Pastor's Columns

To Bear Fruit That Will Last

Sun, 13 May 2012 08:00:00 GMT

To Bear Fruit that Will Last

Pastor’s Column

6^th Sunday of Easter

May 13, 2012

“It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you

to go and bear fruit that will remain.”

John 9:16

Chosen to bear fruit that will remain. How fruitful is my life? What does a fruitful life really consist of? Most of us do try to make progress in our lives: financial progress; career progress; health progress; relationship progress; vacation progress! But what about spiritual progress? What will be the lasting result of this action in the lives of others – and for me?? Will there be lasting gains? Will this fruit remain?

Imagine someone trying to drive to Seattle from Salem, but who gets on I-5 going south instead. Perhaps by the time he realizes this he has gone a long way. When asked about this, perhaps this person might say, “Well, it’s true I drove in the wrong direction, but I did make great time!” If we are not careful, we may find ourselves making good progress in our lives, but in the wrong direction!

To save us from making such choices in our lives, the Lord offers some practical advice on how to bear lasting fruit. First, realize that we are chosen and appointed by God for a specific mission in life. We will find this appointment from God right in the midst of our family, work, school, friends and the people and circumstances and trials of daily life. You have a mission, chosen by God that only you can accomplish. Our time on earth will last only until this is accomplished or it is clear we will not complete the task.

“This is my commandment: love one another as I have loved you (Jn 15:12).” The gospel tells us what kind of love this is: a sacrificial love that lays down one’s life for others. It is very easy to get off track with the goals we set for ourselves. It is very easy to actually be seeking ourselves and only self-fulfillment instead of seeking to fulfill the will of God.

There is a simple test for this. In our goal setting, or in the decisions that we make each day, we can always ask ourselves: what will be the fruit of this decision for others? Is this decision pleasing to God? Is this action a loving action or a selfish one? Am I acting primarily out of self-interest or out of a true desire to love God and neighbor? What are the fruits? Will they endure? If I am seeking only good for myself, this will not endure.

I’ll never forget an interview in the newspaper with a corporate raider in the 1980s. He had purchased a large company in Los Angeles, sold off the parts, made a lot of money, and had ultimately thrown about 12,000 people out of work. The newspaper asked him a poignant question: “How did you feel about the fact that your actions, while profitable for your company, left so many unemployed?” Here is how he answered this question: “Well, it’s true that this was bad for them, but it was good for me.” Decisions made with such a worldview, whether large or small, do not bear good fruit in the end. If we really listen to Christ, we can be spared from making the same mistake.

Father Gary

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The Gift of Time

Sun, 06 May 2012 08:00:00 GMT

The Gift of Time

Pastor’s Column

5^th Sunday of Easter

May 6, 2012

“[My Father] takes away every branch in me that does not bear fruit,

And every one that does he prunes so that it bears more fruit.”

John 15:2

Last year I received a very unusual gift from an old friend—a five-decade rosary with different dates on each decade. It is an intriguing gift that I have pondered often. On the first decade, the day of my birth is listed (one number per bead); then my baptism day on the second decade beads (which was the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary!); then first communion; then ordination to priesthood. But the last decade was blank—no date! I thought she had made a mistake when making this rosary for me.

Why in the world did the last decade have no date? Because it records the date of something that has not occurred yet – the day of my death! It is just a bit creepy to see that blank spot – but in reality, our whole life is summed up by what happens on the last day of our lives, a day we would just as soon not look at much of the time.

The most precious gift God has given us in this world is the gift of time. We only get so much of this! Imagine – some babies get only a few hours to live, while others live well past one hundred. Time is given to us, in the end, so that we will have the freedom to choose – by our faith and by our life – to be for God (or against him). As long as we live, God will never take away our free will.

At the moment of death, our free-will, and the time to choose God in faith, will come to an end. The Lord will then reveal to the soul all of the choices that it has made, from early childhood to the last breath. The soul will see all the ways it has influenced others and made a difference in the circumstances and events that this soul was given in life. It will also see the many ways God was present to the soul, helping it and guiding it on a journey that was meant to lead home to God. Each choice we make while we still live in time is forming us into the kind of being we will be in eternity!

If only we could appreciate now how precious this gift of time really is. How true it is that our entire future may be dependent on one decision freely given. Such moments are often not recognized until they are past. When Jesus prunes us by means of sufferings and trials, he does this so that we will enter eternity with more fruit. Everything he allows or wills in our lives he does because he sees how limited our time on earth really is; and he wishes us to make the most of it before the last date is entered on the rosary of significant dates in our lives.

Father Gary

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Jesus, the Good Shepherd

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Jesus, the Good Shepherd

Pastor’s Column

4^th Sunday of Easter

April 29, 2012

“I am the Good Shepherd.

A Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.”

John 10:11

The Good Shepherd lays down his life for his sheep. Jesus has no limits to his love: he has done everything possible for me. What limits do I have in my love for him, or for others? I lay down my life for Christ by dying to my own will, by being obedient to the voice of the Good Shepherd; so any follower of his will be led to lay down his or her life at some point as part of our lesson plan of life. This is one of the key lessons Jesus teaches the sheep who follow him.

A hired leader, someone who works for himself, whose primary interest is to get paid, will run away when he sees danger coming. This type of false guide has no concern for his flock. Jesus is not like this! He will not leave us when we are in danger, like a path that leads nowhere, but instead, will even die to protect us. In fact, he already has by dying on the cross! If our Shepherd-Guide seems to disappear when danger threatens, he has assured us he is nevertheless always nearby. At these times, we are called to grow in trust.

The sheep, that is the individual Christian who follows Christ, will really get to know his voice (John 10:16). This intimacy with the Good Shepherd comes from spending time with Jesus, listening to him speaking: in the Scriptures, in the Church, in our hearts, in the circumstances of everyday life. Other voices, other noises will be competing for my attention to try to lead me astray. Through the daily silence of prayer I will continue to be attuned to the voice of my real guide, Jesus, constantly speaking to me through the Holy Spirit.

Jesus intends to shepherd everyone, even those who do not know him now, with the goal, one day, of having only one flock. Our free will gives us the choice to accept or reject his voice! Every movement of goodness and beauty in the world, everything that ultimately leads to God is, in fact, the voice of the Good Shepherd: “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock, one shepherd” (John 10:16).

Father Gary

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Sayings of St. Bernadette

Sun, 22 Apr 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Sayings of St. Bernadette

Pastor’s Column

3^rd Sunday of Easter

April 22, 2012

When I was a deacon 16 years ago, my spiritual advisor talked me into taking a personal, private pilgrimage to the shrines of France. It was quite a challenge since I don’t speak the language! Through the tourist bureau there it was arranged that I should spend a night at the guest-house at the St. Gildard’s Convent at Nevers, France, where the incorrupt body (housed in a glass tomb in the convent chapel) of St. Bernadette of Lourdes lies. This is the best example of incorruption in the Catholic Church.

In this place Bernadette spent her entire religious life. She had a lively personality, and was terribly annoyed by those who wished to make her some kind of living saint, simply because Our Lady chose to appear to her! She had a peasant wit infused with grace. After the church closed for the evening, I had full access, since I was a guest of the convent. I sat, alone, right next to the body of Bernadette herself, reading her diary. To this day I felt as if I had met her as I read her own words and looked at the body of this saint, who died over 100 years ago (see picture below)!! It was one of the most singular graces of my life!

On the feast of Bernadette, I found my own diary (lost for 16 years) in which I recorded some of the best of what she said. May God speak to you through her as well! Father Gary

SAYINGS OF BERNADETTE

“If we had faith, we would feel the divine presence everywhere.”

“For the few years we still have to live in this world, we must do our best to spend our time as well as possible.”

Someone remarked to Bernadette that she seemed to take the trials of life with great patience, and she replied: “As it is Our Lord himself who sends it, I must take it.”

Bernadette was asked to explain how she bore suffering for Christ and she said (this is my personal favorite saying of Bernadette) “Suffering passes, but to have borne suffering – remains.”

Someone remarked to Bernadette: “You suffer a lot, don’t you?” She replied, “Well, what do you expect? The Blessed Virgin told me that I would not be happy in this world, but in the next.”

“I would like to know the defects of the saints and what they did to correct these defects. That would help me much more than hearing about their miracles and ecstasies.”

This is some advice Bernadette gave that I often use in confession and in my own life…she said, “The first impulse does not belong to us, but the second does.”

“Oh my God, may your will be done! I accept all sufferings since such is your will.”

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A Visit to the Shrine of Divine Mercy

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Pastor’s Column

Mercy Sunday, 2012

Since most of us will never have a chance to visit the Shine of Divine Mercy in Poland, for this Pastor Column we will travel there together in words and pictures and see what we can discover about the Mercy of Our Lord.

Six years ago a group of Saint Ed’s pilgrims came to Krakow Poland, where the international shrine is located. Krakow is the town where Pope John Paul II was archbishop, and his presence is everywhere, including this enormous statue of him blessing the shrine (from the back) taken from the bell tower.

Most real pilgrimages, whether to shrines or in life itself, involve some suffering, and the Lord tested us here. We tired pilgrims discovered on arrival that the bus driver had reached his maximum hours and had to return after only one hour or so. Most decided to return to the hotel, but five of us adventurous souls stayed the day and returned by public transportation. You know which group the pastor stayed with! Who wants to leave a place like this early? Not this pilgrim.

One place of great grace there was this beautiful adoration chapel on the grounds. It is not a place for quiet prayer! The chaplet of mercy seemed to be recited constantly here, and no wonder, since from the convent in this place, Sr Faustina made known the message of God’s mercy to the world!

St Faustina’s Diary: Divine Mercy in My Soul is, in my opinion, a masterpiece. I am certain she will one day be a doctor of the church. There are few books filled with such incredible and practical wisdom from God, and all this from a nun who never got past the fourth grade! But she faithfully transmitted what Jesus said to her about his mercy. Being as she is a saint-friend of mine, we were thrilled to have celebrated Mass in this chapel dedicated in her honor.

Saint Faustina’s convent, which you can see in this picture, is where she had her visions, and where she suffered so much. Many of the sisters thought she was crazy, or simply not holy enough to be having visions from Our Lord! St. Faustina teaches constantly about the need for silence.

When one goes in the convent chapel, one discovers that photographs are not allowed (so I don’t have any), but here one finds the original Picture of Divine Mercy that Our Lord instructed the saint to paint. This is located on the left side aisle, and below this is a reliquary containing St Faustina’s bones. One can kneel here before the image and kiss or touch this reliquary as an act of veneration and contemplate the powerful message of mercy that has emanated from this place and the humble nun through which God chose to speak.

This picture of the shine basilica itself shows how immense it really is. It is quite beautiful, and recently constructed (our mass was in a side chapel more appropriate for a group of 45). The picture of Jesus of Mercy in the center is exceptionally beautiful.

The Diary: Divine Mercy in My Soul itself was actually placed on the banned list for a number of years after the saint’s death, primarily due to a mis-translation of the Polish. Fortunately, John Paul II re-read these writings in their original language, realized the problem, and set us on the road that has led to Mercy Sunday today.

One of the most comforting teachings in her writings, now confirmed as accurate by the church, is that each soul at the moment of death and before the individual judgment is offered an opportunity to accept God’s Mercy. Of course, the soul must recognize and say yes to God at this last and crucial moment, but what a comfort to those who have lost a loved one who seemed to be away from God! Even Jesus himself indicated that some sins are forgiven in the next world (Mt 12:31). Praise God for his infinite mercy!

Father Gary

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The Slide Rule

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 08:00:00 GMT

The Slide Rule

Pastor’s Column

Easter Sunday 2012

When I was young I fell in love with astronomy and read every book I could get my hands on; later, I wanted to be a doctor. Well, both of these “scientific” professions would have been great, except for one problem: I was failing chemistry. I have to admit that I was a straight A student, and here I was getting a D minus, and this was a grade of compassion. It didn’t help that the chemistry teacher was a sourpuss and a poor communicator!

What was the real problem? I could not figure out how to use a slide rule (this occurred a couple of years before calculators were permitted). I know this sounds like the dark ages to some of you and, yes, this was a time when a pocket calculator was advanced technology! I am convinced that if I had had access to a calculator, I would be a physician today. Instead, here I was, failing chemistry in high school, the ruins of my future career at hand, and I remember looking out the window and the Lord said to me, “Don’t worry about this. I want you to be a priest.” And that was that. Two years later slide rules were in the Smithsonian, but the priesthood remains. That was the moment of death and resurrection.

Are you in the midst of a disaster in your life at this time? Don’t you know that resurrection always follows a period of dying? It is the way of all things. It is God’s way. He will work this disaster you are experiencing into good in your life, just like he did with Jesus.

Sometimes we need a disaster to wake us up and get us where we need to be. Sometimes something needs to die before we can experience the resurrection from the dead!! Is something or someone dying in your life? Are you experiencing a disaster? Do you have a “slide rule” that is killing you? As they say, the back of one door is the front of another!

I really do believe many of you are in that chemistry class of life right now. Many of you loved this subject and excelled, but God is often closest to us in the disasters, trials and sufferings of life. Have you given up hope? Are you afraid of the future? We, in faith, can look at the resurrection of Jesus and begin to see the physics of the future and the truly exciting world that God is calling you to.

Jesus is calling each of us today from the future. You are an eternal being. Jesus waits for you to have faith in him and his church. He wants us to understand that what happened to him in the resurrection of the dead will also happen to you who believe in him; the physical laws of his glorified body you will also share; the sufferings of the present will lead to a resurrection, and your trials will have meaning in the next life.

And if you are having trouble with some “slide rule” in your life at the present time, cheer up. After death, comes resurrection. After night, comes day. Allow God to speak through the “slide-rule” moments of your life and watch what happens.

Father Gary

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Fair Weather Friends

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 08:00:00 GMT

FAIR WEATHER FRIENDS?

PALM SUNDAY

Pastor’s Column

April 1, 2012

There is an intimate connection between Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, and Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week. Traditionally, palms from the previous year are burned to make the ashes for Ash Wednesday. In the same way, the ashes of penance and sacrifice give way to cries of Hosanna on Palm Sunday and the joy of Easter a week later.

We all know that the gladness we hear from the crowds on Palm Sunday is short-lived, for soon other voices will be crying out for the Lord’s death. Christ wishes us to embrace his will, to grant the King an entrance to our heart in both the times of penance and suffering — ashes— and the time of great joy and gladness when everything is going our way — the first half of Palm Sunday. Both realities are present in the gospel of Palm Sunday.

Palm Sunday mirrors life very well. Our lives, like Christ’s, are a mixture of the best and the worst of times. In all these times, we strive to please God by embracing his will. We are not fair-weather friends like the fickle crowds of today’s gospel, who are willing to hail Jesus as king only when he gives them what they want, but turn on him at the first sign of trouble. No, we strive to be true friends that the Lord can count on in all the times, circumstances and events God may permit. Our love for Christ, then, is based on the reality of His love, the love that went to the cross for us. Palm Sunday then is our time to resolve never again to be only a fair-weather friend of Jesus.

Father Gary

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Avoiding the Cross

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Avoiding the Cross?

Pastor’s Column

5^th Sunday of Lent

March 25, 2012

If a man serves me, he must follow me; wherever I am, there my servant shall be.

from John 12:20-33

One of the most surprising facts about the early church for a Catholic is that Christians in the first century did not use crucifixes. Churches did not begin to display Jesus on the cross until sometime after Constantine legalized Christianity and outlawed crucifixions. It was only after Christians began to “forget” how awful crucifixion was that we begin to see Christ on a crucifix instead of a bare cross.

In today’s gospel Our Lord tells us that, if we are a real follower of his, we will be asked to take up our cross and follow him. Where I am, there my servant will be. First of all, notice what Jesus is not asking me to take up his cross – but mine. My life is going to have unique crosses; they will be my own.

Jesus spoke of his own cross: he said, what should I say? Father, save me from this hour? But it was precisely for this cross that I came into the world. We can learn quite a lot from this statement. We are not here just to practice “cross-avoidance” or to have a good time! We are here for a mission and that mission is going to involve the self-sacrifice for others or one special other. Most of us have many such opportunities: a sick child, parent or spouse, listening instead of talking, giving when it is not appreciated, giving way to avoid an argument, and a thousand other ways we die to self.

The cross: most of us would just as soon wiggle out of one if possible, but sometimes we just can’t. The Imitation of Christ speaks about “cross-avoidance” in some detail. It points out that we can try to run from our cross with what we would call today a geographical cure (moving somewhere else), a new job, new home, new spouse, or some sort of anesthesia, but we can be sure that, when we have arrived there, we are likely to find the cross all the same and perhaps an even heavier one than we sought to avoid.

Father, save me from this hour. Is it possible that the very cross you seek to avoid is the one most valuable thing in your life? Isn’t it funny how the sufferings we went through with someone, though it seemed awful at the time, are actually among our most valuable possessions later on? Why is this? There is an old expression that love is what you have been through with someone. Selfish love, “cross-avoidance” type love is, ultimately, sterile. It is our sufferings on the behalf of others that prove our love. And the sufferings I have shared with Jesus will be my greatest joy in the world to come. Love is what we have been through with someone and this is really true of Jesus.

Father Gary

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Choosing the Light!

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Choosing the Light!

Pastor’s Column

4^th Sunday of Lent

March 18, 2012

“And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light.”

John 3:19-20

This past fall, thirty-eight pilgrims and I visited the village of Garabandal in northern Spain. This location is the site of a possible apparition of the Virgin Mary, one of many which the church has not issued a final judgment on. Not knowing what to expect, most of us were in fact quite moved by this place: it is humble, un-commercialized, and somewhat unknown. The message is challenging and got us to ponder certain aspects of Catholic teaching.

One of the (controversial) things Our Lady is said to have spoken here is that at a point in the near future every living person will have some kind of an illumination of conscience: the gift of seeing their soul as it really is before God. And this got me to thinking: all of us really are going to experience this – at the moment of death! But it won’t do us a whole lot of good to see the truth about how we stand in the sight of God after life is over! We must pray very hard to see the truth now, while we are still living and have the chance to correct these things while still on earth. God wishes to help us with this!

God is light! He came into the world to make clear what is true and what is false in our lives. In light of this, therefore, we can begin to evaluate our souls: what actions or sinful behaviors would I prefer not see the light of day? Evil is attracted to the cover of darkness; goodness seeks the light! Someday the whole truth of who I am and what I have become will be absolutely transparent to everyone. What areas of my soul would I prefer remain unobserved? God wishes to enlighten us deeply about these hidden (and not-so-hidden) areas of darkness within us, helping us to do battle with these sinful choices. This will be a life-long battle!

Life consists of a series of choices. God has given us true and objective truth by which we can judge these choices, the actions of our lives: what fruit has this choice produced? Have my actions led to anger, discord, addiction, sin, and dark things that I keep hidden? Or are the fruits a greater love, joy, peace, patience, chastity and the other fruits of the Spirit?

Do my actions conform to the commandments and to church teaching? Am I living a life of obedience to my marriage or religious vows? Am I truly pro-life, or have I embraced the “culture of death” the media tends to plug? We will all have to argue our case before God in total light one day so it is best to ask God to reveal to us now, in the light of faith, the true state of our soul before God, that we might take action now in this battleground we call life on earth.

Father Gary

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Jesus Cleanses the Temple

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Jesus Cleanses the Temple

Pastor’s Column

3^rd Sunday of Lent

March 11, 2012

“He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area.”

John 2:15

A pilgrim to the Jerusalem Temple at the time of Christ would have beheld one of the wonders of the ancient world. Although only the “wailing wall” is visible today, you can take an underground tour of a tunnel under the temple mount and see incredibly huge and perfectly cut stones that undergird the enormous platform Solomon built, and they are still there today.

A gentile in New Testament times who ascended the steps to the temple platform would have been allowed only as far as the “Court of the Gentiles.” This was envisioned as a place where righteous gentiles could come and experience some of the peace, prayer and pilgrimage that was what a visit to the holiest shrine in Judaism was all about. What would a gentile have found when he visited this square?

This is precisely the spot that had been commandeered by the moneychangers, the vendors of lambs and goats and doves! Jewish pilgrims came from all over the known world; and, of course, they needed to buy animals for sacrifice and exchange money, but now this had been turned into a corrupt monopoly and was no longer a place where anyone would find God! Instead, there would have been a cacophony of buying, selling, yelling, cheating and corruption. This is also precisely the spot where Jesus got so angry!

You and I are God’s temple because we were created by God and house an eternal spirit. Jesus won’t tolerate this kind of corruption in a temple of his! We are fundraising to build a new church here at Saint Eds, but imagine for a moment that you were to design your own church – only this one is within you. What does this structure look like? Is it a peaceful place? Would Jesus be at home here?

As Christians, we have invited Jesus into our temple within, especially in the Eucharist. But when he finds that we love something else more than him, or are in bed with some kind of sin or corruption or avarice or greed, he will immediately get to work cleansing the temple. If necessary, Jesus sometimes permits drastic, table-turning events in our lives so that we will convert, but he would prefer that we help him to do this peacefully, especially by making a good confession and truly examining our lives to see in what ways we habitually please – or displease – God.

Father Gary

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