Deacon Dan Wright

Team Hoyt Video

As a special educator, this really spoke to my heart...but as a parent, I'm left speechless.

Hat tip to Catholic and Enjoying It!

Garments of Salvation, Seeds of Faith

The readings for today, the first from Jeremiah, and the gospel from Matthew, stand in contrast to one another. The first offers a warning we must heed; the second lets us know that it only takes a little faith to get going in the right direction.

After I got past the image of the loincloth, since in modern-day societies the loincloth is no longer representative of normative clothing, it was easy to see what was being gotten at. The Jeremiah passage creates the image of a rotted garment. Certainly not good for wearing—for serving the purpose for which it was made. Perhaps a better image for us in our times might be your best tight-fitting pair of blue jeans. Think of what would happen if you buried them for a year and then dug them up to wear.

By analogy, the word of the Lord to Jeremiah compares the wickedness of the people to the rotted garment. They walk in the stubbornness of their hearts, following strange gods. Their actions take place in spite of the closeness of God to them: God had made the people to cling as close to him as garments that cling to the body. Contrariwise the people had become as a rotted garment in terms of their relationship with God.

It is part of the great reconciling and healing message of the Gospel of Christ that we now have access to the kingdom despite the separation that existed between God and humanity. God’s gift of faith makes everything right, which was broken in our original relationship, and it starts out with the mystery of a small amount of faith planted in our hearts. Thank God for the gift of faith!

However, I think it’s reasonable for us to continually take the Jeremiah message as a warning, while continuing to rejoice in the gift of salvation that we hold. We cannot allow anything to rot our relationship. Certainly, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit characterizes a relationship even closer that the clothing that clings to our bodies. Yet if we were to become careless, that relationship would, without any doubt, deteriorate and disappear entirely.

The threat, the danger, is real enough in our times. However, it may be that what stands to hurt our relationship with God is not as clearly identifiable as we might suppose. It may be that there is a danger more subtle than the heterodox teachings and practices that the more popular Catholic blogs decry.

Surely, as in the ancient times, we can become tempted by pride—it's one of the main things that we're warned against. I think of it as the temptation that leads to self-righteousness. It’s the arrogance we find common among people who find the need to assert the orthodoxy of their beliefs and opinions over others at the cost of any relationship or reconciliation. Stubbornness goes along with it. One can become stubborn to the point of spiritual deafness, yet faith comes by hearing.  Our relationship comes by hearing, as all relationships come through a willingness and ability to listen.

Finally, if we’re not careful, there’s the danger of following strange or false gods. It is never so plain and in the open that following false gods simply means making a conscious choice to go with some false doctrine. Even the worst of dissenters doesn’t get trapped that way. Rather, following a false god comes from not knowing the true God. It’s the result of a lost relationship—the rotted garment that was allowed to decay.

It’s easy to spot false gods when you understand that the real God is love. It’s also true that love has to do how we live. If we’re following God, we’re living in a good relationship with the world around us—we’re promoting peace, reconciliation, understanding, healing, and we're standing in solidarity with those among us who have the greatest needs. We can hear the cry of the poor, the outcast, and all who suffer. Another way of saying this is that if we’re living love, we’re following a path that exemplifies love rather than judgment.  We stand ready to share the faith and relationship that bear the sign of reconciliation.

Sowing Seeds

  …and they will walk no longer in their hardhearted wickedness. Jer. 3:17

The words above are prophetic. They describe a time of change, a time of renewal. Moreover, they instruct us to be aware of the enemy that lies within us: the tendency toward hardheartedness, which results from the inclination to sin that remains in us opposed to the Spirit.

Friday is a perfect day for us to reflect on how we might better present our hearts to God in order that they can undergo a more perfect orientation to the Spirit. It can be a part of our Friday penance that we submit our whole being—body, soul, and mind—to the converting power of the Holy Spirit. In doing so, we submit to a will far greater than our own. In doing so we root out every unjust inclination opposed to God.

As I looked at today’s readings, it was really only the one line from Jeremiah that that spoke to me, though I’d like to tie what I have to say to the parable of the sower.

It might seem a little strange that I would notice the hardhearted wickedness line in the passage first thing, except that I believe we live in perilous times and that we need always to be aware of the wiles of the enemy. I recently have seen hardheartedness in places where it shouldn’t be.

I just learned of an upcoming, July 31, ordination of 12 Catholic women. Regarding a similar event in Europe recently, the Archdiocese of Munich reportedly issued the statement that the so-called ordination had nothing to do with the Catholic Church. In my vow of obedience, I can in no way support such events as these mock ordinations. I find it sad that Christians choose to step outside of what it means to be Catholic in order to fulfill their own wishes and desires, and I pray for them—I try to put myself in the place of the women desiring ordination. I attempt to understand, but I cannot agree with them in any fashion.

Furthermore, I understand entirely how this event, and others like it, angers faithful Catholics, both men and women. They feel that something sacrosanct is being completely misunderstood and violated, and I sympathize with their feelings. It was not all that long ago that my parish lost a religious sister who decided to leave the Catholic Church in order to be ordained in an ecclesial body calling itself Catholic. I have also known of fellow deacons that have left in order to be ordained as priests in similar so-called Catholic churches. I find such occasions to be times of great disappointment. They are occasions and times for true pity.

Though certainly one may speak out against actions that go against the teaching of the Church—and even should speak out when we are confronted with a falsehood that presents itself as a truth, suggesting violence is never acceptable. It is not a Christian response. I say this because I found—on a popular Catholic blog—suggestions of violence and male domination in response to the upcoming unsanctioned ordinations. The gist of it was that, the women, who will hold their ordination ceremony on a boat, should be blown out of the water. I’m choosing not to provide a link to that post because I see in it an overwhelming opposition to the true purposes of God’s love.

Having worked closely in the past with the local organization that provides services to women who are victims of family violence, I have learned not to tolerate even suggestions of violence or language that supports violence against women.  It is a true travesty that people are unenlightened regarding the cowardice of perpetrating violence against anyone, but even more against those who may lack the physical ability to offer a defense of themselves.  I am appalled that rather than taking up a true intellectual analysis of the women's ordination, the opponents instead offered macho assertions of overpowering them. I was left in disgust of what I read in the comments.

Violence is the hardhearted wickedness of our times, the true stain on our dignity as human beings, but it is even more a stain than anything else that we might encounter in a world that often presents multiple sorrows. Never mind the insults that I received because I made comments to speak out against the absence of love that promotes a spirit of hatred. What is sad beyond reproach is that Christians—including the children that visit the blog—are being taught that it is acceptable to refer to other human beings in vulgar and ridiculing terms, a violence of language that betrays an astonishingly shallow understanding of how words can be used to further pain and suffering.

As Christian men and women, we are called—even obliged—to offer a defense whenever we encounter so much as the mere suggestion that an acceptable Christian attitude includes violence or hateful and derogatory speech. When we do offer such a retort we can count on being attacked—it’s never easy to stand up for what is right. It’s the harder thing to respond to the insidious evil that masquerades as righteousness. These were the vipers that Jesus had to deal with. True enough, sometimes that which calls itself Christian is not at all what it claims to be. Jesus said know them by their fruits.

Finally, today’s reflection is about sowing seeds. In the parable offered in today’s gospel the sower had good seed. I dare think of the judgment awaiting those who choose to sow bad seed on good ground, but we have the opportunity, thanks to God's great grace, to walk no longer in hardhearted wickedness.

Pastor John Wright on the Violence in Lebanon

John Wright, a Nazarene pastor in San Diego, has an excellent post today on the situation in the Middle East.  He writes:

It was hot here and humid in the middle of the night. It woke me up, and I came down to the internet. I went to Zenit.org/english and saw that Benedict XVIth had a sermon posted from last weeks Ephesians reading. I want to cut and paste it into this post. Benedict here reads the Scriptures profoundly well; John Howard Yoder could not have said this better; it makes Stanley Hauerwas' sermons sound like George Weigel. Here is the Bishop of Rome stating clearly that the way of Jesus Christ, the way of God's response to the violence of the world is the church, called together in the Eucharist, as a oasis of peace scattered through direct action in works of love throughout the world. Our response is God's call for evangelism, to call people to the God who is Love as seen in Jesus Christ to faith in this very particular Jesus. The Pope even uses the n-word in his sermon -- nonviolence as the means by which God conquers the violence of the world.

This is an incredibly profound sermon, remarkable, moving. Benedict chose his name to promote peace in the world. He recognizes that this peace, Christian peace, can only emerge in a commitment in faith to Jesus Christ and therefore, the God of Love who has defeated death, not with retaliatory death, but through non-violent love.

READ HIS POST HERE

Remembering the Devotion of our Youth

I remember the devotion of your youth,
how you loved me as a bride,
Following me in the desert,
in a land unsown.  Jer. 2:2

The Lord remembers the devotion of our youth… As I read the passage from Jeremiah in today’s readings I thought of my own devotion in my youth. It is always good to try to recapture youthful exuberance in our devotion and praise, although we have to realize that we change with time. So it isn’t that we recapture the same experience, but that we recapture the spirit of it.

Certainly, the devotion—the intensity of emotion—that I experienced as a teenage Pentecostal wouldn’t work for me today. This would be true even if I had never converted: even if today I were sitting here writing as a middle-aged Pentecostal. The Lord guides us to be ourselves in our expression of the faith and love that we have.

Nevertheless, I think we really ought to try always to recapture those moments in our lives when we remember being closest to God. It may be that our zeal and intensity serves better in our maturity as a dedication to the tasks that require maturity. It’s all about how our faith grows and changes as we grow older—yes faith matures, it changes as we change.

The zeal of a young person’s experience might be applied to the way that we serve our families, our spouses and children. It might be applied to our dedication to fasting, alms, and prayer. We might find zeal in living out the call to poverty, chastity, and obedience in a religious community or even in our daily lives as laity or diocesan clergy.

I was impressed with a video clip I found, which features a young religious sister receiving her vows. I was also impressed with the works I see featured on the sisters’ website. I thought how the style of worship featured in the clip might be hard to accept by the more traditional among us. Still, I try to make it a habit not to be judgmental. I see something authentic in the sisters’ devotion. As faith matures, the way we express it matures too.

Above all, I believe that it is important to seek the devotion of our youth when it comes to living a life pleasing to God—a life that considers the need for penance and spiritual formation—by seeking always to effect inner conversion.

As we grow older our experience of faith will surely change. Our interests will be different and how we express our love for God will change. However, it is up to us to keep it fresh. So long as we are genuine in our devotion we will continue to please God. God desires authenticity.

Passing the Faith to the Next Generation

I wasn’t quite sure what I would say today on the Memorial of Saints Joachim and Anne. In all honestly, I don’t know that I have ever reflected deeply on the significance of the grandparents of Jesus, but I thought of my own grandparents and how faith in God is passed from one generation to the next.

Last night, as I looked at the readings for today the parable of the Sower and the Seed stood out. Although typically we look at the parable in terms of how faith takes root in our lives individually, I thought how it is often the case that it is we who are the sowers: we sow the seed of faith in the lives of those whom we meet each day—principally we share our faith with our families, with our spouses and children, and perhaps with our grandchildren. If we are single, we also sow the seed in our dealings our friends, relatives, and all others.  It's good always to be mindful of what we are sharing through what we say and do in every situation.

As I think back on my own life it is easy to see the significance of the individuals who planted the seeds of faith when I was very young. While I was nurtured to adulthood by my great aunt and great uncle, for me they were always Mom and Dad. Mom had a special way of sharing her faith with me. I remember her regular time for reading the Bible and her encouraging me to do the same. I still have the King James Version Bible she bought me for my eighth birthday—by the time I was 18 I had read it entirely.

Perhaps one of my best memories is when I was only five mom sat down with me at the kitchen table and shared the essential truths of having faith in Jesus. I have believed and called myself a Christian from that moment. I actually even anticipated baptism from that time, looking forward to it more and more each day.

I never wondered where mom had gotten the faith that she felt was so important to share with me. She frequently shared stories of her childhood and the faith of her parents, who were actually my great-grandparents, the descendants of early Texas pioneers. Mom told the kinds of stories about them that children love to hear. However the thing that I enjoyed most was hearing about their faith. Grandpa was a minister—a preacher—and Grandma, a Sunday school teacher, had a special gift for listening to God.  I can imagine Jesus sitting with Mary and hearing her stories about the faith of Joachim and Anne.

My great-grandparents were some of the first members of the Church of the Nazarene, which actually began in a small north Texas town called Pilot Point around the beginning of the 20th century. It was part of the beginning of the Pentecostal holiness movement of that time.

It was around 1967 when I first remember meeting my great-grandparents. We had traveled extensively through the southwest for the first several years of my life. When I met Grandma, Mom told her that I had been reading the Bible, and she told me that the Lord had spoken to her heart about me—that I would someday be a minister. Whenever I read in Catholic documents that the ordination of the deacon is an ordination to ministry I can’t help but remember the seeds of faith that my great-grandparents planted in my heart, both directly and through their children.

Without a doubt I know that Saints Joachim and Anne prepared Mary for her special role.  It also must be that someone shared faith with them too.  It's easy to understand the significance of biblical genealogies when we see the connections of belief and the stories, the parables, that grow around this very special human experience of believing in God and interacting in a living and dynamic way through our belief, a reality that shines through clearly.

I guess in the end we see that faith is never something that is only ours, just as when we fail God it is never only sin between us and God alone.  We are connected to a bigger reality, a truth that spans the generations.

On the Feast of St. James: Serving the Gospel

The Apostle Paul speaks to us in today’s reading from 2 Corinthians of his role as apostle. It is something the apostles share that, in their mortal bodies, in their weakness and tribulations, the great glory of God shows itself. It is their treasure in earthen vessels: the power of God revealed mysteriously through suffering.

Certainly, every Christian also has access to the glory of God within. In our individual lives, in each one of us, lies the cause for great thanksgiving—the abundant grace by which we entered into relationship with the One from whom we were separated by sin. It is a relationship characterized by thanksgiving, which the Greek of the New Testament calls eucharistia. While every Christian may potentially experience something similar in his or her life to that which St. Paul describes, the focus in today's Feast is on the apostles. Nevertheless, we share similarly in our calling.

In his lifetime, the opponents of St. Paul used his suffering to make the claim against his apostleship. However, a closer look reveals that the suffering of the apostle manifests, rather than negates, his role.

Interestingly, the suffering inherent in the role of the apostles is foretold by Jesus in his dialogue with James and John, which we see in the gospel today. Jesus asks them, “Can you drink the chalice I am going to drink?” In their affirmation Jesus lets them know that they will, in fact, drink from his chalice.  Again, the Eucharistic implications are clear; however, it is in a way that elucidates the meaning of Eucharist in a manner that we may not be accustomed to seeing.

James and John couldn’t have known at the time what lay in store for them. They likely interpreted drinking from the chalice as being able to share in the responsibility of ruling an earthly kingdom. They couldn’t have foreseen Jesus’ plea in the garden on the night before he was crucified, “Father let this cup pass from me…”

Mark’s gospel adds the idea of the apostles sharing in the Lord’s baptism as well as his chalice, which for us ties together the two sacramental moments into a single outpouring of grace through ministry. While the imagery undoubtedly points to martyrdom, it also points to the sanctifying role that the apostles would take. Furthermore, it points to each and every Christian sharing in the ministry of salvation as a cooperative partner in grace.  It also points toward a common share in suffering.

Throughout my life as a Christian I have always felt that somehow each one of us shares something with the apostles—we identify with them, and thus they still lead us in our search for greater depths of experiencing the holy and blessed life of discipleship. Truly we rejoice with the apostles in an outpouring of thanksgiving.

However, as St. Paul shows us, following Christ in the way that an apostle would does not necessarily mean a rosy life of pure bliss. In our desire to be Christlike we must be willing to bear in our bodies the dying of Jesus. For us, in our times, this means being at the service of those who suffer most. You get first-hand experience of what it means to bear the sufferings of Christ when you minister to those whose lives cry out in need.

Being a Christian—a Catholic—has much more to do with our service to those who suffer than anything else we might say in terms of whatever controversies exist in the Church today. I see a tendency in some Catholics to focus primarily on things that should be secondary considerations.  Our truest call is to make the gospel available, to provide the healing power of grace, and to bring solace by reaching into those lives that seem to be devoid of hope.  In doing so we follow the path of the apostles.

Where are they?

This is a photo of my wife and children.  Anyone care to figure out where it was taken?

We haven't done a lot of traveling this summer, but of the places we did go most of them didn't have the latitude and longitude posted.  So, more or less, where was I standing when I took this picture?

The Clarity of Faith

You have been told, O man, what is good,
and what the LORD requires of you:
Only to do the right and to love goodness,
and to walk humbly with your God.  Mi. 6:8

We are given a reminder today, through the words of the gospel, that we all must face judgment. It would seem that the warning of certain judgment would have some bearing on how we live. However, it often appears that rather than following the simple and clear path of goodness, those who call themselves Christian often opt for following a path that only muddles the way of faith.

In the gospel reading this morning, the scribes and Pharisees come to Jesus seeking a sign—they must do so because they have lost touch with what it means to be in relationship with God. They no longer see clearly. Thus, Jesus points to their lack of faith proclaiming, “An evil and unfaithful generation seeks a sign.”

Something we desperately need to seek in our times, rather than a sign, is clarity of vision when it comes to living the Christian faith. Recently, on a Catholic blog, I read a criticism of religion in the world today, which stated that not everything calling itself “Christian” is what it claims to be. Although this criticism was aimed at liberal Protestant denominations as a condemnation, I believe that it is important for us Catholics also to examine our motives. If we claim Christianity, we must always remain mindful of what it means to be Christian—to live the faith.

After my first Mass yesterday I had a little time before preparing for the next liturgy, so I walked next door to the parish family center for a cup of coffee. As I was preparing to leave, a school-aged girl came to me with a question. “Deacon,” she asked, “what is the difference between Catholic and Christian?”

Naturally I assured her that to be Catholic is to be Christian, offering a little history of the word catholic and its meaning universal. The girl’s mother explained to me that her daughter had heard a Protestant minister talking about the difference between Christianity and other religions.  Evidently he presented Catholicism as something outside Christianity.  I've often encountered this opinion with Evangelicals and although I don't think it is the most common view among them, it is widespread.

The girl’s question was interesting to me because I have recently given a good bit of thought to some of the attitudes that I find expressed in the name of Christianity on the Internet, both from Catholic and Protestant sources. It wasn’t too many years ago that I remember having a strong feeling that our being Catholic unites us beyond almost everything. However, recently some of the attitudes that I’ve encountered have caused me to question that unity that I, perhaps naively, took for granted at one time.

On a deeper level, the attitudes of division urge us to seek out the truest meanings of our faith. A friend recently wrote to me and summed up nicely what he sees as being the hallmarks of the claim to be a Catholic Christian: loyalty to the magisterium, social justice for the poor and weak, and dedication to peace.

It’s easy to go on the Internet and find something that states the opposite. I tend to be bothered, naturally so, when I find hate and division being encouraged in the name of the faith—perhaps not explicitly but in the attitude that passes judgment on others. Often I get the feeling that some people may believe that having a doctrinaire and judging attitude is the sum of the faith. I wouldn’t be surprised to find many people like these among the crowd that was seeking a sign from Jesus.

In today’s readings the prophet Micah gives us a clear idea of living the faith. What he says must be taken as an obligation. It’s an imperative to elucidate our Christian vision and to simplify our lives so that the basic elements of what it takes to have a relationship with God are clear. We are to do the right, love goodness, and walk humbly with God. By doing so we offer a witness to the world of what it means to be called Christian.

Mercy and Contrition

In today’s gospel reading we again hear that it is mercy, rather than sacrifice, that God desires. The theme today revisits what we heard a couple weeks ago in a similar passage where Jesus confronts the legalism of the Pharisees over his choice to invite tax collectors and sinners to eat with him.

Interestingly, the message today also involves eating. However, it is out of their hunger, their sheer poverty, that the disciples enter a field on a Sabbath and begin picking grain and eating. Again, we find the Lord coming to their defense with the phrase, “It is mercy I desire, not sacrifice.”

I noticed an interesting parallel in Psalm 51:16 of the Morning Prayer:

For in sacrifice you take no delight, burnt offering from me you would refuse, my sacrifice, a contrite spirit. A humbled contrite heart you will not spurn.

The message today speaks on two levels that bear relevance to living in our world today—the favor that God has toward the poor of the earth, and the mercy that God desires we show in our dealings with others. Of course these two aspects of living in Christ merge with one another, especially in the overall call to be at the service of those with the greatest needs. In many ways showing favor to the poor and being a witness to God’s mercy in the world find their fulfillment in a single action or movement.

I believe that in order to show mercy we need to be acquainted with our own need for mercy—with our own poverty. Out of his pain and affliction the psalmist cries out to God, as we see in Psalm 69:29 of the Office of Readings. In a surprising turn, rather than bemoan his plight, he turns to praise, for it is "a gift more pleasing than oxen, more than beasts prepared for sacrifice."  "The Lord," we are told, "listens to the needy and does not spurn his servants in their chains."

In some ways it appears that often we fail to grasp the true meaning of mercy. More than once I have been told that mercy means you save others by pointing out their sins and faults—I suppose you then stop there?  Too often it seems that those who resort to pointing out faults and sins go no further; they entirely miss the real meaning of mercy or twist it to justify their sin of self-righteous pride or arrogance.

However, look at how Jesus handles the situation when the Pharisees point out the sin of picking grain on the Sabbath. It is not the presumed sin of those deemed as sinners that he condemns; rather, he defends them and instead points out the sin inherent in the attitude that judges others and condemns the innocent and poor.

Jesus points out the self-righteous and smug attitude of those who have no need for salvation because they deem themselves to be above sin. Moreover, they judge themselves to be above the need, or the poverty, of having to glean grain on the Sabbath in order to satisfy physical hunger. Here we can see the Pharisees' hypocrisy in that although they condemn taking grain out of poverty, it was an allowable practice in the circumstance of serving the temple.

The more I reflect on it, the clearer it becomes to me that true mercy is forbearing and forgiving. Mercy is showing love and compassion. Mercy takes the time to listen without rash judgment. Mercy heals. Mercy never takes the position of saying, “I’m right and that’s it! Sin is sin.” You can’t turn mercy into a justification for holding a self-righteous attitude.  In order to minister mercy to others we must first bring our need for mercy to God .

The message that God has for us in our times is one that calls us to show favor—grace—to all members of our human family. It takes a contrite heart to please God. In the spirit of contrition we see ourselves among the ones who need salvation most.  It is with them that we dine on the Sabbath.