ON NOT BEING SATISFIED WITH MAINTAINING

Two of us were exposed to COVID and were subsequently tested.  My friends tested negative.  It was a cause of great rejoicing for him!  He was not infected nor infectious!  It was like Lazarus risen from the grave.  Perhaps too much so.  After all, Lazarus would still have to face life with all its bumps and scratches and once more struggle with death.  Similarly, because of a negative diagnosis, there was still the mandate to quarantine, and after, there remained the possibility of contracting COVID and facing quarantine again. 

Bearing in mind all analogies limp, then there is my positive report.  I too went into a “tomb” of sorts but I will not walk out like Lazarus back from the dead, but more like the resurrection.  No longer will I have to worry (for 12 weeks supposedly) about contracting illness or passing illness along to others (at least COVID.)  No longer will there be a fear of going back into isolation.  It will be a great freeing.  A new life with a new freedom.

All of this had me thinking about heaven.  If I found the fountain of youth, I don’t think I would want to try it.  I am enjoying this life even with its hardships, but I only want to do it once.  No matter how rich you are, how powerful, how independent you will not escape such things as COVID in this life.  If you could live forever, the government upon which you rely will not remain the same.  The grand buildings that were built may not last.  There will still be forest fires, temptations, sickness and death, bad movies, mean people and tofu burgers.  

With a fountain of youth one has reanimation which is a renewal of one’s body.  Resurrection is a renewal of the whole of creation.  It is new wine in a new wine skin.  Ultimately it is the only fitting container.  It is that for which we were created and toward which Christ came to steer us and in which He desired to form us.  We were created for this and should want nothing less.  We are given an appetite for heaven that mere extending of life will eventually fail to satisfy.

MADE YA LOOK YA DIRTY CROOK, STOLE YOUR MOTHER'S POCKETBOOK

It doesn’t matter if you are on the stage or in the sanctuary, or subject in a painting, it matters where your eyes are focused.  In a painting it matters because your eyes direct the viewer.  For an easy example, think of every painting you’ve ever seen of the manger at Christmas.  Look at anybody’s eyes and their stare will lead you back to the baby Jesus.  Often even the ox and ass (rarely the sheep) are staring, mysteriously mesmerized by Him as if he had snacks hidden in his swaddling clothes.  Their stare constantly draws your eyes back to Him also.

There is a painting in my dentist’s office (shown below) that shows about 5 people looking off into the distance at something out of the range of the painting.  The viewer is left wondering, “What are they looking at?  Of what am I being left out?  Who are these people?  What is the NAME of this painting so that it may give me a clue?  Are they waiting for fireworks?  Is it the sunset?  Are there buffalo out on the range?  

As it turns out this painting is called, “People Out in the Sun” by Edward Hopper (1960) and these awkward looking people are actually manikins placed within the field of a nuclear bomb test to see how it would effect humans.  Suddenly this is a very interesting if not disturbing painting.

But I digress.

If you are on stage (and you are a good actor that doesn’t want to steal focus), your eyes are GLUED to what is going happening on stage so that if an audience member looks at you, their eyes are directed back to the action (unless the action is particularly bad and you are particularly interesting looking.)  If you are looking elsewhere, people will look to see at what you are looking.  If an altar server is looking into the sacristy and smiling instead of paying attention to the consecration, people who inadvertently look at the server will start to wonder what he is looking at instead of being present at the Mass.

If you are a community leader and someone else is speaking before a crowd, you look at the person speaking and are not gossiping with your neighbor.  Because of who you are, people will take their cue from you.  (Not important to him, maybe it shouldn’t be so important to me.)

So it is with life.  Our eyes must be firmly set on Jesus and eternal life.  When we focus too much on the things of the world, especially if we are leaders, bosses, parents, elders, popular figures, then we tempt others to forget about keeping their attention on that which is true, eternal, and most important and are distracted by trying to find out what is so fascinating about things that will pass.

OH HECK

How could an all merciful God condemn somebody to hell?

 

I’ve been having this discussion with people for a long time.  Many are convinced that, at best, hell is a temporary place.  “My God wouldn’t send anybody there permanently,” being their argument.

 

Here is another way to approach the idea:

 

We spend this lifetime conditioning our minds, bodies, and souls.  We don’t magically become something different in the next life.  We won’t become angels and dogs won’t become humans.  We will be who we are.  According to St. John Paul’s Theology of the Body we will even retain (when glorified body and soul are reunited) some identity as to our sex.  (Always a hot topic during my seminary years.)  If all that remains, if a person hated (or would not at least accept) the laws and ways of God on earth (unless some sort of invincible ignorance played a role), that won’t magically change either after a lifetime of conditioning.  And since in the next life we are not prone to illusion or delusion (meaning we will see all clearly) we won’t “change our minds” over time.  (Purgatory is another topic.)

 

So remember this: the most used image for the way Christ relates to His Church is bride and groom.  Christ is the Bridegroom, the Church is the bride.  To be united to Him reveals the nuptial meaning of our bodies.  The union is intimate and total. 

 

Using an earthly example, let’s suppose someone proposed to your who everyone, just EVERYONE said is THE perfect person; rich, good looking, powerful, loving, attentive, generous, admired and respected, healthy, supportive – just go on and on and end with, "and smells good."  The only glitch in the whole thing is that you can’t stand this person.  You like messy, you don’t want to be supported but challenged, you like Valuetime Cheesecurls for dinner, and you smell bad and like other people who also smell bad.  As perfect as the other person may be, you will be miserable being married to that person for 50 years.

 

Now imagine that the union is permanent and eternal; someone who does not love God and is forced to be in an intimate union with Him for all of eternity.  That would be horrific for that person.  So God creates a place for these persons to be.  We call it hell.  We know how awesome God is and all He has to offer and would consider it a catastrophic loss.  But if you don’t want what is being offered, you can't see it as a loss and in fact would be tormented by it and so it a mercy that God allows you to be someplace “else.”  In this way He condemns no one, we choose and tell Him where we want to be.

 

Is hell then a great place for these souls?  No.  Like a person in this life who you cannot help, the person who returns to abuse or the person who returns to drunkenness, it is what they know and to some extent “choose.”  To someone who has chosen heaven 

, it seems a life of hell, wailing and gnashing of teeth.

TO ONE THING CONSTANT NEVER

“Sigh no more ladies, sigh nor more,” said Shakespeare concerning men, “One foot on sea, the other shore.” The poem seems to be lamenting the fact. But as Christians, particularly Catholic Christians, that is exactly where we are supposed to be – or rather, one foot on earth, one in heaven.

“In how many experiences have you missed a lesson from God,” asks Saint Escriva, “have you missed out on because you failed to spiritualize them?” “Man is a natural scientist, but a reluctant poet” penned another writer. This world and what happens in it gives us vision and understandings beyond the physical. Indeed for the Christian, reality is a much bigger universe with many more possibilities. It is far greater because there is more than just what we see, measure, weigh, feel, and smell.

But neither re we lost in the spiritual world. This world has much to teach us. This world is also good and has much to teach us about how to live in it. That is why priests have been and often are scientists and why “the Church” is credited with much of the scientific discoveries in this world.

Having a foot in both worlds creates the fullness of creation and all that it can give us. As a silly example, Sebastian and I went for a walk in the MetroParks today. We saw science at work. Man made paths wound their way through the woods. By paying attention to nature somebody knew how erosion works and walls of the river were shorn up, logs placed to keep dirt from being slowly stolen away from running water during rain storms, ditches were dug to control the path of water and so forth. Science kept a usable path in place.

But super naturalizing the walk gave a broader a view to a larger universe also. There were abandoned paths that were slowly turning back into wildness. Old timber steps that were rotting away and looking more and more like a fallen and long dead tree. It reminds us that this is not our home that the earth, as wonderful as it is, could shake us off like Sebastian shaking off the rain on his back. Earth is just slightly hostile toward us like a mother eagle shoving its young out of the nest telling them that it is time that they start flying. This was home, but they belong somewhere else. So do we. In heaven. So that if our mark does not remain forever, that is Okay. This is not home anyway but a place we stopped by. And our graffiti will last until it is painted over, but home will be forever and ever comforting to us.

THE RICHEST MAN IN THE WORLD

How many little party favors and trinkets do you collect especially around the holidays? They may even be nice but the thought might spring to mind, “Where am I going to put this?”

It was not too long ago that I had this thought. The party favor was not all that bad, but as priests we have rather limited quarters and it was going to be one more thing for which I would need to find a spot. Besides, there was a much nicer one in a box in the trunk room that would be brought out for Christmas.

For some reason it was at that moment that I was yanked back into my childhood and saw the favor with young eyes. As I ran my fingers over it I thought how much I would love having one of these as my very own, not having anything like it. As tawdry as I may think it now, it would have been incredibly special to me at one time. I thought of all those with next to nothing for whom this would be quite a treasure, deeply appreciated and cared for over the years, this thing that I at first thought to throw out.

A vision of all the things that I own then came to mind along with the realization that there are many people who would look at these objects as cheap and worthy only of the trash can. Then a vision occurred in which the best of the best were mine, the finest living space, the best cars, clothes, you name it. But in the end it would be the wrong stuff. In fact, it would only be more stuff. None of it would be missed on the journey to heaven (if one indeed were going to heaven.) The finest the world has to offer will be dust and ashes, something to brush off of yourself as you reach for the only thing of value, the only food in the universe, the only thing worth having.

Which in the end made my trinket both the most valuable object in the world (for you are the richest person if you are satisfied with what you have) and absolutely worthless (if your heart is set on heaven.)