. I, of all people, should have thought to wonder about ovarian cancer, since I had those exact symptoms, in exactly the same order. I have never seen rosacea as a symptom, but I can see, as I look at the beautiful picture of you that is printed in the Wake and the Mass booklet, that you had it too, just as I did.

It grieves me that you tried and tried to get answers for all these spirit-sapping symptoms. You were ready to die—had been ready, really, since Antonia’s death—but I wonder if you might have wanted to stay with us much longer if your ovarian cancer had been diagnosed early, as mine was. No wonder you told so many people that you didn’t know what God wanted you to do in the next years of your life. You knew, in that secret and holy place where your body tells you the truth and waits for your conscious mind to know it, that dying was your next great adventure.

And then, of course, there was your dream. It appeared last fall. You dreamt that you were sitting, completely comfortably, in a crypt at the mortuary. Beside you was a companion. You both were in a kind of holding pattern, waiting for the journey you would take together. As you pondered this in your heart, you realized that your companion was Jesus.

You knew, of course. You tried to tell us all. You knew that you weren’t well. You knew that you were exhausted, and then nauseated, and then just sick. But on the day of your diagnosis, on March 24^th, the Vigil of the Feast of the Annunciation―the exact day, eleven years earlier, of my own diagnosis, but with a much different prognosis―you were filled with joy. Finally, a confirmation of that which your soul knew. There was an actual, medical reason for your dis-ease. You were dying. You had, perhaps, six months. You were elated, and, as always, you found the perfect words to describe the indescribable. I have my ticket! You finally had the entrance pass to heaven.

And then Jesus, who had seemed so silent in that earlier surgery years ago, sang your name just like the Bridegroom in that Song of Songs verse that you loved so well: “Arise, my beloved, my dove, my beautiful one, and come!” There was no confusing his voice. You spent your lifetime listening to it, and teaching the world how to hear it too. You knew his voice, and he knew yours. And so you flew to him so that you could be with him for the Holy Thursday Marriage Feast.

Your Sisters are grieving. They look out the window and your tidy, cheerful little house is dark. You aren’t there, to greet them, to love them, to listen to them, to know them in that expert way that you know the people you love. It is still Holy Saturday for them. They are waiting, and watching for signs that the stone has been rolled away.

Oh, Macrina. How blest are those who knew you in this life, and will always hear that glorious laugh, and hear your HILARIOUS answers to our deepest questions. Go to Macrina for counsel, and then stand back. It is NEVER going to be what you expect. You’ll go home reeling. And then, in just a little time, the voice of Lady Wisdom starts to dig deep inside you, planting seeds that will bear fruit for the rest of your life. I will always get chills when I remember Angeline leading the assembly of those who love you in a refrain to Lady Wisdom at the Wake. We were singing to you.

And so, for some it is Easter. And for some, it is still Holy Saturday. We will all probably go back and forth between the two for many years. But whenever two or more are gathered to read scripture, there you will be in their midst, helping them find their story in the STORY.

That’s where we will find you. That’s how we will know that all is well with your soul.

Reflecting on John 20: 19-31

I have an aversion to a particular childhood game. What sort of sadist thought that children would enjoy walking around a circle until the music stops, then scramble to sit in the chair behind them? The tension is that there are only nine chairs for ten kids.

That insecurity about being the one for whom there is no chair―and hence exiled to the sidelines with the other weeping losers―has never left me. I have positioned myself to always be around the winners, to always, paraphrasing Carly Simon, be where I should be all the time.

That’s why I cringe for poor Thomas. He, too, tried to be where he should be all the time. When the disciples discouraged Jesus from going to Judea when Lazarus was sick, it was Thomas who said, “Let us go also, that we may die with him.” When Jesus promised that he was going to prepare a place for the disciples, it was insecure Thomas who asked to know exactly where that place was, so that he could follow. He wasn’t going to be left behind if Jesus did something wonderful in his absence.

So wouldn’t you know, it was this same disciple who happened to be away on that Easter night when the risen Christ appeared. How utterly frustrating for Thomas to arrive back and hear that he had just missed Jesus, that he was alive and had appeared to the others, but not to him.

As Thomas learned, it is never the Divine Mercy of Christ that we be left behind. By his cross and resurrection he redeemed us from Musical Chairs. He has secured a place for us, forever. Blessed be he.

How does the Easter Season bless you with the awareness of the Risen Christ?

We did it. We made it to Easter, safe and sound. Contrary to how we felt, say, around the Second Sunday in Lent, our prayer, fasting and almsgiving did not, in fact, kill us. And yes, many of us did not succeed for the entire season, but we’re here anyway, Easter bonnets donned and the Easter ham in the oven.

Oh, it feels good. We lived with empty sanctuaries and purple drapings for forty long days. Outside, the early spring kept tempting us to behave as if Lent had yielded early this year, as if we were no longer held to its demanding timeline. But then we stepped back into church and were reminded that we are part of a universal fast that does not end just because it’s warm outside.

Is it just me, or has it become much more painful to keep Lent these days? My theory is that there is so much Easter in my daily life―so much beauty, so much fun, so much food, so many books, so many friends, so much prosperity, that keeping a fast from any of it seems much more restrictive than it did in my youth.

But fast I did, in my weak and puny way. I certainly don’t deserve Easter, but, thank God, no one ever does. Yet, despite all of our failures, Easter has finally arrived, with its fragrant flowers and lily-trumpeted sanctuaries. What a feast for the senses!  Bring on the Easter sacraments― the Baptism waters, the First Communion chalices, the Confirmation oils.

For lo, the winter is past, and the flowers appear on the earth (Song of Songs 2:11). Therefore, let us keep the feast.

How are you planning to keep the fifty-day Easter feast?

Mosaic found in church of the Multiplication of the Loaves and Fish, Tabgha, Galilee, Israel

It’s all in the bloodstream. That’s a family joke.  There wasn’t a one of us (including our parents) who had ever understood one minute of Science class.  As we kids cycled through colds and flus and broken bones my mom would read all the directions on the pill bottles, shake her head wisely and say Ah yes.  It’s all in the bloodstream. Which, all these years later, still means in family-speak, The world is just way too confusing and scientific, and I’m admitting defeat.

But of course the ancients knew that it really is all in the bloodstream.  Blood is the carrier of life, and solemn covenants were sealed by splashing blood on the two parties entering into them.  When Moses wanted to show the deadly earnest with which the Israelites promised to keep the Law which they had just received on Mount Sinai, he used the life-force of the sacrificed bulls as a substitute for human blood.  We promise to be faithful, God, and we enter this joyful covenant sprinkled in blood, the life of the world.

When Jesus the Bridegroom entered into his eternal marriage contract with us the night before he died he used the same image of blood, but this time it would be his own.  This is my blood of the covenant. Taken, blessed, broken, shared—This is my Body. This is my Blood.

We Catholics have endured many difficult years recently.  But this this is our Feast.  This is Who we are.  And once again we enter this joyful covenant.  We are one Body, one Body in Christ.  And we do not stand alone.

What memories do you have of your First Communion?

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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).

Have you read The Shack?  The book has its detractors, but oh how it captures this One Truth: we are made in the image and likeness of a God who is Three, and the Persons are in eternal relationship with each other.

An elderly friend said to me the other day, “The truth is, I just want to be left alone.  Leave my Social Security check alone.  Leave my V.A. benefits alone.   Let me sit out on my porch and enjoy the sunset.  Alone.”

He doesn’t really mean it.  I’m sure he also wants to eat, and to do that we all need farmers, and harvesters, and those who drive the food to town.  The magical ways that electricity, and fuel,  and air conditioning, and bicycle tires keep us comfortable all require people—smart people—and millions of smart people before them.

Of course, it’s not just humans or animals or plants or planets that must have each other.  In fact, the God who set the atoms and molecules of the earliest life in motion wasn’t even alone.  Proverbs 8: 22-31 describes a Being who danced with God—who WAS God—at the beginning of creation (the Holy Spirit).  And the first verse of John’s Gospel says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”  That’s Jesus.

The Trinity, together and present before anything existed, danced the universe into being.  A liturgical dance of Three.  And since we live and move and have our being in Christ, we too are caught in the endless dance of Love.  Never alone.  Never on our own.  Thank God.

Which member of the Holy Trinity do you feel you understand the best?

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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).

A PENTECOST SEQUENCE

Come, oh Holy Spirit, come!

Concerns have made our spirits numb.

With fruits of joy and love and peace

Give our anxious hearts release.

When we are sick of sin and Law

Stop us cold with grace and awe.

Hold us dumbstruck, draw us near.

Stay with us this coming year.

Help us see the world anew

And do the things that He would do.

The gentle word, the warm embrace,

Let those who see us see His face.

And help us work for justice, too,

And speak up when You ask us to.

With your sevenfold gifts descend

And help us fall in Love again.

Melt us, mold us, make us new.

Veni, Sancte Spiritu!

What gifts of the Holy Spirit do you most appreciate in your life?

What would YOU like to say about this question, or today’s readings, or any of the columns from the past year? The sacred conversations are setting a Pentecost fire! Register here today and join the conversation.

I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).

Reflecting on Acts 1:1-11

Remain in me. How many times have we heard Jesus tell us this throughout this Easter season?  Remain in me as I remain in you.

And now, like tender branches clinging to the vine, the eyewitnesses are instructed to remain in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit comes upon them.

How they must have longed to say to Jesus, “No!  Take us with you.  Don’t leave us.  We are powerless and terrified without you.”

But Jesus knew what they didn’t.  The Advocate, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit was about to come, like a mighty wind, and change their hearts and all history.

I love thinking about the people in that upper room who remained in prayer for those nine days from Ascension Thursday until Pentecost.  We know from Acts 1: 12-14 that the eleven apostles were there, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his “brothers”.

Wow.  That’s quite a minyan (a Jewish prayer group).  Think of the things they had seen with their own eyes, including the resurrected Christ.  I’ll bet a huge part of their time together was in telling each other the stories, over and over again.  And I’ll bet that Mary had the best stories of all.

Like a mighty wind the Spirit came, and clothed them in so much power that they went out into the four corners of the Roman world, preaching a Jewish Savior.  With Paul and Barnabas and Silas and Lydia and Phoebe and Chloe and hundreds of other disciples (see Romans 16 for a few) they built the church in every settled and unsettled province of the world.

Remain in me, says Jesus. Even today.  Especially today.

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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).

Reflecting on Acts 10: 25-26, 34-35, 44-48

Icon of St. Peter

Perhaps the most challenging statement ever uttered in the history of the world appears in today’s first reading, taken from The Acts of the Apostles.  Peter himself says it:  In truth, I see that God shows no partiality.

Two millennia later, it still takes your breath away.  Peter, the Orthodox Jew, is telling the “God-fearers,” those believing Gentiles in the home of Cornelius, that God loves them exactly as much as God loves the Jewish people!  And, as if on cue, the Holy Spirit rushes upon those Gentiles even before they are baptized in water!  It’s as if the Spirit is saying, “Do you think I have to wait to send my gifts of comfort, and strength, and wisdom upon these people just because you haven’t baptized them with water yet?”

What a scary God that would be—a God who isn’t huge enough to love every single one of us, who plays favorites, who withholds comfort and grace based on our correctly-articulated dogma.  It’s thrilling to read the Acts of the Apostles and watch the Holy Spirit, in the first decades after the Resurrection, gather people of every race, language, and way of life into the one eternal banquet.

In fact, Peter’s realization is so important that it is told originally in chapter 10, and then re-told in chapters 11 and 15.  It’s as if St. Luke was afraid we’d forget it in time.

And so our annual novena to the Holy Spirit begins this Ascension Thursday, as we wait with Mary and all the Church for another Pentecost to take our breath away once more.  Come, Holy Spirit, come.

What are you asking of the Spirit this year?

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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).

Reflecting on John 15: 1-8

The branches of the vine should be especially full and beautiful these days.  Over forty-three thousand adults entered into full communion with us this Easter.  Think of that.

Perhaps it’s because they are getting married and want to share the faith of their spouse.  Or maybe a childhood friend introduced them to Catholicism decades ago, and they finally gave in to a lifelong curiosity.  Or maybe they, like so many people, long for a deep and beautiful connection with God, and they choose us as their conduits to Jesus the Resurrected One.  That’s scary, isn’t it?

But here’s the thing: if the branches are overflowing with new Catholics, and recently-new Catholics, and cradle Catholics, why don’t things seem to change? When the Denver Nuggets are in town, with the capacity crowd of 19,000 roaring the roof off the Pepsi Center, the city knows it.  There is an energy that changes the atmosphere of downtown.

Ah, we say.  The Nuggets must be here.

More than double that number joined the Catholic Church this Easter, and the Easter before that, and Easters for the last two thousand years.

Where is the pulsing, world-changing tidal wave of joy, and peace-making, and justice-seeking, and outreach to those who are estranged?  There are 1.19 billion of us on this planet.  Let’s continue to work for the day when people say, “Ah.  The grieving are comforted, the hungry are fed, families are happier and safer, and the poor have the good news preached to them.  The Catholics must be here.”

In what ways do you work to heal the world?

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I have come to light a fire on the earth; how I wish it were already burning (Lk.12:49).