I'm a thief!

"Recall now the two criminals. Mentioned in all four Gospels, they were called thieves by two of the Gospel writers. Whatever else they had stolen in their lives, the one, commonly called 'the good thief,' stole at the end a reward he did not deserve." - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon

I am convinced that the chief obstacle to Christians living our calling is our failure to realize that we are all, at best, the good thief. At whatever point we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we enter into the transformative journey to become Christ present in the world. And yet, rather than embrace the truth that we remain unworthy of the priceless gift that God has given us through Jesus, we often live our lives as though the purpose of our faith is to help us reach the point at which we no longer need a Savior. I'm pretty certain that isn't God's plan for us, but rather that we continually embrace our complete dependence on God's grace and mercy as poured out for us in Christ Jesus. 

We think of heaven as a reward, and indeed it is. But it is Jesus' reward, not ours. At our best moment, we are the good thief, undeserving of grace but receiving it because God is love and we, wretched though we be, are God's beloved sons and daughters. We deserve that no more than we do our own conception. 

The Great Reversal

 "Yet it hardly seems possible that injustice could be set right by a still greater injustice, that wrong could be set right by a still greater wrong. That is what St. Paul seems to suggest, however, in the passage in which he speaks of God in Christ reconciling the world to himself:  "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God." The language is radical. It is not simply that he bore the consequences of sin, but that he was made to be sin. The great reversal reverses all of our preconceptions: God must become what we are in order that we might become what God is. To effectively take our part, he must take our place." - Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, Death on a Friday Afternoon

Fr. Neuhaus goes on in the next few pages to further probe this idea of how we struggle to accept this truth because it fundamentally offends our sense of justice. Everything in us screams that this cannot be right, despite our having everything to gain from it. 

So why do we resist it? Could it be because we are afraid to embrace its implications? Forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation" (Lk 11:4). If God has taken the judgment we deserve upon himself, the first part of this verse calls us to a response that portends potentially great consequences. As for the second part, we have long believed the lie that our desires are a good thing and our sin is no big deal. We're fond of our temptations, and embracing the great reversal means that we must recognize the truth so that we can receive the mercy we have been given.

There is no way to accept God's mercy without becoming vessels of it for others.

A physical/emotional response

I just noticed a strange and revelatory response I had (have, I'm pretty sure; it felt familiar) to a frequent thought. I was setting aside a temptation to engage in an impure thought process that leads me to sin, partly because I just received prayer for this area last night in preparation for this weekend's Unbound seminar. It was the most subtly sublime moment of grace-filled, Spirit-driven self revelation, concerning a physio-emotional response that I have to temptation. As I decided to not engage in this thought process, I felt the muscles at the base of my skull contract, and I noticed that I thought of why I don't want to engage in that thought process right now, as if I was reserving it to return to at a later time.

As I say, this felt familiar, and I considered other recent times that I have felt this physical sensation. It turns out that it has never been so much a rejection as a postponement of my tempting thoughts, and it is a reason I have not been able to persevere in purity in this area. I then considered when else I have felt like this: it also turns out that this response was seared into me when I was being sexually abused. It is directly related to my resignation to my physical inability to ever force my way past my stepfather to escape from the room when I was a teenager. It became part of the inevitability of my submission to him sexually, and subsequently of my submission to sexual impurity in general.

Wow. This is exactly the sort of red flag I should have learned about in one of my rounds of therapy. It's a question I would now ask of anyone who shared that they struggle in a given area: go back to the beginning of the latest incident, and let's go through how your body physically responded before you realized you were responding. Then: when is the earliest time you remember feeling that way?

I'm not going to assume that the battle is over now. But I understand something about it that I never did before, a physical and emotional and thought process that ties in with the spiritual aspect that I've tried to invoke previously. Perhaps, now that I have all four pieces, I can have lasting victory in this area.

But . . .

. . . the love and grace I have received is my answer to the call of despair.

A general principle greater than any quotation

I keep scouring this chapter from Abba's Heart on forgiveness for that one quotation that leaps off the page and says, "Yes, this thought is the fresh insight that encapsulates this truth." And I just can't find any combination of Neal's sentences that accomplishes that.

But the one concept that he expresses that I love is the idea that unforgiveness is such a blocker for us spiritually because it is a rejection of the very nature of Jesus Himself. It isn't that "The vindictive Father will refuse to forgive you if you refuse to forgive others." It is that it is impossible to enter the Father's forgiving, merciful heart - on display in Jesus' tortured, lifeless body hanging on the cross - and to simultaneously keep our own hearts closed off by invoking on others the judgment which we ourselves deserve. I cannot receive God's mercy while I withhold it from others, and if I receive God's mercy I won't knowingly withhold it from others.

Now, there may be a number of reasons why I do so unknowingly. For instance, events from years or decades ago may have influenced our lives in ways that feel like part of ourselves, so we don't recognize anymore that we need to forgive the classmate who shunned us, the girl- or boyfriend who broke our heart, the parent who taught us to be so self-judgmental, or the sibling who belittled us. Or, I may have sincerely tried on my own to forgive an offense that hurt me more deeply, for which I need to enter into God's protective heart to sufficiently feel safe and be healed to be able to sincerely wish blessings for the person who hurt me. But unforgiveness for any reason is an impediment to God's liberating power. Fortunately, it need not be. God is eager to help us welcome our prodigal brother home.

For the life of me, I can't seem to remember the name of the young man with whom our daughter was living six months ago, who responded to their breakup by stealing household goods she needed to care for her children. I can picture him with his motorcycle, bandanna around his head, and clearly see his face in my mind's eye, yet his name escapes me even though I thought I'd never forget it. My heart wants to rage against him, on behalf of my daughter and her children, "Whatever the two of you went through, why would you take this out on my grandchildren!" Instead, I find I must lift up this clearly wounded young man, whose name the Father has etched on His own heart, and ask Him to bring him home.

As much progress as I sometimes think that I have made in the area of forgiveness, other people come to mind for whom I know I must also pray.

Not my will, but thine

There are practical ways in which we each need to apply these words of Jesus, and they're different for each one of us. I think we get a little dismissive of this idea in some of the small things in our lives, especially habitual ways we've come to accept weaknesses over which we have more control than we give ourselves credit. But what if the ramifications are bigger than we think they are?

The resurrected life we're called to live depends on putting more faith in God's revealed plan for us than in our own limited vision. It isn't that God will withhold mercy from us at any point, but the abundant life He wants to give us gets undermined when we fail to walk under His authority.

Now, we need to be on guard against a self-righteous mindset in this, as if we are trying to earn for ourselves what God is freely giving us. After all, it is Christ in us that empowers us to walk in the ways that are best for  us.

A grandchild to mourn

Neal speaks in his book of the granddaughter he has never met, for whom he and his family - and especially his oldest son - pray regularly. She lives in another country, and her mother (and her mother's family) has not allowed them any contact with her.

It reminds me of the grandchild we will never know in this life, whose unmarried father induced the child's miscarriage by violently punching our daughter in the stomach when she told him that she was pregnant. We didn't learn of this until some time after the events had occurred, and the young man had already been gone from our daughter's life for months. I prayed for this grandchild this morning, and asked him or her to pray for me and to pray with me for his or her parents. They have very different needs for spiritual and emotional freedom.

I have nine grandchildren, and I love them all. One knows the Father's love perfectly. I continue to pray that the rest will know Him, too.

Who I am (again)

I'm not quoting this directly, as I don't have the book (Neal Lozano, Abba's Heart) in front of me at the moment, but the gist of the thought is this: We can identify with our sin, or we can identify with our Father, but not both, and we must choose.

Again, this can go for positive traits in our lives, as well. As long as my intelligence, sexuality, wealth, or status is more important to me than my faith, it is an obstacle to my coming home to the Father's embrace. The thing that gets in our way is the idea that the Father is lucky to have me, rather than my being blessed beyond telling by the Father's mercy.

Above all other things, I am a son of the Father.

Whatever your life has been like, my greatest desire is for you to find your place as His son or daughter, too.

Incomplete picture

The Prodigal drastically underestimates the encounter that awaits him because he never truly understood his father. His memory is vague, and he does not see the whole picture. He remembers some kindness - that his father treated his employees well - but . . . (ellipsis in original) - Neal Lozano, Abba's Heart

The simple truth is that if there is any truth at all to what we believe, we all underestimate the encounter that awaits us. God's love and mercy are beyond our imagining. Our finite minds are bound by time as well as space, and our Father is infinite and timeless. So anyone who believes that they see the whole picture is fooling themselves.

That said, I don't think that's the case for Neal. Rather, he is merely pointing out how our - everyone's - incomplete understanding of God's love keeps us from running home to the Father at a full tilt, the way that He runs to meet us. Of course, since Jesus and the Father are one, His Incarnation and all that He did on earth, culminating in His passion, death, and resurrection, show us the lengths that the Father goes to meet us. Despite these incredible steps, it is still incumbent upon us prodigals to humbly turn toward home. And it is not possible that we do this without also welcoming back those who are prodigal from us.

Unworthy

In his long journey home, the Prodigal faces a hard truth - he is not worthy to be called his father's son [ . . . ] We distance ourselves from the Prodigal to avoid the risk he is taking. Our hearts protest: "No, I am worthy. I deserve better. I work hard. I am a good person - at least, I'm better than most . . . . The gatekeeper will have to let me in to the Father . . . . Surely I am good enough to get into heaven. We argue our case, justifying ourselves by excusing our failures and pleading our successes. We try to earn the love we are afraid to ask for. - Neal Lozano, Abba's Heart

Yes, this is Fr. Spitzer's "comparative identity" at work again. Only by receiving the mercy and grace that are freely offered us do we stop comparing ourselves to others and become vessels of God's love in their lives, too.

There is no more undeserving Prodigal than me. I used to say that with a harsh spirit of judgment toward myself, but now it is just an honest and grateful recognition of God's love and a desire that all should know it.

Getting to know my Father

I am really enjoying this book.

Though God has no body and is neither male nor female, He is Father. (Neal has developed this thought, and I will revisit a couple of the places he has done so, but this next sentence is the one I'm trying to soak in this morning.) Human fatherhood is the pale reflection of God's pure and loving Fatherhood, not the other way around. - Neal Lozano, Abba's Heart

I was already observing how my own experiences of fatherhood, both as a son and, especially (and that word is by no means me being harsh with myself), as a father, fell so utterly short of God's perfect Fatherhood, and here is Neal gently saying that yes, that's true, but it's true for every single one of us. Even the greatest human parent is a flawed, imperfect human being who falls short in some way from being able to provide for everything that his children truly need. It is impossible for us to do more than aspire and strive toward being the sort of parent we have in the Father, in Abba. But neither Jesus's perfection as Son nor Abba's as Father are meant to be standards we can never hope to reach, even when Jesus says, "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect." (emphasis added) There's a reason why this challenging line from the Sermon on the Mount is only offered in the context of loving our enemies, who do not love us! Abba loves us so perfectly that while we were still sinners (Rom 5:8) He sent His Son to deliver us back into His heart! The perfect Fatherhood of Abba's Heart calls us, no matter how we have been broken, to know Love intimately, closely, as we can only do by loving as we are loved.

from earlier:

Many people grow up in families but still sense they are orphans, feeling lost, lonely, isolated, rejected and abandoned. They cannot receive the affirmation of their fathers and mothers, either because actions speak louder than words or their own wounds do not allow them to accept it. They sense deep down that something is wrong with them, and nobody knows it. They believe that they will never measure up.
Alienation from God the Father can be felt in the pain and emptiness left by our parents, no matter how hard they tried to fill the void. As we walk further down this path, you may be confronted with that pain and emptiness. Do not be afraid. No matter how your life began or what was taken from you, the Father holds in His heart the healing you need. What matters most is that you are moving toward His open arms.

Ahh. Balm.

A broken moment leads to growth

I spat out the two angry words before taking even a moment to consider their predictable effect. The evening had already gone downhill, as the next round of conflicts with our granddaughters had washed away the glow of the pleasant evening we'd spent watching a movie together. I've seen that my wife's emphasis on placing obedience ahead of virtually every other consideration has not been nearly so effective with our grandchildren as it had been with our daughters - though I wish I'd known then what I do now. In the few chapters I read of The Explosive Child before returning it to the library, I began to get a glimpse of other, less confrontational ways of helping these little ones grow into the people they will become. But it isn't the sort of approach that one person alone can undertake, especially when the children's parents, teachers, and grandmother get so much more time with them than I do. Maybe I could find some support in the school, but at home, no one else bothered to read a word of this intriguing book.

So now our four- and seven-year-old granddaughters were acting up, or rather, out. They were both frustrated at still being with us this evening; mom was supposed to be off work by now, but her relief didn't show up as scheduled. The seven-year-old was the more frustrated one; she'd gotten very little time with her mom that day, just a few minutes after school, in the car, while grandma drove mom to work. Oh yeah: mom is without a car again. 

So even when g-ma was trying to get them to be ready to go when mom was finished working, they were both in conflict mode. And while I agreed that the seven-year-old deserved the timeout she had been assigned, I judge that grandma is sometimes to quick to reach the final straw and call it a night, removing all hope from the child. She surely knew that she'd be asleep before mom was picked up if she was sent to bed for the night, and then she wouldn't get to see her at all! While trying to calm her down so that she could take her timeout, I heard a lot of what she was saying. Some of it, of course, was just a child trying to worm her way out of the trouble she was in, but there were valid roots in some of it. 

So when my wife came up the stairs and started tossing orders my direction, too, I was not especially open to complying, either. That must have been frustrating for her, on top of the conflicts with the grandchildren, but then, I am not a child to be directed in such a way. 

And when she told me, "You're being ridiculous," I felt completely dismissed. My reaction took all of two words which I'm certain made her feel as dismissed and belittled as I did, so maybe I would have spoken them even had I considered them first. But once I said them, I realized almost as they traveled through the air to her ear that we were done for the night. She left in anger. Our granddaughters did their respective times out, then I read to them while we waited for mom to be finished working. G-ma returned so that I could drive them to pick up mom and take them home, and I apologized again for my outburst. I explained the emotional place that it came from without blaming her for it, acknowledging that what I'd said to her was wrong in any circumstances. I picked up our daughter from work, then drove her and the grandchildren home. The dear seven-year-old fell asleep in the car, confirming her own fear that she wouldn't end up with any time with her mom yesterday. 

When I got home, I told my wife that I understood that merely saying that I was sorry wasn't going to make everything okay, and that I respected her need for space from me. She'd told me that she wouldn't have come home last night had I not needed her car to transport so many people. 

At some point in the night I saw and heard her enter the bedroom across the hallway; then she turned the lights out, so I figured that she had decided she didn't want to share the bed with me. I understood. Before much longer, I got up to find her asleep on the sofa and, not wanting to compound the problem by intruding on her space, I grabbed a throw from off of the loveseat and lay down on the living room floor. After a couple hours, I went into the spare bedroom and grabbed a more adequate blanket, and used one of the loveseat cushions as a pillow, so I might sleep more comfortably for my last hour before needing to arise for men's group. 

I got up and showered, and quickly apologized when she sat upright as I turned on the bedroom light. I hadn't heard her move into the bedroom while I was showering. She smiled, and I could tell that she was feeling more accepting of me. I quickly doused the light and dressed, and when I attempted to kiss her cheek or head before leaving as is my custom, she turned and tenderly kissed me on the lips. 

After men's group, she told me that she had tried to come to bed but couldn't get the dog to move. She knew that I knew she was on the sofa, and wondered why I hadn't awakened her to come to bed, as I usually would have. I explained that I was trying to be considerate of her feelings, and she was surprised when I told her where I'd spent the last half of the night.

We have things to work on, here. I still have to figure out why that phrase makes me feel such a strong emotional response. Of course it is a rejection, but there feels like something deep underneath my feelings. I would like for her to see how she dismisses, well, not just me, but pretty much everyone with whom she disagrees. After four decades together, beginning in high school, I have learned that there is very little chance of her offering an understanding apology for any of her own faux pas. Her greater need, though, is probably to be able to set boundaries that have not really been practical for her to establish given our daughter's circumstances, even given that some of those circumstances have been the direct result of our daughter's own decisions. 

It seems clear to me, though, that I am moving on to grow in a new area. It's amazing how fast it happened. I've struggled with purity for so long, and through Abba's Heart God has given me a new and highly effective tool to use in response to those temptations. For the first time, I don't feel like I'm gutting it out against them but destined to fail eventually. My newfound confidence in the Father's joyful love for me is empowering my life. But other areas in which I need to continue to grow are no longer obscured by that long-ensnaring cycle which consumed so much of my attention and energy for so long.

For freedom you have been set free, and that freedom is far deeper and broader than one area of struggle. It isn't as if God just wants to remove a set of handcuffs, so that we can be more comfortable in our leg chains.

Two sons

One son sins openly and runs away from his father . . . . The other remains, but has withdrawn his heart from the father. - Neal Lozano, Abba's Heart

Two things about this. First: I have certainly been both sons, and perhaps this is true of many of us.

Secondly: It's pretty easy to fall into the second son's trap, for a couple of reasons. We tend to live by the comparative identity, and when we do, we need someone against whom to compare ourselves favorably. The other reason is: those who live rightly may fail to recognize how much that is also a gift of the Father's grace and mercy. When I believe that I have earned a status that, in truth, I could never merit, it's easy to start feeling proud of my accomplishments and lose sight of the gift I have received.

Abba's Heart

I love you, Dad. Do you love me? - Micah Lozano, in a note under the Christmas tree, as recounted by his father Matt Lozano and grandfather Neal Lozano in the Introduction to Abba's Heart

I'm pretty sure I'm going to love this book. And I'm also pretty sure it's going to complete a work of healing in my life that I'm realizing has only begun.

My life cries out this question to the men I could call "father." But opening my prayer time with it, or invoking it during Mass, provides a reminder of a steadfast love which I need never doubt but must - absolutely, life-changing-ly must - remember in a new way. I must always remember my utter, childlike dependence on my Father's love, and I must know it forms the nexus around which every other thing in my life - every endeavor, every thought, every feeling - must revolve and find resolution.

I hope that this wonderful, joyful  reassurance that I feel in my heart each time I have offered this prayer does not fade with repetition.

Rejoicing over me

I am called to repent of unbelief if I do not believe the truth that the Father is singing in joy because of me! - Fr. John Horn, S.J, in the second Foreword to Abba's Heart

This sentence follows closely over the quotation of Zp 3:14-18, with an encouragement to read and understand this passage in the first person. And I find myself aware of a truth in a new way.

I have long known that God rejoices over me when I do what He knows is best for me, and that God loves me even when I don't. But this foreword and this book are leading me to realize that even the sadness which God may feel on my behalf - or even anger, again for my sake and also for others' - does not diminish the joy He takes in who I am, even when I choose poorly. Somehow, that knowledge is part of the five keys of spiritual freedom that help me remain unbound from bondage to poor choices. There is liberating power in knowing who I am in the context of who God - my Father - is.

I have an experience of something like this that I've never had before, in watching my grown daughters. They are a marvel, even when I disagree with their choices.

There is absolutely no way I can express this. But I expect this is but the first toe-in-the-water touch of this book drawing me more deeply into my Papa's heart.

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. 

Neglecting our responsibilities, with cause

I suppose I could be referring to never having any time to express a worthwhile thought anymore. The new job is great, but getting out the door in time for work in the morning has put a damper on my early-morning writing, and accessing social media even on breaks is verboten in my new workplace. Evenings have been crazy busy, too. But at last I have a few minutes to gather a few thoughts from the last week.

My feelings are probably not sufficiently in touch with the citizens of Paris. But then, most Westerners' feelings haven't been sufficiently in touch with the citizens of Syria, Iraq, or Afghanistan for entirely too long. The attack in Paris was supposed to be shocking, but I am not shocked anymore by what we will do to each other in God's name, or that of Justice. From our perspective, the perpetrators of terrorist acts have been primarily Islamic extremists, but those whose homes are destroyed by war may not make such a distinction in who they blame for their homelessness. Don't get me wrong: I'm not suggesting that collateral damage in attempting to combat evil is the same as intentional attack on innocent people, just that I understand why those collateral victims might have a different opinion from mine.

I hope I always remember what the rabbi at the NYC memorial service after 9/11 said. The gist of it was that great threat of evil is not what it does to us from without, but what we become in response to it. And the evil that we have encountered over the past fourteen years has apparently made us a fearful, defensive people, incapable of understanding others' pain. I understand the feelings of my friends who refuse to extend a welcome to those displaced by war in their home country. But their anti-terrorist-cum-anti-Muslim fear prevents Christian refugees from taking shelter among us, too. We seem to have forgotten that the entire Sunni-vs.-Shiite conflict in the Islamic-dominated lands leaves Christians with nowhere to turn. "I don't care," they may protest; it isn't worth the risk, hunkering down in their shells in the middle of the highway.

Really, though, that makes it sound as if my motivation is the same as theirs - determining who best deserves to find a refuge - when I'm really just making an observation about a side effect of what seems to be a predominant view of the "religious right." I find myself disagreeing with their protectionist stance.

I could invoke Franklin, I guess, whose adage about those who would trade liberty for safety could probably be easily extended to those who would protect their own well-being at the expense of those who are far worse off. Or maybe we could talk in terms of lust-filled David, whose royal harem was insufficient to quench his lust for poor Uriah's wife.

But while I recognize that we have a responsibility to look after the safety of our own citizens, the image that keeps coming to my mind is how my Lord treated me when I was his enemy. He did not shrink back from the harm I would do to him, but in his great love and compassion ran forward to embrace the worst hurt that I had to offer, that he might thereby win me to himself. I have long held that it is impossible to simultaneously love another and protect oneself, and that is the true nature of the debate.

To hear us talk, I think it's time to scratch that inscription off the base of that wonderful gift we got from France almost 130 years ago, though. We've become to afraid to care any longer who else yearns to breathe free.

Now, to apply as needed

It is the height of vanity to deny myself the grace and mercy that I freely grant every other person in the world. - words I heard coming from my own mouth at lunch time

Reflections on today's readings

When I was trying to walk out the door at 7:31 to play at 8:00 mass and didn't have the right keys hanging where they belong, I decided on plan B. I'll have to find them before too much longer here, but I wasn't going to lose my mind trying to find them after I was already supposed to be at church if I was going to play.

Today's readings

Sometimes I completely understand why the bishops skip over verses in the assigned readings, because they don't fit with - or even distract from - the main point of the reading which they're trying to emphasize. And sometimes I just shake my head and fear that they've actually failed to underscore the most important part of what we need to hear. For instance, in today's reading from Deuteronomy, here is the passage they've omitted, after "before your very eyes?"

To you it was shown, that you might know that the LORD is God; there is no other besides him. Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you; and on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire.  And because he loved your fathers and chose their descendants after them, and brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power, driving out before you nations greater and mightier than yourselves, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as at this day; - Dt 4:35-38

The passage then continues: "this is why you must now know . . . "

Perhaps the bishops are trying to avoid controversy over the history of Israel and the idea that God provided this land for his chosen people. But it seems to me that it is important for us to know that it we need to focus as much on what the Lord is doing in our own lives, even those things that are in fact discipline or correction for us, as on what he has done in the past. I have been greatly blessed by God, my heavenly Father, and need to keep in mind that his direction for my life is intended for further blessing rather than caprice and control.

The psalm was of course written before we were given much inkling of the triune Godhead, and was a song of the Jewish chosen people, but it resonates even more for me today as a follower of Christ who has filled me with his very presence by pouring out the Holy Spirit, choosing me to be his own in a far more intimate way than even the Jewish people were first chosen. I have read that salvation history has been a continual journey from a chosen person (Adam, then Abraham) to a family (Abraham's descendents, down to Jacob's family in Egypt) to a nation (those delivered from slavery in Egypt to the promised land of Israel) to include the entire world (to the ends of the earth). The Incredibles got it wrong when they said that "if everyone is special, then no one is." We are all special, each chosen individually in our unique way to enter into this relationship with God the Father through Christ Jesus in the Holy Spirit.

The second reading is fairly short, and is worth including in its entirety here:

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of sonship. When we cry, "Abba! Father!" it is the Spirit himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. - Rom 8:14-17

(btw, I continue to use the RSV translation, which doesn't exactly match the USCCB link above because the bishops are probably using the NAB.)

How wonderful that this follows last week's epistle reading, in which we are assured that no one can proclaim Jesus as Lord except by the Holy Spirit. This passage brings out the roles of the persons of the Trinity in our lives. It isn't that they act individually to do separate things, but that God works together in our lives in various ways to draw us into relationship with him, indwelling us with his very self that we might carry on the mission on which Jesus has sent us as he himself was sent. We have the boldness of the Spirit to carry us through the trials we might be asked to bear in his name, for a season or for our lives, so that God is glorified by the works he has prepared for us in which we walk.

Passages like this should disabuse us of the notion that Christians are destined for an easy path because of our faith.

The Gospel reading is the most succinct confirmation of the triune Godhead, for why would anyone have any need of being baptized in any name except that of God himself?

Some scholars try to reduce today's feast and the concept of the Trinity to a pantheistic concept. There is value in knowing and reflecting upon the presence of God in all things. But there is also value in taking one day out of the year, not to put the Divine Persons of the Trinity into a box of orthodoxy, but to consider the implications that the God who loves each of us so much as to have created this universe for us with all its marvels to reveal his glory then humbly came among us to reveal his glory in redeeming sacrifice and even more humbly reveals his glory by dwelling within us even though we still choose our own wishes over God's greater dreams for us - and to know that all of these actions are really one united expression of a love that we barely begin to know in this life.

And so it turns out that this time soaking in God's presence was probably better than playing at an extra Mass this morning.

Pentecost novena, session 3

Related to session 1,  inspired  by Fr. Satish's homily:

When the Holy Spirit convicts us regarding sin and righteousness and judgment, the very first thing that happens is that we become agents of mercy. I receive a gift of forgiveness and mercy which I can never deserve, and this makes me hunger for others to receive it, too. While I may become more aware of the difference between sin and righteousness, that awareness is expressed in the context of mercy and love. We set aside our judgment of others in light of the grace we know ourselves to have received.

The awareness of too many of today's Christians of their own depravity outside of Christ falls short of the level that it takes to be vessels of mercy above all else.