Being Present

Advent, this powerful liturgical season that we are beginning, invites us to pause in silence to understand a presence. It is an invitation to understand that the individual events of the day are hints that God is giving us signs of the attention he has for each one of us. How often does God give us a glimpse of his love!

Pope Benedict XVI, Homily in Celebration of First Vespers of Advent, November 28, 2009

Pope Benedict XVI reminds us of the simple message of this season of Advent in challenging us to be aware of God's presence.  To stop amidst the busyness and distractions of the "holiday season" and be mindful of the One who gives us life. Indeed this season is meant to be a time of waiting with joyful anticipation of Christ's second coming and the celebration of the Incarnation - the celebration of the coming of Emmanuel - God with us.  How will you take time during this season to be aware of His presence?

As individuals we can take time each morning and evening by stopping and praying.  Begin and end this time of prayer with silence allowing yourself to simply rest in God's holy presence.  If possible spend some time with the Real Presence of Christ in Eucharistic Adoration.

As parents we can help our children to appreciate and experience the real beauty and joy of the season, which is Christ.  Take time to light the candles of an Advent wreath and pray.  Explain the many symbols of the season and their connection to our Catholic tradition.  Allow them to wade into the richness of our faith during this Advent season.

As catechists we can teach those in our care about the importance of silence by reaching into Scripture and drawing inspiration from the lives of the saints.  Additionally we can help them to experience silence by taking time during our sessions to be in silence. 

In a world which never seems to be quiet - always wired to something or has something "on" - silence can be the way to begin learning the importance of being present and of spending time in the presence of the God who loved us enough to become man.

Michael Lavigne 

Click here for Advent & Christmas with Pope Benedict XVI from the USCCB

Gift Received; Gift Given

Gift Received; Gift Given

As Divine Providence would have it, my Chinese missionary friend, from the Philippines, and I were walking together on the Plains of Abraham in Quebec City one warm and bright summer day.  Our conversation was filled with youthful zeal as we explored our 'vocations' together; she moving to Taiwan, and I returning to Maine.

Sr. Nancy asked philosophically, "How does one "BE" a contemplative?"  You see, we were lamenting our busy schedules and daydreaming of quieter surroundings.  As we strolled along, I allowed my imagination to drift around the concept of contemplative living. 

Over the years, I have come to understand the difference between my imagination and the Lord's promptings and I assure you, this gift I am sharing with you came from the Lord!

A contemplative is one who:

SEEs.... KNOWs whom they SEE.... LOVES who they KNOW.... and ENJOYS who they LOVE.  (rho 1989)

I have prayed with this gift for many years now.  To SEE means to become aware of God's movement within us, which is life giving!  To KNOW this God who dwells within us is to feel secure even in the midst of trials.  To LOVE the God we come to KNOW in the depths of our being is to find healing for all our wounds.  And to ENJOY God whom we LOVE is to find peace, balance, belonging, affirmation, hope, and trust which assures us that nothing can separate us from Jesus.  And our Lord comes to us each day most intimately in the Eucharist.

Want to live contemplatively?  Then SEE our Lord in the Eucharist.  KNOW it is the real Presence that comes to us so tenderly.  LOVE the Lord in the Eucharist so you may find strength for your mission.  And ENJOY the fruits of the grace that is ours each time we receive Him.

Who is a Contemplative?  Anyone desiring to be.....

Ruth Oakley

In Thanksgiving

This week most families in our country will pause on Thanksgiving Day to take stock of all that we have been blessed with in our lives.  While it is important for us to express our gratefulness to God every single day, I am no different than most people in recognizing the significance of this cultural practice and using this occasion to spend a little more time reflecting on the blessings from the past months – a little more time to focus on the Giver of all good things – a chance to pour out my heart and say that I am thankful. 

This year I am focused on being thankful for the gift of my wife, our marriage and fruits of our love – our children.  I am humbled by my wife’s ability to love me selflessly day-in and day-out and her constant example of patience as she daily loves our children.  Words cannot express the thanksgiving in my heart for the gift of our marriage – the ups and the downs, the struggles and the joys – all of it is part of this graced journey with our God.  I thank the Creator of all life for the miracles of life (fruits of our sacramental love for one another) that He has given Lori and I in our children.  There are so many directions that I could go in following such a thought, so let me simply focus on the thanksgiving I have in my heart each day when I gaze upon their faces – their innocence, their capacity to learn, their child-like faith, their reminding me each evening to stop and…play. 

In the moments of peace (and play) I realize the enormity of their lives – the fact that God entrusted these young souls to my wife and I.  That they are not objects for our amusement.  They are not prizes or possessions.  They are gifts and they belong to God. And in accepting these gifts we assume a great responsibility upon which we will be judged.  Our vocation – our job if you will – is to model for our children our Catholic faith.  We must be passionate in our desire to teach the truths of our faith, model a sacramental life and pass on an awareness of our baptismal call to be disciples of Jesus Christ here on earth. 

As we celebrate Religious Education month (here in New England) it is easy to connect this thought process to our roles as catechists.  In saying “yes,” we take on the awesome responsibility of teaching our Catholic faith to all the children, youth, young adults and adults who God places in our paths.  We will be held accountable for our actions – for our words – for the teachings we pass on or fail to pass on.  Every catechist has an obligation to represent the Magisterial teachings of our Catholic faith to the best of his or her abilities.  It should be the very desire of our hearts.

Jesus, Himself, reminds us of this standard in the Gospel of Matthew when He warns, “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.” (Matthew 18:6).  Prior to these words Jesus speaks of how one needs to have the same humility seen in a child in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.  When I gaze into the face of one of my children or think of the faces of the young people I have worked with throughout the years I am reminded to humble myself – to remember that it is not about me – and to teach the Truths of our faith with courage and integrity, thus remembering that the children, youth, young adults and adults we serve are ultimately children of God, who is the Way – the Truth – the Life.

Have a blessed Thanksgiving Day and may we all celebrate the many gifts that have been bestowed upon us from our Father in Heaven.

Michael Lavigne

Wherever You Send Me

At the beginning of the Book of Jeremiah we read the beautiful, yet daunting, exchange between God and the namesake of the book. "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you. Before you were born I dedicated you, a prophet to the nations I appointed you." (Jer. 1:5) Jeremiah, clearly awestruck and dumbfounded by the Lord's call, insists upon his unworthiness citing his young age.  God objects and calls on Jeremiah to go wherever He sends him and to say whatever He tells him and to do so with "no fear before them, because I am with you to deliver you." (Jer. 1: 8)  Jeremiah is called.  And so are we.

Fr. Robert Barron, in his book The Strangest Way, describes the call in this way: "And friendship with God - not simply worship, discipleship, seeking, or ethical uprightness - but real intimacy with God entailed, I discovered, a giving of self that mirrored the radicality of God's own gift of self in Christ. The point of the Christian life is to be holy with the very holiness of God, and this means conformity with a love unto death." (Barron, The Strangest Way, p. 11) In the end the call is a complete abandonment to the will of the One in Whose image we are created.

This is the challenge of the Christian journey.  Faced with obstacles, both from within and from the outside, each of us must daily "die to ourselves" for the sake of the call.  Of course this can only be done through prayer, taking part in the sacramental life of the Church (especially the Eucharist), learning about our faith, and selfless giving.  It can only be done through growing a true friendship with God.

I raise the above thoughts as a preface for my announcing a little project that I know God has placed in my heart.  Quite frankly, God has been pounding away on this for almost a year and I have found lots of great excuses to ignore His promptings with the most used one being that "I am not worthy."

Beginning with my next blog I am going to begin to write a reflection for each of the Venerable Pope John Paul II's general audiences which make up his "Theology of the Body."  Now there are many, more learned than I, who are better equipped to take on such a project.  However, I take God at His word, "have no fear," as I embark on this journey.  My thoughts on each audience will be brief - less a theological treatise and more an effort to prayerfully reflect on the little things that God will place in my heart and mind as I move through each audience.

This will be my contribution to the growing body of work which has been inspired by the late pope's masterpiece - the "theological time bomb (as George Weigel famously and prophetically described it)" that has begun to have a tremendous impact on the modern world.

"Wherever you send me, I will go.  Send me Lord. Send me Lord. Whatever you tell me, I will say.  Send me Lord. Send me Lord." (Franzak, "The Call")

Michael Lavigne 

Preparing a Place

I’ve recently moved into a seasonal rental right on the ocean and have been doing quite a bit of work to make this little beach cottage my own.  Rearranging furniture,sewing new curtains, decorating with my own style, finding rugs I like, new couch pillows, bedding to match, etc. has been filling the bulk of my spare time.  I want my home to be a place where people will feel welcome and comfortable upon entering.  I’m finding it is a lot of work to prepare such a place!  But knowing the purpose behind the work makes it totally worth it.

All of this house remodeling I’ve been doing got me thinking about the passage from John 14:1-3 where Jesus says to his disciples, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.” (italics mine)  I started pondering this in light of my recent undertakings.  What does it mean that Jesus is preparing a place for me in His Father’s house?  It seems to me that He is preparing a place where my heart can be at rest in the heart of the Father, where I will enter and immediately know that this is where I belong, that I am home.  So often I allow my heart to become troubled by the things of this world, by the daily obstacles that come my way, by unfulfilled desires and unanswered questions.  I find great comfort and hope in knowing that Jesus has promised to prepare a place where my heart will rest in being home.

Sarah Houde

Humbled to be Catholic

Every morning, I thank God for the day, for the life He has given me and most especially, for my Catholic faith. Often in our culture, faith is seen as something extrinsic, as part of our lives. I’m often accused of being too Catholic, of having no life outside of my Catholic faith. And I think to myself, why would I want to do anything outside of my Catholic faith? If I take the message of the Gospels and Scripture seriously, shouldn’t my faith inform my whole being, everything I am and everything I do (Gal 2:20)? Does this mean that I create a Catholic bubble for myself and shun the rest of the world…ok, occasionally I may be
guilty of this, but for the most part I think I am very much one of God’s workers in the world, just not of the world. Capisce?

Last weekend I attended Life Teen’s Core Member University in Boston. They made a very important distinction: for those of us who work for the Church, whether we are paid employees and/or we are volunteering our time, our work doesn’t make us exceptional Catholics. Ministry, evangelization and teaching the faith are the bare minimum of what is required of us. You may be familiar with this quote from G.K. Chesterton, "The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried." I challenge all of you to rise above the bare minimum of your faith and to allow God to cast you out into the deep (Lk 5:4). Living out radical hospitality, striving to build up community and being good stewards of all that God has blessed us with (suffering included – never miss an opportunity to offer up your pains, fears and anxieties), answering those calls is what makes us different and in accordance with the dignity God has given us, exceptional. 

At a youth rally mass a few years ago, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, the Apostolic Nuncio for the United States, remarked that we are not Catholic Americans, we are American Catholics. In other words, our Catholic faith is at the very core of our identity and as such, we very much should be viewing the world and all we do through Catholic-tinted glasses. I absolutely love being Catholic, and I’m humbled at the gift of our faith.

Shaina Tanguay-Colucci

Miner's Miracle

October 15th is the feast of St. Teresa of Avila, doctor of the Church and famous for her analogy of our spiritual life being connected to the depths of the 'well within' from which we draw "life giving water" as Jesus promised the woman in John's gospel.

How appropriate that today I would want to focus my sharing on the Miracle in the Chile Mine!  Because from St Teresa's 'well bucket' of spiritual graces from which we drink the love of God who dwells within... to the Miners in the depths of the earth 'drinking the grace of HOPE'... the same lessons can be applied.

Imagine, 17 days with limited food, you are in complete darkness not knowing if people have given up the search for you?  Then suddenly the ceiling opens and you look up realizing that you will be rescued.  "Mario Sepulveda, the one who brought rocks as souvenirs for fellow miners, gave this remarkable testimony: “I was with both God and the Devil. God won. I held His Hand and there was no doubt He would get me out.” 

The Fenix descended 2,230 feet below the ground to 'scoop up' the miners one by one and hoist them to the surface where the whole world cheered, intoxicated with JOY!  The chaplain to the President who organized a prayer chain said, “this miracle is a proof that there is a God." (taken from Dr. Florangel Rosario Braid, Manilla Bulletin Publishing Co.)

Both images (well bucket and Fenix capsule) make me grateful to the Lord that I'm Catholic!  Because I know that Faith, Hope, and Love, with the greatest virtue being Love... certainly embraced each miner below and family members above, sustaining the HOPE that the miners would be found, would be alive, and would be brought to safety.

St Teresa speaks about the dark night of the soul as a feeling of abandonment by God, yet, she tells us, it is in this moment that we most need to be faithful to prayer which is our lifeline to the "Light" of God's loving embrace.  Like the miners who held God's hand, trusting, refusing to collapse in fear, we too are challenged to trust with Faith, Hope, and Love, that our Lord will never abandon us in times of trouble.

My relationship with Jesus has taught me this truth.  It is through prayer, reading God's Word, quiet times for listening in the depths of my being that enable me to discern between the devil of doubt and the God of Hope!  Thank you Lord, for your steadfast love!  Bless the Miners, family members, rescue workers, and all who choose to drink from the depths of your grace!  Amen.

Ruth Oakley