CHRISTMAS THOUGHTS I often promised to write my reactions to events and Liturgical celebrations in the Augustinian, and I simply never got around to it. Impressions tend to blur as the experience recedes, and I leave it for another time. But time too recedes, and we won't always have it. So I decided to strike this year while the iron was still hot! !
Those of us fortunate to be in the congregation for the 11.OOam Mass on Christmas Day took part in something we will not easily forget.
The air of expectancy that hung over the packed church before Mass began was interrupted by the sight of a little boy, Christmas present under his arm, running up the centre aisle to look into the crib at the altar front. Suddenly the choir struck up "Adeste Fideles". He turned around and looked unselfconsciously up as he stood his ground. A terrific early reminder that Christmas is for children and that adults have a less important role. Several other children came playfully up to touch the figure of the baby Jesus in the crib as the Mass progressed. A charming little girl walked up along the aisle as " Agnus Dei" was being sung, shaking hands with the person at the end of each row in a great show of innocence and peace. The quality of Dolores Glynn's reading early on, set the tone.
Fr. Dick Lyng then in an outstanding homily gave voice to the spiritual message of Christmas. He reminded adults that our festive feasts were mere crumbs that fell from the tables of our children. We felt very close to him as he talked of his own family and his brother Paddy's return home on Christmas Eve from the Mater Hospital where he is being treated for a serious illness. The congregation burst into spontaneous applause as he finished, moved greatly by what he had said.
There was glorious singing from the choir as they soared through beautiful and complex arrangements of the great Christmas hymns. There were very few dry eyes as Sonny Molloy took us through "0 Holy Night" and when Pat Lillis and the full choir concluded the Mass with the "Hallelujah Chorus". We felt glad to be alive. The ovation they received was richly deserved.
As we shuffled out into the daylight an older man said to me, "Thank God we kept the faith -it was worth it for that Mass alone"
To paraphrase Seamus Heaney-
"We all knew something by being there,
something wonderful was emptied into us to keep.
and a pure change happened.
-Des Kavanagh.
AS I WAS SAYING
Janus was the Roman god of the doorway. He guarded all entrances and exits. He is traditionally represented as having two faces, one looking back to the past, the other forward to the future. In January (the month of Janus) we can all identify with this: we look back to the year that has passed, and forward -often with foreboding- to the year ahead. The past is past, and therefore familiar; the future is not yet, and therefore strange. We are more comfortable with the familiar, so the backward gaze predominates. Inevitably, we have all been changed, for good or for ill, by the year that has passed. Old Father Time has left another footprint on our faces. Some of us have been changed for the good, or even the better!
Some of us may have lost loved ones during the year, either through death or broken relationships; others may have been broken by sickness or circumstance; others may have married and had children; others may simply have had a child, and been changed gloriously by the experience. Whatever our individual circumstances, we have all been changed in some measure by the year that has gone. It was Cardinal Newmann who said that "to live is to change, to live fully is to change often." The challenge to us now is to be reconciled to this new self, to make ourselve! at home with our changed circumstances. If we are to live full human and productive lives, this reconciliation is essential Otherwise we will waste ourselves and our days in pining after what is impossible or what is no more.
The New Year is above all a day for reflection on time and how we use it. Technology has provided us with so man 'time-savers' But what do we do with the time saved?
There is an old Irish saying: Life is a sigh between two mysteries. The journey from the womb to the tomb is a short one, regardless of the years we live. Time is a precious commodity. The poet said that the innocent and the beautiful have no enemies but time. Time challenges all of us, irrespective of our innocence or our beauty.
There are things money cannot buy but time can achieve trust, respect, love and a clear conscience. When we abuse time we risk serious damage to our happiness. It has been said that we die clutching in our hands only that which we have given away in our lifetime. This will be especially true of the way we use time. How we experience it as it ebbs from us will be coloured very much by the way we used it when we had plenty of it. In this sense, time is full of eternity. There are echoes here of what Jesus said about losing our life to find it.
The old egg timer is the most effective illustration we have of the ebb and flow of time. Time literally runs out before our eyes. But the more conscious we become of this, the more we will treasure time as a gift. Grab every moment with both hands and savour it. Not a bad resolution at all! Have a happy, healthy new year, and thanks again for all your support and love.
-Dick Lyng.
A NEW COMMANDMENT I GIVE YOU....
As we begin our pilgrimage anew, filled with new hope and new resolution, here are ten commandments that might just provide some 'food for the journey':
Acknowledge your contingency, your helplessness. You are a creature, not the creator. Only God is "ipsum esse subsistens", self-sufficient being. Accept that you can't give yourself life. All is a gift. If you try to guarantee your own immortality, you mimic the sin of Adam and Eve. Proper living begins with the words: "I am not God! "
Pray prayers of helplessness, gratitude, and praise. Hold the world up each day to God. Hold up both its great wonders and its great pain. Pray in gratitude, thanking God for life itself, for light, for this earth, for those who love you. Pray from your weaknesses and helplessness: "Lord, hang on to me lest I slip away from you. Do for me what I cannot do for myself'
Welcome and accept the present moment. Life is what happens to you while you're planning your life. Don't let pressures and heartaches of life steal the present moment from you. Only it is real. Drink it in. It's the only place you will experience love and joy. If not now- when? If not with these people -with whom? If not here -where?
Give yourself permission to be inadequate. Both God and nature give you permission not to be perfect. Don't be too hard on yourself and, especially, on others. Everyone falls short. God doesn't keep you from falling and failing, but redeems you when you do fall. Fear not, you are inadequate!
Be sufficiently loving and critical, both at the same time. If you're critical without being loving, you're destructive. If you're loving without being critical, you're weak. Your loved ones, your family, your church, need you to be loving and critical, both at the same time. Don't blackmail by constantly threatening your withdrawal. Love, be critical, and stay. Pull from your bag the new as well as the old.
Be non-classifiable. Have an unlisted number as regards being liberal or conservative. Admit that the right and left have both run out of imagination and that their sympathies are highly-selective. Don't be naive, but don't be sophisticated either. See both as phases to pass through. Forgive your past.
Bless what's good and beautiful, even as you stand where the cross of Christ is erected. Bless what's good in the world. Never, for the sake of any cause, orthodoxy or justice, denigrate beauty. All that's good and beautiful has God as author. Honour that before speaking any word of challenge to the world. Imitate Christ: First bless the world and its goodness and, only then, go stand where the cross is perennially erected, where the sick and the crushed find themselves.
Be shockingly "Catholic" -earthy and wine-drinking. Bask in the goodness or life. We have divine permission to be happy. God invented wine. Jesus scandalised people with his capacity to enjoy life. He drank wine and let his heart be warmed by friends. Don't confuse John the Baptist with Jesus. John was the ascetic, not Jesus.
Accept ageing with good grace. Rely more on the paschal mystery than on cosmetics. All that dies brings rich new life, even our own bodies. Paschal wisdom will do more for your joy than a face-Iift. Ageing needs to be defined aesthetically. Your soul must be properly aged before it leaves and your body, like an old wine-barrel, it takes on a different function and beauty as you age. Ageing is an art form.
Serve the right God! God, as Julian of Norwich assures us, "is completely relaxed and courteous, himself the happiness and peace of his dear friends, his beautiful face, radiating measureless love, like a marvellous symphony." Don't serve any other God than this One. Don't bow to any molten calf, created in the image and likeness of our own tensions, bitterness and twisted jealousy. Never forget the insight of Athanasius: "The glory of God is man fully alive! "
-Fr. Ronald Rolheiser is a Canadian priest and writer.
THE WISE MEN AND WISDOM: A CAUTIONARY TALE
Some translations of the gospels render the Latin 'MAGI' as 'astrologers'. ('Magician' has the same root). Their faith in the 'birth star' of the Christ Child strongly supports this translation. But the Catholic Church has always been deeply suspicious of astrology and astrologers. Hence, it either allowed the word 'MAGI' stand in its original Latin form, or else it translated it rather loosely and harmlessly as 'The Three Wise Men'.
Catholic suspicion of astrology crystallised in Medieval times. Astrologers were held in high esteem and, in many quarters, they rivalled priests and prelates as 'stewards of the divine mysteries'. Most royal courts had their own official astrologer. It was his sole function to predict the future accurately. (Economists perform this function today!). The king's policies were then trimmed accordingly.
The 15th century French King, Louis Xl, was no exception. He was a devout believer in astrology. Not surprisingly then, he was filled with apprehension when the court astrologer foretold disaster: the favourite mistress of the King would die within eight days. She obliged by dying on the fifth day.
Louis decided to follow the time-honoured practice of astute political leaders: "If the news is bad, kill the messenger!". He resolved to have his unfortunate astrologer murdered. But not before he conducted a little experiment. He decided to test the accuracy of his astrologer's foresight first.
Having already engaged the executioner, he summoned the astrologer to his apartments. "You claim to understand astrology and to know the fate of others," Louis demanded, "so tell me at once what your own fate will be and how long you have to live?".
"I shall die just three days before your majesty," answered the astrologer. In fear and trembling, Louis granted him an immediate reprieve.
While all wise men are not astrologers, some astrologers, at least, are wise men!
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