Month: October 2022

Modern society would have us declare today is Halloween. Costumes, jack o’ lanterns, trick-or-treating, candy. Our Catholic faith, on the other hand, would instead remind us that today is All Hallows Eve, the day before All Saints Day. The Church established All Saints Day to get people’s minds focused away from the minor debauchery and pagan rituals that continue today as Halloween celebrations, and instead focus on something greater and more pure — the men and women, known and unknown, who have been found worthy by God to spend eternity with Him in heaven.

All Saints Day reminds us of our very reason for being and our ultimate goal — to know, love and serve God in this life so we can be with Him in the next. We are called to be saints, plain and simple. But how do we do it? First off, we know we are saved, not by anything we could ever do, but by the sacrificial death and resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Having that faith in Jesus is more than just announcing our belief and waiting for our ticket to heaven. Our Lord made it perfectly clear in his teachings that faith is participatory. Not only are we to believe, but we are to share it with others by the way we live, love and serve. Remember that “whatever you did to the least of my brothers, you did to me”? That’s straight from Jesus himself. The mandate to love and serve comes right from the top.

Once again, how do we do it? Today’s readings give us a little push in the right direction. Step one: believe. Step two: shrink. Paul explains it to the Philippians: “… humbly regard others as more important than yourselves, each looking out not for his own interests, but also everyone for those of others.”

Ah, of course, humility. Jesus puts it this way in the Gospel today, taken from Luke: “… when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you.” Jesus would have us humble ourselves into serving the less fortunate and the outcast. The reward awaits in the heaven we strive to reach.

The Psalm response tells us why we should start small, in humility, on our journey toward God. “In you, O Lord, I have found my peace.” Think of all the saints we do know. Their common trait is their humility, that God is in charge, and they are merely his servants. They testify to the peace and joy we can only find in the Lord, and they did so despite trials, suffering, even martyrdom. May we also find our peace in our reliance on the Lord.

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La sociedad moderna nos declara que hoy es Halloween. Disfraces, calabazas, ir casa por casa a pedir dulces. Nuestra fe católica, por otro lado, nos recuerda que hoy es la víspera de Todos los Santos, el día anterior al Día de Todos los Santos. La Iglesia estableció el Día de Todos los Santos para que las mentes de las personas se alejen del libertinaje y los rituales paganos que continúan hoy en día como celebraciones de Halloween, y en su lugar se concentren en algo más grande y más puro: los hombres y mujeres, conocidos y desconocidos, que Dios ha encontrado digno para pasar la eternidad con Él en el cielo.

El Día de Todos los Santos nos recuerda nuestra verdadera razón de ser y nuestro objetivo final: conocer, amar y servir a Dios en esta vida para poder estar con Él en la próxima. La verdad sencilla es, somos llamados a ser santos. Pero, ¿cómo lo hacemos? En primer lugar, sabemos que somos salvos, no por nada que pudiéramos hacer, sino por la muerte sacrificial y la resurrección de nuestro Señor Jesucristo. Tener esa fe en Jesús es más que simplemente anunciar nuestra creencia y esperar nuestro boleto al cielo. Nuestro Señor dejó perfectamente claro en sus enseñanzas que la fe es participativa. No solo debemos creer, sino que debemos compartirlo con los demás por la forma en que vivimos, amamos y servimos. ¿Recuerdas que “cuanto hicisteis al más pequeño de mis hermanos, a mí me lo hicisteis”? Eso viene directamente del mismo Jesús. El mandato de amar y servir viene desde arriba.

Una vez más, ¿cómo lo hacemos? Las lecturas de hoy nos dan un pequeño empujón en la dirección correcta. Primer paso: creer. Paso dos: hacernos menos. Pablo lo explica a los filipenses: “…por humildad, cada uno considere a los demás como superiores a sí mismo y no busque su propio interés, sino el del prójimo”.

Ah, por supuesto, la humildad. Jesús lo expresa así en el Evangelio de hoy, tomado de Lucas: “… Cuando des una comida o una cena, no invites a tus amigos, ni a tus hermanos, ni a tus parientes, ni a los vecinos ricos; porque puede ser que ellos te inviten a su vez, y con eso quedarías recompensado.” Jesús quiere que nos humillemos para servir a los menos afortunados y marginados. La recompensa aguarda en el cielo que nos esforzamos por alcanzar.

El Salmo Responsorial nos dice por qué debemos comenzar de a poco, en humildad, en nuestro camino hacia Dios. “Dame, Señor, la paz junto a ti”. Piensa en todos los santos que conocemos. Su rasgo común es su humildad, que Dios está a cargo, y ellos son simplemente sus sirvientes. Dan testimonio de la paz y el gozo que sólo podemos encontrar en el Señor, y lo hicieron a pesar de las pruebas, el sufrimiento e incluso el martirio. Que también encontremos nuestra paz confiando en el Señor.

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People love to make fun of the songs we sang at church in the early 1970s, but I was a little girl then and I remember many of them fondly. Today’s Gospel took me back to that time instantly, to the refrain of a  song written by Medical Mission Sister Miriam Therese Winter in 1965: “There was a man in Jericho called Zaccheus. There was a man in Jericho called Zaccheus. Now the Hebrews, they were tall, but Zaccheus, he was small, yet the Lord loved Zaccheus, better than them all.”

This song was my first introduction to the story of Zaccheus, a story I love because it is so relatable with its inclusion of homely details like the short stature of Zaccheus and even the type of tree he climbed. It is easy to picture and understand because many of us have had the experience of being in a crowd at a parade or a concert where we are jockeying for position to get a better view. Imagine having the opportunity to see Jesus. Who wouldn’t want a front row seat for that?

Now Zaccheus was a sinner, a despised tax collector to be exact. And while he wanted to see Jesus, you have to wonder if he really wanted Jesus to see him! Like many of us, he might have hoped to conceal himself and his shame from the Lord. But of course you cannot hide from God! And when Jesus tells Zaccheus he wants to stay at his house, his shame changes to joy.

Predictably, grumbling from the righteous folk ensues. Why has Jesus singled out this sinner for special notice? The First Reading sheds some light: “[Y]ou have mercy on all, because you can do all things;
 and you overlook people’s sins that they may repent.” Jesus picked Zaccheus out of the crowd to give him an opportunity that perhaps the other onlookers who were more righteous did not need.

The First Reading also suggests what Zaccheus’s response might be: “[T]hey may abandon their wickedness and believe in you.” That is exactly what he does, not only welcoming Jesus into his home with joy but immediately vowing to give half his wealth to the poor and to repay anyone he has extorted fourfold!

It’s a happy story, and it can be our story too, since everyone who is reading this is a sinner. I love this passage from the First Reading: “[Y]ou spare all things, because they are yours .  . .  Therefore you rebuke offenders little by little, warn them and remind them of the sins they are committing.” God WANTS to forgive us! God doesn’t punish us harshly for our sins, nor does He give us only one chance. God is our loving Father, and if you are a parent you know how much you are willing to forgive your children. He is gentle with us, like we would be with a little child, reminding us of our sins, being patient and taking His time, doing whatever it takes to call us back to Him. All we have to do is welcome Him with joy.

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I grew up with a fairly large extended family. If you combine both my mom and dad’s sides, I have about 30 cousins. As one of the oldest cousins, I know a thing or two about jockeying for places at the table. We always had a “kids” table at holiday meals. When we were younger, we loved this table. It was where the goofy uncle sometimes sat and where you could get away with harmless pranks, extra rolls and whipped cream on noses. But as we got older and more cousins were born, we began to feel like we were being left out of something even more fun…the adult table. That was the place to be! The adult table had the stories, the gossip, even more extra rolls (how many rolls were there!?), fancier place settings and the cool, younger aunts and uncles. I still remember the Thanksgiving where I got to sit at the adult table for the first time as a teenager. It was amazing. 

Where you sit at a meal, in a movie theater, on a plane, pretty much anywhere, matters on some kind of deep level. Jesus observed this in our Gospel reading today as He watched the guests choose their seats. In Jesus’ time, and similarly even in our own time, the proximity to the host at a meal designated a superior standing relative to the others seated further away. Think about weddings especially, where seating is so often a carefully orchestrated thing. Where you sit matters, be it to you or to others around you. 

It makes me wonder where Jesus was sitting at this table. Was He in the place of the guest of honor or somewhere lower down the table? I wonder how the host felt about Jesus’ speech. Do you think perhaps he wanted to reconsider where certain people were sitting? It also makes me wonder about where Jesus would sit in my own home. Where does He “sit” in my life? Have I given Him the place of honor or replaced Him with something less than worthy of that high status?

It seems almost silly to imagine, asking Jesus to step aside in favor of some extra cash, a promotion at work, a completed checklist or the praise of others. But this is exactly what we do when we do not give Jesus His rightful place as the center of our lives. Jesus is the perfect model of humility, both at this meal and in each of our hearts. He does not shove His way to the front, nor does He insist we give Him what is rightfully His. He waits patiently for us to invite Him forward to sit beside us. 

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