Our Already Is Greater Than Our Not Yet

May 2011

Wauwatosa, WI

"One of today's readings reminds of the fact of how much Christ 'emptied' Himself to become one of us (Phil. 2). One way that Jesus chose to explain this fact of life to us is through the image of the Good Shepherd.  A good shepherd knows and loves his sheep individually and they know him and follow his voice.  He protects his sheep from wolves and from thieves, guides them through dangerous places, and leads them to restful waters and verdant pastures.  He lives and sleeps and eats with them, and even lays down his life for them.

"Is our life as Catholics meant to be a burden or a blessing?  Do we live a happy life assured of God’s love and grace, or do we live an anxious life trying (in vain?) to earn His love and His grace?  Jesus says that He has come that we might have a share in His Divine Life even now, and that we might have it abundantly (Jo 10:10).  Yes, even now we can relax in the security of our salvation.  For, as today’s second reading tells us, “He himself bore our sins in his body upon the cross, so that, free from sin, we might live for righteousness” (I Pet 2:24).  To “live for righteousness” means to live a Spirit-filled life of holiness as Jesus did.  We have died with Christ and we have risen with Him (cf. Rom 6:5-11), so that now “Christ lives in me” (Gal 2:20).  We can no longer boast in our own moral achievements for God has made Christ our wisdom, our righteousness, our sanctification and our redemption (cf. I Cor 1:29-31).

"We can see our salvation and holiness in Christ in two ways:  as already fully ours, and as not yet fully ours. I daresay that most Catholics see their union with God and their salvation as “not yet”, as something they strive for and hope for but which they will not realize or receive for sure until after they die and go to God.  There is of course some truth to that. But we Catholics need to strengthen our grasp on the “already” of our life in God.  If, for instance, an evangelical Christian asks us “Have you been saved?”, our immediate response should be “Yes! Thanks be to God!.”  Jesus has saved me and my “life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3).  I have an “inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for me” (I Pet 1:4)!  But many Catholics will not be that spiritually bold and confident.  It’s true that we can only hope for eternal salvation and that none of us know for sure if we will go to heaven rather than to hell.  But any doubt about my final destiny has to do with the possibility that I may still turn my back on God and His will.  It has nothing to do with God’s gift of Himself in Christ which is always offered to me if only I will receive it.  

"Our assignment as Catholics is to carefully read and ponder each of the bible readings cited above and to thank God that these are gifts are already mine, not just promised.  The Good Shepherd takes every care of his sheep whom He knows by name, just as a father or mother dedicates all their love and effort to caring for their child.  The loved child is carefree and happy because he or she knows he is loved, protected, delighted in, provided for, guided and accompanied, and that “only goodness and kindness follow me all the days of my life” (Ps 23:6).  Our loving God wants each of us to live without doubts and anxieties about His love or about the “dark valleys” and trials of life.  “In all these things we conquer overwhelmingly” (Rom 8:37) because our Father “makes all things work together unto good” (Rom 8:37) for us who trust His shepherding. The truth is that, as we draw closer to God, our 'already' is greater than our 'not yet.'"

I Will Not Wait for Purgatory

             August 25, 1979          Bahar, India

"Seek grace for the smallest things, and you will also find grace to accomplish, to believe in, and to hope for the greatest things. Attend to the smallest things, examine them, think about putting them into effect, and the Lord will grant you greater."          St. Peter Faber

"Let me comment on the theme of this afternoon. It would seem to be a great and quite selfless desire to want to serve Christ and proclaim His truth tirelessly while I have time in this world...It's obvious we must be purified in some way before we can see God and I desire to do that now and not wait for Purgatory for two reasons: I may not be saved if I dally for if I'm not gathering more and more with Him, I'm scattering. And the more and sooner I'm purified by total unreserved surrender, the more I'll be able to do for His Kingdom, the people I'm vowed to serve.

"Over and above all though, a new and beautiful sense has been captivating me; I want to be holy and purified and in love with Christ for His sake, because He wants it, because He wants me. I feel more emptied of self and concerns and anxieties about where I stand and how holy I am etc. Instead I'm aware of a growing simplification that settles my desire and aim and passion more on Him, the Holy Trinity, and less on myself. I want my response to take whatever form His will manifests but I dream of ministry like Paul's or Xavier's...

"This intense desire for holiness and mission and apostolic fruitfulness led me to begin reading, 'To The Other Towns', a book by Bangert about Peter Favre (Faber). He is so special to me because he feels like a kindred spirit....With Favre, I will 'seek the grace for the smallest things' and let God decide my future, which I again surrender to Him."

I Cannot Remain Lonely

October 7, 2010, Tucson, AZ    

"Do you sometimes feel that God is far away from you? That He doesn't know what you're going through or worse, doesn't care? Scripture assures us that God is close, very close, and that He knows all my thoughts, feelings, desires, plans, fears, joys, temptations, choices, sorrows.

" For example, In Psalm 139 we find the psalmist telling God that, 'Before a word is on my tongue, you know it...You formed me in my mother's womb...Your eyes foresaw all my actions..'   And again in Hebrews 4, 'Everything is naked and exposed to Him to whom we must render an account.'  St Augustine acknowledges the intimacy he has with God in my places in his 'Confessions.'     

   "Like Augustine, my prayer too can become an intimate dialogue of togetherness with God. If I can't find words,  I can rest in the knowledge of Christ with me and simply say, 'Lord, you see my feelings. Thank you for caring, for helping, for being so close even if I don't see you. '  It is much easier to deal with temptation and avoid sin if I am aware that God sees, that He is always watching me and waiting to help, like a vigilant parent or friend.

   "If His gaze feels like a threat to me, it is a sign that either I need to repent of my desires or I need  to alter my image of Jesus from that of an ill-tempered policeman to that of the merciful father described in Luke 15. When I remain aware of God's presence during the day, both within me and around me, I cannot remain lonely. It is also easier to seek and receive His guidance in my decisions and temptations that come up in the course of a day. He gives me courage and strength to face my challenges and responsibilities. So, by being aware of the reality of God Present to Me, I can live securely and happily as small children do when their parents are close by. 

   "To this end, may I suggest that you develop the habit of reminding yourself during the day, 'The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall lack' (Ps. 23) or 'The Father knows all that I need.' (Mt 6:32) or a similar short Scripture. Additionally, at the beginning of every period of prayer as well as at the start of your other activities---work, study, leisure, driving the car, going to bed or getting up, attending a party or a meeting etc.---pause for a moment and acknowledge the loving gaze of your Father or Jesus upon you, wanting to be with you, to talk with you and help you in the activity you are about to begin. Tell Him what you are feeling and what you need. Ask Him what He is feeling and what you can do for Him or what He wants for you. Imagine our Father renewing your baptism, like that of Jesus in the Jordan or the apostles at Pentecost. In the way, when you die and see the face of Christ, you will already be well acquainted!"

     

Healing Wounded Masculinity

"On Him lay the sins of us all."

July 10, 1989

"Felt lead by the Lord today to pray the Sorrowful Mysteries as a healing for our wounded masculinity. As this was fruitful for me, I will write it down and pass it on to other men who might be helped by it.

• "First Sorrowful Mystery: Agony in the Garden teaches us that Christ's Obedience uproots man's (esp young men's) rebelliousness and willfulness that wants to apply his own power to his own projects. I.e., "the egocentric masculine untempered by the transcendent masculine will.."
• "Second Sorrowful Mystery: Flogging at the pillar teaches us how to uproot immature masculine power that expresses itself in thrill seeking and dominating others either physically or emotionally. This False Vitality is overcome here by Jesus' True Vitality in the face of brute force. 
• "Third Sorrowful Mystery:  Jesus is crowned with thorns, mocked and ridiculed. He thereby uproots men's reliance on honor that the world bestows on us for our successes...such as money, degrees, larger homes/cars and all the trappings that only belong to this world and are, therefore, passing. By the blood He shed in this Mystery, Christ dissolves False Importance or our drive to establish our little kingdoms.
• "Fourth Sorrowful Mystery:  Jesus carries His Cross to Calvary and thereby uproots the refuge that man tends to take in his aloneness...I.e., the cold comfort he feels in self-pity, in isolation, in setting himself apart from all the 'needy' in this world. The Cross, by contrast, is a personal and a collective burden. 'Weep not for me but for yourselves and your children..', Jesus tells the women by the side of road. Similarly, Simon of Cyrene has to help Him or He wouldn't have made it. Therefore, by allowing Himself to be helped, Christ dissolves our False Independence.
• "Fifth Sorrowful Mystery:  By the Crucifixion, Jesus uproots all that remains of our false ego, of uncaring man bent on his own private projects and life-scripts; of any meaning that we derive from our philosophies, ideologies, politics or any idols erected by man's refusal to submit and give his life totally to others. This very physical act conquers our False Transcendence. 

This Gospel Is Scary

Father's Love

February 16. 1996
Sunday homily
St. Ambrose Cathedral
Des Moines, IA
USA

"In today's reading, Jesus says, 'Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his Cross and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life, for my sake, will find it.'

"This Gospel is scary, we have to admit it. Jesus tells us that we must deny ourselves, take up our cross and lose our life in order to find it. There's no way around this and Jesus doesn't try to sugarcoat it. But this is one of the truths of our Faith that must  be understood correctly or it is misused by the Enemy to scare us away from Jesus, from our Faith, from life.

"I think one of the most helpful distinctions in terms used here was made by Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk who died in 1968, in his book 'New Seeds of Contemplation.'  In it, Merton distinguishes between the True Self who is created and willed by God---always known, intended and loved by God---and the False Self which is created by fear, created by us when we don't believe we are loved by our Father in heaven. So, out of fear, we create an armor that will defend us and we attempt to make ourselves invulnerable to whatever comes. In that process, we harden our hearts so we don't love and we're constantly trying to build our own little kingdoms. A child without a parent does become hard, like a street urchin, who learns to be tough in order to survive.

"So, if we understand this distinction, this hard saying of Jesus becomes easier. If we perhaps hear Jesus saying here, 'If a person wishes to come after Me, he must deny his false self, take up his cross and follow me. Whoever would save his 'false' self, will lose it but whoever loses his 'false' self, for My sake, will find his 'true' self.'

"Even though this way of translating Jesus' words is a little cumbersome, it helps us understand that He is saying that our process of  annihilation is not of my True Self, which is created and nurtured by God. Over the centuries, a harmful strain of masochism and self-hatred has crept into Christianity. The Enemy tries to falsify every good thing and he has truly falsified this one. Many people are deep-down afraid that, if they give themselves totally to God, God will abuse them or take away their freedom.

"Now imagine that. The God who created us and redeemed us wants to destroy us. How can God contradict Himself? Many people have had abusive experiences with parents or others in their lives and live in an unhealed state. We all tend to project our 'unhealedness' on to others and so we project these past experiences onto our heavenly Father as well.  Obviously, we have to purify that notion and realize that we can't re-make God into our image and likeness.

"But we also have to purify a deeper tendency we have of not trusting God and not believing that He is truly in love with us. Jesus said in John 10, 'I've come that you might have life and have it to the full...Whereas the thief comes only to rob and kill and destroy.'  Very very frequently, we have a fundamental, almost unconscious, belief that God will rob or kill or destroy me if I allow myself to fall into His hands.

"But Jesus has come only to destroy what is false in us. The armor with which we attempt to keep ourselves invulnerable to love and keep us from receiving love, the armor of that False Self, must be destroyed, crucified and shattered but only so the real, True Self, the vulnerable self, the loving self, the self made in God's image and likeness can emerge.

"And that is what Jesus is saying here about losing our false life so that we may finally find our true life. Not that this makes the losing part any less painful; it's always going to be painful. We always feel like something necessary to ourselves and our lives is being destroyed and taken away from us. But, at least, this purification of our faith and our trust in the Lord should make this dying a bit easier. We all have to take this great jump of Faith into the Father's arms, just as Jesus did on the Cross."

Reaching for Jesus' Heart

June 2, 1989
Feast of Sacred Heart and the 16th Anniversary of my ordination
Petersham, MA


"My heart is reaching for Jesus' heart. I need to keep reminding myself that our souls, His and mine, are already touching. I feel a need to lay my head on His chest, like John, because that's where God's faithful, compassionate love meets us and where our human love is returned perfectly to God...

"In thinking about this, I realized with joy that in and with Jesus' heart, I can give perfect love to God, even when I feel nothing. So, while I 'fill up what is lacking in His sufferings for the sake of His Body, the Church' by taking up my Cross everyday, Jesus Himself fills up what is lacking in my sufferings, in my ardor, in my sacrifices.  He supplies and gives me to appropriate as my own, His life, His virtue, His love! He has 'become my justice and holiness, my wisdom and reconciliation.'

"As I experienced more of this Great Exchange during prayer, my heart felt like it would burst with the love transfused from His heart...Throughout my prayer was undulating and climbing a Gregorian chant of love and praise which I didn't feel was a distraction but rather a form of praise...How can I communicate this transfused Love more effectively to others, especially my students at Prep? How can I share this Love more often with the Lord? In reading Abp Sheen's book on the daily Holy Hour and Celibacy, I was touched by his practice of short, frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament throughout the course of the day. He compares it to the tenderness, solicitude and delicacy of spouses who work at their relationship...I need to do more of this. With Him, as with others, I can tend to be insensitive and neglectful..."

A Letter from Hospice

May 20, 2011
Wauwatosa, WI
USA

"Sometimes we are a disappointment to ourselves and others. Just let me reflect a bit on this emptiness I am feeling, that we all feel from time to time, and what might be done about it.

"Experience of prayer over the years has taught me to tolerate and even to value emptiness--that blank time when there are no thoughts or feelings or inspirations. St. John of the Cross has taught the world that God needs to empty us of ourselves in order to fill us with Himself. He weans us and dries us up so that we have no alternative but to wait for Him to come. Jesus told us that He was 'going to prepare a place for us' and 'I will come back again and take you to myself.' Still, we wait and wonder and often wander...

"When we look at Scripture, we see that almost all of Jesus' post-Resurrection appearances occurred at times when His followers were empty. For example, Mary Magdalene was distraught because the tomb was empty and she thought someone had come and stolen His body. Jesus speaks her name and she recognizes Him.
Another time, the disciples returning to Emmaus are disillusioned because Jesus whom they had thought was the Messiah ended up crucified. Unknown to them, Jesus draws near, gets them talking about their emptiness and then chides them for not understanding that the emptiness of the Cross was the necessary prelude to the fullness of the Resurrection. He enflames their hearts with a Scripture lesson and they recognize Him in the breaking of the bread.
Then we also read of the apostles hiding behind locked doors in the upper room for fear of arrest by the authorities. The Lord comes through the doors, shows them His wounds, eats with them and so overwhelms them with joy that they could hardly believe it because it seemed too good to be true.
Subsequently, Peter and some others, jittery with cabin fever in Jerusalem, decide to go up to Galilee and fish. But alas, after a whole night, they caught nothing---emptiness---until the morning when a stranger on the shore told them where to cast their nets for a bountiful catch. After Jesus cooked breakfast for them, he invited Peter, who was feeling guilty and afraid for having denied Him, to go for a walk and to be forgiven and sent again to care for others: 'Yes, Lord, you know I love you. Then feed my sheep.'

"Each of us has times of loss, failure, loneliness, emptiness and lack of spiritual feeling and desire. Just as I felt that I had 'nothing to say or give' to you when I started this letter. We must not panic or despair but wait with holy longing for Jesus; or we must just go about doing what we know is His will for us. He tells us, 'Do not let your hearts be troubled...in my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If there were not, would I have told you that I'm going to prepare a place for you?
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will  come back again and take you to Myself, so that where I am you also may be.' (Jn 14:1-3).

"Jesus is always with us when it least seems that He is. He waits for our act of trust. And then He reveals Himself and fills our hearts with resurrection joy!"

Hinds Feet on High Places

December 13, 1991

"I've given much thought and prayer lately to asking the Lord to show me what my 'personal vocation' is. Today, in prayer, I came as close as to this discovery as I ever have when I read Habakuk 3:17-19 in the Breviary:

'For though the fig tree blossom not, nor fruit be on the vine,
Though the yield of the olive fail and the terraces produce no nourishment,
Though the flocks disappear from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls,
Yet will I rejoice In the Lord and exult in my saving God.
God, my Lord, is my strength.
He makes my feet swift as those of the hinds and enables me to go upon high places.'

"Even though I've read this passage many many times, today it deeply consoles me because it is the truth. In our nothingness and poverty, God's glory shines and His power is perfected and manifested as He fills us with His life...This is truth for all, of course, but for me it is personal and particular. So many of my favorite Scripture passages are built around this same theme. E.g., 2 Cor 12:7-10, Rmns 12:1-2, Hbrws 10:5-10.

"My own history of grace and salvation is reflected in all these passages and revolves around the way God has worked through allowing me to taste my existential poverty in my weaknesses on every level....All these weaknesses and failures and trials were/are really invitations by my Lord to accept His self-gift, to empty myself and be filled with Him, thus becoming more my true self.

"I recall, Lord God, the great grace you gave me while I lived in Korea. Instead of spreading the knowledge of you throughout Asia, you chose instead to meet me in my extended illness, in my inability to become fluent in the language etc and you came into my leaky little house and stayed with me in my poverty until I recognized You and, therefore, recognized more of who I really am. Just as you did in Bethlehem, and with Zaccheus and at Golgotha.

"As so I learned to praise You in my poverty. That what I perceive as one reality, You, by means of your presence, change into a higher reality as I begin to praise You. And so my personal vocation is Praise in Poverty...This seems to be the thread or cord upon which You have strung all the beads of my joys, sorrows and my glory: The Paschal Mystery lived out in my own flesh...Protected by Mary and Joseph and instructed by Ignatius, You are forming my identity as your son in the Son...

"This grace seems to help me explain better the paradox that I feel in my bones. That is being
a Living Desire,
a Perpetual Advent,
an Empty Fullness,
a Loveless Passion.
To this I will add, a Praising Poverty!

"Is my identity then precisely the first Beatitude?
Part of me rebels at the idea and realization of being poor forever in this world, at ever deepening levels. Dearest God, give me the grace not to refuse this coming and this embrace of Yours! Amen."