A Thought for the Week
May 10, 2008
Pentecost - Remembering the Way it Was
Occasionally I will be driving to or from work on a weekday and I will notice a new building or a business going up. I know what will soon follow: Big signs announcing “Opening Day.” Following that there will be advertisements in the local newspaper or on television offering special deals. There may also be brightly clad individuals waving signs at the door or on the street corner. It’s all about letting us know that this is an important day for these people, for this company. They are not ashamed to let the whole world know about it.
I’m sure that a lot of planning went into this project of theirs, lots of money and effort as well. One thing for sure: They want us all to know how they feel about their new venture. There will probably never be another day like this in their history.
People find it important to celebrate special occasions: Birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, new jobs, first-time accomplishments, et cetera. For the most part, the persons celebrating want the whole world to know about it too, even though much of the world could probably care less. For these people it’s all-important. First time events have special meaning.
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 04:11 PM.
May 03, 2008
7th Sunday Ascension - Going it Alone
I would never have called my father a liberal, at least in the context we use that term today. He was always a careful and conservative man. He managed to get his family through the great depression of the Thirties which means, of course, that he managed his money carefully.
I can remember receiving only two “major” gifts from my father as I was growing up: He bought me a wristwatch for my high school graduation. On the train station when I was headed off for basic training in the U.S. Army, he shook my hand and I found there a fifty-dollar bill! Now, mind you, fifty dollars was no small change in those days, but I remember him saying: “Here’s a little something just in case you need it.” Then he gave me a hug, something he rarely did. He was conservative, of course!
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 04:22 PM.
April 26, 2008
6th Sunday of Easter - The Long Loneliness
Although I never personally met her, one of my all-time favorite people was Dorothy Day. She died in 1980 and during her lifetime she had several careers: A journalist, a Socialist, publisher of a monthly “penny paper” called the Catholic Worker. (It still only costs a penny.)
She was also a convert to the Catholic Church. She loved this adopted church so much that she had no fear even taking on the Cardinal Archbishop of New York on issues of war and peace.
Most especially though she was known for founding the Houses of Hospitality that welcomed any and all from the streets of large cities. She personally took on the responsibility of making the daily potato soup and bread, making up the beds, sitting and talking to people as long as they needed someone to talk to.
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 01:40 PM.
April 19, 2008
5th Sunday of Easter - Who’s Church?
It has always interested me to notice, at least among Christians, how important a role their church plays in their daily lives. Whether folks attend Mass regularly or not, they will ordinarily defend themselves as Catholics who belong to this or that church.
If you ask folks, particularly on the East Coast, or, say, in Louisiana, where they live, they will tell you: “I live in St. Monica’s Parish or “I live in St. Genieve’s.” Perhaps they will tell you that this is their church because it is the place where they feel ethnically and spiritually comfortable, welcomed, at home. Of course, they will also support and defend that church because it’s theirs. At least that is their conviction.
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 03:58 PM.
April 13, 2008
4th Sunday of Easter - The Politics of Shepherding
I imagine by this time of the year most of us are pretty weary of the politics of electing a president and at this point we are not even in the final stages of the presidential campaign.
Politics has always interested me, not in the sense that I want to be any elected official but rather because the motivations of those who run for office seem so mysterious. Why anyone would want to run for the office of president of the United States, for instance, puzzles me. Either the candidate must have a large ego, loves being a power broker or he is simply a masochist, and doesn’t mind for the next four or eight years being lampooned with cartoons in national magazines. Let’s face it: Politics is messy business: Large bodies of people are basically ungovernable, uncontrollable. Who would want to spend a large part of his or her life fighting political battles?
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 03:52 PM.
April 06, 2008
3rd Sunday of Easter - Recognition
One of the comforting things about being a presider at Mass is that you have a sense that you are in charge! I don’t mean for that to sound disrespectful, but when you are standing before, say, couple hundred people who have come to church to experience God or the sacred, you know that you have a serious responsibility on your hands. People expect you to know what you are doing and to help them celebrate the liturgy in a reasonably sacred manner. That’s your job!
Let me point out, however, that, as in other activities in life, they do no always run smoothly, even those we consider sacred.
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Posted by Cindy Lentine at 01:01 AM.
