The root of man's joy is the harmony he enjoys with himself. He lives in this affirmation. And only one who can accept himself can also accept the you, can accept the world. The reason why an individual cannot accept the you, cannot come to terms with him, is that he does not like his own I and, for that reason, cannot accept a you. Something strange happens here. We have seen that the inability to accept one's I leads to the inability to accept a you. But how does one go about affirming, assenting to, one's I? The answer may perhaps be unexpected: we cannot do so by our own efforts alone. Of ourselves, we cannot come to terms with ourselves. Our I becomes acceptable to us only if it has first become acceptable to another I. We can love ourselves only if we have first been loved by someone else. The life a mother gives to her child is not just physical life; she gives total life when she takes the child's tears and turns them into smiles. It is only when life has been accepted and is perceived as accepted that it becomes also acceptable. Man is that strange creature that needs not just physical birth but also appreciation if he is to subsist... If an individual is to accept himself, someone must say to him: "It is good that you exist"--must say it, not with words, but with that act of the entire being that we call love. For it is the way of love to will the other's existence and, at the same time, to bring that existence forth again. The key to the I likes with the you; the way to the you leads through the I.

-- Pope Benedict XVI

God loved you first. That's why you are here. That's why our students are here. It is indeed good that you exist.

And to show us how to be fully a you and an I, Jesus came to be with us in a very real and tangible way, to live and be with us in every way but sin.

In the first chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, it is announced, "Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means 'God is with us.'" At the end of the last chapter in Matthew, the last recorded words of Jesus are, "And behold, I Am with you always, until the end of the age."

Through Him, with Him, in Him... May your heart be open wide to the graces of a merry and joyful Christmas.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

Each new day is a gift.
Are you going to smile at it?
Or frown at it?

This is not some new age, psycho-babble hype.
The saints, sages, and shaman have been saying this for millenia.

Your life is a gift.
You are a gift to others around you,
to family, to friends, to neighbors, even to strangers.

You cannot add one day, hour, minute, or second to your life.
Come to think of it, even your next breath is gift,
despite your best attempts to try to control it at times.

True happiness and joy come only from a deep sense of gratitude.
And perhaps an honest smile can only come from a joyful heart.

Gratitude, to be grateful or not, that is the question.
The choice is yours.

(And then...)

The gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh in the beginning of His life are often associated with the threefold mission of Jesus Christ as priest, prophet, and king, which in turn, as Dorothy Day observes below, is intimately connected with the end of His life.

In Christ's life there were always a few who made up for the neglect of the crowd. The shepherds did it; their hurrying to the crib atoned for the people who would flee from Christ. The wise men did it; their journey across the world made up for those who refused to stir one hand's breadth from the routine of their lives to go to Christ. Even the gifts the wise men brought have in themselves an obscure recompense and atonement for what would follow later in this Child's life. For they brought gold, the king's emblem, to make up for the crown of thorns that he would wear; they offered incense, the symbol of praise, to make up for the mockery and the spitting; they gave him myrrh, to heal and soothe, and he was wounded from head to foot and no one bathed his wounds. The women at the foot of the cross did it too, making up for the crowd who stood by and sneered.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, my True Love gave to me...

Epiphany means manifestation of the divine, revelation, sudden insight, recognition. How many people are troubled because God does not show himself in the way they expect?

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

We often pray from a sense of need. In the Gospels, Jesus always prayed from a sense of abundance. And so let us too pray in God's abundance.

Father, please bless all of the children born this year, their parents and siblings, and their future friends. May they all be drawn into a deeper relationship with You as they grow in Your light and love.

Father, for all those You call home this year, please grant them Your grace of a good death, to have one last opportunity to choose You, to choose Life. May we meet them again with You in heaven. Have mercy on their souls, Father.

And Father, for all of us in between, grant us Your grace to choose You today, and each day of this year, to be drawn into an ever deepening relationship with You, with others, and with ourselves. Send your grace into every doubt, fear, and temptation, to transform us, to heal us, to draw us nearer to You. Help us drink every drop from the cup of life You offer us, both the drops of joy and the drops of sorrow, for all is gift. Help us be beacons of Your light and love in the world.

We pray with, through, and in Your Son's name. Amen, amen.

The flame of love
Grows as it is divided
It increases by being shared
From one, then two, then three
And darkness is transformed into glory
And the walls reflect its light
Share your flame!
Share the flame!
(St. John of the Cross)

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us...

Our Deliverer and God came by the quietest of signs, in the everyday miracle of a baby being born--the same way that you and I came into the world. He was born amid tears of joy, swaddled in a blanket, and held in the gentle arms of his father. On the first night of his life, he likely fell asleep nursing, his head nestled against his mother's warm breast--like countless babies before him and countless babies since.

Why this way? Why not in power and glory, in fire that swept down from the mountaintops, in the upheaval of nations, or in the blood red stars falling from the sky? Because in coming to us as a child, God was making what amounts to an "autobiographical" statement. The Incarnation was God's confession, his full disclosure. In the baby conceived at Nazareth and later born in a stable in Bethlehem, God revealed himself as a God of love and mercy--a Father who seeks us in the wilderness of our fallen world. (from Catholic Passion by David Scott)

An "'autobiographical' statement, God's confession, his full disclosure"?! Hmmm. Kind of makes one wonder...

...and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means "God is with us." (Matthew 1:23)

All is gift.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

From the Cross, Jesus said, "I thirst." These words point to a gift, to a deep yearning, an ache if you will, to give, to be in a relationship with you.

Two quotes to illustrate this gift.

First, an excerpt from Mother Teresa's "Varanasi Letter" (from Mother Teresa's Secret Fire by Joseph Langford):

Be careful of all that can block that personal being in touch with the living Jesus. The hurts of life, and sometimes your own mistakes--[may] make you feel it is impossible that Jesus really loves you, is really clinging to you. This is a danger for all of you. And so sad, because it is completely opposite of what Jesus is really wanting, waiting to tell you.

Not only He loves you, even more--He longs for you. He misses you when you don't come close. He thirsts for you. He loves you always, even when you don't feel worthy. Even if you are not accepted by others, even yourself sometimes--He is the one who always accepts you.

The second, an excerpt from the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC):

2560  "If you knew the gift of God!" (Jn 4:10). The wonder of prayer is revealed beside the well where we come seeking water: there, Christ comes to meet every human being. It is he who first seeks us and asks us for a drink. Jesus thirsts; his asking arises from the depths of God's desire for us. Whether we realize it or not, prayer is the encounter of God's thirst with ours. God thirsts that we may thirst for him.

And they shall name him Emmanuel, which means "God is with us." (Matthew 1:23)

Pray always; if necessary use words.
Be aware of your be-with-ness with God.
All is gift.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

In the darkness of the season,
     in the silence of Mary's womb,
     new life waits and grows.
     Hope is shaped in hidden places,
     on the edges, in the depths
     far from the blinding lights
     and deafening sounds of consumer frenzy.

In the darkness and silence of my own life,
     I wait,
     listening for the whisper of angel wings,
     longing for a genuine experience of mystery,
     hoping for a rekindling of joy
     and the establishment of peace.

I lean into the darkness
     and silence.
     Expectant.

-- poem by Larry J. Peacock

Gravitate to humility. All is gift.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

I recently read of a parent discussing their young child's first encounter with death, specifically the death of a beloved grandparent. He described his child's experience as "exchanging words with death". What an interesting turn of phrase. The word exchange implies some level of interaction, a two-way communication. Death is one way only. There is no communication. There is no exchange. And yet we try to grapple with death in order to come to some kind of understanding. Thus death can become a door way into mystery, into something larger than ourselves.

From the living's perspective, death takes--gone, zip, silence, nothing more. The words of those left behind seem to strain and grasp into the nothingness of the void left behind of the loved one who used to be. There is no exchange. Death takes. Death gives nothing back. There is no echo to our words.

From eternity's perspective, death is birth--the final transition. In the darkness of the womb, a baby's birth seems like death to the fetus and to its way of life, and yet, he or she is born into a wider, larger, wonderful world of half light and half darkness. At our final death, we pass from this world into another, a still wider, much larger, more amazing universe of light.

Life is one way. Looking forward, the direction is called death. Looking backwards, it is called birth.

And the words we try to exchange with death do not return to us, but echo forward through the dark mystery to our loved ones. We echo through the One--the Word, Jesus Christ--who exchanged our death for life.

Keep hope alive. Dare to trust. All is gift.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

So the snake tempts Adam and Eve "to eat" this one thing by saying:

"[God] knows that when you eat it,
you will be like God and know what
is good and what is bad." ...
As soon as they had eaten it, they
were given understanding and realized
that they were naked. (Genesis 3:5,7)

There is much that can be said about this, but Mark Link, in Path Through Scripture, points out one key to understanding the story of the fall of man and woman is to understand the meaning and symbolism in the word "eating". To eat is to know.

"Adam and Eve learned what 'evil' was by becoming evil. They did evil. They 'tasted' it. Since they were good and became evil, they now 'know' the difference between good and evil."

Going back to being purely good was no longer possible for Adam and Eve. The devil knew this and figured that it foiled God's plan.

Jump forward a few thousand years to Jesus Christ, the New Adam, the One who makes all things new, to the Last Supper, to The Cross on Good Friday, to the Resurrection on Easter Sunday. In a sense of reverse parallelism, Jesus offers His very own body and blood in the form of the Eucharist, the bread and wine of Holy Communion, for us to eat, for us to know goodness. Since we know evil through our sin, we know Good through Jesus. To eat is to know.

And since we tend to forget easily, we need to go back Sunday after Sunday. (Preferably daily.)

Taste and see that the LORD is good. (Psalm 34:8)

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

Blessed are the pure of heart, for they will see God. (Matthew 5:8)

In the movie, The Passion of the Christ, there is a scene where Jesus remembers washing his hands before the Last Supper. The camera pulls in close on his hands as he dips them into the bowl of water and then shifts into slow motion as he gives one gentle flick to shake the water off before reaching for a towel. What a powerful symbol of purification and of baptism.

As a response to that one scene, coupled with the Beatitude above, came this prayer:

Lord Jesus Christ,
purify my heart so that I may see You,
so that I may see You in others,
and so that others may see You in me.

The more I pray this prayer, the more I am convinced that the last line is the most important.

Help me Jesus,
that what I ask of You,
I will give to others,
Mercy, both in word and deed.

Keep hope alive. Dare to trust. Surrender to grace.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son,
and they shall name him Emmanuel,
which means "God is with us."
(Matthew 1:23)

Now jump to very last verse of Matthew, to the last recorded words of Jesus:

"And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age." (Matthew 28:20)

If you recall, "I am" is the name of God as spoken to Moses in Genesis, and often by Jesus himself elsewhere in the Gospels, especially in John.

"God is with us." And Matthew reminds us of this simple yet life changing fact at the beginning and at the end of his Gospel.

So, the next time you feel so alone or empty or tired or sorrowful that you wonder where God is because His apparent absence hits you like a ton bricks, remember these two verses. Allow yourself to be comforted. Despite what your feelings and thoughts and even your senses tell you, the truth is: Jesus Christ is always with you.

Keep hope alive. Dare to trust.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us.

You must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.
(Matthew 5:48)

Have you noticed that certain words in Scripture can have a certain meaning or connotation that interferes with the real message? For instance, look at the word perfect in the above quote. Perfect like God? What does that mean? How can we be perfect like God?

Another example from last Monday's daily reading of Matthew 19:16-22: The rich, young man asked Jesus what good could he do to gain eternal life. Jesus answered by listing several of the Ten Commandments and part of the greatest commandment, "you shall love your neighbor as yourself." The young man said that he was already following those, and then hinted at wanting more. Where upon Jesus replied, "If you wish to be perfect..."

There is that word again. What does Jesus mean by perfect? Does it mean to try to follow the commandments perfectly, as in, flawlessly? I do not think so.

The answer, just as the question, comes from Scripture:

... put on love, that is, the bond of perfection. (Colossians 3:14)

To be perfect is to love, to be in union with God and with others.

Jesus ate with sinners. He was, and still is, not looking for perfect and flawless people. Perfect and flawless people do not need God. Jesus wants people willing to love, willing to put on "the bond of perfection."

A Christian should always remember that the value of his good works is not based on their number and excellence, but on the love of God which prompts him to do these things. (St. John of the Cross)

Keep hope alive. Reflect love, and dare to be "perfect".

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us...

Classical Christian theology and philosophy defines a person as one who has the ability to know, to love, and to choose (to will). This is the image of God in which we are made. (The angels, our spiritual kinsmen, are also persons made in the image of God.)

Saint Richard of Chichester (1197-1253, English bishop) wrote a prayer that fits beautifully into what it means to be a person.

Thanks be to you, my Lord, Jesus Christ,
For all the benefits that you have given me,
For all the pains and insults you have borne for me.

O most merciful Redeemer, friend and brother,
May I know you more clearly,
Love you more dearly,
Follow you more nearly,
Day by day.

The end of this prayer may sound familiar to some. It is the basis for the lyrics to the song "Day by Day" from the 1970s musical "Godspell".

Through this prayer, we call upon God and grace to help make us a full person like Jesus--to know God and others, to love God and others, and to choose good for God and others, day by day.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us...

The people in the crowd represented all parts of the world from all of history. There was a caveman kneeling. There were Asians, Africans, Native Americans, Aborigines, Eskimos, and Europeans. There were people dressed in jeans and t-shirts, Victorian dress, medieval peasants, ancient Roman togas, tribal costumes, and so on. Off to one side was a nun dressed in her black habit standing next to a young woman in cutoffs and halter top giving the impression of a prostitute. Which woman was more attuned to her sexuality? In the middle to the right stood an astronaut in a space suit. The reflection in his visor was the Christmas Star over the small village of Bethlehem. There was a sense of peace in all of their expressions as they gazed at His death on the Cross, a gift meant for all people for all time.

As I meditated on this image and its meanings, my imagination took control and I stepped into the image. (My hope is that you will be able to step with me into this image too.)

There I was, in the middle of that picture, surrounded by other people looking up at Jesus on the Cross. I glanced down and noticed the dust of the desert on my shoes. I felt the pebbles and dirt shift ever so slightly as I shifted my weight to the other foot. The contrast of what I had expected and what the sky looked like shocked me. Instead of cold and gray and darkness, I saw a sky of soft powdery blue with a hint of white puffy clouds low on the horizon. The mid-afternoon sun was warm on my face. All was silent except for the gentle rustle of clothes in the cool breeze.

I looked back up to focus on Jesus on the Cross. He was dead. The drama of the Passion that lead up to this moment was complete. I knew what was going to happen later in the afternoon, and especially on Sunday morning. I understood the source of the peace I saw in the faces of the people standing next to me. I felt the peace too, but not completely. I had a haunting deep sense of guilt weighing heavy on my heart. My sin was responsible for this man being on the Cross. He chose to die because of me.

One by one, slowly at first, then more quickly, the people in the crowd started to disappear. In a few moments, I knew I would be the only one remaining. It would soon be time to face this guilt inside my heart. I would have to face it alone with Him. Instead of becoming anxious, I felt a certain measure of peace. I wondered if I should be afraid. How many times did He say not to be? As the others in the crowd disappeared, I expected the weight of my guilt to grow within me. There is anonymity in a crowd, a sharing of responsibility that falsely disseminates the guilt. No, the weight of my guilt did not change. I knew it was mine. There was no fooling myself. No fooling Him.

Then the last person disappeared. There I was, alone. Alone before the Cross with Jesus dead on it. I continued to look up at Him. The sun was still warm on my face. The gentle breeze continued to toss my hair playfully across my forehead. Should I prostrate myself on the ground before Him? I stood still. The silence of infinity enveloped me.

I bowed my head slightly as if gazing into my heart, searching for the heavy brick of guilt hidden in a corner. There it was. I looked back up at Jesus and said in my mind, "I'm sorry. So sorry." That is all I could say. No excuses. No tears. "I am sorry for my sin. Please forgive me."

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered reading something about Jesus asking St. Jerome in a vision why he had not given Him everything. Jerome replied, "Lord, I have devoted my life to your service. I have given you all my works, all my love, all my praise, everything." Jesus replied, "No, you have not given me your sins."

In an inward gesture of reaching my hands upward, I said in my mind, "Lord, take my heart. Take all of it. All my love, all my joys, all my sorrow, all my sins, all my guilt. It is all yours."

As I dropped my head again, I softly whispered, "I am Yours."

A moment later, I looked up at the Cross again, gazing deeply into His face. The crown of thorns still pierced His lifeless flesh. The trickles and streams of blood were dried and crusted in His hair and across His face. The cuts were still open and the bruises were blue and black and swollen.

On one side of the threshold lies pain, sorrow, loss, guilt, and death. By letting go--surrendering--one steps into the threshold of transformation, through the Paschal Mystery of the Cross, and emerges into healing, joy, victory, freedom, and life.

I looked one more time up at His face on the Cross. It seemed almost like He was smiling. The heavy brick of guilt was gone from my heart. He had died for me, and I was glad to receive His gift, a gratitude that only comes from grace.

The Way stood in front of me now.

"I am the way and the truth and the life." (John 14:6)

One side of the "coin of faith" looks externally, that is, it looks outside of our selves to others for examples and models of living faith. They are witnesses, and it is in accepting their experiences, their testimony, that helps us to believe. (Note: witness, with-ness)

If we look beyond those who have an immediate influence on us, we can see other people have influenced them, and still others have influenced those people, and so. In a very few steps, we begin to see a whole network of witnesses, a web of belief. Follow this web of belief, this chain of testimony, back to its origin, and we find the Apostles, the First Witnesses to Jesus. (Note: testimony, Old Testament, New Testament)

The other side of the coin of faith looks internally, that is, it looks within to our own personal experiences of God. These experiences help us to say internally within our hearts, "I believe."

In other words, each of us who believe, those who have opened our selves to the possibility of God, can identify certain moments in our lives where we have experienced something that is not of ourselves, something bigger, something more. A few of us may have had specific, big life-changing moments. Or more likely, most of us have had several small moments, almost insignificant in their first appearance, but still very powerful, transformative, and energizing.

It is part of human nature to have preferences, and so we naturally tend to depend on or rub one side of our coin of faith more than the other. That is okay, but over-dependence on one particular side is not healthy faith. It does not make us a whole person, both inside and out. There must be some sort of balance because there will be times when doubt challenges to knock our faith down.

Doubt is not always a bad thing. It makes us stronger and helps weed out the unnecessary stuff that we cling to, much like separating the chaff from the wheat. It makes faith honest. Scripture calls this purification, smelting down the gold till it is pure. And it is the interdependence of the two sides of faith, between the internal and external, that keeps both sides of faith honest, real, and balanced.

At the beginning of our journey, we were given a coin of faith. We chose to accept or reject this gift. If we accepted, then it is our task to carry this coin in our hearts, rubbing it in times of need, times of doubt, in bad times and good. Times of struggle or sorrow polish it to a high luster and remind us that God is with us (Emmanuel). Times of joy allow us to bask in gratitude and the glow of Jesus in its shine, and radiate that to others around us, to make God present in the world, to be witness (with-ness).

And at the end of our journey, we will have to hand our coin of faith back to God. We will not need it in our Father's home. Faith is needed only for the journey. Besides, the coin of faith was never really ours to begin with. It really belongs to His Son. Jesus paid our way. He gives the coin of faith its value.

Our Lady of Mercy, pray for us...

P.S. If your coin of faith has been lost, do not worry. Jesus promised all things are found again if they want to be.