Monday Morning Meditation #78: We Don't Need a Reason to Obey God

I hope you all had a beautiful, happy, and hopeful Easter. It is a bit difficult to return to the dark and despairing prophecies of Jeremiah after the joyful way in which the Easter triduum ends. Nonetheless, that is the reading in which I am soaked at the moment, both in my Bible Studies class and in my regular reading. Actually, I am not repelled by these prophecies; rather, I feel a good deal of compassion for Jeremiah. I can imagine how difficult being a prophet of God under such conditions was for him, given some of the difficult but far more modest taskings I have been given; yet, Jeremiah did as asked. In the chapter I read this morning, God told Jeremiah to buy a linen belt, put it around his waist, and not to let it touch water. Then God told him to take the belt to Perath, hide it there in a crevice in the rocks. After some time, God told Jeremiah to retrieve the belt. When Jeremiah did so, he found it ruined. Then God said:

"9 'In the same way I will ruin the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem.
10 These wicked people, who refuse to listen to my words, who follow the stubbornness of their hearts and go after other gods to serve and worship them, will be like this belt—completely useless!
11 For as a belt is bound around the waist, so I bound all the people of Israel and all the people of Judah to me,’ declares the LORD, ‘to be my people for my renown and praise and honor. But they have not listened.’"

Reading: Jeremiah 13: 1-11.

Meditation: I can imagine how disconcerted with God's first, second, and third set of instructions Jeremiah might have been. Buy a belt, wear it, and keep it dry? Whatever for? Why a belt? What was the purpose of wearing it? But Jeremiah did not question; he simply bought and wore the belt. But then, take the belt to Perath and bury it? That was even more strange a command. Why should he do that? What was the purpose of burying the belt? Once again, though, as strange and senseless as the command may have seemed to be, Jeremiah did as asked. Ultimately, he did find out why God wanted him to do this. Not everyone does find out the reason, but the doing of the tasking is important whether or not we know why.

Some of you may know the story of how God told Beth Moore, when she was at an airport, to brush the hair of a man with straggly hair in a wheelchair. (If you have not read the story, you can find it here: Beth Moore's Airport OA...Revisited.) She did not want to do it, but she did do it. Just as Jeremiah did as asked, as have a number of other prophets, no matter how odd the request it sounded or how embarrassing or difficult for them -- and, the important thing in both the case of the linen belt (Jeremiah) and the hair brush (Moore), is that the request made no sense to them, but they did it, anyway, assuming/trusting that God had reasons that they did not need to know.

I have personally experienced this disconcernment when asked by God to do something that I have found to be awkward or embarrassing with no understandable reason as to why it should be do. Like Jeremiah and Moore, however, I have found myself doing as asked. In one of the more embarrassing taskings, I had to ask an employee by email about the condition of his soul! (Keep in mind that I work for an organization that insists on separation of work and religion.) Like Jeremiah and Moore, I had no idea why I was supposed to do this. Like both of them, in this case, I did find out the reason although there are times that I don't. I have learned that it is not important for me to know why God wants me to do something. It is only important that I do it. Developing a level of comfort with not knowing has taken many lessons from God. I am glad I was blessed with those lessons for now obedience alone brings me much pleasure.

Contemplation: That is far as I can go with you this Monday morning. I now retire to private prayer to thank God for entrusting me with one or another task, to promise to act without needing to know why, and to ask for more opportunities to serve God and His people. Then I will move on to contemplation, my favorite part of the day, letting God take over the direction in which my relationship with Him moves.

I will leave you now to your prayer and contemplation. First, though, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I think you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation posts. (During the week, he also posts great homilies and other thoughtful discussions. I enjoy reading those, too, as do readers of this blog who have taken the stroll over to his blog.)

For additional inspiration throughout the week, I would point out two sets of blogs: (1) the list of devotional blogs on my sidebar and (2) my blogroll, where I am following a number of inspirational priests and writers about spiritual matters. I learn so very much from all these people. I highly recommend them to you.

Monday Morning Meditation #77: Is God Unfair?

This week I continued to read the Book of Jeremiah, where I came across a complaint of Jeremiah that is not unlike the complaint that many believers make today. Why, asks Jeremiah, do the unrighteous prosper while the righteous suffer? Is that not, indeed, unfair? Should it not be the other way around? Should not the righteous prosper and the unrighteous suffer? Would that not make it easier for all to to believe? Should we not expect God to be fair, to reward "good" people with a "good" life?

God provides an answer to Jeremiah, perhaps not entirely the response we might have expected:

14 This is what the LORD says: “As for all my wicked neighbors who seize the inheritance I gave my people Israel, I will uproot them from their lands and I will uproot the people of Judah from among them. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
15 But after I uproot them, I will again have compassion and will bring each of them back to their own inheritance and their own country.
16 And if they learn well the ways of my people and swear by my name, saying, ‘As surely as the LORD lives’—even as they once taught my people to swear by Baal—then they will be established among my people.
17 But if any nation does not listen, I will completely uproot and destroy it,” declares the LORD.

Reading: Jeremiah 12: 14-17.

Meditation: When I was an atheist, I never gave much thought to what was fair and not fair. To me, as Charles Sykes once said in an op-ed piece (San Diego Union-Tribune, September 19, 1996), "Life is not fair; get used to it." I was used to it, and I never compared my life to the life of others. Were I to have done so, I would have considered some to be luckier than I and others to be less lucky.

After coming to faith, I encountered many discussions on the "fairness" of God, including books such as When Bad Things Happen to Good People (Rabbi Harold Kushner) and 21 Reasons Bad Things Happen to Good People (Dave Early). And then there are my catechism kids who think that God should protect them and all God's people from any harm or difficulty or suffering and allow them to surf through life on the wings of the wind with nary a feather, uh, hair, ruffled. The aforementioned books try to provide logical counter arguments to my catechism kids' assumptions. To some extent, my kids buy the arguments; to some extent they do not.

The source of my catechism kids' difficulties in accepting the bad things that happen to them is their comparison with others' lives. They expect life to be fair in the sense that good reaps good and bad reaps bad. They don't want to believe the line from Star Trek in which Mr. Spock tells Dr. McCoy, "In a test of good and evil, evil can win unless good is very, very careful."

In a world of free will, there is bound to be good and evil. And where there is evil, there is bound to be evil that triumphs over good if one judges a good life by material goods, career success, power, and prestigious relationships. That is not, however, how God judges success, and it certainly is not the model of a good life that Jesus showed to us -- or any of the saints, for that matter.

None of those things matter to me. I still do not compare my life to that of others. I don't care about the Joneses. They have their life; I have mine. My life has been full of what others might consider suffering: an abusive childhood, children and grandchildren with birth defects, career ups and downs, a considerable amount of poverty throughout my childhood and much of my adult life. Nonetheless, I have traveled the world (often with only $20 in my pocket) and have been able to contribute to improvements in the lives of children in many places. I have had a good life for a good life is not necessarily an easy life, a luxurious life, or a fair life.

And thank God, that it is never too late to recognize the source of our help and support. Thank God for God's grace and mercy even to those who have perpetrated evil against us, for we, too, are all in need of God's grace and mercy. Thank God that God is willing to bring back anyone who repents and asks for forgiveness and that He will set the foreigner who believes in Him among us for most of us were once those foreigners whom He established among His people. Exemplifying God's compassion should be our goal, not crying to Him that life is not fair or that His willingness to forgive people even at the moment of their last breath is not fair. It is fair -- and kind.

On January 30, 2000, Fr. John Claypool gave a radio homily called "Life Isn't Fair, Thank God!" That homily is a wonderfully clear explanation of why what appears fair and unfair to us may be very different from God's definition of fair, which is based on charity (in both senses of that word). Here is the ending to that homily:

"There is an old rabbinic parable about a farmer that had two sons. As soon as they were old enough to walk, he took them to the fields and he taught them everything that he knew about growing crops and raising animals. When he got too old to work, the two boys took over the chores of the farm and when the father died, they had found their working together so meaningful that they decided to keep their partnership. So each brother contributed what he could and during every harvest season, they would divide equally what they had corporately produced. Across the years the elder brother never married, stayed an old bachelor. The younger brother did marry and had eight wonderful children. Some years later when they were having a wonderful harvest, the old bachelor brother thought to himself one night, "My brother has ten mouths to feed. I only have one. He really needs more of his harvest than I do, but I know he is much too fair to renegotiate. I know what I'll do. In the dead of the night when he is already asleep, I'll take some of what I have put in my barn and I'll slip it over into his barn to help him feed his children.

At the very time he was thinking down that line, the younger brother was thinking to himself, "God has given me these wonderful children. My brother hasn't been so fortunate. He really needs more of this harvest for his old age than I do, but I know him. He's much too fair. He'll never renegotiate. I know what I'll do. In the dead of the night when he's asleep, I'll take some of what I've put in my barn and slip it over into his barn." And so one night when the moon was full, as you may have already anticipated, those two brothers came face to face, each on a mission of generosity. The old rabbi said that there wasn't a cloud in the sky, a gentle rain began to fall. You know what it was? God weeping for joy because two of his children had gotten the point. Two of his children had come to realize that generosity is the deepest characteristic of the holy and because we are made in God's image, our being generous is the secret to our joy as well. Life is not fair, thank God! It's not fair because it's rooted in grace."

Contemplation: That is far as I can go with you this Monday morning. I now retire to private prayer to thank God that my life has not been fair for I would have found far less learning and far fewer rewards in a fair life. Then I will move on to contemplation, my favorite part of the day, letting God take over the direction in which my relationship with Him moves.

I will leave you now to your prayer and contemplation. First, though, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I think you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation posts. (During the week, he also posts great homilies and other thoughtful discussions. I enjoy reading those, too, as do readers of this blog who have taken the stroll over to his blog.)

For additional inspiration throughout the week, I would point out two sets of blogs: (1) the list of devotional blogs on my sidebar and (2) my blogroll, where I am following a number of inspirational priests and writers about spiritual matters. I learn so very much from all these people. I highly recommend them to you.

7 Quick Takes Friday #57

See more 7 Quick Takes Friday contributions at Jennifer Fulwiler's Conversion Diary.

I missed posting last Friday. I was spending posting time in the emergency room. Friday morning I provided considerable entertainment for colleagues enroute to a required meeting when I fell and did some damage to my right hand in the process of donating my blood to the sidewalk at work. So, below are some highlights from the past two weeks.

1. Friday evenings Old Mission has been having soup dinners, followed by stations of the cross. This is a traditional Lenten activity for us. It is a great time to sit together with friends at the end of the week, share a simple meal, and spend time together with our parish staff and the priest who is filling in for our priest who is on administrative leave. (That story, for those who have been following, has had little progress other than a judge deciding that the accuser could remain anonymous, which makes it difficult for the defense to do its job.) I know that I have added a few pounds (almost ten, which I am really trying to lose again) because it takes several hours for me to recover from all the up-and-down motions. At ten pounds lighter, it was easier. Good motivation to go back to doing what my doctor wants me to do! (I am not my doctor's favorite patient!)

2. The Diocese held two listening sessions for our parish last week related to the administrative leave of our priest, who has been accused of sexual misconduct by a young man from another parish. They had promised information followed by discussion. However, they started out by wanting people to "work through their grief" in small groups. Our parish is quite a united place. Everyone refused to do this, insisting on being given the promised information and explaining that we have been sharing our grief for weeks, know how to be grown-ups and take turns in a large group, and did not need support but information. Ultimately, the Diocesan representatives did what we requested, not what they had planned. It truly is remarkable how bonded our community is. Unfortunately, though, in spite of being called a "listening session," no one from the Diocese was doing much listening. Sigh!

3. We moved in to our new house over the past couple of weeks with help of Doah and others. Once in, we had the water and electricity turned on. The house had belonged to HSBC Bank, and the bank had refused to pay for electricity and water for an unoccupied building, so we had no idea that we would find some unhappy news (although the bank had misled us on several counts so we were not surprised). We found dripping faucets, a dripping and non-functioning water filtering system, no working appliances work, no working toilets (electricity and water not on), and a big hole in the deck that was left when the VA required the bank to remove mold. So, bit by bit, we are fixing those problems, beginning, of course, with the toilets!

4. St. Francis Retreat Center, which is located on a hill outside my home town of San Ignatio, holds Days of Recollection every Wednesday during Lent. I can rarely make them because I have to work. However, last Wednesday I was able to take a day of annual leave. A full day of worship in the middle of the week made the whole week pass quickly.

5. I co-lead a prayer group that meets at Old Mission every Tuesday evening. Once a month, we gather together at my house to watch a spiritual movie. Knowing that we would have company spurred Donnie and me into turning our modern American cardboard decor into something a little more guest-friendly. We are still unpacking, but at least the kitchen, dining room, and living room areas are habitable both by us and visitors. Our movie? Gospel Road, an oldie but goodie and appropriate for the Lenten season. We had good news, too, because one family that attends our group nearly lost their home due to a bank agent scam. We had all been praying for them, and this week their lawyer exposed the scam and, even better, they got all their money back.

6. Difficulties cropped up at work the instant I returned from Qatar: my computer network forgot who I am. My computer has clearly been suffering from disaffection. Sheesh! I wasn't gone that long! I was threatened with a new computer, and then that threat was acted upon. I got a new computer, but it did not want to remember me, either. Sheesh again! A tech worked over the phone with me for more than an hour yesterday, but no dice, just another hour lost.

7. We did receive one really good piece of news in the midst of all the bad news about unanticipated problems with the house. Our accountant had turned in our income tax forms right before I went to Qatar so that we would be sure to make the deadline, and the refund ($6,000!) came back just in time to buy all the toilets, faucets, and appliances we needed. It helped, too, that all but one of the appliances was on sale for as much as 50% off, as well as free delivery and installation and no interest for the first year. There it goes again -- God taking care of us! It is such a comforting feeling knowing that we can rely on that and don't have to worry about anything, even unpleasant surprises.

And that's it for a full week and more. Today, with more than 600 pending emails, a day of back-to-back meetings, and at least three hours of work still to be done were I to work late, I looked around my office at the normal quitting time, gave about ten seconds of thought to finishing that horrifying work load, then, quietly walked out and closed the door. There is always next week... Now, I wish you a peaceful weekend. Palm Sunday!

Beware of identity theft this Easter!

Here are some fun Internet pictures forwarded to me by my brother:
































































































Happy Easter!

The Unusual Power of God's Credit Card

note: image copyright Katrin Wegmann (www.katrinwegmann.de)

Monday evening Old Mission held a penance service, and I picked up, Rosie, the widow of my recently deceased friend, Jack, who has difficulty walking. Getting to confession is a difficult task for her, so she welcomed this evening opportunity.

As I drove up to her house in the country outside our small town afterward, we saw a tow truck with a vehicle on it, blocking her driveway. She recognized the vehicle as belonging to her unemployed grandson, who lives with her.

"Oh, no!" she exclaimed. "They are repossessing his car. I know he has been having difficulty making car payments. Now he will have no way to get a job."

Rosie also comes to our Tuesday prayer group, and she had been praying for the last few weeks for her grandson, Gary, who had recently lost his job and was experiencing some financial difficulties, including having to move out of his apartment, the reason he was living with her. She had also been praying that George would come to faith.

We found a place nearby to park and got out of the car. I took out Rosie's walker. Gary approached Rosie as she started to walk toward the house.

"Grandma," he asked in a whisper, "Can you help me? My car broke down in a city two hours away where I had gone for a job interview and needed to be towed back here. I think I can fix it, but the tow truck owner won't leave the car unless I pay the towing fee."

"How much?" she asked.

"$185," Gary said, flinching, knowing that Rosie would be angry, mainly because she did not have that kind of money.

"I don't know what to tell you or what to do," she said. "I don't have that much, not here and not in the bank."

Gary was crestfallen -- and worried. "He will have to take the car back with him, then," he said. "I don't know what to do, either."

Having overheard this conversation in spite of Gary's attempt to keep it private, I asked, "Will he take a credit card?"http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

"Yes, he will," answered Gary, "but I don't have a credit card."

"Well, I do," I told him. "I have God's credit card, and it can handle $185."

"Are you sure??" He was stunned.

"I am sure," I told him. "That is the purpose of this card. God will make sure it gets paid off."

With great gratitude, Gary accepted the offer. I sent Rosie into the house, it being cold outside, while Gary, the tow truck driver, and I handled the transaction. Gary thanked me several times, and then I left.

The greater thanks came today, however. Our prayer group gathered at my house for our monthly spiritual movie night. (We watched Gospel Road.) After the movie, we spent some time together, as usual, in prayer, including praying for intentions that had been shared with us.

Rosie had a special intention. "Gary knew I was coming here tonight," she said, "and asked us to pray for his job search to be successful."

Doris, who was on transportation duty for Rosie today, was surprised. "Gary? Really? I thought he did not believe."

"Well," said Rosie, "something seems to have changed."

Yes, indeed, there is something special about God's credit card.

Monday Morning Meditation #76: God Is Faithful

As I sat down to prepare this Monday morning's meditation, I noticed that I have not posted anything since last Monday in spite of having a computer at my beck and call now. There was, however, a small inconvenience that has made posting difficult: I fell at work (four-point splat in front of a couple dozen people) and injured my dominant hand. At first, it appeared to be broken, but the x-rays showed that not to be the case. It was just a really bad contusion, but it made my hand swell up beyond usefulness, accompanied by no strength that sidelined me and made me another workers' comp statistic. (The safety officer was among the witnesses.) It is still difficult to type, but this, too, shall pass. As for the Bible, I continued to read the Book of Jeremiah.

This week I spent time reading through the messages of Jeremiah 3. What stood out for me was the passage in which God says that He will not be angry with Israel (or, by analogy, with us) forever. All Israel has to do is confess her guilt for "I am faithful."

Reading: Jeremiah 3: 11-13.

Meditation: The first thing that came to my mind in reading this passage is the wonderful sacrament of reconciliation that I discovered in coming to faith and becoming Catholic. Of course, we can all repent and tell God directly that we are sorry for our unfaithfulness to Him. There is something seemingly more solemn and sacred when sharing the nature of the unfaithfulness with a servant of God, one of His priests. There is also the added benefit of getting some additional insight into the situations of our daily life that lead us astray. As many fellow penitents have said to me as we have stood in line, waiting our turn for confession, "This is the best therapy in the world -- and, to think, it is free!"

Our mission will be offering bilingual a reconciliation service tonight. As in past years, I anticipate that there will be only a few dozen of us there. There are many reasons that people offer for not taking advantage of the opportunity our parish gives us (among those being, of course, regular reconciliation hours during the week are also available). I am grateful that the parish continues to offer these services at Christmas and Easter (as well as weekly) in spite of low attendance for I want to do as God has asked: confess my guilt. Certainly, I am not without guilt as much as I would like to be guiltless.

Contemplation: That is far as I can go with you this Monday morning. I now retire to private prayer to prepare for reconciliation tonight. Then I will move on to contemplation, my favorite part of the day, letting God take over the direction in which my relationship with Him moves.

I will leave you now to your prayer and contemplation. First, though, I would like to bring to your attention a Monday morning prayer post that you might enjoy:

Fr. Austin Fleming, priest of the Archdiocese of Boston and pastor in Concord, Massachusetts, posts a prayer each Monday morning that he calls "Monday Morning Offering." I enjoy his prayers very much. I think you also will find them inspirational. He has graciously given me permission to include a link to his blog on my Monday Morning Meditation posts. (During the week, he also posts great homilies and other thoughtful discussions. I enjoy reading those, too, as do readers of this blog who have taken the stroll over to his blog.)

For additional inspiration throughout the week, I would point out two sets of blogs: (1) the list of devotional blogs on my sidebar and (2) my blogroll, where I am following a number of inspirational priests and writers about spiritual matters. I learn so very much from all these people. I highly recommend them to you.

Newsflash!: Big Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!

Dearest loves, as you already know, Terrible Chris has left the nest to venture out on his own at Odd Bloggings. Well, now yours truly has also decided to pull a new shape, and I'm pulling up stakes to continue on at my new spot, Fuzzy Logic. Essentially, both of our sites are the same in that we're gonna keep on keepin' on with the content you've come to know and love love love. So expect more of the same from both of us, just in different locales. This new change is effective immediately, so if you're a fan of LET, please consider adding Fuzzy Logic to your bookmarks.

Thanks for the memories, and here's to a whole bunch more.

xoxo,
Megan Terrible