How I Love Thee

 

 

O Deus Ego Amo Te

O God, I love Thee, I love Thee ---
Not out of hope of heaven for me
Nor fearing not to love,
 and be In the everlasting burning.

Thou, Thou, my Jesus, after me
Didst reach Thine arms out dying,
For my sake sufferedst nails and lance,
Mocked and marred countenance,

Sorrows passing number,
Sweat and care and cumber,
Yea and death, and this for ME
And Thou couldst see me sinning !!!

Then I, why should not I love Thee,
Jesu, so much in love with me?
Not for heaven’s sake; not to be
Out of hell by loving Thee;

Not for any gain I see;
But just the way that Thou didst me
I do love and I WILL love Thee;
What must I love Thee, Lord, for then?
For being my King and God.  Amen.

 

--- Gerard Manley Hopkins

 

 

It’s amazing how you can read things 1000 times, and then suddenly you read it again and it hits you with new meaning.  The Bible is like that, but the above prayer in my breviary, which I glanced at, at least 100 times over the years, suddenly hit me yesterday, and I underlined some of the words as above.  I guess Lent and reflections on the Passion will do that.  I’ve been reading some deep reflections on the Passion this Lent.

This morning, however, I listened to Deacon Tom Lowe on Notes From Above, on the local Catholic Radio station.  In recent weeks his show, with Sr. Sarah, has had some wonderful music and reflections.  Dcn Tom spoke about Judas, and his betrayal, and looked at it deeply in a way I’m not sure I’ve reflected upon, or at least not recently.  He posited on what Judas was thinking when he betrayed Jesus.

He and the other apostles likely accepted that Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah, but their expectations on what the Messiah would do upon his arrival were not what Jesus was doing.  And after the triumphant arrival in Jerusalem and the large crowds singing hosannah they may have thought this was the time.  This was the time for the Messiah to take charge of his people and cast out the Romans.  He had spoken to them of suffering and dying for them, but they likely thought that was what a warrior leader would say, but it confused them somewhat.  Perhaps, Dcn Tom mused, it confused Judas more.  Why wasn’t Jesus leading the charge?  Perhaps Judas thought that Jesus was too humble, and he didn’t appreciate what the Messiah should do, to take charge and lead his people.  So perhaps the betrayal was just a nudge to get him to take action.  Judas had seen all the miracles, huge miracles, Jesus had done.  If the Romans came to arrest him, would THAT be the thing which finally triggered him to action?  Despite what Jesus said, perhaps Judas really didn’t have any idea what Jesus meant.  Maybe he betrayed Jesus to trigger him to start his kingship reign on earth.  “Surely,” he may have thought, “he will never allow himself to be arrested.  I’ve seen all his miracles.  And what a big one it will be when these Roman idiots try to arrest him.”  Maybe Judas thought his kiss of Jesus was that of a friend --- “I’m doing this for you, to trigger you to action.  You’ll thank me for doing this, just wait.” 

And maybe when Judas saw what was happening, what Jesus was letting happen ---- and Judas knew Jesus could stop it if he wanted to --- then, then finally, Judas got it.  And now he was more than embarrassed for having tried to trigger Jesus to action, action Judas thought He was meant to do.  Maybe that’s why Judas tossed the coins back at the Romans saying, in effect, this is not what I thought would happen.  And when he saw it carried out to the end, perhaps only then did he realize that it was HE who had betrayed the Messiah and the Jewish people he loved.  And then he committed Suicide.

That reflection on Judas’ motives were striking to me.  Maybe he thought he was just doing what was right??  And then I thought how many times I act that way. O Deus ego amo te.

Who Are You?

Saturday, at morning mass, the Monsignor read from one of the daily Christian meditation magazines (I forgot which).  He read: We cannot find/embrace Jesus without finding Him in the Trinity, without finding Him in humanity.  He said that was a quote from a well-known scholar, Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis.  As he quoted the words, my mind recalled some recent readings of mine which had taught me a new lesson unity of being, and now God seemed to be repeating that lesson to me, so I’d “get it.”  But when the monsignor noted the author of that quote, I REALLY “got it.”

A book has been sitting on my bookshelf for many months.  It is a very thick book, about 900 pages, written by the man the monsignor had quoted.  The book is titled Fire of Mercy, Heart of the Word. It is the 4th and final book in a series of meditations on the Gospel according to Saint Matthew.  The first three books went very deep into what St. Matthew and the people he was writing for thought, and how they thought and acted in the time and culture of Jesus.  It is not nearly as simple as you might hear in any sermon.  Going word by word, Leiva-Merikakis doesn’t just interpret the original gospel, or even just interpret the original Greek language which he uses for his meditations, but he puts the Greek words, phrase by phrase into the culture of the time they were written.  Leiva-Merikakis takes you back to that time, and you understand and feel as the original hearers of those words did.  This final book starts with Matthew 26: 1-5, the start of the plot to kill Jesus.  The reason this book has sat on my bookshelf is that it is on the Passion and death of Jesus.  In a way, I fear reading this book and not just knowing, but FEELING the death of Jesus and all that He and His followers went through, intimately, in my very being.  

Various other books I have been reading lately have shown me something I never before knew about Jesus, and the Jewish faith He was born into.  Back then, there was no word “religion” to describe the Jewish faith or any other faith.  The word Jewish was a word which told you how those people lived.  They went to Temple, had those feasts, etc., etc..  Looking at what they did, you described how they lived as being Jewish.  That’s why when the followers of Jesus, most of them Jews in the start, started doing some different things it bothered the Jewish people --- the followers of Jesus were not living like Jews do.  And at a certain point the Jews described this growing group of people as Christians, followers of Christ.  It was because they lived that way.  There was a recent song titled “You’ll know they are Christians by their love.”  That is how you knew any “religion” in the time of Jesus.  You described people by how they lived and acted.  Christians acted with love.  (I wonder if a stranger today, looking at how we live and act, would know we are Christians.) 

Other recent books/reflections I have recently read describe in more detail that “knowing” possessed by faith and faith-filled people.  It is not just a simple set of rules, like a catechism.  So, Jesus became human, in part, to show humans how they were created to live.  His disciples followed Him to hear His words yes, but also to see and feel how He lived.  A disciple wasn’t like a student who memorized words from a textbook, they absorbed who the teacher was.  In part, that was why Jesus was with them for three years.  And even then, it didn’t all come together until the Holy Spirit came down upon them.  His disciples were created in the Image of God, to live and after a period of time of watching and listening to Jesus, to make who He was part of “who they were.”  

You have make Christianity your very being, how you live, growing in love of God and neighbor.

Leiva-Merikakis: 

We cannot find/embrace Jesus without finding Him in the Trinity, without finding Him in humanity.

- - - - - - - - - -

I was driving in rural areas past some old farmhouses, and I saw one which had some gravestones nearby.  I recalled that used to be the normal way of life and death in this country, people and families living near each other, and graves at a common family site or next to their common church.  Living in community enabled people to absorb the family way of life, which for Christians usually meant living, eating, and praying together.  That’s why the Eucharist is called communion, the food that brings us together.

I’m saddened when I see families break the family unity.  They don’t see the total-ness of being they are destroying.  The ones who break away often justify their action by saying: “but that is who I am.”  

I wonder if Adam and Eve, still in the Garden of Eden today, would they describe the reason to choose the eating of the apple as being: “but that is who I am.”  They are different from the people God created them to be, in His image.  Maybe they should use those words, because in their very being they went from beings who loved and trusted in God in all things, to ones who didn’t trust Him anymore.  And human beings, now on earth, have been trying to rebuild that original level of trust ever since, that level of BEING.

My Catholic faith and family is focused on bringing back that union; to once more be one with Him and His family, becoming one in being with Him.  

So, is that who you are?

Who Will Want Those Babies?

 

I once had a conversation with a friend many years ago on the subjects of contraception and abortion.  At one point they said: “Well, if they don’t do something to stop them, who will take care of those unwanted inner-city babies?”  And I instinctively responded: “I will.”  And in frustration they walked away.

That conversation and question came to me tonight.  The culture’s focus on wanton sexual behavior has only grown much since that conversation, and those sexual actions will not change overnight, even if Roe vs Wade were eliminated.  The activity that resulted in aborted babies will not just stop overnight, nor will the pregnancies.  “And who will want all those unwanted babies?”

I recall the stories of the spread of AIDS in Africa, and the many deaths there, and what happened then.  Parentless children abounded, but “or course” they were taken in and raised by neighbors or friends in the village.  The children knew a new family who loved them.  There was no mass increase of children on the streets, starvation, opening of orphanages, or government care programs.  The villagers took care of them (and this still happens today).  The commandment to Love Your Neighbor is lived out, as an “of course”.

One of the criticisms of Catholics is that we don’t live what we preach.  Love your neighbor?  What would our churches, our parishes do if there were suddenly a mass of unwanted children in our community?  Would our priests and bishops take to the pulpit to demand government programs?  But no government program can do what we are commanded to do: “Love your neighbor, as I do”.  And the Bible often tells how much Jesus loved children, and we should too.

- - - - - - - - - -

In His blessings, God has made me aware of a number of ministries around the world which focus on unwanted children.  They have two things in common:  they are not government programs, and they were started by one person.  And there is one other most crucial thing:  they bring love to those children.

-          The Lingap Center in the Philippines was started by a man from Jackson, Michigan.  Compelled by the Holy Spirit, he started the care center for unwanted street children.  It has cared for hundreds in a facility where they grow their own food, have mass every day, go to school, and many have gone on to college, some returning to help others.  And the children there often go out to the streets where they once lived, where some children still choose to stay, and they help feed them a good meal --- IF, they will sit and be educated for an hour.  The Lingap Center is now rated one of the top orphanages in the Philippines.

-          Mary’s Meals was started by a man who heard of a war-torn area where children were starving amidst the battles.  He loaded a truck with food, drove across Europe, and went through the battle lines and fed them.  Mary’s Meals now “helps” feed over a million children each day --- supplying the food IF the children go to school AND the parents cook the food.

-          There a number of wonderful, loving shelters for pregnant women that I am aware of, so they and their babies can get past the reason for which they felt required to consider an abortion.  Maggie’s Place is one I am fond of.

I’m sure you may know of other examples of how one person changed many lives, but regarding the question posed by this paper:  Who will want those babies which will no longer be aborted?  I expect there will be many new government or liberal company methods to end or avoid pregnancies (and not curtail “our sexual freedoms”), but that should not be the Catholic answer.  What Would Jesus Do is the question to pray and meditate over.  What if only 10 unwanted babies were placed on your church doorstep; what would you do?  Are you making plans for that opportunity to Love Your Neighbor?

Is The Eucharist Food?

 

I stumbled across recently something that I knew, but didn’t KNOW.  I’ve often heard it said that the Eucharist, the consecrated host which has turned into the Body and Blood of Christ, is food.  Some have said that a Catholic mass is like a gathering around a dinner table of the altar, and we share The Bread of Life.  It’s said that the manna in the desert pre-figured the Eucharist; the manna kept the Jews alive in the desert.  Well, really, it wasn’t JUST the manna, for God also gave them water.  Bread and water are said to be the basic foods of life.  The question which came to my mind recently was: If bread and water are the essence of foods for life, why didn’t Jesus say over bread and water at the Last Supper:  This is My Body and This is My blood?  Did He instead consecrate wine as His blood because it was red in color?  If so, that seems a pretty petty reason.  Why bread and wine?

What I stumbled across recently was the importance of wine to the people of Jesus’ time.  You can see it at the wedding feast at Cana; Jesus’ first miracle was changing water into wine.  Wine was needed to celebrate the wedding.  You drink wine to celebrate.  So, when at the Last Supper Jesus consecrated bread and wine into His Body and Blood, He was giving his apostles basic food of life --- bread and Jesus --- and the means of celebrating that life --- wine and blood, which He gave to them from the Cross.  Jesus’ giving of His Body and Blood to us, at the Last Supper and on the Cross, is a thing to celebrate, for now Satan and the power of death were defeated; now the gates of heaven were open for us to enter.  Of course, there is lots more to be said about that, but the point which newly caught my attention was that reason for the usage of wine, versus water.  When I receive the Eucharist at mass, or when I go into the Adoration Chapel to adore Jesus’ presence in that Host before me, I will try to remember that He indicated this is not just something to be seen with reverence and awe, it is something to celebrate.  When we see movies about Jesus’ Passion, they are produced to cause us sadness at what God had to do for us, all the pain and suffering.  They rarely touch upon WHY He chose to do that, which is a cause for celebration.

We often forget that suffering FOR THE RIGHT REASON is a good thing.   There are lots of examples of common people doing this, heroes in war, bone marrow donors, or people who make financial sacrifices for others.  One thing many don’t understand is that even if we don’t see a reason --- why is this happening? --- we can create a good reason: “Jesus, I offer my pains to be joined with Yours for the souls of sinners.”  I’ve often heard it said that complaining about suffering is a waste; offer it up.

Well, I seem to have run astray from my original topic, but on a kind of related matter … I just listened to Fr. John Riccardo’s latest 20-minute podcast titled: Make Time for Beauty (#143 at www.actsxxix.org).  Fr. John is recovering from Covid and He had time to read and reflect during his illness, and one thing that he reflected on was Beauty.  In beauty, whether in sunsets, fall colors, or magnificent art (like The Pieta statue in St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome), all beauty can open our hearts to the awe we yearn for.  Beauty is a reflection of God, and yearning for it is part of how we were created.  It’s kind of a basic thing, like the eating of bread and water, only much more enjoyed when it is bread and wine.  It is awesome.  It’s a beautiful thing.