Remaining mailable

Today Jeremiah provide a different metaphor, the image of the potter and the clay. The Lord said to Jeremiah,

like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, house of Israel.

The book of Genesis tells us that God took the earth (adamah) and formed it into a adam (person) and blew into his nostrils the breath of life. But Jeremiah reminds us of something we can forget. God forming us is not a one time process. God can constantly remake us.

Whenever the object of clay which he was making turned out badly in his hand, he tried again, making of the clay another object of whatever sort he pleased.

We can be 70 or 80 years old, and the potter can still make of us another object of whatever sort he pleases. Until the moment when we draw our last breath, he can make of us another object of whatever sort he pleases.

There is only one catch. We must remain mailable, and unlike clay we have a choice. We can become hardened in the kiln of our own hearts. God has given us the freedom to choose to step out of the potters hands. How many people talk about shaping their own life, shaping their own destiny? In the US, we talk about it as if it were a virtue. There is no virtue in removing ourselves from the hands of the potter.

The real virtue is the opposite, and it requires great discipline: to remain every moment of every day in the hands of the potter allowing him to constantly mold us and shape us, adapt us to perfectly fit whatever situation. One moment we may need to be the silent listener, another the prophet. One moment we need to be a gentle lamb, another the lion. To every thing there is a season.

As we go through the day, let pray that in each situation God will reshape us into exactly what is needed.

Selling ourselves

In the gospel today we have a repeat from Sunday, the two parables: the man who sells all he has to buy the field and the man who sells all he has to buy the pearl of great price.

Why two stories of men doing the same thing? They aren't doing the same thing. While we translate both as "sell", St. Matthew uses two different words. The first man for the field, "trades" or "barters." The second man "disposes of", the verb can even be used to refer to selling someone into slavery— a much more radical idea.

Most people think a priest is a priest. But in the church there are important differences. I am a diocesan priest. We do not take vows, despite what people think, we make promises. I promised to live a celibate life, respect and obedience to the bishop and his successors, and to pray for the Church.

Men and women who are members of religious institutes take vows. Instead of constantly saying members of religious institutes we call them simply "religious" for short. You may also hear terms like monk, brother, sister, nun, mother, etc. Without going into all the distinctions, what they all have in common is what we term the "total donation of self." Like the man for the pearl of great price they give their entire self. They do this through three vows:

Poverty- their property
Chastity-their most intimate self
Obedience -their self determination.

As much as we diocesan clergy hate to admit it, the Church still see this as a higher calling. And we should each day pray for men and women to have the courage to say yes to the unique vocation of the religious, in all of the various communities of religious (Benedictine, Franciscan, Dominican, etc.).

As for the rest of us, while we have not taken the vows of the religious, we are called in our daily lives to constantly hand ourselves over to God. To trade our will for his. To be his servants.
While we own our possessions, we should always see ourselves as caretakers. And even the love of husband and wife should be chaste, directly always to one and only one other, their spouse.

It requires daily sacrifice, but if we believe the kingdom is truly a treasure with a value beyond measure, then it is a simple choice.

The better part not the only part

One of those questions I want to ask God is why we human beings always want binary choices, either this or that. This AND that seems much harder for us to deal with.

Today is the memorial of St. Martha. Everyone seems ready to say who are the Martha's and who are the Mary's. In reality we should all be both. The verse reads



“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.
There is need of only one thing.
Mary has chosen the better part
and it will not be taken from her.”

Notice Mary hasn't chosen the only part or the only acceptable part. She has simply chosen the better part.

Saturday morning I weeded my flower beds. I love the visible sense of accomplishment, a tangible result. But which was the better part: the time I spent doing that or the time I spent in prayer?

If we sat around in prayer, meditation, and reading the bible all day our lives would collapse. We have to be Martha. We all have to be Martha. But we should never let the Martha take over our lives or believe that the Martha is the better part.

The most important thing I do each day is pray. I start each day with God and I sitting on the porch having coffee.

It should be the Mary that drives the Martha. Our prayer should guide our action. But the Martha is essential. Faith without works is empty. Unloading the dishwasher, doing laundry, cooking dinner, the most mundane things in life- but they are all essential, and they are all ministry if done in the Spirit.

The problem most of us have is not the working part of Martha, it is where Jesus starts,

“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.

If we truly believe that prayer is the most important thing we can do each day, then why be anxious and worried? Why be anxious and worried at all. What did anxiety and worry ever accomplish? It only shortens our lives. Mostly it shortens our earthly life, but if we let it interfere with our relationship with God, it can even rob us of eternal life. Anxiety and worry serve no purpose.

Today be Martha. Be Martha every day. Care for others. Be hospitable. Get your work done. But remember, no matter how much you do, it is never the better part of your day. The better part is always the one on one time with God.

How close can we be?

There are a few things that even the closest of friends will not readily share. Toothbrushes are the first things to come to mind. But somewhere on the list for most people is underwear, particularly unwashed underwear.

There are no human words to describe God's love and so the best God can do to communicate with us is metaphors like the love of a mother for a child, the eagle circling her brood.

In the first reading today, God uses one of the strangest of metaphors, underwear. Yes, it sounds somehow holier when we say loincloth but the function is the same. The piece of clothing that touches your most intimidate parts. In trying to explain to Jeremiah what the relationship is supposed to be, God uses a loincloth.

For, as close as the loincloth clings to a man’s loins, so had I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, says the LORD; to be my people, my renown, my praise, my beauty

It isn't a particularly attractive image, the notion that we are God's underwear, but there is something to be said for the earthiness of it. After all what piece of clothing is more personal, intimate? What piece of clothing knows the parts you do not want the world to see? —The messy parts.

The sad part of the story is that God made us to cling to him like that loincloth, and yet as he tells Jeremiah,

But they did not listen

God reminds us today that not only does he know the most intimidate recesses of our hearts, but he has given us also access to the most intimate parts of him. We are meant not to be the hat, shirt, belt or sandals. God has called us to the deepest most personal, most intimate relationship possible. It is offered as free gift.

Today, say yes. Let us open our ears and listen. Let us open our hearts to receive.

Synergy

There are words and phrases that mark every generation and culture. Some become so over-used that they grate on your nerves. In our present generation we constantly hear people saying, "It's all good." My first response (in my head of course) is, "No, it's not!" There is evil in the world. There are things that are good, and things that are bad. There is such a thing as sin. It is not all good.

The sad truth is that if you listen to the tone of voice with which some people say, "It's all good", what you will hear is "I don't care" or "It doesn't bother me", an attempt at emotional detachment, and attempt at avoiding pain.

But as a Christian there is a healthy understanding of the phrase. If we use it as a paraphrase of St. Paul's letter to the Romans.

for those who love God all things work together for good ( panta synergei eis agthon).

The key to this passage is the word synergei from which we get the word synergy. The difference is that we are not saying that each individual things is good. We know that some things are bad, some are evil. The child being shot at the McDonald's in my parish was evil, mortal sin. What St. Paul is telling us is not that the individual pieces are all good, but that God can take even the most horrible thing in the world and put it together with his grace so that the sum total, the panta is in fact Good. -the Divine Synergy.

Someone insults you. Let it go. God will counter balance it. My brother was killed in a car accident when he was 17 and I was 12. I thought it was the end of the world. Four years later God sent Harold (who I just was visiting in Costa Rica) and I not only had a new brother but a whole second family to love me until Michael and I are back together in heaven.

Even when we are the ones who are responsible for wrecking our own life, God can take that and turn it to the good, if we hold on to our faith. Remember the verse does start off "for those who love God." Actually the verse starts off with another more important word oidamen "we know". St Paul doesn't claim that this is something that we believe; it is something we know.

Notice this is not karma. Nowhere does St. Paul tell us that God will repay evil with evil. As a matter of fact in the same Letter to the Romans we are commanded

Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone.

And in First Peter we hear:

Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing.

If I know that for every bad word spoken to me or about me, every bad thing that happens to me, in the Divine Synergy, God is going to make it work out to the good then who can possibly rob me of my peace? Why do I need to get angry or upset? There is only one thing I need to do, Remain always among those who love God .

Grandmothers

This statue stands in the corner of my backyard. St. Anne and St. Mary as a small child. Mary is depicted reading the scriptures. They would of course been the Hebrew Scriptures. Whether or not it is historically accurate doesn't really matter. It is a piece of art that invites us to meditate, meditate on the mother who raised the girl who became the most famous woman in the history of the world.

Today we celebrate the feast of St. Anne. In Hebrew the name would have actually been Hannah (favor or grace). What we know of her and her her Joachim come from a document known as the protoevangelion of James. Like hundreds of other early Christian writings it is not considered the inspired word of God and is therefore not in the Bible. But like the other early Christian writings it does contain some information that can be interesting and useful. Just because it isn't in the Bible doesn't mean parts of it aren't true. Nor does it mean they are "Lost Gospels".

Are the names of Mary's parents essential for salvation? No. But it is worth reflecting on who they were, and what the experience of their daughter and grandson meant to them. How did they react to the news of Mary's pregnancy? What role did they play in the life of their grandchild Jesus? How did they react to his death and ressurection? Were they still alive at that point?

We sometimes think about Jesus Mary and Joseph as if they lived in a bubble. We forget that there would of course have been parents of Joseph and Mary, most probably they would have had brothers and sisters as well, aunts and uncles of Jesus.

Jesus grew up in a world in which extended family was still essential. Did Mary's mother teach her to read as depicted in the statue in my yard? Perhaps not. But did she instill in her a deep devotion to God and his Word? Absolutely.

We all know the old saying, the apple does not fall far from the tree. Today let us take a moment to reflect on the tree from which Mary fell, St. Anne, along with all the other holy men and women who would have been part of the early life of Jesus, those years not included in the Bible, the men and women who had the unique privilege of watching him grow, from from the infant in the manger to the man, the man who would call his apostles, live, die, and ascend, returning to his place at the right hand of the father.

St. Anne is venerated by Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican Churches. Even Martin Luther's decision to enter religious life is said to have been the result of his crying out to St. Anne.

Today let us turn to grandmother who is surely with her daughter and her grandson in heaven. Through her intercession may we to have the faith to say, let it be done unto me according to your will.

Design flaw

If we look at ourselves, we have to wonder if there isn't a design flaw. Yes, someone could say we were perfect until original sin. But then, didn't God know when he made the first man and woman that they were going to sin? Of course he did.

We live in bodies that are constantly changing. Our minds flit from one thing to the next. We know what we ought to do, but don't do it. Bad habits seem to stick immediately and the good ones take years to develop. Our emotions get the better of us. We are sensitive to cold and heat And there are plenty of other animals that are stronger and faster. And to top it all off, we like to beat ourselves up for all these things. Surely there must be a flaw in the design.

And yet, the first reading today reminds us of why there isn't.

We hold this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.

It's all part of the plan, the plan to make us totally dependent on God. St. Paul reminds us that we are built to not be able to get though a single day without God's assistance.

In the Book of Genesis, God took the adamah (earth, dirt) and shaped it into something he called adam (a human being). We were made fragile from the get go.

I remember the uproar from some corners when Rome made it clear that we were not to use pottery for mass, no clay chalices, etc. The vessels for the body and blood of Christ must be the opposite of fragile, they must be unbreakable.

At mass we who are the earthen vessel, drink from the unbreakable the grace and power that comes from God. As much as we need air and food, we need God. We are not flawed human beings, we are dependent human beings. Our biggest mistake is thinking we should be something else or trying to be something else. The minute we disconnect from God, and try to run on our own, we are like an engine without oil. We will run for a little bit, and then...

The best thing we can do is own our earthenness, so that as St. Paul says,

the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.