Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 9

And he went up on the mountain, and called to him those whom he desired; and they came to him. - Mk 3, 13

Ah, but now Jesus desires all of us, and calls all of us to himself. How often we - well, I - fail to respond.

Sometimes, I confess, I still feel more like Judas: outwardly answering Jesus' call, yet keeping my secret heart hidden, not fully trusting that I can share my deepest concerns and perceived failings. Most of the time I think it's okay because my motivations are different, because I do this from a desire not to hurt others. But this results in a pattern of closing myself off of which I then avail myself whenever I find it convenient.

There is no one with whom I'm fully open, really. I wish there was. It is no one's fault, though, save my own.

Today's words

Today's words comes courtesy of the Words at Play blog on the Merriam-Webster site:

pasquinade \'pass-kwih-NADE\ - 1. a lampoon posted in a public place  2.  satirical writing :  satire

I suppose I shouldn't feel bad when the linguists have to look up a word, too. This post is one of the best I've seen on this blog, which I read from time to time when a headline catches my eye.  I wanted to go with a NOD ending to the pronunciation.

ressentiment \rih-'sahn-tee-MAHⁿ\ (am more than a little curious how that last letter of the pronunciation shows up on the blog) - deep-seated resentment, frustration, and hostility accompanied by a sense of being powerless to express these feelings directly

The same blog post led me to this word (lifted from the same article as the previous one). Perhaps it has been found less lookup-worthy because its meaning is more intuitive, even in the absence of context, although it probably isn't obvious to the reader that we should be using a French pronunciation.  

One final observation: Charles Cooke is obviously writing opinions for a more highfalutin audience than I comprise.  I guess I feel a little relieved that I didn't have to look up ignominious.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 8

Mt 9, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?"

Oh, thank God he still does.

The thing is, there are two types of people who ate with Jesus: those who were never the same for the encounter, and those who never allowed him to make a real difference in their lives.

Sometimes I'm afraid that I'm in the wrong group.

I suppose that's the purpose of this step, and of the next several, each of which has "Arriving to a Decision (cont.)" as part of their title.

Today's word

captious \KAP-shuss\ - 1. marked by an often ill-natured inclination to stress faults and raise objections  2. calculated to confuse, entrap, or entangle in argument

I think that, when I've encountered this word in the past, I have always been able to ascertain its meaning from context. I've definitely seen it previously.

This write-up included a word about which I've previously posted, when it was itself a WOTD, but today I couldn't recall its exact meaning. And, as I predicted then, I mispronounced it.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 7

(Lk 5: 1-11, 27-32)

The first thing that strikes me in my second reflection on this passage is the different ways in which Jesus calls us. In the first section, the fishermen are stunned by what Jesus does before he calls them to follow him. First they hear his teaching, then the magnitude of their catch, after they had fished all night without success, astonishes them. In a way, it seems unsurprising that they should follow after such a turn of events. Yet it is clear that they are looking for something other than blessings upon their livelihood, for they leave that behind in order to follow Jesus. But Matthew - er, Levi - is simply sitting at the tax office. Perhaps it is nothing more than Jesus' willingness to have even a tax collector - shunned by almost everyone - as a follower which draws Levi in. Again, whatever it was, his life wasn't going to be business as usual, either.

The second thing that stands out is that, regardless of the specifics of how Jesus calls us, it is still up to each of us to choose to respond, to follow even though it may require radical changes to how we make our decisions and live our lives.

 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. (32) Were there any righteous, they would have no need of repentance, nothing that could serve as visible evidence that Jesus has entered their lives and made radical changes there. The repentance of the sinner is the testimony to those on the outside that something wondrous has taken place in this person's life.

I wonder what evidence I present for others to see.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 6

(John 1, 35-51) When Andrew and (presumably) John begin to follow Jesus, it is at the prompting of John the Baptist. This is often the case with us, too: someone points out to us who Jesus is, and we begin to follow him. Immediately Jesus begins to probe their motivations: What do you seek? (38)  I doubt they are being evasive when they answer a question with a question; they know they're searching, but they probably aren't quite certain what they're searching for, just yet. But when we begin to follow after Jesus, we will find more than whatever we thought we were looking for. Rather than rebuke them for avoiding the question, he simply invites them to Come and see. (39) Likewise, when we are looking for the difference that Jesus will make in our lives, he doesn't tell us from the outset all that we are in for. He just invites us to trust that he will not disappoint us.

As we begin to follow Jesus, life becomes a series of encounters revealing who he is and who we are both in him and without him. Jesus is always infinitely More than we understand him to be. We can only begin to know him more fully as we respond to his invitation, Come and see. As we do, he will amaze us continually, both by who he is and by how he knows us better than we know ourselves (47-48, which is, of course, a natural consequence of who he is).

What about the pain that we nonetheless encounter along the way? On the radio yesterday I heard Chuck Swindoll address the question of why we deal with such crushing hurt in our lives, and the answer he provided seemed spot on: it may serve many purposes, but one of the main ones is to transform our imagined self-sufficiency into God-reliance. Jesus knows already who he is and who we are in him for all eternity, but we do not. Only by his stripping away every other reliance we have in our lives do we begin to know how he is all we need. Many of those events are the natural consequence of living a mortal life among our fellow broken brothers and sisters, but God uses them for a good that ultimately far outweighs the pain in them.

Conflicts, theirs and ours

Okay, I know that it can be hard to recognize or understand the narcissistic abuse that underlies our son-in-law's seemingly righteous indignation. But really, there was no need for mom to attend a wrestling meet - even a major one - on dad's weekend when a) there's a meet every weekend, and b) she had legitimate plans on that day to do something that needed to be done - in this case moving out, which you very well understand needed to be taken care of on dad's weekend. And we ought not think for a moment that their oldest daughter's anger at her mother the next morning over this incident was anything less than a reflection of dad's complaining to the kids about their mom, trying to convince them that she doesn't love them enough to put them first. So stop taking his side. Sometimes he's right, but even when he is he's still ultimately just being controlling. He probably doesn't even realize he's doing it.

On a different topic: don't go shouting hallelujahs when your phone rings at 5 a.m. with a notification that the school is on a delay, because it finally worked. For starters, you don't freaking need to know that anymore. Secondly, I thought we'd already agreed that my need to sleep at that hour outweighs your need to not have to go to all. the. trouble. of checking a website when you wake up.

You don't work for a living; you can sleep in as late as you want after being awakened at 5 o'clock in the morning. I've never had that luxury.  If you want to keep getting those calls, let me know and I'll start sleeping in another room. You just decide which is more important to you and let me know.

And no, I'm not going to assume you're going to see this here. I will be sure to discuss it with you in person, and will try to be less snarky about it when I do.

Today's words

thrasonical \thray-SAH-nih-kul\ - of, relating to, resembling, or characteristic of Thraso : bragging, boastful

Pretty sure I've never heard of Thraso. I suppose I need to brush up on my Roman theater. (or not.)

 vauntful \VAWNT-fəl, VAHNT-\ - vainglorious, boastful

I'm pretty sure I've heard of this one.

106 days . . .

. . . until the first of two dates this year (any year) that would best minimize the survivors' ongoing pain of it.  (293 days until the second one, but that would carry over to Christmas, so that won't work.)  Oh, I suppose leap day might be the best candidate, actually. (371.)

If I could change only one decision . . .

. . . it would be keeping his secret - which became my secret as a result of my complicit silence - for so long.

But that would in turn change so. many. subsequent decisions.

Today's words

jeunesse dorée \zheuh-ness-dor-RAY\ - young people of wealth and fashion

A word I hope to recognize should I encounter it again, but doubt that I shall ever use.

Also, I learned that I've been mispronouncing "acumen."

Our home feels empty

I'm glad our daughter is getting set up on her own, and that she and the kids now have a place of their own.  But I'd have visited last night if I hadn't wanted them to have that first evening together on their own. I miss them already.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 5

This phase, and this step, include a section on arriving to a decision. I am fascinated to find that even though we are not undertaking these exercises together, my bride and I have both agreed that we need to take advantage of a program that the parish is offering this spring. So we shall be enrolling in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University program, which I am hopeful will help get us more on the same page concerning our financial goals and priorities in the context of our faith.

In a related insight that is very clearly not the sort of decision that the step calls for, I felt challenged by Jesus today. The retreat material makes clear that this decision involves a choice that isn't between good and evil, between righteousness and sin, but is rather more about determining what good path the Lord would have us walk.  But that of course requires us to first choose righteousness. I had a sense during and after Mass of him asking me if I really think that the challenges and temptations that I deal with are greater than the ones he faced. Thoughts return to me that I've encountered over the course of the past months, including the idea that we are only tempted as far as we resist. In a sense, once we yield the temptation is reduced in intensity. Further, the same Holy Spirit who strengthened Jesus against his temptations indwells us, as well, so we have the same source of strength that Jesus had to answer our temptations with the truth of who we are in God.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 4

And he went up on the mountain, and called to him those whom he desired; and they came to him.  And he appointed twelve, to be with him, and to be sent out to preach  and have authority to cast out demons: Simon whom he surnamed Peter; James the son of Zeb'edee and John the brother of James, whom he surnamed Bo-aner'ges, that is, sons of thunder; Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Cananaean, 
and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed him. Then he went home; - Mk 3, 13-19

I was concerned at first, when I saw that we were moving back to St. Mark's gospel, that we might be hearing the calls of Andrew, Simon, James and John. But those happen in the first chapter of this gospel, so this calling out of the apostles to their specialized role.

We are not, of course, all called to be apostles. But we are all called to follow Jesus, though, and to follow in holiness and love as he leads us.

Direct hit

Maybe they'll fake it until they make it. Or maybe it will at least look like they never faked for even a moment.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 3

This session is based on the same event as the second passage of session 2, but now from St. Matthew's account (9, 9-13). Since we're to have repeat sessions on each of these passages, I'm going to try to overcome a little disappointment in what is a virtually identical account, except for the use of the Greek form of Matthew's name rather than the Hebrew/Aramaic Levi used by St. Luke.

I guess the main thing that remains is for me to acknowledge afresh, in light of how my morning has gone, that I find my only hope in Jesus' insistence that he came not for the righteous, but for sinners. But this is Lent, and I must also remember that Jesus' ministry in my life is about my transformation as well as my redemption, or more accurately, that my redemption is only complete to the degree that I allow the Spirit to transform me. That is what this season is supposed to be about, for me. I pray that my attitude toward pleasure and toward others would become more like God's and less like the world's. But my attitudes and habits are so deeply ingrained, only God can possibly make this change in me. I thought I'd been having a pretty good year so far, too.

Who you quote on FB

You know, friends: whether they're fictional characters or real people, you should really know who you're quoting. I've recently seen friends promote quotes by Col. Jessup, Hans of the Southern Isles, Mr. Bumble, and Anais Nin. None of these are role models for me. When you quote someone like this, I lose interest in whatever you're trying to say.

Be careful who you quote

I keep seeing quotes used online in support of people's viewpoints, which come from fictional characters that have no business of having their dialog used for these purposes. Here are the most recent:

I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it! I would rather you just said "thank you", and went on your way.  - Col. Nathan R. Jessup, A Few Good Men, quoted to indicate how we should treat the military with respect but completely ignoring that it was a quote from a megalomaniacal character who was attempting to cover up actions which resulted in the death of a soldier, and whose cover-up resulted in the death of another subordinate.

If you would just stop the winter, bring back summer...please. - Hans of the Southern Isles, Frozen, quoted by people who are tired of the current winter weather. Please: you're quoting a villain who was determined to usurp a kingdom and willing to kill people off to do it!

If that's the law, then the law is an ass - misquote of Mr. Bumble, who actually said in Oliver Twist, "If the law supposes that . . . then the law is a ass," in response to the suggestion that the law supposes that a wife acts under her husband's direction. The person who quoted it was a 72-year-old man arrested in NJ for transporting an unloaded 300-year-old flintlock pistol in his glove compartment, and he actually prefaced his quote by saying, "as a wise man once said," which may be the first time that Mr. Bumble has been described as a wise man. I'm pretty sure that the best that can be said of him is that even a blind squirrel finds an occasional nut.

I'm forgetting one more, but maybe I'm just thinking of someone's misguided quoting of Anais Nin.

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 2

This sessions scripture consists of two sections from chapter 5 of St. Luke's gospel, verses 1-11 and 27-32.

The first section is a different version of the call of the fishermen, in which Jesus commands them to drop their nets where they've fished all night and they bring in such an amazing haul of fish that they believe in him right away. I can often relate to St. Peter's response: Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. - Lk 5, 8b.  

I saw a great post on FB earlier today: Satan says "Look at your sin." God says "Look at My Son." No one was more aware of Peter's sin than Jesus, not even Peter himself, and so it is with us. Yet he calls us, and resists our protestations with his gentle persistence: Do not be afraid; henceforth . . . (Lk 5, 10b), and naught remains but for us to leave everything behind and follow him. But his way of our leaving everything behind is unlikely to be as we envision it. I am certainly living the life he is calling me to live, yet I find I must leave behind my attachments to how I think that life should be, to the needs that I believe aren't being met in the ways I need them to be. I need to long to love as Jesus does, not to long for any other thing.

Another great example follows in the second passage, the calling of Levi, who likewise "left everything" but managed to set out a feast for Jesus and surround him with his tax collecting friends, all in need of the care of the Great Physician.  We are unworthy to sit in his presence, and when we judge others as unworthy we miss the grace-filled point of Jesus' love and ministry.  Not one of us has a hope except for him, and he calls us all to leave behind our old approach to life to revel in his instead.

I'm not doing such a great job of reveling lately. I am filled with sadness and loneliness and despair. But I must get my eyes off of myself and back on Christ, and leave everything, and follow him. Thank you, Jesus, for coming for the sick, like me.

God meets every need

If I don't have it then, in the eternal scheme of things, I don't need it.

A memory

I never played Little League - or any other organized youth sports, but baseball would have been my first choice, far and away - because my dad was embarrassed by my lack of athleticism.

Sobbing

Oh, God, I am so alone.
Where are you?
How long?

Conforming (phase 2), Jesus Calls His Followers - Arriving to a Decision (step16), session 1

So they have reworked the calendar to remove the specific dates that I was using for a sense of where I wanted to be by Holy Week - which has a step for each day, each with a list of Scripture passages. So either I need to keep track on myy own to work ahead, or I suppose I could just take vacation all that week and be like a monk, praying seven times a day for the whole week. At least I've figured out why I've been having trouble connecting on my wife's computer.

 The first passage for this step is the calling of the first apostles from St. John's gospel, starting at verse 35 through the end of chapter 1.  This account of the calling leaves a very different impression from the synoptic gospels, which can leave one with the impression that Jesus just meets some strangers by the shore and yells at them and they come and follow. By contrast, the callings in St. John's accounts are heavy on introductions. It's likely that one of the first two to whom John the Baptist points out Jesus is St. John himself. Andrew very explicitly brings his brother, and Philip is brought in through his relationship with these brothers.

I find these early encounters marked by a lot of what we expect at the beginning of relationship, questions and discussion that seek to answer the question we so often have of new people we meet: can I trust you?  As he does throughout this gospel, Jesus seems to somehow provide the assurance that each person needs in response to that question.

He does the same for us, too, when we sincerely seek him.

Today's words

deflagrate \DEF-luh-grayt\ - 1. to burn rapidly with intense heat and sparks being given off  2. to cause to burn in such a manner

I was pretty close on this one, which I think I've encountered before.

overweening \oh-ver-WEE-ning\ - 1. arrogant, presumptuous  2. immoderate, exaggerated

I wanted to define this one as if it had an "a" in place of the third "e." 

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 7

The final session of this step is a reflection from their Manual on the three degrees of the love of God. But this reflection wasn't exactly what I thought it was going to be, focusing more on our love for God than on God's love for us as I expected. And the degrees surprised me a bit, too, but I suppose they make sense.

The first degree that they mention  is the desire to avoid mortal sin, which destroys our relationship with God. At least they don't refer to this as the fear of mortal sin in which so many of us grew up, but rather the earnest desire to avoid actions which permanently separate us from God. So yes, I suppose this is a degree of loving God.

The second degree is like the first, but in the authors' view it is the desire to avoid also venial sin, or any sin which even interferes with our relationship with God.

The final degree, on which they spend the most time, is the desire to seek God in all things, and includes loving our neighbor as well.

One could have a lot of discussion concerning how close these degrees really are to each other. I don't want to presume that I am truly striving for the final one, especially when I am only beginning to feel as if I have any power to choose the second. But I long to draw nearer to God and to those around me for the sake of knowing and reflecting his love more perfectly.

Here is where this discussion of the degrees of the love of God falls short for me: the third degree in particular is clearly a reflection of and response to God's initiating love for us. The extremes to which he has gone for our sake are nothing compared to the baby steps we are able to take in reply.

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 6

Okay, time for the repeat session on Jesus' temptation. (Mt. 4, 1-11)

I'm borrowing this initial idea from someone else here, and I don't remember who. But just as Jesus answers his temptations through his knowledge of truth based on Scripture, we also are strongest against our own temptations when we know who we are. Perhaps this was the reason why the Father spoke his pleasure from the cloud to Jesus. Of course he did so because it was true; God speaks only truth, and he speaks truth into existence. So when God likewise tells us that we are his beloved sons and daughters, it is a truth that he is speaking into being, one that strengthens us against the buffeting of Satan's temptation by reminding us of who we really are and long to be. The enemy brings his strongest temptations and accusations to bear against that, because our truly believing this truth about ourselves defeats him utterly. We have no desire for the illusions he offers us, of fulfillment through gluttony or power or even of escaping responsibility for our choices by offering them as a test of God, when we are at all certain of God's love for us and how fully it alone completes us and fills all our need.

I suppose this is why I am not obsessing over seeing someone receive Reconciliation last night who may be living in a way that will undermine the sacrament's efficacy in her life. It would be easy for me to say, "Yes, but . . . " and list my objections to that person's choices, but then I would take on the role of the Accuser, and I want no part of that. It is also tempting to believe my role is to make her see her errors, but that would be succumbing to the first tempation: to take on the role of God. Through the vivid dream of a friend in prison I have received a comforting command from God which I instead choose to apply: "Pray. Watch me work." His longing for his loved ones is always greater than our own, as is the pain he feels on our behalf which we are often unable to feel for ourselves when we make choices that separate us from God. I could judge that someone is living a lie by approaching one sacrament when they are violating another one, but that judgment has no place in the heart of one who has himself received unfathomable mercy. Rather, I long for others to know it, too, and I know there is a grace at work in each sacrament that exceeds the will of the human participant. We are incapable of knowing the full extent to which God is at work healing and transforming us each time we receive him in Eucharist, in Reconciliation and all the sacraments, as well as in prayer and in all the other ways he comes to us.

So my eyes filled with tears of hope and longing, which I am convinced were not fully my own, and I pray that those who were Reconciled last night would fully receive the grace available to them and be strengthened against the temptations in their own deserts.

The cold never bothered me anyway

Sometimes I think I like winter because my heart feels at home there.

I guess I'm referring to a lot of different aspects of the season in that one sentence.

• The way the bitter wind buffets, honestly cutting through to the core, where no layer of artifice provides the illusion of anything other than what is.
• How loving family and friends somehow warm you anyway, when you seem to have no heat resources of your own.
• How a storm sometimes follows close on the heels of a previous one, before you've had a chance to recover any sense of normalcy, making you just deal with it as best you can.
• How you steel yourself against the onslaught, knowing you are strong enough to survive it.

Okay, I'm probably going to come back and add to this one.

Today's word

xeriscape \ZEER-uh-skayp\ - a landscaping method developed especially for arid and semiarid climates that utilizes water-conserving techniques (such as the use of drought-tolerant plants, mulch, and efficient irrigation)

I didn't know this one, but it made sense. I must have associated the prefix with the imaging technology. And I was also not familiar with these related words:

softscape \SAWFT-skayp\ -  vegetation (as shrubs and flowers) that is incorporated into a landscape — compare hardscape

hardscape \HARD-skayp\ - structures (as fountains, benches, or gazebos) that are incorporated into a landscape

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 5

This step differs from some of the previous ones in that it uses only a couple of scripture passages, with instructions to reflect on each one twice. This is a wonderful technique for gaining insight into God's Word, which has so much depth and wisdom that we can never plumb the depths of it. Coming back to a familiar passage later often causes us to first rediscover the things we have found there previously, but returning soon after reflecting on it the first time will often steer our thoughts in a very different direction. This is part of the beauty of the process of Lectio Divina, which can also be applied to sacred reading outside of the Bible. The first of the four steps in the traditional Benedictine approach to Lectio - read, meditate, pray, contemplate - calls for slowly reading the same passage four times, each with a different focus or point of view.

I'm pretty certain that I'm short-changing the process a bit by reflecting too quickly in response to what I read, but I am also feel God using this anyway, even though I may be "cheating" a little. So, today's reflection on Mt 3, 13-17, with and expectation that it will be different from the last one:

Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.  John would have prevented him, saying, "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" - Mt 3, 13-14

Is it not always thus? We say, "I need . . . ," acknowledging our shortcomings before him, and Jesus comes to us by taking our need upon himself. We need, all of us, to be baptized by Jesus, and we are, but rather than having to sojourn into some distant wilderness on a mysterious quest to find his baptism, he comes to us. As a precursor to our immersion in his divinity, he shows us how he is fully one with us in our humanity. As we aspire to become more than we could ever be, he is willing to take a form far less than he has always been. Because we need to be washed clean of the sin that stains our souls, he is washed clean before ever taking it upon himself to eradicate it forever.

Today's words

diapason \dye-uh-PAY-zun\ - 1a. the principal foundation stop in the organ extending through the complete range of the instrument b. the entire range of musical tones  2a. tuning fork  b. a standard of pitch

I was not anywhere near guessing this one. One of the example sentences barely fits into definition 1b and, it seems to me, almost represents a somewhat new definition. I'd never have pronounced this correctly; it would have come out more like \dye-AP-uh-zahn\.

tantara \tan-TAIR-uh\ - the blare of a trumpet or horn

Two new words over my extended (due to illness) weekend, and both are related to music. I believe I've heard this one before, and knew how to pronounce it, at least.

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 4

The scripture reading for this session is the temptation of Jesus, from chapter 4 of St. Matthew's gospel. I have always thought of the immediately preceding verse as a message from the Father intending to bolster Jesus' strength for his fast and temptation; the first verse of chapter 4 then indicates that the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, and I have interpreted this to mean that the Holy Spirit who visibly descended upon Jesus at his baptism at once then led him to do something he was not considering beforehand.  I still think that this is a valid interpretation of these events. But things with God are often "both, and" rather than "either, or," so it might also be the case that Jesus was considering a prolonged fast prior to his baptism, and the Holy Spirit (and the Father's voice) confirmed for him that he was on the right path, so he put his thoughts into action.

Early in my Christian walk, I tended to think that the temptations which Jesus faced were pretty unique to him. But the more I read, think and pray about them, the more convinced I am that they are all rooted in tendencies which we ourselves share. I have lately been led in this train of thought by a recent reflection in these Exercises, and I won't further expound on that here. Rather, I think that it is better for me to remember, as the blessed season of our annual Lenten retreat approaches, that whenever we are acting in ways which please the Father, there are sure to be new temptations that arise. This is an inevitable part of the process of growing closer to Jesus through the Holy Spirit, and we do well not to cling too much to the mountain of Tabor, but quickly draw our sustenance there and steadfastly resume the work of allowing God to put his love more fully into action in our lives.

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 3

The time I was going to spend on this step over the weekend instead became times of rest and attempted recuperation. So now, back into it, moving on to the scripture meditations now:

John would have prevented him, saying, "I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?" 

But Jesus answered him, "Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he consented. 

And when Jesus was baptized, he went up immediately from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and alighting on him; and lo, a voice from heaven, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased." - Mt 3, 14-17

I believe God is most pleased with our humility, when we are willing to acknowledge that obedience is more important than whatever other, lesser truth we might invoke. This episode was, of course, not the first instance of the eternal Son's humility. I believe that it is somehow part of his divine nature to be in humble obedience to the Father's will, knowing that the Father desires only the greatest good. I also believe that it was part of his human nature to be tempted to rebel against God's divine will, and that the pleasure which the Father expresses here is an affirmation that resisting that temptation will keep Jesus on his ordained path.

I believe that God is equally pleased with us when we truly seek his will rather than our own. Even if we might misread it in the specifics, our willingness to humbly submit to God's will as he has revealed it in Scripture and church teaching pleases him. The degree to which we can then live out what is revealed therein should serve as an indicator of our level of spiritual freedom.

Staying out of a disagreement, yet expressing my thoughts

50 Shades would seem completely unobjectional in circles in which sexuality and novelty are celebrated as inherently good for their own sake, because pleasure for its own sake is viewed either as a positive or even as a means of personal growth. 

But these things are no more true of our sexuality than they are about any other good thing. Every gift from God has a proper place for which is was intended and for which it thrives, and outside of that place becomes like a cancer. 

The thing that concerns me is not that society embraces 50 Shades; we should expect nothing else. In fact, I get frustrated with Christians who expect nonbelievers to live by the standards to which God calls us. It isn't that there is anything wrong with pointing out the inherent shortcomings in the secular attitude, but we must do so without a sense of moral superiority, as if we are better than nonbelievers because we have accepted a gift we don't deserve. 

So my first concern about 50 Shades is a reflection of a much larger one: that so many within the church think that it's acceptable to remove a beautiful gift of God from its proper place and boundaries and simply revel in it for its own sake. We have grown up immersed in a society that snubs its nose at quaint ideas of propriety and purity, of the preposterous idea that any good thing should be reserved for God and the purposes for which he designed it, let alone that we ourselves might exist only to glorify him so that all might enter into his boundless love. There are many believers who see nothing wrong with the world's point of view, especially versus the perceived alternative of puritanical restriction on something the world sees as too long withheld from us. These believers have accepted the lie that we have further evolved and become more enlightened than our primitive forebears of centuries past. Any time spent reading their profound thoughts ought to disabuse us of the notion that we are superior to them merely by virtue of our technological advances. 

But the temptation to consider our sexuality as outside of God's purview, as something that we should decide for ourselves the best use of, is the same as for wealth, possessions, power, happiness, leisure, etc. These are each good in proper context but become harmful when taken out of it, or when taken to extremes or made a goal into themselves. And when the church joins secular society in misusing God's gifts rather than proclaiming the higher truth, we are not doing our job.

All of that, though, does not mean that my concerns about 50 Shades are limited to its effect on church members. Quite the opposite. As someone whose  adolescence and subsequent life were marred by the abuse of the concept of mutual consent, I believe that I am well qualified to observe that yes, for some people - perhaps many people, who will certainly almost never realize it at the top - this slope  is very slippery.  The more we mainstream sexual permissiveness, the more people will get caught up in their weaknesses. Also, the more people will attempt to manipulate others into actions that they would not choose for themselves.

Finally, these books and film themselves bear testimony to the existence of a slippery slope; fifty years ago they would have found only a niche acceptance rather than the widespread acclaim they have today. Simply stated, though, these glorify sexual revelry outside of the marriage covenant by promoting forms of it which are novel and therefore exciting, when that is not God's plan for any of us.

But we know better, right?

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 2

. . . the ultimate purpose of the contemplations of the life of Jesus is to help the companions in their own choices of life . . . . the encounters and events of the life of Jesus always involve a decision for or against him and his way and the direction of that path. At this point instead of continuing meditations of decision in which the companions would deal with the concrete issues of their life, they deepen their conforming to Christ and that alone should become the source of solution for their unsettled questions and provide the criterion of decisions. - Step by Step Retreats, Step 15: Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God, Orientation and introduction

All of this boils down to a longer version of the modern tetragrammaton WWJD?, but there is an important distinction: Ignatius expects us to determine this based on scriptural study and meditation. Too often the WWJD? approach is simply a lofty version of "do good," with "good" defined primarily by our own poorly-formed conscience and underdeveloped understanding.

In every good choice, as far as depends on us, our intention must be simple. I must consider only the end for which I am created, that is the praise of God our Lord and for the salvation of my soul. Hence, whatever I choose must help me to this end for which I am created. I must not subject and fit the end to the means, but the means to the end. - St. Ignatius of Loyola, as translated and quoted by Step by Step Retreats, Step 15: Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God, Orientation and introduction

Too often our approach is backwards: "What outcome do I desire? How can I make my choices so they bring about that outcome? How can I convince myself that these are God's will for me?"  St. Ignatius is reminding us to take the opposite approach in every situation. First, God has revealed his will so very clearly for so many circumstances: it is for us to glorify him with our lives.  Of course, we often don't know what outcome will occur as a result of our actions, and we are all about focusing on the outcome.  So, too often, we make choices so as to facilitate the outcome we desire. Or we think we know what our needs are and how to act so that they are met, and so we trust ourselves more than we do God to provide for them. But if the only outcome that truly matters is the salvation and sanctification of my soul, then the other circumstances over which we so fret and which lead us to choose imperfectly now lose some of their power to induce anxiety and wrong thinking in us.

Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. - Victor Frankl, as quoted by Step by Step Retreats, Step 15: Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God, Orientation and introduction

This is worth contemplating for a while. What, indeed, will I decide is the purpose of my life? Is it merely eudaemonistic/narcissistic self-indulgence, or will it serve a good greater than my own personal well-being?

It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain. - Jn 15, 16a

This reminder which St. John provides in the Last Supper discourses would serve the apostles crucially over the course of the next few days and weeks, as they would see their Savior killed and encounter him anew as their resurrected Savior. It serves us well, too, to remember that we are at our finest only when we remember that we are God's chosen ones, holy and beloved (Col 3, 12 etc., as frequently quoted by Fr. Dave) and let that central reality of our lives guide the decisions that we make along the way.

Lots of good stuff in this orientation and introduction!

when my phone vibrates . . .

. . . and i know it's just the login confirmation code that I just asked for, and i'm disappointed anyway that it isn't an actual person touching base with me . . .

Today's words

I'm thankful for today's Dictionary Devil puzzle, which is making up in one day for the lack of new vocabulary this week from the Word of the Day feature:

eudaemonism \yü-ˈdē-mə-ˌni-zəm\ - a theory that the highest ethical goal is happiness and personal well-being

I knew that the concept of "good" had to appear in this definition somewhere. I fear I may be living with someone who embraces this philosophy. I was mispronouncing the second syllable, and probably continue to do so if I ever again encounter this word.

rhebok \ˈrē-ˌbäk\ - a brownish-gray antelope (Pelea capreolus) of southern Africa

It seems that I may have previously encountered this word at some point. I was also mispronouncing the first syllable of this word, but only because I didn't want to pronounce it like the shoe, which turns out to have gotten its name from the animal, so I have a chance of remembering how to pronounce this one the next time I see it. (I think I trust the "best answer" at that link for the source of the name Adidas more than either acronym that some of the other answers invoke.)

vagary \ˈvā-gə-rē; və-ˈger-ē, vā-; also ˈva-gə-rē\ - an erratic, unpredictable, or extravagant manifestation, action, or notion

Well, I actually knew this one, but had only seen it in plural form. I had a friend once with whom I used to disagree about pronunciations. When we looked them up, it always turned out we were both right, though I tended to use the preferred pronunciation and she tended to use an alternate one. Here's one of those words that I would have thought others were mispronouncing if I ever heard them use one of the alternate pronunciations.

Conforming (phase 2), Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God (step15), session 1

. . . a healthy human psyche is characterized by a good sense of humor, too and we find also this in the personality of Jesus as the gospels present him. The humor of Jesus is subtle and manifests a great gift of wit and irony, precise timing and play of words, aimed to heal and convert the listener. - Step by Step Retreats, Step 15: Baptism and Temptation of Jesus - Three Degrees of the Love of God, Orientation and introduction

Humor as a tool of spiritual growth. What a concept!  I wonder who came up with it?

I have actually long considered certain passages in which I could picture Jesus chuckling as he underscored a message, or thought he might have been needling his disciples a bit where others read a tone of chastisement. I think that considering this possible aspect of Jesus' personality leaves us with better insight into both his humanity and his divinity. There are places where it obviously wasn't on display, such as when he cleared the money changers out of the temple.

But even in the accounts of his temptation following his baptism there could be elements of humor in his responses, as if he can't quite believe that the devil would trying this or that particular tactic against him. (I'm pretty sure we're headed to one of these passages later in this step, so I'll leave further discussion for when we move into that text, after I devote another session or two to this introduction.)

Today's word

moxie . . .

Okay, we all know how to say it and what it means, but I had no idea of its origin. (It's pretty rare for me to list a word for that alone.)

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude in Scriptural Case Studies (step14), session 3

He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man named Zacchae'us; he was a chief tax collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. 

And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, "Zacchae'us, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today." 

So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, "He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner." 

And Zacchae'us stood and said to the Lord, "Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold."  

And Jesus said to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost." - Lk 19, 1-10

I was wondering what passage they'd use for the third type of attitude. What a perfect choice! I've reflected on Zacchae'us often over the decades, but this gives me a new context for considering his example.

It seems to me that, as is true for so many other aspects of a sincere faith journey, the first requirement we must meet to model this attitude is an understanding of our proper relationship with God in Christ Jesus. So often we approach what God asks of us as if he is something other than a loving Father who always wants what is best for us, and who graciously bestows it on us despite our unworthiness to even be called his sons and daughters. We see God instead as trying to limit our joy by imposing restrictions or obligations on us, and this keeps us from seeking what he truly desires for us in our lives.

I am certain that Zacchae'us was under no delusions regarding his stature within the community (pun intended), and understood what a great privilege it was that Jesus would come to his home. When this is true of us, we tend to receive Jesus joyfully, too! But when we fail to understand what a gift God has given us in adopting us as sons and daughters and delivering us from our sin, everything else we do becomes a struggle in the undercurrent of this denied truth.

We have heard a lot of talk lately about being people of gratitude, and that is very important, but if our first appreciation is not for the most important gift of our unmerited salvation, putting on the proper attitude of humble obedience to God in each thing will be impossible for us.

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude in Scriptural Case Studies (step14), session 2

Okay, I've been looking ahead at this retreat, and I'm really kind of annoyed. There are steps coming for Holy Week that are assigned a single day but which contain seven scripture passages! I don't know how anyone outside of a monastery would have a hope of doing them justice. I think I may work ahead a little if the intervening steps provide the option. Since there are only three passages assigned for this step, which I started only a couple days behind, I believe I'll try to work ahead a little starting now.

As they were going along the road, a man said to him, "I will follow you wherever you go." And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head." 

To another he said, "Follow me." But he said, "Lord, let me first go and bury my father."  But he said to him, "Leave the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God." 

Another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home."  Jesus said to him, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."  - Lk 9, 57-62

It's pretty clear how these represent the second of the three attitudes. Each of these people express their desire to follow Jesus, and he reveals to each of them how they are unwilling to put into action all that doing so really entails. We ought not judge them harshly, though, for we are often the same way. We misunderstand what it will truly mean to follow Jesus. I, for instance, am hesitating to speak the truth in love to someone because I am afraid of what it might do to our relationship.

It is all well and good to be convinced that a certain path represents God's plan for us, but unless we are willing to truly commit to that path we may be further removed from God's will than those who don't try to follow it in the first place. I believe it is less pleasing to God to disregard what we believe he wants of us than to not care what that might be in the first place.

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude in Scriptural Case Studies (step14), session 1

This step will use a scriptural example of each of the three attitudes elucidated in the previous step (which I included in my final session as I found it most revelatory to consider the three attitudes together). In this step I expect it will make more sense to reflect on each scriptural example separately. Again, I will not be limiting myself to financial considerations here, though I can see that this area is also due some attention.

The First Type:

And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: `Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.'" 

And he said to him, "Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth." 

And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me." 

At that saying his countenance fell, and he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions.  - Mk 10, 17-22

Each of these examples is certain to imperfectly mesh with the three illustrations from the last step/session. This man represents the first type because he knows, because Jesus has told him, that he should give away his wealth.  In the previous step, the first couple did not consider whether it was truly God's will for them to give away their wealth; they simply assumed that they should based on their own understanding. (This is how this scriptural example departs from the first type in the parable.) However, the underlying result is the same: the man goes away and appears unwilling to follow through on what Jesus has told him to do, just as the first couple failed to allow their belief that they should give away their wealth to actually spur them into action, to truly change them.

We need to be careful how we decide what we believe God is telling us to do. That was a key part of the Three Types discussion from the previous step.  The biggest obstacle to our truly seeking God's will is that we are afraid that God will tell us to do what we do not want to do. Sometimes he does! At other times, he merely reminds us that what he wants for us is more trustworthy than what we want for ourselves. This is true in our finances, our relationships . . . in every part of our lives, really.

For instance, I can't help but wonder: did our decision last night to retake control of our laundry situation today - when we really didn't have the cash on hand yet to do it - interfere with a way that God wanted to provide for our needs, or perhaps for someone else's?

I see the people around me choosing to do whatever it takes to get their needs met, without consideration of whether that choice contradicts God's clearly-revealed plan for our lives.

Am I doing any differently?

I know that I'm trying to.

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude toward Possessions (step13), session 3

The first couple is convinced that they should give away the money in order to be free of it, but they never do it actually. They have the mistaken concept that holiness equals radical renounce(ment) but they cannot do it and in consequence they live with a sense of guilt because of the attachment. This couple honestly would like to love God, but their underlying attitude is fear (of) him; they are afraid of a demanding God and find the heights of sanctity too frightening. They live and die remaining in the same situation without resolving the problem and really answering God’s call to them.

The second couple decides beforehand that they should keep the money and use it for good, for example investing it and from the profit regularly give to the poor. They desire to be free of the attachment to the money but in the same time also want to keep it, convinced that they know how to use it for the greater glory of God and how to "save their souls." Also this couple remains in their attachment which they don’t recognize either, they decide without discernment with an attitude of bargaining and a sort of pretense.

The third couple too wants to be free of attachments, but they do not decide immediately either to get rid of the money (or) to keep it. They don’t act without discernment, without seeing how this sum integrates in their life and relationship with God. Their attitude is the abandonment and openness toward God, a childlike trust in him as they try to understand for what he inspires them and what is the better for them. When Jesus in the gospels tells the disciples to become like children, he calls to this attitude of trust and dependence on God: "Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." (Mt 18:3) . . .  - Step by Step Retreats, step 13

Continuing my focus on non-monetary application from my previous two sessions:

I have attempted both of the first two approaches. In the first decade of our marriage, I was more like the second couple. I was determined to cling to what I knew I needed regardless of the impact it had on my bride and our relationship. If she had a problem with one of my friendships, I considered it "her problem." This created an adversarial relationship between us that tended to both separate me emotionally from my bride and draw me closer to my friend in emotionally unhealthy ways. My refusal to truly trust God to provide for my needs resulted in my determination to provide for them according to my own understanding.

Later I became more like the first couple. Understanding the pitfalls of my previous approach, I became unwilling to enter any friendship with the slightest potential for me to misuse it in that way. There were, of course (well, it's "of course" to people who know me well) good reasons why I overcompensated in this way. Perhaps God has used this period to provide enough distance from the earlier one to break a habit that I might have tended to fall back into. The thing is, when I finally reached the point of being able to find something more like the middle ground, I still had to break some of the old habits.

I think I'm still only beginning to see how to take each friendship as it comes, accepting in each case God's guidance over how to conduct it, being truly sensitive to my bride's needs as well as my own and my friend's, and above all seeking to truly honor and glorify God as I trust him in the conduct of my life. But my remaining attachment to the perceived needs that I am trying to have met, by insistence to God that he isn't providing for me in some way, is a clear indicator that I still have a long way to grow.

I think that, if we were journeying through the exercises together, my wife and I would probably need to focus as much on the financial aspect of this step as we would on the relational one.

To include the obvious conclusion of this step's meditation:

From this point of view, only the third couple goes through a transformation of their desire and reaches freedom from their attachment, while the first two did not change at all or only (temporized) about it. The dynamics of this therapeutic transformation of attitudes can be applied also to the struggles of addicted or neurotic persons with their problems. - ibid.

And I suppose this last sentence probably describes me more accurately than I would like to think.

Conforming (phase 2), Three Types of Attitude toward Possessions (step13), session 2

Imagine that each of the three couples obtains a great sum of money. The way in which they acquired it is honest and morally perfect, but as Ignatius puts it "not entirely as they should have, for the love of God,"  which means that they did not search for it as a result of a proper discernment process. There are many of this kind of thing in our life; we acquired or discovered them before reflecting or even thinking about how it fits in our existence and in our relationship with God. These things are morally perfect, to possess them is honorable and they might be the source of much good, but if not integrated in our love of God they constitute a "part of that wealth that seeks to absolutize itself and therefore become the starting point of true sin." - Step by Step Retreats, step 13

First, a consideration of what either St. Ignatius or Karl Rahner (it's impossible to tell without consulting the referred resource which of these two introduced this concept; for that matter Rahner may have borrowed from someone else) means in using the term "morally perfect."  From context, they clearly can't mean anything like "incorruptible" or "not susceptible to use for sinful purposes."  It appears to mean something more like "a thing that is good so long as it is kept in its proper place." When you think about it, this applies to pretty much every gift God has bestowed on us.

In the previous session I pointed out how my own application of this most urgently needs to focus on something besides wealth and material possessions.

Let us suppose that the couples in our example desire a great spiritual freedom and as they feel the attachment to this money presents an impediment of their goal, they want to free themselves of it . . . -  ibid.

This is where I am only beginning to enter into a deeper recognition that I still need to grow. There have always been ways that I think about my life and my circumstances that I now see represent attachments that reveal, at their core, that I tend to place my trust more in those things than in God to meet my needs. I suppose that, for me, this has always been primarily true of my emotional needs. For many years, this resulted in a tendency to place too high of a priority on certain of my friendships, to the detriment of my relationship with my bride. In some cases this resulted in those other relationships taking on some aspects that should have been reserved for my marriage.  It has only been relatively recently that I have learned not to allow this to happen, and as a result my recent friendships have been more balanced.

Yet I still find myself basically complaining to God that he is not meeting my needs because of the absence of the sort of friendship that I perceive that I "need" to have in my life, as if God has ever truly neglected my needs. So perhaps this present time is itself a gift from God, as much as my recent morally perfect friendships have been, to teach me to trust in him rather than in them.