Christ's Asset-Management Advice

Christ’s Asset-Management Advice

Pastor’s Column

4^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

January 30, 2011

          Thirty years ago, I can remember my mother complaining that the bank CD rate she was getting was too low – and it was 18% at that time!  Now you are lucky to get 1%.  A decade ago it seemed like there was no way for real estate prices to decline.  The stock market has suffered dramatic rises and crashes.  Gold and silver seem to be doing the best at the moment and most ordinary folks don’t have much ability to invest in these kinds of things anyway!

          Besides, we all know that, whether one succeeds or fails as an investor, all of this is quite useless in the world to come.  Why do we spend so much time worrying about this world (which is so temporary) and so little about the world to come (which is eternal)?  Why indeed?  Because we can’t see that world yet, that’s why.  It seems far away, yet only your next heartbeat keeps you here.  That’s how close it is.

         

          What we really want to know is what will be valuable in heaven?  What asset classes should we be developing now?  Jesus sees far into the future and knows where we should be investing; we on the other hand tend to go for short term gains.  But the world of the future (heaven) will in many ways be a mirror image of this one – in other words – everything will be turned around—what is valuable now will later prove to be worthless, while what seems cheap and unattractive now will be priceless.  Many of us are like treasure seekers who miss all the real gold laying around in plain sight, because we do not recognize these things for their true value; instead, we go after fool’s gold!

          According to today’s gospel (Matthew 5:1-12), those who will be “wealthiest” (most blessed) in the world of the future will want to be cultivating investments in these areas as opportunities for the greatest possible gain: being poor in spirit (practicing detachment from possessions); accepting mourning when it arrives without complaint; practicing meekness; being hungry and thirsty for righteousness; becoming a merciful person in my daily choices; aiming for cleanliness of heart, especially in what I look at, listen to and in my speech; being a peacemaker instead of a person who stirs things up; and (what may be least attractive of all), being insulted, persecuted and calumniated for Christ’s sake!  That’s really winning the lottery!

          Some of these are more attractive than others, but on the last day of your life, you will want to have an ample supply of all these assets in your personal portfolio.   Why is that?  Because, when you take all eight of these “beatitudes” together, they are a description of the Son of God, and the more like him we become, the “wealthier” we will be in the life to come. Love is what we have been through with someone, and to have suffered (and all these beatitudes involve some degree of suffering) will connect us with Jesus in a way no other asset class can match.  No, it doesn’t look valuable now, but just wait.

                                                                                                    Father Gary

Some Opportunities Never Come Again

Some Opportunities Never Come Again

Pastor’s Column

3^rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

January 23, 2011

          We are haunted by these first gospels of the new liturgical year.  Jesus has emerged from the obscurity of his home in Nazareth to proclaim Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand! (Matthew 4:12-23).  How in the world could Jesus state that the Kingdom was immanent –at hand ­­-- when in fact we have been waiting now for 2000 years!?

          The people who lived at the time of Christ were receiving an opportunity that no human being before or since has ever quite experienced …. God Almighty in the person of Jesus Christ literally walked among them.  He was only to live three more years, so if Jesus called, they had better not miss their chance!  Each day of our lives contains hidden opportunities to grow in character and faith.  Peter, James, John and Andrew had to say yes when Jesus passed by.  They recognized in that critical moment an opportunity that would never come again.

          The Kingdom of God is at hand for us as well.  The Kingdom of God, at present, is within us but none of us knows how long we have to prepare!  When we die we are immediately confronted with the absolute truth about ourselves and God’s constant love for us.  Now is the time to prepare to enter the Kingdom, to be ready!  Each day is a dress rehearsal for eternity and God makes use of every event, whether pleasant, unpleasant or even tragic, to prepare us.

          The Lord serves up a daily banquet to us, a table literally filled with all kinds of rich foods, a feast which is called the Will of God.  At times we are required to suffer intensely.  Other moments are filled with great joy; still others, opportunities to serve.  We are challenged to step out in faith.  We are caught in traffic and must practice patience.  We have relatives, co-workers, classmates or friends that bug us.   These are all precious opportunities to allow the Holy Spirit to prepare us for eternity.

          Can you imagine Simon and Andrew not listening to the call of Jesus as he passed by?  There they were, fishing, and Jesus spoke a word that changed their life—Come, follow me.  So we too must be ready to hear the Lord when he calls.  This is why we pray every day, attend Mass on Sunday, and pay attention to how we treat the people around us,       because God is likely to call at a time we are not expecting, and we must be ready, or we will miss the opportunity that God has given us.  Such a prospect is haunting indeed.

                                                                                          Father Gary

Behold the Lamb of God!

Behold the Lamb of God!

Pastor’s Column

2^nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

January 16, 2011

Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world. 

Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb!

          Behold!  These words above are part of the new translation of the Mass that we will begin using this Advent 2011, and part of the text is taken from this Sunday’s gospel (John 1:29-34).  Let’s remember the current wording for a moment so that we can compare the two:

This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  Happy are those who are called to his supper.

          The first thing to notice is that most of the coming changes will highlight the biblical nature of each part of the Mass with more accurate quotes from the scriptures.  This new translation offers us a rich and deep spiritual encounter with the mystery of the sacrificed and risen Christ.  Our translation at the Lamb of God is moving from the rather pedestrian “This is…” to “Behold.”  Behold – we hear it twice.  Yes, the Eucharist being held by the priest really is the Lamb of God, but the word behold invites us further into the mystery we celebrate and are about to receive at communion.

          What does it mean to behold the Lamb of God?  These are not just the church’s words – John the Baptist used them as he watched Jesus approaching him to be baptized.  To behold is to be invited to contemplate a deep mystery.  To behold is to ponder a truth so great we can never reach the end of it.  When we behold the Lamb of God at Mass, we are in fact beholding the very same Jesus that John saw two thousand years ago!

          Using this word in the Mass at the Lamb of God, after an absence from the liturgy of 40 years, invites all of us to learn to behold.  Life is full of unnoticed mysteries! We find Our Lord in so many places, much as John the Baptist did, but sometimes Jesus prefers to be not so obvious.  Why is this? He wishes to be searched for, recognized, pointed out, discovered, and when we spot Him we say, “Behold!  Here He is!  He has been with me all this time and I did not recognize Him.” 

          Where do we “behold” Him?  We will find Jesus hidden in the circumstances of our lives, in the Eucharist, in the Scriptures, in our sufferings, in coincidences, in life and even in death.  In every deep mysterious encounter of our lives with Christ, we are invited to become people who have learned to behold, to ponder the mystery and make it our own.

                                                                                                  Father Gary

The Sign of the Cross

The Sign of the Cross

Pastor’s Column

The Baptism of the Lord

January 9, 2011

          Saint Bernadette, the famous seer of Lourdes, was once asked what her favorite prayer was.  She answered, perhaps surprisingly, that it was The Sign of the Cross. She noted that the Virgin Mary herself taught her how to cross herself correctly – slowly and deliberately – making this action the prayer that it ought to be. She learned all this simply by watching how Mary herself made the Sign of the Cross during the apparitions.  I’ll bet most of us would not put the Sign of the Cross in first place among our favorite prayers! 

          The Sign of the Cross is a prayer without words.  Catholicism is full of prayers like this.  For example, when we genuflect before a tabernacle, we are actually praying with our bodily posture.  When we bow our heads before receiving communion, this action too is a prayer.  Walking in procession to receive communion can be a prayer.  There are many other examples of this.

          One of my favorite classes that I like to teach is “Why do Catholics do that?”  We Catholics have so many ritual actions (actions that we perform again and again), that we can forget why we do them or where they came from!  The Sign of the Cross is one such ritual, and it has an interesting history.

          The Sign of the Cross is a remembrance of our baptism, and most of us need the reminder because we were too young to remember the real thing.  Likewise, we recite the creed at each Sunday Mass as a way of re-affirming our baptismal promises each week and the beliefs that we hold in common.  Baptism begins the journey toward eternal life that continues after death.

          The next time you witness a baptism, notice that the very first action the priest or deacon performs is to trace a cross on the baby’s forehead while saying “I now claim you for Christ our Savior by tracing the Sign of the Cross on your forehead” … and then the parents and godparents are invited to do the same thing for the child.  It is precisely this cross and the baptism that immediately follows that we are reminding ourselves of when we make the Sign of the Cross!  This is especially in evidence when we enter the church and dip our hand in the holy water before crossing ourselves.

          In the early church, the Sign of the Cross was made just as we do in a baptismal ritual.  It was a small cross made originally just on the forehead that over time gradually grew bigger to encompass both shoulders and the whole upper body.  This ancient way of signing ourselves is preserved in the three small crosses we make before hearing the gospel:  one on the head, the lips and the heart as we pray Lord, open my mind, my lips and my heart that I may worthily hear your gospel.  The Sign of the Cross is one our most powerful prayers…. Each time we pray it well, we are ritually reminding ourselves that we have been claimed for Christ – we belong to Him forever!

                                                                                          Father Gary