Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Tag: Prayer

  • Thursday of the First Week in Lent

    Thursday of the First Week in Lent

    Today’s readings

    During this first week of Lent, our Liturgies of the Word are teaching us about the Lenten disciplines: fasting, almsgiving and prayer. On Tuesday, we heard the Lord’s prayer, and today we hear the prayer of Esther and Jesus’ injunction to persistence in prayer.

    I love the story of Esther, and as I often tell people, you should read the entire book of Esther from the Bible (it’s not very long). It reminds us that we need a Savior. Esther’s adoptive father Mordecai was a deeply religious man. His devotion incurred the wrath of Haman the Agagite, who was a court official of King Ahasuerus of Persia. Mordecai refused to pay homage to Haman in the way prescribed by law, because it was idolatry. Because of this, Haman developed a deep hatred for Mordecai, and by extension, all of the Israelite people. He convinced King Ahasuerus to decree that all Israelites be put to death, and they cast lots to determine the date for this despicable event.

    Meanwhile, Esther, Mordecai’s adopted daughter, is chosen to fill a spot in the King’s harem, replacing Queen Vashti. Esther, however, never had revealed her own Israelite heritage to the King. She would, of course, be part of the extermination order. Mordecai came to Esther to inform her of the decree that Haman had proposed, and asked her to intercede on behalf of her own people to the King. She was terrified to do this because court rules forbade her to come to the king without an invitation. She asked Mordecai to have all of her people fast and pray, and she did the same. The prayer that she offered is beautifully rendered in today’s first reading.

    Esther knew that there was no one that could help her, and that it was totally on her shoulders to intercede for her people. Doing this was a risk to her own life, and the only one that she could rely on was God himself. Her prayer was heard, her people were spared, and Haman himself was hung from the same noose that had been prepared for Mordecai and all his fellow Israelites. This evening, in fact, is the beginning of the Jewish feast of Purim, which is a festive observance of this biblical story.

    God hears our own persistent prayers. We must constantly pray, and trust all of our needs to the one who knows them before we do. We must ask, seek and knock of the one who made us and cares for us deeply. Prayer changes things, and most of all, it changes us. It helps us to rely on God who gives us salvation through Jesus Christ, the One who shows us how to ask, seek, and knock.

  • Ash Wednesday

    Ash Wednesday

    Where do you see yourself in forty days?

    I’m sure many of us have had to answer some version of that annoying question when applying for a job. You know: “Where do you see yourself in five years? Ten years?” But I ask that question today because I think we have to decide what getting ashes on our foreheads today means for us. If it’s just to check a box, or avoid the question “I thought you were Catholic?” at work, or to prove to Mom that we made it to Church, then we’ve missed an opportunity. Ash Wednesday is the busiest day at any Catholic Church hands down: busier than Christmas, and busier than Easter. And it’s really good that we are here today to mark the beginning of Lent, but seriously, where do you see yourself in forty days?

    The hope is that today we get reminded that we are dust, and to dust we shall return; and warned that we need to repent and believe in the Gospel. Then we take those admonitions and unpack them for forty days by engaging in fasting, almsgiving, and prayer, so as to rise on Easter Morning, greeted by the Morning Star that never sets, a new creation that has died and risen with our Risen Lord. That’s where we need to see ourselves in forty days.

    They (whoever “they” are!) say that it takes 21 days to start a new habit. So in forty days, we should be able to really accomplish something important. So if we find ourselves right now looking for a better relationship with God, a better relationship with the people in our lives, or wanting to be happier, more positive people, then the traditional Lenten disciplines of fasting, almsgiving, and prayer, if we really engage them, can make a huge difference in our spiritual lives, and in our lives in general.

    Maybe this year we will fast from spending so much time on social media, or on our phones or tablets in general, and really take an interest in the people in our lives. Maybe we will fast from the negative influences in our lives, whether that be news or media in general, or relationships with people that drag us down. Maybe we will fast from negativity, and choose to look at people differently, asking God to give us the grace to see them as he does.

    In almsgiving, maybe we will take the time to really give of ourselves. Yes, we can write the check to help any number of charities, but maybe we can also make a meal or even just a dessert for a lonely neighbor or relative. Maybe we will give alms by making time with our family a priority. Or maybe we will even volunteer to mentor someone in need, or to assist in faith formation here at church.

    For prayer, maybe this isn’t the only time we do daily Mass during these forty days of Lent. Perhaps even just a day or two a week before work or whatever the day’s agenda may be. Or, we could visit the adoration chapel for fifteen minutes once or twice a week. Or, maybe we try a new devotion like a daily Rosary or reading a few paragraphs of the Gospel of Luke every day.

    Forty days of some combination of that can really affect our relationship with God and our relationships with the people in our lives in an amazingly positive way. And doing this, we don’t blow the trumpet and say, “Hey, look at what good things I’m doing!” No, we do it unassumingly and note with joy the changes it makes in our demeanor.

    I hope this Lent is incredibly powerful for every one of us; that it makes our Easter Morning all the more joyous; and that it changes us in ways that will make our lives better for years to come.

    Where do you see yourself in forty days?

  • Saturday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time

    Saturday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    You know, this Gospel reading is filled with all sorts of off-putting comments, isn’t it? I don’t know about you, but I bristle at the thought of comparing God to a dishonest judge! But that’s not the point here. Of course, Jesus means that God is so much greater than the dishonest judge, that if the dishonest judge will finally relent to someone pestering him, how much more will God, who loves us beyond anything we can imagine, how much more will he grant the needs of this children who come to him in faith?

    But people have trouble with this very issue all the time. Because I am sure that almost all of us have been in the situation where we have prayed and prayed and prayed and nothing seems to happen. But we can never know the reason for God’s delay. Maybe what we ask isn’t right for us right now – or ever. Maybe something better is coming our way, or at least something different. Maybe the right answer will position itself in time, through the grace of God at work in so many situations. Most likely, we just don’t have the big picture, which isn’t ours to have, really.

    But whatever the reason, the last line of the Gospel today is our key: “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” And that’s why we have this particular Gospel reading at this late date in the Church year. As the days of Ordinary Time draw to a close, we find it natural to think of the end of time. We don’t know when the end of time will come; Jesus made that clear – nobody knows but the Father. But when it does come, please God let there be faith on earth. Let that great day find us living our faith and living the Gospel and loving one another.

  • Thursday of the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time

    Thursday of the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    When you stop to think about it, we are so richly blessed to have as our guide for prayer, and a prayer that we can say, the words of our Lord himself. It’s such a beautiful thing that this is usually one of the first prayers that we learn. It’s a powerful tool for our spiritual life, and can get us through good times and bad. In fact, I was celebrating the Last Rites for someone the other day, and she was in and out as often happens in one’s last moments. But when we got to the Lord’s prayer, she moved her lips in prayer along with us. I was really struck by the beauty of that moment.

    This wonderful prayer teaches us how to approach our God in prayer. First, it teaches us to pray in communion with our brothers and sisters in Christ. This week, in our Office of Readings, we priests and deacons and religious have been reading from a treatise on the Lord’s Prayer by Saint Cyprian. On Monday, that treatise told us: “Above all, he who preaches peace and unity did not want us to pray by ourselves in private or for ourselves alone. We do not say ‘My Father, who art in heaven,’ nor ‘Give me this day my daily bread.’ It is not for himself alone that each person asks to be forgiven, not to be led into temptation, or to be delivered from evil. Rather we pray in public as a community, and not for one individual but for all. For the people of God are all one.”

    Second, it acknowledges that God knows best how to provide for our needs. We might want all the time to tell him what we want, or how to take care of us, but deep down we know that the only way our lives can work is when we surrender to God and let God do what he needs to do in us. And so the Lord’s Prayer teaches us to pray “thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” The whole point of creation is that the whole world will be happiest and at peace only when everything is returned to the One who made it all in the first place. Until we surrender our lives too, we can never be happy or at peace.

    Third, this wonderful prayer acknowledges that the real need in all of us is forgiveness. Yes, we are all sinners and depend on God alone for forgiveness, because we can never make up for the disobedience of our lives. But we also must forgive others as well, or we can never really receive forgiveness in our lives. “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” might just be the boldest prayer we can utter on any given day. Because if we have been negligent in our forgiving, is that really how we want God to forgive us? When we take the Lord’s Prayer seriously, we can really transform our little corner of the world by giving those around us the grace we have been freely given.

    So as we pray the Lord’s Prayer later in Mass, and even during our Rosaries and private prayer, let us take some time to reflect on these beautiful words and to give thanks that the One who wants us to be in relationship with us gave us a prayer that helps us to be in that relationship.

  • Ash Wednesday and Saint Valentine

    Ash Wednesday and Saint Valentine

    Today’s readings

    Saint Valentine was a clergyman who lived in the third century.  A martyr, he was beheaded on February 14 in the year 369. Before this, he had been condemned to death for evangelizing.  But the pagan judge gave him the opportunity to prove the authenticity of Jesus by inviting him to cure his blind adopted daughter.  This he did, and the judge and his family were converted and baptized. He was later recaptured for continued evangelization and beheaded.  He gave his life for the Gospel and ultimately for our Lord.  One legend says that he defied the orders of the emperor and would perform Christian marriages for couples so the husbands could avoid conscription to the army, and it is for this reason primarily that he was put to death. That same legend says that, in order to remind the couples of their vows and God’s love, he would cut out hearts from parchment and give them to the persecuted Christians, which sounds a lot like giving Valentines to loved ones.

    It’s not lost on me that Ash Wednesday this year falls on Valentine’s Day. Love of God and neighbor is the essence of the Gospel message, and both of these celebrations bring that call to love to the forefront of our attention. Just as we love our loved ones on Valentine’s Day, we are called on Ash Wednesday to come to a deeper, more vibrant love of God and neighbor.  And so on Ash Wednesday, we are called to dedicate our Lent to the three traditional spiritual practices of fasting, almsgiving, and prayer.

    So first, there is fasting.  We can give up snacks, or a favorite food, or eat one less meal perhaps one day a week, or we can give up a favorite television program or activity.  Fasting helps us to be aware of the ways God works to sustain us when we’re lacking something we think we need.  The whole idea of fasting is that we need to come to realize that there is nothing that we hunger for that God can’t provide, and provide better than we could ever find in any other source.

    Second, we pray.  Sure, we’re called to pray all the time, but maybe Lent can be the opportunity to intensify our prayer life, to make it better, to make it more, to draw more life from it.  Maybe we are not people who read Scripture every day, and we can work through one of the books of the Bible during Lent.  Maybe we can learn a new prayer or take on a new devotion.  Maybe we can spend time before the Lord in the Tabernacle or in adoration.  Maybe we can just carve out some quiet time at the end of the day to give thanks for our blessings, and to ask pardon for our failings.  Intensifying our prayer life this Lent can help us to be aware of God’s presence at every moment of our day and in every place we are.

    Finally, we give alms or do works of charity.  We can visit a soup kitchen or go out to collect groceries (and, ahem, not expired ones!) for the food pantry.  Maybe we can devote some time to mentoring a child who needs help with their studies, or volunteer to help in our school or religious education program.  Or we can spend time with a homebound neighbor or parishioner. Works of charity might be a family project, choosing an activity and doing it together.  When we do works of charity, we can learn to see others as God does, and love them the way God loves them and us.

    And none of this, as the Gospel reminds us today, is to be done begrudgingly or half-heartedly.  None of it is to be done with the express purpose of letting the world see how great we are.  It is always to be done with great humility, but also with great joy.  Our acts of fasting, prayer, and charity should be a celebration of who God is in our lives, and a beautiful effort to strengthen our relationship with him.

    The ashes we receive today don’t mean anything if we don’t internalize the call to love better. Repenting of our hard heartedness, or indifference, or apathy, or straight out racism, misogony, and any other sin will help us to more fully receive God’s love and change our lives, and the lives of others around us.  Small changes, spiritual practices during Lent, can make this a reality. Love is who God is, Valentine’s Day or not, and the ashes on our head remind us that love calls us to do whatever we can to change the world for the better.  It all starts by changing our lives for the better.  That’s the gift of Lent.

    It is my prayer that this Lent can be a forty day retreat that will bring us all closer to God.  Our collect prayer calls this a “campaign of Christian service.”  Lent is a time to pay more attention to the ways God wants to bless us and respond by giving blessing to others.  May we all hear the voice of the prophet Joel from today’s first reading: “Even now, says the Lord, return to me with your whole heart!”

  • Thursday of the Twenty-seventh Week of Ordinary Time

    Thursday of the Twenty-seventh Week of Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    The Divine Liturgist today is inviting us to find our hope in God, and inviting us to turn over our lives to God in hopeful anticipation that God will answer our needs. Sometimes I wonder how willing we are to actually do that. It’s almost like we want to pray to God just in case I can’t fix things on our own or work out our needs by ourselves. Kind of like a divine insurance policy.

    But that can’t be the way that the Christian disciple prays. We have to trust that God will give us what we really need. He certainly won’t be giving us everything we want. And he probably won’t be answering our prayers in exactly the way we’d like him to. And we will certainly find out that he will answer the prayers of our heart in his own time. But he will answer. He will give to the one who asks. He will be present to the one who seeks. And he will open the door to the one who knocks.

    The Christian disciple must be willing to accept God’s answer in God’s time on God’s terms. When we do that we might even find that when God gives us what we really need, instead of what we want, our lives are so much more blessed than we could ever have imagined. Blessed are they who hope in the Lord.

  • The Twenty-third Sunday of Ordinary Time

    The Twenty-third Sunday of Ordinary Time

    Today’s readings

    So today our Gospel, at the end of it, talks to us a bit about what prayer looks like.  I have to say, when the Scriptures talk about prayer, I get a little uneasy.  Not because I don’t like to pray, or think prayer is a bad thing.  But more because I think mostly we misunderstand prayer, and usually a brief mention in the readings like we have today can do more harm than good.  The line almost at the end of the Gospel reading is the culprit: “if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father.”

    Really? Anything? I don’t know about you, but I personally can think of examples – plenty of examples – of times where I had prayed with friends or family for something and ended up not getting it.  You can probably think of examples too.  People tell me all the time, “Father, I have prayed and prayed about (fill in the blank), and I never get any answer, it doesn’t seem like God even hears me.”  Have you ever thought that?  Well, if so, you are not alone; lots of us have.  So what are we to make of this?  Why would Jesus make a promise like that if he wasn’t prepared to deliver on it?  Well, I’d like to make three points about prayer that maybe will help with that conundrum.

    First, in the line right after this, Jesus says, “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”  Notice how he says, “in my name.”  So it’s not like a couple of us can get together and pray for something crazy and hold God accountable for granting it.  That would be absurd; I’m sure you realize that.  If we’re gathered in anything less than the name of Jesus, we’re in the wrong place, and you don’t get what you want, or even what you need, when you’re in a place other than where Jesus is.

    Second, reflecting on that same line, I would point out the last phrase: “there am I in the midst of them.”  Sometimes God doesn’t answer all our prayers in the way we think he should, or in the way we would like him to.  God isn’t a divine vending machine.  But he definitely always answers them with his presence.  Sometimes that leads to resolution of a problem that is greater than we could have imagined.  Sometimes it makes us a stronger, more faith-filled person.  And sometimes the answer to a prayer means that we are the ones who have to change, not the situation, or the other people, or whatever is going on.  So the abiding presence of our God, most perfectly experienced in community, when two are three are gathered in his name, is the most important answer to every prayer.  And even if it’s the only answer, it surely is enough.

    I want to give an example from my recent illness.  The cardiologist wanted to do a full set of tests to see why I was in Afib.  I prayed and prayed that everything would be normal and I could go home.  Not so fast.  My stress test was abnormal and they wanted to do an angiogram.  I was, frankly, scared, and not real excited about the procedure.  But in my prayer, God reminded me that I had recently told him I wasn’t feeling my best and asked him to help me figure it out.  God said he was answering that prayer, and that I needed to trust him.  Again, it wasn’t how I would have wanted it to work out, but God was there for me in it.

    Finally – and I can’t say this often enough, nor stress it strongly enough – prayer is not a magic wand.  You might read in this brief little passage that all you have to do is pray for something and you get it.  “God help me win the lottery.”  Not so fast.  Prayer is always experienced in relationship: relationship with God and relationship with others.  That’s why this brief little passage mentions praying together, and praying in Jesus’ name.  Those are important points, and it’s best not to overlook them.

    Prayer is a relationship, prayer is work – sometimes hard work, prayer is a way of life for the disciple of Jesus.  We enter that relationship at our Baptism, and it’s our task as disciples to nurture that relationship our whole lives long.  When we put in that hard work, Jesus makes a promise on which he will always deliver: “there am I in the midst of them.”

  • Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent

    Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    Have you ever felt like you were certainly in the fire? Things in life may have gone from bad to worse. When we’re in those times of life, sometimes we know that the reason for it is that we have sinned. Now I’m not talking about when people in your life are sick or anything like that, God doesn’t punish sin by unleashing evil on us.  Maybe it’s more like when relationships have gone bad, or things have gone wrong at work, or there’s financial hardship. You know the feeling, things are just piling up and you have no idea how to get out, it’s getting hotter all the time and it seems there is no salvation. But deep at the heart of it, you feel the weight of your own sin. I can testify to being in that place myself in my life on occasion. To that, the young man Azariah speaks:

    For we are reduced, O Lord, beyond any other nation,
    brought low everywhere in the world this day
    because of our sins.
    But with contrite heart and humble spirit
    let us be received;
    As though it were burnt offerings of rams and bullocks,
    or thousands of fat lambs,
    So let our sacrifice be in your presence today
    as we follow you unreservedly;
    for those who trust in you cannot be put to shame.

    We have to be a forgiven and forgiving people. When life crashes in on us, we have to confess our sins, and cry out for God’s pardon and mercy. And when it is given us – and it will be given us – we must become a merciful people who extend forgiveness to every single person in our lives without hesitation. We have to be a people who throw mercy around freely, because that’s how it’s been given to each of us.

  • Tuesday of the First Week of Lent

    Tuesday of the First Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    The prophet Isaiah and Jesus speak today about the great power of words. Isaiah speaks specifically of the power of God’s word, a word that will not return empty but will go out and accomplish the purpose for which God sent it.  We see the word that the prophet speaks of here, of course as the Word – with a capital “W.”  That Word is Jesus Christ who comes to accomplish the salvation of the world, the purpose of God ever since the world’s creation.

    The prayer that Jesus gives us today, the classic prayer that echoes in our hearts in good times and in bad, is a prayer with a specific purpose in mind.  That prayer, if we pray it rightly, recognizes that God’s holiness will bring about a Kingdom where his will would be done in all of creation.  It begs God’s forgiveness and begs also that we too would become a forgiving and merciful people, just as God is merciful to us.  Finally, it asks for help with temptation and evil, something with which we struggle every day.

    Today’s readings are a plea that God’s will would finally be done.  That his Word would go forth and accomplish God’s purpose.  That his will would be done on earth as in heaven.  As we pray those familiar words, they can often go past us without catching our attention.  But today, maybe we can slow down just a little, and pray them more reflectively, that God’s will would be accomplished in every place, starting in our very own lives.

    Because to God belongs the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

  • The First Sunday of Advent

    The First Sunday of Advent

    Today’s readings

    I don’t know about you, but I always find this weekend after Thanksgiving to be a little strange.  Here is a weekend when we can barely clear the plates at the Thanksgiving dinner table before we have to make room for Christmas.  And I’m not talking about the religious observance of the Incarnation of our Lord, but rather all the secular trappings of that holy day.  It begins about Halloween, or maybe a little earlier, when you start to see the stores slowly make room for the Christmas stuff.  They sneak in some “holiday” signs here and there, and start to weave the garland into the end of the aisles, just past the Halloween costumes.  On Thanksgiving day, you get about a thousand emails from every store or business from whom you’ve ever purchased anything.

    And then there’s Black Friday itself, which now starts bright and early on Thursday morning – Thursday, you know, Thanksgiving Day.  We then get to be treated to Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday.  What a commercial mess this has all become, what a sad commentary on what makes our society tick.  We barely have time to gather up the pumpkins and corn stalks and autumn leaves before we have to set out the Christmas stockings and brightly-lit trees and candy canes.

    Now, I will say this.  There are times in my life, this year included, when the joy of Christmas is definitely welcome, and I’ll celebrate it as long as I possibly can.  So I’ve been listening to Christmas music, and have watched more than my share of Hallmark Christmas movies with Mom over the past several weeks.  I like to celebrate Christmas all the way until February 2nd, the feast of the Presentation of the Lord.  So I’m in it too.

    But I find that this rampant consumerism is really just part of the ambient noise of our society.  From television to social media to email spam to Christmas jingles on the store loud-speakers, the noise never seems to stop.  Whether it’s political bantering and bureaucratic infighting, or the latest pop culture scandal, it seems like there’s always a lot of noise going on.  And we could add to that our own noise: sin in our lives, unaddressed family strife, and so much more.  It’s no wonder we often have the television on as background noise, we seem to clamor for it.

    But all that noise comes at the peril of our spiritual lives.  The noise fills up the space that God wants to use to speak words of encouragement, solace, or challenge.  When we are constantly listening to other things, we can’t hear the voice of God who wants to be part of our lives, who wants to give us himself.

    The emotions we feel at this time of year are palpable and often conflicted.  The Church knows this, and in Her great wisdom, gives us the season of Advent every year.  It’s a season that recognizes that there is this hole in our hearts that needs to be filled up with something, and can be filled up if we will just be quiet and make space.  That something isn’t going to be an item you can pick up on Black Friday, or a trite holiday jingle, or even a peppermint mocha latte.  Those things can’t possibly fill up our personal sadness, or the lack of peace in the world, or the cynicism and apathy that plague our world and confront us day after day.

    And so in our readings today, rather boldly, the Church is telling us to cut out all of this nonsense and get serious about our eternity.  Because if we’re only living from Black Friday to Cyber Monday, we are going to be left behind with our cheap electronics and gaudy trinkets, and have none of the real riches of the Kingdom of God.

    And so our first reading, from the second chapter of Isaiah’s prophecy, has us taking a step back to look at our lives: “Come, let us climb the LORD’s mountain, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may instruct us in his ways, and we may walk in his paths.”  We need to go a little higher and look down on what we’ve become in order to see how we fit into the bigger picture.  Do we see ourselves as concerned about peace and justice in the world, looking out for the needs of the needy and the marginalized, blanketing our world in holiness and calling it to become bright and beautiful as it walks in the light of the Lord?

    Or do we take part in those deeds of darkness that Saint Paul writes about in his letter to the Romans today?  Do we participate in these dark deeds to the point of giving scandal to those who carefully watch the activities of people of faith?  If we do, then Saint Paul clearly commands us to get our act together: “Let us then throw off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light.  Let us conduct ourselves properly…”

    So this Advent season is clearly about something more than hanging up pretty decorations for a birthday party.  It’s about something more than perpetuating rampant consumerism and secularism.  And it’s definitely about more than participating in the same old noise we encounter all the time.  The stakes are too high for that.  Because while we are distracted by all of that ambient noise, we are in danger of missing the joy for which we were created.  Just as in the days of Noah, as Jesus points out in our Gospel today, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, so it will be in the coming Day of the Lord.  Just as those oblivious ones were surprised by the flood, we too are in danger of being surprised by the second coming.  God forbid that two men are hanging lights on the house when one is taken and the other is left.  Or that two women are getting some crazy deals at Kohls and one is taken and the other is left.  Or that two people are having a Twitter feud and one is taken and another is left.  We have to be prepared, because at an hour we do not expect, our Lord will certainly return.

    Don’t get me wrong: the return of our Lord is not something to be feared.  Indeed, we eagerly await that coming in these Advent days.  I’m just saying that if we aren’t attentive to our spiritual lives, if we don’t create a space for silence and reflection, if we aren’t zealous about living the Gospel, if we aren’t intentional about making time for worship and deepening our relationship with the Lord, then we are going to miss out on something pretty wonderful.  And that pretty wonderful thing isn’t in the far-off, distant future.  If we quiet ourselves and open our eyes, He’s right in front of us, walking with us, calling us to become more than we are, to become the glory for which we were created.  We have to stay awake, we have to turn off the noise, we have to live in the Lord’s daylight and not prefer the world’s darkness.  We have to eagerly expect our Lord’s birth into our hearts and souls, right here and now, and not in some distant day.

    Or we’ll miss it.  God forbid, we’ll miss it.

    So I am going to give you some quiet time right now, and also after Communion.  I want to give you an opportunity to pray in that silence. 

    So, in these moments of silence, I invite you to take a moment to call to mind something positive you’ve been meaning to do.  Maybe it’s a practice of prayer, or getting up on time, or exercising regularly, or reaching out to a friend or family member you haven’t talked to in a while.  If you’re like me, you could come up with a whole list of those things, but I want you to call to mind the one that is most tugging on your heart right now.  In these moments of silence, I invite you to talk to Jesus about that thing.  Offer it to him, and ask him for the grace to accomplish it, or at least begin it, in these Advent days.  And then listen for his support of you in that endeavor.