From Empty Hands: December 2012

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Still In There

So, I've used this joke before--and even on this feast--but it works so well and still gets laughs!

Blessings on all of your families...

The Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, & Joseph C

Readings

A Sunday school teacher wanted to make sure
that her young class understood

that Jesus wasn’t just a made-up story,

but is real and living even now.

So she asked her students, “Where is Jesus today?”

Stevie raised his little hand and said, “He’s up in heaven.”

Maggie was next called upon and answered, “Jesus lives in my heart.”
Jake was waiving his hand furiously in the back of the room.

“I know! I know!” he blurted out. “Jesus is in our bathroom!”

The whole class got very quiet.

His teacher gathered her wits, swallowed hard,

and asked Jake how he knew such a thing.

“Well,” he said, “every morning my father gets up,

bangs on the bathroom door, and yells,

‘Good Lord, are you still in there?’”

A few years ago,

the childhood home

of Pope Benedict XVI

was turned into a small museum

in his native Bavaria.

During the course of renovations,

a Christmas letter was discovered,

handwritten by a seven-year-old boy

back in 1934.

The letter was just put on public display

for the first time;

translated, it reads:

Dear Christ Child!

Come quickly down to earth.

You will bring joy to children.

You also will bring joy to me.

I would like a prayer book for Mass,

a green Mass vestment,

—he and his brother, Georg,

liked to "play church"—

and [an image of] the heart of Jesus.

I will always be good.

Greetings from

Joseph Ratzinger.

Clearly, the Catholic faith

had a central place in the Ratzinger household.

As that Sunday school teacher asked:

Where is Jesus today?

What place does the good Lord have in your family’s life?

Parents have an essential role

in shaping the religious imagination and identity of their children.

That’s an amazing power and an awesome responsibility. (cf. R. Smith)

(And while I say it belongs to “parents,”

I’m thinking of grandparents and godparents, older siblings,

aunts and uncles, teachers and neighbors, too.)As we can see from their annual Passover pilgrimage,

Mary and Joseph were diligent

in passing on their most deeply held values—

especially their religious tradition—to their Son.

Likewise, regularly coming here, to the Lord’s temple,

as a family for Mass

is at the heart of Catholic family life;

for it, there can be absolutely no substitute.

But things mustn’t stop even there.

Jesus went down with them to Nazareth,

and was obedient to them.

It takes real discipline to raise disciples:

to not only instruct them in the truths of our faith,

but to also inspire them to lovingly and faithfully

live out God’s commandments.

Nothing teaches children more

than the example—good or bad—of their parents.

It’s fairly safe to say most parents here today

don’t have to worry about raising a future Pope…

…but we should all be trying to raise future saints.

Headlines these days can make us wonder

how well we’re doing in this arena.

Yet I was touched and encouraged by a small scrap of paper

I found on the church floor after Mass late on Christmas Eve.

First, in the clear handwriting of an adult, it reads:

Dear Jesus

I Love you

God I Love you

And then in the large, shaky letters

of a child imitating Mom or Dad, it says,

GOd I LovE

It really is that simple!

And that’s what it’s all about.

Using all the means at our disposable,

we must constantly strive to make sure our youngsters

never lose sight of Jesus,

as did Mary and Joseph those three anxious days in Jerusalem.

Let’s instead make sure that our children know

that God’s Only Begotten Son,

who came down from heaven to earth at Christmas,

dwells with us still.

They can always find him here:

in the church, in the Eucharist.

May they also learn from us

how to find the good Lord at home,

in all the twists and turns of family life—

maybe even in the morning wait for the bathroom.

Thursday, December 27, 2012

Let It Snow!

"No worries! I've got this under control..."

Monday, December 24, 2012

Very Merry

Being a priest, you have to wear many hats...

From our home to yours,

a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!

I never post my homilies before I'm through delivering them...but in the spirit of Christmas I guess I'll make this one exception. And wherever you see [RING], well, you can just imagine what that stage direction means...

The Nativity of the Lord - Christmas

Readings

At St. Helen’s Church

up in Chasm Falls,

there’s a full wrap-around gallery—

much as there is here at Notre Dame,

except on a much smaller scale

in that tiny country church.

I have several “little friends”—

ages five and under, I’d guess—

who regularly sit upstairs with their families…

…and who regularly

make not-so-whispered comments

for the rest of us to enjoy.

Just over a year ago,

at the same time as the new Roman Missal was implemented,

we reintroduced the custom of ringing bells [RING]

at the moment of the consecration in the Mass.

In a tradition going all the way back to the thirteenth century,

bells have been rung to elicit both joy and attention

as bread and wine—in a very real yet hidden way—

become the Body and Blood of Christ.

It’s at the very heart of the Mass,

and at the very heart of our Catholic faith.

Needless to say, it’s an especially solemn moment.

So you can imagine the reaction in the pews

when, on that first Sunday of Advent

that the bells were back,

as I was elevating the Sacred Host above the altar,

and a server was ringing the bells

from his kneeler [RING] —

just as we’d practiced—

a high-pitched voice from the loft intones,

“Ding-a-ling-a-ling-a-ling-a-ling!”

So much for solemn!

And then, not two weeks ago:

same church, same moment in the Mass, same bells,

and—I presume—my same little friend upstairs,

gleefully declaring [RING] : “Jingle bells!”

Bells are not nearly as much a part of daily life

as they once were here in the Western world.

Nowadays, out telephones have MP3 ringtones,

our alarm clocks buzz,

and schools send out an electronic signal over the intercom

when it’s time for classes to change…

but they don’t have actual bells anymore.

Bells are pretty much left for just two things that I can think of:

churches and Christmas.

At Christmas, there’s a lot of talk of bells.

There are Jingle Bells and Silver Bells.

There are Salvation Army bells at the doors of the stores.

And there’s that memorable line

from the end of, It’s a Wonderful Life:

“Every time a bell rings [RING] an angel gets his wings.”

The famed American author

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

once wrote a poem called, “Christmas Bells.”

(It’s been turned into a Christmas song,

but they usually leave out a couple of the verses.)

Longfellow wrote this poem on Christmas Day 1864.

In the summer of 1861,

Longfellow’s wife, Fanny, had burned to death,

and he himself was injured and permanently scarred

while trying to save her.

That same year,

the first shots of the American Civil War were fired,

leaving the entire country in turmoil and fear.

Tragedy struck again when Longfellow’s son, Charles,

a lieutenant in the Union army,

was shot on the battlefield in November 1863

and left crippled for life.

In the face of both national unrest and great personal loss,

Longfellow didn’t feel much like celebrating Christmas.

He wrote in his journal, “‘A merry Christmas’ say the children,

but that is no more for me.” (December 25, 1862)

But then, on that particular Christmas Day,

in the depths of grief and gloom,

Longfellow heard church bells ringing—

and he was inspired to write these hope-filled words:

I heard the bells on Christmas Day

Their old, familiar carols play,

and mild and sweet

The words repeat