Colors of Hope

The Election of a New Bishop of Rome Begins

Wednesday, May 7 is the beginning of the Conclave in the Sistine Chapel, where 132 Cardinals from every inhabited continent on earth will gather to elect a Pope to succeed the late Pope Francis as leader of a Catholic Church that counts some 1.4 billion members.

This blog "covered" the last Conclave back in 2013. It was remarkable for many of us for the unprecedented (virtual) access we had to the ceremonies via livestream leading right up to the Cardinals entering through the doors of the Chapel, which were then closed and locked beyond the reach of all media technology. The livestream switched to the "chimney camera" so that we could see right away the color of the smoke when the four daily ballots were burned. Once the white smoke came, we saw it pour from the chimney in real time.

Then the "feed" switched to the balcony over Saint Peter's Square where great crowds of Romans gathered to wait for the new Pope to be announced and presented, and to give his first blessing. It was a long and suspenseful period of time that passed before we were introduced to a 76-year-old Argentine named Jorge Mario Bergoglio, who took the name "Francis."

The next 12 years of his papacy were beautiful, surprising, and challenging in ways we never could have expected.

Now the time has come, once again.

The world is very different than it was a dozen years ago. The ceremonies will be livestreamed from the cell phone in your pocket to the widest "smart TV" on your wall. Like in 2013, we Catholics will have the chance to be joined in prayer and solidarity all over the world, in support of the Cardinals as they carry out their sacred office, and in welcoming the new Successor of Saint Peter.

I'm not sure I'm going to watch every moment of the events on streamimg video. (I will at least check the smoke.) I have no expectations or analysis regarding who among the Cardinals right now is this "man-who-will-be-Pope." His responsibilities will be immense, the media scrutiny relentless, but the graces of the Holy Spirit superabundant for him to carry out God's will for the good of the whole Church and the world.

The way we can best be attentive to the process that is beginning is to pray for the Cardinals, that they will choose someone filled with wisdom, truth, charity, and humility to lead the Church in the worship of God, and guide us in adhering to Christ in whatever trials might await us in times to come. He will need to confirm us in our faith, inspire us to be courageous in our witness, and be an example to us of the ardent love through which the Sacred Heart of Jesus wants to love this poor world and every human person living in it.

Could This Be Pope Francis's "First Miracle"?

The last time these two met in person, things — to put it mildly — did not go well. But last week, after they both attended the funeral of Pope Francis, Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelinskyy had an intense impromptu meeting in the back of Saint Peter's Basilica. The U.S. President's hostility, it seems, has turned around (at least for now), and the United States and Ukraine have since signed an economic cooperation agreement which is somewhat more vigorous in its affirmation of Ukraine's sovereignty.

It's a miracle?

Probably not, but it may be a step toward the peace that Pope Francis so ardently prayed for to his last breath. His perseverance in prayer and sacrifice for "Martyred Ukraine" will bear fruit. We all must continue to pray for an end to Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, and for a just and lasting peace which respects Ukrainian sovereignty and allows Ukraine to flourish.

And we must continue to pray for the eternal rest of our beloved Francis, and for the approaching conclave that will elect his successor.

Athanasius and the Incarnation

May 2 is the feast of the crucially important fourth century Church Father Saint Athanasius of Alexandria. The text that follows is an excerpt from my 2003 book The Created Person and the Mystery of God, which - if I had actually had an "academic career" - would have been regarded as "one of his early works" (I was 40 years old when it was published😉). It has much in it that I would have liked to have developed in greater depth, but my path "moved in a different direction" due to illness and disability, which is a familiar story for anyone who reads this blog. 

The "historical section" of this book contains concise vignettes of some of the Church Fathers, and follows a style that is similar to my monthly articles in Magnificat (which I have been writing since 2013). If God wills, I may yet return to working on a "more mature" scholarly project bringing together the various themes and methodological approaches that I sketched out in this book nearly a quarter of a century ago. The intellectual realm of historical studies within the context of philosophical and theological anthropology (i.e. this multifaceted approach to "the created person and the mystery of God") is still the inspiration for my studies and what writing I have been able to do. My experience and my thinking have grown much since the days of this book, and circumstances have opened new doors and indicated larger vistas that would require several volumes to bring together in a formal academic study. 

If someone gave me a very large financial grant (enough to keep my wife and I going for the rest of our lives) and if they were very patient, a project like this might be possible. I am certain that no form of "AI" will ever be able to do it (perhaps it could assist in some tasks, like finding sources).

Who knows what might happen? May the Lord lead me, empower me, and show me the way. We live in a time of epochal change. I think right now of some poor archbishop who might be a bit older than me, taking a coffee in Roman coffee bar, looking forward to what he hopes will be a short bit of ecclesiastical "business" so that he can get back home; he has no idea whatsoever that in a few weeks he will be the Pope!

But, speaking of epochal change, I am supposed to be introducing Saint Athanasius here. Let us therefore proceed to text which looks at a great figure who endured many "changes" but persevered through them all in his defense of the Divinity of Jesus Christ:

Less than five years after Constantine’s declaratiom of religious freedom in 313 a.d., the Church was plunged headlong into a new type of crisis. A popular, talented, and politically astute priest in Alexandria named Arius had developed a theory about the Trinity.  Up until this time, most attempts by Christian thinkers to shed light on the unity and distinctness of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit had been provisional at best.  For Arius, classical Catholic accounts of the Trinity were dissatisfying and ambiguous and seemed to involve the Church in irrational and contradictory affirmations about God.  He proposed a simple solution, logically coherent, easy to understand, and—at first glance—seemingly consistent with the language of the New Testament.

Arius taught that the One Eternal God is the radically Unoriginate One in every respect. This meant that God is solely unoriginate "in Person" (this, in any case, is what his approach to the Trinity inescapable implied). It follows, that the Logos, the Word, is "God's" first and greatest creature.  The Word is a reflection of the Divine Being, so perfect that he is called “Son” and God is his “Father” in a unique manner.  Nevertheless, he is a creature.  According to a famous slogan of Arius which he even set to music, “there was a time when he was not.”  This first creature fashioned everything else in turn; therefore he is called “god” in relation to the rest of creation; however he is not divine by nature.  The Holy Spirit, too, is a creature, the first and greatest creature of the Word who is himself the divine-like creature of God the Father.

What Arius proposed was ingenious and remarkable.  It appeared to be nothing less than a translation into Christian terms of the “Divine Triad” of Neoplatonism, in which Universal Intelligence and Universal Soul were inferior reflections emanating from the Transcendent One and bringing forth the spiritual and material world in turn.  It seemed as though Arius had reconciled Catholic faith and philosophical wisdom, giving a rationally satisfying explanation of the Trinity. 

In fact, however, Arius had deconstructed the mystery of the Trinity, and he stubbornly refused all correction on the matter of what became known as the "great heresy" that bears his name.  His theory was condemned at the Council of Nicaea in 325, wherein the Only Son of the Father was proclaimed God from God, Light from Light, True God from True God, begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father.  After this Council, however, the Arian party succeeded in gaining imperial favor by means of deception and intrigue.  Enormous political pressure was brought to bear against orthodox bishops by Constantine’s successors, and imperially sponsored synods tried to construct and then impose compromise Trinitarian formulations that secretly favored the Arian position.  

In the center of this storm was the singular figure of Saint Athanasius, the great bishop of Alexandria and fearless defender of Trinitarian orthodoxy.  Athanasius was exiled from his see no less than five times during his tumultuous career, because he stubbornly opposed any and every politically engineered compromise with the Arian position.  

Modern secular historians may often wonder why Athanasius was so passionate and so persistent about what might seem to be an abstract theological point.  Yet we can appreciate the energy of his zeal if we realize that he perceived the deep connection between the mystery of the Trinity and the mystery of the Incarnation and Redemption.  Athanasius’s conviction about the Trinity was inseparable from his conviction about the Christian event and its significance for the life of man.  Through the incarnation and redemption, God has made it possible for us to share in His very life.  Our union with the Word made flesh gives us a participation in the Divine life.  This is the great patristic teaching on deification (“theosis”): God became man so that men might become “gods”—that is, adopted sons of the Father.  Athanasius perceived the radical implications of Arius’s theories: if the one who became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary was not fully Divine, how could he possibly give us a participation in the Divine life?  In the Arian system, the magnificent destiny of the Christian man comes crashing to the ground.  The one who walked the earth, who became our friend, who gave us his flesh to eat and his blood to drink, was merely another creature like us.  God has not shown us His face nor invited us into his friendship.  He remains a stranger to us.  Thus Athanasius declares: “the Son of God became Son of Man, so that the sons of man, that is, of Adam, might become sons of God.  The Word begotten of the Father from on high, inexpressibly, inexplicably, incomprehensibly and eternally, is He that is born in time here below, of the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, so that those who are in the first place born here below might have a second birth from on high, that is, of God.”  

Moreover, if the Holy Spirit is not fully God, how can he possibly transform us into the likeness of God?  “If the Holy Spirit were a creature, there could be no communion of God with us through Him.  On the contrary, we would be joined to a creature, and we would be foreign to the divine nature, as having nothing in common with it…If by participation in the Spirit we are made partakers in the divine nature…it cannot be doubted that His is the nature of God.”  

Thus for Athanasius, the full co-eternal divinity of the Word and the Holy Spirit was not only a truth about the mystery of God; it was also a matter of life or death for man—it was a truth decisive for the human vocation.  Only the Divine Word made flesh divinizes His brothers in the flesh.  If Christ is anything less than God, then the gates of heaven are closed and man is still in exile from his eternal home.  The comfortable rationalism of Arius, in the end, robbed Christianity of its very heart.

First Council of Nicaea, 325 - from an ancient fresco in present day Turkiye.

The Freshness of Spring and the Joy of Easter

"Almost-May" flowers and green are coming with their splendid show. The freshness of Spring!🌷🍃🌱

Even greater, the joy of Easter that remains in this season. Christ is Risen from the dead, and the foretaste of joy remains with us, carries us, renews its promise to us even in this strange year of 2025 that is so full of sorrows and concerns and trials — in our personal lives, in our society, in our world burdened by the distortion of sin that breeds so much injustice and violence, where war rages in many places and casts its looming shadow of horror over all of us. 

The Church rejoices in this Easter Season and “mourns” the passing of our beloved Pope Francis, sorry to be deprived of his physical presence but also astonished by his final days so luminous with deeds and words of mercy. Next month the Cardinals will elect a new Pope. There is no point in worrying about things beyond our power. We must pray from the heart for the Church, the world, and all our needs, and entrust everything to Jesus Christ our Lord.

Catherine of Sienna: A Fire Whose Embers Still Glow

The wonderful Caterina Benincasa, born into that wild, corrupt, belligerent fourteenth century Italian city-state called Sienna, has her feast day April 29th.

Tomb of Saint Catherine in Rome

She was one of the most amazing women who ever lived, the youngest of 25 children, chosen to experience and communicate to the world the astonishing, relentless, mad love of God for every human being.

She spoke fearlessly to those in power, to the wealthy, the clergy, to anyone who would listen. She moved the hearts of popes, brought reconciliation to warring factions, served the poor and the sick, and left testimony to her experiences of the mysterious embrace of Christ the Bridegroom of her soul. His love burned through her and made her 33 years of life an unforgettable fire whose embers still glow, warming us and giving us hope even today.

She was a vital presence for me when I lived in Rome, from her repose under the main altar at Santa Maria Sopra Minerva and out into the church piazza, into the streets, into the air. Catherine, from Sienna, from the Tuscan hills she came to be the friend of the bishop and the people of Rome for nearly 700 years.

She held the fires of divine love in her heart and in her hands, and helped us to draw near to Him, this humble woman, this familiar friend, who still looks after me even when I forget to ask her. She knows the “mad hope” that cries out to God from my own heart. She knows my long and often obscure journey of hope, the journey of my life, of my vocation. She reminds me of the Light and Love of the One who draws me to my destiny.

It is a joy to encounter Saint Catherine of Sienna in the liturgy during this Easter Season, the continuing celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus who transformed her whole existence. She witnesses to the Risen Jesus who is working through the Holy Spirit to change us, and who invites every person to the embrace of the Mystery who has created them to share in His infinite fulfillment, His glory which is the Happiness that every heart desires.

"You are a mystery as deep as the sea;

the more I search, the more I find,

and the more I find the more I search for you.

But I can never be satisfied;

what I receive will ever leave me desiring more.

When you fill my soul I have an even greater hunger,

and I grow more famished for your light.

I desire above all to see you,

the true light,

as you really are."

~Saint Catherine of Siena

Divine Mercy Sunday, 2025

“For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.” Jesus, I trust in You!

Mourning Pope Francis With Hearts Full of Gratitude and Joy

I don’t yet know how to “say goodbye” to Pope Francis (to his presence in this world). I find in this time of mourning that follows for nine days after his burial an intensely personal space for my own grief. On some level, I feel once again an “orphan” even as I struggle with being “reborn” in the elder years of my life and my vocation. Yet the sense of “loss” is simultaneously full of gratitude for the fulfillment of his life and ministry, and expectation that his witness will continue to bear fruit in the Church and the world — and in my own life — as God’s great design for all of creation continues to unfold through Jesus Christ in the grace of the Holy Spirit.

Though I have no new words in these days, I think the tribute I wrote two years ago — on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of his papacy — could be reproduced here with a few changes in style that indicate his mission is now completed. Now is the time to pray that God grant him the eternal reward of his labors, but also to thank the Lord and to thank Pope Francis for accompanying us during this stretch of our journey toward our destiny in the fullness of Christ Risen and Glorified. Thus, I shall adapt the words I wrote two years ago into a conclusive (though inadequate) effort to express my thanks, and the joy that has been born and continues to grow in my soul:

Dear Pope Francis, thank you for the twelve years of fidelity to the office to which God called you — to be Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, Servant of the Servants of God, and a shepherd and father to us all.

You reminded us every day of the loving presence of Jesus in our lives, and challenged us to share the joy of the Gospel with the whole world, to live with responsibility and gratitude for the beauty and value of all of God’s creation, and to cherish and support the irreplaceable, lifelong mutual love of husbands and wives as the essential foundation of family life. You encouraged young people and—by word and example—taught us how to embrace growing old, and the mysterious value of the sufferings that we are called to endure. You emphasized the special human gift of dialogue and mutual enrichment in the relationship of grandparents and grandchildren, of the elderly with the younger generations. This interaction is an important part of God’s providence: in this way life and history are informed by the union of wisdom and innocence, by experience of the past and hope for the future. 

You always emphasized the special love of Jesus for the poor, the forgotten, the marginalized. Attention to their material needs (including their very real need for justice, mercy, and equity) is not motivated by utopian schemes but by fidelity to Jesus who calls us to recognize him and serve him concretely in the poor: “I was hungry and you gave me food… I was sick and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me… I was a stranger and you welcomed me.” You exhorted us to work in the ways we can to build a more just, loving, fraternal society — to foster the “revolution of tenderness” that Jesus is working even in the midst of this temporal world, as the glowing light of his glory on the horizon of earthly life that has already begun to illuminate everything, as the foretaste of eternal life that sustains us on our historical journey with the promise of fulfillment. It is worthwhile, therefore, to glorify God through works of mercy, and even to work for the “civilization of love” (Saint Paul VI), the social vitality of Christ’s saving love that “already”—even NOW—embraces the whole human person and every aspect of human life. 

We are called to adore, worship, and live in gratitude and joy as children of God our Father, and to serve Jesus our brother in one another and especially in the poor, the abandoned, the lonely—because it is particularly through them that Jesus cries out to us and yearns for our love. God loves everyone, which means that his Catholic Christian disciples cannot rest in any form of self-satisfaction, but must always seek the face of Christ who has united himself to the fulfillment — the destiny — of every person.

In these past twelve years this was the wisdom — the heart and soul — of your Petrine ministry. What you proposed to us is often difficult, but it is the way of the Gospel, the truth we need to hear, the guidance and correction of a merciful father who is called to help us mature in Christ. It requires us to face our own weakness and incoherence, which humbles us. But it is good for us to be humble. Your Papacy was an ongoing work of Christian love and service for which I am truly grateful.

Thank you, Pope Francis, for being a “father” to me in Christ in these past twelve years. You consoled me, instructed me, provoked me to look more deeply at things I thought I already knew, helped me to be patient while living in the midst of an often-confusing and sometimes-terrifying society—to listen to the Holy Spirit and follow Jesus, to resist temptations to resentment, wounded vanity, grudges, gossip, or forgetting Christ’s lordship over history and trusting instead worldly ideologies that promise easy security (and revenge) if I am willing to sell my soul. 

I am so grateful for your paternal solicitude by word and example that has been a light for me during a period filled with pain in my own life, unstable health, much sorrow and grief, so many changes in the passage of time, and — of course — many surprising and profound joys too. (The older I get, the more I find that sorrow and joy often come together in circumstances and events, because they are so full of the Mystery to whom they point, of whom they speak—the fulfillment that has already begun, and that hastens us onward.)

Dear Pope Francis, in your ministry you accompanied me and encouraged me in so many ways, through so many words and gestures. I prayed for you as you bore the enormous sufferings that weigh upon individuals and peoples in the Church and in the world, I will continue to pray for you, that the Father will soon bring you into the fullness of His beatifying presence, through His Son Jesus in the communion of the Holy Spirit.

Pope Francis and the Words of Hope and Mercy

He preached the Gospel until his final day, which was the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Pope Francis spoke and lived and, finally, died as a pastor and a witness to the love and mercy of God. Right to the end, with his last breaths, he gave us hope.

Scenes of April Spring.

Scenes of April Spring:

Thank You, Pope Francis

Pope Francis was called home to the Father’s House this morning at 7:35 AM Rome time. After a beautiful Easter Sunday, in which he was able to visit the faithful in Saint Peter’s Square and give the traditional “Urbi et Orbi” blessing, Francis surrendered his soul to the embrace of God’s mercy on the morning of Easter Monday. May the Lord grant him eternal rest and an abundant reward for his faithfulness and all his labors.

Jesus Christ Has Triumphed Over Death

Alleluia! Christ has triumphed over death.

“The light of the Resurrection illumines our path one step at a time; quietly, it breaks through the darkness of history and shines in our hearts, calling for the response of a humble faith, devoid of all triumphalism. The Lord’s passage from death to life is not a spectacular event by which God shows his power and compels us to believe in him. For Jesus, it was not the end of an easy journey that bypassed Calvary. Nor should we experience it as such, casually and unthinkingly. On the contrary, the Resurrection is like little seeds of light that slowly and silently come to take root in our hearts, at times still prey to darkness and unbelief.

“…we cannot celebrate Easter without continuing to deal with the nights that dwell in our hearts and the shadows of death that so often loom over our world. Christ indeed conquered sin and destroyed death, yet in our earthly history the power of his Resurrection is still being brought to fulfilment. And that fulfilment, like a small seed of light, has been entrusted to us, to protect it and to make it grow.

“When the thought of death lies heavy on our hearts, when we see the dark shadows of evil advancing in our world, when we feel the wounds of selfishness or violence festering in our flesh and in our society, let us not lose heart, but return to the message of this night. The light quietly shines forth, even though we are in darkness; the promise of new life and a world finally set free awaits us; and a new beginning, however impossible it might seem, can take us by surprise, for Christ has triumphed over death.

“This message fills our hearts with renewed hope. For in the risen Jesus we have the certainty that our personal history and that of our human family, albeit still immersed in a dark night where lights seem distant and dim, are nonetheless in God’s hands. In his great love, he will not let us falter, or allow evil to have the last word. At the same time, this hope, already fulfilled in Christ, remains for us a goal to be attained. Yet it has been entrusted to us so that we can bear credible witness to it, so that the Kingdom of God may find its way into the hearts of the women and men of our time.”

~Pope Francis, from text of Easter Vigil Homily, April 19, 2025

Holy Cross

“We adore You, O Christ, and we praise You,
because by Your Holy Cross You have redeemed the world.”

Image: William Congdon, “Crucifix” series (1960s).

The Banquet of His Love

Here is the Collect Prayer for Holy Thursday. 

This prayer encourages us to "draw...the fullness of charity [agape] and of life" from the One Sacrifice, a "sacrifice new for all eternity" that is the Paschal Mystery accomplished by Jesus and "entrusted to the Church." As Saint Thomas Aquinas expresses it: “O sacred banquet in which Christ becomes our food, the memory of His Passion is celebrated, the soul is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us.” Jesus gives Himself, in the "banquet of His Love" in which we can participate wherever we are in the world today, through the ministry of the Church in the offering the Eucharistic Liturgy. Wherever we are, Jesus loves us and wants to stay with us, draw close to us, raise us up new life as God's children:

“O God, who have called us to participate in this most sacred Supper, in which your Only Begotten Son, when about to hand himself over to death, entrusted to the Church a sacrifice new for all eternity, the banquet of his love, grant, we pray, that we may draw from so great a mystery, the fullness of charity and of life. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever.”

Holy Week Begins in the Vatican

Although he was unable to say the Mass in public, the still-convalescing Pope Francis prepared and published the text of the homily for the beginning of Holy Week celebrations at Saint Peter's Basilica. 

Francis’s health continues to improve as he recovers from the pneumonia that hospitalized him from February 14 to March 23. He made a brief public appearance after the conclusion of the Mass, giving much encouragement to the pilgrims at Saint Peter’s (and all the rest of us.). 

The Pope's written homily was read aloud by Cardinal Leonardo Sandri during the Palm Sunday Mass. Here are some excerpts from Francis's text that can help us prepare in the coming days:

"Jesus comes to meet everyone, in every situation. When we see the great crowds of men and women whom hatred and violence are compelling to walk the road to Calvary, let us remember that God has made this road a place of redemption, for he walked it himself, giving his life for us... In our own day, [many people are] bearing the cross of Christ on their shoulders! Can we recognize them? Can we see the Lord in their faces, marred by the burden of war and deprivation? Faced with the appalling injustice of evil, we never carry the cross of Christ in vain; on the contrary, it is the most tangible way for us to share in his redemptive love.

"Jesus’ passion becomes compassion whenever we hold out our hand to those who feel they cannot go on, when we lift up those who have fallen, when we embrace those who are discouraged. Brothers and sisters, in order to experience this great miracle of mercy, let us decide how we are meant to carry our own cross during this Holy Week: if not on our shoulders, in our hearts. And not only our cross, but also the cross of those who suffer all around us; perhaps even the cross of some unknown person whom chance — but is it really chance? — has placed on our way."

Christina Grimmie is a Sign of Hope in the Resurrection

It’s not Easter 2025 yet, but it is the 10th of April, and so I share these Easter greetings Christina Grimmie posted long ago as I remember and honor her legacy 8 years and 10 months after her death. 

Holy Week and Easter are approaching, and Christina lived her life, loved with great love, and died in the hope of the Resurrection. Her witness and example continue to shine for us, pointing to the glory and beauty of Jesus Christ that wins the victory over death and even the most incomprehensible violence.

I Denounce the U.S. Deportation Policy

El Salvador. The Savior.

I cannot set this aside and ignore it. Not on any day. Especially not in these days.

Here are the shaved heads and constrained bodies of men in an enormous prison. It is a small glimpse of a much bigger picture. These are human persons, created in the image of God, redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ crucified. They are my brothers.

Some of them are also probably dangerous gang thugs that none of us would want walking around our neighborhoods. We would be terrified if we knew the things that some of the men in this prison have done. But are they all criminals? Who knows? Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele and his collaborators have suspended all reasonable forms of "due process" for these men.

This is El Salvador, the land of Saint Oscar Romero, who was martyred by a different kind of "gang" in 1980. Today, this land and many other places in its vicinity are still afflicted by a "cycle of violence."

In these days when we enter liturgically into the mystery of the death and resurrection of Jesus, I cannot ignore the suffering of my brothers. Nor can I ignore the fact that the “executive branch” of the government of my own country is authorizing an unaccountable federal police force to pull people off the streets, put them in chains, fly them to El Salvador — without charges, without recourse to legal assistance, without trial — "discarding" them in this unregulated concentration camp, ignoring repeated federal court orders for due process, and bragging about it.

So far, it has only been a few hundred people. They are "the worst of the worst," we are told (even though most of them have never been charged with a crime, much less convicted of anything). We have also been told that this administration intends to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants. By what methods? These are human persons. They are not garbage. They have a right to be treated with dignity.

I denounce and reject these deportation policies and the means by which they are being carried out. I do not applaud. I refuse to shout "hail, victory!" to this administration. There is not much I can do. I'm virtually a prisoner of my own afflictions. I write only with great difficulty these days. But that doesn't mean I have to shut up altogether. What the party in power is doing is wrong! And, to the party not-in-power at this time, I'll repeat (again and again) that when you say there is a "fundamental human right" for anyone to kill unborn children in their mothers' wombs, you LIE!

That's all I have the energy to say right now.

Jesus suffers in the poor and vulnerable, in victims of violence, and also in us (and for us) who are sinners. All of us. We are all sinners. May God open all our hearts that we might be converted and begin to be transformed by the inexhaustible mercy of the Crucified Jesus, who longs to draw every person into the depths of His wounded and forever open Heart.

Lord, Direct Our Hearts Aright

Saturday's COLLECT is a powerful prayer that reminds us of our total dependence on the mercy of God, and also the power of His grace to heal, renew, and transform our hearts.

His mercy is always "working" to "direct our hearts aright." His merciful love anticipates our freedom, working even in deep dark spaces of our soul, offering healing and forgiveness, renewing our freedom and opening up new possibilities for reconciliation and growing in love, awakening and sustaining our free cooperation with His plan to save us, change us, and make us His sons and daughters through His Son Jesus Christ crucified and risen.

Remembering My Father, Six Years Later

My father passed away six years ago on this day, April 3, 2019. (Requiem Aeternum...) Here he is in this picture sometime around the year 2011 - the O.G. "Papa" (for the Virginia Janaros) hugging his youngest granddaughter, who was then around four or five years old (she's 18 now!). It's striking for me to realize that I am now the "Papa" and my oldest granddaughter is almost four years old!!

So much has happened in these past six years. My grief has "turned a corner" and is finding its place within the ongoing, ever-changing, not-always-easy but ultimately beautiful history of our family. 

But there are still times when I miss him (for example, looking at this picture🥹). I want to talk to him about this new stage of my life, about "elderhood" (i.e. "growing old," but not just in the negative sense). I want to talk to him about the wild winds that are blowing through our nation and the world in this present moment (which are beyond anything he could have imagined while he was still living on this earth). 

I believe he remains "close" to us. We carry on his legacy in this world. I feel like he is "encouraging me" - from his resting place within the Heart of Jesus - to remain faithful, to trust in God, and to love my family. He was a quiet but deeply dedicated example of all these things throughout his life.

I love you, Dad. May the Lord reward you in His eternal joy.

Twentieth Anniversary of the Passing of Saint John Paul II

April begins with anniversaries of people who have passed from this life into the infinite embrace of the Mystery of God - people who played fundamental roles in the formation and sustenance of my own life's journey.

Twenty years ago, April 2, 2005, Pope Saint John Paul II came to the end and the fulfillment of his singular vocation as a global witness to Jesus Christ: the Living One who calls each person to eternal life. John Paul was the Bishop of Rome, the Successor of Saint Peter, and a great teacher for more than a quarter of a century. His papacy began when I was 15 years old and ended when I was 42. His witness of preaching the Gospel — the Word made flesh who reveals God's love and the full truth of what it means to be human — reached me personally as an encounter with Jesus that was decisive for my life as a young person. My whole generation of Catholic Christians shared in this experience and found the strength and contours of our Christian vocation through the light of the Holy Spirit that shined through John Paul II at the dawn of the third millennium.

Now we are growing older and the world shakes once again with the explosions of war and great winds of change that carry us we-know-not-where. But we have his enduring friendship in the Communion of Saints, from which Saint John Paul II reminds us: "Be not afraid."

John Paul had prepared and released the written text of his final Angelus message, which was read at noon on Sunday, April 3, the day after his death, Divine Mercy Sunday. Here is a section of those words:

"As a gift to humanity, which sometimes seems bewildered and overwhelmed by the power of evil, selfishness and fear, the Risen Lord offers his love that pardons, reconciles and reopens hearts to love. It is a love that converts hearts and gives peace. How much the world needs to understand and accept Divine Mercy!

"Lord, who reveal the Father's love by your death and Resurrection, we believe in you and confidently repeat to you today: Jesus, I trust in you, have mercy upon us and upon the whole world."