New Arrivals

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children, new life, teach, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I have lately been graced with pictures of several babies very recently born and I am stunned at their faces. For me, new babies always seem beautiful but these days it is the quality of awareness that seems prevalent. It’s as if they have something important to say – even if only a week after their arrival! Perhaps that is why they have come now: to give us hope for a future that seems rather dim. Maybe they will be the ones to solve all the problems that we seem to have been unable to achieve or unwilling to take on because it all seems too difficult. Maybe they are here to give us confidence that there are better days to come.

Today I am praying for all children, especially that ones who have recently arrived. My prayer is that they will be generous and loving, insightful and willing to help others rather than just seeing to their own needs and wants, and convinced that they themselves are lovable and loved just for who they are. That would certainly lift up the world.

But who will teach them if we don’t – by our own actions, i.e. words informed by deeds?

Love for the Little Ones

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children, exclusion, love, poor, Pope Francis, refugees, Sisters of St. Joseph, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

As we turn the page of our calendars to February, we find in the middle the feast of St. Valentine. I will probably have more to say about this saint then; (his feast has become more of a “Hallmark holiday”). Today, however, there is a striking reminder from Pope Francis about how our love can be shown throughout this month and beyond. I found it in the monthly e-news from our province of the Sisters of St. Joseph and will make it a “hallmark” of my spiritual practices for February. Won’t you join me?

“See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven always look upon the face of my Heavenly Father” (MT 18:10). It is not just about migrants: it is a question about seeing that no one is excluded. Today’s world is increasingly becoming more elitist and cruel toward the excluded. Developing countries continue to be drained of their best natural and human resources for the benefit of a few privileged markets. Wars only affect some regions of the world, yet weapons of war are produced and sold in other regions which are then unwilling to take in the refugees produced by these conflicts. Those who pay the price are always the little ones, the poor, the most vulnerable, who are prevented from sitting at the table and are left with the “crumbs” of the banquet. (cf. LK 16: 19-21)”

Of Children and Sheep

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children, Good Shepherd, humility, kingdom of heaven, Matthew, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

As I read this morning’s gospel, I must have been giving it less that 100% of my attention because suddenly I said to myself, “Wait a minute! I thought Jesus was talking about little children, not sheep.” And so he was. The text from Matthew 18 began with a question from the disciples to Jesus about who was greatest in the Kingdom of heaven. (I think the disciples were overly concerned about that issue – as are people living now, although more about who is greatest on earth.) Jesus was very clear in his answer. (see vs. 1-5. Hint: it’s the little children).

Abruptly, however, or so it seems, Jesus starts talking about a shepherd with 100 sheep who leaves the 99 to find the one who wanders off and gets lost. (vs.10-14) I’ve always loved that section and actually all the texts about real shepherds whose job isn’t the easiest in the world. Think about it! Sheep generally are pretty similar in their looks. One would need to really get to know them deeply in order to distinguish them one from another…but I digress. The last line pulls it all together. Jesus says, “In just the same way (as with the sheep), it is not the will of your Heavenly Father that one of these little ones be lost.”

So what is the lesson here. I think it’s one of those texts where multiple meanings are possible and all are worth considering. It could be a call to care for children – and how timely is that message right now? It could be a reminder of the importance of humility…or the fact that the less fortunate need our attention. It could be providing us with a hint about the need to never give up on anyone. There are lots of ways to interpret it. What do you say about it all?

Bless the Lord!

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barakah, bless you, children, divine Source, grace, love, mercy, power, Psalm 103, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

I was startled by concepts in an alternate translation of Psalm 103 this morning. The first line was not so different from the lectionary reading but it made me feel the guilelessness of a child who might blurt it out: O God, I bless you with my whole heart and soul! Verse four caught me, however – again like a child now prancing with delight: I wear your love and mercy like a crown! The entire translation was delightful but the attending notes afforded me what I was looking for that opened up a new perspective in my relationship with God.

“The word barakah”, I read, “is Hebrew for blessing.” (No surprise there.) “It means something more in Hebrew than it does in English, a power and grace that flows from one being and place to another through the universe from its divine Source. Interestingly, it flows both ways, from the divine Source to ourselves, and from ourselves back to the Source, Apparently we are catalysts in the flow of blessing.”

Two questions of note follow: How is it possible to be a blessing, or one of the conduits through which it flows? and more to the point of my wondering, How is it possible to bless God? I’m used to asking for God’s blessing on others but can blessing the Divine, the Almighty One be efficacious in the same powerful, gracious way as blessing other beings? How does the understanding (or at least the acceptance) of that flow of blessing alter my view on things or the way in which I wear that crown of love and mercy that is God’s gift to me?

The Simple Things

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blessed, children, happy, kindness, Peru, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, welcome

As promised, I have returned “at the turning of the calendar.” I cannot, however, be blamed for bringing the blast of arctic cold home with me. It was sunny summer in Peru with temperatures about 100 degrees higher than here in New York State! What I have brought home are memories of an extraordinarily beautiful and generous population, rich in kindness if not in finances and a willingness to welcome others with open arms.

The gospel acclamation for this morning says this: “Blessed are you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth; you have revealed to little ones the mysteries of the Kingdom.” Immediately I am thrown back to the large room inside the front door of the convent in Lima where we made puppets with the neighborhood children one day last week. Newspaper, scissors, markers and a few other sheets of shared paper – one with an outline of a rabbit’s face – were all Alexa and I needed to create our puppet and share the delight of everyone in the room. At the end of the morning the children prepared to leave with their treasures (including one Hershey kiss and a piece of bubblegum). There was no pushing or shoving as they lined up single file. Rather, kissing each of us in turn as they walked out the door, they whispered, “Gracias, Hermana” and blessed us with happy smiles.

There will be more to tell, I promise, but for now, it is enough to hold those sweet faces in my heart.

A Cry Heard in Ramah

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children, Herod, jeremiah, massacre, Matthew, parents, prophecy, Ramah, sorrow, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, violence

Today is not a happy remembrance in the calendar of Church feasts. It is the commemoration of “the Holy Innocents,” the victims of Herod’s massacre of all the baby boys under two years old. Herod was determined to eliminate the possibility that someone – a “new-born” king (Jesus) – would usurp his power. Since he had no idea of where that child might be found, his rage prompted the terrible deed that left so many mothers bereft. It was a fruitless gesture, as violence always is, because Jesus and his parents were well on their way to Egypt when the massacre occurred.

This violence is replicated in our time whenever war and senseless killing happens around the world. I see in my mind’s eye faces of Syrian children in the bombed-out buildings in Aleppo. Closer to home are the images of Sandy Hook just five years ago this month. Although murder is always difficult to endure, the tragedy always seems more horrific when innocent children are killed almost before their lives have begun.

I am praying for parents today, especially for mothers who have lost a child for any reason or no reason at all. For those whose children die because of senseless violence, drug abuse, war, starvation, traffic or other accidents, suicide…so many causes that leave a gaping hole in the hearts of those left behind.

The poignant message of today’s gospel, which Matthew (MT 2:18) saw as
the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy, calls for our prayer for the sorrowing today. We cannot ignore the pain of his words that speak to the cry heard in our own day around the world: “A voice was heard in Ramah, sobbing and loud lamentation; Rachel weeping for her children, and she would not be consoled, since they were no more.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bless the Children

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blessing, children, different, extraordinary, Jesuit, joy, simplicity, spiritual opening, spontaneity, St. Aloysius Gonzaga, summer, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, wonder

My thoughts this morning are of children – simple thoughts really, for a number of reasons. We have finally (some would say swiftly) arrived at the calendar designation of the beginning of summer and I have been aware that this is the last week of school for the youth of New York State. Freed for the summer from the constraints of study, some are likely jubilant while others quickly become bored. I suggest prayer for young people in general that this season will afford them some new, safe adventures and good friends to companion them.

Today is the feast of St. Aloysius Gonzaga who lived in the 16th century and died at the age of 23. An extraordinarily spiritual youth, he had a “spiritual opening” at the age of 7 years and was teaching catechism by the age of eleven! After a 4 year struggle with his father who was determined that his son join the military, Aloysius entered the Jesuit order. Soon after, in caring for those brothers sickened by plague, he contracted the disease and died. As I read about his early life, I thought of the children I have known as “different” or extraordinary – often the intellectually brilliant ones – who are not well accepted by their peers. Conformity is a much safer path to walk, especially in our younger years. I pray for those children and teens who wish for a simpler life but know a different calling, that they may accept themselves and others and come to celebrate their uniqueness as God’s gift.

Finally, I see pictures of the beautifully alive faces of the youngest members of my own extended family and pray for children everywhere that they may be granted loving parents or guardians like those I know their parents, my younger cousins, to be. May we learn from the young the lessons of spontaneity and wonder, of simplicity and joy and may they be a blessing to us in this season.

 

 

 

 

 

Holy Innocents

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Aleppo, Barbara Abdeni Massaad, children, Christianity, disease, holy innocents, Soup For Syria, starvation, Syria, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, violence, war

Today in Western Christianity (and tomorrow in the East) we celebrate the feast of The Holy Innocents. Herod the Great, an insecure king of Judea, was fearful of any threat to his throne. When astrologers from the East who had come to pay homage to the “newborn king” Jesus and eluded him upon their departure without giving up his whereabouts to Herod, the king became furious and ordered all boys under the age of two years to be killed. This slaughter puts one in mind of children in war-torn countries today who, though innocent in every way, die each day from violence, starvation or disease.

I have rarely, if ever, been as distressed about the plight of the world’s children as I have been in the past year seeing newsfeed of the children who are attempting to flee tyranny and danger. Especially moving to me are the pictures from Syria, recently and most dramatically, those from Aleppo. I carry the images with me everywhere, lamenting my inability to effect any tiny change to the situation.

Miraculously, I saw on the news some days ago, the story of a woman – a Lebanese American photographer and chef – who has been taking soup to a refugee camp on the Lebanese-Syrian border. Her name is Barbara Abdeni Massaad and over the past year she had created a project called Soup For Syria. Garnering recipes from 80 famous chefs for soups from different cultures, she wrote a 208-page book in less than one year which includes the recipes and wonderful food photography as well as photographs of the refugees. One of the celebrity chefs, Roden, “hopes the book helps to keep the plight of Syrian refugees in peoples’ minds and that it will raise funds to alleviate their awful living conditions until their future is settled.”  (www.theguardian.com)

The wonderful thing about this for me is knowing that the Interlink Publishing Group has pledged that 100% of the proceeds from the book sold in the United States will go to fund the food relief efforts of the United Nations High Command on Refugees for Syria. There is a movement to get people involved in this project, found on the website soupforsyria.com. My hope is to organize a soup supper in my town – maybe many! – where the price of admission is the cost of the book that will be available at the event. I read this morning that the book is temporarily out of stock because of the great demand – which makes me happy and gives me time to get organized. A reprint is underway and new orders will be ready to ship in February, so I need to get busy.

I know that my efforts will not change the face of the refugee crisis in the world. But I will at least add my small piece to the solution, knowing that some of the Holy Innocents in our world will be fed!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorrowful Mother

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childbirth, children, dolors, Jesus, motherhood, mothers, Our Lady of Sorrows, Peace, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

Although I have never birthed a child I have, in my years of teaching and then ministering in a parish, come to understand the joys and sorrows of motherhood. I have watched mothers love their children through celebratory days in church and school and family life. I have listened to mothers lament behaviors that they did not understand in the lives and loves of their adult children and on occasion I have suffered with them because I loved their children too. Love has a way of breaking us open both in joy and sorrow, taking us out of ourselves to a greater capacity than we could ever imagine in ourselves.

Today is the feast of Our Lady or Sorrows, formerly called by the Church “the Seven Sorrows (or Dolors) of the Blessed Mother.” No wonder so many mothers have devotion to Mary. Just think of what she went through with Jesus! I don’t often think of the everyday life of Mary: the immediate connection that she had when she first held Jesus in her arms, how she felt when he said his first word or took his first step, the pride she must have had as he grew and when she heard him preach…We only have what the gospels and Tradition have recorded for us and know few of her moments of fear for him or her intense grieving at his crucifixion. Can you even imagine her joy and the tenderness between them in their meetings after the Resurrection? There is a lot to imagine and we are able to do so because of our own experiences of such love as she had for her son.

So again today I find myself praying for mothers, in all their moments of light and dark, of peace and pressure to “give in,” in all their woe and willingness. I pray that they may know a certainty that I read this morning in a short prayer verse of Thomas Merton: O God of holiness, grant us to seek peace where it is truly found! In your will, O God, is our peace!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Greatest and the Least

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become childlike, children, creativity, humility, imagination, Jesus, Matthew, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, turn

It seems as if the disciples of Jesus were overly concerned about status because the text of this morning’s gospel (MT 18:1-5) harks back to the conversation that we spoke about on Monday of this week. Then they were talking about who was greatest among their company; today, Matthew recounts their concern about who will be greatest not just here on earth but in heaven! Once again, Jesus speaks of humility by calling to himself a child as an example. Matthew actually give us three pieces of advice in this short response of Jesus. 1.) Jesus says, “unless you turn and become like little children…” Turning in a different direction always gives us a different perspective; it is what needs to happen when we pray for conversion, and Jesus says this morning that unless we do it we will not enter the kingdom of heaven. 2.) The second follows the first. “Whoever humbles him/herself like this child will be greatest in heaven.” So it’s not a race to the finish. Everyone who learns how to let go of status or privilege or anything that sets us apart will, it seems, be equal then and nobody will be striving for anything. 3.) It isn’t enough for us to become like children, we have to befriend them. “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me,” Jesus says. For any of us who have had opportunities to “hang out” with small children, it’s impossible not to learn from their incredible energy, their imagination/creativity and their honesty/simplicity. I guess that could be the purpose of the words of Jesus to us today. If people like that will be our companions in heaven, we ought to get about our preparation for membership in that crowd!