Advent, Day 12 - Peace is not merely the absence of war - a response to The Terror Report

Our response to yesterday's news on The Terror Report: 

78. Peace is not merely the absence of war; nor can it be reduced solely to the maintenance of a balance of power between enemies; nor is it brought about by dictatorship. Instead, it is rightly and appropriately called an enterprise of justice. Peace results from that order structured into human society by its divine Founder, and actualized by men as they thirst after ever greater justice.

The common good of humanity finds its ultimate meaning in the eternal law. But since the concrete demands of this common good are constantly changing as time goes on, peace is never attained once and for all, but must be built up ceaselessly. Moreover, since the human will is unsteady and wounded by sin, the achievement of peace requires a constant mastering of passions and the vigilance of lawful authority.

But this is not enough. This peace on earth cannot be obtained unless personal well-being is safeguarded and men freely and trustingly share with one another the riches of their inner spirits and their talents. A firm determination to respect other men and peoples and their dignity, as well as the studied practice of brotherhood are absolutely necessary for the establishment of peace. Hence peace is likewise the fruit of love, which goes beyond what justice can provide.

That earthly peace which arises from love of neighbor symbolizes and results from the peace of Christ which radiates from God the Father. For by the cross the incarnate Son, the prince of peace reconciled all men with God. By thus restoring all men to the unity of one people and one body, He slew hatred in His own flesh; and, after being lifted on high by His resurrection, He poured forth the spirit of love into the hearts of men.

For this reason, all Christians are urgently summoned to do in love what the truth requires, and to join with all true peacemakers in pleading for peace and bringing it about.

Motivated by this same spirit, we cannot fail to praise those who renounce the use of violence in the vindication of their rights and who resort to methods of defense which are otherwise available to weaker parties too, provided this can be done without injury to the rights and duties of others or of the community itself.

Insofar as men are sinful, the threat of war hangs over them, and hang over them it will until the return of Christ. But insofar as men vanquish sin by a union of love, they will vanquish violence as well and make these words come true: "They shall turn their swords into plough-shares, and their spears into sickles. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more" (Isaiah 2:4).

Vatican II - The Church in the Modern World

Come, Lord Jesus

Advent, Day 10 - Thomas Merton: Take Five Minutes

On December 10, 1968, Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk of the Abbey of Gethsemani, Kentucky died by accidental electrocution at the age of 53 in Bangkok, Thailand as he completed a six-day pilgrimage to study and to teach about prayer with leaders of oriental religions.

His voluminous writings as a formidable and radical social critic, spiritual leader and modern prophet include controversial events on war, industrialization, labor and solidarity, nuclear technology, mass media and the challenge of change.

Merton's chief concern in his writings is the transformation of every human being in relationship with God, the deep concern with the internal desire for God that exists within each person's heart. Throughout his brief but extraordinary life, Merton is the ultimate pragmatist in his approach to the hunger of the human heart for God in the moment and in every activity of daily life.  

Today, in his memory, we offer two famous quotes from the enormous library of Mertoniana. We suggest that readers who do not know the writings of Thomas Merton begin to dip their toe into the ocean of this compelling author's work, whose writing still remains fresh in today's contemporary culture. Take five minutes and sit with two writings that Merton penned. What stands out for you? Where do you find your own heart in his words? 

Thomas Merton in Louisville Square, Kentucky

 “In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness… This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud… I have the immense joy of being human, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.”

“Then it was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts, the depths of their hearts, where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach, the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes. If only they could all see themselves as they really are.  If only we could see each other that way all the time.” Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander

Prayer of Thomas Merton

“My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.” Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude

Thomas Merton, prophet of God, pray for us.

Today's Gospel reading, Advent, Day 10

"Jesus said to the crowds:
“Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened,
and I will give you rest. 
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,
for I am meek and humble of heart;
and you will find rest for yourselves. 
For my yoke is easy, and my burden light.” Matthew 11:28-30

Come, Lord Jesus. 

Advent, Day 9 - "I'm hungry."

"I'm hungry," she told me. "I haven't eaten in two days. I'm waiting to be cleared and placed in a shelter. I'm homeless." She said it without hesitation or guile, just simple honesty. Her hunger drove her. I guessed that she was in her late 'teens, early 'twenties, tops. 

I bought two sandwiches and two cups of coffee for both of us and invited her to sit at a tiny table out of the cafe's steady traffic. As she munched on her sandwich and wrapped her hands around her hot cup, she told me her story.

Later that day, an agency person came to retrieve her and bring her to a shelter. The woman asked me if I could locate the young girl: we searched and we couldn't find her anywhere. She had disappeared to sleep under a church stairwell, a bridge, an abandoned building - anywhere to get away from the pouring rain and cold. The woman from the shelter and I took a moment to mourn the missed opportunity and this young girl's certain fate. She was subject to anything out there. But for a few hours, she had been warm, fed and heard without judgment. Perhaps that's all she wanted. I'll never know. 

Later that evening, I parked my car to meet my husband and a friend for dinner. Not five seconds passed when a man approached me and asked me for money so that he could "go and get something to eat." I dug in my wallet and gave him whatever was left of the cash contents and said a few words about staying warm. He thanked me and disappeared into the night. God only knows if he spent the money on food but that wasn't my call to make. And then it struck me: why hadn't I invited him to dine with me, my husband and my friend? I still don't know the answer. 

We can give someone who has nothing something to eat or even hand them food. We can put money into the 'special' collection on a Sunday morning that will go to feed our hungry or purchase the myriad prepared baskets of foodstuffs sold at the counters of super markets, pat ourselves on the back and tell ourselves that we've done our job. We've helped to feed hungry people. But sharing a meal with a person who is homeless is a much deeper, a much richer experience that offers insight into our own deep poverty and dependence on the mercy of God. We're all poor in one way or another and we all look for comfort in one way or another.

Until every belly is full and every person knows that they have a community of friends, the reign of God is a long way off. We have our mandate in today's reading from Isaiah: "Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God." (Isaiah 40: 1, 3-5) 

"We cannot love God unless we love each other and to love we must know each other. We know Him in the breaking of bread, and we know each other in the breaking of bread, and we are not alone anymore. Heaven is a banquet and life is a banquet, too, even with a crust, where there is companionship."  from The Long Loneliness, Dorothy Day

Come, Lord Jesus. 

Feast of the Immaculate Conception, Advent, Day 8

Image of Ann, Mary and Jesus by Leonardo da VinciMary,

White Dawn, 

you were created and nurtured for nine months

within the womb of a holy woman, Ann

who was unware that she and her husband, Zachary

seeded and raised 

the purest womb that would host

the Child

who brings heaven to earth,

as a gift.

Holy Mary, blessed among all women,

pray for us now,

and at the hour of our death.

Amen.  

Advent, Day 7 - Counter cultural or frenzied?

Second Sunday of Advent 

Photo by Dusty Rayburn

Are we here to change the status quo and make a difference as a countersign of the current culture? Or do we just fit in to the frenzy? The following text Johannes Baptist Metz will take a bit of time and patience on your part to muse and consider. The image by Dusty Rayburn offers additonal perspective. Will you take the time to read it or will you be too busy, too frenzied, too driven by the secular season to take a few minutes to slow down and be quiet? 

"One of the distinctive features of this modern anxiety is that its victims can never know nightfall. Their whole lives are spent in the glare of lights, and what bright and blinding lights they are! These lights are, as it were, the wayward eyes of our own anxiety, which instinctively try to shield themselves against God's breakthrough. But they can glimpse God's coming against the backdrop of darkness, and therefore they never know rest.

"The anxiety-ridden cannot enjoy peace and quiet either. Their words and actions go on amid the din of unceasing noise. Their songs and pleasures are loud and slapdash, as if they were afraid to catch God's alien note in the chorus. They meticulously drown out silence with incessant talk and noisy chatter, so that they can stay at peace with themselves. It is as if stillness were a threatening cloud from which God might emerge to rend their hearts.

"Patience is another quality that the anxiety-ridden cannot display. They cannot patiently cultivate those realities that require slow development and silent blossoming: love and fidelity, mutual understanding and friendship, marriage and family life. That is why these realities are in crisis today to a greater or lesser extent, riddled with an anxiety that cannot stand the slow pace of deliberate, tender care.

"Finally, the anxiety-ridden cannot enjoy any peace. From time to time it happens that this anxiety no longer feels able to put up with itself. It seeks to neutralize our imagined alienation in God's advent by arrogantly precipitating our annihilation on its own. It stirs up strife and destruction, it foments war and revolution. The continuing brinkmanship of our age, the powder keg on which we sit, is not a political problem in the last analysis. It is really a religious problem, an outgrowth of our contemporary neurosis and our flight from God's inescapable coming.

"The anxiety-ridden secretly hope that their self-instigated destruction will ease the pressure that weighs down upon them. But even our self-wrought destruction passes away, and the anxiety remains. Its mournful cry can be heard amid the debris. It remains because we ourselves remain, because God's advent remains, and because the former cannot fight off the latter. "

--Johannes Baptist Metz