On Pilgrimage in Oklahoma City

If God was calling you to do something, how would you know?

We live in a stream of information.  500 channels on the cable, several hundred million web sites — everyone wants our attention and our allegiance.  We make many choices every day, some are minor, others are major.  All of our decisions have consequences, great and small.

It’s a busy world, and all of us have busy lives.

How then can we discern the signs of these times and God’s will for us in these times.  What does God want me to do?

There are many paths of discernment in the Catholic world.  I am most familiar with Ignatian discernment that derives from my experience with the Annotation 19 Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius retreat that I completed in 1994-95.  It’s not really possible to describe the richness of this tradition in this little blog post, at the end there is a link to an interesting summary.  I can highly recommend the “Retreat in Daily Life” experience of the Annotation 19 Exercises.  It certainly changed my life.  None of the little that I have done these past 15 years would have been possible without that experience.

As with anything, discernment takes practice, and the more practice, the better you become at discernment.  God wants us all to experience a radical freedom that opens our hearts to God’s hopes and dreams for us.  It begins with an understanding that God is not a remote deity but is actively involved with our lives.  It continues through a proper understanding of the reason for our being and place in Creation. It understands that most of us are conflicted, pulled this way and that way, and often grope our way forward blindly. There are no final answers, discernment is a process, a journey, that never ends. It is truly wholistic, taking into account the objective circumstances of our lives as well as the interior movements of the Spirit, our emotions, dreams, desires, fears, hopes, and understandings.

Given the trajectory of world events these days, discernment is radically important for all who seek to understand and live God’s will.  Through this novena of novenas, we have an opportunity to break from our busy-ness and experience time with God where we can learn to open our ears and our hearts so that we can hear the word of God for and to us.  Sure, sometimes that message is not avoidable (think of Paul heading to Damascus and meeting a vision of Christ that knocks him off his donkey and blinds him), but more often, our experience is like that of Elijah. . .

And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.

It’s time to stop waiting for the great winds and earthquakes, and open our ears so we can actually hear the still small voice of the Lord.

Ignatian Discernment and Decision-Making

Speaking truth.  It sounds so easy and of course, very pious.  Who is not in favor of truth?

But as Pilate said so long ago, “What is truth?”  He said this in response to Jesus’ declaration that He had come into the world to testify to the truth.  After his question to Jesus, Pilate actually went out to the people and told them the truth — “I find no evil in this man.”  But the people were having none of it.  Crucify Jesus, they said in response to his truth. Give us Barabbas!  So Pilate had Jesus flogged, dressed in a purple robe and crowned with thorns.  Then he brought him out to the people and said the words that have been immortalized in the Roman language — ECCE HOMO!  Behold the Man!

Still, the people were having none of it.  Crucify him!  Pilate tries to speak some more truth to them — “This is your King!” –  but they will not listen.   Pilate goes back inside and says to Jesus — Just who are you and where do you come from?  Jesus replies with silence.  Pilate grows angry and says — “Don’t you know who I am and what I can do to you?” Jesus then speaks more truth, which sends Pilate back outside in another attempt to reason with the mob and avoid executing an innocent man.  “If you do not crucify him, you are no friend of Caesar! “  So Pilate washes his hands of the affair and “hands him over to be crucified.”

It’s clear from this narrative that speaking truth can be a perilous occupation.  Pilate wants to do the right thing, he doesn’t want to kill Jesus, he wants truth in this situation to prevail — but there is a limit to his devotion to the truth, and the enemies of Jesus go right to the “crux” of that matter when they say “If you do not crucify him, you are no friend of Caesar!”

So Pilate chose the easy way, left truth behind, and attempted to shift blame for his judgment to the mob with the famous washing of the hands.  Oh if only it was so easy to remove one’s responsibility to Truth!

Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Martyrs of Latin America speak truth to us today.  They tell us that all human beings are persons of worth and dignity.  All human life is sacred, from the moment of conception to the time of natural death.  This includes all poor people who live on top of resources and land that is desired by the rich and powerful.  This includes every person collaterally damaged by warring armies caught up in the objective evil of unjust war.  It includes everyone that the violent and the bloodthirsty want to kill.

Like Jesus, the Martyrs of Latin America spoke truth to power, to the people, and to the Church — they did so at the cost of their own lives.  Those Mayans murdered at Acteal could have been somewhere else less controversial that day.  The Jesuit Martyrs of Central America could have been less devoted to the truth.  Oscar Romero could have chosen the “safe” hierarchal career path.

But ad majorem Dei gloriam, they did not choose the easy and the safe route of going along to get along with deceit and the lies of the demons who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.  Unlike the Catholic bishops of these United States, they stood firm and unwavering in their devotion to the Truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  May their example inspire all of us to always take the hard path of Truth and may their prayers on our behalf give us fortitude in the face of the moral relativisms of this era.

A compost pile is beauty at work.

It is an integral and organic part of God’s natural plan for Creation.

God did not create beautiful leaves for trees, or pasture grasses, or shrubs, or any other growing thing for it to end up wrapped in black plastic and buried at great monetary and environmental cost in a giant pile of garbage.

God’s evident intent for Creation is that natural growing “creatures” like plants, trees, and grasses die and then their physical existence decays and the nutrients are returned to Creation for use by other growing creatures and organisms and plants and animals and birds and human beings.

It is a mark of the arrogant wealth of this era that we boldly and rudely reject God’s plan for Creation and turn instead to environmental sodomy, leaving the natural way of Creation and embracing the unnatural.  We take the flowers from our altars, where they have given beauty to the holy liturgies of the Church, wrap them in black plastic, and bury them in piles of trash and think nothing of it!

Is this any way to say “Thank you” to God for the beauties and wonders of Creation?

How long will we have those beauties and wonders of Creation if we continue to reject God’s way and continue to revel in environmental sodomy?

One of the critical issues these days is the increasing abuse of authority in all walks of life — political, economic, religious, academic, etc.  Human history is littered with the debris of corrupt aristocracies, but I think it is likely the present situation is among the most egregious of all time.  Whether it be Catholic bishops willingly putting themselves in captivity to the Republicrat ruling class of the United States, or the corrupt CEO parasites of Wall Street looting shareholder value and the taxpayer to fund their lavish lifestyles, the problem is the same: the betrayal of the common good and the glorification of selfishness.

Our world society has become like a runaway freight train, headed for a broken-down bridge over a deep chasm.  It seems as though nearly all of the natural checks and balances of our systems have themselves been corrupted or simply eliminated.

The United States Catholic bishops can commit enormous crimes against children, they can give material cooperation to the objective evil of unjust war, and apparently no one in the Vatican cares enough to discipline anyone for such substantive reasons.  Indeed, the evidence is that the Vatican conspired with the US bishops to cover up the decades long series of crimes against children in the US Church and elsewhere.  The arch-episcopal-pedophile-lover-of-all-time, Cardinal Law, formerly of Boston, remains a cardinal of the Roman Church, and is a member of all of the committees involved with the selection and formation of bishops!

I know it is tiresome to hear this kind of thing again, but since the scandal continues, we have to continue to observe its unfolding, as painful as it may be.

The secular world is in no better shape.  Economics, politics, corruption remains the rule, not the exception.

The demons who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls certainly are having a run of success.  Nevertheless, as with Belshazzer’s feast, the hand-writing is on the wall of the grand party this regime of corruption.  Mene, mene, tekel, upharison. God has numbered the days of this regime of corruption and will bring it to an end.  The arrogant of this age have been weighed in the balances and found wanting.  This kingdom will be divided and given to others.

In the end, the prophecy of the Magnificat of Mary will be literally fulfilled.  The rich and arrogant will be brought low, the proud will be scattered, and as Jesus said, the meek will inherit the earth.

Temperance has never been easy for me.  Some spiritual advisors in the past have suggested that my personal “golden mean” may just naturally be set a bit higher and faster than normal, but I always wonder if they really mean that or are just trying to help me adjust to my life as I habitually live it.  Today was a typially non-temperate day.  Funeral in the AM, chores and phone calls and emails and several wild google chases on random issues that came up and I just HAD to learn more right then.

I looked at the clock and thought, “I’m going to bed early tonight”, since tomorrow will probably be just as busy as today.  But then I remembered, “The Novenas!  And today begins a new one.”  So I put on some quiet music, got out my novena prayers and prayed through them quite routinely at a reasonably rapid rate of verbal prayer, came to the end, and all of a sudden, all of the words that I had just prayed hit me with all of their meaning all at once.  I had to just lean back in my chair and close my eyes and simply rest for a moment.

What was I thinking of when I wrote that prayer to the Martyrs of the Americas? I wondered quietly.  Can I actually bear to pray that every night for nine days? Especially in conjunction with the prayer written by Pope John Paul II to Mary for life.

So I had to pray the prayers again, and this time more slowly, pausing and “seeing” all those we are praying about and for and asking to pray for us.

I think all the prayers of this Novena of Novenas are dangerous to spiritual apathy and indifference.  But there is something about the prayer to the Martyrs of the Americas that really touches me.

I have always had a special place in my spiritual heart for the Martyrs of these Americas.  In the 1980s, before my conversion to Catholicism, I was involved in various secular/libertarian peace movements, and the issues of Latin America were prominent.  The Justpeace website was first published on the internet on December 22, 1997, and I remember a certain urgency to get it up and running on that day.  Later, I learned that on December 22, 1997, 49 Mayan people, members of a pacifist movement called Las Abejas (the “Bees”) that was involved with projects to protest injustice in their region, were murdered by paramilitary forces, in a church in Acteal, Chiapas, Mexico, while the regular Mexican military stood by and did nothing.  It has always been my belief that the Justpeace website, and all that has derived from it since that day, was the first-fruits of their intercessory prayers as martyr-saints.

I’m sure I’ll have more to say about this as this novena develops, but I believe that remembrance is very important to the works of justice and peace.  The Empire works on an “out of sight, out of mind” philosophy. If we don’t talk about or remember its victims — the “collateral damges” — then everything is fine because they don’t even exist anymore.  Thus, to forget the victims of Empire is to consent to the crimes of Empire.

To protect and extend the cause of Life, we must never forget the victims of the culture of death.

Mary was a woman of strength, wisdom, and justice.  She lived among a people impoverished by injustice and oppression. She knew the joys and sorrows of being a parent.  She followed her Son throughout his ministry, and was one of the handful who stood with him to the very end at the crucifixion.  She could have given up in the face of the evil of her day, but she didn’t.  She walked the journey, all the way, and to this very day, she continues to walk with us. When we are discouraged or afraid, she is there to comfort us and give us strength.  Her prayers on our behalf bring grace and peace and healing.

Oscar Romero had plenty of opportunities to get out of his situation.  Indeed, he didn’t even have to get into it in the first place.  He could have been a non-controversial bishop — that’s what everyone was expecting and indeed, by all accounts, that’s why he was chosen Archbishop of San Salvador.  He could have continued throughout his ministry with his eyes, ears, and heart closed to the cry of the poor.  But he chose another path.  He opened his eyes, his heart, and his ears, to the guidance of the Spirit and so it came to pass that he spoke courageously and publicly against the terrible evils of his day. So it also came to pass that his own government murdered him, while he was celebrating Mass, with a gun and bullets paid for by the US taxpayer and sent to El Salvador by President Jimmy Carter.

As individuals, we may never have to face such terrible choices as Oscar Romero and Mary our Mother of Sorrows endured.  But in our own way, the radical demands of discipleship are laid upon us — not in a once-in-a-lifetime event, but in a daily challenge.  It might even be easy to say — “Yes, I will embrace a glorious martyrdom for the cause of Justice and Peace” — but what most of us are actually faced with are daily questions, daily opportunities to hear the cry of the poor and respond in faith, or to close our ears to what is happening around us and go forth in arrogant ignorance.  We may be willing to die for the Faith, but in the here and now, are we willing to take less, so that there is more for others?

Are we willing and ready to redeem the structures of violence and evil in our world, or are we following the bishops who give tacit consent to injustice and oppression, while going to great lengths to preserve appearances and protect our plausible deniability?

If these are uncomfortable questions, then you signed up for the wrong novena of novenas.  This is the “we are going to root out the sin in our hearts and lives and be converted” novena, not the “we are going to go along to get along and not rock the boat” novena.

Today we did 278 deliveries of food to low income people here in the Oklahoma City area.  About 45 people showed up to help.  It was hot, and it didn’t get cooler as the work proceeded.  Even so, people were in good spirits.  Before we began bagging the groceries, we prayed together for God’s blessing on our work.  As always, we dedicated this work as reparation for the many sins against life of this era.

It I were to start listing all of those sins, I might still be writing some time tomorrow afternoon and no one would have time to read all of it, even if I had the time to write it.  Suffice it to say that the sins against life of this age are egregious.  The originate in the various acts of human persons, and over time, become systemized in great structures of sin that make it easy for us to do evil.

Our purpose, as Christians, and as Catholic Workers in particular, journeying in the charism of Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin, is to counter those structures of sin with structures of beauty, wisdom, justice, and truth.  We want to make a world where it is easier to be good.  We are convinced that if we continually do good, as much good as we can, wherever we can, under whatever circumstances we can, that eventually we will get good at it.

With the news being what it is, it’s not hard to let your emotions run you right into depression and apathy.  The news is full of so much evil.  Which is why the good that we do is so important.  It may not make the morning news or go viral on the internet, but God sees each act of wisdom and goodness and if you think He thinks that all this is meaningless, you are wrong.  We don’t see all that is to be seen, but there is One who does, and his call to us is to continue in faithfulness and do His will, on earth, as it is in heaven.

The “Act of Caring for Creation” for this novena is to pick up trash in a public place.  Trash is a big deal, on many levels.  It is the consequence of the unrestrained gluttony of our economy and lifestyles.  It pollutes the earth and wastes resources and can poison and kill our fellow creatures and critters.  Littering is a symptom of the disconnection we feel from our community and place, from the natural Creation, from God, and from our fellow human beings.

Our house is a corner lot, and we have lots of foliage.  Every day trash blows into our yard and catches on the various bushes and plants.  We have to pick trash every day.

Picking up trash is an act of orthopraxis.  It is taking responsibility for place and community.  It is an act of penance — for our own gluttonies, and for the many sins against life that are characeristic of this age.  Yes, it can be yucky and icky and you may find things like discarded drug needles and etc and about the latter, thank God that you found them instead of a child.  Wear gloves and carry a can for disposal of the needles.  What’s that you say? You won’t find any drug needles in your neighborhood or area?  I hope not, but that’s not the way I would bet if we went on a trash picking excursion together.

Sure, this may be like bailing with a tea cup, but interesting things happen when you pick up trash.  I have had strangers join me for a few moments. I’ve seen people throw some trash down, they see me picking up trash, and then they pick up their trash.  And read this comment that was posted on my Facebook Wall by Caralyn Oakley:

I thought this would make you smile - On the first day of the Summer of Novenas, without being told, and without knowing anything about it, my 2 year old picked up some trash lying on the ground at a restaurant. When I asked him what he was doing, he said, “It mess, Mommy. I fix it.” The innocence of children! Made me very encouraged for the first day!!!

Ad majorem Dei gloriam!

The Gospel reading for Mass today comes from the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount.

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’
will enter the Kingdom of heaven,
but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.

Strong words. Not hard to understand.

Jesus goes on to compare those who do God’s will with a man who builds a house on rock, and a man who builds a house on sand. When the rain and storm and wind come, the house built on the rock stands, and that which is built upon sand is destroyed.

It may be, going forward into the next 20 years or so, that we will see some literal fulfillment of these words. The storms press hard against our globalized world society.  (I started to write “civilization”, but I’m not sure we have that.) There are any number of religious folk out there who may be weighed in the balances and found wanting during the coming turmoil.  They have drunk deeply of the wine of the culture of death, and willingly done the work of the demons of war, violence, and injustice. They may have a perfect ordination, an apostolic line going all the way back to St. Peter, but if they do the works of demons and do not do the will of God, their cathedrals and tele-churches — however beautiful — are built upon sand.  And when times get tough, we will all see them for what they are.

At the end of the writing, having delivered to us some of the most powerful words in all the Bible, Matthew says simply that the people were “astonished” at the teachings of Jesus.

I think many people, when they read the Bible, just gloss over passages like the Sermon on the Mount.  These words of Jesus are  too counter-cultural, not very Republican and not very Democrat either.  They too are astonished that Jesus would say such things, so when the demons whisper to them — “He really wasn’t talking about Iraq and Afghanistan or Vietnam, Americans get an exception to all this dogma about loving your enemies, you can be as merciless and unjust and violent as you want, and God won’t care — they open their ears to the demons, and close their ears to the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is always easier to listen to demons than to Christ.  The demons tell us comfortable things that we want to hear — consume, destroy, kill, grab, use it up, throw it away, show no mercy.  Jesus, on the other hand, calls us to conversion of heart, mind, and soul.  He says “everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who builds his house on a rock.”  And what do we hear when we listen to Jesus?  Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, turn the other cheek, give food to the hungry, water to the thirsty, heal the sick, clothe the naked, visit the sick and imprisoned, house the homeless.  We also hear His call to cleanse the Temple of the wicked bankers and moneychangers who befoul the sacred ground.

So what’s it to be for us, as we pray these days of concern for justice, peace, and the Care of Creation?  Shall we hear and then do the will of God? Or will be hear and do the works of demons?  Life or death, the choice is ours.

Today was the feast of the Nativity of St. John the Baptist.  This is a feast of great antiquity, perhaps the first feast of a saint in our liturgical celebration.  Sermons for this feast exist from early in the Christian era.  Under the old Julian calendar, the summer solstice fell on this date, and thus in Europe there are numerous folk customs associated with the celebration, most notably the building of bonfires and associated revelry.

It’s actually kind of a sedate night here at home, no bonfires on the yard (one issue with that is just about anywhere on the property except for the driveway and sidewalks, a bonfire would burn veggies or fruits or other useful plants, herbs, trees and bushes.

But perhaps we could have an allegorical bonfire — a bonfire of Justice — on this “St. John’s Day” that will burn away structures of sin, injustice, violence, and oppression and — as ash gives fertility to the soil — the burning away of the old will nurture the growth of new structures of justice, beauty, and wisdom right here in the midst of the collapsing ruins of the old.