Ordinary Time…Again ??

 As the saying goes, “What goes around comes around.” But make no mistake, when Ordinary Time appears at this time of the liturgical year there is a new twist. The Church is telling us something. Keep in mind that an Ordinary Time period follows the two central mysteries of our faith: the Incarnation and the Paschal Mystery. Ordinary Time is ‘absorption’ time…time to soak the soul.

 Our New Year begins with the celebration of Mary, Mother of God. Now why would Mary be placed before us to begin this time? Ah…because Mary is the one who ponders in her heart…and that is what we are invited to do. She is the Mother of believers, and that’s us.

 The Word has bonded with our DNA…our carbon and calcium, our double helix. He asked Mary for a body so he could be part of our day-to-day struggle. Only by bonding with matter could he suffer from the inside, not just as a compassionate observer. The Epiphany reveals that this is universal…for everyone. On our side, we bond with him in our baptism, so we ponder that he meets us there. The month ends with the Beatitudes. They show us what we will look like when all is said and done; when the struggle is over.

 Little Tyke,

 you have us wrapped around your little finger.

You knew how to get our attention.

Who can resist a baby?

Love bent so low to fit into a tiny body…

God with skin on.

 

 

2023: Where Shall it take Us?

The New Year is here. We again receive the gift of time. As women and men of the Word, as Dominicans, in these reflections we have been keeping our ear close to the heart of the Church by listening to our Shepherd. Francis. This attentiveness has brought us smack against the topic of synodality, for this is where his developing thought for the Church leads in what he has written from Joy of the Gospel, to Laudato si, to Fratelli tutti, to Let Us Dream.

 The ancient name for the Pope is Pontifex, which means bridge-builder, and that is exactly what this present Holy Father is doing: he is building a bridge. From what to what we might ask? He is bridging from Vatican II into the future of this community we call ‘Church.’ He is leading us into a future we must create as we walk it- together. The time is past for just taking ‘orders from headquarters.’ We need to listen to one another…to what the Spirit might be doing in one another, and pay attention. This is very new for some of us…”Just tell me what I should do!” we have said in the past. Now we are being asked to share what the Spirit is doing in me, in us…and I need to pay attention to what is moving me to courage, to truth-telling, and to making sure I don’t injure love. For what injures love and unity is not of the Spirit. It is from darkness.

 As we enter this New Year, we will continue moving forward through our dedication to study. We will seek light to do this inner work. We will be using two sources. The first is a document from a specially appointed Commission. It is Synodality in the Life and Mission of the Church from the International Theological Commission. The second document has just been released, and it comes from the General Secretariat of the Synod, called “Enlarge the space of your tent…” (Is 54:2). It is a Working Document for the Continental Stage of moving the universal Church into a synodal rather than a hierarchical mode of being and operation.

 We will begin with this new document, for it comes after some initial listening to the entire global body. You can find the entire document here: https://bit.ly/continental-stage. The title is taken from this scripture passage: “Enlarge the space of your tent, spread out your tent cloths unsparingly, lengthen your ropes and make firm your pegs.” (Is 54:2) In this one passage we are given the structure key to expanding a tent. We need to spread out the cloths, lengthen the ropes, and firm up the pegs. What an image for the Church…!

·       First, spread out the cloths unsparingly. Now the cloths are what protect from the sun, the wind, and the rain. They need to be spread out to protect and welcome those still outside this space, but who are called to enter it.

·       Then lengthen the ropes: they hold the cloths together and balance the tension needed to keep the tent from drooping with the softness that cushions movement caused by the wind. So, if the tent expands, the ropes must be stretched to maintain the right tension.

·       Finally, firm up the pegs. They anchor the structure to the ground and ensure its solidity, but they are moveable whenever the tent needs to be pitched elsewhere.

 So, the Church is called to stretch out, but also to move. At its center stands the tabernacle, the presence of the Lord. The tent is held by the sturdiness of its pegs, the fundamentals of faith that do not change, but can be moved and planted in ever new ground. The tent can then accompany the people as they move through history. But in order not to sag, the structure of the tent needs to keep in balance with the different forces and tensions around it. This calls for discernment. The many reports coming in envision the Church as an expansive, but not homogeneous dwelling, capable of sheltering all, but open, letting in and out (cf. Jn. 10:9), and moving toward embracing the Father and all of humanity. More to come. Fasten your seat-belts for an exciting ride…

 

The Mysterious Coming

This year Christmas is on a Sunday. Yes, we are remembering the coming of the Christ in history, and the Church will be reminding us during this month of the final coming in majesty. The humanness and powerful images captivate our attention. Yet there is a subtle coming that can escape us if we do not intentionally heighten our awareness of it.

The risen Christ in his transformed humanness meets us in a thousand disguises. His Easter message was “Now I will no longer be with you the former way. I will be wherever you are.” This nearness, this intimacy, can be unnerving, because it is so personal. He is always at my side. He accompanies me as I fold my laundry and brush my teeth. He holds me in grief. He guards me when I sleep. This mysterious ‘coming’ is something he decided long ago. It is I who am out and about. It is I who forget and mistakenly think I am alone. The result is often anxiety, worry, fear, and sadness. These unwanted guests are in my house all too often. But there is a holy trick. They can be put to service.

 In these dark days of winter, when my mood is heavy, there can be a sly smile on my soul. Each time I notice my mood I can call out, and I can use the awareness to remember. I can remember that no matter my mood, no matter the circumstances, no matter my discomfort or outright pain, nothing can separate me from him. The mysterious ‘coming’ is my own. I am coming to a deepened awareness. My Advent is a coming in mystery…a coming to a new awareness of a new truth. Yes, he came…and he has never left.

 I sometimes think my soul is empty

like an empty house

or a kitchen table with no one around it.

But I am mistaken.

My soul is an open window

and the Spirit’s breath

often blows in to kiss my cheek.

Through my soul I am connected with all of you.

I reach all those weeping and I sit with those with no home.

I gaze across the sea at those bobbing in lifeboats

hoping to reach a safe shore.

At the table of my soul sits a distinguished Guest.

He is there each day to have a cup of coffee,

and each day I am aware of his wounded hands and feet.

He makes himself at home.

Sometimes I forget.

But I am learning to remember he is just around the corner of my mind.

The One who is always coming…

Epilogue to Francis’ Dream

 As preachers, we’ve been putting our ear to the heart of the Church, in listening to Pope Francis dream in print. He has led us back to the original spirit of the early Church…the synodal Church.  His book, Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future, has an epilogue. We’ll now take a look at his ‘last word.’ Sometimes a thinker gives us the summation of his/her thought in an Epilogue…!

 Francis does not disappoint. He gives us two words, and they both identify us as ‘pilgrim.’ The two words are decenter and transcend. In giving us these final words, he distinguishes between someone going round and round in a labyrinth, and someone on a pilgrimage. The first can return to where one has started and remain the same. The pilgrim returns different. The pilgrim is changed.

 To decenter means to intentionally shift from concentrating on myself to becoming more and more aware of everyone around me. In our time, this means resisting the narcissistic urge. Decentering shifts our attention to union…the bonding that is everywhere in my life.

 To transcend means to refuse to give into the fixation on my powerlessness and failures. It means we refuse the luxury of despair. There is always some small thing I might do, some small thing I might give, if it be only a smile.

 To decenter and transcend. These indeed might be my daily Advent project. I might feel I only have a stable-like shelter to offer, but it transcends sleeping in the barnyard in the cold. I might feel the only strength I have is a stubborn will. Then I will put it to use daily to decenter, and delight in each person who enters my personal space. Who knows? I might be entertaining an angel unawares…! Thank you, Francis, for opening your heart to us…for dreaming out loud in print…and showing us a shepherd’s heart.

Dreaming with Pope Frances : More on Section II

 In section II of Pope Francis’ Let Us Dream: The Path To A Better Future, we ended last time in considering his concern for the voices and gifts of women. (See August Community Connections.) Remember, he is building a point of view that provides the wisdom for some important ‘Choosing.’ Get ready. Francis is building up the qualities that equip us to tackle synodality. This is where he is going. Synodality is the focus of the whole end of section II.

So, what is the bridge? The pope’s concern about the vital role women must play is but lead-in to two ideas that speak to the heart of the evening news: fraternity vs. individualism, and what he calls the “isolated conscience.”  Fraternity is “the sense of belonging to each other and to the whole of humanity…(It) is the capacity to come together and work together against a shared horizon of possibility…It’s a unity that allows people to serve as a body despite differences…preserves and respects plurality, inviting all to contribute from their distinctiveness, as a community of brothers and sisters concerned for each other. (68)

 Then Pope Francis tackles the major obstacle to this fraternity: the isolated conscience. Pointing first to the Church, Francis describes the person of isolated conscience as one in the grips of “a bad-spirit temptation to withdraw spiritually from the body to which I belong, closing us in on our own interests and viewpoints by means of suspicion and supposition…(turning) us…into beleaguered, complaining selves who disdain others, believing that we alone know the truth.” Whether revolutionary or restorationist, what marks these ideologies is rigidity. (69) When I’m asked to step out and become part of something bigger, suspicion supplies reasons to hold back, justifying this by my pointing out the faults of others. I become a master of criticism, a charitable openness to the other is replaced by clinging to the supposed superiority of one’s own ideas. (71)

 The antidote, says Francis, is self-accusation…admitting I am a sinner in need of great mercy. This can prevent polarization, the downward spiral of accusation and counteraccusation.

But engage with conflict and disagreement we must, in ways that keep us from descending into polarization. We do this by allowing for new thinking that goes beyond division. We need the art of civic dialogue that weaves together a different view on a higher plane.

 Referring to Romano Guardini, Francis challenges us to consider that the pulling apart of differences in tension really all coexist within a larger unity. The spirit of conflict turns contrapositions into contradictions, demanding we choose: thus polarization. Mediocre thinking allows this, taking us away from the possibility of a greater reality. Likewise, we can deny the tension in the two poles of a contraposition. Let be. The result is relativism…the unreal position that anything goes. Deep stuff, but it is going on before our eyes in the evening news. It is with these keen observations that Francis approaches synodality where we will join him next time.

 

Check Points for a Disciple

 We’re in the second half of Ordinary Time, and sure enough, the Church brings us back to center: the Cross. It is not by chance that the Exaltation of the Cross is a central September feast. The whole of Ordinary Time is a formation in discipleship flowing from the Cross and Resurrection. So, what are the formation points for us this month?

First, we’re reminded that we can’t be part-time disciples. We need full-time resolve. Then we are given the powerful parable of the Prodigal Son, to remind us that we are to be Reconcilers wherever our families, communities, work, or retirement take us. Then the last two Sundays make sure we understand where true riches lie…inwardly and outwardly in our public lives.

But we are not to lose sight of the Cross. Why? Because the Cross is the fullness of revelation about God and ourselves. About God, because nowhere, in any other religion, is God revealed as hanging on a tree, dying. Here the hidden God is revealed through the Word, joined to our humanity as a self-sacrificing Lover. More, we are not merely told. We are shown, by life-blood being poured out in a Spirit-burst upon the unsuspecting world. Among all the world religions, this is radical revelation.

But we too are revealed. We are tortured, tormented, broken, scourged, ridiculed, thirsty, abandoned and abused. And where is God while we struggle? There…in our midst. Look at the human form of your brother and sister. There…that’s where God is. The radical revelation is complete. The union finalized. God is not safe in heaven. God is wherever we are.

“We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you,

For by your holy Cross you have redeemed the world.’

It’s shocking.

It turns everything upside down.

Where is the majesty, the power, the splendor, the glory?

Head mocked for its hopes, plans, and dreams…

Hands nailed so they can’t help…

Feet fastened so they can’t come running…

Heart open like a window without shutters,

where I can run and hide anytime.

No condemnation?

No.

No condemnation.

Amen.

Continuing to Dream with Pope Francis

In June we explored Part I: A Time to See of Francis’ Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future. We learned that three conditions distort our vision of these times: They are narcissism, discouragement, and pessimism. Narcissism is drowning in your own image. Discouragement is seeing only what you’ve lost, and pessimism shuts the door on the future.

 Once we’re wise to these three ‘dis-eases’ infecting our vision, and intentionally resolving to avoid them, we’re ready for Part II: A Time to Choose. Between the third step, to heal and repair, however, there is an important middle step. We need a firm set of criteria to guide us:

•      Knowing we are loved by God
•       Called to serve in solidarity
•       A healthy capacity for silent reflection, and
•      Places of refuge from the tyranny of the ‘urgent.’

Francis then takes us back to foundations: the Beatitudes and the Catholic Social Principles: the preferential option for the poor, the universal destination of goods, solidarity and subsidiarity, and above all, discernment of what we learn according to the signs of the times. This includes the important value of unfinished thinking, when we realize we really don’t know enough about something to reach an opinion. There is always the urge to make a snap rash judgment. The result is a false certitude rather than a tentative certainty. Francis reminds us to that we can always distinguish the voice of the Spirit from the voice of the evil spirit. God’s voice always opens up possibility. The evil spirit will suggest you are worthless and can do nothing.

Because this second Part is so rich in insights, we will limit this reflection to one more topic. The pope focuses on the leading role of women. He states that women are the most affected and the most resilient in this present crisis. Beginning with a reference to the Gospels, Francis recalls that the women were not paralyzed by the tragedy of the cross. They responded, and were the first to be open to the message of the resurrection. He cites women economists who have distinct approaches to addressing financial need, focusing on areas sidelined by mainstream thinking. These women are advocating an economy that sustains, protects, and regenerates, over one that merely regulates and arbitrates. The pope goes right to the ethos of this thinking, ideas formed from direct experience. He warns against reducing women in leadership to their functions rather than their ability to challenge the assumptions of power altogether. This focus of Part II is worth reading. We will pick up other insights from Part II next time…!