God’s Fools

Rembrandt "Jeremiah"

Deacon Tom writes ©

"God's Fools"

Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Complaining one day on how she was treated, the Lord told St. Teresa of Avila, this is how I treat all my friends. St. Teresa responded… “Lord, it’s no wonder you have so few of them.” I suspect the Prophet Jeremiah experienced this same feeling. He complains to God, “You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped.” Jeremiah feels that God seduced him into being His pawn and given him a mission that makes him “an object of laughter;” brings him “derision and reproach all the day.” Jeremiah doesn’t see himself as God’s chosen one but rather as God’s fool. He wants to walk away from the work God has given him to do, but he can’t. God’s Word “becomes like fire burning in his heart…imprisoned in his bones” and he just can’t stop being God’s mouthpiece. So he continues to speak God’s word, even though it leads him to a life of personal sacrifice, a life of being a “fool for God.”

Jeremiah is one of many who knows the tension there is between responding to God’s call and seeking to follow the ways of the world. St. Paul continues this theme by teaching “Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.” Do you notice how there is no reference to “easy” or any mention of a “yellow brick road” here?

Jesus tells us that it is through Him that we come to know God’s Will and the way to do this is to “… deny ourselves, take up our crosses and follow Him.” We must embrace the folly of the Cross; we must be, in a real sense, “Fools for Christ” in order to see clearly the path God has in store for us. In other words, we must distinguish ourselves from the world… by what we do, by what we say, by how we view the world around us, by how we treat those we meet along the way, and by applying God’s wisdom to all that we do. This, of course, is foolishness in the eyes of the world.   

If we have been striving to live as Jesus’ disciples, we probably will get some bumps and bruises along the way. That’s a good thing. That’s how Jesus will recognize us when we come into His kingdom. He will see our scars and know that we are one of His fools who tried our best to love our enemies, forgive those who have hurt us, and seek to serve all our brothers and sisters in Christ. By our scars He will know we have been “His good and faithful servants.”

Enjoy the day!
Deacon Tom 

The Way of the Lord

Jacob Wrestles with the Angel

Deacon Tom writes ©

"The Way of the Lord"

Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Hello everyone. I am writing from Harrisonburg, VA where Rachel and I are having a wonderful time visiting our son and daughter-in-law and our three grandsons. As I promised many of you, here is a brief reflection on this Sunday’s readings.

We don’t have to be scripture scholars to realize one of the predominant topics for our Sunday readings is how often we turn our backs on God and do things “our way.” The reason for this is that we have failed to overcome our primary enemy… not the devil, but his closest ally…ourselves…“We have met the enemy, and he is us” as Pogo put it so aptly.

Isn’t it strange that we have to overcome ourselves in order to find our way back to God? … that we have to “die to self” as Jesus taught His disciples? In a small book entitled “My Daily Bread", Jesuit Fr. Anthony Paone names some of the challenges we face by contrasting what it is that pulls us away from God… our very nature, and what draws us closer to Him…grace. Here are some of those differences:

• Nature is selfish;  we have three concerns in life – me, myself and I. We are focused inward and that is a difficult condition to overcome. Grace, on the other hand, causes us to look outside our narrow self-interest and enables us to be concerned about others and seek to do God’s will, even when doing so will be an inconvenience or cause us to make sacrifices we wouldn't otherwise consider making.

• Nature hates all restraint… “anything goes” is the order of the day…a “Don’t tell me what to do!” attitude. Grace seeks self-control, self-conquest, obedience. Grace seeks to please God in all that we do.

• Nature loves honor and respect as a symbol of our importance and status. We desire these things for one important reason: to satisfy our insatiable egos. Grace accepts honor and respect but only to offer them to God, who, as St. Paul says is the one, “ from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be glory forever.”

May we increase in grace so that our true nature as God’s children may shine in our lives and the lives of our loved ones.

Enjoy the day!
Deacon Tom

“What Would Jesus Do?”

                                       Deacon Tom writes ©

                                            "What Would Jesus Do?"

Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

“Observe what is right, do what is just.” Sounds sooooo simple, doesn’t it? But somehow, as we go about our daily affairs, there are times when knowing the “right” thing to do, or knowing the “just” thing to do is not easy. Some people use the acronym “WWJD” to guide them in making a tough decision. You may have seen their formula for success written on a bumper sticker or two as you drove along the highway. Yes, when we have a difficult decision to make, it is wise, even critical perhaps, to ask ourselves this question, “What Would Jesus Do?”

Jesus is always teaching the disciples how to live and act in ways that are pleasing to God. Today we encounter Jesus teaching us about breaking down barriers that separate and divide us from one another, barriers that stand in the way of our becoming one with each other as we are called to do at each Eucharistic Banquet.  

In today’s gospel Jesus and the disciples encounter a woman whose daughter was tormented by a demon. The disciples can’t be bothered with her and they advise Jesus to “Send her away.” Pretty harsh response from the Apostles, isn’t it? But what else could they possibly do with her?  Isn’t that how we deal with the difficult people in our lives; those individuals who we wish would just “go away;” those people who are always making demands on us or “who keep calling out to us” for something?

Fortunately, Jesus has a better grasp on what’s the right thing to do. He listens to the Canaanite woman and sees what strong faith she has. He is moved by her faith and He grants her favor. Her faith was all that Jesus needed to work a miracle in her life.  The very presence of Jesus in this woman’s life, even for this brief moment, was life altering for her and for her daughter who was healed.

Jesus told us that we would be able to do greater deeds than He did if we but have a little faith. It shouldn’t surprise us then what remarkable power our presence has in the life of others. This is because God abides in each and every one of us. We have His power to reconcile ourselves with one another; the power to cast away loneliness and fear, the power to bring the presence of Christ everywhere we go, even to those who “keep calling out to us” and who refuse to “go away.” We have the power to do any of the things Jesus asks us to do. All we need to get started is to ask ourselves in any given situation, “What Would Jesus Do?”

Enjoy the day!

Deacon Tom