Wayne La Pierre, The NRA and Stupidity

"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," so says Wayne LaPierre, CEO of the National Rifle Association in a speech carried live on radio and TV today. His response to the Sandy Hook, Newtown, Connecticut Massacre? "Put armed guards in every school in the United States," he says.

LaPierre is dangerously ignorant of basic psychology. In his classic text on serial murderers and
violent behavior in general, Dr. Robert I. Simon, a forensic psychiatrist, says we all have the capacity for violent behavior of the most heinous kind. Our value systems kick in most of the time to reign us back from acting out some of our darkest impulses.

His book is called "Bad Men Do What Good Men Dream." It's a disturbing book because it shatters
the belief that there are good people and bad people. It turns out that there are just people. All of us have dark sides.

.In my Church we talk about how Original Sin, the tendency toward evil, even the attraction to evil is part of every grace-filled person's struggle. Deep down we are twisted, not corrupted.

The vast majority of us learn not to act on destructive impulses but that doesn't mean we don't ever think of murdering the guy next door.

While we sleep and our conscience is resting, we can even plan and visualize what we might do to people or what we might take from them. These dreams of so-called good people can be incredibly violent.

So firstly: LaPierre , spokesman for the National Rifle Association, doesn't know diddly-squat about human nature. Put people in school with guns and you may find someday that the protectors have done bad things.  They were having a bad day.

Secondly: A person without a gun can talk down another person with a gun who is threatening to take a life.  It happens every day when police departments send trained negotiators in to talk violent people out of the killing themselves or someone else. More often than not they are successful.   How can LaPierre, CEO of the National Rifle Association be so obtuse?

I and thousands of other clergymen have been in unstable situations just like I've just described. The disturbed or angry person is there, with a loaded gun.

We listen a lot.  Listening often diffuses violence.  The disturbed (not bad) person is holding the gun
and ready to use it. We try to calm the situation.

I pray a lot. I know that someone could come into the confessional and blow my head off.
I'm no hero but I hope I won't be a coward either, the next time I'm in that situation.. La Pierre should sit in a confessional for about an hour and then tell me if he can separate the sheep from the goats.



 

Sandy Hook, Newtown, Connecticut  and Malice, U.S.A.

As a priest, I have to face hundreds of people in church over the holiday weekends and find  something to say about this awful thing that has happened to us. Newtown Connecticut is downtown Chicago and mid-town Manhattan. Newton is Westmont, Illinois where I live.  The people who attend my church are like people who attend churches in Newtown. I sorely need to find a fragment of hope to lift them up. Last weekend it wasn't easy.

I talked about original sin, actual sin and evil in our world.  As Karl Menninger said in his book "Whatever happened to sin?," the denial of sin in the world is a dangerous.

We are hearing that the Sandy Hook  killer was sick, mentally ill, tortured in his isolated world. His frustration mounted and finally exploded in the moment he destroyed his mother and Newtown's little children.

This killer was certainly derranged, psychotic. But his mental illness is not the whole story.  He could not have had a chemical imbalance in his brain that caused him to destroy children, innocent children, children who had no power to fight back. People who are mentally ill are not typically and more
sinister than anyone else, though they may mess-up their lives.

Although I have some medical background, I've never really understood the scientific justification for blaming chermical imbalances for aberrant behavior.  Sure, if your glucose is dangerously low, you need  glucose to keep you from agitation and violence. If you have too much TSH (Thyroid stimulating hormone) you might be nervous and anxious until medical intervention makes things right again.

 Sin, on the other hand, is as real as the hot touch on the side of your thigh as a pickpocket leans in on you in a crowded bus and removes your wallet in an instant violation of your person. It's the chuckle of the kid who kicks a stray dog and makes it howl in pain.  Sin is the thrill of domination that a young woman feels when she dumps a guy that she's strung along. Sin is acting to end your life and taking random individuals with you.

 Nothing can bring the Newtown, Sandy Hook children back, but we have to do something. I am preaching that we have to counter with kindness. I am signing up for acts of random kindness. Also, put me down for groups that encourage banning easy access to assault weapons and other military armaments. Where do I sign to limit young people (and adults) access to violent video games, games which appeal to the dark side, the destructive side of life.

Put me on the side of  grace  because it's the only thing that can
drive out evil.




 

The National Rifle Association, the right not to bear arms.

The second amendment assures every citizen the right to bear arms. With this right comes the reponsibility to be careful with those firearms.  To its credit, The National Rifle Association sponsors classes in gun safety.  For this reason, I have no problem with hunting, and with hunters owning and using rifles and shotguns. But, because the NRA advocates handgun posession and helps train hand gun owners,the National Rifle Association is not an organization I would belong to.

 Sure, if I lived in the country and not as I do now, in a great metropolis, I'd likely belong to the "Rod and Gun" club. I like to fish and you could probably talk me into a trek through the Northwoods during deer season. But, I draw the line at handguns, a line behind which stands the National Rifle Association.

Handguns are for killing people. I don't want one in my house and I don't want you sitting at the next table in a restaurant with your 357 magnum hanging at your side as if you are somebody because you carry a gun. I don't want to assume that the bulge in your coat pocket is a gun, either.

I think the second amendment was intended to assure that a militia could be raised if and when it was necessary to defend American territory. With this idea in mind, the National Rifle Association has turned the second amendment into a mandate to carry arms for personal defence. Instead, I want to see that right curtailed as stictly as possible. Yes, I'll defend home and turf but in my own way.

In my lifetime, I have asked two people to get out of my car because they flourished handguns, neither was a member of the National Rifle Association. One was a salesman-friend who carried his hand gun in his front pocket wrapped in a thin white handkerchief. He said he just wanted to show it to me. He was chuckling as he brought it out.  Even though I knew him well and we were not near our destination, I pulled over and quietly asked him to get out.  He thought I was joking. I wasn't. The NRA would not have approved.

When I needed directions in an unfamiliar city, a man, dressed in a nice suit volunteered to direct me to my destination and I let him get into the back seat of my car.  I'd offered him a ride of a couple of blocks.When he brandished a handgun and asked me what I thought of it, the following words ran through my head: "Why did I let myself get into this situation?"

Fortunately, the man did exit the car without further incident.  I concluded he wanted to show the gun to me because in his eyes it equalized me with his condition. I had an impressive brand new car, he had a big, shiny handgun. The National Rifle Association  would have supported this show-off.

I'm glad that in each case I did not reach for my pistol, simply because I didn't have one with which to threaten either of these guys.

I can think of a hundred different ways to counter an intruder.  The last thing I would do is go run for a handgun. I'd use my head and not try to blow his off.

 

What's in a Name? Everything.

"What's in a name? "That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." Shakespeare certainly had a way with words, didn't he?

Would it make any diffference to you if that fragrant, beautiful, red  flower with delicate petals and sharp thorns were called somethng else? Probably not. When I speak the word "rose" I do not have to say much more for you to understand, and somehow feel, the presence of that flower.

Would it make any difference to you if you were called something else?  There are a ton of individuals named Mary or Alice but nevertheless every Mary or Alice --or Joe, for that matter--recognizes  immediately when someone speaks their name.

Your name is uniquely yours. At a party, there can be an entire room full of people talking at the same time in various conversations but you can hear your own name above all the talk, no matter how loudly or softly it is spoken.

Someone recently asked me why Catholics choose a new name at their Confirmation. 
Everyone knows that at Baptism the new Christian is called by name and christened
personally, using a given name: "I baptize you Theresa in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit." But, why at Confirmation do we choose another name?

At Confirmation no new name is required.  Your baptismal name is fine. Sometimes, another name, a saint's name is chosen because the person to be confirmed has a favorite saint. "Francis," for St. Francis; "Ann" for St. Ann," are common examples.

Someday God will speak your secret name, a name that He alone knows (Rev. 2:17).  He will speak it out of the immense silence of the universe and you will hear it and you will embrace it as your own. You will understand finally that God knows you as He knows Himself. And, you will know Him and speak His Name in love and thereby, please Him.
 

Trappists, Cats and Peace.

Recently, I spent four days with Trappist Monks on retreat in Iowa.  Yes, I was in full retreat from the noise of my life including ringing cell phones, blaring ambulances, and the people babble of T.V.s, radios, and office small talk. I needed this retreat. I needed the monastery and the Trappist monks who live there.
 
Outside, the trees are bare and the air is brisk and cold in the mornings. I like to take a walk on the monastery grounds especially here where quiet rules in the back fallow fields of Winter Iowa. The walk is a metaphor for my retreat journey, and for my life's journey. It seems I'm always on the way somewhere.

The chapel looks cold when you walk in.  Where is all the religious art? The altar of sacrifice is way back near the far wall. It's a simple table. The dark wooden stalls of the Trappist monks face one another across the nave, lined up for choral recitation of the Divine Office, the monks' prayers for the world. That's the Trappist way of warming up their souls and ours, too. It feels great and heart-warming to join the rythym of morning song and evensong with the chanting monks. "Retreat" is a good word for taking a step back and rediscovering prayer.

I prayed with the monks as they sang the Office at morning, noon and night. at other times, too. Reverently, deliberatively, they prayed.   I sought reverence as they sang  but most of all I loved the silence, the unhurried pace of the life of the monks. There can be no retreat for me without quiet.

Someone told me recently that he likes cats as pets because they are peaceful. To watch them undulate through their lives effortlessly in your home can bring healing to a harried soul. However, I don't like cats much. I do like monks.

The Trappists who read the sacred scriptures during the Mass were deliberate and spoke full-voiced without being loud. The scriptures seem so much richer when pronounced with understanding and affection.  My roots soaked up this welcome rain.

I'm home now.  My retreat with the Trappists is over, but I'll be back again next season. Meanwhile I've taken the monks and the monastery home with me, here in the midst of the noise of my life.
I am still inside, though, a place within me where I want to live. The monks sing and bow there and wake to pray in the night. 

Kathryn Dyer Art: Prints for Christmas

These days I am involved in exhibiting Kathryn Bradford Dyer's linocuts.  She was a local artist who taught at the Art Institute of Chicago for twenty years. I knew her and  she had no family, so when she died, she left the art to me. I consider it my job to promote and preserve her art and introduce people to her through her art, thereby preserving her memory.

I am very happy with how the shows are working out --far better than I thought possible. It's because I have people who actually like Kathryn Dyer's art. Bruce, a local artist, appreciates her
soulful expression and Susan, a local designer, sees proportion and pattern in Kathryn's work that perhaps only a designer could appreciate.

There's a certain whimsy in the art of Kathryn Dyer that I never really noticed before. Along with the drama of her chronic depression which appears as a kind of darkness in Kathryn's art, there was always a bit of wow here and there.

The linocut featuring Adlai Stevenson's quote "The Life of an Egg-head is Difficult" shows his head rolling around as a chicken egg would in an eccentric way.   Also, her pieces of flotsam and jetsam from the sea shores and the Indiana sand dunes hang from her banner prints like little jokes, wry comments, happy serendipity.

The linocut show is called "From Darkness to Light, The Linocuts of Kathryn Dyer." It was exhibited at Westmont Public Library for six weeks this Fall (2012). Now, a separate linocut show of her Christmas designs --Christmas Cards -- she called them will be on exhibit at Lombard Public Library.

Benedictine University will exhibit the linocuts in April, 2013 for four to six weeks. I am delighted with this arrangement.  I only wish that Kathryn could see the faces of people as they see her art for the first time. Kathryn Dyer art is finally being exhibited and we are all better for having discovered it.

Wonder Bread Died Today. R.I.P.

When I was a kid we lived one block from the Wonder Bread baking company. All I had to do any day of the week was to open the door of our basement apartment and the sweet, yeasty smell of bread baking entered my soul.  Yes, I know that sounds dramatic but let me back up a bit. I'll return to Wonder bread in a minute.

Both of my grandmothers made bread. I still remember coming home from school, opening the door
and being greeted by that wonderful smell of bread baking. A visiting grandmother would be fluttering around the kitchen, tending to the details of preparing dinner while the bread baked. I soon would forget about the outside bread smell from the Wonder Bread plant.

My father's mother was a warm, stout woman who loved kids, joking around, and playing pinochle.
Just before her bread came out of the oven, she knelt down and brushed egg whites over the top of each one.  The loaves baked for a few minutes more and each came out with a golden, crusty top. Compared to this bread, the soft, white sliced Wonder Bread baking down the street was bogus, hardly a bread at all, I thought at the time.

My mother's mother, a gentle woman with a permanent soft smile, baked her bread huge!  She raised six boys and six girls who waited by the oven for the fresh bread she baked daily.  Her technique for
tending the loaves was to apply a thin coat of lard to the tops of the loaves just before she took them out of the oven.  That made for a nice, thick browned top, a softer crust than Dad's mother made.  I can see her now taking the bread out of the oven by grasping the hot bread-pan with nothing more than a part of her apron folded over to protect her hand, her face glowing warm like the bread.

I could not imagine one of her loaves fitting into a Wonder Bread wrapper. Way too big.  The wrappers  which contained the industrial bread were white with big letters announcing WONDER BREAD.  With no individuality to each loaf, Wonder Bread made them all the same size, medium.

Both breads, branded by different women from different backgrounds were wonderful to eat while still warm. I miss the bread, I miss both grandmothers, too. The bread they baked served not only my physical hunger but some deeper hunger served by women who knew how to bake bread with love.

Wonder Bread died today, Nov. 21, 2012 when it's owners declared bankruptcy.  Their bread was alright, I suppose, but it served only half my hunger. To this day, I can't eat a slice of white industrial bread. Instead, I try to find some home bakery bread to remind me of what real bread tastes like.

 

Republicans: Blind and Deaf

One thing has become crystal clear in the post presidential election discussion: Republicans can't seem to get it into their elephantine heads that the U.S. has changed racially and ethnically in its composition.

Instead of embracing Americans of all hues, Republicans (and many Democrats) are still blind to what is happening in this country. America has always been a country that accepted immigrants of many cultures, of many languages.  In the last quarter of a century it is Hispanic American and Asian American populations which have grown in size and in importance. They are talking, Republican leaders aren't listening. Or, are they profoundly deaf?

President Obama is an African-American. What you see is what you get.  People of color identify with him.

 I don't know what Mitt Romney could have done to attract non-whites to his message. Perhaps, he could have learned a few words in Spanish and tossed them out now and then during his campaign. At least Romney could have publicly eaten an enchilada or two.

The day after the election, gun stocks went through the ceiling because, of course, now that Romney is out, Obama will probably try to ban automatic weapons. Then how are real Americans (read white) supposed to defend themselves when "they" come after us?

I look out to the worshipping community on Sundays and I see whites sitting next to hispanics. My altar servers are oriental, and the ushers are of many colors. We get along. Republican office holders should take a cue from the Catholic Church. Integration is one of the things we do well.

We need American leaders who will re-teach us that this country is open to everyone who wants to contribute to our culture, to everyone who wants to love this country, regardless of color. It's going to be a hard sell but it falls on Republicans to get their heads out of the sand and do it.

(I took this photo of a child in Mali two years ago. I wonder how he got the tee-shirt.)

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American Catholics, Sandy and Emergency Response

Why isn't there a National Catholic Relief Services Agency sponsored by the National Catholic Conference of Bishops?

 The American Catholic Church can't seem to get its charitable arms around the people who are suffering the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.  While the international arm of the American Catholic Church is already using recent donations for Cuban and Haitian relief efforts after hurricane Sandy through its website, www.crs.org, there is no Catholic national site to receive donations for this American tragedy.

The national office of Catholic Charities which represents agencies tasked with assisting needy people within dioceses, does not at this point accept on-line donations to help those on the east coast who need food, fresh water, housing, clothing and other forms of assistance. To its credit,  the national office of the Knights of Columbus has opened a donation tab on its web site specifically for aid to Sandy's victims. You can donate there.

Someday soon the American Catholic Church ought to start a national office of relief to collect donations and respond in a hurry when floods, hurricanes, fires and other disasters occur in our country.

Some dioceses, including New York and Boston are having special collections for the victims of Hurricane Sandy on the first weekend in November. Donations can be sent through their web sites.
 

Barach Obama, Chicago, and the Personal Touch.

I was raised in a neighborhood on the northwest side of Chicago where a cement curb outside our house still bears the words, “Fixed for Bob and Sharon’s wedding.”  That repair was made forty years ago. My mother had warned the precinct captain that if the broken curb were not fixed by the date of my sister’s wedding, she was going to vote Republican in the next election…she voted Democratic.

Well, these days only one of us five siblings still lives in Chicago but Illinois politics has a long outreach in the state. Another sister, Carol, recently told me this story:

 One morning about five year’s ago , Carol, who is legally blind, noticed a figure coming up to her house in downstate Illinois  “I thought it was someone from one of those religious groups  who try to get you to go to their church,” she said. "When the door-bell rang, I almost didn’t  answer it."

“I opened the door and there was an African-American guy with a big smile, a nice suit and a clipboard." That much she could make out.

“Hi! I’m Barach Obama and I’m running for president of the Unites States," he said. "But I need lots of signatures to get me on the ballot.  Would you sign for me?”

She had never heard of him. “ O.K.  I’d be glad to sign. But you’ll have to point to where I should sign.  I have low vision,” she said. 

"He showed me the place and I signed.  He thanked me and gave another nice smile and left.  I didn’t know who he was at the time," she said.

She  likes to tell this story of the time she signed her autograph for a future president.

I’m not sure Carol will vote for Barach Obama in this election and I am not sure she ever voted for him. But Chicagoans are used to a  kind of politics that works because it is personal.

In Chicago, you can actually meet candidates and they listen to what you say. Obama learned Chicago politics and applied it to his campaign. 

 

 

 

 

Illinois Mink, Twin Lakes Forest Preserve

While I was walking along the one mile path around one of the lakes of Twin Lake Forest preserve in DuPage county, there he was just about 50 feet from me, a mink. He was gamboling across the walking path at lunch time. Approximately two-feet long with the characteristic sinuous gait that he shares with the smaller weasel, looked at me, and then scampered into the high grass and brush along the lake. (I think it was a male since females do not usually reach the length of the one I saw.)

  With short dark fur, this mink was definitely long and built close to the ground. In a lifetime of walks and runs through fields and forests this is the first mink I have ever seen.

Mink are hard to mistake for any other animal. A river Otter comes close but they are much larger than mink and spend most of their time in the water.

Mink are land predators who love mice, rats, rabbits and even squirrels. They make their homes underneath rock piles or brush and close to water.

Two days ago, on the same path I saw a full-grown coyote, the second one I've seen in this locale this year.  Within 300 yards of this spot is a McDonalds and a Wal-Mart.

Illinois wildlife is adapting quickly and beautifully to our presence.

Praise the Lord for all creatures great and small!


 

Jesus Sent Them out in Pairs.

"Woe to him that is alone, for when he falls, he has none to lift him up." (Ecc 4:10)

Luke's Gospel tells us that Our Lord sent out his disciples two by two. (Lk 10:1-9)  He sent them out in pairs because He knew how easy it is for us to get discouraged. You and I need a companion along the way to help bear the burdens of preaching the Gospel.  Yes, sometimes the Gospel demands more energy than one man has.

Remember Peter who denied three times that he even knew who Jesus was? Even John, likely the youngest disciple ran away when Jesus was bound in chains and led away by some soldiers. Fearful that he was next, he ran away naked.

That night there was Peter, without his brothers in the Gospel, standing and warming his sinful hands at the fire of the pagans in Pilate's courtyard. Timid, alone and frightened.

Judas distraught with no where to go, fashions a noose, throws the rope up over a strong branch and with his traitorous hands pushes himself off into the air.  He dies unsupported and alone.

We all bear the effects of original sin, especially pride. If I think that because of my preaching or my example that I am somebody, leave it to a companion to set me straight. My friend along the way will see when I need understanding, will see when I need to be left alone for awhile.

How satisfying it is to have my companion walk with me on the Gospel journey and to feel a supporting  hand on my shoulder. 

"A brother who is helped by his brother is a strong city." (Proverbs 18:19)

Aging is Meandering with Intent.

I can't believe I'm writing this. It hurts to say that I now know what it means to be disregarded, to be overlooked and ignored. Waitresses don't see me sitting there alone, waiting, reading --or pretending to be reading-- a book.  Young people  don't ask me questions or comment or treat me as a person. I've been told: "I saw you over there, some old guy. I didn't know who you were."

"You ought-a bust his butt," a five year old challenges his dad, when we nearly bump in an aisle at Walmart.  The child sees an older man, not an elder.

What does aging look like socially?  When moms pull their children toward themselves in Barnes and Noble as you approach a discount table of books, as if aging were contagious .

Even my friend sheds me like a dead leaf in the fall.  Nothing more to contribute to his life.
At least one, I've offended by my anger so that even though I told him of my regret and sorrow at my actions, something friendly has disappeared from the warm relationship we once had.

Sometimes, it makes me want to curl up in my room, and avoid everyone, my door closed.

However, I am not dead yet. I know there are friendships still to be made, books and articles still to be written. Paths to be walked in the morning. Things to be seen. Things to be heard.  Things to be felt.  I'll be darned if I will let other people's attitudes toward my aging affect how I live my life. And, hey  -maybe a lot of what I have been experiencing is the result of how I present myself. In other words, I'm projecting.

I might not have patience anymore for an extended period of pastoral activity. I know I'm not as fast as I once was. Occasionally, my intellectual process just steps down after a period of intense thought. But, I can still preach, preside at the Eucharist, be useful as a brother in networking,  I still love music, classical and, jazz.  I still can walk and visit and learn and be in other countries with little fear.  In fact, I almost never want to go home.  (By the way, another definition of home: "When someone knocks you have to let them in." (A variation of "Home is where when you go there they have to take you in (Robert Frost?).

I pray differently. I am called to more meditation, centering prayer and adoration but I have to get used to this because for so long there was little time for this in my day and less room in my heart with all its file cabinets full of things to do, things to regret, things I've done, things I'll never do. I've got to remember that anytime is a good time for meditation. And, each day, now, it is a must.

I have to have projects. Writing, yes, but also there are other things I can do. Preaching each week is, I must admit, not a joy.  I approach each sermon with a sense of dread. My mind says: You've got nothing to say. You do believe what you are going to say, right?  By the way, why not tell them what you actually believe? I am certain that temptation to evil is also in the midst of this.  I am battling myself, the flesh, the devil when I preach.  No wonder I'm tired.

I go through this angst each weekend that I preach.  Each week, the homily turns out more or less fine.  Each week I'm reminded to trust Him.  I tell Him: Use me as a channel of your mercy, even if the substance of my conduit is full of cracks, and leaks.  He can use anyone, even me.

Yeah, yeah. It's embarrassing but I have always wanted a quicker mind, an intellect that could find the seed in a mess of leaves, broken branches and fragmented bark.  Instead, I see the whole dam
mess and I see it as a whole. When I try to parse it out to its essentials,  I lose track of what I am looking for in the first place.

I have wanted a skill at writing that is more facile, that pours out of my heart in logical
constructed sentences and paragraphs.  Instead, I write and then perform surgery on my work. Out go extra words, adjectives --plucked, just because as Mark Twain said, they exist.

I have sat in a room with bright guys who speak rapidly, grasp things just as quickly, and move on. I'm lost in their dust. I would love to have that kind of intelligence. But, I am aware that I have ways of knowing that are not necessarily logical but still authentic paths to truth.

I have known brilliant people who really have a tough time relating to the rest of us. I do not want to be like that.

I just have to use the gifts that I have.

I admire the logical progression of paragraphs to support a main theme.  I know most writers have an idea, then, make up a beginning, middle and end. Eventually, they build up an outline and stick to it as they write.

My mind works instead, like a sous-chef preparing a salad. I start with ripping up some lettuce --that is the passionate part. No trouble there. Then I cut up some tomatoes for color and add some celery (facts)-- as much as I have. And ,finally, something to cry over, the onions.
I cut all this up, mix it up and hope that I can bring it all together with some palatable dressing. Viola: My salad with its unique dressing on life.

What else can I do? Life is what happens when I am planning to do those big things in life that I'm gonna do someday.

I am very happy how the details of the show for Kathryn is working out --far better than I thought possible.  It's because I have people who actually like Kathryn's art.  Bruce, the artist, appreciates her
soulful expression and Susan sees proportion and pattern that perhaps only a designer could appreciate.

There's a certain whimsy in Ks art that I never really noticed before.  Along with the drama of  her chronic depression which appears in her paintings,  there was always a bit of wow here and there. Adlai Stevenson's "The life of an egg-head is difficult" shows his head rolling around as a chicken egg would, eccentrically. Her pieces of flotsam and jetsam from the lake and from the sand dunes hang from her banner prints like little jokes, wry comments, happy serendipity.

I want to believe that there is still time to encounter those I would like to know and those who I, if I would let them, could experience me.

I've had a few relationships with those people --nothing lasting but with some intimacy.

I think I better make more of this happen.

"Change we can Believe in," or Maybe Not.

Four years ago, Barack Obama promised a new dawn for America and the world. What exactly was to change and how that change would take place was not too clear. On the eve of this presidential election  president Obama stays the course with change and hope. The people of Libya, Mali, Egypt and Yemen are not on board.

When I was in the North African country of Mali two years after Obama’s election, I took a photograph of a little boy in the countryside standing by a tree. There he was in his faded Obama T-shirt, not able to read what he was wearing and living in one of the poorest countries on earth.

Libya borders Mali.  Maommar Qaddafiwhile he was dictator in  Libya used his power to build an opulent, sprawling government complex for Mali in the heart of its capitol, his gift to this desperately poor people. Even in death the dictator of Libya represents more positive change to the people of Mali than Obama can imagine.

Since that picture was taken, insurgents associated with Al Qaida have invaded the region of Timbuktu and destabilized Mali. The little boy with the Obama T-shirt is unlikely to be better off these days. Unfortunately, our country under President Obama has done little to assist Mali and children like the child with the Obama T-shirt, despite President Obama's words at the beginning of his presidency:

"I see Africa as a fundamental part of our interconnected world  --as a partner with America on behalf of the future we want for all our children." (Obama, speaking in Acera, Ghana, July 11, 2009)
 

Libya, Mali, Egypt with the rest of Northern Africa is emerging as a region rich in natural resources and with potential to grow their economies.  Yet, change for the boy with the five-word Obama slogan has meant less food, less access to health care, less opportunity than he had before. In Mali, it is also more dangerous for this boy and his village, too.Like Mali, Libya's new regime is fragile and ripe for takeover.

President Obama and Obama's supporters should realize that the United States represents hope to poor countries like Mali and Libya.  Kids like the boy with the Obama T-shirt see a black United States president and believe that just maybe their lives could change for the better.

In Mali, I saw another boy wearing a faded T-shirt depicting Muslim leaders. I still do not know who these figures were, but I wonder who is winning the hearts of young people in Libya, Mali and the rest of the Northern Africa.

Chicago Cubs, 2012.

I've pretty much stopped following the Cubs.  These days it's a minor league franchise playing with the big boys. The little boys are outclassed and outmatched.

The arrogance of Theo Epstein and the owners of the Chicago Cubs is beyond reckoning. They seem to think that the fans will hang around loyally while they charge us the same ticket price to watch minor leagurers play major league teams.

There used to be a time when the minor leagues were for apprentices, talented young guys who
learned how to field and hit and run. Now, these guys are in the majors making dumb base-running gaffs and swinging at balls already in the catcher's mitt.

The manager, a dour and clueless former player, relentlessly talks about how he, we, have to have patience with these young players while they learn the craft of baseball. Well, opposing pitchers make the Chicago Cubs look like fools as they flail at pitches outside the strike zone and miss hit-and-run  signs like high school kids. Learn how to run in high school!  Learn how to hit in the minor leagues!

Who says that the building plan of Mr. Epstein will work? Most players who have potential don't work out.  Felix Pie? Mark Prior? Those that do learn how to play on a team and they learn from seasoned players whom they interact with game after game.

 The magic of a team has to involve seasoned players who know how to play at a major league level and engage younger players in the art of winning baseball games. It's not just teaching and honing individuals until you can insert them into a team.

The Cubs have been in countless building programs over the century of futility.  Chicago Cub fans have suffered for long decades but now we are being taken for granted. The owner seems to think that Cub fans will pay to see whatever inept team shows up at Clark and Addison.

I've had enough.  I love Wrigley Field.  I even warm-up to the Chicago Cubs as lovable losers. But, enough is enough. I hate what is being shoved down our throats in 2012: a team made up of kids who should be in Iowa learning how to hit, pitch and play on a team.

I'm not going anymoreChicago Cub games and I'm not watching them, either. Wait! I take that back.  I really enjoyed the Little League finals.  Great baseball.



 

Nuremburg, Germany, 2012.

        It is late July and I am on a European river cruise with two friends. I like cruises but hate the
boring tour guides, so I usually go off on my own whenever I'm visiting some place new. Today at 6 AM  I carefully make my way down the gang-plank and begin walking along the canal which links Neuremburg to the Main and Danube Rivers.

Although there is only the ocasional cyclist at this early hour, I skip the bike path and opt for one of the dirt paths which radiate away from the bike lanes. I take one of them and meander toward a forest, lush and still, mostly dark, though the tall evergreens are letting in some light alread. Scrub brush grows up along the path and  areas of sparce green grass are becoming almost meadows, spaced among the groves of trees.

On my left, just ten minutes into my walk I see a figure standing still in a field maybe seventy feet from me. It's a lone deer,smaller than our white-tailed species, hiding from me right out in the open.  She is sure that I won't notice her. (I decide it's a "she" simply because this deer has no antlers. I actually hope she's a she.) Her long ears are erect and turned in my direction and her fur appears to be dark grey with the morning light just touching her head and haunches. Her large eyes are glistening and steady as they regard me.

The deer is a microcosm for me. I look at her for who she is and she looks at me for who I am.
In that mystery, I find God. Why can't He come to me in the glance of a deer? Or, surprise me with a song of a red-bird in mid-winter or a wild orchid in the shadow of a sycamore tree in April?

We look at one another for some minutes. No one else is around.  It's very quiet. I make a move to continue down the dirt path and instantly the deer bounds once, twice and enters the darkness of the thick forest.

This is why I go places, often by myself.  This European deer is a new species for me, the Western Roe Deer (Capreolus capreolus). Wild deer still survive here in Bavaria after industrialization, two world wars and habitat destruction.

The guide this morning will miss seeing this deer and so will the rest of the passangers.  Maybe they wouldn't care to experience a wild deer in a Bavarian Forest.

If I do not see anything else on this journey that is new, I will remember this morning, and this deer outside of Neuremberg Germanyon a hot summer morning in July.




       

Andy Griffith, Opie and Common Sense

Opie's father in the series "The Andy Griffith Show" is remembered as a kind and just single parent who let his son learn life's lessons well. There were no "time outs," no lame excuses accepted and no physical punishment, either. When Opie did something wrong, his father would try to teach him how to make it right, or at least how to avoid making the same mistake in the future.

Once Opie killed  a nesting robin with a stone from his slingshot. Andy asked the boy how the little ones in the nest were going to survive with no mother to feed them. Father and son agreed that since Opie had taken the life of the adult bird, he would have to feed them. Opie kept them in a cage and fed  them until they were ready to fledge. Later, fully grown now, the young birds fly away as Opie lets the cage door swing open wide.

The series went on year after year. Opie like all young boys made mistakes as he grew up. But he always recognized that his father was wiser than he was. Andy, on his part, never gives in to a zero tolerance policy. How can a child learn a lesson if we don't allow for mistakes?

I once mentioned to my father that a friend of mind was thinking about becoming a carpenter but he was afraid of making mistakes. My father answered quickly: "Why if I were afraid of making a mistake. I could never have become a carpenter. Everyone makes mistakes.  You just have to learn from them."

The part Andy Griffith played in his series reminds me that there was once a standard for learning that was nearly sacred to parents.  It wasn't inflexible rules, nor was it tolerance for misbehavior. The golden rule of parenting was use common sense. Andy applied common sense with such skill that those of us who watched each week felt confident that life itself ought to be the greatest teacher of all.

Obama, American Bishops, Throw Their Weight Around

Are you as unsure as I am about the American bishops' response to President Obama's health care plan?  He is insisting that Catholic Church institutions pony up to pay for access to contraceptives, abortion services and sterilizations for all their employees.  But wait a minute! Mr. Obama goes on to explain that the Catholic Church will not have to pay for health care which goes against the Church's ethics. No. Their insurance companies will pay for whatever the Church objects to on moral  grounds, not the Church itself.

My question is: Who pays the insurance premiums? If the Church pays the insurance company premiums which funds the things the Church objects to, how can the Obama administration not see that it is forcing the Church to act against its core values? Many of the Church's agencies are self-insured and could not be expected to pay for health care it considers immoral.

The bishop's response to all this is to throw down the gauntlet. Two weeks of prayer and polite demonstration and expensive full-page ads in national newspapers should do it, they seem to think. However, reaction of Catholics to this approach seems fairly tepid. Most of us priests would not be able to mount a good argument against the disputed provisions of the bill so you won't be hearing much from most pulpits, either.

The bishops have not made their case clear. On the street it feels like this: Here's the bishops of the Catholic Church trying to throw their ample weight around again. While the poor suffer for lack of access to health care, the bishops continue to defend their positions and fight the embarassment of the sex abuse crisis emenating from its shepherds.  Many women in particular are furious because  the big shot men in the Church want them to be satisfied with second-class health care. Something is rotten in the state of the American Catholic Church.

 I don't, of course, agree that our Church wants the poor to suffer more or that poor women should not receive health care. But I am concerned about contraception because it separates sexual relations from love.  I'm concerned about abortion because it ends an innocent human life.  But, I understand that others do not come to the same conclusions that I have.

We have to stay in dialogue with our neighbors.  I read the graffiti (some of it) and bumper-stickers which reflect the mood of our culture. A recent sighting:  "Pray Your Rosary and Stay Out of My Womb." What's wrong with this picture? Dialogue it's not. Somehow we have provoked this kind of a response because the official American Church looks like a big bully. 

Our bishops should be able to come up with a better plan to get us through these rough days without compromising our Catholic values or appearing to force those values on others. We Catholics deserve better leadership.

It's Holy Week, 2012.
Holy Thursday should stick in our souls like an arrow that finds it's mark. Jesus givse us an example of humility and service. However, there's not a word about service, ministry, or love changing the world on MSN's home page this week. Most of the stuff there is fluff about Lady Gaga's latest reincarnation and gems like how to avoid baggage fees at the airport.

Good Friday.  Hey, the New York Stock market will be closed  in observance of the day of our salvation. So, we get a day without a display of public corporate and individual greed.  One day a year. A good start.  Our Christian memorial day, a Friday to beat all Fridays.

Holy Saturday. Baptisms and new life for all.

Easter! Mary Magdalene: "I have seen the Lord!"

Resurrection of Christ, 2012

 I did see the "Passion of the Christ"  when it opened in 2004 but was not moved much by it.  I was distracted by the actor who played Christ (He tried too hard.) and by Gibson who gave us no Gospel background for his drama on suffering. We all looked at the bloody scenes out of context.

The gospels make it clear Jesus does not start out acting as the Atonement.    Instead, He grabs our hearts as the Son of the Father and the Light of the World. He cures the deaf and makes a crippled man walk. Even those born blind can see after an experience of the Christ. We meet this great heart before we see it broken.

Nevertheless, right away as the film begins, Gibson has Jesus reduced to a figure abased in atonement before a God who demands blood and death in order to ransom sinners. I'm not saying Gibson is wrong to paint Christ as suffering servant. It's just that he seems to miss the warm missionary aspect of the Christ's message. The token nod to the Resurrection forgets to include what raising up means for a fallen world.

The Christ suffers and dies for us but, as St. Paul says, if the resurrection has no meaning, then we should be pitied for we are still in our sins. Gibson's drama is all bad news while the gospel itself speaks of good news.

Substitutionary atonement or exemplary atonement? Neither explanation satisfies the human heart awed by the simple elegance of the gospel stories of the passion and death of the Christ.

We become one with Him as resurrected when he show us his hands and his side. The passion of the Christ is over, then and our salvation dawns on us when we meet Him in the breaking of the bread.

Churchiness, pooped. Secularism shining.

Secularism in America is growing fast.  Since the early 70s, any kind of belief in God or church attendance has dropped 21% among the lower classes of Americans to where less than 50 % believe in God or attend Church. (Charles Murray, Wall Street Journal, Jan. 21-22, 2012, pp. C1-2)

It's taken for granted that even among church-going believers, only around 30% attend church several times a month.

 However, many Catholic churches are overflowing with parishioners on Sundays. How can we think that the Catholic faith is not relevant and influential in our country? Things look good, right? Or, maybe not so much.

The fact is that we aren't building many churches anymore so the ones we do have are filled. Yes, the number of Catholics has increased significantly as our population grows.  Lots of senior Baby Boomers are showing up while their children and their children's children slip away. Hispanics have helped us grow but they seem to move easily to other Christian Churches when those churches attempt to incorporate their cultures and language into their worship services.

Since less than a third of our parishioners are present on any given Sunday,
we can easily accomodate them. However, on the feasts of Christmas and Easter we see a better picture of what would happen if they all came with any kind of regularity.

Meanwhile as church attendance diminishes in importance in the lives of our people, dioceses establish elaborate fund raising programs and the bishop's conference installs baroque changes to the wording of the Mass, thereby attempting a renewal which is having about as much effect as rearranging deck chairs would have had on the sinking Titanic.

We must take the New Evangelization much more seriously. We should stop spending outrageous amounts of time and money trying to save enormous church structures of dubious architectural worth.  Instead, we need to get back to working with neighborhood groups and clusters of households in an attempt to develop vibrant Catholic communities. We should build churches where our people live and let the old churches fade away.

Our Sunday liturgies need  priests and deacons who can deliver well-developed homilies that speak to the needs and hopes of their parishioners. People who come to church need to feel welcomed and part of what is happening, and not just observers of a liturgical action.

Forget about trying to save dying Catholic schools, many of which are no longer part of the mission of their parishes anyway. There are many schools that have drifted so far away that they are no longer so much Catholic as elitist and separatist schools.  Let them die so that new ways of Catholic formation can emerge.

 We need a new vision for our Catholic Church in America.  So far, our episcopal leadership has been unable to provide heart and soul to Benedict XVI's new vision of Evangelization. 

Roman Missal Three and Those Darn liberals

I am an ordinary parish priest, a practitioner, not a linguist. But, after stumbling through the proper prayers of Advent these past few weeks and continuing to stumble through Christmastide, I do not think that Roman Missal Three is working very well.

What a disappointment. Not only is the translation awkward, but the way the Latin phrases are structured into English gives the translation an unnatural, tortured formality where, for example, the faithful become oblations as dew falls on the altar. Beautiful, ain’t it?

I’m confident that the translators wanted to keep certain values intact. As they faced translation problems they tried to retain core elements of the official Latin translation so that the final English text would attain a beauty and formality comparable to the Latin text.

      At some point they made a decision to remove options among the prayers, apparently feeling that priestly spontaneity would mask the mystery of the Eucharist.

The resulting third edition of the sacramentary is the proverbial camel produced by the committee which was in charge of creating a horse.

Over fifty years ago, John Ciardi, American poet and writer approached his attempt to translate Dante’s Divine Comedy with humility. Though he was learned in old Italian and modern English, he gave up trying to rhyme tercets and decided literal translation meant that he had to translate ideas not individual words. He called the result a “transposition,” not a translation. Dante's great Italian classic lives beautifully in Ciardi's faithful transposition. But, then, he was an artisan in English which took him beyond dynamic equivalence.

The one consolation in all this is that the bishops who approved the translation must also try and proclaim the liturgical prayers themselves. Therefore, I beseech and heartily pray that these authorities may so rejoice in the novel experience, that they may soon be brought to the eternal judgment seat of God where, retaining all humility and confidence, and as perfect oblations, they will receive their right and just reward. Amen.

A long-time parishioner came up to me after a recent Sunday Mass: “Father, I am so angry at all these liberals and what they’re doing with the Mass…stuffing this new translation down our throats….”

Ah, yes, those darn liberals are at it again.

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Eulogy for Stan Richmond: If I were a Rich Man.

Over the weekend I lost a good friend of thirty years. The news came from the man's son and caught me like a sucker punch to the stomach.

My friend was a faithful and good man, Short of stature, yes, but you shouldn't think to cross him.  He would not forget that. Nor would he ever forget a kindness shown to him.

He was a business man all his life, in fact, he was a salesman and a student of human nature.  He knew the right things to say and the right questions to ask to establish a relationship with a client that would make the guy want to buy whatever my friend was selling.

At one time, as a salesman for the family business he sold furs. When I knew him, he sold high end collectibles to people (mostly men) who had so much money they didn't care the price of an item.  No matter, they wanted the thing. My friend would sell it to them. Both were happy.

Yes, it is hard to be good and a business man at the same time.  You know too much. You have all the advantage. The client, though, receives what he wants and happy with his purchase doesn't care much about why the businessman is selling.

My friend looked at money in a slightly different way from most of his clients. Take donations.  He'd peal off several hundred dollars to send to a missionary who was building a clinic for poor indigenous in Mexico.  He called it "casting bread before the waters."  I took that to mean my friend trusted that giving away without strings attached was the way to be a just man.

He once sent me a parcel of knishes which took a thousand mile trip to my doorstep. It was a spontaneous gift because he remembered that I loved knishes. He made them himself and when I tried to thank him he just said, "Hey, enjoy!"

He was raised in a strict Jewish household of parents who also came from generations of observant Jews,  He was taught to smile and he loved a good joke. Both he shared with his friends.

Recently, I learned that for some Jews a special day is set aside where the worshiper goes to a river and throws morsels of bread into the current while confessing their sins. The bread and the sins are carried away. This day, called "Tashlich," occurs between Rosh Ha Shana and Yom Kippur.

I don't think its a coincidence that Christians pray for daily bread in the most sacred prayer of the Savior. Bread is fundamental to cultures throughout the world. To eat bread is life-giving. To toss it upon the waters is sacrificial.

So, goodbye, good friend. I'll miss contact with you.  I always considered you the richest man in town.