Now begins the sending and receiving of greeting cards by the hundreds of thousands. May you enjoy both, especially the messages going and coming to and from your family and friends and all.
Basically, even though you and I do not wear any postage, we might think of ourselves as a greeting all year round. That is because every time a Mass ends, we are sent to our families, friends, and all with the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Central Standard Time and Sunday morning recently had one of their twice yearly encounters.
Remembering to set the clock back and getting to Mass on time is always a pleasant accomplishment in spite of now having to turn the lights on a little earlier.
Editor’s note: This column is based on Bishop Morlino’s homily at the Red Mass on October 26.
Dear Friends,
It is most interesting that, when asked which commandments are the greatest, Jesus doesn’t offer something new. When Our Lord is asked which commandments are the greatest, Jesus doesn’t say we need “change” — which is, of course, the watchword of both our political parties today. Instead, Jesus goes back to the Old Testament, basically to the Book of Exodus, and Jesus offers the summary that was very common in the early Jewish community about what we now call the natural law. Jesus points to those two great commandments: “love God above all things, and love your neighbor as yourself.” And in so doing Jesus is a teacher of the natural law that was written in the hearts of the people of His time, just as it was written in the hearts of the earlier Jewish community, just as it is written in every human heart.
In the United States, only about half of those who were eligible to vote actually cast ballots during the last national election.
I admit I have not always voted in the past. When I am tempted not to vote, however, I think back to a story I once heard about a certain Aunt Katherine who died a few years ago. She was blind during the last months of her life, but she had her daughter read the ballot to her and fill it out on her behalf. She was careful to sign the ballot and make sure it was mailed.
Some people have actually heard corn growing. They tell me this happens when all the conditions are just right; enough good weather and plenty of rain.
Looking around our area makes me think there must have been a lot of noise in the fields this past growing season. Corn, beans, hay, grains, you name it, they have all grown like gangbusters. What a miracle when we think how it all comes from seeds that are planted.Maybe, if you are like me, reminders help from time to time. Harvest season is upon us. Gardens and fields both are producing the fruit from all that has been growing. I am reminded that our God of all creation planted the seed of faith in my life to bear good fruit. If the conditions are just right, and with enough prayer, receiving the sacraments, striving to love God and my neighbor, this can result in a fruitful life.
Hearing that there was a wise man who knew everything, the story is told of one who was younger and wanted to prove it. Taking the smallest from a flock in a nearby tree, he approached and said, “Tell me old man, I have a bird in my hands, is it alive or is it dead?”
The wise one looked and thought, “If I say it is alive, he will close his hands and crush the life out of it. If I say it is dead, he will open his hands and let it fly in my face.” He looked once more at the young man before him and answered his question with the words, “It is in your hands.” Life or death was in his hands.
Dear Friends,
Continuing the theme of last week’s column, in terms of the spiritual exercise of examining our consciences, the readings of this past Sunday have prompted me to proceed along the same line.
The Gospel story tells us of those who are called to work in the master’s vineyard only at the last hour and they still receive a full-day’s pay. Those who have worked for longer periods in the master’s vineyard complain and find fault with the master for his generosity to the late arrivals.
Ax felled autumn is no fall at all, death only has color when entered by the living.
The bright hues of orange, yellow, and red which will festoon our trees these coming weeks make an important statement. Namely, what was there all along finally becomes visible for us to see and enjoy.
Leaves which had been green for months gradually show their true colors as the seasonal process of dying takes its course. If this process were to have been stopped by laying an ax to the tree, the leaves would simply have turned brown as the result of having been cut off from their roots, their life source.
Dear Friends,
It is important that I set the record straight in response to the multitude of requests I have received to do so.
On Sunday, September 7, while in prayer before Mass, I had a sense that I needed to set aside the homily that I had prepared in order to address the confusion perpetuated by two of our public officials with regard to a most basic conviction of our Catholic and human reason with regard to abortion.
Dear Friends,
In the first place, let me thank so many of you for your expression of prayerful and loving support as I celebrated five years as your bishop, on August 1. St. Alphonsus Ligouri, whom we celebrate on August 1, is the great patron of moral theologians, and I am very devoted to him. He had a strong and unique devotion to Our Lady of Perpetual Help, to whom I’m also very devoted. I hope that all in the diocese will ask the intercession of St. Alphonsus and Our Lady of Perpetual Help, so that we can continue to move forward in union with our Holy Father and in loving obedience to him, to be that faithful local Church whom we are called to be, today and tomorrow.
