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January 26, 2009
Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time [February 1, 2009]
I am sure there is a custom in most families to review occasionally the colorful characters in their ancestral history.
I must confess to one very jolly, roly-poly uncle in my family history who has always fascinated me: Uncle Bert as we knew him. A photo in an old album portrays him standing near a fancy new Buick. He is dressed for his “business:” Suit, nicely pressed, sporting a flat-topped straw hat that many dandy men wore in those times.
Uncle Bert was a man who did not fit the “agricultural mold” of our family. Rather he was a man of the road, a salesman and purveyor of schemes. Never rich, he nonetheless, enjoyed his lifestyle. What he was best known for was the “ability” to tell fortunes for a small fee. I’m sure this career did not last long inasmuch as many of his predictions and other schemes often came to naught as a hoax. Nonetheless, he was a happy man, working daily at his “career.” He thought of himself as something as a “prophet.” The title gave the semblance of weight and credibility to his “trade,” but my sense is that eventually he did not have a great fortune to leave to his heirs.
The thought of Bert, our “family prophet”, and his questionable profession came to me as I read the scriptures for the Fourth Sunday in Ordinary time. Both, the first reading from the Jewish Testament of Deuteronomy and the gospel speak of the power of prophecy. In Moses’ day, the people were terrified that God might address them personally concerning their transgressions. “No,” Moses assures them, “a prophet will do that.” In truth however, the Jewish prophets often proved more critical of their peoples’ ways than God himself might have.
Jesus too often impressed his synagogue audiences with his authoritative preaching. He did not need the permission of the scribes to proclaim God’s word. He spoke on his own. People were astonished and pleased with his independent spirit.
All of which brings us to the topic of prophets of our own time. They are not fortune-tellers or seers, and yet in a sense they are “seers” inasmuch as they have the insight to “see” into their own times and speak to those times with the courage of their conviction.
I imagine we all have our own list of our personal and favorite prophets. I drew up a list of my own some days ago and on that list of only 10 (there are hundreds more.) you will find such people as Pope Benedict XVI, Rabbi Abraham Heschel, Albert Camus, philosopher and novelist, Dorothy Day, lover of the poor, Gerard Manley Hopkins S.J. poet, Henry David Thoreau, writer and lover of wildness, Daniel Berrigan S.J., Thomas Merton, monk and modern Augustine, Deitrich Bonhoeffer who was hung by the Nazi SS because he questioned Hitler’s vision of a future Germany. And lastly, George Carlin, humorist and philosopher. His vocabulary was not always easy to bear, but he could also say some things that could literally take your breath away.
All these prophets whom I chose often said hard and beautiful words. No fortune telling, just simple insight into their times and that is why I remember them.
Speaking your mind and your convictions with candor will often get you into trouble as it has ancient and modern prophets. Nonetheless, like Moses and Jesus, it is important to speak with the authority of our convictions when the occasion calls for it. Some folks may be a bit astonished by it, but better that than to be embarrassed bys not saying anything at all.
The scriptures:Deuteronomy 18: 15-20; 1 Corinthians 7: 32-35; Mark 1: 21-28
Posted by Cindy Lentine at 11:11 AM.
January 20, 2009
Third Sunday in Ordinary Time [January 25, 2009]
I imagine it does not often occur to many serious Christians who read their bible and pray from it, that if they were simple to look between the lines they might discover a source of genuine entertainment, even good humor. No, I grant you, humor doesn’t just jump out at you from the pages of the bible. There are no stand-up comics in the bible as far as I know.
And yet, for those who choose to see the human aspects in the history and stories of the bible, there are truly some hilarious scenes.
The problem is, of course, that we do not go looking for humor.
We imagine that the bible is much too serious book for all that.
But, at the same time, what’s to keep us from believing that holiness and humor can’t spring from the same source, human mistakes, human foibles, even decisions made from the best intentions?
So, you would like some proof. It is all there in the scriptures for this Sunday, the Third in Ordinary Time. It is the story of Jonah, an ordinary Jewish fellow whom God invites (for whatever reason) to head east to sin city, the great metropolis of Nineveh. His orders? Preach repentance to those pagans.
Well, all this does not sound very inviting to Jonah. He was convinced that no one, particularly a Jew could convert these people, but after mulling it over and trying to turn back at least once, he comes to Nineveh, that huge city. True to his word he walks through the city preaching penance, all the while saying to himself: “Hey, this is so stupid. No way these people are going to repent.”
Ah, but here comes the humor: After the very first day of preaching, every living soul, even domesticated in the city began to throw ashes over themselves as a sign they were willing to do penance.
So, finally, here is Jonah, despondent, sitting under a shade tree, angry with himself that his penance preaching had actually worked. So, he complains to God: “How could you let this happen to pagans?” In the very last line of the story (not quoted here) God chides Jonah: “Why are you so sad Jonah, you’ve been a great success. It doesn’t take a Jew to repent, right.” End of story.
It’s a story about our prejudices, our sense that there are simply some people beyond salvation. Of course, God proves otherwise, right?
The second piece of humor comes out of the gospel story of two uneducated brothers, fishermen, and how they got their unexpected start in life, no not in the Galilee fishing industry, “church work.”
One day, they are sitting around in their boats after work, fixing their nets, complaining about the poor catch.
Suddenly, a man walks by whom they recognize as the local famous preacher. So with nothing better to do, they ask him where he lives. “Come and see,” he says. So, having nothing better to do, they spend the day with Jesus. We are not told what transpired, but we can imagine that Jesus must have said a few things about the Kingdom of God, his favorite topic of conversation. Nothing very spectacular in all that; not until the end of the paragraph where Jesus says to Peter: “You seem like a dependable man to me: Come follow me, I’m naming you rock (rock solid). I will change your career from fishing to preaching.
That may not sound very humorous, but think of it: One minute Peter is a fisherman, the next he is pope. Considering all this from our perspective today that is pretty funny. Not only that Peter’s friends join him on this venture and they all ultimately become bishops.
The gospels do not present this as humor, but when you think of the human factors involved, from fishermen to pope and bishops, well, at least it must make smile.
But what is the moral of the story? Well the moral is that God’s plan for our lives is, oddly enough, much different than ours. Jonah had a completely different sense of his future than Gods. Peter and the “guys” also had a sense that they would be fishermen for the rest of their lives that is until Jesus came along and changed it all. How differently both of those careers turned out.
Perhaps the added thought might be for us to listen as we go about our life each day: There might be a message from God in some seemingly small event that would take us in a direction we never thought possible. Well, it happened once to some ordinary people. Could it happen to us? Probably so.
The scriptures: Jonah 3: 1-5, 10, 1 Corinthians 7: 29-31, Mark 1: 14-20
Posted by Cindy Lentine at 02:36 PM.
January 12, 2009
Second Sunday in Ordinary Time [January 18, 2009]
I have a good friend who lives in the rural Alaskan village of Trapper Creek. Actually, I should be cautious calling it a village; it’s more of a vague geographical” point on the main highway to Fairbanks. You would not be able to find it on the map because it does not exist as an actual village. Most local folks would simply tell you that you are “there” if you come to the “T” of the Parks highway and Petersville road.
An all-purpose store with a red roof sits there just up the hill from the short airstrip. I would often stop there for coffee and a sweet roll on my way to the nearby church of St. Philip.
I wanted to mention the location because my friend Red Cooney lives somewhere out there in his cabin. I often promised that I would come out and check over his place but somehow never got around to it.
Anyway, even without an address, everyone in Trapper Creek knows where it is for two reasons: First, Mr. Cooney raises chickens, mainly for the eggs they produce. Secondly, Red also has this rather modest farm he has hacked out of the woods where he raises potatoes every year.
Now, why should I be telling you all this? I’m telling you all this because Mr. Cooney has made this chicken and potato farm his vocation. I think he might deny that assertion because chickens and potatoes are really part of his living. Perhaps he also has another source of income of which I am not aware, but that is not relevant here.
Now, I can claim with all honesty that this is truly Red’s vocation because on many an occasion he would grace me with a dozen eggs and a sack of potatoes before I flew home.
Not only did he often load me up with such merchandise but he also regularly drives around in his old red pick up to the various homes in the area and sells the produce. If the folks can pay, fine, if they cannot, he’ll say, Hey, I’ll catch you next time, ok?” Sometimes, he will just forget about it entirely. Everyone understands. It’s part of his vocation, you see.
The more important farm project, however, goes on in the late falls when the potatoes are ready for the digging. It is well known that Beans Café in down town Anchorage feeds hundreds of hungry people every day.
What does Mr. Cooney do? He graciously invites the folks, the guests at Bean’s Cafe to come up and help him dig. In return they can have truckloads of potatoes, which will feed folks during the long Alaskan winter.
And so it was that one man made it possible for folks to have generous portions of the fruit of the earth.
I am saying all this again because that is what our scripture readings for the Fourth Sunday in the church year are all about, listening to the voice of God and following that invitation as the young Samuel, noted in first reading, did or as those disciples did when Jesus invited them to come and see where he lived. It was in two such situations that vocations were born.
The point is that vocations are often born out of the earthly situations in which we find ourselves and not in some divine fire from heaven.
Secondly, vocations often come out of the relationship, the conversation that happens between people. That is where human needs often are discovered where responses become possible.
Whether it is a matter of collecting eggs and distributing them or digging potatoes and trucking them to Bean’s Café, it is all about paying attention to one’s intuition, one’s call and following up on it. That is what the young Samuel did. The passage relates that he grew up and the Lord was with him.
Regarding the disciples, they also followed the Lord Jesus home. Of course we all know how their lives turned out. It’s all about paying attention to voices, not out of nowhere, but out of the here and now, the earthly realities we all know so well.
Red Cooney will probably be displeased with me for using his name and telling his story. But, hey, it’s all about vocation, isn’t it?
The scriptures 1 Samuel, 3:3b-10-19 1 Corinthians 6: 13c-15a, 17-29 John 1: 35-42
Posted by Cindy Lentine at 10:07 AM.
January 05, 2009
The Feast of the Baptism of the Lord [January 11, 2009]
It has often occurred to me that so many incidents in our lives seem to be accidental or perhaps coincidental. We may not have planned this event; it was just something that was part of our life cycle. Perhaps someone else even made the decision for us and we had little or no part in it at all. That seems rather scary when one thinks about it, but on the other hand, perhaps it is grace that steers us through life anyway. There are so many things included in this grace that we may never notice its importance.
This, for instance is the way I look at the sacrament of baptism for Catholics. Your baptism and mine came along at the end of a long line of Catholics going back perhaps many generations. If you or I had been born into a different culture or if some accident of history had broken that long link of Catholic predecessors I probably would not be writing this as a Catholic and you might not be reading it, at least as a Catholic.
Baptism is such interesting rite, so simple rite: It’s all about water and words. Water itself is a substance that has so many different uses and meanings. Indeed, we are beginning to see it’s importance more today than ever because of global warning.
In the ordinary sense, of course, it’s all about washing, slaking, cleaning, refreshing, et cetera. That’s what water does by its very nature.
We can begin to see, therefore, why the Church and churches over the centuries chose water as that instrument that should convey to us the washing away of our human faults and sins. Its just the most normal thing to do.
Of course, in our Catholic church, our long-standing tradition is to baptize children who obviously have not committed sin. So why do we do that?
The reason why the Church does this is because every single one of us has been born into an existence where sin is obvious to us. Our human world is a “fallen” world, a world that struggles to rise above these human failures.
So, how does this happen? It happens because this church, this human community we are born into takes on sin and promises us salvation through the power of Jesus Christ
Readings: Is 55:1-11; 1 Jn 5:1-9; Mk 1:7-11
Posted by Cindy Lentine at 09:57 AM.
