Welcome, Everybody, to our new home.  And thanks, Becky, for all you have done to welcome us.

 

 

Readings:  

 Exodus 24, 3-8,   This is the blood of the covenant

 Psalm 116,   I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord

 Hebrews 9, 11-15,    He is a mediator of a new covenant.

 Mark 14, 12-16, 22-26,   The Eucharist   

 

 

 

 

John with his long awaited arm operation done.

 

 

Exodus:   8 points on the readings, including 2 on Exodus, 4 on points from the other readings, 2 more on Exodus

    1.  This is the 2nd book of the Torah/Pentateuch, the first section of the Old Testament.  Deuteronomy, which we visited last week, is the 5th & last book.

 

 

 

Emma doing her candle Magic.

 

 

    2.  Story: This is a fabulous and edifying fable that tells how the Israelites got out of slavery in Egypt with the leadership of Moses. 

    3.  Passover: the night the angel passed over the first born male children of the Jews because they had smeared lamb blood on their door posts.  But the angel killed all the Egyptian first born sons to make Pharaoh let the people go.  Remember, this is not history, rather like a fable, like Aesop's Fables.  There is a story about the burning bush in the Holy Land, for tourists.  Tourists are told this bush was the bush that burst into flame and from which Yahweh spoke to Moses.

 

 

 

 

Welcome in, Harper.  I cannot wait to meet your new little sister, Betsy.

 

 

    4.  Covenant vs Contract: in a contract two parties agree to do something.  If one fails, the contract is often null.  In a covenant two people agree, and even if one party fails, the other party honors the covenant.  The Covenant between Yahweh & the People:  the people will honor Yahweh as their only god; Yahweh will protect and care for them as his chosen, and bring them into a new land.

    5.  Sacrifice & holocaust: ancient tribal belief that I must offer to my god (s) things precious to me to appease the god's anger or win his favor, for example, animals, prisoners, and the most beautiful girl in the community.  Jesus was seen as this sacrifice to appease the god, and also as the high priest who usually performed the sacrifice.  Thus the emphasis on blood & death.  Today scripture scholars as well as ordinary folks don't believe in a God who was so angry that he demanded special sacrifice.  We do not have a vengeful, angry God.

 

 

 

 

Sandra reads our Blessing of the Candles.

 

 

    6.  12 tribes: the 12 sons of the patriarch Jacob (or Israel; the 3 patiarchs were Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob-Israel).

    7.  Author & Date of Exodus: not Moses.  Rather a compilation of material from different centuries, that was mostly put together after the Babylonian Captivity, e.g., ca. 550 BCE.

    8.  Our Selection from Exodus: the people have been wandering in the desert and are now being given laws and customs they must observe.  The Covenant is being sealed.

 

 

 

 

The Best, Shonda & Ben.

 

 

A Banquet of Joy

In  honor of it being the feast of Corpus Christi, which is a celebration of our relationship with someone who totally loves us and accepts us as we are, I want to tell you a banquet of joy story.

These banquets take place morning, noon, and night.  It does not matter.  In fact, my dad was part of a morning banquet every week day at Christ the King parish, as I mentioned last week.

 

 

 

 

Rita & her admirer at the JCC gym, Jewish Community Center.

 

 

The banquet I was part of was in the morning about 6:00, at the Jewish Community Center, in the second floor gym, in fact.

There is a little lady named Rita.  She is black, about 60, big hair, somewhat round, and walks slowly into the gym with a walker.  She arrives with a DART bus, the small type bus that picks up individuals.

She comes maybe twice a week and settles on a recumbent bike which she pedals easily for 30-40 minutes. 

 

 

 

 

If that crazy Parkinson won't let the right hand behave, Jackie makes for a great substitute right hand.

 

 

I noticed her because she was unique in the gym.  And I really admired her for doing it.  So I started greeting her and we exchanged names sometime during the past year.  Last April I told her that I would be gone for a couple of weeks.  Rosemary & I were going to France.

She was so excited and asked me to bring her a little key chain statue of the Eiffel Tower.

 

 

 

 

Want to know why Rosemary played hookey from Juliettes Friday?   These two little critters, great nieces Rosemary (how about that!) and Alice, flew into Dallas with their mom, Kristine.   

 

 

I told Rosemary and, lo and behold, one afternoon in a tiny town curio shop in the Perigord region we found just what she wanted.

It was a week or two until I saw her come in one morning.  I got the Eiffel Tower key chain, went to her bike, bowed, and gave her the gift.

She went so crazy over that little token of my affection for her that I was almost in tears.  Her delight was my Banquet of Joy.

 

 

 

 

Coming up, Cupcake of The Week Time, everybody's favorite part of our celebration.

 

 

When was the last time you had a Banquet of Joy?

 

 

 

 

Sez Leo, "Cupcake time yet??"

Readings:   2 Chronicles 36, 14-23, Whoever among you who belongs to any part of his people, let him go up; Psalm 137, Let my tongue be silenced, if I ever forget You; John 3, 14-21, Jesus said to Nicodemus, “the light came into the world.”

 

Chronicles:

Author (s): Unknown

Date:  ca. 450-350 BCE, at least after The Babylonian Captivity.  You will see why. 

 

 

Subject:  a summary of the entire span of history to the time the people returned to Jerusalem, i.e., from Adam to the end of the Babylonian Captivity, 450 BCE.  Therefore, it begins with Adam & a genealogy up to King Saul and King David, through David's son Solomon & the building of the temple to the Babylonian Captivity with Nebuchadnezzar to Cyrus the leader of the Persians who defeated Nebuchadnezzar (what a fabulous name, 5 syllables)  and allowed the Hebrews to return to Jerusalem.  Note that Babylon was near Baghdad in Iraq, while Persia was Iran.

Our selection: this is the very last chapter of ca. 60 chapters, including Chronicles 1 & 2.  A bit of a summary chapter, it says that Yahweh was so mad he got Nebuchadnezzar to defeat the Hebrews and cart them off to captivity in Babylon.  Then some 50 years later he gets Cyrus to defeat Nebuchadnezzar and free the Hebrews to return to Jerusalem, which they do. 

Sources: Catholic Encyclopedia, Wikipedia.

 

 

The Nature of God

Anybody here know Bartholomew Granger?  Or who he is?  I’ll tell you.  He is from Beaumont and 41 years old.  Last Wednesday morning he was waiting outside the Beaumont courthouse where he was on trial for abusing a member of his family. 

At some point he reached into his pickup, pulled out his gun, and started shooting.  He killed a 79 year old lady just passing there.  He wounded three others including his daughter whom he also ran over with his pickup truck in an attempt to flee the scene.

 

 Anybody hear about the 22 kids from Belgium on a spring break ski trip to Switzerland?  Killed in a bus that simply ran into a bridge returning to Belgium.  22 kids plus some adults.

Which, taking into account our readings today, leads me to ask you two questions.

First question, does God get angry and punish bad people?  The Bible certainly seems to say so. 

• For example, Chronicles says today that the "anger of the Lord was so inflamed that there was no remedy."  As a result he had the Hebrews killed, burned out, and carried away as slaves in Babylon.  For a symbolic 70 years, which seems to suggest that the Hebrews had neglected to rest on the Sabbath, 7 being a special number.
• For example, Yahweh got so mad at his earlier creation that he sent the great flood, killing everybody except Noah, his wife, and the animals.  
• For example, in John this morning you find out that you will be condemned if you do not believe in the name of Jesus. 
• For example, it is held that Jesus had to come and die on a cross and he did so to take away the Father's anger at us for our ancestors' sins.  Thus, the gates of heaven, closed up to that time, would be reopened.  True?

 

 

 Were the kids on the bus bad?  Is Granger bad?  The little 79 year old lady?   What about Sargeant Robert Bales, who allegedly massacred a handful of women & children this week in Afghanistan.  Are they all such sinners that they must be punished like happened to the Hebrews in Jerusalem?

So, what do you think, what do you believe?  Does God get angry and punish bad people as we see repeatedly mentioned in the Bible?  What we are dealing with here is what you think the nature of God is.  Which leads me to my next question:

 

 

Second question, who are the bad people?  Or who are the good? 

Obviously the man who killed the old lady and injured three including his daughter whom he ran over is bad.  He deserves what?  Sargeant Robert Bales?   Be condemned?  Forever? 

From my experience as a priest and as as psychotherapist, I have discovered two things. 

First, that nobody is bad, and nobody is good.  Everybody is both bad & good.  But what about Granger?  Bales   Are they not bad?  John says, "He who does wicked things hates the light."  They must really hate the light.

 

 

Secondly, I discovered that if I had grown up in the environment of many of these so called bad people and I had been forced to live in the horrible surroundings they saw daily, I probably would have done the same things.  I do not know how many times I have talked with people who have done similar things and discovered that they were horribly wounded people.  Inside they were deeply hurt.  Outside they vented their hurt through anger and, watch out, through violence.  

                                                                                                    

And look what we are finding out about Bales, on his 4th mission, 3 of them in Iraq.

 

 

As a balance to this negativity and tragedy, let me remind you that we likewise see beauty in people.  I saw it in Ermy, the check in lady at the Jewish Community Center who greeted us cheerily Friday morning at 5:45 when we came for a spin class.  And the 20 or so friendly class mates.  I saw it in the courage of Michael Morwood yesterday who shared with us his own faith and understanding of the nature of God & Jesus. 

So, reconsidering Granger & Bales & the kids from Belgium and all the Bible stories about God being angry and punishing people, what do you think about the nature of God?

 

 

Sources: The Center for Liturgy, St. Louis U.  Online Ministries, Creighton, U.  All on line.

 

 

Readings: Acts 5, 12-16; Psalm118; Revelation 1, 9-10; John 20, 19-31

 

Second Sunday After Easter – Reflection on the Readings

 

  

Acts of the Apostles continues Luke’s Gospel by focusing on the spread of Christianity after the Resurrection.  The focus is first on the work of the Apostles and especially on the position of Peter, and then in the second half of the book, the focus is on the work of Paul. 

 

Today’s reading from Chapter 5 comes immediately after the apostles have been brought before the Sanhedrin (the powers that be in the Jewish community) and told to stop their preaching about Jesus.  This is clearly a focus on the question “who will be in charge of the twelve tribes of Israel?  It also echoes back to Abraham and his being placed in charge of the tribes of Israel. 

 

   

Remember, we are dealing with a group who have only the Old Testament to turn to in their attempts to make sense of all that they remember or heard about Jesus.  The power of God, working thru Peter is now much stronger than even when Jesus cured.  All people need for healing is to have Peter’s shadow pass over them.  There is no need for any physical contact!  Luke is here building up the importance of the “new leaders” of the people, the apostles.

 

  

 

Our second reading is from the Book of Revelations; a much-misunderstood work, which I wish had never been included in the New Testament!  The work is primarily written in an apocalyptic style and its main focus is on the Roman Empire and the battle which the early Christians had with that entity.  There is nothing about the 21^st century in this writing, nor about how the world itself would end!  The writer had no idea of a place called the USA nor the Soviet Union!  

 

Second Sunday After Easter – Homily

 

Poor Thomas!  Actually thank God for Thomas!  It is comforting to know that someone else had doubts about the resurrection.  One week after our high point of Easter Sunday we are immediately given this wonderful little incident.  What I like about it is that it allows space for a very natural doubt to exist side be side with the faith in the Resurrection. 

   

Back in 1968 a book was published called Introduction to Christianity by Joseph Ratzinger.  The book was a through examination of the Apostles Creed.  I remember being surprised when he talks fairly early on in the book about both the believer and unbeliever share, each in his own way, doubt and belief.  At the time it struck me as quite surprising.  Remember I was a naive seminarian in my early twenties and everything was rock solid!  Oh for those nice innocent days!!

  

I have since grown up to recognize the truth in Ratzinger’s book, and in my own life.  If we remember back to the church before Vatican II we seemed to live in a world of certainty.  We were told exactly how everything was, now it seems things are messy!  It is what happens when you look behind the curtain, as happened to Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. 

   

Doubting seems to be an integral part of our lives.  We would very much like the comfort of absolute certainty, and we do have it in a few things, like death and taxes, but for all the other areas of our lives we move from one doubt to another, all the while trying to either buy insurance or insulate ourselves in some other way against the uncertainties of life.  And belief in God is one area where there is lots of room for doubt, since God is mystery. 

 

 

  

So what can we begin to compare or faith in God to in our experience?  It seems to me that it is like being in love.  You meet someone and fall in love.  But the other person is free to respond or not.  The minute you force their response it is no longer love.  And so our most intimate of relationships with other humans is based on a hope that the other will respond and continue to respond.  If I think of God along those lines there is one major difference, God is going to love me, in this relationship; God is the only one taking the risk. 

 

Picture 1:  Tony begins Mass

 

Picture 2:  The Offertory

 

Picture 3:  Jim, Bob, Jackie, & friend 

 Readings:  

 Ezekiel, 2, 2-5, Hard of face and obstinate of heart are they to whom I am sending you.

Psalm 123, Our eyes are fixed on the Lord, pleading for his mercy.

2 Corinthians 12, 7-10 A thorn in the flesh was given to me to beat me, to keep me from being too elated.

Mark 5, 21-43, A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.

 

More Observations on Ezekiel (June 17 we also had Ezekiel)

Who:  Ezekiel is one of the Big 3 prophets.  Why?  48 chapters.  The other 2: Isaiah & Jeremiah.  These 3 have lots of chapters & material.

Ezekiel was born into the priest class.  He later was considered a prophet.  He got The Call from God.  When he was about 25 he was swept up in the Babylonian captivity, around 590. 

When: It covers the period of the Captivity, 600-550 before Christ, which Ezekiel lived personally.  But the work is composed toward the end of the Captivity, around 550.  This is Ezekiel’s material, but it has been saved and edited by his fellow priests.

Message:

1. Ezekiel criticizes the people and warns them that their bad ways will be punished, for example, by being defeated and led into slavery and the Captivity.
2. He promises comfort and a brighter future for the captive people, especially envisioning a restored temple (which then lasted until when?  The year 70, when the Romans finally destroyed the temple & the priestly cast ceased to function, to this day).
3. An amusing vision: The Dry Bones, chapter 37.

  Today’s selection:   Ezekiel gets The Call or invitation from God to go tell the Israelite people that God sees what is going on.  Which means, tell them they are behaving horribly and they will pay dearly for their misbehavior. 

2 Corinthians observations -(2)

1.  This second letter to Corinth is often called the severe or tearful letter.  Paul was upset with the Corinth, Greece community because of what he thought were false prophets undermining his authority.  These people could have simply been people who disagreed with him.  At points you can almost hear Paul playing his violin & singing 'Poor Paul.'

2.  He talks here about a thorn in his flesh.  So, what is that?  People have speculated for centuries.  Could it have been he was OCD (obsessive compulsive), bi-polar (mood swings from manic & dramatic to depressed), a sexual addiction, epilepsy, or something else?  Is there evidence in his writing for any of this?  Maybe. No way to really diagnose.  The patient has been dead for a few years.

Sources: Good News Bible, New Interpreter’s Study Bible, St. Louis U. Liturgy Studies, Wikipedia

 

Jack & Sophia

Ever seen a Prophet?

Friday I received a call from an old friend in Baton Rouge.  Since my class reunion with my S.J. buddies, I have been longing to reconnect with other old friends especially in the New Orleans area where I lived and worked in the early 70’s. 

My friend’s name is Lucy and she is a St. Joseph sister.  I knew her and her community really well when I was director of a spiritual center at Grand Coteau, near Opelousas, a couple of hours up the river from New Orleans. 

In those days Lucy and the St. Joseph sisters were spiritually and psychologically healthy nuns working to make the Catholic community even better along the lines set up by Vatican II. 

I lost track of them when I went to Tanzania & Kenya, only finally making contact again with Lucy on Friday.  I had to search all around for her phone number, and then when I called she was out of town. 

I found out that their headquarters on Mirabeau Ave. in N.O., where I gave some retreats & said Masses was wiped out by Katrina and they have relocated in Baton Rouge.  I was stunned.



I thought about Lucy & her sisters when I was looking at these readings about Ezekiel & Jesus’ roles as prophets.  I would like to talk about 3 nuns who were & are prophet like people for me. 

I have become aware in the past couple of weeks how rich has been my experience with so many women of this caliber.

Remember, first, prophets do 3 things.  They criticize the evils of their times, they promise God will punish, and they offer consolation for reform.  A side effect of their criticism is the hatred of the people they are criticizing. 



I consider this pretty Old Testament.  New Testament prophets don’t promise God will punish.  Most of us don’t believe that any more.  Katrina was not a punishment from God.

First, there is a sister Marian.  A doctor, from around Denver, a Medical Missionary of Mary.  We are about the age.   She had been working in Tanzania since before I first came in contact with her around 1980.   She is there this morning.

Marian & her community not only work in Tanzania, a poor country, but she normally works in the most remote places you can reach.  No tourists visit.  One of her specialties since I departed Tanzania is AIDS & HIV patients. 

Another sister about my age working in Tanzania is Anita, a Maryknoll.  She & her sisters work to empower the females of the villages.  Do not imagine the men of the village always like this.  These sisters, too, live in remote places and in utter simplicity, like the Medical Missionaries of Mary.  The simplicity of their living often shamed me as a Jesuit.



Then, there was one special nun who worked on my spiritual renewal team, a Sister of Africa.  Hanny was her name.  She was not American, but Dutch & lived in Holland during the Nazi occupation.

She was about 10-11 years old during the occupation. Her family lived on a small farm & they successfully hid a Jewish family during the war.  Hanny used to courier messages on her bike, holding them in her mouth. 

One time she rode up to a German check point with her German shepherd dog.  The guard came out and shot her dog dead.  When I knew Hanny she had accepted this and was marvelously peaceful. 

I talk about these nuns today for two reasons.  First, they have been models of courage, service, and prophetic vision for me.  I am blessed by their presence in my life.

Secondly, the American nuns, as you probably know, are enduring a lot of criticism from the Vatican.  Their leadership team here in the States is getting what prophetic voices get, rejection.  Rome ought to be ashamed of themselves. 

Finally, if you want to see something touching, Google Nuns on the Bus.  This was a June bus tour by nuns appealing Congress for more rather than less support for the poorest of the poor.

These are just a few of the heroic religious women I have known in my life.  I am in touch with Marian, out of touch with Anita, and Rosemary & I visited Hanny a few years ago in Holland, where she now lives in retirement.  Lucy has opened a door for me to reconnect with a number of the sisters I knew and have lost contact with in Louisiana.   I even suggested that we might have a reunion and she was all for it. 

Wonder where the prophetic people are today?  Check out the religious sisters as a starter.

Who is the prophet person in your life?

 

 

 

 

 

 

+Says Louis, "Welcome in, Everybody."

 

Readings:

Genesis  18, 20-32,  Sodom!  Good story.

Psalm 138,  Lord, on the day I cried for help you answered me.  (a terrific psalm)

Colossians 2, 12-14,  You were buried with him in baptism.

Luke 11, 1-13, "Ask & you will receive."

 

 

The Great Candle Team in action.

 

Intro to the readings:

1.   Another nice story about Abraham's relationship with God.  We can all place ourselves in Abraham's' shoes.

2.  The Gospel reading gives us an idealized version of how the Our Father came about.  With all these stories, you probably would not be far off if you suspected a ghost composer rather than Jesus. 

It ends with an encouragement from Jesus to ask for what you want with persistence, "ask & you will receive."  Reminds me of my mom & her 8 day novenas.  One of those novenas was, I bet, that I would leave the Jesuits quickly and go to college like a normal kid.

3.  Psalm 139.  As much as I like parts of the readings, it is Psalm 139 that really touches me and has touched me for decades.  I would like to spend a couple of minutes explaining why & how it has played a role in my life.  All 4 stanzas move me.   The first line of the first stanza sums it up, "I will give thanks to you, O Lord, with all my heart."

 

 

 

 

Leo joins the Music Machine.

 

I will give you thanks, O Lord, with all my heart

This event took place 20 years ago or more.  Do you remember one Spring afternoon (think it was Spring), when Hillary Clinton came to Dallas?  I know not the reason, but come she did.  There was an ordinary motorcade somewhere in the Dallas area.  All was peaceful until one of the motorcycle policemen had an accident.  The policeman was killed in the accident.

 

 

We probably really don't want to know what is going on over there.

 

The man was a member of St. Marks Catholic Church, where I was saying every Sunday the 9:00 & 10:30 Masses.  I always said the English Mass in the cafetorium at 10:30, and the 9:30 was either English in the main church or Spanish in the cafetorium.  Seeing as the policeman was hispanic I probably knew him from the Spanish Mass.

The funeral which was huge was held at Restland on Greenvile Ave. & Forest Lane.  I went to the viewing to offer my condolences, but decided to skip the funeral, it being so huge.

 

 

 

Watch out, Sydney, for that Rosemary.

 

The family has 4 or 5 kids and the kids were in individual rooms.  I chose to visit with one of the daughters because I knew her probably the best.  She was around 13 and was seated with her girl friend at the back of a room and people were lined up to visit her moving clockwise through the room.

I got in line which started in the hall.  When I got in, the girl got up and ran over to me and we hugged.  I stayed in line and when I got to the girl she told her friend that I was her priest and that when she made her first confession, a process which I don't like, I gave her for her penance two Hershey Kisses.

 

 

 

Elevation Time.

 

I give Thanks to you O Lord with all my heart. 

I give thanks because that little girl got my message.  The message: that "your kindness, O Lord, endures forever."  (Stanza 4,line 3)   This was why I gave out Hershey Kisses instead of penances and even hugs to every kid despite the warning about "don't touch the kids."  I grew up without enough hugs. 

"The Lord is gracious and merciful, never gets angry and is abounding in Love." Psalm 145 & other locations.  Another of my favorites.

Can you believe that?

 

 

 

Who let that Shropshire in here?

Readings:

Sirach 15, 15-20,   If you trust in God, you too shall live.   

 Psalm 119,  Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord.

 1 Corinthians 2, 6-10,   What eye has not seen…

 Matthew 5, 17-37,    If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away.

 

 

Hi, Genevieve, Better watch out that some of the women around here don't swipe you red shoes.

 

Observations:  on Sirach—

What:  This is one of those 12 odd books in between the Old and the New Testament.

 Author: a Jewish teacher called Joshua.  The only identified author in the whole Old Testament.  He tells us who he is, that he is a teacher, lived in Jerusalem, and traveled a lot.  It seems he put his work together while running a school in Alexandria, Egypt.

 His grandson translated the Hebrew work into Greek.  This Hebrew text was lost for centuries until the 19^th century, when 2/3 of it was found in Cairo.  Then other portions were found in Qumran and Masada, as late as 1964.

 

 

Welcome back, Dee, you look so terrific with your brand new hip.  Did I not warn you that you would love it?

 

 Date: composed around 175 years before Christ.  About 90 years before Christ the Jews put together their official bible, but excluded Sirach because they could not find the Hebrew version, only the Greek. 

 Christians accepted the book as part of their bible in the 2^nd century after Christ.  The Council of Trent (keep 1555 in mind as a date) officially accepted it, making it part of that extra 12 books called the Apocrypha or Deuterocanonical.  Martin Luther rejected the book & so do many Protestant congregations today.

 Subject Matter: practical ethics, duties.  Beware of the either / or spirituality presented.  Also, what about unconditional love??

 

 

Welcome back Christine, and welcome to your first day out of the hospital. 

 

Subject today: you may choose good or bad.  Beware of the either / or spirituality presented in the reading.    All is either good or bad.  No in between or both, which is more what we all are, both good and bad.  

It can be simplistic & Pelagian, that is, it is all up to you and you have all the strength needed to choose good.  Pelagians thought that you had to EARN your salvation.  Therefore, the more religious stuff you did, like the more Masses, the more pilgrimages to the church & shrines, the more novenas & rosaries,  the more merit you win for yourself.

 

Psalm 119: the longest of all the psalms.  A focus on observance of the laws, decrees, and statutes.

 

 

The terrific sister Candle Lighting  Team of The Week, Zoe & Tori with help from big sister Georgie.

 

 

Matthew 5:  a continuation of the Sermon on the Mount. Note the figures of speech called “antitheses,” namely, “You have heard it said, but, I say to you.”  4 even 5 times.  Matthew is trying to establish the authority & authenticity of Jesus.

See if you can find any unconditional love in this passage?  

Sources: Good New Bible; New Interpreter's Bible.,  Reginal Fuller, S.J., David Westberg, S.J., & Larry Gillick, S.J., St. Louis U. Liturgies, on line; Wikipedia;

 

 

Leo and his buddy, John.

 

Wako Spirituality

We have been here before, Folks.  In fact, at Romeos Friday Mike sits down and says to me, “So, are you going to start with that same story again?”  Yes, Everybody, we begin with that same story.  Just a quick reminder.  Here we go.

When I was studying theology in Toronto years ago, like maybe 1970, an article came out in the local newspaper.  Some guy had read the passage saying that if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away.  He did it, folks. 

 

 

 

Play Station Numero Uno with the beautiful Zoe and the beautiful Victoria.

 

 In this passage from Matthew there are five pieces of advice to the early Christians which taken literally can get a person all messed up.  Is there a positive as well as a negative to each? 

Two observations before I touch the five.  I have mentioned this so often that I hope you are not worn out.   First, infinite demand and infinite acceptance.  Watch out here for a lot of infinite demand.  I’ll give a positive & a negative for each.  Secondly, God, unconditional love.

 

 

Beginnings…

 

Matthew’s five pieces of advice are 1. breaking the least commandment,  2. getting angry,  3. looking at a woman, 4. divorce, and  5. swearing.  Here goes.

1. Matthew says that if you break the smallest commandment you will be the least in the kingdom.  Moreover, unless you are better than the Pharisees, you will not even get into the kingdom.  The positive here is that the bar is set high.  The negative is that all, all of us sinners will be kept out. It creates scruples and obsessive compulsive behavior.  
2. Secondly, if you get mad at me and call me a fool, you are going to Hell.  I love it.  The positive here is the call to anger management.  I am challenged to know that all feelings are okay and need to be controlled.  The negative is that it gives me the idea that anger is not allowed, so stuff it.  Trouble is, it does not stuff well.  Not like a sleeping bag or tent.  It pops up in unexpected places.

 

 

The Offertory Team, Sandra and Nina, Kerry and Mary.

 

3. Looking at a woman with lust.  The positive here is teaching respect for all people.  This advice, written by men for men, was attempting to gain some respect for women who were looked upon as property.  I found this in Tanzania & Kenya.  Rosemary read me an article about some guy who cut off his wife’s ears and nose for reporting him for abuse.   The negative is that it teaches us that feelings are sinful.  In the old days, we thought we looked at a girl and we were going to hell.  This is doubly sad because I don’t think there is a hell anyway.
4. Divorce is adultery.  The positive is that it reinforces the unity of marriage.  The negative is that people stay in abusive or addictive marriages long after it may even be safe.  Divorce is failure and we all fail sometimes even in tragic ways.  In order to escape using the word divorce the Catholic Church comes up with the more convoluted word Annulment.

 

 

The Best, Ray and David.

 

5. Swearing.  The positive is that it involves politeness and respect for others.  Even if I am okay with my anger I do not swear at someone.  The negative is that it tightens us up.  We forget the therapeutic value of cussing, maybe a healthy & fun way of releasing anger.  The healthy Jesuits I lived with certainly partook of this therapy. 

 

 

Anybody due soon, Bethany?  Like in two weeks?  Wow!  Cannot Wait.

 

 The overall danger in these pieces of advice is that we really get messed up, forgetting two things.  First they are presenting infinite demand and they make no mention of infinite acceptance.

Secondly, where is the God of unconditional love?

 The poor guy in Toronto who blinded himself is an example of how we can mess ourselves up with goofy religion. 

 

 

 

Please don't cry John.  I promise not to try singing again, maybe.  

 

 Where are you with these ideas?

 

 

Help, Everybody.  She is taking over.