Path to Meaningful Success

Crew wanted for hazardous journey.  Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful.  Honor and recognition in case of success.

This is probably not found on any college brochure or application you have filled out, but it is a true ad from a London newspaper from back in 1914 when Ernest Shackleton was beginning his expedition to the South Pole.  More than 500 applied for the 28 positions available for the journey and every one of them survived.

Yet, success is what we want for all of you.  It is one thing your parents want for each of you, success, viable living so you no longer have to live off of your parents.  Success–hazardous journey, small wages, long months, darkness, danger, possible loss of life–who of us would ever consider that path in life, at least with a right mind we would not!  Yet, people do every day.  Maybe it’s not so much that we make that choice and that path, but so often it is the path that chooses us and we can never look back once we embark.

 It is the path, however, that Christ invites us onto because it is the path of success that he walked.  You have heard about that journey throughout your education and formation in the faith.  There was not a whole lot that was easy about His path, and yet, most of us would consider him pretty successful–He has sold more books than anyone!  So as he begins his transition to departure as we hear in today’s gospel, his parting words become very intimate to his friends, at a moment of great vulnerability in his life, he tells them of peace, he tells them not to let their hearts be troubled and afraid, he reminds them of his love, because he knew full well at this point in John’s Gospel that a hazardous journey, complete darkness, danger, and impending loss of life were going to be the reality in their world and lives, and so he tells them as he tells us how important it is to have a solid relationship with God, to trust and have faith in that God, and no matter what life brings at you, you will find true success because life always rises over death!

 Paul writes his letter to the Philippians from prison.  He certainly doesn’t sound like someone in prison, but he too has been chosen and accepted to embark on the more difficult path in life.  He understood danger and sacrifice, no pay, darkness, and yet it only strengthened his resolve to live out the call that had been given to him.  He, like us, did not always choose the path of Christ, and there are obviously consequences when we don’t, but later in life he discovered faith in the one who calls, Christ crucified.  And yet, despite the more difficult path, he speaks of honor, justice, love, gratitude, that there are fruits and gifts in responding to the path Christ has chosen for you, and like Paul, regardless of how difficult the path is, Jesus assures all of us of one of the greatest gifts if we listen and follow, the gift of peace.

 My friends, as you graduate and begin the next stages of life, so much awaits you.  There is eagerness and anticipation, but also anxiety of having to face the unknown of this journey and path in life.  Now more than ever, as Paul tells us, prayer is necessary in your life.  As you head out and face the crossroads of life, don’t just choose the path that may appear easy.  Yes, it may get you many things in your lives and that sounds good at the moment, but when you’re out there and you’re not sure where it is life, and more importantly, God, is leading you, remember the words of Ernest Shackleton.  Remember the words of true success that will bring you integrity, faith, character, principle, and fullness of life; and despite that it may be tough at times, and it will, this path with always lead to greatness in your lives.

Crew wanted for hazardous journey, the journey we call life.  Small wages, bitter cold, long months          of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful.  Honor and recognition in case of success.

Choose the path less traveled in life and you will find true success and you will be fulfilled by life and the peace of God will be with you always.

A Love Song for God’s Vineyard

Acts 9:26-31; 1 John 3:18-24; John 15:1-8

“Remain in me as I remain in you.”  I’ve heard this passage from John described as a love song for God’s vineyard.  In just a few short verses, Jesus mentions eight times the need to “remain”…but what does that mean?  It was obviously significant if it was mentioned that many times in these few verses as well as other places as he nears the end of his life.  In the First Letter of John, the second reading today, he says it has to do with the disposition of our hearts and where they are at this moment; where does my heart “remain” at this moment in my life?  

One of the great stories of conversion of heart comes in Acts of the Apostles with the conversion of Paul.  We hear the end of the beginning of his conversion story today when he has to approach the other disciples.  Needless to say, when he shows up they are naturally terrified of him.  They are firmly aware of the disposition of his heart…he live with fear, hate, and anger towards these early Christians.  He was one of the best pharisees out there…knew the law better than anyone, but these followers of The Way were about something even beyond that…they were about love, compassion, and forgiveness, and yet, that wasn’t Paul’s experience until he literally gets knocked on his back end and blinded by the Lord when he can finally begin to see what he was doing to these followers, to the point of killing them for their belief in Jesus.  It wasn’t until he had the experience of that love, compassion, and forgiveness in the Lord that the disposition of his heart began to change and obviously becomes one of the great leaders of the Church and preachers of Christ crucified.  He learned to remain in the Lord, rather than the fear, hate, and anger.  If you remain in those, that is what you will become.

Jesus was concerned about that with his own followers as he approaches his impending death.  Again, eight times he tells them about remanning in Him; that’s your grounding when the world collapses around you, as it will when they face the cross and it is no longer a love song that plays within their hearts.  They become trapped, like Paul, in the fear, hate, anger, and anxiety, and so immediately after the resurrection, they once again experience that conversion of heart when Jesus reconciles them.

As we continue this journey through the Easter season, we are invited to evaluate the disposition of our own hearts and what do we want to be in this world.  Does the love song play within our own hearts or is it fear, hate, anger, anxiety that plagues us.  Sometimes we need to be knocked down like Paul, or maybe not always so drastic, but conversion is needed nonetheless in all our hearts so that the love song can sing.  Remain in me as I remain in you.  Remain in Christ and we will be like Christ.  Remain in love and we will be love, and it is love, it is Jesus who this world needs more than anything.  Remain in me as I remain in you.

Finding Resurrection

Mark 16: 1-[8]; 1 Corinthians 5: 6-8

There was a movie that came out a few years ago entitled, Finding Neverland. It’s somewhat of a biographical story of JM Barie, the writer of Peter Pan and how this whole idea of the “neverland” came about. He speaks of his experience growing up and losing his brother and the trauma that it placed on him, but even more so on his mother, who, in many ways, became incapacitated to even take care of him because of the pain and loss that she had experienced. So “neverland” came about as an escape, and eventually becomes the story of Peter Pan. Neverland was a place where he could escape the pain and suffering, a place that was perfect and untouchable, a place where he didn’t have to grow up and wouldn’t have to confront any of the darkness that had plagued his life.

I believe, in my own life, but many other lives I have encountered as a priest, that we want “neverland” more than we want resurrection. I honestly believe that! None of us want suffering, and so we often create these neverlands for ourselves to avoid it, but at a price of never growing up in our faith and not living this paschal mystery of death to life.

In many ways it follows the story of the disciples, in particular in Mark’s Gospel who we hear from today on this Easter Sunday. When they first encounter Jesus everything is all honky-dory and things are going great and they love what they are doing for and with him, and then the cross comes; and what happens? They scatter. They avoid it and run…they want neverland rather than resurrection because it is only through death that we experience resurrection! Today it’s the women’s time in Mark’s Gospel. They have been the faithful one’s throughout the gospel. They were the ones who were even there at the crucifixion and so rightfully so, they are the first to head to the tomb and given the gift of experiencing the resurrection. However, what we don’t hear today is their response. The next verse, and final verse of Mark’s gospel, speaks of how they left trembling and bewildered; full of fear and never go to report what they had seen to the other disciples out of fear. Ah, they are just like the others and Mark leaves his community provoked to respond…NO, I will not be like them; I will have the courage to go out; I will have the courage to face the suffering, trusting that God will transform it. I will have the courage to journey to Jerusalem, rather than to neverland.

Mark tells us the way to do it is to go back; they are to go back to Galilee where it all began. For us, as people of faith, we can go back to our baptism and begin to see that through the lens of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Even more, we can go back to the beginning in the Garden of Eden and see Adam and Eve now through the lens of the cross and resurrection. We are so quick to give up on God, on the Church, because as I said, we often desire “Neverland”. And that’s the whole idea; this isn’t neverland and it never has been. We are about resurrection!! At some point in our lives we have to grow up beyond neverland and face the sufferings of our lives, now knowing through this lens, that resurrection will happen. It won’t be a perfect ride getting there and it certainly won’t be easy and without suffering, but it is the way to resurrection and it is the way to discipleship.

Paul tried to convey the same message to Corinth. He tells them in today’s second reading that they have to give up their old self and take on “Christ crucified” for that is who we are! We can begin to look at our lives, in hindsight often, through this lens. That’s why the disciples are told to go back to Galilee and not Jerusalem. Things were too fresh in Jerusalem. The leaders were just glad it’s was over. When we are lost in our sufferings, as that city was, it is often hard to see the resurrected one because we are desiring neverland. Yet, if we go back to the beginning, we can begin to see that God has always been present, even in these most difficult of moments, and we can gradually begin to give up that wanting of neverland and seek resurrection.

My friends, as we begin this great season of our faith, we are invited to “Find Resurrection” rather than “Finding Neverland”. At some point we have to give up neverland and confront the pain and suffering that may come. We have to in order to grow up in our faith, because that is who we are, a resurrection people, not a neverland people, a people of the great Alleluia!!

On the Fence

2 Chronicles 36: 14-16, 19-23; Ephesians 2: 4-10; John 3: 14-21

I had the opportunity this weekend to check out the Goretti Players perform their spring musical, Celebration. One of the main characters in the show is a man by the name of Mr. Rich. He’s an older gentleman who begins to come to the realization that his life is pretty empty…he can no longer feel and no longer love, and yet, sees it in the young people around them and wants what they have. The problem is, he has created an artificial world for himself. He wears artificial hair, makes artificial body parts, likes artificial flowers, and so he lives in this artificial and fake world where love just can’t happen. But now he finds himself on the fence…he sees the emptiness of this artificial world and yet desires more. He wants something more than the fake; he wants to live and love.

It is the predicament that Nicodemus finds himself in throughout John’s Gospel, the only one that he appears in. He is unlike any of the other characters we meet in John’s Gospel, like the Man born Blind, the Samaritan woman, or Lazarus, all who go through this gradual process of coming to faith and fully committing themselves to Christ. Nicodemus struggles and finds himself on the fence. His noted quality that John points out, is that he always comes to Jesus in the night. Obviously light and darkness have significance in this Gospel. So today he comes to him at night for many reasons, certainly seeking that same love. Yet, he too knows the fake world that has been created for him. He is one of the only religious authorities that comes to Jesus in this way, but has to do it at night because of his status, this artificial world where he is comfortable, but unfulfilling. In the night because of the increased pressure that is on Jesus and his impending death. Because of this world he lives in, and despite the desire of his heart, he can’t be seen with Jesus.

He does gradually grow throughout the gospel. The next time he appears in chapter 12, he actually stands up to the religious authorities, yet quickly backs down because of the pressure then put on him in sympathizing with Jesus and then feeling that rejection. In the end, the final place he appears is at the death of Jesus, but even here it is Joseph of Arimathea that takes the lead in anointing Jesus’ body for burial. This fear and uncertainty puts him on that fence between the artificial world, that becomes our world of sin, and the world that Christ invites to of love and life.

In that musical Mr. Rich couldn’t look at himself for years in the mirror because he didn’t like what he had become, this artificial self and couldn’t stand the sight of it. Yet, the message from the young man was to look into the eye of God. Nicodemus has to keep looking into the eyes of Christ, even if it is at night, and the more he gazes, the more he can begin to leave behind the artificial world and move to the life that Christ promises. Paul tells us today , though, that we can’t do it ourselves. We often need God to push us off that fence to the other side before we can stand naked and surrender ourselves to the life and love of Christ.

Even the writer of Chronicles in today’s first reading understood this. He gives this litany of all that they had participated in, this artificial world of sin and fakeness. He reminds them of what happens when they enter into this world…remember exodus, remember exile, remember the desert, remember feeling abandoned and empty. If you return to that artificial world you have created for yourself, you will once again face that same destiny. Yet, John tells us that the darkness of that world is what we like and want because it’s what we know and are comfortable with, but a world that is dead and without opportunity for life.

As we enter into these last weeks of the Lenten season, the invitation remains the same for us on this journey. We are invited to surrender to the other side of the fence, to the life and love that Christ promises and leave the fake and artificial world behind, knowing its emptiness and its lack of fulfillment. If we want to love and live the way Christ calls us to, then we have to leave it behind, continue the gaze into his eyes, and allow God to push us over and off the fence. We are assured, as people of faith, that the life and love we desire surely awaits.

Turning things Upside down

Exodus 20: 1-17; I Corinthians 1: 22-25; John 2: 13-25

Before about 2 months ago, the name Jeff Bethke meant absolutely nothing and may still mean nothing to most of you. But if you spend anytime not he internet or youtube, you’d probably be familiar with his video that he posted entitled, “Why I hate religion, but love Jesus”. To date, there have been almost 20 million people that have viewed it. Of course, the natural inclination by “Church people” when the video posted was to, like Jesus, crucify him…prove him wrong, tell him how he’s wrong, and so on. However, if you spend anytime getting to know why he did this and who he is, you will see that he actually is a practicing Christian, attends church like us, and after reading about him on a spread in Time Magazine a few weeks, simply wants to engage people in conversation because he believes religion is no longer authentic, that it has become too political, divisive, and all this other negative stuff, that it has driven people away from the faith. He agrees that his theology may not be the best, but does believe that religion needs to be turned upside down, and is necessary at times because it loses sight of its mission and purpose of leading people to a deeper and more intimate relationship with Christ, with God.

Even Jesus challenged religion as we hear in today’s Gospel. He’s angry at what has become of the Temple, and in many ways, wants to turn it too upside down. You have to understand the make-up of the Temple area at that time…there was the street, then this inner courtyard, and then the Temple area. The place we find Jesus today is that inner courtyard area, which was also the place that the Gentiles came to pray since they weren’t allowed into the Temple, and so the market has moved from the street in tot this area of prayer. It angers him, but also because the religious leaders were allowing this and at time profiting from it…again, losing sight of their mission and purpose of leading people to the Father; Jesus himself identifies it as the Father’s house.

In the first reading we hear something we are all familiar with, the Ten Commandments. Again, keep in mind the bigger picture of this story because the Israelites also lost sight of what was most important…Moses was taking too long up the mountain, they became impatient, they were getting anxious, and so build this golden calf. When Moses does return, he too, like Jesus, becomes angered by what they have done! Of the 17 versus that we hear today, about ten of them are about what is most important, that being the relationship with this God. How easy it is to lose focus on what is most important. Seven of the ten commandments are about relationships, and yet, most of our time is spent getting lost in the other three!

Paul too has that experience with the Corinthians, who he rightfully turns upside down. He mentions today that Jews demand signs and Greeks, wisdom, but he says you already have what you need…we have Christ crucified! Stop looking out there and losing your focus on what is most important, that relationship with Christ. That is why we come here and what is most important about religion, and why at times it needs to be turned upside down…we lose sight of the all-important relationship that we are invited into with God.

During this season of Lent we are being invited to be turned upside down by Christ, because we too lose sight of our mission and purpose and what is most important. We focus too much on politics, jobs, finances, sports, and everything else that has a tendency to pull us away and lose sight of what is most important, that relationship with God. What, in my life, needs to be turned upside down so I can begin to grow in that relationship with God? That’s why we are here…to grow in that intimate relationship with the crucified Christ in this Eucharist and once again regain our focus on our mission during this season of Lent.

God, Violence, and Youth

I had written this article a few years ago for The Catholic Review and rewritten several times following, after a young, teenage man had murdered his family in Cockeysville, MD. When I heard the story out of Ohio this morning at Chardon High School, it reminded me of these words. A similar response from the people: “These things don’t happen in Chardon.” …and unfortunately, they do. It saddens me to see such stories. Here is what I had written…

I am more and more convinced after working with teenagers, that adults really don’t always understand where they are coming from. It is easy for any of us to say that we were their age once; but has the mindset changed? If anything, we can all agree that our society and culture have changed and developed over these past years, sometimes much quicker than we can advance. It appears less innocent; and at times, more violent than ever before.

I’ll never forget a conversation I had with a young man a few years ago who told me that he sometimes treats his parents as if they were dead, because he would rather have it that way. Can you imagine?!? He had told me that he felt so much pressure to succeed on their terms, that he never had the chance to just be a kid. He, like so many others, was a pressure cooker waiting to explode and didn’t know how to creatively channel that energy. He, and many others that I have talked to, feel that they are given responsibilities that are well beyond their scope of reasoning, that they have no where to turn. In two-parent working families or in single-parent families, these “kids” are often given the responsibility of making choices for their younger siblings that should clearly be left to a mature adult. Yet, they aren’t and we are left with no one to blame for the violence that sometimes ensues in their own lives and the people around them.

Now I know that the immediate reaction of people will be anger; that it sounds like I am blaming the parents for this situation. However, that is not necessarily the case. Even that “kid” has to take some responsibility for his actions. We are in a position, though, that we must start asking “why” and not just in these seemingly isolated cases, but why are “kids” feeling such pressure? Why does it seem that “kids” can no longer be “kids”? Why are people so quick to steal their innocence in the face of mounting expectations and pressures in life?

A lot has changed, it seems, since I was a teenager, albeit twenty years now, but not always necessarily for the better. There was a time when schools were safe, when homes were safe, when it seemed like we lived in a protected world, where war and violence only happened “over there”. Yet, as time passes, it seems to be coming closer and closer to home. There was a time when the parent was always right. There was a time when you had to believe in God whether you wanted to or not. There was a time when the teacher was right and I was wrong. What ever happened to those days? What ever happened to the days where parents made the choices and decisions for their kids, whether they liked it or not, and that decision stood, no questions asked. It was the right choice. What ever happened to the day when kids didn’t have to prove anything, they can just play; they can just be kids?

My fear is that a revolt is brewing deep down in many young people; many young people that have walked through my life, bruised and “beat up” looking for answers and some kind of hope in the midst of the senseless violence they witness. It is a revolt that none of us, as adults, will be able to stop, because it is a drive and a passion to be a kid, a reclaiming of innocence lost, and nothing more. It is a desire to believe in something that is bigger than us, a belief in God. We need, as a society, as adults, to give them the bigger picture in life because so many are trapped within the confines of that pressure cooker, and, sadly, one day tragedy happens, more frequently, it seems, and we are left wondering “Why?”. We need to move beyond a disposable society; to see ourselves as broken, but redeemed at the same time.

No, it is not an easy concept for a kid to understand, nor adults at times, but as adults we should be able to at least begin to grasp the mystery of life and death and then model that for them in return. Kids need to be taught and modeled that life isn’t perfect, that we can’t always get our own way, that it’s ok to be held without being abused, that I can be punished when I am wrong, that I should take responsibility for my actions, that there are consequences for how I act, but at the same time, there is something bigger that exists. What needs to be taught, and maybe how I see myself as a voice for these teenagers, is to say, I understand that there is all this mess in your life, but deep down, it’s not the end of the world, you shouldn’t ignore it, don’t let it fester within, that there is a God and that God loves me and you regardless of anything that any of us can say or do because we believe in a God that is not only merciful but also forgiving. Therein lies a lesson for all of us to learn, adults and kids alike.

UnderWater

From a distance you are filled with innocence.
White, frothy waters, streaming by,
thunderous crashing of falls.
A river at play, like a child,
wanting it’s own way.

Yes, a place to play,
but nonetheless, a place with power,
with determination,
demanding presence from us all.

But innocence you have taken, or so it seems.
That fateful day when the waters collapsed,
engulfed and trapped,
the filling of lungs with your precious cargo,
death knocked and then darkness; voices seeming distant,
calling my name to come out!

I have now grown older and we both are forever changed.
You, not even remembering that day; life has moved on,
your waters moving endlessly away.
And yet, for that moment, we were but one;
surrendering to your will gave me hope,
letting go gave me light,
at a moment when death seemed imminent,
you spit me out and offered me life.