Palm Sunday Procession begins.
Readings:
Entrance, Luke 19, 28-40.
Isaiah 50, 4-7, I give my back to those who beat me.
Psalm 22, My God, My God, why have you abandoned me?
Philippians 2, 6-11, God greatly exalted him.
Luke 22, 14-23, The Passion.
Holy Thursday & Good Friday, 7:00, Marlene's, 2017 Keystone, Plano.
Palm Sunday procession.
Palm Sunday continues.
Buddy reading The Blessing of the Lenten Candles, all 5 plus 1.
Welcome in, Everybody, from Cindy & Dee.
Readings:
Isaiah 62, 1-5, The Lord delights in you (a good one)
Psalm 96, Proclaim his marvelous deeds to all the nations.
1 Corinthians 12, 4-11, There are different kinds of spiritual gifts.
John 2, 1-11, The wedding at Cana.
Also from Ken and the two crazies behind him, Cindy & Marlene, Welcome in, Everybody.
Mary Ellen Munzell
As a way to honor Mary Ellen, I would like to tell you 4 stories that show why she was a special friend and dear to me.
The first time that Mary Ellen came to my attention in a special way was the first time we gathered a group for a two week trip to Italy. We had about 8 people.
And not to be outdone by the previous characters, Grace, too, says, "Welcome to our special Memorial for our dear Mary Ellen." It was Grace who packed her up so she could move back home to Connecticut, where she stayed one winter and returned immediately back to Dallas.
Mary Ellen asked me if she could go over about 3-4 days early and be picked up in the area around Lake Guarda, Italy. I was a little nervous, but thought okay. Mary Ellen wanted to visit Trieste before meeting up with us.
Why Trieste? Because her deceased husband, Chris, had been born there to a military family. Mary Ellen wanted to leave some of his ashes, which she did.
The A Team.
Just in case you are not familiar with how Mary Ellen & Chris met, it was at the American Embassy in Buenos Aires where she was working as a secretary and Chris was a Marine guard.
It was when Chris died that Mary Ellen took on the goal of scattering his ashes on golf courses on which they had played, especially in southern CA, where they had resided for some years. Which brought her to Trieste.
It takes a Grandmother!
I can still remember approaching Verona. It was sunny & mild. Verona was quaint & colorful. The plan was to meet Mary Ellen in front of the train station. She had taken the train from Trieste to Verona.
As we approached the small station on our right I saw ahead of us a traffic circle with a lot of flowers, and there was Mary Ellen. I was so relieved and impressed with Mary Ellen and touched by her gesture.
Are our musicians crazy or what??
The second event caused me to love Mary Ellen’s adventurous spirit. I took her and Rosemary to the best game parks in East Africa for a visit with the lions, elephants, and giraffes. This had been my home for about ten years. I had lots of connections.
We hired a driver & helper, rented a Land Rover, and headed to the mystical Ngorongoro Crater and the magnificent Serengetti. We visited all the animals and, in fact, late one morning a lion walked up and plopped down in the shade of our Land Rover.
It takes a Dad, too. Cody, a great one, and Olivia, his daughter.
Picture this. The Land Rover’s roof lifts up and locks into place so you may stand. We were standing while the lion took a morning siesta. If we had leaned out, we could have touched that lion. We didn’t.
I was especially touched by Mary Ellen on this trip. The ride was rough, we tented, and one afternoon we drove though a scrub area with Tsetse Flies, which could keep up with the Land Rover. We had to shoo them away for about 30 minutes.
Nothing better than meeting up again with good old friends, like Bob & Jackie McGrath and Joanne Languell.
The third story. Mary Ellen had a small private swimming pool in her back yard, as many of you know. What you may not have heard is that ME liked to skinny dip in her pool, until one afternoon she spied two young neighbor boys peeking over the roof line of her neighbor’s house.
Finally, as you had to know, ME was an avid supporter of U Conn’s women’s basket ball team. She loved to watch them play and then she and her sisters would discuss the game. U Conn had a record of 111 victories the day before ME died. The very next day, U Conn lost.
And more good old friends, like Cathy, Jackie, Alice.
Thanks, Mary Ellen, for being a special person and a special friend
And still more good friends, Grace, Camille, and Diane..
Readings:
Isaiah, 22, 19-23, On that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim
Psalm 138, Lord, your love is eternal. I will give thanks to you, O Lord, with all my heart X 3 times.
Romans 11, 33-36, Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God.
Matthew 16, 13-20, You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church.
Thanks to the Team
Music, Ben & Shonda
Readers, Connie & John Doherty , & Buddy, the candle blesser
Gospel: Deacon Mike
Homily, Stack
Eucharistic Prayer A & B, Stack & John Cade
The Magic Zoom makers, Mike (on vacation) & Richard (on vacation), Tom, Ben & Hue
Final Blessing, Rosemary
Coming up in the readings is the psalm of the day, i.e., Psalm 138, one of my long time favorites. There are two translations, the more modern and the more traditional. Because I have spent so many hours meditating on the more traditional form, I offer both translations. For me thanks is the key to my relationship with God, as well with others. See what you think about the italicized parts.
1. I will give thanks to you, Oh, Lord, with all my heart for you have heard the words of my mouth; in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise.
2. I will give thanks to your name, because of your kindness and your truth.
3 Your kindness, O Lord, endures forever.
Aviana watching over the stove and over us.
Reflections of a Tornado Refugee Family
Somewhere in the distant past when I was a Boy Scout at Christ the King I was trained to always leave my campsite better than I found it. I probably drove my fellow campers crazy when I went camping with my Jesuit buddies and especially when I went with Bill & Mike, Ray & Rose, and a dozen or so others. I would aim to be the last camper to leave the site, with the exception of Mike.
Exactly a week from tomorrow I will be cleaning a campsite. Rosemary & I will be departing the house we have lived in for 15 years and the house that my parents bought in ’75. I will take one last look around, probably with Rosemary, to make sure this campsite is better than I found it. Even though a bulldozer will demolish it.
Looking out our front window, 4 houses used to be there.
This is already proving to be emotionally quite difficult for me. The problem is that there are numerous tender memories in that house, like the portrait of Aviana that Rosemary painted on the ceramic tiles behind the stove in the kitchen, painted one summer while I was out camping with the gang. For her I had put in the tiles and the parquet flooring in that kitchen. Every room in the house I have painted and decorated with decals. I painted the outside more than once and even the sturdy tool shed. This campsite has been a home.
The neighborhood, too, has touched my heart. This is where the 16 year old St. Marks boy who lives three doors down rang our bell one spring afternoon and told me ‘Thanks for being delightful neighbors.” I am still touched. We also have handled all the free refreshments for our neighborhood July 4 party. Rosemary, the lady who walks the little white dog, is known everywhere. She is also the Tulip Lane block captain. She expects me to salute her.
There used to be a 50 year old beautiful Live Oak on this corner. Gone, along with whole bunches of other trees.
The one reason I am happy to move on: the destruction of the trees, many of which I planted. It used to be delightfully shady at our corner, Tulip Lane & Camellia. Now, it is a desert, with all 8 of the houses around us destroyed. It must also have been 20 degrees hotter those 100 degree days recently.
The house itself has a number of cracks in the ceilings and walls, which is why we easily decided we had to move. It has been a comfortable campsite. Despite the presence of the bulldozer just across the street, I will leave this campsite as neat as I found it.
As Psalm 138 says, I will give thanks to you Oh Lord, with all my heart, eventually.
There are three lots on this corner.
Please Remember these special people:
For Becky's dad discovered with the virus; For Cindy recuperating at home; For Esparzas, Frank & Mary, For all the medical personnel struggling to treat the tsunami of sick people, in particular, locally, Cindy's staff at Presby, Dallas, and at Frisco Presby, the mother of Harper and Betsy, Kendle, working in labor & delivery; For Mary & Dave Hall's g-daughter Allison Keller working at St. Lukes, Woodlands, For Joe Hogan with cancer; For Loretta's aunt Alicia; For Sydney; & For Sir Charlie & Jan; Shonda's mom & Cody & Ben & all of Shonda's dear family; for Michelle; for Bill Ekes' longtime buddy, Bobby Duncan, who just passed to the other side.
To stay in our house we had to replace the roofing. A good move. It has taken us 5 months to find and get into our new place, September 1.
For Jackie's mom; For a friend, a neighbor, & a doctor, Karen, with brain cancer; For Rick Turner searching for a kidney donor, Type O neg; For Meredith, cancer free; For Hue; For John O'Donnell; For Dee, and for her daughter, Lisa; For John Schanot's continued health; For Anthony & Sabrina; For a young man who is suffering from depression; John Cade's mother in law, Kalliopi Piskiouli and Lambrini, plus John's daughter, Joey, with cancer.
The house of the professional hockey player, Tyler Sagan. It is now gone.
Birthdays: Marsha Farmer & Marilyn Ackerman
Anniversaries:
Rose & Wally Banzhaf, 49th
Brain Trust??
Community Finances, August 23, 2020
Expenses: $600.00
Outreach $500.00 (often for Souls Harbor, Legacy, etc.)
Thanks, Folks, for doing what you can.
The Best Music, Ben & Shonda.
Rosemary's Blessing:
May you learn to see your self
With the same delight,
Pride and expectation
With which God sees you in every moment.
To Bless the Space Between Us by John O’Donohue
As of September 1, Rosemary & I will have a new address, 7017 Helsem Way, Dallas 75230. This enclave has TREES, unlike our poor, dear, tornado battered Preston Hollow neighborhood.
Readings:
Ezekiel, 34, 11-12, 15-17, As a shepherd tends his flock when he finds himself among his scattered sheep, so will I tend my sheep.
Psalm 23, The Lord is my shepherd, there is nothing I shall want. (good one)
1 Corinthians 15, 20-26, 28, Christ has been raised.
Matthew 25, 31-46, He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
Ezekiel observations and reminders:
I've mentioned how Ezekiel is one of the Big 3 Prophets, #3 after Isaiah & Jeremiah, 48 chapters vs 66 in Isaiah. I also mentioned how he lived smack dab in the middle of one of the two or three biggest tragedies of the Jewish people, the Babylonian captivity, say 555 before Christ. He was there.
In American history we can look back and identify special presidential leaders, Washington, Lincoln, Roosevelt. They came forward in crisis times.
Ezekiel was this type of leader in Jewish history. He saw what had happened to other Jews of the northern province of Israel (Jerusalem is in the southern province of Judah) after they had been carted off as slaves after a defeat by the Assyrians (Syria still). They intermarried and simply disappeared in the DNA of the middle east.
Ezekiel is in Babylon and is determined that his community would not lose its identity. He did three things to help maintain the spirit of the community: he emphasized 1. observance of the Sabbath, 2. kosher diet, and 3. male circumcision.
Eventually after ca. 50 years the community still was a cohesive unit and it returned to rebuild Jerusalem, at least the second or third generation. The Jews are one of the few peoples to be defeated and scattered, and still return to their original homeland. They remained there until the Romans defeated them in 70 C.E., returning when? 1948, after the Holocaust.
Today's reading comes to us from an Ezekiel captive in Babylon, and has Ezekiel promising the people a return, a brighter day after the captivity. He uses the figure of speech, I will. But I is Yahweh.
Note on both Ezekiel, Psalm 23, and Matthew: There are two consoling readings this morning, Ezekiel and Psalm 23, The Lord is my Shepherd, there is nothing I shall want.
At the very end of Ezekiel’s consoling passage and in Matthew there is talk of the sheep and goats. Beware of taking this literally. This is either/or spirituality. Guess what: we are all goats. I see heaven full of both sheep and goats. And I can’t find any evidence of hell.
Thanksgiving History: Everyone knows about the first Thanksgiving in 1602 with the Pilgrims and the Indians eating together, the Mayflower, and Plymouth Rock.
When did our Thanksgiving begin? Our ancestors have celebrated end of harvest feasts of gratitude for centuries. Lincoln first focused on a national feast; FDR established the national holiday in 1941.
Thanksgiving
This morning I would like to talk about Thanksgiving and in particular I would like to tell you about my top three blessings of the year.
Rosemary & I have a habit at the end of the year of writing down all our blessings and gifts of the year. We usually begin tagging them at Thanksgiving. And since she is in Princeton, NJ, for her niece’s wedding, I get to say things about her I would not admit if she were here.
Looking back over the year I have a ton of blessings, but in particular I have three I would like to mention.
Guess what number One is. Yep, Rosemary. I know, and Rosemary reminds me frequently, yes, I married up. But this marriage with Rosemary is one of the 3 biggest blessings of my whole life. 10 years in East Africa and my Jesuit career are the other 2.
You people should have told me how good it can be. I know, for sure, all of you gave Rosemary about a year before she had enough of the old geezer bachelor. However, because of living in community my 40 odd years as a Jesuit I really never was a bachelor. I loved living in a community with other guys, like in a fraternity. But it does not come close to life with Rosemary. And this May we celebrate 10 years.
My third blessing of the year is my splendid summer filled with fun events. It started, as usual, with our 5 Boro bike tour of NY with the McGinn family reunion. The next big one was the bike ride across Iowa with Bill Hammond and about 15 thousand others. This event is like 8 days of 4th of July, all the little towns overflowing with spirit and hospitality. I just try to slow the clock down and absorb it all.
Then comes the Hotter ‘N Hell Hundred bike ride the last Saturday of August, out of Wichita Falls. This takes preparation and planning on how to survive. Finishing that event produces such a spirit high in me.
Then in September came our 8 night back pack trip in Yosemite, my favorite National Park among all the ones I have seen. This was as fun as ever, the campfires, the meals, the views, the quickie bath in the cold river or stream after a sweaty hike, and the exhilaration of climbing into my tent and and into my down sleeping bag on a near freezing night at about 10 thousand feet.
Finally there was the Viking River cruise on the Danube with Rosemary. I love riding trains. But, listening to the water swish by our cabin window beat the train by a mile. And more beauty.
Can summer get better than this?
And the final blessing, number two, this marvelous community, you people. When I departed to get married, I never expected to be doing this, especially 10 years later. I thought it was over. You people are a treasure in my life and I will continue to celebrate with you like this until I get called to the heavenly homestead. You are so much fun and make my life so rich. Thank you.
And your Blessings of The Year?
Readings:
Isaiah 43 1-5, Do not be afraid for I am with you. I have called you by your name, you are mine. When you pass through deep waters, I will be with you. Your troubles will not overwhelm you. When you pass through fire, you will not be burned. The hard trials that come will not hurt you. For I am the lord your God, the holy God of Israel, who saves you.
Psalm 145, Lord, this is the people that longs to see your face.
1 John 3, 1-3, See what love the father has bestowed on us.
John 14, 27, 15, 9 & 11, (27)Peace is what I leave you; it is my own peace that I give you. (9)I love you just as the father loves me, remain in my love. (11)I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.
Special readings in honor of All Saints.
Welcome to our celebration of our dear ones. Happy All Saints & All Souls.
Isaiah observations:
Who. This is second Isaiah, the best. Handel's Messiah uses a number of lines from Isaiah 2.
Subject. It is a time when many of the people of Judah are in exile in Babylon, crushed and without hope. The prophet is proclaiming that God would eventually set his people free and take them home to Jerusalem. (Note the Exodus theme, escape from bondage to find a new life, thus giving hope to those in Babylon.)
Our Subject. Do not be afraid. You will not be hurt.
Welcome in Everybody, say Georgie and Buddy.
All Souls Day observations–
Let me give you a bit of history and the thinking behind this All Souls' Day. Five observations: the theology, purgatory-limbo, a legend, pre-Christian practices, and today.
We are talking mortal & venial sin here. If the person died with mortal sin, they are you know where. Those with venial sins have to go through purification and purging, which brings us to All Souls' Day and purgatory.
Wake up Buddy, you are missing all the good stuff.
At least the Catholic Church recently acknowledged that the limbo idea was bogus. The pope said it does not exist and never did. Though many consider purgatory to be in the same class, it still exists. Want to know how we know? A previous pope was offering indulgences. The indulgence is for the soul in purgatory. It speeds up the process. There are partial & total indulgences. We can win them for these souls and get them out or we can win them for ourselves.
For instance, on the last feast of Peter & Paul Rome offered an indulgence if you visited a church named after one or both of these two, and you recited a prescribed menu of prayers.
Offertory with Mike & Judy & Mary.
Some time after this, i.e., 1000 A.D., the Cluny Monastery established an All Souls' Day. Ca. 1300 Rome followed suit.
Pretty good, Hugh and Sydney; Rosemary does to me the same thing.
Guess who wears boots now.
5. Today. Limbo has been discarded by Rome and many scholars consider purgatory a dinosaur idea from antiquity. Consequently, All Souls' Day celebrates Samantha, my mom & dad, Rosemary's mom & dad, and all our loved ones pictured on the stage. All Saints' Day handles the canonized. Hell is also considered today a mental concept, not real.
So we say, What special blessing did you receive from one of these people pictured or whom you remember in your heart?
Do we have little mice crawling around around the floor of our community? Little mice with boots?
Do not be Afraid
In honor of All Saints and All Souls I chose two of my favorite scripture passages. Let me explain why.
I will always remember the summer of 1970. This was the summer just before I was ordained in 1971. I came down from Toronto to work as an apprentice chaplain at Boston City Hospital.
One afternoon I walked into the room of a guy who was dying. He was elderly and a typical Boston Irish Catholic. I asked him about his life, the positives and the negatives. I asked him how he felt about dying.
He said he was resigned to it even though he knew he was going to hell.
Cole, our semi-pro candle lighter, at his craft.
I was stunned. It seems he had married young and gotten divorced. Then he married again and lived happily with his second wife for decades before the lady died. He had never gotten an annulment.
What was the Catholic teaching of these days, even though Vatican II had already taken place? Yes, this was mortal sin and it would take him straight to hell forever. He was stoic about paying the price.
Well, you can guess what I did. I got another Jesuit, a priest, to visit him and send him home in peace.
Recognize anybody in this picture?
This, folks, exemplifies the spirituality of fear that many of us Catholics lived with all our lives. My dad had it. Not so much my mom. I had it, for sure. Like I’ve mentioned here frequently, it was fear that I was going to hell with my buddies that convinced me to join the Jesuits.
It was in Tanzania where I slowly and unconsciously learned the spirituality of unconditional acceptance and love. It was definitely reinforced in my work with psychology.
I would propose again that we have a God of unconditional love, not a God of punishment, especially eternal punishment.
Recognize anybody in this picture?
We used to have limbo for babies who die without being baptized. Even the Catholic Church admitted that this idea was made up by people. Purgatory? Protestants say this does not exist and is not in the Bible. Made up by our ancestors. So, what about hell? Could it, likewise, be an idea and not a reality? I, at least, think so.
The readings I’ve chosen for this celebration of All Saints and All Souls focus on Do not be afraid. They are some of my most favorite Bible verses. Maybe the people who wrote in the gospels about eternal fire were simply trying to get people to obey.
Lots of people have their favorite Bible verses. Some verses focus on eternal fire. Others talk of living without fear, certainly without fear of eternal punishment.
What a team!
What is your belief? A God of unconditional love or a God of eternal punishment?
Special Readings for Christ the King, Download Nov . 22 Special Readings for Christ the King
Zoe says, "Hi, Everybody, Welcome in."
Homily by Mike
Our two Readings and our hymn from Psalms reveal that God has sent to us his very son, the Messiah and King of Kings, who is robed in majesty and his kingdom will last forever. He has empowered us with the Holy Spirit to be Christ in the world to continue to bring about his kingdom. Metaphorically, we have been robed in majesty, in goodness and mercy, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another.
Genevieve, says, "Hi, Folks, So nice to see you here this beautiful Sunday.
Recall the story of the two prostitutes who stand before Solomon. The two of them had been living together and both had given birth to a son only days apart.
A terrible accident happened shortly after that. One of them rolled against her child in the middle of the night and her son was suffocated. She did a terrible thing. Getting up she placed her dead child in the arms of the other woman and took the living child back to her bed.
"Hi, Harper, So nice to see you back."
When it was nearing morning the mother of the living child realized that the child next to her was dead. Now it was she who began to weep. It was not until it was light that she realized it was not her child who had died. The king listened as the two woman began to argue with one another as to who was the mother of the living child.
Finally he said to his servants, ‘Bring me a sword so that I might divide the child. The real mother raised her voice to protect her son’s life, ‘Give her the child, certainly do not kill him.’ The other said, ‘divide him.’
The Candle Experts of the Week, Leo and Cole.
Of course the king now knew the real mother. Justice was served; however, it was done at the expense of mercy! After realizing in the morning that the dead child was not her child, she should have run to the other woman to embrace her lovingly, to kiss her tenderly, to cry with her, to listen to her, to comfort her, to take care for her, and to forgive her.
Think about the story about the prodigal son. After throwing away his inheritance in riotous living, one day ‘he hit bottom,’ he longed to eat the pods that the pigs were eating; but no one gave him anything.
The Team.
But unlike the woman whose son was dead, he took the initiative to seek help from what also seemed a hopeless situation. ‘I will go home and tell my father that I have sinned against God and against him.’
The prodigal son sought forgiveness, and his father welcomed him with mercy and a celebration with the fatted calf, begging the older son to join them. They had to rejoice and celebrate, and forgive, because his younger brother had been dead but was alive again. Mercy and forgiveness flow forth from the Law of Love of the kingdom of God.
The Best in Music, Shonda, Bethany, Ray.
Think about the example we received from Jesus when the woman caught in adultery was left standing before him. The scribes and Pharisees had left one after the other after Jesus had encouraged them to come to their senses, ‘The one of you who is without sin cast the first stone.
The word of our King of Kings is mercy. Is there no one left to condemn you? ‘Neither do I condemn you.’ After forgiving her, he sent her along the way to make her journey with him; for the journey of every disciple is a journey to Jerusalem. Next week begins our liturgical journey to Jerusalem. The intention of the Church is that we also make it a spiritual journey, for it is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.
Elevation of us all.
Readings: Isaiah 61, 1-11 (beautiful); Psalm is Luke 1, 46-54 (The Magnificat, beautiful); 1 Thessalonians 5, 16-24; John 1, 6-8, 19-28 .
Isaiah:This is Third Isaiah. One Isaiah goes to Chap. 39; Two Isaiah, chapters 40-55. From 40 on we have what is called the Book of Comfort, as I mentioned last week. Our selection today is all about comfort. The writer is consoling the Hebrews during the Babylonian captivity, which took place about 580 BCE, in other words about a century after One Isaiah wrote.
The first marvelous couple of verses are repeated more or less in Isaiah 42, i.e., Two Isaiah. Also, Luke puts these words into Jesus' mouth in chapter 4 of his gospel. I will have all of chapter 61 read because it is so good. For the reading, google The Bible at Your Fingertips.
Advent Wreaths: This little liturgical practice came to the Catholic liturgy, believe it or not, from the German Lutherans in the 1500's, the time of Martin Luther. It was more than just decoration. The circle symbolized eternity. The greens, Christian life in a dead time of the year. The candles represent each of the 4 weeks of Advent, each candle symbolizing the greater light brought by Christ. Their color purple symbolized penance and purification for the Coming. The Rose candle says, 'We are almost there!'
Chosen Me to Bring Good News to the Poor
Last Sunday 15 of you donated blood. Many of you chipped in to help with our adopted family. Beth, who herself has donated a lot of time to this family, says we are close to having everything we need. Others of you brought food. And all of you brought food for the Anniversary Brunch, a feast, as usual.
A month or so ago I was honored to help bless the Habitat house that many of you helped to build.
Every month you help to contribute $2,000 to our Collin County Adult Clinic, where everyone on the staff, doctors, nurses, technicians, and helpers, all work pro bono, gratis, without pay. That is $24,000 you have donated to support this marvelous service this year.
The generosity of our little community, of you people often blows me away and always humbles me.
Isaiah is talking about this. He says Yahweh has chosen me and sent me. He is obviously talking about himself, and the temptation is to leave it at that. That's his job. I would propose, however, that Yahweh is calling each of us. We are chosen and we are sent to bring good news to the poor, to heal and to comfort. The poor, the broken hearted, and the imprisoned are all around us. If we don't bring them good news and comfort, perhaps nobody will.
When I lived in Tanzania & Kenya occasionally I would ask myself, "What on earth am I doing over here?" This passage about bringing good news to the poor often gave me consolation and motivation. I can remember reflecting upon the idea when I was traveling 4-6 lonely hours over dirt roads on my motorcycle to get to a center where I was going to conduct a week long or month long seminar for nuns and priests.
In John's Gospel the writer is setting the scene, similar to Mark's reading last week. He is using John the Baptist to make way for The Good News, the Jesus event that let's us know that Our God is accepting us, not condemning us.
The writer of this gospel is likewise crafting his work. In a short space he identifies John the Baptist and prepares the reader for something greater. Why is this important? Because John the Baptist was popular, had his own group of followers, and could have been mistaken for the Messiah. The gospel writer takes 4 steps.
Step 1. John the Baptist's place in the drama: give witness to The Light, e.g., Jesus, The Good News.
Step 2. A negative witness about who he is: not The Light, not the Messiah.
Step 3. A positive witness about who he is: preparing a way & making straight the way.
Step 4. Why is John the Baptist baptizing: preparing the people for One greater, The Light.
The Light, The Lord, The Messiah that John's gospel talks about is the one who brings good news and comfort to the poor, the broken hearted, and the imprisoned. He, however, cannot do it alone.
This year each of you in our little community has helped out. How are you bringing Good News and Comfort to the Poor today?
AUDIO: http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2008-12-14.mp3
Picture 1: Serving, Lisa (Mom), & daughters Lorynne & Lacee
Picture 2: Frank & Laura Reyes celebrating 26th
Picture 3: Frank & Mary Esparza watched by Audry.