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March for life week

1/26/2016

Something good for the week of the March for Life:
Quoted in the Magnificat: Year of Mercy Meditations:

Mother of the 7 Maccabean Martyrs

“One, Severa Mukakinia, watched the Hutus butcher all 7 of her children. She’s been gang-raped so many times she’d lost count. She’d been left for dead, dumped in a local river.

But she didn’t die. She lived to discover that she was pregnant from one of the genocidal rapes. Many people counseled her to have an abortion…

But this woman came to the conclusion: ‘Why should the child suffer for the crime of its father?’ She decided to give birth to the child….

She named her baby daughter: Akimana: Child of God.

A wonderful quotation:
Don’t look down to see who it is by until the end. I bet you’ll be surprised:

“IT IS NOT POSSIBLE FOR US TO KNOW EACH OTHER EXCEPT AS WE MANIFEST OURSELVES IN DISTORTED SHADOWS TO THE EYES OF OTHERS. WE DO NOT EVEN KNOW OURSELVES; THEREFORE, WHY SHOULD WE JUDGE A NEIGHBOR? WHO KNOWS WHAT PAIN IS BEHIND VIRTUE AND WHAT FEAR BEHIND VICE?NO ONE, IN SHORT, KNOWS WHAT MAKES A MAN, AND ONLY GOD KNOWS HIS THOUGHTS, HIS JOYS, HIS BITTERNESSES, HIS AGONY, THE INJUSTICES COMMITTED AGAINST HIM AND THE INJUSTICES HE COMMITS. … GOD IS TOO INSCRUTABLE FOR OUR LITTLE UNDERSTANDING. AFTER SAD MEDITATION IT COMES TO ME THAT ALL THAT LIVES, WHETHER GOOD OR IN

ERROR, MOURNFUL OR JOYOUS, OBSCURE OR OF GILDED REPUTATION, PAINFUL OR HAPPY, IS ONLY A PROLOGUE TO LOVE BEYOND THE GRAVE, WHERE ALL IS UNDERSTOOD AND ALMOST ALL FORGIVEN.”
SENECA
(NOTE THIS NON-CHRISTIAN STOIC, DOESN’T SAY EVERYTHING IS FORGIVEN, EVEN UNREPENTED SIN.)

I was criticizing a priest in my head during a Mass in our larger area, for being so formal and unfriendly seeming during the celebration and humility. So, after the Mass there was a reception. The priest was greeting the people. Up close he is a tiny sweet old man, greeting us with such loving enthusiasm, each one.

I introduced myself as teaching at the seminary because I wanted to give him my book, published by Goodbooksmedia, LAST CALL, about Late Vocations. When he heard my name he said "Oh, you are she. I read your books." And he gave me such a smile.”

I felt bad about being so critical.

An absolutely beautiful quotation From Dostoevsky’s novel The Possessed:

“My immortality is necessary if only because God will not be guilty of injustice and extinguish altogether the flame of love for Him once enkindled in my heart. And what is more precious than love? Love is higher than existence, love is the crown of existence; and how is it possible that existence should not be under its dominance? If I have once loved Him and rejoiced in my love, is it possible that He should extinguish me and my joy and bring me to nothingness again? If there is a God, then I am immortal.”

A bad week!
I got into substantial arguments with 2 of my closest friends. As we worked toward reconciliation I came up with this funny way to put why I was hopeful: “Do we have enough money in the bank of our friendship to cover this unexpected expense?”

RECONCILED AT LAST, MY TWO ESTRANGED FRIENDS GLEEFULLY AGREED TO RESUME OUR ACCUSTOMED REGIMEN OF FRATERNAL JOVIALITY.

On a Catholic radio show, the interviewer asked me why I write books. My answer was simpler than I thought it would be: “I would say because I have gotten so much insight out of reading, I have a need to convey any idea I think is helpful to others beyond the circle of my immediate students.”

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Sound and Fury

1/12/2016

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This is a beautiful story from a book (Moscow Was My Parish) by an American priest stationed in Moscow in the 1950’s. He writes about the passing through Moscow of English, Irish, American and other priests and nuns who had been imprisoned by the Communists in North Korea but finally released. The Russian Communists arranged this release and had them come through Moscow on their way to their countries of origin. Here is how he describes an old priest who had been forbidden to say Mass for more than 2 years in the prison in North Korea but now could celebrate Mass at the author’s little chapel in Moscow:

“He got as far as the Gradual. Then he began to cry, his great shoulders shaken with sobs, and it took him almost an hour to finish. Afterward he said, “It was even greater than my first Mass.”

I always wondered why people at work, such as men mowing lawns, the teens in public places play such loud music on earphones. I had an experience last week that explained this in a positive way.

A friend who adores Rachmaninoff wanted me to hear his 3rd Piano Concerto while he was driving me from one place to another. He put it on high, high volume. At first I thought it too much but then suddenly it was as if nothing but this music existed. The volume shut out all other passing thoughts.

I got into a state of bliss. Afterwards I talked to him about how great music and other art is redemptive in the sense that it takes out of the many sounds around us or the many sights around us, what is most beautiful. In that way it is a foretaste of heaven.

I have been embroiled in a controversy involving a Catholic leader on the web who writes vitriolic damnation of priests and bishops for their complicity or negligence concerning certain terrible sins of Catholics.

I am trying to explain how zeal is good, but being a zealot is not; and, on the other side, how compassion for sinners is good, but not tolerance of the sin.

Dietrich Von Hildebrand wrote a fantastic book on this called Morality and Situation Ethics. He explains why self-righteousness is a sin of pride that cannot be excused just because the self-righteous one is correcting laxity. Both pride and sins of the flesh are evil. The Christian approach, instead, is to speak the truth with love, realizing always that “there but by the grace of God go I.” I have a summary of this book of some 7 pages that I use in class. If any reader is interested, I can e-mail it to you. Just write me at [email protected].

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A Week Away

1/4/2016

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Dear readers,
I spent Christmas week in North Carolina with the daughter, Carla, trying to deal with chemo pain and the family, and other guests.

Here are some highlights that might be of general interest:

Since I couldn't get Carla to agree to let me take her to Lourdes or Fatima or Guadalupe...I thought, heh, we have charismatic Guatamalan healers in the parish here, some of whom are friends of mine. She agreed to let them come to pray over her in her desperation.

They are a lovely, humble couple. She did feel some heat from the hands laid on, but did not feel any better, however she saw Mary in the face of the wife, and when the deacon husband prayed partly in Spanish, she, who doesn't know a word of Spanish not only understood what he said but actually prayed in Spanish with him, she says aloud, but I didn't hear anything!!!!

Then, the best was when thanking them for coming she said,
"IT IS MORE IMPORTANT THAT YOU ARE SO LOVING THAN IF I GET OR DON'T GET A HEALING!!!!"
Is that not holy?????

Some thoughts from my mentor, Marian Catechist Gary McCabe:

Every person breathing in the world at any moment is a little rainbow: the sign given to Noah that He would remember his Covenant by forgetting our sins.

What a Foolish God -- so full of paradoxes.

What a Silly Infant -- in need of our help to accomplish his Mission!

The “dragon” of Revelation always wants to devour the little baby Jesus who is growing the kingdom in our souls, families. This isn’t just at the end-time but it is always happening.

St. Augustine wrote that on the last day those who are justified will have been washed in the blood of the lamb and will be in white garments with Christ even larger, to form us all together into a Host offered to the Father. He will consume us and take us up. This is going on always in each Mass. We think we are consuming Him, but He is consuming us, that God will be all in all.

Some conflicts, of course, as in every family visit, Jesus seemed to tell me on the way back to the seminary where I teach:

“As you recall each scene of the visit be thankful for all the good and work toward forgiveness of others and yourself about what was not so good. Have as your framework that given the fallen nature of humanity it is absurd to dream that your children would be perfect, in any way you wish them to be, or that you could exempt them from suffering."

Here is a quote from Bonaventure:

"Life in this earthly exile is a sort of suburb of the heavenly kingdom. Every day savor in advance something of the eternal beatitude."

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March for life week

Sound and Fury

A Week Away

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