The harmony of obedience

Homily: 4^th Sunday of Advent – Cycle C

          The Saint Meinrad Archabbey church was built in the late eighteen-hundreds and was finished in 1907.  It is a beautiful Romanesque church with twin spires on one end and smaller turrets on the other that give its strong arched entryways a truly majestic feel.  The locally-sourced sandstone that makes up its exterior has aged very well and gives this church a unique appearance.  Inside, its high ceiling and long nave evoke images of the great basilicas and cathedrals throughout Europe.  Although the interior was originally arranged in a traditional manner—with the monk’s choir stalls nearest to the sanctuary and the pews arranged in rows facing the sanctuary like they are here in our church—a renovation in the nineteen-nineties resulted in a new concept of layout.

          Now, I’m going to ask you to put your “imagination hats” on, so stay with me here as I try to describe this new layout.  First, much like our sanctuary is elevated in what is known as the apse of the church, so was the sanctuary in the original Archabbey church.  The first major change that they made was to level out the floor, so that everything would be on the same level.  Then they placed their choir stalls—which are basically like “stadium seating” for the monks that they use when they come together to pray—on either side of the nave and facing each other.  The monks recite the Psalms daily and they do so by alternating side to side for each stanza of the Psalm.  And so this is a very normal setup for the monks’ prayer space in the monastery church.  Seating for any guests that join them in prayer, however, follows the same pattern.  Although not set up like the stalls, they are arranged on either side of the nave and they face each other.

          Processions are a big part of monastic liturgies and so to accentuate that fact, they decided to place the altar and the ambo at opposite ends of the wide center aisle created by the seating arrangement so as to give them opportunities to make a procession to the altar during Mass.  So what you have here is a “three aisle” setup: the wide center aisle, with the ambo on one end and the altar on the other, and two side aisles, one each behind the seats in the nave.  It’s a very unique setup that (my personal experience can attest) works better than it might sound like it would at first.

          One of the things that often gets missed by visitors to the church is the floor.  It’s a terrazzo floor—which is made of chips of marble, glass or other aggregates embedded in tinted cement, and ground smooth and polished to a silky sheen—and the design was intended to accentuate the seating arrangement in the church.  (Keep your imagination hats on, because we’re going on one more journey.)  In the side aisles (behind the seats), the floor is marked by stones of various shapes and sizes, arranged without any pattern or sequence.  The center aisle, however, is marked off by a continuous line that weaves back and forth from one end of the aisle to the other and then returns to make a complete loop.  Inside each circle that is created by the weaving line there is a six-pointed star (a “star of David”) made up of two opposite facing triangles.  Inside each of these triangles are smaller triangles; and inside of those, even smaller triangles, all of varying, yet ordered colors.  To the uniformed observer, the floor is an interesting piece to look at, but its full meaning doesn’t stand out.  For the monks, however, the floor is full of meaning.

          You see, as I mentioned before, processions are a big part of monastic liturgies.  On Sundays and the more significant feasts of the year, the monks assemble to pray in procession.  This means that they process in from the monastery along the side aisle, where the stones are uneven and randomly ordered, into the center aisle, where the stones are balanced and highly ordered, as they make their way to their choir stalls.  For them, this represents moving from the chaos of the world into the harmony of the liturgy: from disorder to order.  What the monks acknowledge is that when everything works in harmony, things are whole; and when everything is whole, there is peace.  Thus, for the monks the liturgy, well celebrated, is their wholeness and through it they find peace.  Then, after being strengthened by their experience of wholeness, they return back to the world, ready to face its chaos once more.

          The same is true for us, of course: that when everything works in harmony, we are whole; and when everything is whole we are at peace.  In order to be whole, however, we have to work in harmony with our creator, who is God.  The monks do that by their focus on the liturgy.  So how do we do that?  In a word: obedience.  Through the disobedience of our first parents we lost our peace because we lost our wholeness, our harmony with God.  Yet, through obedience to God—first Mary’s and then Jesus’—our harmony (and, thus, our wholeness) with God has been restored.  Through obedience to God, Mary brought forth a savior for us.  For this reason, as we heard in the Gospel today, her cousin Elizabeth could say “Blessed are you!”  And through obedience to God Jesus brought forth salvation for the whole human race.  Because he would restore wholeness, and, thus, harmony, to the human race, the prophet Micah, in our First Reading, would prophesy well about God’s anointed one and say that “he shall be peace”.  And so we see that Jesus, who is humanity perfectly restored to wholeness, is peace in himself.

          So, if Jesus has restored wholeness—and, thus harmony and peace—to the human race, then why is there still chaos and disorder in the world?  That, my friends, is because you and I have not yet fully allowed the harmony of obedience to rule our lives.  In other words, we spend a lot more time trying to do what we want to do, rather than doing what God wants us to do.  Believe it or not, this is one of the main reasons for Advent.  You see, Christmas is not just a hyped-up birthday party for Jesus.  It’s actually a reminder to the world that the Lord, the Mighty Savior, has come and that he is harmony, he is wholeness, he is peace.  Our work during Advent, therefore, is meant to restore our obedience to the Father in Christ by reconciling us through him, so that on Christmas Day we will be truly ready to experience peace in the midst of this chaotic world.

          My brothers and sisters, five days of Advent remain.  Let us use these days to pray a little more, to spend a little extra time in silence (and darkness!), and to slow down a little so as to allow ourselves to be more ready to be obedient to what it is that God is asking of each one of us: for when we have been restored to perfect obedience to God our Father then will we be truly ready for the celebration yet to come.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – December 20^th, 2015

Be cold and weary and hungry...

          Lent invites us to share the experience of Jesus in the desert.  Be brave.  Go into the desert of this Lenten season and you'll know the true joy of celebrating Easter.

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Homily: 1^st Sunday of Lent – Cycle B

          Two weeks ago I was off making my canonical retreat (that is, my retreat that is required by canon law) down at Saint Meinrad, where I went to seminary.  It was good to be back down there as I was able to connect with a lot of the seminary staff and the monks whom I knew when I was a seminarian.  It was also good because I was able to spend time doing some hiking around the area, which was one of my favorite activities during my time there.

          Saint Meinrad is located in a very rural setting in southern Indiana, which is actually much more wooded and hilly than here in the “northern plains”.  Thus, a hike down any of the back roads around the seminary will provide you with a lot of solitude along with a challenging hike.  Long Johnnytown Road was one of my favorite roads to take and so I made it a point to hike that road once again.  The day that I went out the weather was less than favorable.  It had turned quite cold and the wind was blowing hard from the northwest.  Thankfully, the road is surrounded by woods, for the most part, and so, except for a few stretches of road, I didn’t have to face the wind.  It is a tough road to hike under any conditions, but that day’s conditions made it a degree or two more difficult (perhaps even more so because I’ve been living here in the flatlands for so long now).   It was so tough, in fact, that at times I wondered whether or not I was going to make it back.  I did of course and, although I was tired, I felt refreshed for having made it.  As I read and reflected on today’s Gospel reading, Jesus’ experience of being in the desert reminded me of this.

          In the Gospel we heard how Jesus was driven into the desert and that he remained there for forty days where he was tempted by Satan and dwelt among the wild beasts while angels, nonetheless, ministered to him.  As it is for us today, the desert is a harsh place: a place of solitude in which you are exposed to extreme conditions.  Jesus was driven into the harsh physical conditions of the desert and had to face harsh spiritual and emotional conditions as well: the temptations of Satan and the fear of being attacked by a wild animal.  Nonetheless, he went willingly, driven by the Spirit who had just anointed him after his baptism in the Jordan River.  He emerged from that time of testing more deeply conscious of the truth about himself and his mission.  We see this because the next thing that the Gospel tells us is that Jesus began his mission of preaching; literally taking up where John the Baptist left off by proclaiming “The kingdom of God is at hand.  Repent and believe in the gospel.”

          Lent, for us, is meant to mimic this desert experience of Jesus.  It calls us to leave off what we are comfortable with and to be “driven into the desert”, so to speak—the solitude inside of ourselves—in order to confront the demons and wild beasts within us—which are our sinful inclinations and untamed passions—so as to emerge more deeply conscious of the truth about ourselves and our mission.  And what is this, but a call to prayer: a call to confront the truth about ourselves before God and to allow him to show us the deeper truth of who we are in Him.

          Because we are bodily creatures, however, this “desert experience” must also include a physical aspect.  Thus, we create a physical “desert” for ourselves by fasting: by giving up certain comforts and pleasures so as to create the conditions in which we might confront our sinful inclinations and untamed passions more readily.  Ironically, all of this introspection is meant to lead us outside of ourselves: to encounter the real suffering of our brothers and sisters around us—our neighbors—and to work to relieve their suffering through the means that have been given to us.  Through almsgiving we enact our mission to proclaim that the kingdom of God is at hand, the kingdom in which the poor have the good news proclaimed to them.  Thus almsgiving, in a way, becomes the fruit of our Lenten desert experience.

          The American poet, Henry David Thoreau once advised “Take long walks in stormy weather or through deep snow in the fields and woods, if you would keep your spirits up.  Deal with brute nature.  Be cold and hungry and weary.”  I believe that this quote speaks to something very true: life is difficult and if we try to mask that fact by filling our lives with comforts and distractions then we’ll never truly live.  After that hike I took while on retreat I was “cold and hungry and weary”, but refreshed for having done it.  I dealt with “brute nature”, which caused me to confront some of the demons within myself, and I emerged with a spirit more deeply aware of the truth about myself and of the mission that I have been given.

          My brothers and sisters, Lent invites us to face the reality of ourselves—with all of its demons and wild beasts—as well as the truth of who we are—children of God and coheirs with Christ to His Kingdom—so as to renew us in baptismal faith that we might go forth to proclaim the greatest of all truths with renewed vigor: that Jesus Christ is risen and that the kingdom of God is truly at hand!  Therefore, let us not be afraid to go into the deserts within ourselves to confront the demons of our sinful inclinations and the wild beasts of our untamed passions; and there to call on the angels to minister to us; and let us not be afraid to then go out into the deserts in our community to encounter the marginalized: those who we are afraid to meet because of what they might demand of us.  For there, in these encounters, the truth about ourselves will become known and our mission will become clear.  Then, having done this, we will emerge to experience once again (or perhaps for the first time) the true joy that Easter brings: the joy that even now we are invited to experience here, in this Eucharist.

Given at All Saints Parish: Logansport, IN – February 21^st & 2^nd, 2015

More reasons to believe...

I was able to catch these images last Friday as a few of us walked out to the winery (Monkey Hollow Winery) a couple of miles out behind Saint Meinrad.  I'm going to miss this place...

What do you say, Dubya?  Still think B-town's got anything on Saint Meinrad?

Take a look at this...

...and try to tell me that there is no God!

(Taken from the window of my room in the seminary, October 27th, 2011, about 4:20 p.m.)

Time to catch up...

Hey friends, it's time to catch up on all the stuff that's been going on with me in the last month!

Mission Mini Marathon: Accomplished!

With the grace of perseverence in my training, I was able to participate in and complete my first half-marathon on May 7th. I began the weekend in a somber way, with the funeral of my friend Edgar. Then I was honored to server at the Mass for Vocations at St. John's in downtown Indy. I carb-loaded at the Race for Vocations pasta dinner, stressed about where we would park Saturday morning, and went to bed way too late.

Nonetheless, I felt great Saturday morning and even though my plans for parking didn't work out and it took forever (it seemed) to get to a Port-a-John before the race started, I made it to my starting corral and was even able to start the race with a few fellow Race-for-Vocations runners. I ran a conservative race and finished in 2:11, about a 10 min/mile pace. As you can see by the post-race picture, I had something left in the tank. Next year (and I mean that!), I plan on running in well under two hours.

Mission: Semester Completion - Accomplished!

It was "no rest for the weary" as I was immediately back to the seminary after the Mini to finish up the final week of the semester. I had papers to write and finals to take, and then I had to move completely out of my room, all in seven days. My Trinity final provided the most daunting challenge as I endured a monumental spiritual battle the entire day. Satan felt it necessary to taunt me all day long, saying "You can't do this." when I knew I could. It took just about all that I had to get through it, but with God's grace I completed it and the rest of my work in time to get moved out.

Saying goodbye is difficult and I find that with the whirlwind of activity at the end of each semester that I never do it well. I just hope that all of the guys know that I will miss them and that I pray for them regularly.

Mission: Chillax - Accomplished!

After getting moved out of the seminary, I spent a few days in Carmel visiting friends and then made my way up to J-town to hang with my family for a week. I did get some definite relaxing in, but also spent a lot of time running around and taking care of maintainance things for my car.

Two of my friends from high school, Joe and Jake, and spent the better part of a day at the National Restaraunt Association trade show at the McCormick place in Chicago. Imagine walking around a convention center, and doing nothing but sampling different gormet foods all day and you get an idea of what it was like, and why it was worth the price of admission.

The best part, however, was spending time with my parents, sisters, and niece and nephew. The kiddos have grown not only to remember me, but to miss me when I'm gone and so it is always a special treat for them and for me when I can visit.

Mission: Ordination - Counting down...

After returning from J-town, I moved into my summer parish in Anderson, IN. I will be helping Fr. Bob at both St. Mary's and St. Ambrose parishes this summer. I spent a couple of days getting settled in, then promptly jetted off to Cincinnati to witness the final oath of my classmates, Aaron and Crispine, in the Glenmary Home Missioners. It was a beautiful ceremony and as a bonus, I got to see some of the folks from the seminary and give them a proper goodbye.

Now, the countdown is in full swing. I have five days until ordination day and I plan on taking a lot of time to pray and to reflect on this journey so that I am prepared to participate fully and consciously in the ordination. Thank you to all who have prayed so generously for me throughout these past five years. Please continue to pray for me and my brothers who will be ordained with me, Travis Stephens and Sam Futrals, as we make our final preparations to be ordained this coming Saturday (June 4th).

Look for a post soon after!

A step back...

Having returned to the seminary to start my next semester, I'd like to take a step back and reflect for a moment on a couple of the often unspoken aspects of the seminary experience.

First, after spending ten weeks in Antigua, Guatemala, a city that by no stretch of the imagination could be called "quiet," I have been struck by just how easy it is to find a moment of silence to listen to the "small, whispering voice" of God speaking to me. One has to want to find this experience in the seminary, for sure, as there are many things within the community that can distract you from that silence (good things, of course, but the point is that the silence is there when you choose to enter into it). I've found refreshment by simply placing myself within this experience of silence during these first couple of weeks.

Another part that we seminarians often forget is the cost of our seminary education. None of us forgets the fact that many faithful, committed people back in our dioceses and who support our religious communities make many sacrifices to provide for our years of formation as we prepare to be the ministers of the mysteries of our faith for this generation and generations to come. But we do sometimes forget that we seminarians, aside from giving ourselves wholly to the process of formation, can share that burden somewhat by seeking out scholarships like those offered by the Knights of Columbus and Logos Bible Software. Each year, the Knights provide scholarships to Catholic seminarians currently enrolled in a four-year theology program. The awarded funds apply directly to the tuition/room & board costs for the seminarian and thus lessen the burden that the people from their home diocese or who support their religious community must bear. Another innovative program has been initiated by the Logos Bible Software company. They are providing a seminary scholarship to a seminarian of any Christian denomination as a way of promoting the ministry of spreading the Gospel and the care of souls. And these are just two ways that we seminarians can do our part to ensure that we are being good stewards of the generosity of all who support us from our homes.

Conscious again of just how truly blessed I am to be able to pray and study at such a place as Saint Meinrad, I am energized to give myself fully to my studies and formation so that I may one day, God willing, be a humble and fruitful steward of the ministry that God has called me to. As always, thank you for your prayers!