Month: March 2018

I was at the Arlington Diocese Men’s conference on 3 March 2018 – a Catholic gathering, our bishop was there all day, and it was really a powerful time.  750 men, young men, and boys from all over the diocese there to learn about our faith and how to grow in it.  The speaker made a comment that stuck with me, about religious freedom in the US.  It was so strong that I want to share it with you all to spark the thought.  I won’t use the whole quote but I want to launch into the question with a preface: We have religious liberty in this country.  I won’t get into the many countries that have killed people for their faith, lets just use it as an absolute.  We have it here in the US and it is awesome!  Which leads to this question.

What the hell are you doing with your religious freedom?  

Because it sure doesn’t seem like much.

(Thanks to Fr. Mike Schmitz)

I want to revisit silence for a tiny bit.  And add in stillness.

There is a fantastic song by Rush called “Time Stand Still“, which my friend Rich recently brought to my attention in a wonderful Facebook post earlier this month.  In the song, the person doesn’t want to go back in time, they aren’t looking back.  They want to look around now, see more of the people and places that surround them now, to paraphrase their lyrics.  The premise of the song is “this moment”, staying in it, being present in it.  (Again, I’ll talk about Rush in another post – it’s worth it.) Continue reading “Time Stand Still (Silence pt. deux)” →

Taking you All Saints parishoners back to the days of Fr. Hoppough, Fr. Flood, and Fr. Vito (“deeyah”).  Fr Hoppough has this way of saying “ar” like “ah”.  This comes up every time the Gospel is the reading where Martha and Mary are attending to Jesus in Bethany.

My sister shared a story with me today that moved me, and I wanted to pass it along to you all.  She was having a discussion with her daughter on the way home from a medical appointment and the subject of Lazarus and death came up.

Jesus heard that his very good friend Lazarus was sick, but lollygags 3 days before going to Bethany(!), if you remember the Gospel passage.   My sister, in a moment of extreme insightfulness, had the reflection that when we are pestering the Lord for something and it doesn’t seem like He’s answering, He just might have something better in store, like resurrection instead of healing.

Here I want to quote, because I love voices:

“The girls have been watching a lot of Mary Tyler Moore, so I said, ‘Imagine what Martha said to Jesus, but in Rhoda Morgenstern’s voice. “If you had been here, he wouldn’t have died!!!!!” (It’s actually kind of fun to yell at Jesus in Rhoda’s voice.) I said, imagine you had a brother who was sick… and Jesus showed up just a little too late, what would you say . . . oh . . . duh . . . and your brother’s birthday was on the feast of St. Martha. . . .'”

God works in mysterious ways.  Thanks to my sister, we now have another patron to pray to, who is good about nagging Jesus to get things done!

And remember, He might have something better in store.

PS – I Love conversations like this.  Sitting around and talking about football bores me.  And when I got this email today I was just floored.