How Can We Learn to Give and Receive Mercy?

Jesus said, “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:36). The need for mercy presses itself upon us in these days, as the clouds of war darken the skies all around us. War should remind us that we are all broken and conflicted within ourselves, and in our daily relationships with one another. Jesus tells us to “be merciful” to one another, but it’s so difficult. How can we learn to give and receive mercy?

Sometimes it seems like we're trying to put "mercy" in a box and dole it out according to our own measure. This is an effort that cannot succeed, and it's just as well because our measure is so meager.

The mercy of other people is at best a sign and an instrument of the ineffable, overflowing mercy of God. We must turn to Him, beg for His mercy, and ask Him for the grace to be drawn by His love so that we will adhere to Him and trust in His mercy.

I beg to remember His abiding love every day, to remain in Him, to trust in His mercy. He knows me. In His mercy He knows the undying thirst of my soul; He knows my heart's longing in a way that I don't even begin to understand. I pray that I might trust in Him to lead me to my destiny.

I want to live this relationship with the God who makes me exist in this very moment, the God who is Infinite Love. I want to live in adoration and gratitude to the God who is all-powerful and all-good beyond my understanding, the God who is “my Father.” I must trust in His mercy to give me what I need (because I don't know what I need — I don't really know my true self). I must trust in His mercy also to break off from me the things that keep me from attaining the real fulfillment for which I have been made, which is nothing else but Him.

I need to trust His tenderness and His gentleness, which endure even when all other affirmations or consolations are absent and I feel abandoned and alone. In this solitude I can only cry out to Him and long for Him in the firm conviction that He hears me, He wants me, and that the darkness and emptiness are the vast spaces of the mystery of His inexhaustible Heart that holds me.

I know that God “wants” me because He has sent His Son (God from God, the Person of the Father’s Son, who is always with the Father and the Holy Spirit in the inexhaustible mystery of the Trinity, the Mystery of Eternal Love, the One God who is a communion of Three Persons). He has loved me—and all of us—in His Son, His “Word” who is not only “spoken to us” but who has become flesh, taken our human nature, born of the Virgin Mary to dwell with us, die for our sins, rise from the dead to create us anew. 

Jesus is God made man, our brother, and He loves us. He came into my life, my own history, first — through an event, my Baptism. And through His enduring presence in His Church, I grow in this encounter with Him—adhering to Him through faith, in the life of faith, hope, and love that His Spirit engenders within me. I believe too that He loves every person, and that this same Holy Spirit is at work in the history of every person, working within the mystery of their own freedom, drawing each of them according to a wisdom greater than our understanding. 

I can trust in God, who has taken hold of my whole life (and who embraces the life of every person) through the humanity of Jesus Christ. Jesus knows who I am, and He carries me in my suffering and accompanies me through all the depths of darkness and the experience of feeling abandoned and alone. He has made those depths His own. His mercy is His brokenness on the Cross, which He invites me to share.

The best way we can show mercy to one another is to help bear one another's burdens. We are called to open our hearts—with great humility—to the mystery of the other person's suffering. This is what we need from one another. It is the way that we can discover the presence of Jesus in every person's life, not with condescension but with a great reverence for the person.

I must welcome this person, because this person is loved by Jesus. It is the great Heart of Jesus that gives value and dignity to every person and to all our relationships. Whenever I speak to a person, my words should be shaped by the desire that Jesus come more fully to us both — to heal us in His mercy and draw us together along the paths of His mercy. I beg for the grace of this humility, for myself, for you — my dear brother or sister — for all of us. I am not “naturally” humble or welcoming of others. None of us are, in the measure that God calls us to be. He calls us to be like Him. We cannot make ourselves “like Him” by our own strength; we need the transforming power of His grace that forgives our sins, gives us a share in His life, and empowers us to live in a new way — to love one another and to be merciful to one another. We must all beg for the grace of this adoring responsiveness in love to the God who is Love.

As Pope Francis says, "We cannot trust in our own strength, but only in Jesus and in His mercy." Indeed, our strength is much too small to fathom the mercy of God. Our strength is too frail to bear His weakness on the cross.

Jesus, enable me to be merciful.
Have mercy on me.
Make me an instrument of Your mercy.

Jesus, I trust in You.

Francis: “War Erases the Future”

Words from Pope Francis’s General Audience of October 18, 2023 (courtesy of Instagram):

October 17, 2023: Praying and Fasting for “Justice and Peace”

Catholics and other Christians and people of good will around the world have been praying and fasting on this day for “justice and peace” in solidarity with all those who are suffering: terrorist victims, hostages, and their families; civilians trapped without basic necessities and under bombardment; Israelis and Palestinians; Jews, Muslims, and Christians… Here are some words from my brother and sister Catholics ‘on the ground,’ immediately involved, offering their sufferings and themselves…

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“We have offered our readiness at least to try to bring the hostages back, at least some of them, this is being attempted. It is very difficult because, for mediation, you need to have interlocutors. And at this moment, it's not possible to talk to Hamas… Am I ready for an exchange? [i.e. to voluntarily become a hostage to Hamas in exchange for the release of the other hostages.] Anything, if this can lead to freedom and bring those children back home, no problem. On my part, absolute willingness.”

~Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, 

  Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem

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“We want peace because war does no one any good. We want this brutal war to end. Many people have lost their loved ones, their homes, and everything they have. We ask for justice: justice and peace. The Palestinian people also have the right to live. We ask not to punish the population because of a fanatic group. And then we ask that you pray for us.”

~Sister Nabila Saleh, 

  Holy Family Catholic Church, Gaza

When We Lose Someone to Suicide, the Wound Remains…

Below is a poem that I wrote over a decade ago and that has appeared on this blog before. I don’t know what to say about it, really. I know that on a beautiful October day, 18 years ago, I learned of the tragic death of a very special friend—a friend from a family that has been close to our family for three generations. He had visited us with his brother fairly recently, and we knew that his depression had turned in a dangerous direction (though apparently he was able to hide it from people in general). 

His depression was different (and much more severe) than anything I have suffered in my “constellation” of mental illnesses over the years. He was very sick. We knew he was struggling, and that there was a danger… but who imagines that these things can really happen?

This seems like it was a long time ago, and I have mourned and grown and have been healed in many ways. It’s a different time in my life. I am passing through the grief of the deaths of my own parents (who were his godparents). I have also mourned together with other friends whose families have been plunged into sorrow over suicide. There have been too many people who have lost their lives, and too many families who have had to endure this suffering.

But it’s been a long time since the death of my friend, and so much has happened since then. I would think that the “emotion” expressed in this poem would be something I would feel only “remotely” at this point, as an attentive compassion to others who go through this, and as a cry to God in prayer that the epidemic of suicide might not be such a scourge in our part of the world—where we have so much wealth, where we think we can be “safe” and secure, where we have so many resources for improving mental health, where we have “awareness” and where much is being learned and put into practice to improve people’s lives and address their many hidden crises and traumas. 

Much good is being done. Many lives are being saved, and many people are being treated successfully for illnesses that were scarcely acknowledged to exist when I was a child. My own medical and therapeutic treatment for depression and OCD, sustained by a supportive environment, must be regarded as a success (my physical health… well, that’s another story, but overall I manage it). Without mental healthcare I don’t know what kind of bizarre husband and father I would have been during the past decade-and-a-half (during the time the kids were growing up and needed a loving and mentally stable father). Instead, it hasn’t been a disaster, and it seems that I have done okay—I now have four basically normal young adults (😉), a couple of great in-laws, and — what a wonder! — grandchildren. (We still have a teenager at home, of course, so stay tuned… the adventure goes on!) I am grateful: for the grace of God, the love and patience of my amazing wife, and access to good mental healthcare in the ways I have needed it.

We need an “army” of mental health professionals today—an army that is strong enough to be compassionate and tender, to bring merciful aid to those who are suffering. Many people don’t get the medical care, the therapy, the counseling, the accompanying that they need for the disorders and traumas and wounds that they suffer in this unprecedentedly stressful and tumultuous world. Humans (especially in the “rich world”—the “West”—the world I know best) live in environments and with powers and possibilities that no human beings have ever had before. We also live with a hyper-vulnerability, being continually invaded by these new forces we think we control. We are exposed and turned inside out by gigantic (sometimes monstrous) collective and interconnected experiences that can dominate our interiority, crowd out self-reflection, and confuse our need for transcendence by overwhelming us with spectacles of material power that are only transitory, that leave us frustrated and hollow.

This is the “front” in our war. It is a strange war. The enemy is opaque. But the explosions are all around us, in the emergence of this ever-evolving artificially-constructed human world—a world of unprecedented power that envelopes us, that we think we are “using” but that we don’t understand (with wisdom). Therefore, it invades everything we do with its own relentless dynamics, shaking us, stretching us, deluding us, exhausting us. We are all at least a little bit “concussed.” We need the place that has been called the “field hospital,” where there are inexhaustible resources of mercy for the whole of our humanity. Mental healthcare needs to be vitally connected to the “field hospital;” it can contribute to bring healing because it is a work of mercy.

Life. It’s hard for everyone. There’s no shame in admitting it. When we recognize our vulnerability and ask for the fullness of life, for true freedom, for an answer to our yearning hearts, then we begin to live in a new way, unmasking the “absolutist” pretenses of every finite power, and beginning to understand with wisdom, begging for the gifts that enable us to engage this gigantic world with a gigantic compassion. Mostly we will fail, we will be overwhelmed, we will be wounded. But it is the begging that matters, the giving-over of our weakness to that “Weakness that is stronger than every strength” (see 1 Corinthians 1:25).

My memory of my beloved friend, and of that day nearly twenty years ago, is full of hope. But it’s not a “cheap hope.” Even though many other needs and challenges have come since then that have “distanced” me from the tragedy, I still know that losing my friend to suicide remains an open wound. It still cries out to be healed. Occasionally its vividness rises up, prompted by this or that circumstance. I can’t really explain. There are tears, and I do not understand them, but they flow… even now… once in a while. They cry for healing, and for a greater love—a love that hopes all things, endures all things… a love that never ends.

We all need healing. We all have wounds that cry for a greater love.

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In Memory of a Friend

"He didn't seem like he was depressed and was always smiling. This is shocking" (Anon).

A bright autumn day
colors 

crisp
sunlight flashing on the windows.
A clear day, blue with painted hues of leaf.

I stood strong and tall
in the breezy wind
and felt life once again
like great power
from my head flowing down through me.

With large strides
I passed over the fields
drinking fountains of expansive air.

And with the red sun playing on my head,
I burst through the door
but her face was bloodless white.
I stopped, and suddenly
the October air froze on my skin.

She searched my face
with a gaze of shiny wet cheeks
and spoke your name,
and this single word
had a weight
that said everything.

Fire arose in my bones
and spread all over me
until it found my eyes.

And the sun flickered in the shadows.

              --in memoriam, jp, +october 17, 2005

Israel and Palestinian Gaza: The Brink of Full Scale War

We wait, holding our breath, as Israeli ground forces mobilize on the border of the Palestinian territory of Gaza, an impoverished, desperately overcrowded, chaotic strip of Mediterranean coastline where most of the population of 2.1 million people live a daily struggle for survival. They are hemmed in together behind Israel’s defensive wall in conditions little better than prison—conditions that have arisen in consequence of the failure and breakdown of previous diplomatic agreements for a process leading to a “two-state-solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the midst of these multitudes of innocent civilians there are also groups of anti-Israel militants who hope to overthrow the State of Israel with help from hostile Islamist neighboring countries and (even) governments. They want all Israeli people to live in fear (including those who have politically opposed the current hard-line government and have actively worked for Palestinian rights); they practice terrorism as a form of jihad (“holy war”), and those who die performing terrorist acts are regarded as “martyrs.” Meanwhile some Israelis would like to drive all Palestinians from the land, and until then impose as many restraints on them as possible. The failure of dialogue between these two peoples has left the field of action bereft of the possibilities for creative and human solutions, and that space has been filled by polarized ideologues who are ready—once again—to place their trust in war. The innocent ones—the Israelis and Palestinians who seek peaceful coexistence, dialogue, real interpersonal and communal solutions—they are the victims and will continue to be the victims as this war escalates.

What can we do? We can stand in solidarity with them. We can pray for them—with real prayer, with the prayer that the Pope calls “the meek and holy force to oppose the diabolical force of hatred, terrorism, and war.” We can also make an offering to God and a gesture of solidarity by fasting. People all over the world will pray and fast for peace on this coming Tuesday, October 17.

Meanwhile, the Pope urges us to continue to remember “tormented Ukraine.” Really, these are not two separate wars. They are related in more ways than we realize. But regardless, we must have hearts and minds that are larger than the trending topics on Twitter/“X”/…whatevah. The suffering of peoples is made known to us in our era by “real time” multimedia. Some follow it as a form of “entertainment” while others feel powerless in front of the weight of all the suffering all over the world, and would prefer not to think about it. 

But seeing and hearing about these events can be an opportunity to pray-with and suffer-with our brothers and sisters in distress. It may seem a small thing, but—like a cup of water to the thirsty or a visit to a sick neighbor—it is prayer-in-loving-action, it is a work of mercy. We are human persons. We are not information collectors. We have hearts. Whatever our circumstances, our hearts can unite in begging for God’s mercy, and can reach out to accompany those who are suffering—we can’t “fix” them, but we can draw near to them, even if only in our hearts, so that they do not suffer alone. Our hearts can extend themselves in mercy, and we must beg God to enlarge our hearts. Mercy is the new reality that is building up and transforming our world. We are called to participate in this work, in this mystery of mercy.

Texts from Pope Francis and the assembly of Catholic bishops of the Holy Land:

“I continue to follow what is happening in Israel and Palestine with tears and apprehension: many people killed, others injured. I pray for those families who have seen a feast day transformed into a day of mourning, and I ask that the hostages be released immediately. It is the right of those who are attacked to defend themselves, but I am very concerned about the total siege under which the Palestinians are living in Gaza, where there have also been many innocent victims. Terrorism and extremism do not help reach a solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, but fuel hatred, violence, revenge, and only cause each to other suffer. The Middle East does not need war, but peace, a peace built on dialogue and the courage of fraternity” (Pope Francis, General Audience, October 11).

“I continue to follow with great sorrow what is happening in Israel and Palestine. I think again of the many… in particular of the children and the elderly. I renew my appeal for the freeing of the hostages and I strongly ask that children, the sick, the elderly, women, and all civilians not be made victims of the conflict. Humanitarian law is to be respected, especially in Gaza, where it is urgent and necessary to ensure humanitarian corridors and to come to the aid of the entire population. Brothers and sisters, already many have died. Please, let no more innocent blood be shed, neither in the Holy Land nor in Ukraine, nor in any other place! Enough! Wars are always a defeat, always!

“Prayer is the meek and holy force to oppose the diabolical force of hatred, terrorism and war. I invite all believers to join with the Church in the Holy Land and to dedicate next Tuesday, 17 October, to prayer and fasting…

“I am looking at the Ukrainian flags: let us not forget tormented Ukraine” (Angelus, October 15).

A VLOG POST About Autumn, Time, and How We Grow

Here is a short “VLOG POST” from mid-October (filmed 10/13, revised 10/17). Our Shenandoah Valley has begun to “feel” the change of seasons. Sitting along Happy Creek at sunset in mid-October, JJ talks about the season of Autumn… in the year and in his life. Time is given to us to grow and bear fruit.

Here’s the link to “JJProf’s” YouTube channel:

Christina Grimmie: “Wear Your Heart Out…”

It has now been seven years and four months since the murder of Christina Grimmie in Orlando, Florida at an open meet-and-greet after what turned out to be her final concert on June 10, 2016. In her honor, I have attempted to create a cartoon meme.

She remains a luminous witness even today to the truth that the Love of God through Jesus Christ is “all [we] need.”

A New Outbreak of Terrorism and War in Israel and Palestine

Last Saturday, the Islamic terrorist group Hamas carried out a massive attack on Israeli territory, using advanced technology to disable and breach the wall surrounding Palestinian Gaza and invade Israeli territory, seizing hostages and brutally murdering hundreds of men, women, and children in Israeli villages and at a local music festival. At the same time, rockets were fired from Hamas outposts in Gaza against Israeli targets.

My heart and soul go out to everyone who has suffered because of this monstrous and shameful attack, especially my many Jewish friends whose loved ones may have been impacted, or may still be in danger. This all must be terrifying in ways I can scarcely imagine. There is so much frustration, pain, and sadness that still afflict so many Israeli people: good people who wish only to live in their own homes, in safety and security, without grand ideological ambitions, in peace, freedom, and equity with all their neighbors who come from diverse religious and cultural traditions.

Why is there so much violence on this little piece of earth?

The political and military leaders of the State of Israel are determined to do whatever it takes to fight terrorism with all the power at their disposal—to restrain, cut off, and uproot the sources of danger to their people and their nation. But how? Are there means available that are not tainted by retaliation, feeding the cycle of violence, taking revenge for the shedding of innocent blood by shedding more innocent blood? Many good people find that this question has forced itself upon them. How hard it can be, in the face of great danger! It’s not a situation anyone would choose to face. In these circumstances, alas, it has evoked a response that increases suffering and sorrow.

Taken totally by surprise by the weekend attack, Israel has declared war on Hamas and has begun relentlessly bombing Gaza. The awful fact remains that these criminal and barbaric Hamas terrorists embed themselves and operate in the midst of the extremely densely populated and impoverished people of Gaza; they are indistinguishable from the rest of the 2+ million civilian inhabitants crowded into the confines of 365 square kilometers of the Eastern Mediterranean shore. Gaza’s Palestinian people—including women, children, and the elderly—are inevitably the victims of an ongoing Israeli bombardment of their region as Israel tries to seek out and destroy Hamas.

The present tragedy is that a “war against Hamas” (even motivated by an effort of self-defense) means war against the entire population of Gaza. Forgive me, but I cannot be silent: this kind of indiscriminate “total war” is never justifiable and can never bear fruit. There is no effective way to limit the destruction it unleashes. As a Catholic, I think that Vatican II expresses it well when it teaches that “war aimed indiscriminately at the destruction of entire cities of extensive areas along with their population is a crime against God and man himself. It merits unequivocal and unhesitating condemnation” (Gaudium et Spes 80). This teaching is also a reasonable inference drawn from the truth about human nature and the dignity of human persons. 

Yet the tremendous fears of the Israeli people are also reasonable, awful, and accurate: Hamas seems to have “upped its game” as a sophisticated and coordinated military threat that can plan unprecedented invasion projects and deploy technical force in new and more dangerous ways. It is hard to imagine that they could have acquired these capacities without third party training and support. Syria and Iran has been indicated as possible sponsors, and behind these Islamic countries that oppose any form of the State of Israel there lurks the long shadow of another hegemonic and increasingly nihilistic power that at this very moment continues to prove its dedication to waging criminal warfare. We cannot assume that Russia has ceased to export its ruthless and destructive tactics to violent militants in Africa and the Middle East, even though the notorious Wagner Group has allegedly been disbanded. It’s certainly “convenient” for Russia’s expansionist war in Ukraine that another “front” has opened up in the Middle East that will divide the attention of NATO, the United States of America, and the U.N. and perhaps draw that attention away from Russia’s plan to pummel the civilian infrastructure of Ukraine this coming winter.

Meanwhile, Palestinians and Israelis appear to be trapped in a toxic and intractable situation that will bring further death, destruction, and misery to countless Jews, Muslims, and Christians in the place known as “The Holy Land.” Alas, it’s a very old and very long story. In its most recent chapters, the modern dynamic of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has been a running source of hatred and violence that has been passed from generation to generation. It has been a constant feature of world news for my entire life.

I have not so much as a hint of how to resolve these conflicts. 

I know that I want the modern nation of Israel to flourish as a homeland for the Jewish people, who have such ancient roots and such a unique history in relation to this land. I also want others who call this region home to have their rights and freedoms fully respected. Religious freedom and uninhibited access to the places of pilgrimage (some of which are considered “holy” by Jews, Muslims, and Christians) are fundamentally necessary. In the abstract, there is widespread agreement on these points, but particular claims and counterclaims have become tied in knots that no one seems to know how to unravel. Assertions of power, terrorism, and war have only tightened the knots. Negotiations and mutual concessions take place between leaders, only to be reinterpreted by new political leaders or rejected by new militant “movements” (like Hamas).

Over the years, I have learned a little about the legitimate needs and the unjust actions of the various parties that have fought over this territory since I was four years old. Peace, even in the form of “coexistence” (which is the lowest level of human interaction, but which will suffice for now, in the present circumstances), along with respect for the rights, needs, and legitimate aspirations of everyone, the renunciation of violence, the commitment to ongoing dialogue to resolve disputes and understand one another better: these are the substance of agreements made by political leaders in treaties again and again and again.

Political leaders cry, “Peace!” but their is no peace. War rages in the ancient land that is so specially loved by God, the land of God’s covenant, of the Law and the prophets; the land where God Himself began to dwell with the human race and—by the events of His crucifixion and resurrection—won for the human heart an ineradicable destiny of union with Himself. Why?! Why so much bloodshed? 

The theologian might respond that “if the Lord’s Providence permits this terrible warfare, it must be because He foresees that it will ultimately lead to a greater peace that glorifies His infinite mercy.” It’s easy enough to say these words, and ultimately I think they are true. But this “theological observation” does not reduce the existential horror of these acts of violence, destruction, and death. What do I know about these raw, harsh realities? As a thinker and writer—and an old fool who has scarcely begun to understand the meaning of the words he has played games with all his life—I grasp for words like straws when confronted with the terrifying need to struggle against the twisted ways of the human heart when it is bent upon evil. I grasp for words, like the long reeds growing on the riverbank that I would lunge for when my boat was overturned, desperately hoping they might help keep me from being swept away by the raging current. 

Words: they may even be true, but they may also hurl us more deeply into the Mystery that sometimes seems so obscure—because we cannot make our eyes or our hearts “large enough” to trust the ineffable ways that Love triumphs over evil. Yet we must trust in the ways of Love. We don’t “understand” and maybe all we can do is suffer these ways of Love, suffering in hope (so seemingly fragile and yet resilient enough to give us strength to take the next step)—hanging on to the hope that Love’s promise will be fulfilled. Ultimately, where else can we go? God is Love, and we must never give up seeking and working for God’s peace even in the face of apparent impossibility.

But my heart finds no consolation, right now, in mere words. I weep for this sacred land. It has been like an open wound in this modern world—a world that has such ardent desires for “peace” without really knowing what peace is. Perhaps the suffering of the Middle East, along with so many other open wounds throughout the world, will open our hearts to an encounter with the One whose peace changes us, and thereby brings greater peace to the world. I weep, and I long for this peace; I beg for it, as I mourn the awful deaths of so many of my Jewish, Muslim, and Christian brothers and sisters and the corresponding afflictions brought down upon perpetrators and victims alike.

I weep and pray.

An “Ever Closer Union” With Jesus, Through Mary

“In the Rosary we turn to the Virgin Mary so that she may guide us to an ever closer union with her Son Jesus to bring us into conformity with him, to have his sentiments and to behave like him. Indeed, in the Rosary while we repeat the Hail Mary we meditate on the Mysteries, on the events of Christ’s life, so as to know and love him ever better” (Pope Francis).

Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary.

“Autumn Evening”

“Autumn Evening” ( #JJStudios #DigitalArt ).

The Synod: Learning to “Walk Together”

The XVI General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops has gathered in Rome after a long process of preparation that entailed meetings of dialogue among bishops, priests, and lay people in dioceses all over the world. It would be too much to generalize and simply say that it was a fruitful experience for the younger churches in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, but a complicated, perplexing, over-structured, and sometimes agenda-driven process for the wealthy churches of Europe and North America. It’s not surprising that some of us in “the West” can be anxious about a process that appears to be intent on “listening to everyone.” We have had over a century of experiences (and reinforcing media narratives) that might well incline us to view all human interaction as a struggle of hyper-partisan power politics. This is not without reason, and indeed points to a potential human dynamic wherein ideologies can “hijack” a well-intentioned dialogue and turn it into an opportunity to sow dissent and confusion while increasing their own power in society.

Thus, the fears or the expectations of our peoples might easily stand in the way of our perceiving what the event and the grace of this “Synod on Synodality” really is for the whole Church. Pope Francis is pursuing “the synodal path” for reasons entirely different from the preoccupations of the Western media. He believes that this difficult effort is necessary because it is God’s will for the whole Church today, and for the Church’s evangelizing mission in the world. So often we fail to recognize that the Synod is an ecclesial event whose value cannot be measured by this-worldly criteria. Even if it yields nothing that gains our excitement, or appears to be “a failure” in earthly terms, we must not ignore what the Holy Spirit is trying to accomplish—where the Spirit is leading the Church—in these initial and vulnerable steps toward a more profound mutual understanding and compassion among the members of Christ’s Body, a fuller involvement of ourselves in the real possibilities for living in the world today (amidst epochal changes) as brothers and sisters of Christ, and as servants of everyone.

We have too little faith in the fact that Jesus Christ really is the Head of the Church, that He directs the Church in the ways of His redeeming love, and has promised to be with us always in our journey through this present life. But if we listen to Pope Francis with the expectation of recognizing the grace of God at work in him to lead the Church, we would recognize the supernatural value of this Synod with patience and confidence that it will bear fruit. Indeed, the fruits of the Synod are ripening even now.

Pope Francis knows this, and he is dedicated—as “Vicar of Christ” at the present moment in history—to lead the Church’s first new steps in “walking together” and being the light of the world.

We should listen to the Pope’s words (below, in bold type), as he preached in the October 4 opening Mass, in which he reminds us of the gaze of Jesus that defines us, communicates Divine love to us, and challenges us “to be a Church that, with a glad heart, contemplates God's action and discerns the present. And which, amid the sometimes agitated waves of our time, does not lose heart, does not seek ideological loopholes, does not barricade itself behind preconceived notions, does not give in to convenient solutions, does not let the world dictate its agenda. This is the spiritual wisdom of the Church, summarized with serenity by Saint John XXIII: ‘It is necessary first of all that the Church should never depart from the sacred patrimony of truth received from the Fathers. But at the same time she must ever look to the present, to the new conditions and new forms of life introduced into the modern world which have opened new avenues to the Catholic apostolate’ (Address for the Solemn Opening of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, October 11, 1962).

“Jesus’ gaze that blesses invites us to be a Church that does not face today’s challenges and problems with a divisive and contentious spirit but, on the contrary, turns its eyes to God who is communion and, with awe and humility, blesses and adores him, recognizing him as its only Lord. We belong to him and — let us remember — we exist only to bring him to the world. As the Apostle Paul told us, we have no other ‘glory except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Galatians 6:14). This is enough for us; he is enough for us. We do not want earthly glory; we do not want to make ourselves attractive in the eyes of the world, but to reach out to it with the consolation of the Gospel, to bear witness to God’s infinite love, in a better way and to everyone. Indeed, as Benedict XVI said, precisely when speaking to a synod assembly, ‘the question for us is this: God has spoken, he has truly broken the great silence, he has shown himself, but how can we communicate this reality to the people of today, so that it becomes salvation?’ (XIII General Assembly, October 8, 2012). This is the fundamental question. And this is the primary task of the Synod: to refocus our gaze on God, to be a Church that looks mercifully at humanity. A Church that is united and fraternal — or at least seeks to be united and fraternal — , that listens and dialogues; a Church that blesses and encourages, that helps those who seek the Lord, that lovingly stirs up the indifferent, that opens paths in order to draw people into the beauty of faith. A Church that has God at its center and, therefore, is not divided internally and is never harsh externally. A Church that takes a risk in following Jesus. This is how Jesus wants the Church, his Bride, to be.”

A Note on “Grace” and Ancient Chinese Wisdom

[The Chinese text pictured is the title of Matteo Ricci’s book, “The True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven,” written in Chinese by the great Jesuit missionary, and first published in Beijing in 1603.]

One aspect of my East Asian Studies Project involves reading and trying to appreciate more deeply the Chinese Classics and other ancient texts (in English translation, since I don’t know Chinese). In so doing, I cannot engage them otherwise than as a Catholic Christian, thus participating in some small way in a dialogue of great importance. 

From time to time, I record some “notes” here, especially on points that have arisen in discussion and efforts of clarification. I have only begun to study these things, so I don’t speak from any personal expertise. I have “impressions” that I am trying to verify as best as I can. Let me therefore present this question in the form of a NOTE: The Confucian emphasis on virtue as self-cultivation seems isolated from any awareness of the need for a relationship with God. How does the Confucian “superior person” resemble and/or differ from the Christian who lives by the Spirit and who “grows in virtue” by cooperating with the grace of God?

This seems like a huge question that involves other related questions. Some may think it’s comparing apples and oranges, but the question arises nevertheless for me as I read these texts, and I want to look at its various aspects, and hope to find at least a more firm orientation for my understanding.

There are many valuable insights in Confucian exhortations to live a humane life, but the realization of such a life seems to be entirely within the reach of human possibilities (and, indeed, restricted to a human scale). I’m far from certain that this is accurate, however. It may be more indicative of a presentation that calls for a full and explicitly developed context for considering human action. Having said that, I think perhaps the lack of a sense of the need for God’s grace may be one of the limitations of the Confucian ethical tradition—there was a similar “absence” in Ancient Greek philosophical ethics, which is why the Greeks had so little hope for the vast majority of ordinary humans to attain virtue.

The Chinese may have been more “optimistic” (Mencius especially) about human nature. They focused on that part of ethics that involves social order, though it extends deeper than “politics.” The Confucian ideal of the sage, the “superior person,” does seem to be self-cultivated(?), but there is also a pervasive emphasis on “the will of Heaven” that I would like to understand more fully. 

“The superior person will never suffer calamity, because he realizes that nothing is a calamity” (Mencius). I think Mencius is trying to say that everything has meaning—even that which we experience as suffering—when we are conformed (?) to the “will of Heaven” which orders all things. What does that mean? What is the intuition here, and what are its possibilities? There’s a lot of emphasis in ancient Confucian tradition to adherence to what has been “given” (to the point that, as the tradition develops, the “roles” in society become rigid and the place of interpersonal dialogue in the service of benevolence and harmony gets minimized). I don’t know if it goes any further than that, or what might be suggested in the aphorisms and dialogue format which convey these teachings.

I am trying to appreciate the inherent “openness” of some of these classical Chinese philosophers who didn’t have the ambition to “explain everything” (the systematizing came later) and left transcendent truth in the mode of an “open question.” This was a quality that deeply impressed Matteo Ricci and the early Jesuits, and it appears also in their Mandarin followers (especially in the converts who are known as the “Three Pillars” of the Catholic Church in “modern” [i.e. post 1600] China: Xu Guangqi, Li Zhizao, and Yang Tingyun). It also appears in the remarkable “founders” of the Church in Korea. It was Korean scholar-officials of the Confucian tradition who first encountered Christ through the Jesuits they met during diplomatic visits to Beijing. A few were baptized, and they returned to Korea and brought others to conversion so that there were 4000 baptized Christians by the time the first European missionaries came. 

I think perhaps the traditional wisdoms in East Asia were “open to grace” in ways we haven’t appreciated (or were in part efforts to articulate the movement of grace already at work within them, as it was among “the Gentiles” before the coming of Christ, and presumably continues to be [according to the mysterious working of the Holy Spirit] among those after Christ who have not yet had a decisive encounter with Him). 

After initial missionary efforts and sometimes striking success, the Church in East Asia has been hindered and persecuted mostly for political reasons (modern European colonial ambitions didn’t help). Otherwise, the Church might have grown much more widely in the 17th-18th centuries. God willing, it will grow now and in the future wherever it has the freedom to do so. Great 20th century Chinese Catholic converts like John C. H. Wu challenge us to appreciate the ways that Jesus will transform, revivify, and fulfill East Asian traditions. (I have written about Dr. Wu elsewhere; see this LINK.)

Saint Thérèse in “Color”?

Sunday took liturgical precedence over Saint Thérèse of Lisieux’s October 1 feast this year. But we still remember her and honor her. When she speaks like this, what can I say other than 😮⁉️ 

“Yes, in order that Love be fully satisfied, it is necessary that it lower itself, and that it lower itself to nothingness and transform this nothingness into fire" (Saint Thérèse).

Here are more astonishing and mysterious words from Thérèse, as she lay dying in agony from tuberculosis in 1897. How could this be possible?

And, of course, you’ve seen the famous black&white photo of Saint Thérèse as a girl of 15. Well, I used some basic digital tools and a bit of work and I got THIS result. I cannot guarantee that she “really” looked like that, since I had no information regarding the precise colors (eyes, hair, skin tone), but perhaps it gives us some idea of how she looked, or a more striking impression of her being a *real human being* of a relatively recent time (January 2, 1873 — September 30, 1897). Wow!

A “VLOG” at the End of September

Happy End of September! 

I have made a Vlog post, in which I reflect for a few moments with you all after my evening walk. I really should make more videos. I should just “get over” my feelings of awkwardness talking to the camera, and my fear of being “boring” or not having a sufficiently pre-packaged “message” or speaking so slowly through my “brain fog.” I have many observations and a little understanding to share, and I’m over 60 so I should just get-it-out-there using all varieties of accessible media but not worrying too much about a “slick show.” As ever, I’m inspired by the immortal words of G. K. Chesterton: “If a thing is worth doing, it’s worth doing badly.”

I’m in an odd mood in this video, probably because I have been studying too much about Maoist China lately, going through memoirs of political prisoners, etc. (currently reading the prison letters of Wei Jingsheng, former Red Guard and then famous “Democracy Wall” dissident in 1979). 

My life as an invalid can sometimes feel a “little bit” like “solitary confinement” in a prison — but, of course, it’s not like what these guys went through. I’m not being interrogated, tortured, pressured to make false confessions and implicate other people I know in any false “crimes.” It’s not that bad! I’m studying and forming my own mind, and I’m trying to find ways to open up more and share with you the things I’m learning (mostly, I’m learning things that make me realize how little I really know).

Anyway, here’s a chat which is rambly, but stick with me.  It all ends in a very encouraging way:

Archangels

Happy Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Rafael — the angels whose names we know from Sacred Scripture.

Jesus said to Nathaniel, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (John 1:51).

Remembering Hong Kong’s “Umbrella Movement”

Nine Years Ago — On September 28, 2014, police fired tear gas at a peaceful protest in Hong Kong Central. For Hong Kongers, this was an unprecedented act of aggression by the region’s once-highly-respected and up-until-then-independent police force against its own people. In response to police violence, millions took to the streets in the ensuing days and weeks in what became known as the “Umbrella Movement.” 

Inspired by Ukraine’s Euromaidan protests earlier that year, Hong Kongers remained in the streets for more than two months, demanding political reforms as they saw their “guaranteed” special autonomous status being eroded by mainland China’s Communist PartyState. After peacefully disbanding in November 2014, the movement continued to work through the social and political process, only to be thwarted again and again by the increasing encroachment of Beijing’s “Lawfare” tactics, which ultimately led to the struggles throughout the city in 2019. The Pro-Democracy movement won an overwhelming victory in the November 2019 District Council elections, but—as we all know—other circumstances soon arose that “cleared the streets” globally. While the world sought solutions for a global crisis, Beijing imposed a new “National Security Law” in Hong Kong on June 1, 2020. The Repression of Hong Kong began in earnest.

There needs to be a dialogue about Hong Kong’s future, but dialogue is impossible if people are forbidden to speak freely. Let us remember this day, and pray for those who have been silenced, and especially for those who are in prison or on trial because their efforts to be heard were met with violence and repression.

Happy Birthday Avril Lavigne: Sing Your Heart Out

Happy 39th Birthday (‼️) to the enormously talented, funny, rowdy, sometimes reckless, always great-hearted Canadian singer-songwriter Avril Lavigne. She’s also a fellow Lyme disease survivor who has done much to spread information and awareness about this illness, and support others who are struggling with it.

Avril is currently busy with many things (I can’t keep up with her). Her musical creativity is her greatest gift, and when she reaches down deep she can make powerful songs that seem simple but resonate profoundly thanks to her uniquely versatile and evocative voice. No one in the world sings like her. Two decades ago, she sang with real-life candor about being a teenage girl—about liking boys, of course, but also about the whole spectrum of enthusiasm for life, wondering about the future, dreams, awkwardness, loneliness, searching for human connection, and the discovery of existence as an awesome adventure that is “anything but ordinary.”

“Dear Avril, there are still songs not yet written that no one but you can sing. Give your great voice to those songs that express the whole range of struggles and joys and questions of your life today. Don’t give in to cynicism, but find the wonder and fascination and urgency of what life offers you now. Ask that question, ‘is it enough?’, and then sing your heart out. You can sing these songs like nobody else. And not just power ballads (of which you already have some of the best ever); go ahead and rock ‘n roll it — make some “noise,” not just in anger, not for vengeance, but with the energy and enthusiasm that will help the rest of us to wake up. Your voice has a strength and a clarity and a quality that shapes words so that they stick in our heads.

“Wishing you many more happy birthdays…”

The Thousand Days of Hong Kong’s Jimmy Lai

“If I suffer for the right cause, it only defines the person I am becoming. It can only be good for me to become a better person. If you believe in the Lord, if you believe that all suffering has a reason, and the Lord is suffering with me ... I’m at peace with it” (Jimmy Lai, Hong Kong democracy activist, former publisher of the Apple Daily, Prisoner of the Chinese Communist Party-State).

Today Jimmy Lai marks 1000 days in solitary confinement in a maximum security prison in Hong Kong. He is presently serving a sentence of five years on trumped-up charges regarding his newspaper supposedly violating a lease agreement, but that’s just a warm-up for whatever Beijing is really planning to inflict on this courageous 75-year-old whose newspaper published the truth about Hong Kong’s struggle for freedom over the past decade.

He still faces charges of “subversion” under Beijing’s “national security law” which the CCP imposed on Hong Kong in 2020 in order to crush the further advance of Hong Kong’s popular Pro-Democracy movement. The Brave New China of Xi Jingpeng uses different tactics to smash those who refuse to conform to its agenda of building a total surveillance society and a neocolonial, neo-fascist commercial empire. Rather than mowing down dissenters with the tanks and guns of the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989, China’s current Party-state wages “Lawfare.” Beijing has invaded Hong Kong with the implacable hydra-headed monster of its bureaucracy. When the CCP speaks about the “rule of law” what they really mean is that they rule using their “laws” interpreted and administered by their system without public transparency or accountability. Its a 21st century version of old Imperial China’s “death-by-a-thousand-cuts.”

Jimmy Lai has spent nearly three years in prison, waiting for a trial that continues to be delayed—a show trial that is guaranteed to produce another prison sentence that will last the rest of his life. He waits along with hundreds of other political prisoners, including Joshua Wong—the 26-year-old activist who has been fighting for the freedom of his city since he was a teenager in 2012 —and others who may disappear into the notoriously inhuman Chinese prison system that has tortured and brutalized so many dissidents in the past. The world must not forget them.

They will not suffer alone. The young ones, if they embrace the call of interior non-violence—if they refuse to hate their captors, their torturers, and those who hold power—they will be shaped by a freedom that is irrepressible when it lives by love, and one day they will emerge as men and women prepared for leadership, prepared to change their beloved city and all of China. They must endure in hope that China will change, that the nightmare of repression will end. Their suffering will not be in vain. Indeed, the many Catholics and other Christians among them (including Joshua Wong and 2014 Umbrella Movement leader Benny Tai) know this by their faith in Jesus. May He sustain them, and all their compatriots who in suffering for the sake of what is right are carrying out a great work of mercy.

Then there are the elders. Jimmy Lai escaped from Chairman Mao’s dystopian reign when he was a boy, and took refuge in then-British Hong Kong. He worked hard and used his creative energy to build a successful business in the British colony and became a full British citizen. Long a supporter of his wife’s Catholic faith, Jimmy Lai was finally baptized in 1997, within a week after the colony was handed over to mainland rule under an agreement that was full of promises of “autonomy” for Hong Kong. But we know only too well that Leninist fascism always puts the iron grip of Party control first, that it lives by lies and broken promises.

As a British citizen, Jimmy Lai could have easily left Hong Kong when the persecution began in 2020. But he chose to stay, to continue the fight, knowing that for him it might well end in suffering. He finds the grace of courage, and he sees the meaning and value of the road ahead, because he knows in faith that “the Lord is suffering with me.”

[*Digital portrait of Jimmy Lai (above) based on news photograph. Credit to original photo owner—used for educational purposes only in this personal weblog. Art by JJStudios.]

“Pray, Hope, and Don’t Worry”

“Pray, hope, and don’t worry.”
~Padre Pio (September 23)

Autumn is Here, and It’s Wet!

Happy Fall 2023. (…or Spring, if you’re Down Under.) We have arrived at another equinox.

Unlike the rest of the planet, here in “The Valley” we had what seemed like an unusually mild summer. 

But it has been very dry. Thunderstorms came like splashes of water on thirsty ground, but they didn’t help the water levels. The lawns have hardly needed mowing all summer. Then, after surprisingly bearable temperatures throughout July and August, we finally had a big heat wave at the beginning of this month.

Now we have arrived at the nearly three-quarter-mark of the year. The temperatures have plunged and the skies have opened. The seasons are “shifting gears” again.

My joints ache. Arrgh! They hurt!—which is not exactly “news,” although getting older is not helping.

They will trouble me especially until the brisk air of October comes in to stay. Wet weather is the worst for the old “rheumatism,” but I shall manage as best as I can while we finally get relief from the drought.

I love Autumn. I’m not too thrilled about the shorter days, especially the earlier evenings. Still, the best weather of the year (at least in my opinion) comes to our area in the next three months. Fall colors are not usually dramatic, but they vary throughout the season and combine with the changing angles of sunlight to create many colorful vistas.

I shall post some “natural” photographs (is there even such a thing?—that’s another question for another day). But photos are a form of media that seem best suited for “catching” nature as she puts on her own show.

But I shall also permit those Autumn colors to inspire my art. It will be fascinating to watch where they lead me.

Jesus Calls Matthew… and Each One of Us

Happy Saint Matthew’s Day! It’s time once again for our annual contemplation of “The Call…” painted in 1600 by that Master of Shadows and Light, Michelangelo Merisi da CARAVAGGIO! I am still “shook” by this painting as much as when I first saw the original in Rome, 30 years ago.

The painting expresses something of that great mercy that Jesus brought into the world, that healing mercy, that inexhaustible mercy, God’s mercy. He calls Matthew to follow Him, to stay with Him, to trust in Him. Christ’s mercy penetrates the darkness of Matthew’s life of sin and engenders something new within Matthew’s heart, an attraction that awakens his true desire and draws him to Jesus. In following the call of Jesus, Matthew is converted. 

The Pharisees’ condemnation of their behavior didn’t change sinners or give them hope. What changes them is the presence of Jesus—Mercy incarnate—the Divine Physician, the Savior who calls sinners to follow Him and be freed and made new by His love. 

He calls Matthew the tax collector to be one of the Twelve Apostles, His chosen witnesses for the foundation of the Catholic Christian people. 

He calls each one of us—no matter how messed up we are, no matter what our sins are, no matter how impossible it may seem to us that we might ever change our lives—He calls us all through our time in this world, every day, every moment. With infinite love and mercy, He implores us, He begs us, “Follow me, stay with me, trust in me.” He wants us so much, because He loves us with an immeasurable love. We who wallow in our sins, fixated on ourselves and tying ourselves in knots—what if we allowed ourselves to hear His voice? What if we looked up to see His face? Why not follow Him? He is the One for whom we have been created. He is our happiness and fulfillment. And He is here.

If we stay with Him, we will change, we will be healed and transformed. Mercy opens up within the depths of our souls a new “space” of desire, a hope that He will save us, that we can be with Him forever because He has come to be with us. The more we follow Him, the more He draws us to love Him, and the more we see all of reality in a new way, the true way. The “conversion of Saint Matthew” is the fruit of his encounter with Jesus Christ who calls him. It is enough to say, “he got up and followed Him” (Matthew 9:9).

Thus we read in today’s Gospel:

“As Jesus passed by, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the customs post. He said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him. While he was at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat with Jesus and his disciples. The Pharisees saw this and said to his disciples, ‘Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ He heard this and said, ‘Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the words, I desire mercy, not sacrifice. I did not come to call the righteous but sinners’” (Matthew 9:9-13).

The Birth of the Church in Korea

Today is the feast of the 103 Korean martyrs canonized by John Paul II in 1984. The remarkable story of the beginnings of Christianity in Korea—along with an account of the conversion of one of them, Saint Mareuko Jeong (in older transliterations “Mark Chong”)—appears in my column in this month’s Magnificat. Here is the text:

Saint Mareuko Jeong Eui-Bae is one of the 103 Korean martyrs whose feast we celebrate on September 20. He is among some 10,000 Koreans who gave their lives for Christ during multiple fierce persecutions in the mid-19th century. Most were ordinary lay men and women, but some were also from the educated classes and the nobility. We know enough about the high-ranking nobleman/scholar Mareuko Jeong to appreciate the particular drama of his conversion.

Korean cultural life flourished for many centuries, creatively appropriating ancient Chinese literary and religious traditions into its own independent society. But by the end of the 18th century, the 500-year-old Joseon dynasty was in deep decline, and dependent on Qing-dynasty China. Meanwhile, the Joseon Neo-Confucian State had become a religious/political structure of rigid social hierarchy, with the monarch at the center, followed by the noble and scholarly classes, and with many of the common people reduced to a status of virtual slavery.

It was the scholar-officials who began searching for ways to reform this ossified society. In frequent diplomatic trips to Beijing, they met “Westeners” (including Catholic priests) and obtained books on developments in Western science, technology, philosophy, and religion translated into Chinese. Thus arose the “Sohak” movement—groups of scholars who studied “Western learning” and discussed its possible value for reforming Korean society. For most, it was mainly an intellectual examination of various Western ideas, but a few were drawn specifically to the Catholic faith. Yi Sung-hun was baptized in Beijing in 1784, returned to Korea, and baptized a few of his compatriots. By the time the first priest arrived in 1795 there were 4000 baptized lay Catholics waiting for him.

There was also aggressive opposition to the new teaching. The Joseon royal house and their Neo-Confucian supporters viewed Christianity as a threat to the Korean social order. Worship of One God in Jesus Christ undermined the religious/superstitious system of rites offered for the monarch and the hierarchical continuity of clan and family. Christianity preached that God was the Father of all people, who were brothers and sisters with a common destiny in Christ regardless of their origins and social status. Among the scholars who abhorred the new Christian teaching was (Mareuko) Jeong Eui-Bae.

Born in 1794, Jeong was an established professor of Chinese literature and defender of the status quo when persecution broke out in 1839. By that time the French Foreign Mission Society had sent a bishop and two priests to Korea. In 1839, Jeong Eui-Bae witnessed the brutal mutilation and execution of Bishop Laurentius Imbert, Father Peter Maubant, and Father Jakob Chastan. (They are also among the 103 martyred saints.)

The 47-year-old scholar had seen death many times. But in these three men Jeong saw something completely new: an astonishing joy in the face of torture and death. Jeong was growing old in a society where death was covered with shadows. His studies gave no hint as to how to face death, much less to embrace it with the joy he saw on the faces of those missionaries that day.

Disregarding his honorable station, Jeong obtained and read forbidden Christian books and met the people who believed in the One written about in those books. Glimpsing there the Source of hitherto unknown joy and hope, the long-cynical old professor was totally converted. He was baptized Mareuko (Mark) and devoted his newfound zeal and intellectual skills to working as a catechist and caring for the sick. The poor humble people whom the former aristocrat had once scorned he now served with love until his own martyrdom in 1866, at age 72.

San Gennaro

Happy "Janaro Family Feast Day"! Buona Festa di San Gennaro! 

Today is the Feast Day of the Great Ancestor of the Janaro Clan, the original Saint Januarius, fourth-century bishop and martyr. I'm sure he must, somehow, be related to us, what with the "Benevento" and "Naples" regional traditions and all... or there must be some connection, because "Janaro" (with the "J") is a variant in old Neapolitan dialect of "Januarius." Both of which are derived from the mythical Roman god "Janus," the "guardian of the gateways" and all places where people come in and go out (note that "January" is the first month, the end of one year and the beginning of another).

Thus I hypothesize. 

In any case, according to Legend (and I should know, because I made up the legend) he is the patron saint of the Janaros. 

SAN GENNARO, PRAY FOR US!!