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Contents: Volume 2: Sunday 23C September 5, 2010
1. -- Lanie LeBlanc OP
2. -- Fr. Paul O'Reilly, SJ
3. -- Barbara Cooper, OP
4. --
5. -- (Your reflection can be here!)
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1.
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Subject: Sun. 23 C
This Sunday's Gospel passage from Luke is probably one that
most folks might want to skip in favor of learning about an easier
way to be a follower of Jesus. Prerequisites of hating one's family
and one's own life as well as carrying one's own cross and
renouncing all one's possessions before someone can join the ranks
of a Christian don't seem to be recruiting tactics that would
attract many people. I guess that is Jesus's point. (I say guess
because I'm not quite sure about the word "hating".)
What I think is that Jesus is trying to tell us that such a
decision to follow Him is not an easy one nor one to be taken
lightly. In my personal life, it seems to be a decision I must make
each day, sometimes each hour ! Being an authentic Christian is
just not easy at all. Even going to church on Sunday and not
scowling after a nearby official church person (usher, hospitality
greeter, etc.) shakes your hand during the Sign of Peace while
looking the other way requires a quick mental readjustment toward
God rather than jerking your hand back. It is the sum of these
quick mental adjustments toward God that can be someone's personal
cross to carry or perhaps the cross is something more easily
identifiable such as an illness or a deep sorrow.
Whatever it is, each of us definitely has a cross to carry
in this life. Carrying it with our whole being while remaining
focused on Jesus is what, I think, Jesus is asking of us as His
followers. This is hard stuff.... but we have the help of the Holy
Spirit, our families, and our faith communities to succeed. (I
don't really understand that hating part unless it means hating
because they might distract us from Jesus.)
Perhaps it would be good advice to calculate how focusing on
Jesus is going to work for us before we give up our families or
being Christian. How can we live in this world, actually embrace
this world as being good since it comes from God, and still focus on
Jesus and how He wants us to live? Again, this might require daily
decisions or hourly ones, but surely very prayerful ones.
The best place to start is with prayer. Only then can the
journey become possible because God will lead the way.
--
Blessings,
Dr. Lanie LeBlanc OP
Southern Dominican Laity
Provincial Promoter of Lay Formation
lanieleblanc@mindspring.com
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2.
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"Anyone who does not carry his cross and come after me cannot be my
disciple...none of you can be my disciple unless he gives up all his
possessions."
I am sure that some of you here will know what it is to live with an
alcoholic. It requires a level of self-sacrifice of which few people
are capable.
One of the things which doctors are taught to do in dealing with
alcoholics is to try whenever and however possible to confront them
with the real consequences of their drinking -- the effects it has
on their health -- on their job -- on their career; on their
finances -- and most especially on the people they love and who love
them. So, the standard question we ask the relative of an alcoholic
is "How does so-and-so's drinking make you feel?"
So, the last time an alcoholic came to see me with his wife, I asked
his wife to tell me how his drinking made her feel. She talked about
how it made him violent -- and of the many times he had hit her,
including four broken bones at various times. She talked about the
many times she had left him, but always returned when he begged her
to. She talked about how the family business had been ruined both by
the money he drank away and by the foolish decisions he had taken
while drunk. And she talked about the damage it had caused to his
health -- to his liver, his stomach and his heart -- and also the
medical bills that they had run up trying to get help for those
problems. And she talked about many more things that I can't speak
about here. And throughout the time she was speaking, he just sat
and stared at the blank wall in front of him.
Eventually, she finished. And the next question we usually ask is
"What would it mean to you if so-and-so stopped drinking?"
Normally, people say things like -- well it would help his health,
or his job, or his career, or the family finances, or our
relationship or something like that. But she didn't say anything
like that. She simply said "I would give my whole life to get him to
stop drinking."
The way she said it left no room for doubt that she really meant it.
Rather shocked I asked "Why?!"
She said, "because I love him".
It was at that point that he began to cry.
I do not know if he had never heard her say that before, or just not
in that way and with that emphasis. Or if he had just never listened
before when she did say it. But it was a Lazarus moment for him.
Since that moment he has been like a man reborn.
Perhaps it is too much of a cliché to say that there is no man so
bad that he cannot be redeemed by the love of a good woman. I know
far too many counter-examples to that one. Certainly, I do not say
that there is any simple or single answer to serious problems of
alcoholism or domestic violence. But I could not then, and I cannot
now, help but be awed by the woman's example of love and self gift.
We who genuinely seek the redemption of one another must every day
pick up our Cross and follow him who redeemed us all. It is a path
-- a vocation - which costs not less than everything.
Let us stand and profess our Faith in Christ who gave up His Life
for Us.
Fr. Paul O'Reilly, SJ <fatbaldnproud@yahoo.co.uk>
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3.
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23rd SUNDAY -C- SEPTEMBER 5, 2010
Perhaps its the change in our weather after record breaking heat, or
having been raised in Newark NJ in the 40's and 50's and loving all
the Broadway songs popular at the time, or just a spirit of
frivolousness, but today's' reading from Luke had me singing Rodger
and Hammerstein. Remember Annie and Will in "Oklahoma", singing:
"All Er Nuthin'"? (For those not familiar with early Oklahoma
speech: "All Or Nothing")
With me it's all er nuthin'.
Is it all er nuthin' with you?
It cain't be "in between"
It cain't be "now and then"
No half and half romance will do!
I'm sure there was someone in Jesus' audience who spoke up and
argued that the Bible commands us to love our mother and father.
And Jesus himself told us to love even our enemies. So why would he
now say: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and
mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even
his own life—he cannot be my disciple"?
I think it was to get the audience's attention. Jesus isn't giving
us permission to hate anyone. It's not about "loving" and/or
"hating" but about commitment. About being "All Er Nuthin'. It
brings to mind the story in 1 Kings 19 where Elisha is called to
follow Elijah:
"So Elijah went from there and found Elisha son of Shaphat. He was
plowing with twelve yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the
twelfth pair. Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him.
Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah. "Let me kiss my
father and mother good-by," he said, "and then I will come with
you."
"Go back," Elijah replied. "What have I done to you?"
So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and
slaughtered them. He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat
and gave it to the people, and they ate. Then he set out to follow
Elijah and became his attendant."
There were some folks in the early Church who planned to be baptized
... later. They realized that being a disciple meant changing how
we live our lives. Some folks today also realize this and have
opted for a "kinda, sorta, maybe later" sort of Christianity; the
kind of religion that "blesses" me and makes me feel good about
myself while giving me a measuring tape with which to condemn
others.
Jesus says: it's "All Er Nuthin'". What would that be like?
First, it would be living with a "single heart", undivided
attention and a life focused on loving the One who passionately
loves us. It means letting go of anger, revenge, possessiveness,
greed. It means putting compassion in the place of harshness and
hatred. It means living with gratitude and respectful appreciation
of creation. It means trusting in God's love more than our feeble
attempts to be "good" or "just" or "righteous". I means - like the
disciples on the mountain of Transfiguration - " looking up and
seeing no one, only Jesus". (Matt 17)
Jesus expects us to throw our whole selves into the relationship.
To learn from him and to embrace his Spirit. To stop doing the
things that are contrary to God's Kingdom and start doing the things
that will help establish that Kingdom.
And when the going gets tough, he expects us to continue, like he
did, all the way to Calvary. With him:
.... it's all er nuthin'.
Is it all er nuthin' with you?
Barbara Cooper, OP
Vancouver Island, BC Canada
bcoop@animail.net
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4.
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5.
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Volume 2 is for you. Your thoughts, reflections, and insights on the
next Sundays readings can influence the preaching you hear. Send
them to
jboll@preacherexchange.org. Deadline is Wednesday Noon.
Include your Name, and Email Address.
-- Fr. John
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