No One Hopes Alone

That's the title of today's Dynamic Catholic Advent reflection.

I don't think I have anything to add to that.

Coincidence?

Today's Advent reflection from Dynamic Catholic has the same title as the local Catholic opioid response program I've been working with: Choosing Hope.

Hope

Today's Best Advent Ever article (well, I see it's actually yesterday's, based on the time I finished and published this post) discussed a faith-filled baseball player's response to the end of his career. I was encouraged to realize how it echoed my own response when i received a setback early in both my military career and my faith journey. (That is, it was early in both, not a setback in both.)

It seems as if i struggle more to hope now than i did back then. It seems as if my faith in God is not as consistent.

The first week of Advent

That single candle, burning in the darkness that it dispels, is a metaphor that I can almost believe after being curled up untouched throughout another lonely night in another season of isolation.

I'm still reading about hope in the daily reflections from Dynamic Catholic's Best Advent Ever.

Maybe . . . perhaps not for this life, but maybe.

Like John, like Elizabeth, like Mary, like Jesus

Each of the principals in today's reading from St. Ambrose offers us something to emulate. Christ brings Grace, prenatal John recognizes His presence, Elizabeth responds to John's intrauterine testimony with humility and acknowledgement, Mary proclaims a wondrous canticle of God's greatness. Together, they offer, respond to, and acclaim the Father's wondrous grace and mercy.

At times in our lives we are each called to take on these various roles in the proclamation of the Gospel. Sometimes we are in need of grace; at others we are the one recognizing God's presence or proclaiming His love to someone else who desperately needs it.

We are all called to receive Christ and manifest His presence to the world.

Today's Office of Readings

Since I primarily use the Divine Office during the seasons of Advent and Lent, and since Advent doesn't always have a full fourth week, I don't pray today's Psalm very often. I love the series of "isolated avian" references - pelican, owl, sparrow - though without knowing for myself how accurately they reflect each species' natural behavior. The last half of the second section speaks to why I believe that God has preserved me in spite of how utterly I've failed Him and those I love. The first part of the last section resonates with me right now because of the advancement of my kidney disease; I need to be careful not to let my mind get out ahead of that, though.

Today's Isaiah reading is more familiar (because the Office always uses this in the final octave of the Advent season, regardless of where it falls in the week), and every time I see the Lord refer to his stubborn people I must plead guilty.

This reading from St. Bernard gets me every time. (Rabbit hole warning: this link contains three others; one of them, though, contains the entire text of this reading, since the dated hyperlinks expire - or at least they used to; I haven't checked in a while.) The thing that strikes me about this reading this year is a shift in perspective: as anxious as the souls of all humanity throughout all of history are, collectively, for our Mother's answer to the angel, so much greater is God's desire for each one of us to provide our own fiat in response to Him.

Last week of Advent

If I am anticipating accrurately, there are some powerful readings this week.

Hear me, O house of Jacob, all who remain of the house of Israel,
My burden since your birth, whom I have carried from infancy.
Even to your old age I am the same, even when your hair is gray (or gone?) I will bear you;
It is I who have done this, I who will continue, and I who will carry you to safety . . . 

Listen to me, you fainthearted, you who seem far from the victory of justice:
I am bringing on my justice, it is not far off, my salvation shall not tarry;
I will put salvation within Zion, and give to Israel my glory. - Is 46: 3-4, 12-13

These words remind me that I am not the first to experience God's presence and power and then to know doubt and darkness. His dawn breaks forth when it will best reveal His glory, but meanwhile He will not cease to sustain us through the night.

No man has ever seen God or known him, but God has revealed Himself to us through faith, by 87 which alone it is possible to see Him. - from a letter to Diognetus

I want to know, and God is reminding me that He has given me something that is better for me, now, than knowing: He has provided the gift of faith.

The whole of today's Office of Readings, including the Psalms, is worth the time, bringing me a great sense of God's loving presence exactly where I am.

Timeless truth

Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who depend upon horses;
Who put their trust in chariots because of their number, and in horsemen because of their combined power,
But look not to the Holy One of Israel nor seek the Lord!I - Is 31:1-3

Is this not too often our approach to everything? Even when we think to cry out to Him, we look to our own solutions, not trusting that if we act according to His loving guidance He will provide for our needs. Our fear drives us to avoid the help that He provides and to seek what seems a more likely means of our providence.

By his own powers man cannot see God, yet God will be seen by men  because He wills it . . . The Spirit prepares man to receive the Son of God, the Son leads him to the Father, and the Father, freeing him from change and decay, bestows the eternal life that comes to everyone from seeing God.

As those who see light are in the light sharing in brilliance, so those who see God are in God sharing his glory, and that glory gives them life. - St. Irenaeus, bishop, from a treatise against Heresies

Grace. Always, it is God's gift that gives us life.

More on humility

I was hoping to quote from the passage from The Imitation of Christ, by Thomas à Kempis, which I read in the breviary this morning, which was mainly focused on practical applications of humility. But my online source instead has the reading for the memorial of St. Lucy. This reading from St. Ambrose is also excellent, though, for the Advent season and for all who are seeking Christ, even though it comes from a book on virginity.

Whoever seeks Christ in this way, and finds him, can say: I held him fast, and I will not let him go before I bring him into my mother’s house, into the room of her who conceived me. What is this “house,” this “room,” but the deep and secret places of your heart?
Maintain this house, sweep out its secret recesses until it becomes immaculate and rises as a spiritual temple for a holy priesthood, firmly secured by Christ, the cornerstone, so that the Holy Spirit may dwell in it.
Whoever seeks Christ in this way, whoever prays to Christ in this way, is not abandoned by him; on the contrary, Christ comes again and again to visit such a person, for he is with us until the end of the world.

I find myself doing housekeeping of this sort during this Advent season, repenting of and renouncing those thought patterns that turn me inward toward myself rather than toward Christ.

I'm going to have to write about the passage from The Imitation of Christ later. Stuff in there really resonated with me, but I don't want to misquote it.

Testimonies of God's love

Our Lady of Guadalupe, Pray for us.

I read the historical account in one version of today's Office of Readings. But the Advent reading from a discourse On the Contemplation of God by William of Saint-Thierry strikes me more today:

O Lord, salvation is your gift and your blessing is upon your people; what else is your salvation but receiving from you the gift of loving you or being loved by you?

. . . and later:

He taught us to love him by first loving us, even to death on the cross. By loving us and holding us so dear, he stirred us to love him who had first loved us to the end.
And this is clearly the reason: you first loved us so that we might love you – not because you needed our love, but because we could not be what you created us to be, except by loving you.

. . . 

Everything he did and everything he said on earth, even enduring the insults, the spitting, the buffeting – the cross and the grave – all of this was actually you speaking to us in your Son, appealing to us by your love and stirring up our love for you.
You know that this disposition could not be forced on men’s hearts, my God, since you created them; it must rather be elicited. And this, for the further reason that there is no freedom where there is compulsion, and where freedom is lacking, so too is righteousness.

You wanted us to love you, then, we who could not with justice have been saved had we not loved you, nor could we have loved you except by your gift. So, Lord, as the apostle of your love tells us, and as we have already said, you first loved us: you are first to love all those who love you.

The voice, the Word

Yesterday the Office of Readings provided this wonderful reflection from St. Augustine that continues to amaze me every time I read it.

The word in my heart is to convey the love of God. Yet so often the "voice" of my actions falls short of that desire. I become like the mindless babbling into which we so often lapse when we are exhausted or frantic and lose our focus on the purpose of our speaking.

But also, too often I am a selfish voice, wanting to be loved for myself rather than desiring chiefly to let God be loved.

Prayer by the light of the wreath again this morning

First time this week, but for better reason. Was glad for the opportunity to help a friend see the light of God's love pierce through the perceived darkness, and a short night of sleep followed by a night of catch-up was a small price to pay for it.

Had a quote from St. Augustine I wanted to share, but online I can only get the St. Ambrose reading. Except for big exceptions, I focus on the Advent season over the saints' feast days, and at home with my breviary I can do that. Maybe I'll get a chance to post later . . .

Don't Ever Give Up

I've no idea if this post will be at all coherent, and that's okay.

Before I could start in on much of anything else this morning, I was reading a little of Matthew Berry's weekly fantasy love/hate, even though I don't have time for fantasy football. I like the other things he writes about in his column. Since it's Jimmy V week at ESPN, he ended that part with the quote from Valvano's famous speech at the ESPY's back in the 90's. It struck me, because of the strange feeling I had driving home from the pharmacy last night of wanting to set the cruise control, take my hands from the wheel, and close my eyes. I knew better than to give into this, of course. Oddly, it wasn't rooted in any circumstances of my life. Things are actually going pretty well.

After toileting, I lit the Advent candle for my first time of praying by its light in the morning. Sixth day of Advent. Clearly I haven't been doing this season right, not preparing my heart as I should, and that certainly has nothing to do with not having a whisky Advent calendar in my life.

I love to pray the Office of Readings during Advent and Christmas, by the light of the Advent wreath and then the Christmas tree. This morning's prayer time (link will probably not be valid indefinitely) was hard for me, but I think it will end up being in a good way.

Instead of the invitatory listed at the link above, I like to use Psalm 24 daily for most of Advent. This morning, when I reached the psalmist's observation about who can ascend to the holy place, I lamented my continued impurity and desire for worthless things. It was nearly a despairing feeling to know that I still struggle so much, until I remember that I am supposed to struggle, so that I might never seek to enter God's presence by any means except His grace as expressed in the Savior whom His people await. Then, in Psalm 34, I recognized that I am my own chief enemy, from whom I need the Lord to deliver me.

The Isaiah reading reminded me that all of God's children will ultimately find their place in Him, although some chastisement along the way may be in order.

And I still love the reading from St. Anselm, with its insistent call to make this time, this season, what it should be. I am not the first to long for God, even since Christ walked the earth fulfilling the Israelites longing for a Savior. I should, however, never give up seeking Him, or I shall certainly not encounter His presence.

A long-awaited Advent

I have so enjoyed spending the last few evenings reflecting on the Office of Readings with my bride. We have been combining the Evening Prayer psalms with the longer reflections from the OoR, and I hope she has enjoyed it as much as I have.

Today's reading from St. Bernard is one of my favorites. I have written a little about it thrice before, and will not quote it again here. It was especially nice to be able to share my enjoyment of it with my dear wife.

This is one of the readings that I look forward to encountering year after year, each time entering into it a little deeper than the time before. Bringing someone else I love into this one with me was a special treat.

Advent lessons

During Advent and Lent, I'm always tempted to skip the saints' feast days and focus on the daily Office of Readings for the season. But this morning I caught up again with St. Jane Frances de Chantal (from Saturday) and San Juan de la Cruz (today), both of whom had words out encouragement that I was in a good place to receive this morning.

Getting behind on Advent, already . . .

. . . but not in the usual way, yet.

A funny thing happens with the season of Advent. There are some great memorial days, but when I pray the Office of Readings for those days, it usually means I don't have time to reflect on the office for the Advent weekday.

So the very first weekday this Advent was the feast of St. Andrew. There was a really nice reflection on Andrew's probable role in leading his brother, Simon Peter, to Jesus. But since then I've been opening to Monday's daily readings, for last night's reflection and now again this morning, where a thought  from Isaiah has struck me. But the time with the Lord each day is more important than the specific "accomplishment" of it, and is about far more than my own thoughts. In this moment, it occurs to me that perhaps I have oft put too much emphasis on my own reflection rather than simply being in God's presence.

The thought from Monday's Isaiah passage, briefly:

How she has turned adulteress, the faithful city, so upright! Justice used to lodge within her, but now murderers. Your silver is turned to dross. Your wine is mixed with water. - Is 1:21-22

The next couple verses contain more of the same. Many fear a similar lament over America. I am more concerned about making sure that I and those I love don't have to hear such harsh words.

Come, Lord Jesus. Fill the hearts of your faithful.

Thoughts on a pastoral letter by St. Charles Borromeo

Beloved, now is the acceptable time spoken of by the Spirit, the day of salvation, peace and reconciliation: the great season of Advent.

It feels like a time to acknowledge the ways that I grew as a disciple last year, and the ways that I did not. More importantly, it feels like an acceptable time to let the Lord turn some of the latter into the former. I don't know why I keep feeling like I'm missing out on something by denying what I've let myself think of as a part of myself. But I think it's time to trust that God provides for the things that really are needs, just as he has provided abundantly for us financially.

When I pray the fifth Sorrowful Mystery, I contemplate the Seven Last Words of Jesus on the cross, along with the last three Stations of the Cross. One of these is, This day, you will be with me in paradise. I'm reminded, too, of the words of Psalm 95: Today, hearken to the voice of the Lord. This day is the acceptable time, and while that is true of every day, it feels especially true of this wonderful season of Advent.

One day, though, we will find that all days are one this day.

When we remove all obstacles to his presence he will come, at any hour and moment, to dwell spiritually in our hearts, bringing with him the riches of his grace.

True, except. It makes it sound as if it's up to us to remove all obstacles, when the only obstacle we must - or can hope to - remove is our stubborn, selfish will. As soon as we submit that to him, humbly, even acknowledging when we can't accomplish it, but only want to, and recognizing that the wanting is a gift of the richness of his grace, too, we find him transforming our desert into an abundant garden of spiritual blessing. The more we cooperate with his grace, the more he blesses us, or rather, the more we can receive his blessings.

So this Advent season, the Church calls us to prepare for him the place that matters most.

Who judges whom

I find myself thinking of a thought from Fr. Neuhaus. I suppose I shall start with the topic that came up at men's group. One of the guys has been wondering - as we are prone to do - about how to know at the end that we have lived well enough. It's a thought process that has scriptural roots to it, and if we're not careful about it, can cause us to having us cross over the line to thinking that we have to do enough to earn heaven, rather than the kingdom being a free gift that Christ has given to us, to which our lives become a natural response. "If it's all about mercy, then, and if there are no limits to God's mercy, does that mean that no one is ever condemned?"

There were lots of ways to address this, and several just from Death on a Friday Afternoon. One, of course, is Fr. Neuhaus' well reasoned argument that God's mercy is sufficient for that outcome, and that we should all hope for it, for the sake of every one of our brothers and sisters. 

Another one carries Fr. Neuhaus' discussion of our audacity in daring to judge the Creator, and his audacity in submitting to our judgment, a step further. The one constant throughout salvation history in our relationship with God is that he always respects our free will, even to the point of submitting to our judgment. 

So: what if the person who will ultimately judge me is the same person who judged Jesus? What if that person is me? 

What if our insistence on judging is the only thing that ever condemns anyone for eternity? And what if the nature of that judgment is this: our unwillingness to spend eternity with people whom God has forgiven may serve as the biggest obstacle to our entering into mercy and grace, which is the only requirement for my redemption?

Perhaps this is why Jesus told us "Thus will my heavenly Father do to each of you who does not forgive his brother from the heart."  Because my brother will be forgiven by God, and if I do not accept that, then I cannot enter the kingdom. I will be like the brother of the prodigal son, standing my ground outside in a huff.  Perhaps this is why he taught us to pray that the Father "forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." 

So we begin this Advent season of mercy and grace, which marks the beginning of this Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy. I know I am called to deeper holiness this year, but it must be rooted here. 

Conforming (phase 2), God Prepares a Way for Our Salvation - The Mystery of the Incarnation (step 8), Session 6

Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, "Sacrifices and offerings thou hast not desired, but a body hast thou prepared for me; in burnt offerings and sin offerings thou hast taken no pleasure. Then I said, `Lo, I have come to do thy will, O God,' as it is written of me in the roll of the book." - Heb 10, 5-7

Not a very long reflection on this one, except for my gratitude that Christ came for this purpose and a reminder that this has major implications for us if we are the Body of Christ.

Conforming (phase 2), God Prepares a Way for Our Salvation - The Mystery of the Incarnation (step 8), Session 5

Well, somehow I have misread the calendar and not realized I was supposed to be finished with this step on Saturday. So another step tonight, then one in the morning, and we'll double up as time permits during Christmas. (yeah.  right.)

Yes, the LORD’s eyes are on those who fear him,
who hope in his merciful love,
to rescue their souls from death,
to keep them alive in famine. - Ps 33, 18-19

Sometimes - a lot, of late - I feel like the Israelites in the desert, having grown accustomed to and then weary of this gift of manna with which God feeds my soul. I grumble in my mind against the tedium and challenges of gathering my daily bread, rather than being appreciative that God has given me what I need to sustain me.

For instance, when the battles against and ADHD and ODD six-year-old have again reached the point at which she rages against how mean I am as I try to hold her to some standard of behavior, to draw a line that doesn't allow her to intrude on her siblings physical persons or to destroy property, or attempt to teach her obedience when it is so completely against her nature, it is easy for me to be blinded to the patience with which God is blessing me, keeping me from losing my patience and lashing out against her in anger. Instead he is giving me a capacity to love her which I know that she recognizes, after the outburst when she is calmed.

Tonight was hard.

The worst of this happened in the car as I waited for her mom and grandma to take care of their business in the fabric store. It was challenging for me to not blame them - especially my bride - for needing to do this errand now, with the little ones already beyond their limit of being still and patient. It is a challenge for me to see that God is keeping me alive in the famine of my life, through them, as he supplies emotional support and connection that I sometimes judge as too meager for my needs.

Tonight was hard.

Yet I hope in his merciful love to provide what I need. I know why the manna must be gathered daily: it is to teach us to rely on God's providence rather than our own or even rather than the gifts by which he supplies my need.

There is much more in this wonderful Psalm, but tonight this is how he is keeping me alive in famine. I know: it is bountiful banquet, too.

Our soul is waiting for the LORD.
He is our help and our shield.
In him do our hearts find joy.
We trust in his holy name.
May your merciful love be upon us,
as we hope in you, O LORD. - Ps 33, 20-22