Homilies

Readings: 2 Kings 4, 42-44; Psalm 145, The Hand of the Lord feeds Us; He answers all Our Needs; Ephesians 4, 1-6; John 6, 1-15 

Kings: 4 observations–

Subject Matter: The Kings, naturally.  Especially Solomon after the death of his father, David.  But also treated:

    1.  The temple.  Solomon builds it.

    2.  The death of Solomon who held the nation together.

    3.  Division: Israel in the north breaks away from Judah in the south.

    4.  Israel destroyed completely by the Assyrians, ca. 720.

    5.  Fall of Jerusalem & destruction of the Temple; Nebuchadnezzar & the Babylonian Captivity, ca. 585 BCE.

    6.  Cyrus of Persia releases the Jews to return to Jerusalem after defeating the Babylonians (remember Babylon was near present day Bagdhad).

Date: from 900 – ca. 550 BCE, or from Solomon to Nebuchadnezzar & Cyrus

Authors: a compilation of many sources that was put together at the end of the Babylonian Captivity, ca. 550 BCE.

Our Selection: There are 2 significant prophets, Elijah & Elisha, his son.  In this piece, Elisha it telling a man with 20 loaves of bread to feed a crowd.  This is a lead into the Gospel of John about feeding the multitude. 

Sources: Encyclopedia of Judaism, Wikipedia

The Miracle of Sharing My Food

I hate to do this to you folks, but every time I read this story about 5 loaves and 2 fish feeding a crowd of 5,000 men (to say nothing of the women), I am reminded of my days in Tanzania, East Africa.  You who have heard these stories, please forgive me.  They just clarify so much.  Here we go.

I was on an overnight train.  I was traveling from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the capitol, to Moshi, a town near Kilimanjaro, where the Jesuits had a small one to three person house, which I used as a base when I was not traveling around Tanzania, Kenya, & Uganda giving seminars and retreats.

I had arrived in Dar es Salaam late for some reason and could not make an advance reservation for a first class cabin, which was the only way to go.  You shared a little compartment with another guy.  Because I was without reservation, I had to buy a coach ticket.  These trains are marvelous old antiques from the colonial age, but travel by coach is mayhem.  They are packed.  Don't dream of getting a seat.  Just be grateful that you can get inside.  Which I did, sitting on my one small suitcase, expecting to be awake all night listening to the kids, chickens, ducks, and snores of the few who had a seat and the ability to sleep through it all. 

You board this train for a 7:00 P.M. departure.  You expect to arrive Moshi around 5:00 A.M.   This particular night the train came to a halt at about 1:00 in the middle of nowhere.  Naturally, nobody knew why we stopped and for how long.  We stayed in that spot all the rest of the night and all the following day until about 6:00 P.M. 

Everyone on that train had food & water hidden away, except one gringo, who tried to sleep on the rocks on the edge of the roadbed, knowing he would hear the train move and could get up and get back in.

I was actually rescued from dying of thirst in the heat of the day by a young German couple in the first class compartments, the only other white folks on the whole train.  I was afraid to drink the water of the Tanzanians because they often did not purify it. 

I tell this story because the Tanzanian people on the train I suspect would be similar to the Jews listening to Jesus in that crowd of 5,000 men.  People like these do not go away from their base unprepared.  Not only do they carry food & water, they hide it so as to not have to share with someone too stupid to bring his own.  The women, especially, can hide in their robes lots of things.  Hoarding in the cultures we are talking about is no sign of inferiority.  It is survival. 

What Jesus did that was confounding is that he got these country folks to share their cache.  He takes some of the bread & fish and passes it on.  The person who receives it takes some, but feels uncomfortable only taking.  So the person puts a portion of his or her own in the basket.  What do they end up with?  Twelve wicker baskets of leftover food.

This interpretation of the 5 loaves & 2 fishes is as old as when I got ordained back in 1971, and before that.  I find it fascinating because we can go and do likewise.  You & I cannot multiply bread & fish, but we can share treasures.  We can share and we can invite others to feel secure enough to share. 

I finally arrived home to Moshi in the middle of the next night.  I even caught a thief with his hand in my right pocket at a little kiosk lit with a kerosene lamp.  The train had stopped at some tiny station and a lady was selling little pieces of rice bread or something.  I pulled that man's hand out of my pocket, grabbed him by the shirt, and threw him back.  If I had yelled "thief!", he might have been killed on the spot.  I knew the custom and the language, and he knew I knew.  He ran. 

I also got to know the German couple, even climbing Kilimanjaro with them one of my 5 times.  So, folks, sorry for repeating a favorite story of mine.  The question, too, is the same.

How am I overcoming my temptation to hoard & sharing my food?

Picture 1:  Mass with T.J.

Picture 2:  Bill Carey & Ron Kovatis

Picture 3:  Ron donating $2000 to CCAC with Claire & Ray, Jackie & Cathy

Picture 4:  Barb & her sister Evie from Germany

Readings:  Jeremiah 23, 1-6; Psalm 23, The Lord is My Shepherd; there is nothing I shall want; Ephesians 2, 13-18; Mark 6, 30-34     

Jeremiah:

Author & Who: Jeremiah is called "the broken hearted prophet," because he felt compelled to say woe to the leaders & shepherds of the state of Judah.  He predicted tragedy for the people because of their unfaithful ways.  Because he predicted such catastrophe, the leaders & even the people hated him.  He hated his his prophet job and his unpopularity.

Jeremiah is considered #2 of the big 3 prophets, along with Isaiah, #1, and Ezekiel, #3.  They are considered the major prophets because of the size of their works, e.g., Jeremiah has 52 chapters.

Baruch, Jeremiah's secretary & scribe, is considered the person who wrote down & edited the Book of Jeremiah. 

Time: ca. 625-575, i.e. before the famous Babylonian Captivity and during part of it, which took place starting around 585 BCE.

Setting & Story: Catastrophe is coming in the person of Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon (near Baghdad, Iraq, of all places).  He has defeated the Assyrians who had destroyed the northern Jewish state of Israel (ca. 720 BCE) and is now looking at Judah, the southern state with Jerusalem the capitol.   The 10 tribes of the north were carted away and disappeared into the Middle East gene pool.  Intermarriage and lost culture. 

Jeremiah sees what is coming, predicts devastation, and blames it on the leaders & shepherds of the people of this southern state of Judah.  It happens as he foretold, and Jeremiah ends up going to Egypt, where he dies.  He also predicts the return of the people to Judah and the rebuilding of Jerusalem.

Interesting Side Note: can you guess when the Genesis story of creation in 7 days was composed?  Biblical research reveals that the creation story was put together during the Captivity, i.e. ca. 575.

Why?  The priests & prophets (e.g., Ezekiel) of the Jews in captivity determined that the people would not be assimilated into the local gene pool as their cousins in the northern kingdom had done when made to live with the Assyrians.  They decided they would establish customs & religious practices that would make the Jews so different they would not intermarry.  Three special laws were established: 1.  male circumcision; 2. dietary laws and laws about not touching menstruating women; and 3. the Sabbath.

The priests put together the 7 day creation story to suggest that Yahweh approved of their Sabbath law.  They had Yahweh rest on the 7th day to bolster their demand that all Jews take a day off every 7 days.  Before the Babylonian Captivity there was no legislated Sabbath and no myth of Yahweh creating the world in 7 days with the 7th being a day of rest.  So, now you know when the story was created & by whom, the priests, and why, to keep the Jews united vs the Babylonians.  It worked, even down to today.

Our Selection: Jeremiah is saying woe to the leaders & shepherds of the Jews of Judah.  He is also consoling them that a better day will come when they will have good leaders and they won't have to fear and tremble.

Sources: Bishop Spong, The Sins on Scripture; Wikipedia

Shepherding

Every Friday morning since before 1990 I have had an appointment with a little lady about 4'11' named Elizabeth.  She is 93 this year. 

In the beginning she used to take the bus to Jesuit for our meetings.  In fact, one fall Friday morning she was walking along the main first floor hall, the bell rang for the end of class, the guys poured out, and one big kid, number 55 in his football jersey, knocked her down.  Uninjured and flattered by the attention of all the boys, she wended her way to the back of the property where my office was.

Some of you have met her because you have helped me move her from a second floor to a first floor apartment, then from that apartment to a condo she bought.  Npw she lives in the 3 Fountains retirement home a little off of Park Lane, east of Central and Northpark Mall.  She has always been a independent, bohemian lady with a literary bent.  She wrote a novel 80.

The church she always attended after her conversion and until she could not get around was Holy Trinity in the Oak Lawn area. This was where she lived most of her life.  While she was at Holy Trinity she met a couple in their 50's who used to bring her home after Mass. 

As Elizabeth got older the couple got more involved.  Really involved in a helpful way.  The husband, who seems familiar with real estate, found the condo that she bought, then found the retirement home for her, doing all the paper work.  He is selling the condo for her right now.  At first I though there was some kind of swindle taking place, because they were almost too good.  They were real, however. 

The wife continues to visit Elizabeth about once a week, taking her to the doctor and pharmacy, using a lot of her time.  This is depite the fact that Elizabeth can often be less than gracious.  I do not know how many times I have been sumarily kicked out and told not to return.  Elizabeth admits that she often treats the lady harshly.

This couple has been a life saver not only to Elizabeth, but also to me.  I did not know how I was going to help Elizabeth deal with her growing inability to get around.  She had said often she would never go into one of those old folks homes.  She had told me she wanted to die in her condo.  The couple somehow helped her over this obstacle.  What they did, I think, is they just took her to a couple of places they had checked out.

I talk about this couple today because they exemplify something I think the gospel is trying to convey, the meaning of being a shepherd, a care taker. 

Jesus does two things in the episode that I think are marvelous.  First, he shows care for his comrades.  These guys had been out sharing the message, had returned to share their adventures, and they were tired.  People were all around.  Jesus suggests that they all go away to a quiet place and rest.  This is shepherding or care taking one's closest, one's family, one's team. 

They get into a boat and cross some water, obviously the Sea or Lake of Galillee, one of the beautiful places of the world, a heart shaped body 21 miles in length & only 7 miles across.  Many of you could swim it.  The second marvelous thing Jesus does is take compassion on the people who have anticipated where he was going and got there first.  He changes his plans and tends to them.

This is our challenge.  The couple who care take Elizabeth is an example of what Jesus is showing us. 

Whom do you shepherd or care take?

AUDIO:  http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-07-19.mp3

Picture 1:  Mass with Sabrina & Ruth

Picture 2:  Choir, Wendy, Shonda, Ray, & Celeste

Picture 3:  Ekes & Wittiks–Bobby & Debby, Barb W., Mabel, Marlene, Cindy, Curtis, & Warren W. 

Readings:  Amos 7, 12-15; Psalm 85, Lord, let us see Your Kindness and grant us Your Salvation; Ephesians, 1, 3-14; Mark 6, 7-13 

Amos:   

Author: Amos or his scribe.  He was a shepherd of sheep & tended sycamore trees.  One of the 12 minor prophets of the OT, minor because of smallness of the works.  Amos has only 9 chapters.  Usual pattern of prophets: 1. predictions of dire times for evil behavior; 2. predictions of better times in the future. 

Date: Ca. 777 (a memory help), after the kingships of David & Solomon, time of King Jeroboam of the northern kingdom, called Israel vs the southern kingdom, called Judah (where Jerusalem is).   

Geography: Note the two kingdoms, Judah in the south, Israel in the north.  Amos tended sheep in a little town called Tekoa, 10 miles south of Jerusalem, in Judah, the south.  He is sent by Yahweh to Bethel, a small but important town in the northern kingdom, 10 miles north of Jerusalem, to warn the people of Israel & their king Jeroboam that Yahweh was mad at them.  The wicked high priest of Bethel, Amaziah condemns Amos for his interference.

The Setting: a time of prosperity.  But Yahweh is mad at the greed of the wealthy and their oppression of the poor (which ties into our gospel talking about walking lightly through life).  We know the people of this kingdom of Israel are headed for annihilation by the Assyrian nation.  And they will disappear as a significant body.  

Our Selection, chapter 7: (reading all of chapter 7) Amos describes three visions or dreams he has.  Amaziah gives it to him for spreading these visions around.  Then, Amos responds and socks it to Amaziah with a hammer.

Mark:  a couple of reminders–

    1.  Mark is the first of the 4 gospels written, ca 70 C.E.  Note: Jerusalem & the Temple were smashed by the Romans in 70, after a Jewish rebellion.  In 73 the famous Masada battle took place.  More about this event another day.  Just think, from this date until 1948 a Jewish state did not exist.

    2.  The first written documents were by Paul, his letters.

Sources: Grace Institute of Biblical Leadership; Catholic Encyclopedia; Wikipedia

Traveling Light through Life

A couple of weeks ago I called this guy from the city of Dallas.  The city provides a special service for people with lawn sprinkler systems.  They come out, check it, and offer recommendations for how to make it more efficient.  One of our neighbors told me about the service and I thought, "Why not?" 

So I get our system as efficient as I think possible, fix all the heads so they are not watering the street, have the grass all clipped, and invite the man out.  He comes in a fancy painted up little car and turns out to be a great guy, very affirming. 

He checks each of our three zones, notes how everything is working well, compliments me on how everything functions, gives me a print out, and departs.  I am feeling pretty great because I got into this sprinkler business a number of years ago when I found out how expensive even just a visit from a professional is.  I discovered that sprinkler systems are basically like Lego toys. 

So I take the print out and am scanning it.  I see that he has noted the amount of water one zone puts out per minute.  I had seen him out at the curb checking the meter.  I read the amount, then read it again unable to believe that it can be correct. 

The paper says one zone uses 100 gallons per minute.  There must be a mistake.  I add it up.  I usually run a zone for 10 minutes. That is 1000 gallons of water.  I got 3 zones, so I am watering my St. Augustine for 30 minutes.  3000 gallons every time I water!  I want to throw up. 

Making it worse, I had just read an on line info about water shortages coming.  Like El Paso and San Antonio are running out of water.  I am scrupling over using a toilet that consumes 3 gallons.  And here I am watering a our precious St. Augustine with 3000 gallons. 

I was reminded of this when I read this passage from Mark, part of which I have liked for years.  Where he says, "Take nothing for the journey."  Two thoughts.

First, this is obvious exaggeration, hyperbole, the old spiritual principle of infinite demand plus infinite acceptance.  If I had taken nothing for the journey on any one of the trips I took by motorcycle in Tanzania, you would not be stuck listening to me here today.  I've talked in past years about taking a journey or two where I did not travel prepared, like when the train broke down & was out nowhere for about 48 hours.  And I had not even brought water.

Second, I take this word journey as symbolic.  It  could mean a trip we take to Houston or Europe.  For me, however  it means the journey of life.  It is a challenge to walk lightly through the journey of life.  It means minimize stuff and toys.  It means travel free, be free.

By nature I am pretty comfortable with traveling light through life.  I did it for years in in East Africa.  Living as a Jesuit with a vow of poverty, which shamed me, also sharpened my sensitivity to simplicity. 

Yet here I am faced with watering St. Augustine with 3000 gallons of water.  This is going to be hard to simplify.  Even normally I only water 2 times per week.  Now I want to water once a week.  I got to look at zero landscaping.  Achieving simplicity & freedom on this is going to be difficult

There is a cynical saying going around that he wins who has at the end the most toys.  Delusion!  He with the most toys is probably the most trapped.  In the Jesuits we had an image we used sometimes, the monkey & the banana.  The banana is in a cage.  The monkey holds it but can't get his hand out while he holds it.  Stuff can be our banana.  Jesus says, "You want to be free?  Travel light."  I'm wondering if my St. Augustine is my banana.

What is your banana?  Your St. Augustine?

AUDIO:  http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-07-12.mp3

Picture 1:  Beginning Mass with Lorynne & T.J.

Picture 2:  Anthony & Sabrina

Picture 3:  Maggie

Picture 4:  Chloe with her mom, Clair

Readings:  Ezekiel 2, 2-5; Psalm 123, Our eyes are fixed on the Lord, pleading for his Mercy; 2 Corinthians 12, 7-10; Mark 6, 1-6. 

Introduction & Homily by Tony O'Donovan:

Ezekiel 2:2-5; the prophet wrote at a very traumatic time for the Jews.  In 595BCE the Babylonians had destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple!  The people were carried off into exile.  Their whole understanding of this event was punishment for their behavior.  The style of the book is what is described as Apocalyptic. Other books in this style are Daniel and Revelations in the New Testament.  Characteristic of this style is strange visions and prophesies about the future.  Ezekiel himself has been described as a strange one!

2 Corinthians 12:7-10 Paul’s Second Letter to the community in Corinth.  In fact scholarship today is pretty much in agreement that what we have in first and second Corinthians are parts from four letters.  In the section today we have Paul what I would call ‘ranting’ about himself.

Mark 6:1-6:  Today’s gospel reading is early in Mark.  You will recall that last Sunday we had several miracles attributed to Jesus.  This Sunday we find Jesus showing up at home in Nazareth, and the people are unable to see him as anything but a carpenter.

How is your Eyesight!!

Today’s gospel strongly suggests that we take a moment to examine our eyesight!  In the gospel we find a whole town with poor eyesight.  They can only see Jesus as one of their own, a carpenter, and not as Mark has been presenting him, the Son of God. 

It becomes too easy for us to fall into traps about how we see people in our daily lives, and of course depending on how we see them affects how we treat them.

My mother used to have a saying about people, and I think she sometimes applied it to me.  “I was a house devil and a street angel”.  It can happen too easily.  We treat those closest to us perhaps not as well as we should, we take them for granted.  We go deaf to the things they say to us, and eventually the relationship becomes stale or worse, dead.  I guess another way of saying it is that “familiarity breeds contempt”.

Audio: Sorry, on vacation this week.

Picture 1  Mass with Tony concelebrating and T.J. helping

Picture 2:  Altar Servers

Picture 3: Tony celebrating after 33 years

Picture 4:  Tony receiving the community's blessing read by Rosemary with support from Reilly, Richard, Maureen, Ryan (hidden), and Ginny

Readings:  Job 38, 1-11; Psalm 107, Give Thanks to the Lord, his Love is Everlasting; 2 Corinthians 5, 14-17; Mark 4, 35-41 

Job:  

Today: You see the story in the papers about Jake Fleming?  20 year old UCLA student & tennis player, in town to visit best friend at SMU, part of group going to a concert at Fair Park, after the concert another group of white kids argue & one kid sucker punches Jake, he falls & hits his head on the street, is in an induced coma now because of bleeding inside his skull.  This kid bad?  He was planning on teaching little kids tennis during the summer.  Why do bad things happen?  Why suffering?  This is why the story of Job got put together.

The Story: Job is a good man, pious, married, affluent, 7 boys, 3 girls, obeys the Lord & his laws.  Satan makes a bet with Yahweh: you take away Job's goodies, he will curse you.  "Deal," says Yahweh.

Shortly after that, one day servants come to tell Job: 1. rustlers have taken his cattle & killed his servants; 2. lightning has killed his sheep & shepherds; 3. more rustlers took his camels & killed their caretakers; 4.  a storm has killed his 10 kids.  Job does not curse.  In fact, he makes the famous statement: "Naked I entered the world, naked I leave.  Blessed be the name of the Lord."

Satan then proposes another bet with Yahweh: let me afflict him bodily, he will curse you.  "Deal," says Yahweh.  Job is struck with leprosy and is expelled to the trash heap outside the town.    Job does not curse Yahweh, but he does say, "God, put a curse on the day I was born."

Then Job's wife and three friends all attack him, basically telling him to just die, because he is obviously a bad man.  Job says, "No, I've done nothing wrong."  Eventually he is rewarded by Yahweh, lives 140 more years and has 7 more sons and 3 daughters, plus more wealth.  

How many questions do you have?  How does a person's badness or goodness effect the bad things in his life?  Bad things don't happen to good folks?  That is the main proposition of Job, they do.  How about Yahweh making bets with Satan?  What about a Satan?

Author: not Moses.  A compilation of sources. 

Structure: a central poetic section with  a prose entry and a prose exit.  Perhaps the happy ending was also added.  Again, a parable, a fable, a myth, not history.

Date:  the present form was probably put together after the famous Babylonian Exile, i.e., ca. 550 BCE.

Our Selection: after Job complains, Yahweh responds rather critically, saying, "Who do you think you are," and, "Do you forget who I am?"   

Sources: Fr. William Most on line, Good News Bible, Wikipedia          

All Pro Dad

Being dads' day I have one story about my dad and 3 ideas about how to be an all pro dad. 

I do not know how we all survive adolescence, folks.  When I was a bratty teen-ager, my dad knew that anything he would say I would discount.  One of my best friends was pretty much the same way, my friend Pete, who was at the wedding, the FBI guy.

So my dad and Pete's dad made an arrangement where the four of us went out to eat at a restaurant once in a while.  I would talk with his dad while Pete would talk with my dad.

I admired his dad because he had worked in the FBI and was an exec at the local Chance Vought Air Plane company.  I still remember him telling me, "You can't fight city hall, John."  I guess I was, at school and in the neighborhood. 

    Suggestion 1: take the kid out for the special meal, just the two of you or with his/her pal & dad.  How often?  Maybe seasonally.  Then ask normal questions, how you doing, how is school, how is life at home?  What do you like best, your best friend?  Listen & converse.

    Suggestion 2: family meal, ideally 6-7 days a week, at least 3-4.  Again, ask normal questions, listen & converse.

    Suggestion 3: be a fun person by creating fun things to do, go camping, go to the beach, go canoing (down the Trinity), do a late night Baskin Robbins trip, bike (around White Rock or the Dallas & Plano trails), cook (like my dad used to make a cake every Saturday afternoon & he saved the bowls for me to lick clean).

So, how are you going to be an all pro dad?  All Pro Person?

Source (which I edited considerably): All Pro Dad (a helpful weekly service for dads), http://www.allprodad.com/playbook/viewarticle.php?art=5

AUDIO: http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-06-21.mp3

Picture 1: Dads Tony & Jerry, plus other suspects

Picture 2: Dads Mike, Tom, & Ray

Picture 3: Dads Charlie, Ray, & Tom

Picture 4: Julie & Doug at 23 years

Readings:  Exodus 24, 3-8; Psalm 116, I will take the cup of Salvation, and call on the Name of the Lord; Hebrews 9, 11-15; Mark 14, 12-26

Exodus: 8 points on the readings, including Exodus–(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.

    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.  The Last Supper was a Passover meal.  

    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.

    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 Special Meal

As usual, last Thursday & Friday I am preparing thoughts and ideas for our homily today.  I tell Rosemary that I want to talk about the theme of special meals in connection with Eucharist and that I am going to take a big risk and put it together after the Collin County Classic Bike Rally.  Why?  Because I am anticipating that the meal they serve to the riders after the ride will be special, a meal from heaven. 

After the race yesterday, however, I totally was not hungry.  My stomach is not sick, just tight from so much exercise.    In fact, if I want anything it is  half of a cold watermellon.  I even pass up some tremendous food at the Eshelbrenners where they were celebrating Gloria's visit from Seattle.  She is getting married this Labor Day and guess who is doing it. 

So I head home and tell Rosemary please get the watermellon ready.  She opens it and, ugh, it is over ripe.  So I go to Tom Thumb and finally about 3:30 I have the first bite of watermellon.  Folks, it was watermellon from heaven.   I did not have a big feast, but I had a special meal of watermellon & a salad.

What is your special meal?  Your favorite?  Your favorite restaurant?  Favorite meal of the year?  Thanksgiving?  I talk about this because special meals are the form on which the Eucharist was originally built.  I see 3 characteristics about a special meal that are common with good Eucharistic celebration.

    First, camaraderie and conviviality.  I expected that we would have a bunch of our people at the McKinney North High School dining room for lunch.  It would have been an electric ambiance with everyone just finished the run.  It did not turn out that way.  Thanksgiving can have this characteristic.  Our Vines celebrations have it.

    Second, quality food and drink and often special food.  Thanksgiving we have turkey, birthdays have ice cream & cake with candles, weddings have special cakes.  In Tanzania a goat was roasted over a spit to celebrate a wedding.  It lasted all day long.  Which brings up time.  Special meals take an hour or more when it is really working.  We at Vines spend an hour, maybe a little more.  We have good wine and good bread, home made bread. 

    Thirdly, rituals.  At Thanksgiving we often say a prayer of thanks.  At weddings, cake cuttings.  At special events, blessings can be mentioned.  At Vines we have our rituals, the sign of peace, the music, the readings and great homilies.  Next week we have a special blessing for the old dads.

I would propose that special meals are the foundation for Eucharistic celebration.

What meals are special to you?  How do you initiate them?

AUDIO:  http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-06-14.mp3

Picture 1:  Cole Ryan Webster welcoming the community with Kevin & T.J.

Picture 2:  Cole's baptism with his mom Erin & dad Chuck, Lisa & Brandon

Picture 3:  Lynda with Kayla

Picture 4:  Peyton & Madison with their mommy Ashley

Readings: Deuteronomy 4, 32-40; Psalm 33, Blessed the People the Lord has chosen to be His Own; Romans 8, 14-17; Matthew 28, 16-20.

Deuteronomy: This work is the 5th and last book of the Pentateuch/Torah.  The first 4 books are Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, & Numbers.  Deuteronomy has basically 3 speeches delivered by Moses before the people enter the promised land.  He reviews all they have endured the past 40 years and how Yahweh has shown his care and power to save them.

Author: Moses may have spoken some of the ideas in the speeches, but others have put the work together.  In fact, in chapter 34 the death of Moses is described.  Someone other than Moses probably covered this episode.

Date: 700 years BCE.

Our Selection: the end of the first speech.  Moses is reminding the people of how Yahweh cared for them and why they must honor him for this as their one and only god.

Happiness & Peace: Loving Relationships

Want to know what makes for happiness?  Old Stack will tell you this morning.  I have talked about some of this in the past, but it is so good it is worth reviewing.  I do this especially on the feast of our three person god.  Our god is a relationship god and that is what I want to talk about.

The ideas this morning come from a study of 268 male Harvard students starting in 1937, a 7 decade longitudinal study that is almost unique in its breadth.  The identities of the students are secret unless the student identifies himself.  Ben Bradlee, the editor of the Washington Post did so, and it was deduced after he died that President Kennedy was one of the students.  Most of the participants still alive are now in their 80's and are treasure chests of information about life.  Every 2nd or 3rd year most of their lives they were questioned and studied.  The latest write up comes from the June Atlantic magazine.

The question was not how much trouble or how little they encountered in life, but how and to what effect they responded.  How they adapted and became happy-healthy or sad-sick people.  Psychiatrist George Vaillant has spent the last 40 years organizing the data coming from the study.

He has come up with the following suggestions taken from the lives of these 268 men.  Here are 7 factors that contribute to happy-healthy people:

    1.  Education.  For you kids who just finished a long school year, it may feel so good to be out.  However, your education is a big factor in you being a happy-healthy person, in the future and even now.  I would include ongoing education.  We never cease to learn new things, even how to dance, yoga, languages, history, geography, and so on.

    2.  Healthy & mature adaptability.  Vailant identifies 4 ways of adapting, from psychotic, immature, and neurotic, to healthy, like humor, altruism, forgiveness.  See the link to get his complete explanation. The analogy for this is the grain of sand in the shell that develops into a pearl.

    3.  No smoking.  Never too late to stop if you already have started.  You kids, you will end up looking uglier than me if you start the habit.

    4.  Moderate use of alcohol & no abuse.  College kids and even high school kids get caught up here so easily.  The culture of drinking excessively.  However, a new phenomenon is emerging as our population ages, geriatric alcoholism.

    5.  Exercise.  Want some exercise next Saturday?  Come with me and Hammond for the Collin County Classic, the bike run with 55 miles as the max and various shorter routes.  Make it fun, make it daily.  At least a few times a week, like take a walk.

    6.  Weight control.  My visit to McDonald's.  Kids loading up on layers of fat, salt, and sugar.  A very seductive place.

    7.   Relationships: loving and long term.  Vaillant suggests that this is the factor.  Loving is life-filling, it is motivational.  Because I love another, I exercise, I study, I approach life with moderation and spirit.  After all the data he has evaluated, Vaillant states that a relationship of love is the only thing that really matters in life. 

Who is the person you love most in the whole world?  Who is number 2, 3, 4, 5?

AUDIO:  http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-06-07.mp3

Sources: Atlantic, http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200906/

Picture 1:  Mass with Kevin & Noah

Picture 2:  Reed in his mommy's lap, Nikki, with daddy Keith

Picture 3:  Reed being baptized

Picture 4:  Keith (dad) being baptized

Readings: Acts 2, 1-11; Psalm 104, Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the Face of the Earth; 1 Corinthians 3-13; John 20, 19-23

Acts:  a reminder–

Author: Luke, the author of both The Gospel & The Acts

Date: ca. 50 years after Jesus' death

Today's selection: In chapter 1 we saw 3 things: introduction by Luke, the Ascension, and the election of a new apostle, Matthias, to take Judas' place.  The next big event is the coming of the spirit.  That is what is described today.

Pentecost by Tony O'Donovan

Readings: Acts 1, 15-26; Psalm 103, the Lord has set his Throne in Heaven; 1 John 4, 11-16; John 17, 11-19.

Acts: a review–

Author:  Luke, the author of The Acts & The Gospel

Date: ca. 50 years after the death of Jesus

Our Selection: Believe it or not, we are now back to chapter 1 after getting as far as chapters 9 & 10.  What is going on is this.  The chapter opens with an introduction and then a description of the Ascension, Jesus going up in the sky.  Apparently the event took place about a half mile outside Jerusalem on the Mt. of Olives. 

Afterward, all the community come together in the room they had been hiding in. About 120 are present and Peter gets up to speak.  We read Peter's words. 

John's letter: There is a great line in this selection.  See if you can spot it when you hear it.  I'll tell you after the reading, but a hint, it is the last line.

The World

Last Sunday evening I took Rosemary to the emergency room at Presbyterian on Walnut Hill.  Many of you may not know that for years she has endured a condition where her heart would spike up to ca. 180 and lock in there.  Normally when she felt a spike coming she would lie down and it would subside.  Occasionally it would take a longer, like an hour or two. 

Sunday, after the spike continued for 4-5 hours and she was feeling nauseous and lousy, I called our doctor who assured me the event was not life threatening, not a stroke or a heart attack, and that I should take her to the emergency room so they could arrest the spike. 

So I rush over to Presbyterian reassured that she was not in danger from the spike, but anxious about going to the hospital.  Flashing through my mind are stories about hospital mishaps, overworked nurses, scissors left inside incisions, mixed medications, and people going in with a hang nail and coming out with a staff infection that kills them. 

However, I was humbled and impressed with the efficiency, the care, and the cleanliness of what I encountered.  We arrived about 8:00 and I did not leave until shortly before midnight.  It actually took most of that time to bring the spike down and keep it down.  It would come down, then immediately spike.  The phenomenon is called SVT, supra ventricular tachycardia. 

When we walked into that emergency room, I only had to put Rosemary's name & date of birth on a piece of paper, and they whisked her into the care of numerous teams of nurses, a doctor, and eventually one of her heart specialist team.

Then a great thing happened on Tuesday morning when they did a procedure on her called an ablation, where by they run a little wire up from the groin, through a vein into the heart cavity, and zap the malfunction.  Rosemary came home and donated her heart medications to the CCAC.  She does not need them anymore.

The people in Presbyterian were terrific, amazingly professional, caring, and warm.

This has been on my mind a lot and I thought about the experience when I noticed the John reading about the world.  Did you notice that he uses the word world 9 times in a small paragraph, always in a negative context?  Like, the world is a bad place.

We have talked about this before and I would like to propose again that, while the world around us has a lot of pain & suffering, the world also has tremendous beauty.  And, moreover, you and I can increase that beauty, helping to minimize the suffering. 

As I've mentioned before, I pick up here the scent of the old philosophical principle of dualism.  That is, the whole world is divided into two opposites, hot & cold, dark & light, spirit & matter, and especially, good & bad.  Moreover, bad & good covers other doubles, for example, light is good, darkness bad.  And especially, matter is bad, spirit is good.  Consequently, the world full of material & stuff is seen as the enemy.

This extends to my person.  My material body vs my spirit, my thinking and feeling.  To free the latter I must discipline and control the body.  Taken to an extreme people get into hurting themselves, so as to free the inner spirit.  I did not have enough common sense as a young Jesuit to realize that some of the penitential practices we were encourage to do we just self abuse.

Where are we today?  Today we are encouraged to treasure our world and to improve it.  We see this all over the place.  I was at the CCAC, the Collin Co. Adult Clinic, Thursday and here are all these people providing medical care to the poorest people pro bono, no salary or stipend. Ken Cramer sent me a note, "When can we have another food drive?"  Great reminder.  We'll do it next week.

I saw recently where Groundwork Dallas had another Trinity clean up.  Hundreds showed up to remove trash and in particular a hill of dead tires illegally dumped in the forest.  I wished I could have been there, like the time Ron Kovatis got many of us down there.

I propose that our challenge is not to hate the world, but the treasure it and to make it even more beautiful. 

How are you beautifying our world?

AUDIO: http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-05-24.mp3

Picture 1:  Mass with Kevin & Sabrina

Picture 2:  Sabrina, who graduated Friday from 8th grade at St. Monica with a Presidential Award for excellence, reading her poem Download Bread_by_sab[1]

Picture 3:  John Doherty preparing to receive a blessing on his employment away from home

Picture 4:  Donut Shoppe with customers Kevin, Chloe, & Denni

Readings: Acts 10 25-48; Psalm 98, The Lord has revealed to the Nations his Saving Power; 1 John 4, 7-10; John 15, 9-17

Acts:  Another review–

Author: Luke, who wrote both the Gospel and Acts

Date: ca. 40-50 years after the death of Jesus

Our selection: This same selection was read on Easter Sunday.  What is happening is this.  Last Sunday we began the second half of Acts, from chapter 9 to the end.  Last week's reading had to do with Paul returning to the community in Jerusalem after he had his conversion experience on the road to Damascus. 

This week we get into chapter 10 which focuses on two characters: Peter and a Gentile (non-Jew) captain in the Roman army named Cornelius.  Cornelius was supposed to be a good man and he has a voice call him, "Cornelius." "What is it, sir?" he answers.  The voice tells him to go a town called Joppa and talk with a man named Peter.  Cornelius sends two servants.

Meanwhile in Joppa Peter has that vision we talked about Easter Sunday: a sheet coming down from the sky with a multitude of animals.  Many of the animals are considered ritually impure by Jews.  Peter is told by a voice to eat from these animals, but Peter refuses.  While this is going on the two servants arrive and the voice tells Peter to go with them.  Peter arrives at Captain Cornelius' house and that is where we take up the story.

Luke is interested here not so much in history as in convincing his readers that the Gentiles as well as Jews are included in the new religion.

Source: Good News Bible

Psalms:

Dates: Put together at ca. 300 years BCE.

Author(s): The old belief that David composed all 150 Psalms is just myth.  The reality: many people and groups of people composed the psalms over centuries.

Purpose: songs of gratitude, sorrow, pain, and longing to be sung by the Jewish people, especially in the temple and later in the synagogue.  Special songs were composed for feast days like passover and the feast of lights, to name just two.

Source:Bishop (Episcopal) John Shelby Spong, Origins of the Bible XXV, published 5-2-09 in Mirabile Dictu

Requem for a Water Trailer: That Your Joy May be Complete

Friday morning I handed it over, Folks.  You remember the big red water tank I used to fill up at the back door here ever since we started coming here?  Friday I donated it to the Texas Tree Foundation, the group where I used to buy our trees wholesale. 

A number of events were taking place that made me aware it may be time for me to move on to another hobby.  PISD & RISD have both said they don't want any more trees because they get in the way of their big lawn mowers and it busts their budgets.  My truck is smoking badly.  And heading into 70 years I am aware I cannot lift and dig like I used to. 

I admit I experienced a sadness when I went to Jean Atwood's house Thursday night to pick up the trailer, Jean who has been so generous to store the trailer in her driveway for the last 4 years, ever since I departed Jesuit & we planted Plano Senior.  And likewise, Friday morning when I drove it over to the the tree farm.  I have spent hours working with that trailer and have kept alive thousands of little trees through terrific Dallas droughts. 

More than the sadness, though, I sense a joy probably like what is mentioned in John's Gospel, one of my favorite line in Scripture. 

I certainly was consoled when I delivered the trailer to the team at the TX Trees Foundation near TI.  They need the trailer to water trees in a downtown Dallas urban forest park this summer.

I, likewise, am delighted when I ride streets in north Dallas shaded with our trees.  I pass islands, say, on the east side of Love Field, along Lemon Avenue, and I can see in my mind Kovatis and Leals planting the islands or Rose Banzhaf shoveling mulch into containers behind Hillcrest High.  I can see Kim Quirk & her family planting trees in a park at Lovers Lane & Lemon.

I got some amusing memories which give me joy.  Plano Senior, 5:30 A.M., Sean Schleicher watering from the back of the truck in the dark, I'm driving.  I get us stuck in the mud of a shallow irrigation ditch just north of the baseball diamond which had over watered its field and the water had drained into the ditch.

Remember the beautiful day we planted 400 trees in 1 hour at Plano Senior?  We were scheduled to start about 12:00.  Ten minutes before 12:00 I'm in that big south east parking lot getting things ready.  Kovatis comes by and yells, "Where is everybody?  We got a lot of work to do!"   I look up 30 minutes later and people are everywhere.  30 more minutes and people are coming up asking where are more trees to plant.  Everything was planted and the picnic we planned for 3:00 began ca. 1:00. 

Remember the chili picnics prepared by my buddy Lamberty at Jesuit?  Remember way back when we took two Sundays to plant Marsh Lane from LBJ to Northwest Hwy and Frank Hart, my old coach from Christ the King, invited the whole planting party to his restaurant?

These memories give me great joy as do my trips around the streets, parks, and school campuses we have planted.  How many?  Who knows?  Take 20 years and conservatively say we averaged 200 trees a year.  That would be a minimum.  And most of them are all out there.

This is the joy I think John is talking about in his Gospel.  We got it.

What next?

AUDIO:  http://mysite.verizon.net/reso7rjy/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/2009-05-17.mp3

Picture 1:  Mass with Kevin & Noah

Picture 2:  Richardson Women's Club Gazebo Wedding of

Picture 3:  Dorothy & Jim butterly

Picture 4:  The red water trailer custom built by Al Tenbusch