Saint Agnes Witnesses to the Transformation of Life in Christ

She was not the first woman to sacrifice the possibility of marriage and motherhood in order to follow Jesus in a deeper way. 

But Saint Agnes gave physiognomy and voice to consecrated virginity as a marriage to Jesus, a singular spousal dedication to him that engages a woman's heart completely, beyond the competition of all human interests and even life itself.

The radiant life and sacrifice of a 12 year old girl in third century Rome, and no doubt her continual intercession thereafter, have fostered in the Church an awareness of the Church's own deepest life.

In an ancient liturgical antiphon, Agnes says: "I am espoused to him whom the angels serve; sun and moon stand in wonder at his beauty." 

There are numerous stories about this extraordinary heroic young woman, but what is certain above all is the astonishing ardor with which she embraced martyrdom when it was imposed upon her. It was for her the culmination of the singular commitment and focus of her life, which was her response - empowered by the Holy Spirit - to the gift of the love of Jesus, experienced in a profoundly personal that raised up and defined the whole form of her life.

Saint Agnes was venerated from the beginning (right after her death) by the clergy and the people of Rome, and then throughout the Western Church and also in the Eastern Churches. This was not unusual for martyrs in the early centuries of Christianity. But there was another aspect of her witness that was radically significant for Christian and human history. Indeed, we must try to appreciate the fact that St. Agnes showed the world a kind of life, a freedom, an originality, a way of giving and loving that were new for human beings, and especially for women, in the long and tired history of the human race. She indicated that women are cherished, ultimately, in a way no one had ever imagined.

She displayed the transcendent passion, creativity, and freedom of belonging to Jesus. Her martyrdom was transfigured into a joyful procession in which she made haste to give her whole self to Jesus, not only fearlessly, but with the conviction that in him she would attain the super-eminent fullness of life: a life immeasurably beyond anything she could have attained naturally even if she had lived a long life on this earth. “What I longed for, I now see; what I hoped for, I now possess; in heaven I am espoused to Him whom on earth I loved with all my heart" (expressed in another antiphon of the ancient liturgy that honors her on this, her feast day).

Agnes's witness shines brightly on the fact that for the spouse of Christ, nothing is lost. The sacrifices that are made do not express contempt for the goodness of earthly life, but rather the ecstasy of a love that seeks the Source of all goodness, and thereby finds a hundredfold of fruitfulness even for the life of this earth.

St. Agnes, a young girl, a virgin and martyr for the love of Jesus Christ, thus lived with such fullness that her presence and solicitude continue to this day. For seventeen hundred years, women have followed her example and given their whole selves to Jesus, loving him as their Spouse in prayer and seclusion, and also by serving him in those in need.

We call them nuns and sisters. We even call them "mothers." Today, more and more, we call them our friends and colleagues too, whether in religious habit or as lay women who consecrate themselves in the context of the many new charisms that the Spirit is giving to the Church of our time.

They have sought God and followed the lamb. And in this giving of themselves, they have been the colossal protagonists, the shining stars of love and hope, the bearers of peace and compassion to this world as well.

Agnes stands as one of the pillars of the greatest "women's movement" of all time, and her witness today remains as compelling as ever. She gave up marriage on this earth and everything else even to life itself. And in Christ she became a true mother to generation after generation of daughters to this day -- of women who freely choose to give themselves away beyond the reckoning of this age, and thereby to find a fullness of life beyond measure.

"An Anchor For the Soul"

This was an eventful day in my country. A peaceful and successful transition was achieved in the executive branch of our federal government.

Many unpredictable circumstances will contribute to how public affairs unfold in the coming months and years in relation to the various levels of USA government(s) and society. Obviously these matters will remain an ongoing source of attention, concern, constructive engagement when possible, and prayer for all of us here and throughout the world.

But more than enough has been said about these things. For our part as Christians, let us be always committed to truth and charity, to civility and dialogue, and to building up the good according to the responsibilties that have been entrusted to us in our daily lives.

For this, we have a firm place to stand, an "anchor of the soul" - Jesus, for whom we live. He has conquered sin and death, and as Lord of history he calls us to share in his victory, to place our trust in him as we live in our times, in our work, in our personal and social responsibilities, in our families and communities, as we endeavor to love God and our neighbor, struggle against obstacles, and endure suffering. 

This is also the Week of Prayer for Unity Among Christians, a matter of particular importance in these times of anxiety, uncertainty, and divisiveness that can pose a special challenge to our efforts to grow closer to one another in love, to be brothers and sisters.

In the Roman Catholic liturgy this week, the Collect is a simple prayer:

Less simple, perhaps, have been my attempts to virtually "illuminate" this prayer in my "digital scriptorium." Here are a few different examples that represent - if nothing else - a continuing learning process and a helpful exercize. In any case, appending them here allows them to be archived.

30 Years Ago: The "Gulf War" Begins

Since last Fall I have been peeking in from time to time to a journal I kept from September 1990 to May 1992. Not long ago, these ruminations and the events that inspired them were 25 years old (i.e. in 2015), and I reproduced some selections in this blog. In the blinking of an eye, it seems, the same journal is now 30 years old.

Now we are marking the 30th anniversary of the beginning of the "Gulf War," or the first part of the USA's war in Iraq. The 1991 war was aimed at driving Saddam Hussein's regime out of Kuwait, which Iraq had invaded the previous Summer. The rapid and enormous military mobilization and response led by the USA was over in a few months, and "victory" was proclaimed (for the first time in what was to become an unnerving habit in years to come). in fact, it was only the beginning of a perplexing and problematic struggle in that part of the world that had many unforseen and sometimes catastrophic consequences over the next three decades.

If we think about it, we can see how the West is still involved in the implications of what happened a hundred years ago when the British and French created a constellation of "nation-states" out of the ruins of the Arabic domains of the Ottoman Empire. (Then, of course, Israel was established after World War II.) The inattentiveness, the lack of vision, of the victors at Versailles in 1919-1920 not only prepared the foundations for another war 20 years later, but also bequeathed unresolved political divisions and tensions even to the present time.

But 1991 was a "heady" moment in the history of the modern Western world. With Eastern Europe suddenly free and apparently "democratic," with the Soviet Union tottering (it would fall by the end of the Summer of '91), with China once again "reforming and opening" and its people free to get rich (the recent bloody events of Tiananmen Square being conveniently forgotten) - it appeared to many Westerners that "we had won." We had reached "the end of history," which, ironically, was not a Communist utopia but the global triumph of materialist consumerism (though we articulated this in the more lofty, but ultimately vacuous, idealism of "freedom" and "liberal democracy").

In fact, many good things and many genuine freedoms and new human possibilities opened up during this time. But in the midst of real "victories" that we still do not yet understand - and that have only begun to sprout from a variety of sources, some of which remain hidden to us - we in the West were myopic to our own endemic problems and fatal weaknesses. 

The secular West is not "dead" yet, in 2021, but the sickness is obvious and impossible for anyone to ignore. In '91 it was still possible to pretend vigorous health, or even renewed vitality. Even today, the dying West is surrounded by the clamor of its "children" - some rebellious, others perplexed, and a few (perhaps) curious and wondering about the relics of what once gave youthful life to a culture that has become a monstrosity in its dying "days" (years, decades, even centuries in historical terms).

All of this is the context of 1991's grand intervention into the Persian Gulf, that began a new chapter in the struggles of the Middle East. Hardly any of the particulars of the drama in the region, or regarding the radical Islamic groups that would emerge during and after the USA's interventions, were predicted in 1991. At the time, the Gulf War was a very popular undertaking in the USA. It was notable for being the first war to be "televised live" (it being the early days of 24 hour cable news). For the media and many who watched in this country, the war seemed to have all the superficiality of a sports game.

That troubled my younger self. I saw yet another sign of the decadence of our society in the manner in which people seemed happy to sit on their couches and "root for the team," even if no one really knew why "the game" was being played. I was not referring to the servicemen and women in the military who did their duty in good faith, and exhibited courage then (and later) in difficult circumstances.

Now, in 2021, I am looking at my old journal as a historical artifact of what feels like a very different period in time. Yet these past events fit into the bigger picture of the ongoing epochal shift that is creating the first globally interactive world, for better or for worse (or perhaps for better and for worse, with respect to different aspects of life).

In any case, here is what the 28 year old graduate student wrote (by hand) in that journal during these January days 30 years ago:

Wow, Laura Pausini is Such a Great Singer!!🎶

Below I have posted a link to a very moving song, sung by one of Europe-and-Latin-America's most celebrated voices. 

Most anglophones still don't know this legendary singer. Yet she has sold over 70 million records worldwide, which is insane considering that she has never broken into the Anglo-American English language market. She has over one billion streams on Spotify. Obviously, lots of people around the world love her music.

Laura Pausini is already the undisputed “Prima Donna” of Italian popular music (and arguably - at least for the pop melódica style - the “Primera Mujer” of Hispanic music, with her quarter century of Spanish language songs deeply influencing a whole generation of Latina and Latino singers). 

Laura has a superb, powerful, versatile voice that enables her to sing a broad range of styles, and appeals to audiences of all ages. She is a magnificent artist with palpable charisma, but also a woman who hasn’t let global superstardom go too much to her head: she manages to be both classy and down-to-earth; she is openhearted, funny, accessible, and lovable to people from a variety of cultures: not only from her native Italy, but also Spain, Mexico, Brazil, and many other places that all feel that she is "one of their own."

It's a remarkable natural talent she has: to have a genuine "international appeal" while still keeping connected to her roots, with her family and friends in the small village of Solarolo near Ravenna in Italy.

Laura's latest song, “Io Si” - featured in the movie The Life Ahead starring the remarkable 86 year old Sofia Loren - has been nominated for an Academy Award. I hope she can add the Oscar to her American Grammy (first Italian woman ever to win one, ironically for an album in Spanish from 2004) as well as her six Latin Grammys and countless international prizes. 

Here is Laura from a recent event, singing “Io Si” in Italian but speaking in English (which is her fifth language). You don't need to understand Italian to appreciate this beautiful song: (mobile site click link HERE)

January is Still January After All

This has always been a month of crazy variations in weather for the mid-Atlantic region of the USA, as far back as I can remember. And my memory from living in this area goes back forty years.

At the beginning of the week I was singing the praises of mild sunny days. Indeed, things got even warmer, so that on Thursday I was out in short sleeves, not just for a walk but also to soak in the sun while reading (see #1 [picture] below😉).

By Friday, however, the weather started getting angry. The heavy, gray, damp air moved in.

This afternoon, the rising wetness and the (relative) lowering temperatures brought on the sudden surprise documented in #2 [video]. I was lucky I didn’t get caught in the middle of this burst of rain-snow-sleet-whatever-it-was.

The squirrel in #3 [video - zoomed in] was not so lucky, but it made a fast dash for shelter. There was some “white stuff” (so it would appear from the pine tree in our backyard shown in #4 [photo], which I took from inside the house, behind the kitchen window). There was a bit more of it later. None of it stayed around for very long.

That’s January in Virginia. Next week could bring all sorts of surprises. And then comes February!

Why Do We Burn Against One Another?

Fires of anger and pain are burning in the world today. 

Human fires are ablaze, exploding beyond the bounds of human frustration, scorching the earth with divisiveness, vengeance, greed, rapaciousness, robbery, cruelty, murder. Human desperation seems intent upon burning up the world in fury, because it finds that nothing in the world can satisfy the human heart.

We cannot satisfy one another, nor can we repair the injuries we inflict on one another. So we entrench ourselves in opposing factions and continue to tear one another apart.

An eclipse of ugliness is upon many places in the world, covering over many facets of life with shadows. For too long we have sought this darkness, to cover over everything in reality that cannot be controlled by our own power. We have wanted to indulge the illusion that we are answerable to nothing beyond ourselves, that we are the masters of our own individual universes. Yet we cannot control our inevitable conflicts with others who grasp for the same power, and so we burn against one another.

This is what is at the core of our social problems, our political catastrophes, our wars. Our violence is a sign that we don't know why we're alive, and that we're frustrated and desperate in the face of our failure to generate our own identities and purposes for living.

But why are we alive?  

We have been created and called to find our fulfillment in the Infinite Mystery of God. We are given freedom so that we might grow in love as we journey toward God through history together with those who have been entrusted to us. But we are so indigent, so terribly vulnerable, so desperately in need. We stand before one other like open wounds, aching for "something" we don't know how to articulate, nor how to give to one another.

We are aching with our need for the love of God, and we will never have peace if we try to live our lives and organize the world pretending that God doesn't exist.

But where can we hope to find God?

It is Jesus Christ who brings us God, brings us healing, and brings us together.

Luminous Spaces

It is the middle of an eventful January 2021. In the midst of all our trials and tribulations, the world has not disappeared. And God is still good. All the time.

As of this moment the breath of life is in me, this being in accordance with God's wisdom and loving plan leading me to my eternal destiny.

I shall breathe deeply.

The first digital art image below captures something of the impression of a nearly perfect Winter afternoon in the Shenandoah Valley. Bright sun with a few clouds, 52 degrees(F), barely a breeze in the brisk air, and luminous spaces in every direction on the paths of my walk today. 

Rejuvenating!

The second digital art image presents the January sun as it sets beyond the pine trees.

In Violent Times, Christina Grimmie Shows Something "Greater"

Now it's four YEARS and seven months. But we love her more than ever!💚 

I have been marking the tenth day of each month for a long time, in memory and sorrow certainly, and yet from the beginning there has always been something more. This young woman continues to become more meaningful, more luminous, more a brilliant light and a source of courage for me.

Indeed, in these violent times, Christina Grimmie helps us all to remember what is greater, what gives ultimate value to life, what cannot be destroyed.💚💚

THEOPHANY: The Dove, The Father's Voice, The "Beloved Son"

We rejoice and are filled with wonder on this great and glorious feast day! 

The Christmas season culminates in the celebration of "the Baptism of Jesus," known in the early Church (and still in the Byzantine tradition) as the "Theophany." If we reflect on the icon here, we can understand better the significance of the event of Jesus's public participation in the "purification ritual" of John the Baptist, as recorded in the Gospels.

The emphasis is the mystery of the Trinity revealed, as the Spirit descends upon Jesus in the form of a dove and the Father's voice is heard ("theophany" is the "appearance of God"). 

Jesus is immersed in the waters, not for his own purification (he doesn't need it, obviously) but to consecrate the waters of the world by contact with his body and to begin the restoration of all creation as the New Adam. Jesus is naked (sometimes, as here, portrayed with a loincloth), which symbolizes the restoration of Adam's innocence before the Fall. Strange beasts and humanish forms under his feet symbolize the demons defeated by Jesus. John the Baptist gazes not at Jesus but at the Holy Spirit, corresponding to his own testimony in John 1:32-34. Angels wait upon the shore in adoration and readiness to serve Jesus who is the Lord of all creation. 

This is just a very brief reading of the icon. As we reflect on this symbolism, let us not be led to think that this is nothing more than a clever and imaginative mythological story. This imagery conveys the truth about a real event that happened to a real man, Jesus. He is revealed as the Father's Son, annointed by the Holy Spirit. These signs point to the opening up of God's Trinitarian Love to us, the Love that transforms us and brings all creation to its fulfillment.

"This is my beloved Son..." The voice of the Father singles out Jesus, and identifies Him in relation to human destiny. This man Jesus is the answer to the human search for the Mystery that sustains everything and gives ultimate meaning to life. God has answered the question of our hearts by entering our history as a man, giving His life to us, and accompanying us on the journey to our destiny, to live in the glory of His love forever. 

Christians receive the sacrament of baptism from Jesus, through His ministers, because God's love for the world and for every human person is not abstract, distant, cold and inaccessible. God has touched us in Jesus, our brother. His love enters our history and changes us. 

Let us therefore be grateful for our baptism, or - for those who do not yet know Him - ardently seek this encounter with the Mystery who heals and saves and brings the heart to fulfillment. Here is the "touch of God" who has come to meet every person on their journey, and who will begin to draw to Himself whoever opens their heart and asks for the truth and beauty of life.

"He Shall Bring Forth Justice to the Nations..."

"Thus says the Lord: Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased, upon whom I have put my spirit; he shall bring forth justice to the nations, not crying out, not shouting, not making his voice heard in the street. a bruised reed he shall not break, and as moldering wick he shall not quench, until he establishes justice on the earth; the coastlands will wait for his teaching.

"I, the Lord, have called you for the victory of justice, I have grasped you by the hand; I formed you, and set you as a covenant of the people, a light for the nations, to open the eyes of the blind, to bring out prisoners from confinement, and from the dungeon, those who live in darkness."

~Isaiah 42:1-4

Indeed, God the Father has sent His Son, the Eternal Word, to dwell among us. Joy to the world!

Love (1 John 4:8-16)

Love

(1 John 4:8-16)

Whoever is without love does not know God, 
for God is love.

In this way the love of God 
was revealed to us: 
God sent his only Son into the world 
so that we might have life through him.

In this is love: 
not that we have loved God, 
but that he loved us 
and sent his Son as expiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, 
we also must love one another. 

No one has ever seen God. 
Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us,
and his love is brought to perfection in us.

This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us,
that he has given us of his Spirit. 

Moreover, we have seen and testify
that the Father sent his Son as savior of the world. 

Whoever acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God,
God remains in him and he in God. 

We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us.

God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him. 

Strange Days, But "He Will Come, and Life Will Change"

The international celebration of Epiphany this year marked a day of distressing events in my own country, as well as much ongoing suffering in the world. Here in the United States of America, it is a cause of great sorrow and concern to witness the violence that we have nursed for far too long in our hearts pouring out into our streets, and into the Capitol Building in Washington DC to disrupt the special session of Congress that met to formally certify the results of the recent Presidential election.

For all the increase of our material power, our times continue to show how weak and vulnerable we are as human persons. This immense, complex society we have constructed is in reality so fragile.

But Jesus has come to bring the Father's mercy to embrace us in our weakness. Whatever darkness and troubles may lie ahead, He is our hope and strength.

The Year's First "Challenge": Turning 58

January 2, my birthday, turned out to be a beautiful warm sun-and-clouds kind of day. I treated myself to a good long walk this morning. Vistas of the Blue Ridge are everywhere!

I guess I could call the pictures juxtaposed below the "58 Year Challenge" (well, more like "57 Year" because I'm probably one year old in the first picture😉). Certainly no one would call me "babyface" today.

Thanks very much to everyone for the "Happy Birthday" wishes on various social media platforms. I always appreciate reading them and thinking of all of you, whether you be near or far, young or ... ahem ... "mature," etc. 

Wishing you a very Happy New Year!🎉⭐

The Christmas Octave Ushers in 2021

Today is the “Octave” of Christmas, and is dedicated in a special way to Mary, the Mother of God. “Christmas Day” is celebrated liturgically for eight days, and thus coincides with the end of the solar calendar year and the beginning of the new year. Thus we welcome the year 2021.

Meanwhile the “Christmas Season” continues to Epiphany and after. Keep celebrating the event of Christmas, the miracle of God’s love who has come to dwell with us.⭐️✝️

One Plus One Equals Three (A New Adventure Has Begun)

As this year ends and a new one approaches, it is the appropriate time to confide to this blog the news regarding what promises to be a dominant theme of my reflections in 2021.

To put it more simply and directly: my dear daughter-in-law Emily Janaro is three months pregnant.

Of course, John Paul and Emily have already told all their friends. But I have said very little so far. It's such an awesome reality. It humbles me once again, makes me grateful — so grateful — to be human, and ... well, I feel a bit shy, when it comes down to it.

Sure, we all know how these things "work" — here we are, a family, and John Paul and Emily got married, and they want plenty of kids, and well, ya know ... it's not like rocket science ...

And then, BOOM, there's a "someone," just like that, who is going to be a major part of the rest of our lives!

A new human person has already come into existence. Already, this new person is changing all of us around him or her in ways we never could have constructed from out of ourselves. This child, who right now is only the size of a peach, has already changed our whole family.

My wife and I are grandparents for the first time. Our daughters are aunts. My son and his wife are a father and mother.

Wait, what?? Let me say that again.

Grandparents. What is that like? Plenty of my old friends are grandparents now, so it shouldn't be a big deal... except that none of my friends are me! I am a grandfather. Sure, it doesn't involve much right now besides empathy for "the kids" in this new experience — "the kids" being John Paul and Emily, and especially Emily who has been a trooper through all the first trimester stuff.

Birth is, of course, the grand entrance of the child on the stage of life, and the cutting of the first and most physical of the many "umbilical cords" that nurture the child in the stages of growing up.

Birth is coming around July 2021.

But thanks to technology, this kid has already "Skyped" from inside the womb. They had their first sonogram weeks ago. The still pictures weren't very clear, but the live action and sound were a wonder. There is nothing quite like the first time you see and hear that new heart beating.

This was John Paul's and Emily's Instagram post
announcing the news a couple of weeks ago. 

When Eileen and I saw pictures of this first sonogram, we were amazed because the day is still clear in our memory when we first saw the sonogram and heard the heartbeat of this child's father. 

After the new year, they will have another sonogram, which might reveal whether the child is a "he" or a "she." He or she may acquire a name before birth. Then it's just one more step to Instagram! (just joking😉). Needless to say, I'll post "baby updates" (just like I used to do verbally in my classroom when we were expecting John Paul). Of course, our grandchild's mother will have veto power over any posts....

I feel a little bit giddy, like this is a totally new thing. We did have five babies... well, Eileen had five babies, but I was there supporting her, and I saw each one of them born (women reading this are so totally not impressed). But we're going to do whatever magic it is that grandparents do with their grandchildren, without a clue as to what that means, but no worries about it either. (As I recall with my own parents, the grandchildren did most of the "magic" and they just rode the wave.)

I decided (without much thought, but very spontaneously) that I will be called "Papa." Eileen will be "Nana." Our kids called my Dad "Papa," which was what he called his grandfather. The name has a lineage. "Papa" Pasquale Janaro born around 1880; his grandson "Papa" Walter born in 1935, and "Papa" John in 1963 (son John Paul, 1997, and first grandchild, 2021). There's a good chance that this child will live well beyond 2080, and perhaps even into the 22nd century.

That's a chunk of real history, potentially spanning four centuries in 200+ years. That's living, breathing history: my father's stories of his grandfather passed on to me, and me passing on the memories to the next two generations. It's a heritage of relationships.

Suddenly, I have a "new name" that has come down to me from the past. And the reference point for that name is the peach-sized baby who will keep growing and, with God's help, be born in six months.

G. K. Chesterton, in one of his mystical quips, once said that "God knows all things... except arithmetic!" He was referring to the incalculable, overflowing, gratuitous, boundless love of God. In God's eyes, one plus one does equal three, and much more. It flows over from persons to families to peoples linked through the generations. History. The "place" where God cultivates the human family with a tender wisdom, a "human ecology" that has proven resiliant through many trials. (We do well to remember it, and revere it.) Above all, history is where God gathers us in a more radical way as His children, as brothers and sisters of His Son Jesus Christ.

Before I was born or any of us were born, He loved this child. He wanted this child. He loved and wanted each one of us.

How can I not be in awe of this gratuitous love? I hope and pray that my grandchild, and others if God grants them, will experience a taste of this marvel, this beautiful mystery of love, in the heart of his or her family ... our family.

Letting Ourselves Be Loved By God

Pope Francis has preached very powerfully in this Christmas time on God's coming to dwell with us and what His presence means for our lives.

The astonishing revelation that we are loved awakens an unexpected joy in us, and a new sense of responsibility to say "yes" to Love, and to share the joy of love with the whole world.

"True nourishment in life comes from letting ourselves be loved by God and loving others in turn... God always loves us with a greater love than we have for ourselves... Only the love of Jesus can transform our lives, heal our deepest hurts and set us free from the vicious circles of disappointment, anger and constant complaint... Dear sister, dear brother, never be discouraged. Are you tempted to feel you were a mistake? God tells you, ‘No, you are my child.’ Do you have a feeling of failure or inadequacy, the fear that you will never emerge from the dark tunnel of trial? God says to you, ‘Have courage, I am with you' " (Pope Francis).

And today the Pope posted this picture and these words on Instagram (English and Spanish are provided here).

The Joy of Our Redemption

⭐️It’s the FIFTH DAY OF CHRISTMAS!⭐️

“Christmas Day” is a great festival that lasts for a whole week, and the season continues into January. The liturgy continues in these days to mark the glorious event of God’s coming to dwell with us. 

Keep celebrating the joy of His birth in your hearts and homes. This is the joy mysteriously at work deep within us, the joy of the redemption of our humanity that is stronger than all our sorrows and frustrations, all our disappointments and regrets, all our sins. 

Let us make room for Him, for His joy, for His inexhaustible love that draws near to each of us with tenderness and “longs for us” to welcome Him into our lives. His presence changes us, saves us, fulfills us and gives meaning to everything. 

We may feel like strangers in a strange world, far from home, perplexed by the brokenness of our lives, estranged from ourselves. But He has come to be with us, and He is our HOPE!

⭐️Merry Christmas.⭐️

For All the Innocents Who Suffer...

It is the Feast of the Holy Innocents. Let us pray for innocent victims of violence throughout the world.

The Family: A Wonderful and Fundamental Community

From homilies of Cardinal Karol Wojtyla (Saint John Paul II), Archbishop of Krakow, Poland, Christmas week 1968 and 1969.

"My dear brothers and sisters, today we are all filled with the Christmas joy which comes from the faith that God has been born into the world. However, our joy must expand and spread, so that each year it embraces new thoughts and events and brings them into the joy of Christmas, in order that the mystery of the Incarnation may grow fuller and fuller each year until the end of time."

"The mystery of the Holy Family concerns each individual family in a specific way, both husband and wife but also that special community which begins with their marriage, in other words, the community of parents and children. Whether this is a community of mature people or of those still in formation, it is a wonderful and fundamental community, and without it the human race would not exist.

"While we can change the parts of an engine, the fundamental human community of the family cannot be substituted. It must be served and helped to develop. It is not licit to destroy it, since it is a work of God."

When God "gave [man and woman] the power to transmit life, he invested them with the divine power of creation. Thus the work of creation continues through the family in every age and generation of human history. As parents, you are partners with God and share in his work in a way in keeping with the dignity of the human person. The Creator wants the work of creation to be manifested in every human family and, through the family, in every people and society and in humanity as a whole."

Jesus comes to redeem and fulfill creation. "The work of redemption shows us the full value of everything human and especially of marriage and the family. It is as if God himself — symbolized in the family by every newborn child — said to every couple: 'See how beautiful it is, and how it is both human and divine!' This is the meaning of today's feast.

"The divine and human beauty that exists in the family can only be gained through constant effort. It is not ready-made, but must be worked for by every couple. We are quite right in saying that marriage is based on love; we find this truth in the gospel. However, we must immediately add that true love makes us capable of taking on the tasks and problems of married and family life and that if it does not give us this capacity it cannot be called love. We should therefore be careful not to debase this wonderful word that was spoken by the Son of God as the greatest commandment.

"Through marriage and the family Christ carries out his work of redemption, which he won for us on the cross. However, just as Christ came to resurrection through the cross, so too, difficulties and hardship bring us to the true values of marital and family love and real formation and development: first and foremost the mutual formation of husband and wife and then the education of their children."

"We are all of us overwhelmed and dumbfounded in the face of the divine love which took on human flesh and entered into the human spirit. We compare our miserable human love with his immeasurable love, and we pray that love may grow within us, that it may never be extinguished despite any difficulties or obstacles, and that it may never dim but always grow stronger. May it never dim or fail, particularly in our families, in our marriages, and in relations between children and parents and between old and young... May it grow ever stronger within our society and withstand every effort to undermine or destroy it. 

"These are our wishes as we gather at this eucharistic table on which in a few moments, as at every Mass, Christ will be born to become our bread and to nourish us. Let us say to him today: 'Welcome! Come to us, be our nourishment, and teach us to love.'"

Merry Christmas 2020

Christ is Born! Come, let us adore Him!

We had a lovely Christmas Day, and look forward to observing with gratitude the coming weeks of this beautiful Christmas season.

The table and food were great as always:

Lovely and great above all was the woman who always makes it happen. Thank you, Eileen!

He Has Come to Dwell With Us

He has come to dwell with us.

He has come, the One who creates and sustains our very being, our intelligence, our freedom. 

He has come, the One who is the ineffable source of the miracle that manifests itself everytime one of these strange little material entities in the universe says, "I am a 'someone'" and when it sees another speck of cosmic dust like itself and says, "You are a 'someone'!"

He has come, the One who makes our mysterious, otherwise inexplicable personhood real, vital, and so intimate that it is truly "our own." He comes to be with us, to be close to us, to fulfill to the end His fidelity, His mercy, His love for us.

He has come: Jesus.

He, the Eternal Word, took flesh in the womb of a woman, the always-and-all-holy woman He chose and prepared to be His mother. Jesus born of the Virgin Mary.

He has come to dwell with us, to make us His brothers and sisters. 

He wants us to be with Him forever, to share with Him the fulllfillment of all things, and above all to share in His own inexhaustible life, His glory, His joy, His love.

He comes, who encompasses and surpasses all our aspirations. Let us take time, in these days, to make room for Him in the center of our hearts, of our lives.

Distance Overcome

Agnese Janaro Turns 22

The birthdays come in thick this time of year for our bunch. Earlier this month was Teresa (as I have already noted). Now Agnese turns 22. Before the end of the year, my mother will be 82. Then just after New Year's comes my 58th birthday.

Thus the seasons change once again. Winter has come and the days will begin to grow longer again.

Happy Birthday, Agnese. We love you! We are so grateful to God for you.⭐

COVID and Society: As 2020 Ends, Cracks Widen in the Ground

Looking back from this late-December vantage point at the wreckage of the past year, I am much troubled and filled with sorrow. Many of my "troubles" are personal and/or pathological (indeed, I have been suffering from a strong bout of depression for the past month), so I generally avoid trying to draw corollaries between my "moods" and the specific problems of our times. I do have some broad observations drawn from the obviously increasing degenerative condition of our technologically hyper-developed society, with its misshapen and haphazardly scattered engines of material power that we grasp more desperately even as our ignorance (our lack of wisdom) grows greater.

Some things are simply puzzling. Certainly, the answer to the larger question "Where do we go from here?" is something we will probably only learn as we stumble through it (and even then only if we're paying attention). But there are plenty of particular puzzles too, in this year when the strangeness of life has inescapably confronted even our ordinary routines.

The resurgence of COVID in these recent weeks and months has hardly been a surprise to anyone. (Did we really even get a “break” since March?) Serious illness continues to burden victims and hospitals everywhere. Meanwhile there seem to be more people in our local region coming down with “mild cases” identified by positive tests or by some of the more peculiar symptoms of the virus. Now, several different versions of the COVID vaccine are beginning to be administered, according to where the need is greatest.

As Christmas approaches and the year nears its end, we are still wondering how this whole global phenomenon will play itself out. In the U.S.A., the situation remains "complicated." Infections are still on the rise of a disease that, for a great many if not most people, manifests itself as a flu-like illness that resolves itself in a couple of weeks, along with some odd, lingering effects like temporary loss of taste and smell.

In the proximate environment in which I live, COVID doesn’t seem to strike people as anything unusually or horribly dangerous, and they and their immediate circle of relatives and friends seem to weather it pretty well.

Thank God for that.

In any given locality, COVID does not look like that big of a problem... UNTIL IT IS!!! Add to your “immediate circle” just one person who is susceptible to grave infection and he or she can become life-threateningly sick. And while age and predisposing conditions have been identified as more likely to bring on the more dangerous forms of COVID, it has also landed serious and even fatal hits on young and otherwise healthy people.

Recommended precautions by public health authorities require some measure of sacrifice, but people are increasingly worn out by all these months of vigilance. Frequently they are not careful, which is like playing Russian roulette with the disease. Just because many people “dodge the bullet” doesn’t mean they are behaving in a responsible way.

Overall, I hope that what I have seen in my own country during this past year is not an example of how we plan to respond habitually to future national emergencies. 

Those in the hospital, along with medical personnel and healthcare workers, have a vivid sense of what is (and will continue to be) at stake in grappling with an unprecedented public health crisis. And it is a crisis, if for no other reason than the fact that we are dealing with the sudden appearance of a new, globally transmitted disease that health experts are still trying to understand. It's the kind of phenomenon where civil action needs to be taken: people who have responsibility for the common good must exercise their authority. We immediately think of legislators and public officials, but a healthy society also has established social institutions that need to serve as reference points in a time when unified action is needed.

Our community has commonly accepted processes whereby experts in medical science are verified, and there are associations that oversee the quality of their work. It's a deeply flawed process, and may well not always produce an "academy" of ideal competence, but in a time of emergency their established social position must be given a measure of credit. Unless they recommend that we do evil in order to obtain a good result, it is entirely reasonable to accept and implement their "guidelines" (individual circumstances allow for prudence and flexibility here, but the common good needs to remain in focus for everyone). 

For many ordinary U.S. citizens during this pandemic, however, maximizing certain recommended practices of self-restraint and minimizing the risk of spreading infection have not been perceived very clearly as civic responsibilities. Instead, there has been a tendency for both “sides” of this nation’s chronically over-politicized and acutely dysfunctional civic culture to interpret adherence to health precautions as a partisan action, a demonstration of allegiance to or rebellion against "government intervention." It has often seemed, too, that public officials have been too ready to hijack the story of the pandemic (from different angles) in support of their own demagoguery.

All of this is very disturbing for someone like me, who experiences his own health as a particular area of vulnerability. I don't mean this in the sense of a personal fear of contracting the disease in a serious and dangerous form. I wouldn't want that to happen, of course, but the "vulnerability" I'm referring to here is broader in scope. To use an analogy, a person who has difficulty walking is more aware of their dependence on the solidity of the ground under their feet. They are more vulnerable to earthquakes. In battles, they are more likely to be "collateral damage."

So many things are troubling, beyond the impact of the COVID pandemic itself and the socioeconomic problems it has occasioned. The U.S.A.’s popular pandemic response has been too much burdened by a dialectic of hypocritical moralism versus individualistic revolt. In my opinion, the capricious and sometimes chaotic behavior of national political leadership has exacerbated the problem, as have those elements in the press and media that have engaged in relentless provocation and their own political grandstanding or pursuit of settling scores.

The U.S.A. has had difficulty in dealing with the pandemic as a unified civil society. What does this indicate? Certainly it would be easy enough to say that we are beginning to "reap the whirlwind," that we are on the threshold of seeing the cracks in our social order widen to the point where they themselves will begin to rupture the most mundane elements of our daily routines.

Ever since I can remember (over 50 years), ominous voices in our society have declared that we are falling apart, that chaos is just around the corner. It has often looked that way before. And yet much has endured, and new worthwhile possibilities have been realized. Even in this darkness, a wonder persists, and grows, and deepens — something greater is being engendered, something with a hidden but inexhaustible solidity.

No matter what, I am grateful for my life. If my perspective is dim at the moment, that doesn't mean I have forgotten what makes it worthwhile to get up every day, and set about living life with the expectation that truth and goodness will always make a way forward, even when the earth shakes and its noise drives people to folly, and everywhere they sharpen the weapons of war.

There are other forces at work in history, beyond our violence and stupidity.

Just "One Cup"...

Now THIS is what I call a "CUP" of coffee! 😉🍵❗