Category: Conversion

Lent: On God’s Good Side?

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Creation, Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, Mercy, spiritualityLeave a comment

March 7, 2022
Monday of the First week of Lent

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we are invited to be like God:

The LORD said to Moses,
“Speak to the whole assembly of the children of Israel
and tell them:
Be holy, for I, the LORD, your God, am holy.

Leviticus 19:1

Our first reading goes on to tell us how to be a decent person.

Don’t steal, lie, or cheat
Pay just wages
Respect and help those physically burdened
Be impartial and just
Defend life
Don’t slander, hate, take revenge, or hold a grudge

Basically, the message is about kindness …
deep kindness,
the type that comes from realizing
how infinitely kind God is to us.

Leviticus, after a long list of practical examples, sums it up:

You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
I am the LORD.

Leviticus 19:18

Our Gospel tells us what happens when we make the choice to take the Old Testament advice — or not.

We are all familiar with the parable of the sheep and the goats. And we all hope our scorecard gets us into the right herd “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him …”

In this parable, Jesus puts the advice of Leviticus into practical form for his followers. But he adds one dynamic element that not only invites but impels our wholehearted response:

Amen, I say to you,
what you did not do for one of these least ones,
you did not do for me.

Matthew 25:40

Leviticus invites us to become holy as God is holy. But Jesus reveals the secret that this Holy God lives in the poor, hungry, homeless, imprisoned and sick. By embracing these most beloved of God, we find the path to holiness.

Poetry: When Did I See You – Renee Yann, RSM

When Did I See You …
(Woman Who Is Homeless)

In the bitter rain of February
I sat inside a sunlit room,
and offered You warm prayer.

Then, she passed outside my window
dressed too lightly for the wind,
steadied on a cane, though she was young.

She seemed searching for
a comfort, unavailable and undefined.
The wound of that impossibility

fell over her the way it falls
on every tender thing that cries
but is not gathered to a caring breast.

Suddenly she was a single
anguished seed of You,
fallen into all created things.

Gathering my fallen prayer,
I wear the thought of her
like cracked earth wears fresh rain.

I’ve misconstrued You,
Holy One, to whom
I spread my heart

as if it were a yearning field…
Holy One, already ripe within
her barest, leanest yearning.

Music: The Least of These – Karl Kohlhase

Lent: Time of Holy Listening

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Jesus, Lent, spirituality2 Comments

March 2, 2022
Ash Wednesday

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we resolve to turn our hearts more fully to God. The sacred journey of Lent, one we have traveled so often over the years, invites us each time to go deeper into the Well of Mercy.

Joel’s pregnant phrase summons us:

Think of the “even now” moments of your life, those times when, despite darkness and cold, you turned toward light and warmth. Think of a time when, in contradiction to all negativity, your soul proclaimed:

  • Even now I hope
  • Even now I believe
  • Even now I love
  • Even now I care
  • Even now I repent
  • Even now I forgive
  • Even now I begin again

The rise of an “Even Now” moment in our souls is like the hint of spring pushing its head through the winter snow.

It is the reddish-green thread suggesting life at the tip of the brown, cold-cracked branch.

It is the moment we believe that what we desire and love will turn toward us and embrace us.

Can you imagine God having such moments, longing for our attention, love, presence, catching a glimpse of our turning?

Our reading from Joel describes such a God.

Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart…
These words suggest God’s longing for us, for our devotion and love.

But our holy intentions weaken and we often drift away from our “first fervors”. Our hearts attach to distractions from God. So God says:

Rend your hearts …
and return to the LORD, your God.
For I am gracious and merciful,
slow to anger, rich in kindness …
Come back to Me, with all your heart.

Joel 2: 13-14

This is what Lent is all about. Each of us knows where our hearts have wandered. Each of knows what we must turn from — even now — to return to God’s embrace.

If we can hear God’s longing in this haunting reading from Joel perhaps the true turning will begin. A blessed Lent, a holy listening, my friends.

Poetry: God’s Longing – from Rumi

All night, a man called out “God! God!”
Until his lips were bleeding.
Then the Adversary of mankind said, “Hey! Mr Gullible!
… How come you’ve been calling all night
And never once heard God say, “Here, I AM”?
You call out so earnestly and, in reply, what?
I’ll tell you what. Nothing!”

The man suddenly felt empty and abandoned.
Depressed, he threw himself on the ground
And fell into a deep sleep.
In a dream, he met an angel, who asked,
“Why are you regretting calling out to God?”

The man said, “ I called and called
But God never replied, “Here I AM.”

The Angel explained, “God has said,
“Your calling my name is My reply.
Your longing for Me is My message to you.
All your attempts to reach Me
Are in reality My attempts to reach you.
Your fear and love are a noose to catch Me.
In the silence surrounding every call of “God”
Waits a thousand replies of “Here I AM.”

Music: Come Back to Me – Gregory Norbet, sung by John Michael Talbot

Primed for Transformation

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Creation, Faith, Lent, spiritualityLeave a comment

February 27, 2022
Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings prime us for the coming of Lent. Lent is all about the transformation of our hearts within of the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus.

But before we are ready for such transformation, we must be totally aware of ourselves and open to God’s Presence in our lives.

Our readings call us to a deep look at our spiritual integrity as it is revealed in our words and actions. The image of a good tree, bearing fruit, suffuses all our scriptures today.

What about the integrity of our words:

The fruit of a tree shows the care it has had;
so too does one’s speech disclose the bent of one’s mind.
Praise no one before he speaks,
for it is then that people are tested.

Sirach 27:6-7

What about the integrity of our faith:

The just one shall flourish like the palm tree,
like a cedar of Lebanon shall he grow.
They that are planted in the house of the LORD
shall flourish in the courts of our God.

Psalm 92: 13-14

What about the perseverance of our faithful labor:

Be firm, steadfast, always fully devoted to the work of the Lord,
knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.

1 Corinthians 92:15-16

What about our actions – the fruit we bear to the world:

A good tree does not bear rotten fruit,
nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit.
For every tree is known by its own fruit.
For people do not pick figs from thornbushes,
nor do they gather grapes from brambles.
A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good,
but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil;
for from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks.

Luke 6:43-54

Let’s set our sights on the beginning of Lent which is now on the near horizon. How do we want to begin the transformative journey offered us once again in this magnificent liturgical cycle? Now is the time to prepare.

Poetry: Birches BY ROBERT FROST

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy’s been swinging them.
But swinging doesn’t bend them down to stay
As ice-storms do. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun’s warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust—
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows—
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It’s when I’m weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig’s having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth’s the right place for love:
I don’t know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

Music: Tree Song – sung by Evie Karlsson

Live in Truth

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Discipleship, Faith, spirituality, Truth2 Comments

February 25, 2022
Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings instruct us on one of life’s most important realities: truthful relationship – with God, nature, other people, and ourselves.

James reminds us that the prophets spoke the truth at great personal cost.

Take as an example of hardship and patience, brothers and sisters,
the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.
Indeed we call blessed those who have persevered.

James 5:10

Culture sometimes characterizes a “prophet” as one who can foresee the future, one who has a greater capacity than the normal person. And indeed there are great leaders who fit that understanding. They see things rightly and help us to realign our vision.

But, in an everyday sense, a prophet is simply someone who sees the truth and is unafraid to speak it. A prophet doesn’t pretend, deflect, lie, ignore, hide, distort or abuse Truth. The call to this kind of prophecy is one that we all share.

Such a call requires that we are honest, first and foremost, with God and with ourselves. It asks that we live a discerning and courageous life, reverently telling our truth as best we understand before God:

… let your “Yes” mean “Yes” and your “No” mean “No,”
that you may not incur condemnation.

James 5:12

In our Gospel, we find the Pharisees trying trip up Jesus with their pretend concern for the Law. Instead, what they are really concerned about is that they could lose their hold on power if the people turn to Jesus and his teaching.

Jesus calls them “hard of heart” because they are not open to the Spirit. They hide in a labyrinth of minutiae rather than the clarity of Love and Truth.

Living in the Truth of God’s grace and mercy, we grow in our ability to be prophetic. It means that people know they will get the truth from us — not opinion or advice; not bluntness or unnecessary critique — but a discernment offered in love, reverence, and mutual hope.

Like the biblical prophets, and like Jesus himself, we will meet people who don’t want that kind of truth. They haven’t been able to espouse it in themselves, so they don’t want to hear it from us. We see this played out daily in a sham political world that continually creates its own version of reality to suit its selfish ends.

In such situations, James would offer us this encouragement:

You have heard of the perseverance of Job,
and you have seen the purpose of the Lord,
because the Lord is compassionate and merciful.

And our Alleluia Verse offers us a prayer for such times:

Your word, O Lord, is truth;
consecrate us in the truth.

So persevere.
Seek your truth in prayer.
Give it to the world generously
with compassion and mercy.

Poetry: A Legend of Truth – Rudyard Kipling
“A Friend of the Family”
From “Debits and Credits” (1919-1923)

Once on a time, the ancient legends tell,
Truth, rising from the bottom of her well,
Looked on the world, but, hearing how it lied,
Returned to her seclusion horrified.
There she abode, so conscious of her worth,
Not even Pilate’s Question called her forth,
Nor Galileo, kneeling to deny
The Laws that hold our Planet ‘neath the sky.
Meantime, her kindlier sister, whom men call
Fiction, did all her work and more than all,
With so much zeal, devotion, tact, and care,
That no one noticed Truth was otherwhere.

Then came a War when, bombed and gassed and mined,
Truth rose once more, perforce, to meet mankind,
And through the dust and glare and wreck of things,
Beheld a phantom on unbalanced wings,
Reeling and groping, dazed, dishevelled, dumb,
But semaphoring direr deeds to come.

Truth hailed and bade her stand; the quavering shade
Clung to her knees and babbled, “Sister, aid!
I am–I was–thy Deputy, and men
Besought me for my useful tongue or pen
To gloss their gentle deeds, and I complied,
And they, and thy demands, were satisfied.
But this–” she pointed o’er the blistered plain,
Where men as Gods and devils wrought amain–
“This is beyond me! Take thy work again.”

Tablets and pen transferred, she fled afar,
And Truth assumed the record of the War…
She saw, she heard, she read, she tried to tell
Facts beyond precedent and parallel–
Unfit to hint or breathe, much less to write,
But happening every minute, day and night.
She called for proof. It came. The dossiers grew.
She marked them, first, “Return. This can’t be true.”
Then, underneath the cold official word:
“This is not really half of what occurred.”

She faced herself at last, the story runs,
And telegraphed her sister: “Come at once.
Facts out of hand. Unable overtake
Without your aid. Come back for Truth’s own sake!
Co-equal rank and powers if you agree.
They need us both, but you far more than me

Music: Beautiful Truth – Angela Predhomme

Pepper and Salt

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Discipleship, Faith, spirituality2 Comments

February 24, 2022
Thursday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, both James and Jesus pepper us with some fire and brimstone.

James is preaching against the sin of exploitation, especially as it relates to economic justice, the sanctity of work, and reverence for the worker.

Come now, you rich, weep and wail over your impending miseries…
Behold, the wages you withheld from the workers who harvested your fields are crying aloud; and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.

James 5: 1;4

James, in his time, is condemning a sin that has endured throughout history. In a 2020 address, Pope Francis confronted the same evil:

The pandemic has exposed and aggravated social problems, above all that of inequality…These symptoms of inequality reveal a social illness; it is a virus that comes from a sick economy. And we must say it simply: the economy is sick. It has become ill. It is the fruit of unequal economic growth — this is the illness: the fruit of unequal economic growth — that disregards fundamental human values. In today’s world, a few wealthy people possess more than all the rest of humanity. I will repeat this so that it makes us think: a few wealthy people, a small group, possess more than all the rest of humanity. This is pure statistics. This is an injustice that cries out to heaven!

General Audience, August 26, 2020

James and Francis – speaking the same message for different times.

In our Gospel, Jesus teaches that the rewards of a well-lived life are measured in mutuality and generosity, not dollars:


In concluding his above referenced address, Pope Francis, like Jesus, focused on children:

Let us think about the children. Read the statistics: how many children today are dying of hunger because of broken distribution of riches, because of a sick economic system; and how many children today do not have the right to education for the same reason. May this image of children in want due to hunger and the lack of education help us understand that after this pandemic crisis we must learn and do better.

Jesus too measured a soul’s health by its effect on children:

Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,  it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.

Mark 9:42

These readings teach hard lessons, lessons which society still seems unable to learn. Let’s ask for the grace to see our own role in helping to realize the sacred balance of goods that Jesus, James, and Francis call for.

Let us not tire in advocating for social Justice because, as our Gospel warns:

Everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good,
but if salt becomes insipid,
with what will you restore its flavor?

Mark 9:49

Poetry and Music: Salt of the Earth – The Rolling Stones
In this song, Mick Jagger writes an anthem to the working class. But in a twice-repeated stanza, the singer professes a distance from this very group, perhaps loosing touch because of his own material success:

And when I search a faceless crowd
A swirling mass of grey and black and white
They don’t look real to meIn fact, they look so strange

The song uses a quote that refers to a passage in the Bible where Jesus encourages people to give the best of themselves:

You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned ? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

Matthew 5:13

Hear God Speak Your Name

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Church, Conversion, Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, Jesus, spirituality2 Comments

February 22, 2022
Feast of the Chair of St. Peter

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings invite to consider God’s naming us – calling us.

We celebrate wonderful Saint Peter – so fully human, so fully holy, so fully in love with God! As we pray the Gospel of Peter’s naming, may we deepen in understanding our own naming by God.

Once, Jesus asked Peter what he believed. Peter answered, simply and magnificently:
“YOU ARE THE CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD.”
Peter was an ordinary man who responded to Jesus with a clear and extraordinary faith.

One June morning, nearly fifty years ago, I sat in a sun-drenched field in the Golan Heights of Israel at a spot called Caesarea Philippi. Thirty other pilgrims composed the group as we heard today’s Gospel being read. Listening, I watched the rising sun grow brilliant on the majestic rock face in the near distance.

I thought how Peter might have watched his day’s sun playing against the same powerful cliffs as Jesus spoke his name:

Jesus said to him,
You are Peter (which means “Rock”),
and upon this Rock
I will build my Church.

A few years later, I stood at the center of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Looking up, I saw these words emblazoned around the awesome rotunda dome:

Tu es Petrus,
et super hanc petram
aedificabo ecclesiam.

On that sunlit afternoon two-thousand years ago,
Peter could never have imagined
what God already saw for him.
Yet, Peter responded – with his whole life.
This is what makes a Saint.

Jesus calls us to be saints too. He lovingly speaks our name into a sacred future we cannot even imagine. But if, like Peter, we trust and believe, God does the rest.

Poetry: Peter by John Poch.
The poem captures the transformation of Peter’s humanness into God’s hope for him – the “changing” of his name.

There are three things which are too wonderful for me,
Yes, four which I do not understand.
The way of an eagle in the air,
The way of a serpent on a rock,
The way of a ship in the heart of the sea,
And the way of a man with a maid
–Prov. 30:18, 19

I
Contagious as a yawn, denial poured
over me like a soft fall fog, a girl
on a carnation strewn parade float, waving
at everyone and no one, boring and bored.
There actually was a robed commotion parading.
I turned and turned away and turned. A swirl
of wind pulled back my hood, a fire of coal
brightened my face, and those around me whispered:
You’re one of them, aren’t you? You smell like fish.
And wine, someone else joked. That’s brutal. That’s cold,
I said, and then they knew me by my speech.
They let me stay and we told jokes like fisher-
men and houseboys. We gossiped till the cock crowed,
his head a small volcano raised to mock stone.

II
Who could believe a woman’s word, perfumed
in death? I did. I ran and was outrun
before I reached the empty tomb. I stepped
inside an empty shining shell of a room,
sans pearl. I walked back home alone and wept
again. At dinner. His face shone like the sun.
I went out into the night. I was a sailor
and my father’s nets were calling. It was high tide,
I brought the others. Nothing, the emptiness
of business, the hypnotic waves of failure.
But a voice from shore, a familiar fire, and the nets
were full. I wouldn’t be outswum, denied
this time. The coal-fire before me, the netted fish
behind. I’m carried where I will not wish.

Music: Peter’s Song – Face to Face – Michael O’Brien

I recall
something in the way
you called my name,
an ordinary fisherman you called me friend and took me in.
How everything had changed
because then I knew I’d never be the same.

Love came and rescued me.
I gave up my everything to follow.
Now I know.
All that I was before
won’t matter anymore
for I am a new man
because I have seen my Savior
face-to-face.

I recall
standing in the courtyard by the fire,
words still ringing in my head,
three times before the break of dawn
you would be denied.
And yet I saw no judgment in your eyes.

Love came and died for me.
I gave up my everything,
gave up my everything to follow.
Now I know
all that I was before
is dead and it lives no more
for I am a new man
because I have seen
my savior face-to-face.

The dark night, the new day –
The stone was rolled away –
my Savior, You are the Light
You are alive! Ascended to heaven.
I know that you will come again.

That moment I will arise
to worship before your throne,
to bow down for you alone are worthy,
so worthy
and there with saints of old,
I’ll sing a brand new song in heaven
forever
where I will see my Savior face-to-face.

Twists of Faith

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Faith, Gospel, Jesus, spirituality1 Comment

February 21, 2022
Monday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, the deep undercurrent of our readings is about the power and difficulties of faith.

James talks about how our faith can be choked by the weeds of “bitter jealousy and selfish ambition”. These chokers make us “boast and be false to the truth”. They fill us with a “pretend wisdom” that is not from the Holy Spirit.

Praying with this passage, I asked myself why we allow these ugly constraints to grasp our souls when the alternative James describes is so beautiful:

… the wisdom from above is first of all pure,
then peaceable, gentle, compliant,
full of mercy and good fruits,
without inconstancy or insincerity.
And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace
for those who cultivate peace.

James 3:17-18

The Gospel helped me with an answer.

Unconditional faith is scary. It requires us to give control over to God. It asks us to let go of fear and to trust God’s Spirit within us. It needs us to empty our hearts of pretense and self-protection in order to make room for God’s transforming Mercy and Love.

This kind of faith will change us. It will make us “foolish” and insecure in worldly terms. It will cause us to live from a Wisdom the world misunderstands and mocks.

It’s hard to live that kind of faith. The dad in today’s Gospel admits it. He wants to have a faith that invites Christ’s power into his life. But he’s afraid. What if God wants something different for him and his son? What happens if he gives control over to God?

This yearning father confesses his ambivalence
in a plea for Christ’s assistance:
Lord, I do believe. Help my unbelief!

We all find ourselves within that plea sometimes in our lives. It’s a faith of “if”, “maybe”, and “but” – all of which are hardly faith at all. Unconditional faith is “Yes”, no matter what. It is the place where Faith and Love merge.

Our faithful “Yes”, as the e.e.cummings poem might describe it:

love is a place
& through this place of
love move
(with brightness of peace)
all places

yes is a world
& in this world of
yes live
(skillfully curled)
all worlds

Music: When we live this “Yes Faith”, God’s love, God’s heart lives in us. This song by Michael Hedges, based on another poem by e.e.cummings, can be a prayer for us. We may be unused to calling God “my dear”, “my darling”. But a loving name for God can be helpful to our prayer. And it is an ancient practice of mystics like St. John of the Cross. Use whatever might feel natural for you. Don’t be hesitant about being in love with God❤️

I Carry Your Heart – Michael Hedges (Lyrics below)

I carry your heart with me
I carry it in my heart
I am never without it
Anywhere i go you go, my dear
And whatever is done by only me
Is your doing, my darling.

I fear no fate
For you are my fate, my sweet
I want no world
For beautiful you are my world, my true
And it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
And whatever a sun will always sing is you

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows
Here is the root of the root
And the bud of the bud
And the sky of the sky
Of a tree called life;
Which grows higher than the soul can hope
Or mind can hide
And this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
I carry your heart
I carry it in my heart

The Greatest Sin

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, repentance, spirituality, TruthLeave a comment

February 15, 2022
Tuesday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, James continues with his spiritual encouragements.

For one thing, he makes it clear that God doesn’t tempt us. Some of us make the mistake of thinking that, saying things like, “God is testing me.”

James, outlining a perfect way to examine one’s conscience, says this:

No one experiencing temptation should say,
“I am being tempted by God”;
for God is not subject to temptation to evil,
and God himself tempts no one.
Rather, each person is tempted when lured and enticed by his own desire.
Then desire conceives and brings forth sin,
and when sin reaches maturity it gives birth to death.

James 1:13-15

Sin is an uncomfortable topic, and it’s an elusive one. Most of us aren’t outright blatant sinners. I think most of our sins are quiet indifferences, failures to love, unacknowledged greeds, self-imposed blindnesses to our responsibilities toward one another. These generate excuses that allow us to gossip, judge, blame, ignore, hurt and even use others both in our immediate world and in the larger global community.

In my experience, these desires are usually disguised, pretending to be beneficial for us at first sight. But underneath, they are rooted in selfishness and excess, diverting us from our center in God.

So if we have some little labyrinths of temptation and sinful habits ensnaring us, we should listen to James. He encourages us to examine and check our own concupiscent desires as they are the seeds of our spiritual undoing.

In the second part of this passage, James takes the tone up a notch. He reminds us that, once centered on God, we realize that only good things come from God.

All good giving and every perfect gift is from above,
coming down from the Father of lights,
with whom there is no alteration or shadow caused by change.

James :17

I particularly love that last phrase, rendered in our hymn today like this:

It’s beautiful to see how James, as a real spiritual leader, is so aware of his flock’s human struggles. No doubt, he shares them. What a blessing that his wise and loving guidance has come down through the ages to us!

Prose: from Carl Jung

The worst sin is unconsciousness,
but it is indulged in with the greatest piety
even by those who should serve humankind
as teachers and examples.

Music: Great Is Thy Faithfulness – sung by Chris Rice

Things Change; God Doesn’t

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Jesus, Poetry, Prayer, spiritualityLeave a comment

February 10, 2022
Thursday of the fifth Week in Ordinary Time
Memorial of Saint Scholastica

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, our readings leave me wondering about what makes God tick.

In our first reading, God exacts justice for Solomon’s unfaithfulness, but God does it sort of like a prosecutor in a plea bargain.

I will deprive you of the kingdom … but not during your lifetime
It is your son whom I will deprive … but I won’t take away the whole kingdom.

1 Kings 11:11-13

What’s going on with God in this reading? Well, it’s more like “What’s going on with the writer as s/he tries, retrospectively, to interpret God’s role in Israel’s history?”

The passage is much more than a report on exchanges between God and Solomon.

It is a testament to Israel’s unwavering faith that God is intimately involved in their lives. In every circumstance, the believing community returns to the fact that experience leads to God and not away from Him.

So “Solomon … had TURNED his heart to strange gods”
BUT God had not turned from Solomon.
Nor would God EVER turn because
God has CHOSEN Israel.

In our Gospel, the Syrophoenician woman tries to get the favor of Jesus to turn toward her. And actually, Jesus sounds pretty mean and stingy about it.

Again the writer Mark is portraying, retrospectively, a significant time in Christ’s ministry. Jesus has really gone into hiding in a remote place. Apparently, he wants space to figure some things out. The story indicates that one of those things might be whether or not his ministry should embrace the Gentiles.

The persistence of this woman’s faith is a turning point for Jesus Who evolved, as we all do, in his understanding of his sacred role and meaning in the world.

These passages encourage us to constantly turn toward God Who lives our life with us. Day to day, our lives change and challenge us. But throughout, we must stay centered on our God who does not change. This sacred relationship is essential to our spiritual growth. As we become bigger in heart and soul, so does our concept of God and what God’s hope is for us.

Poetry: All this “turning” brought to mind some favorites lines from T.S. Eliot

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.

from Burnt Norton

Music: Perfect Wisdom of Our God – The Gettys

Spirit Set Free

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Gospel, healing, spiritualityLeave a comment

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we have two highly dramatic passages in which a lot of people are annoying one another! If there were an Oscar category for “Best Biblical Drama”, these stories would definitely be nominees!

In our ongoing “David Saga”, the troubled king flees Jerusalem because his own son Absalom is plotting to overthrow him. David, at this point in time, is humbled and not a little wearied by the theatrics of his life. His sins continue to haunt him and wreak a recompense. 

Shimei curses David by Julius Schnorr von Karolsfeld

In today’s passage, we meet Shimei who has his own little miniseries going on in the Bible. Shimei is part of Saul’s family and holds David responsible for Saul’s demise. When meeting David in this passage, Shimei dangerously, and we might say stupidly, sets on him, throwing dirt and stones at the King. David prevents the troops from responding to the wildly outraged man. David even suggests that God may be trying to teach David something in the attack.

The Demoniac at Gadara

In our Gospel, we meet another wildly outraged man. This one is tormented by his inner demons, causing him also to put himself in dangerous situations. Jesus names this man’s tormentor and casts it out, giving the man control of himself again.

Have you ever been so offended, humiliated or injured that you felt outrage for yourself or another? Such fury chains us, making rationality and reconciliation close to impossible. Sometimes, it renders us impotent to name and address the deep source of our indignation.

Instead, we lash out with stones of anger or passive aggression – throwing the dirt of condemnation rather than seeking inner balance and healing.

Most of us have encountered large or small “dementors” in our life.
(Thanks for the term AND the image, Harry Potter)

But when I think of those who have endured unbelievable degrees of torment, I am amazed at their stories of faith and resolution: Anne Frank, Victor Frankel, Nelson Mandela, Harriet Tubman …. Jesus Christ. How did they come through it whole and blessed?

Maybe the possessed man in Mark’s Gospel was just lucky that day to run into Jesus. Or maybe he sought out Christ, trying to find stability in the midst of his derangement.

When we face our own imbalances can we stay still long enough to ask, as David did, “What is God teaching me in this. How can this lead me closer to God?” If we could, might we not be surprised to see our demons named, cast into the greater sea of God’s eternal wisdom, peace and love?

Poetry: Matthew VIII, 28 Fr. – Richard Wilbur
This poem, spoken by the residents of Gadara or Gerasa, imagines that they are more interested in their commerce than in miracles. They’re pretty disturbed about their pigs too

Rabbi, we Gadarenes
Are not ascetics; we are fond of wealth and possessions.
Love, as You call it, we obviate by means
Of the planned release of aggressions.
We have deep faith in properity.
Soon, it is hoped, we will reach our full potential.
In the light of our gross product, the practice of charity
Is palpably non-essential.
It is true that we go insane;
That for no good reason we are
possessed by devils;
That we suffer, despite the amenities
which obtain
At all but the lowest levels.
We shall not, however, resign
Our trust in the high-heaped table and the full trough.
If You cannot cure us without destroying our swine,
We had rather You shoved off.

Music: Set My Spirit Free – Maranatha Singers