Heroic Action or Infringement of Rights?

As much as our world changes and the values and morals alter concurrently, sometimes it is good to see that embedded deep within us is a natural understanding of how we should respond. Many health situations that create controversy and endless disagreements often start from a good intention that is found within us as human beings. The push for assisted suicide generally comes from seeing someone suffering and acknowledging that things shouldn’t be that way. Our desire to eliminate suffering in others is good, but we don’t always pursue the correct course of action.

What this tends to create in society is the belief that each individual should be able to do what they think is best. As an individualistic society, we are quick to argue that nobody can force their beliefs and opinions on me. I am free to do whatever I want, whenever I want. Sometimes we will add the caveat “as long as I am not hurting anyone,” but often, culturally, we see our freedom as the one objective truth.

Do you remember hearing roughly a month ago about a MLB umpire who saved a woman from jumping off the Roberto Clemente bridge in Pittsburgh? I found the story a beautiful testament of someone caring about a stranger and doing something when others just walked by. What I find particularly interesting about the story is how it was reported. People came together to help a woman who was trying to jump off the bridge and commit suicide. John Tumpane, the man who first started helping the woman, is spoken of as a hero and as someone who saved another person’s life. These weren’t Christian news agencies, but this event was reported very similarly in several mainstream secular articles.

I agree that he was able to help save someone’s life, but I find the cultural inconsistency obvious.

This woman didn’t want to live. She made a plan, she started to carry out that plan, and then she was stopped by someone walking by. Most people will look at this as a positive ending to a story that could have been tragic. We see someone wanting to end it all and we rejoice that someone noticed and she was able to hopefully receive the help she needed.

In a purely individualistic sense, what I see is a woman who was not allowed to make a choice she wanted to make. She wanted to end her life, but other people decided that her life was worth living, worth saving. To us, it is easy to see this as heroism in action.

Why do we as a culture not view this as an infringement on her rights? Continue reading “Heroic Action or Infringement of Rights?” →

Teaching: To Pursue The Truth Together

I’ve spent a great deal of the summer considering how this next school year will unfurl. Each fall, I start with the hopes that this will be the best year ever. And, in many ways, that has largely proven to be true. The more I teach, the more confident I feel teaching. The longer I am there and the more experiences I have, the more prepared I feel to handle future problems and situations. Yet despite all of my preparations and extra reading I do during the summer, one thing is certain: I will never be perfectly prepared for every question they ask me.

Honestly, I think I am able to answer most of the questions that arise in the classroom. If I have never considered the question or even heard the answer, I am surprised how often I am able to give an answer anyway. I’m not lying to them or just trying to look smart. I’ve come to realize that the longer one knows the Lord and studies His Church, the better one is able to think with the mind of the Church. So even if that question has never been posed to me before, I can often give a pretty confident answer because I have come to know and understand the Church to a degree.

There is, however, a lingering concern that I will be unable to answer a question. Or, worse yet, that my lack of knowledge will appear to mean that the Church has never considered that question or that her theology is found wanting. Regarding those fears, I think back to the summer before my first year of teaching. I was presenting these concerns to a trusted priest and he asked if I thought that a student could ask a question that the Church couldn’t answer or that would prove her wrong. I told him that I was certain the Church had answers and that I trusted her to be true in all things she affirmed as true. For him, that was the end of it. So what if I didn’t know the answer? I knew the Church had an answer and I was fairly confident I could find it if needed.

For the last five years, that is what I have sought to do. To a generation that I struggle to understand, I have striven to present truths they struggle to find relevant or accurate. I ask them to consider the truths of the Church and they echo Pilate by saying, “What is truth?” They question if it matters to know the truth. They ask if everything could be true. And I try to use logic and personal examples to show them the beauty of knowing and pursuing the truth. Continue reading “Teaching: To Pursue The Truth Together” →

Nothing Again Would Be Casual and Small

Each Sister of Life wears a medal that has inscribed on it a fragment of poetry by Fr. John Duffy. The line is from the poem “I Sing of a Maiden” and it speaks about the Annunciation.

“And nothing again would be casual and small.”

The author is speaking of the Blessed Mother conceiving Our Lord. Yet the fact that the Sisters of Life carry this line near their hearts makes me think it must relate to their lives and my life, too.

Generally, though, my life feels casual and small. Despite my desires for great and wonderful adventures and experiences, much of my life is composed of the ordinary and seemingly insignificant. What does it mean that nothing is casual or small?

In a way, I think Jesus speaks to this when he remarks on the widow’s gift to the temple treasury. Jesus and the apostles watch people come and give large gifts of money, but the poor widow puts only two small coins into the treasury.

Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For they all contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living.

Mark 12:43-44

In a simple comparison of amounts, is the widow’s gift small? Yes. What makes it stand out to Our Lord? The fact that despite her poverty, she still gives everything.

Most of us are comfortable giving generously when we know we will still have ample for ourselves. And I’m not going to lie and tell you that I live any differently. While I donate money, I do not “give until it hurts.” I give when it is comfortable or when I feel like it or when I remember. Generosity is not a hallmark of mine. When I was in elementary school, my dad would give my younger sister and I an allowance. Conservative in nature, I always pocketed my money and saved it for a future purchase, probably a book or something. My younger sister would spend her money nearly immediately, stocking up on some candy or treat at the gas station convenience store. Yet while she was quick to spend, she was also quick to share. I, on the other hand, would primarily buy things for myself and was slow to share them with others.

Jesus is commending the poor widow’s generosity with her finances, but I think there are deeper truths we can discover here. Things that might point to how nothing is casual or small. Several weeks ago, this was the Gospel at Mass and I left identifying myself largely with the widow. Not because of her generosity, but because of her apparent littleness. Continue reading “Nothing Again Would Be Casual and Small” →

Saints and Sinners: The Indelicate Reality of Christ’s Church

In college, I took a course called “Theology of the Church” and the professor made certain to cement a specific truth in my mind. He spoke frequently of how the Church is the spotless Bride of Christ, without blemish or error. Yet he spoke just as often about how the Church is stained and tarnished, filled with sin and weakness. Each Catholic must come to terms with this dichotomy if he or she desires to fully understand this living organism we call the Catholic Church.

The saints are beautiful models of following Christ and seeking holiness in the midst of a chaotic world. For most of the difficulties we face in life, we can turn to a specific saint who had similar struggles. There are saints who had difficult relationships with their parents or children, saints who were falsely accused, saints who had superiors who treated them unjustly, saints who lost loved ones, saints who experienced poverty, saints who struggled with drinking or drugs, saints who battled anger and violence, and saints who people thought were foolish or incapable.

Yet we know the Church is not merely comprised of saints. I belong to the Church and I am most definitely not a saint yet. So while it is easier to focus on the virtues and gifts of the saints, we also know we are a Church filled with sinners. We have sinners in the pews, in the choir, in the streets, at the altar, in the diocesan offices, in the Vatican, and in the chair of St. Peter. Each of us, on our journey to become the saints God desires, must fight our own battles as we acknowledge our sinfulness. The goal is not to make perfect masks that cover up our imperfections. Rather, we seek to let Christ into our deepest sins and allow Him to transform us.

It is with this knowledge of myself, as a sinner striving to be a saint, that I can recognize this reality within the Church herself. She is perfect: Christ instituted her, the Holy Spirit guides her, and the Father welcomes her members into Heaven, one by one. Yet she is us: flawed, broken, dragging our weary hearts to Calvary and to Heaven. All of the romantic notions I have about the Church and her beautiful, soul-shaking theology necessarily contrast painfully with the reality of the Church that I see around me. Reality is certainly not so romantic and not so obviously beautiful. Nonetheless, it is still the Church I love.

When we encounter scandal in the Church, it is helpful to remember this inherent dichotomy, one that existed from the beginning of the Church, yet one which will end when we are purified and in Heaven. While I love quite fiercely different humans within the Church, I also know that my love for the Church is not solely based on these humans. My spiritual director is wise and I find myself able to share the workings of my heart with him. My pastor leads me to a deeper understanding of how to encounter Christ in the daily moments. Yet even should these priests fail me, I would not stop loving the Church.
Continue reading “Saints and Sinners: The Indelicate Reality of Christ’s Church” →

Farewell to a Pastor

Jesus and the prophets spoke to the people of their times in ways that enabled the listeners to understand. They used examples and situations that were relevant. Growing up on a sheep farm, the numerous references to sheep struck me as particularly insightful. Many of my classes have heard stories of how sheep aren’t the brightest and how fitting I think that is in relation to humans. Yet for all the ways that sheep seem dim-witted, they have some great qualities that make them endearing.

Sheep are communal beings and generally move as an entire flock. It was rare that simply one sheep would slip through a defect in the fence. If one had escaped, it was likely that multiple had. I have several memories of trying to separate a couple of specific sheep out of the flock and their attempts to remain with the larger group. Yet their desire to be in communion with others, in their simple animal way, is something that is roughly mirrored in humans. Even as an introvert, I know I need to be in communion with others. I want to be alone at times and yet I find an intense joy in sharing life with others, too.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber; but he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens; the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” (John 10:1-5)

When the sheep would wander far out into the pasture, my dad would go to the gate with a couple of pails of corn, cup his hands to his mouth, and bellow, “Sheep!” It wasn’t really a unique call in terms of words used, but his voice was unique to the sheep. My brother could try to imitate it, but I remember going to the pasture on days I was responsible for chores and trying to yell in the deep pitch of my father. Generally, they were unconcerned. After calling and several enticing shakes of corn kernels in a bucket, they would lift their heads and begin to head in my direction. As soon as my dad calls, they start running in his direction, at near full speed. They know the shepherd’s voice.

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hireling and not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hireling and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd; I know my own and my own know me, as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep.” (John 10:11-15)

The word pastor literally means a helper or feeder of sheep. For years, I only referred to my priests as “Father.” And there is admittedly a beauty in that. I love the filial sense of love and respect that is found in the relationship between a priest and his people, a father and his children. Yet over the past couple years, I have found the term pastor increasingly meaningful. I used to equate it only with Protestant churches and their ministers. However, pastor means shepherd and I know the importance of the role of the shepherd.

In a world that is chaotic, the sheep need a shepherd to speak through the noise. For the past three years, I have had the great gift to be led by my parish priest, my pastor, Fr. John. He is a priest of my diocese, but I found myself quick to claim a closer association with him if possible. Not simply a fellow member of the diocese, he was my particular shepherd, the one leading my parish community. Continue reading “Farewell to a Pastor” →

Wonderful Awe

A couple of weeks ago, I sat at my dining room table with a couple of friends and discussed with awe the world around us. In the midst of busy lives and increasing advancements, sometimes it is easy to take for granted things that should be amazing to us. For a few hours, my friends and I moved from topic to topic, considering the world with great awe.

Wonder is the normal response to splendor.

Thomas Dubay, The Evidential Power of Beauty

This event struck me because of how easy it is to view the world in a tired, jaded way. While I know a decent amount of theology, my knowledge in so many other areas is small and incomplete. In day-to-day interactions, I take many things for granted. Things that would astound me, if I paused for just a moment to acknowledge them. So we conversed with wonder about the internet, smart phones, suspension bridges, wind turbines, time, and solar power. It was a joy to consider what the human mind has conceived and how it is possible for us to create things. A couple of months ago, I read a book about a watchmaker who would travel by train to another town simply to get the correct time from an astronomical clock for his town’s clock tower. We were amazed that now we could just look at our watches or phones to know the time.

I have had multiple situations where I have discussed with others the beauty of things I do not fully understand. The complexity of a single human cell, the vastness of the universe, and the splendor of mountains have all, at one time or another, been a topic of conversation and awe. Yesterday, I flew across half the country in less than three hours. The fact that flying is even possible helps bring wonder into a situation that can be consumed by impatience with security and airline rules. I looked with curiosity at the mountain ranges that looked like large creases on a landscape far below me. A patchwork quilt of farmland and mile after mile of straight country roads soon greeted me as I neared my destination. I spent much of my flying time reading a book, but every now and then I would look and marvel at the world below and this plane far above.

It is troubling that in a universe replete with mind-boggling fascinations masses of people live dull and drab lives….Fully jaded men and women, old or young, marvel at nothing….To be listless, dull, bored, and lifeless is not only a miserable condition, it is an illness, a fact obvious to anyone who is intellectually alive. To respond to reality and to appreciate it are normal; not to respond is abnormal.

Thomas Dubay, The Evidential Power of Beauty

This world that surrounds us is quite magnificent. It is beautiful beyond understanding. People laugh a bit at me when I profess the beauty of South Dakota. And when I was in high school, I probably would have laughed at myself, too. It was only after traveling around Europe during my semester abroad, that I began to see beauty in a multitude of places. The scenery became glorious because everything was surrounded in a golden halo simply because it was European.

When I came home, I found myself wanting to pull over to the side of the road to take pictures of scenery. I was surprised that a field of corn filled me with joy or that wide open prairies seemed as beautiful to me in South Dakota as they had in Austria. My eyes were opened to see the beauty that can be found anywhere. Continue reading “Wonderful Awe” →

The Shack: A Catholic Critique

Spoiler: If you haven’t read The Shack by Wm. Paul Young and don’t want to know anything about it that might take away from your initial experience, please be aware this post might not be for you. I discuss elements of the story, but I don’t give it all away.

I recently finished reading The Shack and I found it to be, as a whole, a beautiful story of how God desires to enter into our most painful situations and transform them by His presence. The way Young depicts the interactions within the Trinity caused me to stop and consider more deeply the perfect communion found within God Himself. In fact, as soon as I finished The Shack, I picked up Fr. Michael Gaitley’s book The ‘One Thing’ is Three: How the Most Holy Trinity Explains Everything. After reading about the communion of the Trinity in intimate detail, I was filled with a desire to learn more about our Trinitarian God.

The general story line of The Shack is about a man named Mack who has experienced great suffering and loss. He receives a note from God asking him to come to an old shack to spend the weekend with Him. When Mack does this, he enters into an incredible encounter with the living God and grows in an understanding of each person of the Trinity.

The main aspects of Young’s story I found to be edifying. It was simply some of the side details or conversations that made me wonder if he was critiquing Christianity as a whole or specifically Catholicism. Or, at least, his perception of what the Catholic Church teaches or is. There are a handful of elements that struck me as a direct rebuke of Catholicism. The two I want to focus on are ritual and institution.

There is a beautiful section where God involves Mack in “devotions” after a shared meal. Rather than producing a Bible to read from, Mack is surprised when Jesus reaches across the table, takes the Father’s hands, and speaking honest, loving words of adoration. It reinforces the reality that devotion is entering into a loving relationship with God, not something that is merely rote or filled with words. After another meal, Mack expects the same thing to happen.

“What about devotion?” asked Mack.
“Nothing is a ritual, Mack,” said Papa…

What is so wrong with something being a ritual? There are a couple other places where ritual is portrayed as unsavory and in conflict with God’s desires. I could agree with this if ritual meant that something was insincere or done merely out of habit. However, that is not what a ritual has to be. Sometimes rituals are the best way to enter into something that is far above us. Like the Mass or marriage, we follow a religious ritual because we are connected to something bigger than just ourselves.

The Catholic Church is known for saying the same Mass over and over and over again. My students will sometimes question why they need to go to Mass each week when it is simply the same thing they heard the previous week. But if we understand the sacrifice of the Holy Mass as it actually is–the priest in persona Christi re-presenting the sacrifice of Jesus at the Last Supper and consummated on the cross at Calvary–then we would realize that nothing else would be a fitting memorial.

Yes, it is a ritual. But Jesus also said “Do this in remembrance of me.” Why reinvent the wheel every Sunday when Jesus has given us His very self and asks us to share in this sacrificial meal? More than new praise and worship songs (which I appreciate in a specific context), the Mass prayed throughout the ages unites us to the earliest followers of Jesus Christ. This isn’t a bad type of ritual, but rather a ritual that unites Christians across space and time. Continue reading “The Shack: A Catholic Critique” →

Sacramental Records and Sacramental Beauty

I know sacraments aren’t a contest, but how many have you participated in or witnessed in a one week time period?

After I go to confession within the next couple days, I will be at five sacraments. Five out of the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church. That is a record for me, although I can’t tell you what the previous record actually was.

Last Friday, I went to ordinations for six priests for my diocese. On Saturday, I attended the wedding of a couple friends. Yesterday, I became a godmother for the youngest daughter of a couple with whom I am friends. Interwoven over this week were several Masses and soon I will go to confession to bring the grand total of sacraments to five this week.

One of the beautiful aspects of the sacraments is how tangible they are for us physical creatures. As I stood behind the mother at the baptism, I watched the priest sign the child with an aromatic cross of chrism. She was claimed for Christ in a physical way so as to show the spiritual reality. The water poured over her head, reveals the spiritual cleansing that is taking place even though we cannot see it happen. Long after the scent of chrism has vanished, her soul will still be marked with an indelible seal, proclaiming her as a new creation in Christ.

At ordinations, I watched the bishop trace the hands of the men with chrism, consecrating their hands and lives to the eternal High Priest. Beyond the chrism, there was the laying on of hands by the bishop and all their brother priests. Placing their folded hands within the bishop’s hands, they promise obedience to the bishop and to his successors. Called to conform their lives to the cross, they prostrate themselves before the altar of the Lord, the place where they will daily offer up the sacrifices of the People of God and make present the sacrifice of Jesus. Continue reading “Sacramental Records and Sacramental Beauty” →

Home: From Rabanal del Camino to South Dakota

Walking into my hometown parish church for Memorial Day Mass, my family settled into a pew and prayed for a few minutes before Mass started. It wasn’t particularly early, but the quiet and stillness made it feel earlier. The priest was praying from his breviary and other parishioners were in silent preparation for the greatest memorial feast.

I was a bit surprised to find a Camino memory surface after a few seconds in the church. The beauty of a still morning and entering a place I regard as a home, took me back to Rabanal del Camino, arguably my favorite spot along the Way. Enticed by a sign outside the church saying there was a Benedictine Pilgrim Guest House, we stayed in Rabanal for a couple of days. While brief, this was far longer than any other town we saw in Spain.

After our first night at the guest house, we walked the short distance to the church for morning prayer. The parish church was still and cool. Choir stalls occupied the front of the church and those of us who stayed at the guest house quietly settled into them for our community prayer. Simply having slept in the same town for two nights made me feel like a resident. I watched pilgrims continue their walk and was filled with a strange joy that I was able to leave my backpack next to my bed.

Early afternoon, we gathered for lunch in the monastery, prepared and served by the lovely Benedictine priest. Even with a meal shared in silence, it was a tangible sensation of the familial in a country where I often felt as though I simply passed through. In the evening, we gathered for Mass and then later for evening prayer. Mass wasn’t an unusual occurrence along the Camino, but participating in Mass in the same church with a priest who recognized me was a novelty.

It wasn’t until we stopped walking that I was able to notice how much my heart longed for the familiar. While I enjoy adventures, I also really love home. Being a wandering stranger for weeks at a time was difficult for my homely heart. When we spent a couple of days in one place, I was able to experience the joy of resting and the gift of the familiar.

One evening, after we had supper at the guest house, everyone staying there took a stroll through the streets of Rabanal. Though I knew those outside my party for only two days, it seemed we were a little family, following after the Benedictine priest who had an endearing sense of humor and depth. A French lady happened to see our group and simply joined us as we walked leisurely to the outskirts of town. I didn’t blame her; it is something I would have wanted to do had I not already been in the group. Continue reading “Home: From Rabanal del Camino to South Dakota” →

A Sunset’s Two-fold Gift

On the way back from my nephew’s baseball game, I attempted to distracted my niece and nephews by directing their attention to the sky. It was sunset and the streaming colors changed minute by minute. I pointed out the different colors and asked if they could see any others. As the minutes passed on our drive home, I would sporadically stop and ask what other colors they could see in the sky. They seemed intrigued by the way the colors would transform after only a short time. It was also neat to hear them come up with different names to describe the precise shade of color we were witnessing.

At one point, one of my nephews talked about how the sky was like a painting. Excited that they were no longer touching each other or complaining about being touched, I ran with this. We spoke about how God is like an artist and how he creates these beautiful paintings each day. They are never quite the same yet they greet us each morning and each evening. My second oldest nephew is a big fan of math, so I gave him a few math problems to conceptualize how many sunrises/sunsets God has made. He seemed a bit surprised to consider the thousands upon thousands of paintings God has blessed us with, just stretching back a couple of millennia.

Simple beauty is not lost on children, sometimes they (like us) just need to be directed to where they can see it. A few colors splattered on the vast prairie skies can be an opening to recognize the way God works in the midst of our lives. Whether or not I notice, God is pouring out His blessings upon me in new and varied ways each day. Sometimes noticing it requires fighting nephews and an evening drive home.

Seeking After His Heart

A Blog Following the Quest of A Human Heart

Category: reflection