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During our two-week young adult mission trip in Argentina, one thing that really struck me was the selflessness of the priests and sisters working in the City of Charity.

Every day they had only one priority: to serve God by serving others. Every moment of their day was dedicated to someone else: a child who needed a playmate, an elderly man who needed to be fed lunch, a teenaged girl who needed help getting her wheeled-chair unstuck, etc. When they weren’t directly serving others, they were doing things behind the scenes: sweeping a room, preparing the next meal, going over a list of errands with the Superior, etc. And of course their days were marked by Mass, Liturgy of the Hours, and silent prayer.

While in Argentina, we had he pleasure of taking daily siestas which offered me the opportunity to ask myself: What is my priority? And it’s a question I think we can all ask ourselves.

Take a spiritual siesta this afternoon and ask yourself what your priority is. What priority dictates your decisions, your time management, who you spend your time with, what you do in your free time, etc?

Then ask God to reveal any selfishness in your life. Believe me, He’ll tell you the honest truth!

The Catholic Standard, the official newspaper of the Archdiocese of Washington has opened up a space in their online edition to share stories of priests who have made a difference in our lives. What a great way to share the ordinary and extraordinary ways our priests serve God’s people.

As Mentors

Here’s my story. I don’t think I would be doing the work I am doing today if  I hadn’t met Fr. Dave Fitz-Patrick. Fr. Dave is a priest of the Archdiocese of Washington who is a military chaplain serving in the Air Force. I met Fr. Dave while he was serving the Diocese of Fairbanks as pastor at Sacred Heart Cathedral. I was a Jesuit Volunteer. My volunteer assignment was to serve as youth minister and coordinator of social concerns for the Cathedral parish. About three months into the job, I discovered that I loved everything about it!

The year was 1985 and at that time there were not many lay people involved in parish ministry and so while I entertained thoughts of doing this work full-time after finishing my volunteer year, I assumed that it really wasn’t possible for a lay person. I did not think I had a call to religious life and so I decided that I really shouldn’t think to much more about it.

About a month later, Fr. Dave asked me what I planned to do after my volunteer year. I said I wasn’t really sure. He asked me if I was enjoying my work and I said I loved it.  He then asked if I would think about serving the church in a full-time capacity.  I asked if it meant becoming a nun because I really diidnt’ think that was what the Lord was asking of me. He said that it did not necessarily mean that– as there were lay people who were beginning to work in parish ministry, but it would mean studying theology.

A deal of a life time

He then made me a deal, if I would agree to stay on in my job, I would be given time in the summer to study theology. It was a deal I couldn’t refuse and it began a mentoring relationship that saw me through two masters degrees and a doctorate! It was the prayer, advice and support that Fr. Dave gave me that helped me develop the spiritual life and practical skills I needed to serve the church in ecclesial ministry.

In big ways and small

I really knew he had my back, when I took a position as a pastoral associate in a parish and he called to check in on me and asked how it was going. I told him I made my first visit to a home-bound parishioner and when I asked her if she had a favorite prayer we could pray together, she responded with the Memorare.  I hesitated because I did not know the words by heart. She saw my hesitation and commented on her concern for the future of the church, if “people” couldn’t pray. I was pretty embarrassed.  Three days later in the mail I received a hand-made palm size copy of the Memorare with a note saying to hang in there and keep visiting the sick!

Click here and share your favorite story. http://www.cathstan.org/main.asp?SectionID=53&TM=46024.06

The Gospel from Saturday’s Mass is a stark and brief one: Jesus came with his disciples into the house. Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”  (Mark 3:20-21) Many different explanations exist about this obtuse little Gospel.

Of course one theory is just to take it at face value: some in Jesus own family thought he was crazy.  I celebrated Mass with the Sisters this morning and speaking with them after Mass most of us could think of at least one family member who thought we were crazy for entering religious life or the priesthood: “You’re throwing your life away! You’re crazy! What a fool!”

Ah, to be a fool for Christ! Now that is a wise thing indeed. But it is so daring and frightening that few even among priests and religious get there. To be a fool for Christ is to be mock, scorned and hated by this world, to be the butt of jokes, to be held in derision. Yet how many of any of us are willing to accept this? We have such a powerful instinct to fit in, be liked, be approved by men. The martyrs of the early Church accepted death for proclaiming and living Christ but we can barely endure a raised eyebrow! Maybe it is ambition that keeps us from the goal. Maybe it is an overly developed wish to live in peace with the world. Maybe it is fear or maybe it is just plain laziness. But few of us Christians can bear the notion of really being thought a fool by this world and so we desperately strive to fit in.

But St. Paul is clear:

Do not deceive yourselves. If any one of you thinks he is wise by the standards of this age, he should become a “fool” so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness”and again, “The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.”So then, no more boasting about men! (1 Cor 3:18-21).

I am in a year-long process of preparing my parish for an Evangelization outreach. One of the things I tell them repeatedly is that if you evangelize, expect to get it with both barrels. Expect to be scorned, rebuffed and ignored. Expect your children and grandchildren to roll their eyes and say, “There you go again.!”  Expect a fallen away member of the family to ridicule you and recite your own past sins. Evangelizing is hard. Sometimes the fruits seem lacking despite repeated attempts. And it is often our own family members that grieve us most. But all of this is just fine. We have to remember that in spite of negative reactions we haven’t done anything wrong. We often think, probably from childhood, that when some one is angry at us we have done something wrong. Not necessarily. Sometimes it means we have done something right. A doctor often causes pain and discomfort in order to bring healing and so it is that the Word of God is sharper that any two edged sword. Sometimes people are angry and “hurt” because we have done something precisely right. The protest of pain often precedes the healing that follows.

But in the end, the biggest obstacle to evangelization is our fragile ego. We are often so afraid to incite a negative reaction, to incur another’s wrath or even worse, ridicule. Perhaps we will be asked a question we cannot answer or the other person will “out maneuver” us with Bible quotes and “win” the argument. Perhaps a fallen away family member will succeed in embarrassing us about our past sins. Perhaps it is just too painful to be told “no” again by a spouse or child who refuses to go to Church. Perhaps we will end up feeling like a fool.

And there it is, that word again: fool! Are you and I willing to be made a fool for Christ’s sake? Are we willing to risk ridicule and failure in order to announce Jesus Christ? The world has gone mad and the Gospel is “out of season.” More than ever the Lord needs a few fools to risk ridicule and hatred to proclaim his gospel to a hostile world that often thinks it is a foolish doctrine that is hopelessly out of touch.

It is said that among some of the Monks of the Orthodox Church it is common to place upon their tombstone the phrase: “Fool for Christ” Not bad. I pray that I will increasingly live a life worthy of the title. And if I do, kindly grant me the favor of inscribing on MY tombstone: “Fool for Christ.”

Here’s a little video showing forth Christ as “fool.”  After this discourse the cry went up, “How can anyone take him seriously!” (Jn 6:60)

It is increasingly possible for many of us to live in our “own little world, ” in a kind of self-selected universe. For example, I don’t listen much to radio any more. Instead I have set up my iPod to download favorite podcasts. I also have loaded only the music I like. Satellite Radio also narrow casts a very specific genre of music or information. T.V. too can be cherry picked,  TiVo what I want and skip the rest. As for news, here too I can decide who informs me. I pick the blogs and websites that will inform me. As for newspapers and broadcast TV news, sorry the content is too uncontrollable. Even with blogs which might provide a variety of subjects, I can set up an RSS feed and screen what I really want to read. Cable news as well is fairly focused on rather specific niches so I can usually find what I want to hear. Cable TV in general also has increasingly narrow subject matters, there’s a golf channel and a Home and Garden Channel, the Science channel, History Channel, a cooking channel or two and let’s not forget EWTN.

The bottom line is that increasingly  I can very carefully control the content of my life, what will influence me and what will be my daily fare.  Until recently there wasn’t the kind of choice that we have today and we were stuck with three networks and whatever junk was on tended to have exaggerated influence. The news on these networks was usually quite left of center and gave the impression that everyone thought the same way. And to some extent they did. Networks had too much power. Beyond the news,  in regular programming one was often exposed to a daily fare on these networks of stupidity, dysfunctional families,  and sometimes crudely sexual content. The rock and pop music I grew up with also had a very monolithic influence on my generation and encouraged hatred of authority, promiscuity, drug use and generally unedifying behavior. Once again the limited selections made the “mainstream” stuff too powerful. But now I have options and can rather carefully craft the world I live in.

To a certain extent this ability to craft my world is wonderful. In terms of the moral life it allows a kind of custody of the eyes and ears. I can limit the influence of many and bad things that once were able to reach me. I can be careful of what I listen to and what I look at. Scripture says: A discerning man keeps wisdom in view,  but a fool’s eyes wander to the ends of the earth (Prov 17:24). Or again: Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. (Prov 4:23-25).

So, on the one hand I can more carefully screen what will influence me and with more options I am more likely to choose that which is good.

But on the other hand if we begin to live in increasingly separate worlds what do we share? More and more I find that people mention events, and people that I have never heard of. To some extent I am proud of this for the emptiness of what works some people up amazes me. Some years ago everyone started talking about some one named J.Lo I finally asked who this was and after some moments of incredulous stares I was informed somewhat irritably that this was Jennifer Lopez. Unfortunately the full name didn’t help since I still didn’t know who she was and why I should care that she was breaking up with some dude. To this day I still couldn’t tell you a thing about Jennifer Lopez.

OK that’s a silly example. But the point is that many people live in increasingly separate worlds and the shared cultural experience is lost. This can surely affect Evangelization and the preaching task enormously. Perhaps I exaggerate the threat a bit and our self selected worlds are not that tightly sealed. But more and more I find it harder to understand what people are talking about.

I also find that many people don’t have a clue as to what I am talking about either. Often they have not heard of basic biblical figures and stories. Increasingly they are unfamiliar with Church teachings, feast days and basic theological terms. The clear challenge is that we have to get our message “out there.” But lately there are a lot of “theres” out there! The opportunities to communicate are enormous but so are the challenges as many people (me included) continue to live in a world that is more and more a self-selected universe which shuts out all unwanted influence and only admits what is pleasing and affirming but far less challenging and expansive.

The self-selected universe can greatly aid a proper custody of the eyes but it also runs the risk of becoming insular.

This humorous video clip is one of my favorite scenes from the Star Trek Movies (Voyage Home). In it to very different worlds collide. Kirk and Spock try to navigate in a world very different from their own. Spock especially has a hard time understanding what it going on and what it all means. They are from a different universe after all. Please excuse the brief profanities which are not being celebrated but rather are being critiqued.

From the Mission Trip, Laura writes:

In truth, our faith calls all of us to mission work. While some are called by God to do mission work like that described above, there are very simple ways to bring Christ to all people, as He has instructed us. The “ministry of presence” is perhaps the most powerful way, particularly with those we are serving here.

On our first day at the City of Charity, a priest asked one of our missionary, “What are you doing today?”

“I don´t know,” he replied.

“Well, the most important thing is that you are here.”

The people here at the City of Charity know that we are here to be with them and they know that the reason we are here to be with them is that we love them and they know that the reason we love them is that Christ loves all of us. This is mission work in its simplest form.

While some here are blind and deaf, mentally disabled, or clinically insane, we have been repeatedly surprised by their acknowledgement of our loving presence here. Whether in their smile, their laughter, their head on our shoulder, or their hand squeezing ours, we know that they know that they are loved. That is the gift we bring.

Now, do abandoned, deaf, blind, insane, elderly, or diseased people only live in third world countries? Nope. Do you have to travel twenty-seven hours in order bring Christ´s love to them? Nope. Do you have to risk your health or your life in order to be with them? Nope. It´s your grandfather. The woman living next door. The man in the retirement home down the street. The little girl at the community center downtown. There are plenty of people in the Washington, DC area who need you to show them that Christ loves them.

Have you made your New Year´s resolution yet?

Dear Jesus, help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go.

Flood our souls with your spirit and life.

Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly, that our lives may only be a radiance of yours.

Shine through us, and be so in us,

that every person we should come in contact with may feel your presence in our soul.

Let them look up and see no longer us, but only Jesus.

Stay with us, and then we shall begin to shine as you shine; so to shine as to be a light to others; the light, Jesus, will be all from you.

None of it will be ours.

It will be you shining on others through us.

Let us thus praise you in the way you love best, by shining on those around us.

Let us preach you without preaching:

not by words, but by our example,

by the catching force,

the sympathetic influence of what we do, the evident fullness of the love our hearts bear for you.

Amen.

(daily prayer of Mother Teresa based on prayer by Cardinal Newman)

　

　

 

The article below appeared in the Times Online (UK Edition) reports that some scientists are now designating dolphins as “non-human persons” that should have both moral standing and rights. I’d like to present excerpts from the article here and then comment below. The article is available by click the title just below:

Scientists Say Dolphins Should be Treated as “Non-Human Persons.”

Dolphins have been declared the world’s second most intelligent creatures after humans, with scientists suggesting they are so bright that they should be treated as “non-human persons”. Studies into dolphin behaviour have highlighted how similar their communications are to those of humans and that they are brighter than chimpanzees. These have been backed up by anatomical research showing that dolphin brains have many key features associated with high intelligence.

The researchers argue that their work shows it is morally unacceptable to keep such intelligent animals in amusement parks or to kill them for food or by accident when fishing. Some 300,000 whales, dolphins and porpoises die in this way each year. “Many dolphin brains are larger than our own and second in mass only to the human brain when corrected for body size,” said Lori Marino, a zoologist at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, who has used magnetic resonance imaging scans to map the brains of dolphin species and compare them with those of primates.

…Marino and Reiss will present their findings at a conference in San Diego, California, next month, concluding that the new evidence about dolphin intelligence makes it morally repugnant to mistreat them.  Thomas White, professor of ethics at Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, who has written a series of academic studies suggesting dolphins should have rights, will speak at the same conference. “The scientific research . . . suggests that dolphins are ‘non-human persons’ who qualify for moral standing as individuals,” he said.

A few thoughts of my own:

1. Beware –The title of the article is poor. Beware of titles that begin “Scientists say…” Ok, how many? One, few, thousands? What kind of scientists? What is their standing in the scientific community?  etc. The full article which you can read gives us little of this information. We only hear of several scientists by name, along with some admittedly fascinating findings.
2. How is the word “person” understood here? I am not a very good philosopher but I remember Boethius’ definition of a person: “an individual substance of a rational nature.”  Now to demonstrate intelligence is not the same as to to demonstrate rationality or the capacity to reason. However, arguments could go on forever as to how to define rationality even if the moderns accepted Boethus’ definition. But it might help if these scientists could give us their working definition of “person.”
3. Humans have a dignity that transcends mere intelligence – But let’s just say for the sake of argument that we accepted the point that they were some how persons. We already accept the existence of “non-human persons” since angels (who are not human) are persons. But from a Christian point of view this would still not change the fact that human persons have a special dignity that transcends our brain power. We are not special merely because we’re so smart and have these big brains. We are special because we are made in the image and likeness of God. Scriptures grants to man this very special prerogative. For example, when God made Adam it said that God took dust  from the earth, formed the man and then breathed into his nostrils so that man became “a living being”  (cf Gen 2:4ff) Adam (and later Eve) carried the very breath (Spirit of God) within them. This is never said of any other creature. Further, to no other creature did God ever say, “Let us make him in our image.”(Gen 1:26). Indeed God goes further to distinguish the human person from other creatures when he says: “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth,  and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” (Gen 1:26-27).  Hence, beyond the question brain power or perceptible intelligence, the human person has a special dignity. This is made even more significant at the Incarnation of Jesus: “For to which of the angels did God ever say, ‘You are my Son…‘ (Heb 1:13). Now I understand that these Scripture quotes will hold no weight in a science discussion.  I only mention them here so that we Christians do not  go running off in silly directions following merely the word of scientists. There is more to human dignity than intelligence or our ability to socialize. We have special dignity due to the prerogatives and distinctions  God has given us.
4. Rights for Dolphins? How about Duties? Now, if it is true that Dolphins are “persons” with “rights” does it not also follow that they have responsibilities? Can we fine them for bad behavior? Can we punish or imprison them if they kill unjustly. There ARE stories of dolphins getting violent. Should we arrest them and bring them to trial? How rational are they really? After all some like to claim thay are “even smarter than humans!” It is true that we do not hold every human person responsible for what they do even if it is wrong. For example a three year old child would not be brought up on charges even if they slug their playmate in the eye. However, we do punish them in age appropriate ways. Some argue that dolphins have brains just as well developed as a three year old child.  Hence, should we school (oh, bad pun) dolphins and punish them in certain ways when they get out of line? Just asking. But I am not merely being flippant (oops another pun!). I am asking for distinctions to be made and for us to be a bit more careful before we run off and effusively pour forth titles upon animals.
5. Careless thinking – Indeed, we ought to think through what we are really saying and be a bit more careful in how we speak. We live in rather silly times really and it seems we have lost touch with basic principles of philosophy and the fact that words mean things. If you ask me, we lack intellectual discipline in many areas and are very careless in how we speak, use words and grasp ancient philosophical and theological principles. Dolphins are smart seemingly social creatures. I like dolphins. The are magnificent creatures. (They are cute too since they seem to have a permanent smile on their face). But a dolphin is just a dolphin. For all their “brilliance” they do not build cities, write poetry, discuss philosophy, debate morality, collect art, build temples or worship God. They are dolphins after all.
6. I’ll go you one better! As for their rights, I am not sure. I know this however, we do well to respect these creatures which do seem to live at a kind of higher stage than many animals. But respecting them isn’t about their rights, it’s about me being human. And while we’re talking about being human, let’s get around to protecting  baby humans in the womb before we worry about conferring rights on dolphins. “Save the Dolphins?” How about “Save the Baby Humans!”

Ok Your Turn. Comments are open and ready! Remember, I am not good in philosophy so some of you philosopher types might be able to help. But remember, use English!