ONLY 39 MORE DAYS TO GO! YOU CAN DO IT!

There is not a lot of accountability in lent.  If you did not fast yesterday, chances are there was nobody around who had power to discipline you.  If you ate meat there wouldn't be a cut in your pay. If you are not giving up something for Lent (of doing something extra) you won't get a ticket.  If you are not diving into prayer and almsgiving, you won't receive a warning notice from the city.  Lent is entirely voluntary and you will get out of it exactly as much as you put in to it.

How awesome it is that we are encouraged in our self disciplines rather than under the watchful eye of a Big Brother.  It means that whatever we undertake, it is not a matter of outside forces guiding our actions from which we look forward to escaping the moment the pressure is released.  It is, rather, something that comes from within, forming habits and character, not just compliance.

May your Lenten practices steep you in Truth, bathe you in Goodness and set you aglow in Beauty for the rest of you life.

WHAT'S A NICE GOD LIKE YOU DOING IN A WORLD LIKE THIS?

Having a relationship with God is much like having a relationship with any person.  God is, after all, a person.  Granted, He is a Divine Person, but He is someone with Whom to be in a relationship just the same.  

All relationships develop.  Even as an infant, to a certain extent, one must learn who Dad is.  This happens by spending time together talking, playing, eating, learning what each likes - the gamut of what it is to be in a close relationship with another person.

How does one apply this to God?  It is no secret.  You spend time together, we are invited into each other’s activities, we learn about Him, talk with Him, do the things that He likes to do, etc.  In other words, don’t treat Him as though He were merely a force, an emergency dispatch Person, some distant being or only an historical figure.  He is alive and active all around you, calling you at every moment, desirous of you, shouting out for you, wanting to walk with you and be consciously with you.

BUT - if you don’t know how to do this - even if you pray every day - how do you get started?  Get started like you would with anybody that you want to get to know but can’t quite figure out how to fit into each other’s lives yet.  Start by holy flirting.  Whenever or wherever you come across Him, smile and send a hello - like a quick text.  If you are in a deadly meeting and God comes to mind, don’t think, “Gee, I’ll have to pray later,” send him a text prayer immediately.  “Hello God.  Me here.  Bored.  Thinking of you.”

Make a surprise visit to His house.  Pop in for just a moment.  “Hey God.  It’s me!  I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d pop in and say hi.”

Open yourself up to a message from Him.  Make yourself available.  “Okay God, what do you want me to learn, understand or do today?  Who do you want me to meet?  Send me someone to do something for today.”

Spy on God.  Read a little of His history (Scripture.)  I bet His mom would just love for you to read about her Son since they didn’t have photo albums back them.  When you start, it doesn’t have to be an hour sloshing through the genealogy.  Take 5 minutes and pick a verse.

Also get to know His friends and find out more about Him through them.  The saints have all kinds and various insights into Him.

All relationships are two way streets.  It won’t be all God.  He respects you too much.  He is like the Good Neighbor Who sends cookies over to your house and sits out on His front porch and calls out, “Hello!” and invites you over dinner.  “Come on over!  I’d love to have you for dinner anytime!  There is always a place at the table for you whenever.”  We just have to stop a frantic life, walk up to the railing of the porch and choose to set the date.  

IF GOD WOULD ONLY LISTEN

It is not unusual for someone to be mad at God because it appears as though He is not answering their prayers.  Usually this means that God is not following our directions properly.  “If He loved me, He would do as I request because - well - it’s really what I want.”

And it is interesting to ponder if God thinks the same thing.  “I’ve told them exactly what I want.  Why don’t they listen?”  But the difference is that God doesn’t get mad and He will be there tomorrow listening just as intently as He did the day before and hoping we will listen just as attentively.  

IF GOD HAD NOT BEEN ON OUR SIDE

“‘If God had not been on our side.’  This is Israel’s song.”  (Psalm 124)

This little ditty from the Psalms is a great example of why it is so important to contemplate, reflect and meditate.  Often when all we look at is where we are going, we only see the challenges ahead.  (Pharaoh wont let us go, the Red Sea is in the way, we are running our of food . . .)  But in reflecting back they can see how God has been with them every step of the way, through miracles, releasing them from their slavery, parting the Red Sea and removing the Roman soldiers as a threat, gaving them manna in the desert.

Parish life can be like this too.  We can get caught up in all of the work that needs to be done, all of the challenges ahead, all of the programs that the diocese wants implemented and it can be overwhelming.  But as pastor of this parish, I can look back over the past ten years and realize that we have been seen through everything that set us back on our heals when they first appeared.

You can see this with older and wiser priests.  Fewer and fewer things ruffle their feathers. Something comes down the pike - something new that must be implemented immediately or else the end of the world will happen, and priests and parish staffs and volunteers start going wild like chickens who have a wolf knocking at the door of their straw houses.  But the older priests take it in stride.  Most things will pass.  Many will be replaced by the latest and greatest before the old is even fully implemented.  All that it takes is a new person in political office or a change in Church administration.  So the older pastors roll with it not getting too excited following gate advice of  Alexander Pope, “Be not the first by whom the new are tried, nor yet the last to lay the old aside.”  This can only come by experience and by reflecting/mediating on that experience.

The spiritual life is the same.  The one who doesn’t meditate sees each new trial as the end of the world and wonders why God has abandoned them.  The one who sees God acting in his past knows God will see you through one way or the other - even if that is saving you at death and bringing you into heaven.

In opening the new Catholic school in Akron we hit a lot of walls and often thought the project was over.  Feeing sad at that but entrusting it to St. Sebastian or St. Julie, we would go our way wondering what would happen next.  Every time, seemingly impossible obstacles were removed and we could only attribute that to God and the intercession of our saints.  “If they had not been on our side,”  This is our song - and our encouragement to face the future.

GUARDS AND METAL DECTECTORS VS PRIESTS AND CONFESSIONALS

“Outrage is an appropriate response to the carnage in Parkland, but it’s not an answer.”  This was written by Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune as reprinted in the Akron Beacon Journal on February 18th.  “Those demanding dramatic action accuse those who disagree of enabling murder.  But it’s no sin to reject false remedies.”  

The “cure” for which so many people are looking is various forms of gun control.  Unfortunately, at least according to this article which sited various studies including “a 2013 study of the 1994 law for the National Institute of Justice” which said, “We cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation’s recent drop in gun violence” and that any such ban, “is likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement.”

But we want this so badly because it seems like an obvious and effective action item.  It seems to make sense.  We can all rally behind this and DO SOMETHING that will help rid us of these atrocious situations and sooner rather than later.

One thing we are sure we CANNOT do is hold a prayer service in the school for the various “good” reasons that such things are banned (although crosses and candles did make an appearance but I am sure that will be overlooked.)  If there is one thing that might bring comfort at all to a horrific situation like this is the idea that these kids have souls that are taken care of, that they live onion some way, and that there is hope.  But instead the will receive metal detectors, guards, safe spaces, counseling, assemblies on how to spot potential threats among their peers, and have active shooter drills.

This will possibly keep them alive longer.  But it is not the one thing that will give them hope forever; the one thing that gives them hope even in the very teeth of death.  It is the knowledge that there is hope even in death.  It is this hope that give a person the power to be stronger than their fears.  Bravery gives way to courage.  Courage allows us to crawl out from behind our walls and out of our safe spaces and reach out in charity.  And charity alone will bring about the healing we need to bring about the long term, peaceful solutions we need to foster sanity in our culture.  Granted, it may only bring healing to the individual at first.  Then maybe to those around him.  If they are lucky, they will bring healing to their small community. It may take most of their lives to accomplish this but better to take a long time than waste our time doing things that only work marginally at best.  And kept up, it could eventually change the very culture in which we live, which historically we see can happen.

Have you ever noticed that none of these shootings take place at a Catholic school?  There has been one Catholic school campus shooting since at least the 1920s and that was in 1979 when a 21 year old man shot and wounded 4 people at Gonzaga University.  That is not to say that it could not happen.  Every pastor who has a school prays daily that this will not happen at his school.  But even if there 20 in the next month, it would not remotely come close to the number of schools that have had them.  

There are a lot of factors to give reason for this, but not the least of which is we are allowed to say from a Divine standpoint that killing is wrong, bullying is wrong, shutting out the world is wrong, not caring for others is wrong, and not forgiving and being forgiven is wrong.

A guard and a metal detector or a priest and confessional box?  If you had to take a wild guess, which of these would you say might bring about a longer lasting, more positive change to our nation’s problems?a

ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE PRAYERS

“Say this powerful prayer and God will grant you a wish.”

I hate those pieces of paper that end up in church pews.  When I find them I throw them away.  God is not a machine.  As though if you find the right nickel to stick in, the machine will do whatever it is that you task it.  Like you parents, no matter how much you might beg for a horse and no matter how perfectly behaved you are, there is no guarantee that you will receive one.  This mentality is one inch away from the prosperity Gospel.

That being said, I have had some prayers that have constantly surprised me.  I’ve told you before about praying to my guardian angel and being astonished.  Here is one more that I am shy about sharing (for some inexplicable reason) but that, more often than not, seems to be something near and dear to my Father’s heart and appears to bring about some blessings.

So say that there is some person with whom you are having difficulties.  And assume that you want those difficulties healed in some fashion.  (You don’t necessarily get to pick the “how” of it, just the “that”.)  While praying for the other person and for yourself is always helpful, there is one more prayer that I use.  It does not exactly entail praying for the other person or for yourself, but by engaging the imagination, picturing the relationship between you.  For me, it changes from person to person, but a particularly, shall we say, “failing” relationship I might picture as a withering vine between us; fading leaves, withering branches, limp and lying on the ground.  The point is, there is not much of a connection, not much love, not much life getting through.  So I lift that image - that relationship up to God and ask Him to bring some healing - to do something (it’s always His call) and thank Him.

A great number of times I walk away from an encounter with the other person and find myself thinking, “Well that went strangely well.”  And then I remember that I had prayed that odd little prayer and give credit to God for doing . . . something.  And I’m never quite sure exactly what it was.  But I am grateful.  

A PIOUS REFLECTION ON THE LIFE OF ST. SEBASTIAN

Although today is the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul (happy feast day St. Paulers in South Akron) here is presented a pious reflection on the life of St. Sebastian (January 20th) which was presented as a homily for our feast day this year.

A soldier lays on his bed; a cot perhaps really.  And though he put in a full, difficult day, he is wide awake.  He cannot fall asleep.  His military brain is on alert. It isn’t that he has a troubled conscience.  In fact, his conscience is quite at peace.  Just because something is legal or illegal does not mean that it is moral or immoral.  He is a soldier and he is supposed to obey.  But what about when obedience goes against truth, love, and even God?  So he chose to be as loyal as possible without compromising his ideals, his morals, or his heart.  It was not a rash decision.  Is was born of years of contemplation and reflection.  And even though years later he would be depicted as a young man in his prime, in actuality, though soldier tough, he was an older, wiser man with a heavy white beard.  And so he spent much time considering the consequences of this very day.

Finally came the noise for which he was waiting.  The sound of men coming down the corridor attempting stealth.  But he could hear them.  He was a soldier after all.  And he knew that someone had betrayed him and that it was only a matter of time.  So he gets up and sits on the edge of his bed, already in full uniform save for his weapons to show that he was both ready and that he possed no threat.  He was prepared for this night.

The door didn’t explode open as if they guards were coming to capture an enemy.  He was, after all, the head of the Praetorian Guard, charged to protect the emperor, which he did to the best of his ability.  He was their leader, their father figure, and friend.  No, the door slowly opens, almost politely, and there were his men with conflicted looks on their faces.  Only one word is spoken.

“Sebastian.”

He stands and joins them and they walk down the corridor.  It has begun.

There was no man handling.  No binding.  These strong, proud men shuffle their feet and avoid making eye contact.  No words are spoken.

It is an ugly scene before Dioclesian the Emperor.  Right now it doesn’t matter if he is right or wrong, moral or immoral, if he is good or if he is evil.  What matters now is that he has the power to enforce his will and a soldier is condemned to death.

It is kind of a grotesquely gruesome death.  Not the arrows that will come, but the friends, the comrades, the fellow men-at-arms who suddenly find themselves on the opposite side of the law.  Friends must lead their friend, their authority and father figure, the person they respect to death.

Their own hands must strip the dignity of his uniform from his body, bind him to a stake and stand off at a distance and pull back arrows on the string in the direction of this great man.  Everything is said with their eyes.

“Why did you make us do this Sebastian?  We are soldiers.  This is our duty.  We follow the emperor even when we don’t like it.”

But Sebastian’s eyes convey their own message.  “You have to understand.  I am Christian.  I have a duty to the One Who so loved me.  This is what it is to love; to be able to sacrifice everything for the one that you love even when the consequences are not what you want them to be.”

Now, his friends are expert archers and the also know the human body well and they know where to pierce the body so as to not cause death.  The first flurry of arrows whisper through the air and puncture Sebastian's body causing him to buckle in pain and fall to his knees.  But he looks up and some mysterious glow shines on his face and he now knows how much he loves God and so fills with hope and begins to rise.

You can imagine the soldiers thinking “Just stay down Sebastian.”  But he doesn’t and they are forced to let go another volley of arrows that devastate his body and Sebastian collapses to the ground and they leave him to his death.

They must go on.  But someone else comes by; a woman by the name of Irene and her companions.  She has come to take Sebastian’s body to prepare it for burial.  But there is something odd here.  As she moves the body the wounds well with blood and bleed.  He is not dead!  He is alive!  

So she has him brought to her home where she cleans and tends to his wounds, bandages him, giving his nourishment, and when he is feeling a little better they begin to talk about his adventures in helping Christians.  

But one day the conversation becomes a little more serious.  Sebastian begins to speak about how important it is for all Christians to risk even their own lives for the faith.  "If we do not this, thing swill ever get better."  

“But seriously Sebastian, and don’t take this the wrong way, but how can we realistically accomplish by this?  Even being identified as Christian can lead to our death.  Look what happened to Marcillious, and Markus - look what happened to you Sebastian.  We all risked everything just tending to you.  A lot of good our mission will be if we are all dead, or jailed, or even just ridiculed.

“And of course it is easy for you to rest on your laurels and say, ‘all of you should go out and fight for the faith.’  The risk is over for you.”

That stung like another arrow.  

Once again, on a night after his body sufficiently healed, the soldier lay awake again on his bed.  And this time he was wrestling with his conscience.  He thought to himself, “If you perform a great enough act to show the person you love that you indeed love him, are you then off the hook?  When a mother goes through such great pain giving birth to her child, does that mean she doesn’t have to sacrifice anymore for her child to prove er love?  If a man gives up everything to marry the woman he loves, does that mean he mean he never need sacrifice for her again?  And if we love God and we perform one great act of love for Him, does that mean we need never risk again for the rest of our lives?  Can we even call it love if that is our mentality?”

So once again, Sebastian sits up on his bed, stands, and sets out to go before Dioclesian.  He comes across him on a set of stairs somewhere out on the Apian Way outside the walls of Rome and gives a prophet’s warning to the Emperor.  “You are mistreating God’s people and breaking his holy law!  Hear this from Sebastian who you tried to put to death!  God spared me and sent me to you to give you fair warning.  Repent of your ways and turn to the Lord and save you soul!”

Dioclesian is petrified.  Is this a ghost come to haunt him?  His bowels turn to jelly and his heart races.  But soon he recovers when he realizes this is Sebastian in the flesh.  Somehow he had survived his execution.  Pulling his wits together he orders his guards to bludgeon Sebastian to death and this time in his presence so that he can be sure that he is finally dead.  He orders the body to be thrown in the gutter and left like so much rubbish.  Then the procession continues.  The fury blows on like a storm passing through after it has done its damage.

The noble heart that loved so much, that was willing to risk everything for God and for his brothers and sisters to prove his love is thoughtlessly left by the side of the road.  A gift rejected.

Dioclesian wins.

Or did he?

The rule of Dioclesian is long over.

Rarely is his name spoken other than in reference to St. Sebastian.

There are no buildings named after him.

Nobody tries to imitate his life.

His name is not on our lips in supplication.

He is not remembered fondly.

He is nor respected for his nobility, his leadership, his love.

And one wonders where he is spending all of eternity.

He is a shadow in the brilliance of our patron, St. Sebastian who has a privileged place in heaven and who like to interceded for us.  

Lord, fill us with that spirit of courage 

which gave your martyr Sebastian 

strength to offer his life in faithful witness. 

Help us to learn from him to cherish Your law 

and to obey you rather than men. 

We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, 

who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, 

one God, for ever and ever.

Amen.

WOE IS I, LORD

What do you do with that pesky sin you can’t seem to shake?  Go to confession.  Pray about it like St. Paul prayed to have the thorn removed from his side.  Maybe even the thought came that this is something with which you may have to learn to live.

Or maybe someone else needs prayer.  Maybe the only help they will receive is from you.  You know their sin, you know what a struggle it is, you know the traps, the triggers, the aftermath, the helplessness.  Who better to pray for them than one who suffers similarly?  Instead of turning inward with an attitude of “woe is I,” a prayer might be offered in earnest, “Lord, you know I understand how this person struggles.  Deliver them please.  Set them free.  Give the courage, strength, and fortitude that they need to be a better version of themselves for you.”

The problem with sin is that it is a radical turning inward; what I want, what I need.  Prayer can turn into the same thing.  Some of the prayer is great.  But if prayer becomes so focussed on the self; my pain, my regret, my cry for mercy, my wanting help to get over this desire; then it does not fully embrace the cure which is to turn outside of oneself, to radically turn outward in love, devotion, attention, and assistance.   

We are a Church of sinners.  But do we also want to be a Church of people turned in on themselves and concerned about their own problems?  Or would we rather be a Church that as a community tries to help each other dig ourselves out of our sins?  

Today I am sending out a prayer for assistance and mercy for all those who struggle with the same sins with which I struggle.  I love you.  More importantly, God loves you.  May you receive what you need today to carry on the good fight.

FEAR OF PRAYER

One of THE most intimate things two people can do with each other, even over and above anything physical that they might do, is to pray together.  During wedding prep I have had couples who were well versed in all of the things that should be put off until after their wedding day and are not the least bit shy about it, but ask them to pray together - alone - and more than just gra

ce or a Hail Mary (though I would be excited about that too) and many of them freak out - and I don’t use that phrase lightly.

Often, with these couples that I prompt to go home and try a prayer night, what I hear, when they report back, is, “It was so difficult!  Prayer is such a personal thing!”  These are with people who are about to become ONE and have done just about everything two people can do with each other (often including the man asking his partner to put poison in her body so that it cannot fulfill its mission to procreate) yet prayer is a wall that is almost too high for some to climb.

Why might this be?  In prayer you are exposing yourself at an incredible depth to another person - especially if at least some of the prayer is free flowing.  “What should we lift up to the Lord?”  Generally, in this type of open prayer, what we are bringing forth are the things that scare us, the future that we hope for, what we want on the deepest level and what we want to avoid, our vision is expressed, we expose the depth of our love, the strength of our faith, and perhaps what we assume about the other with whom we are one.  And all of this we invite the other to petition God with us that it might be realized or faced.  That means that we need to be on the same page.

Being a Catholic Christian is not something we tack on to who we are like “scrapbooker” or “Indians fan.”  These you can even despise and still love the other wholly - maybe even more so.  But being Christian is essential to us like being male or female.  If you cannot share or appreciate this, there is some serious discernment that needs to take place.

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: HURRY UP AND WAIT

GIRM paragraph 89

I detest announcements at Mass.  Well, that’s not true.  When there is need of an announcement where and when else is everybody gathered (hopefully) so that you can tell them about something important for the community? 

But the problem is, “How do you regulate announcements so that A) they do not drone on with too much information and B) that there is proper vetting system in place so that there are not 2,000 of them?”  We have announcements at the end of Mass just before the final blessing.  Just when you think things are about to wrap up and your are grabbing your music book as well as your hat making ready to escape our horrible parking lot, someone says, “We have just a few announcements.”  I see the air go out of people’s lungs and shoulders slump.  If there are a number of them, then you can SEE attention starting to drift off toward the ceiling.  Announcements should be like javelin tosses.  You throw one, and it is quick and a doozy.  After that, people shut down and anything said will be as well heard as a long lecture of the benefits of flossing sitting outside on a hot afternoon having already had a bottle of wine.

But that has ALMOST nothing to do with today’s post.

It seemed very common that, in many places, the announcements (or talks, or funding requests, or invitations to events) took place BEFORE the prayer after communion simply because it was a quiet moment and those who were going to be late for Mass are there and those who are going to try to sneak out early haven’t left yet.  

The problem with this is that THE COMMUNION RITE IS NOT YET OVER.  The prayer after communion is not called the prayer after communion simply because it is some random prayer that just happens to be after communion but rather it is “to complete the prayer of the People of God, and also to conclude the whole Communion Rite . . . ”  Thought it may not seems so, adding ANYTHING before this prayer would be a kin to stopping before the Angus Dei and saying, “Before we receive Communion today, I have a couple of announcements.”  

At least one local parish makes their announcements before Mass (missing the late comers.)  Most of us (I think) make it at the end of Mass annoying those who had it in their mind that they were just about to ease on down the road.  BUT VERILY I SAY UNTO THEE that I think this is cool that people are wearied at this pause before concluding the Mass.  I do believe that announcements are a necessary evil but it shows what an intrusion they are, no matter when they are done, to the Mass.  It messes with the flow of prayer and ritual.  It is the fly in the soup; one little spec that seems to taint the giant pot.  It is like the plane that was just about to touch down but which decided to make one more loop before landing.  It is like this post that has now gone on a few sentences too long.

FRIDAY POTPOURRI: A PRAYER FOR EVERYBODY - INCLUDING THEM

Imagine a grand old church like St. Peter in Rome.  Over the altar is the grand round dome while  below the floor plan is square and angular.  This is not just the work of interesting architecture.  It all means something.  Circles that have no beginning or end represent things eternal, represent heaven, represent God.  Things that are squarish represent earthly things, man made things, man.  That these two shapes come together right were the altar sits is making a point.  When we celebrate the Mass, heaven and earth are colliding like that which powers the Starship Enterprise with matter and anti-matter coming together.  (Other versions would be a square nave and an apse for example.)

Particularly for Catholics, this is essential theology.  When we celebrate The Mass, we don’t celebrate one at St. Sebastian at 9:00AM, one at St. Vincent at 11:00, and one at St. Bernard at noon though it appears to us that we do.  There is only One Mass being celebrate around the world and throughout time.  

That is also why when we speak about the Body of Christ, we include the entire Church; militant, penitent, and triumphant.  The Body cannot be cut in twain even by death.  The bride is united and alive in the Bridegroom with Whom she is One causing the whole body to be alive as one, death not being like a severed hand left on the ground - or conversely, that those who have not been born into the next life yet not being a branch on the vine.  So we are always somehow mysteriously connected in Christ.

One of the glorious things about St. Sebastian Parish is that the walls are lined with depiction of saints.  I often think as we are heading into the heart of the Eucharistic prayer of the saints (official and otherwise) showing up and joining those in the pew to offer oblation to our Father.  There may be only a few hundred at Mass, but it is standing room only once everyone shows up from angels to toddlers.  A Catholic church is like one of those mysterious buildings that are much larger on the inside than they are on the outside.

Understanding that things like time and space work differently in the next life, it is easy to imagine the whole of God’s children coming together in concert for the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.  And it makes even more sense that we may all pray for each other; we on earth praying for each other and for the Church Penitent, the Church penitent praying for themselves and for the Church militant, and those in heaven praying for all of us to come to perfections as the Bride of Lamb with them in our heavenly inheritance.  

This all leads us to today’s subparagraph g of paragraph 79 of the GIRM.  Another important aspect of the Mass is the intercessions, and by it, I believe we are not just talking about the general intercessions, but all of the intercessions that take place during the Mass.  They are sprinkled all over the place like pepper from a grinder on your salad at a nice restaurant.  “For all your children scattered throughout the world,” and “For our departed brothers and sisters,” just to name a couple “by which expression is given to the fact that the Eucharistic prayer is celebrated in communion with the whole Church, of both heaven and of earth, and that the oblation is made for her and for all her members, living and dead, who are called to participate in the redemption and salvation purchased by the Body and Blood of Christ.”

IS THIS POST JUST FOR YOU OR IS IT FOR EVERYBODY?

So should you pray in particular or in general?

I am often praying for my parish and then I wonder, why am I only praying for this parish?  Don’t I want all of the parishes around me to be well?  If they are doing better, then we will all do better right?  (Or should I just trust that their pastors are praying for them?)  

But on the one hand, I was made responsible for this particular group of people.  It is my duty to look after them, pray for them, and make sure I do all I can to make their parish strong, vibrant, and healthy.

I know, I know . . .  had to do a LOT of driving to do yesterday and had a lot of time to think.  And this may sound silly - and I’m not worried - I was just wondering.  

So take the case of seminarians.  Do I pray for MY seminarian and the seminarians who are associated with me and the parish?  Why not pray for all of the seminarians at our seminary?  At least tangentially they will all have an effect in my life.  But what about the rest of the nation that is hurting for priests - or the world for that matter?  HA!

BUT THEN . . . what about the personal needs of the seminarians I know?  That kind of gets lost in the soup of prayer for everybody.

So it was that a turn to the Mass was made.  There are times for particular prayers and time for general prayers.  “Let us pray” is not a signal for the Missal to come over.  It is the time that the Church, those anointed priests at their baptism, to offer particular prayers.  

“For Jimmy John and his bookworm infection.”

And then there are the general intercessions for the Church at large.

“For Austria and all nations suffering with bookworm infections.”

It is important to remember the particular and the personal:

“For Debbie’s soul”

And equally so for the general and shared humanity:

“and the souls of all the faithful departed.”