Saturated with Love

 

Last Sunday, I had the privilege of returning to my former parish at Holy Family and the gospel was about the beatitudes. You remember them. Blessed are the poor in spirit, blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted, blessed are the meek, blessed are the those who hunger for righteousness, blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy, blessed are the pure of heart, blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who are persecuted

 

If you ask me which one is the most important. I say it’s the merciful. If you look at the life of Jesus, I would say it is saturated with mercy. Remember when the kids came to Jesus and he says don’t lead one of these astray or else. No one wanted the kids around.  Jesus had a tender heart where he tells the parable of the workers in the vineyard and the people are outraged where everybody gets paid the same thing and God says you’re going to begrudge me my generosity, you’re going to tell me how to dispense my Mercy. Or when the blind and lame come to him in the temple and he heals them or when the prostitutes and tax collectors get into the kingdom of God before the unrepentant because Jesus has Mercy for All. Or when the sheep and the goats are separated in the great judgment based on who shows Mercy to those who are naked and those who are poor. Jesus was a man saturated with Mercy in everything he did and said.

 

My hunch is in the Beatitudes He’s calling us to be just like him. Not talking about being some kind of superhero, not talking about being the bishop or prime bishop, about being a scholar or a missionary, simply talking about being a Christian, one holy moment at a time.

 

God has shown you great Mercy by all means please share it because Lord knows the world  could use a little Mercy right now.

 

Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends who have been wounded by their neighbors, relatives and friends. Give us the graced of humility to show Mercy to anyone who has hurt us. Give us the grace to let go of our anger and resentment and be saturated with Mercy because the world needs a little Mercy right now. 

 

No Ordinary Day

 

When did you experience a day when nothing would be the same again?  One of those milestone moments in your life.   A thing that you can point to as something that definitively altered things for you, your experience, and your routine.  Maybe you thinking back to the first day of school or graduation days.  When you started your first job.  Moved to a new town.  As ordinary, routine as life can be, where days, weeks, months, and years can fly by that seem lost in our memories – there are those days that forever stand out in our hearts and minds, the days when everything changed:  the day you met your future spouse, a wedding day, the day you had a child – my ordination day.

Today, a patient shared that he was celebrating his third month anniversary of sobriety. a life-changing day for him. Well, truth be told, that he has been marking every single day since his quit day back in November that started on his birthday. The day when he became sober.

I am – so proud of him.  It is an incredibly courageous thing and sadly is something that’s more counter-cultural than ever to commit to sobriety.  25 years ago there was a greater push for people to wake up to the harmful effects of alcohol – now we have so-called government leaders gleefully legalizing even more dangerous substances like marijuana…  That helps contribute to all kinds of influences that enable and encourage reckless behavior and is causing higher rates of addiction, to the point that some can’t even imagine going sober for a week.  But this man and countless others bear witness to the possibility of breaking these addictive cycles, the positive shifts and transformations of life it has brought to them that they can all trace to a particular day when their lives changed.

Every year we hear from one of the Gospel writers about how Jesus called his first disciples.  More than likely these men had some encounters and heard Jesus preach a few times before this incident.  Yet there’s something definitive about this particular day where He calls them.  Jesus had just preached saying “Repent, the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  And then somewhat simply says a few words that invite them to follow Him – and they drop everything and do just that.

This becomes a day where they left behind their livelihoods – leaving their nets.   A day where their lives were completely re-ordered and re-prioritized – leaving their families.  They could have had no idea what each day that followed would look like, the challenges, the trials, and how radical this decisive moment would be.  But they heard His voice, saw His face, and knew they didn’t want to let this opportunity pass them by and become a day they regretted.

How we can, like the disciples, accept the invitation to follow Jesus.  Follow Him by committing to prayer.  Follow Him through my selflessness and sacrificial offerings to others, especially those in need.  Follow Him by letting go of the anger, and the pain and offering forgiveness.  Follow Him, striving to do all those things, knowing that they’re hard, knowing we’re not perfect but that He keeps calling and inviting us to get up, to keep pursuing and striving and trying.  And finding in the process, when we do, that no day will ever be the same.

Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends that we accept His invitation to be his disciples. Give us the grace and strength to keep pursuing, to keep striving, to keep trying to be the best disciple that He knows we can be.

 

Patience of a Saint

 

Yes, our medical system is seriously “broke.” Not in losing money, although corporate management would disagree but in getting services. For example, this morning I called my neighbor’s primary office to see if they ordered and faxed a referral last week for a nurse home visit and to start physical therapy. Our neighbor had slipped out of her bed to the floor and could not pick herself up.

 

Thank God, her cell phone was within reach and she called her sister for help who then contacted my spouse and the two ladies got Maggie off the floor and cleaned up her mess.

 

Back to the doctor’s office who reported they had faxed the order for a PT visit, but when I called the home care office if they received the referral and “sure enough:” no orders were received for PT for our neighbor. Now what happened?

 

I contacted the physician’s office and they verified they had fax the order but when I checked their fax number it was not correct. They had a different fax number to forward doctor orders. So “kindly” I asked to resend the request for PT to the correct fax number given to me by the triage nurse. And yes, I will call back later in the day to verify that home care got their orders. Whew! Now that was easy. You got to be kidding.

 

I have the humble privilege of being deployed over twenty times to help folks in Buffalo after the once in a generation blizzard. I have heard their heroic stories saving lives and then sometimes their sorrows that loved ones did not survive. Yes, as we start this new year, we will face many difficulties, but once again the God we pray to wants you to know this morning that your prayers are important and heard and will be answered. Just a little patience and keep on “pedaling” meaning persevere and never lose hope.

 

Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends coping with our “broken” medical system. Sometimes we wait for hours for an answer from customer service or have to call multiple times before the appointment is made. Give us strength, courage and hope.