-Last Sunday's homily is available by email
-This Sunday's Scriptures can be found at USCCB.org>>>
-I will be celebrating mass this weekend at 5:30 Sat and 8:00 Sunday
Passing Away
I can't help but retell the story of a couple of weeks ago about my attending the wake of a deceased parishioner. I found a four-year-old great-grandchild of the deceased sitting alone next to a laptop computer staring at a video of his deceased great-grandmother...they called her "Mutti".
With my most compassionate intentional smile and showing concern I said to the little boy "is that your "Mutti"?" He answered "yes". I said, "I am sorry that she passed away." He looked up from the video and turned to me puzzled and said "oh, she didn't pass away, she died."
That little boy was 100% right. no sugar-coating his reality. She died. We use the expression "pass away" to say "die". Jesus uses it to communicate the very nature of things...those permanent and those transitional, if you know what I mean.
Jesus says that everything is "passing away" except, of course, his Word will never pass away. It seems that faith may be this clarity of vision: the ability to see, know and understand what is "passing away"(transitional) and what is enduring forever(real).
I am interested as to what in my life and in your life are we called to see clearly as "passing away"? If you are like me I often get my heart set on the transitional or on the unreal and I see it as reality, not passing away. I need, like that little four-year-old, to get real and see things as God sees them. The ones that are made to "pass away" and those that are intended to endure.
And, what could be the providential and graceful purpose of this "passing away"? What is the good of it except to "make way" for God's real life and reality now?
3 comments:
Like you said, from our faith, we know that all things will "pass away". But sometimes we forget, especially when it is someone close. It just so happens, that I was talking with someone yesterday about how we we, as adults, sometimes need to see things with the simplicity and innocence of children. Jesus said it too.
Teresa of Avila's bookmark . . .
Let nothing disturb you;
Nothing frighten you.
All things are passing.
God never changes.
Patience obtains all things.
Nothing is wanting to him who possesses God.
God alone suffices.
From Eccliastes...an appointed time for everything...
We are counseled our entire lives in Scripture & by Church of the fact of change and the fact of our Lord's Presence, and I see most of us don't get it or can't accept it or have reluctance. Our Lord wants us to be like surfers adjusting to the wave, accepting the wave instead of resisting it & crashing on our boards against the waves!
I think of a church song from the 70s...look beyond the bread you eat, see your Savior and your Lord; look beyond the cup you drink, see his love poured out as blood. All these songs that try to teach us of change, of looking beyond what the situation is to see what the facts of God's Love & Presence are.
Whether we realize it or not, scientifically EVERYTHING is CONSTANTLY changing, but we want things the way they are. I think of when I got a new vacuum cleaner (a Dyson!) & wanted the new features of the Dyson but wanted the old features also of my Hoover. Our children are born & we expect them to grow up (all changes!) We take two ibuprofin & expect things to change...we take flour & eggs & sugar & other stuff & expect it to become some kind of baked dessert. In accepting daily small changes, we grow, whether we realize or not. Change is a daily fact of life.
My Father is living with the changes of Parkinson's Disease. A month ago he could no longer buckle his belt. Now he sometimes doesn't realize his hand is on the end of his arm. Daily he is experiencing and knowing the changes in himself. AMAZING how he is accepting it and knowing the Lord is in the moment, with him, truly incredible! Tough & hard stuff??? For sure!!!
And Father...all those words you use...metanoia, conversion aren't they all about change, passing from one thing to another?
Sorry for the rambling & I could go on & on...
There are times when it strikes me anew that we can learn so much from nature. It’s there we can see God’s mighty and glorious hand at work without interference. Nature doesn’t try to take her own control of things – she lets things be as God designs them. Sometimes there is violent destruction, other times just a simple, quiet passing away of things. But always there is new life. Nature follows the course God has in store for her.
For us, it is not so easy to let things pass away. It’s hard to not hang onto what we already know – and often times what we love. But I think the critical step in faith – to really own up to faith – is to follow Jesus in His obedient response to God the Father. That means that we follow Him into the Paschal Mystery – not knowing where it will lead, but believing that what matters is allowing God’s will to enter in so that His grace can be at work and His new life will follow. “Making way for God’s real life and reality now.” I like that.
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