Remembering

Today I returned from a Lenten preparation retreat at the St. Francis Springs Prayer Center. Nearly 100 people came yesterday to ready themselves for the beginning of Lent during the retreat proper, and they came from all over. I won't attempt to recount what was said in the individual sessions, because it wouldn't have the same impact second hand. But it was after most of the retreatants had left that the real retreat began for me.

It began with a walk around the surrounding property, an apt metaphor perhaps for the Lenten journey ahead. Yesterday was beautiful, with a bright blue sky and lengthening shadows as I set out just after four. The weather was chilly, but not really cold as I walked out the gravel road toward the entrance. A car full of departing retreatants stopped to ask if I needed a ride, thinking I was hoofing it home. No thank you, I said, I'm just out for a walk.

I turned right to follow the trail that runs along the edge of the woods and past the little pond that holds the water supply for fire suppression at the Center. After a quarter mile or so, I turned right again onto an old road that goes past a storage building toward an old farm field.

Fifty yards up the road, I looked up the corridor of the road and out into the field. From the dark cool shade of the road I was on, I could see the field was covered in old corn stubble and tall dead grass washed in golden late afternoon light. And as I looked, a young buck walked into view, browsing, looking, browsing more, looking more. He was followed by three does.

I was downwind and in the shade, wearing gray and black, so I figured I might have a chance of getting close, so I stalked as best I could up through the dry crackly grass and leaves, along the edge of the woods that partially obscured me from the view of the deer. But the last doe sensed something she didn't like, and stared at me for what seemed like ten minutes without moving a muscle. In the end she just didn't like the looks of me, flipped up her flag and she and her friends trotted off.

Continuing down the road, I entered the field, which could not be more than a couple of acres surrounded by Virginia pines and brush. My friend Don Lahey wants to plant a vineyard there someday. I couldn't help thinking it would be a great place to plant a garden to supply fresh food and herbs for the Center. Or maybe just for the deer.

Re-entering the woods, I walked a short distance further to what has become a favorite spot of mine, a rock outcropping the size of a small bus that I have decided to call Petrus. You can easily climb its flanks and sit comfortably with a birds-eye view down the ridge to the creek, surrounded by open woods. It reminds me of sitting in a deer stand, listening to the woodland sounds and peering intently around for signs of wildlife. When things get that quiet in the woods, you can clearly hear the flapping of a small bird's wings twenty or thirty yards away. Fr. Louie chose well this piece of land. St. Francis would approve.

Decamping from Petrus and continuing down the trail, I crossed the little creek that runs parallel to the building and walked downstream. Twice I stopped to admire places where the creek tumbled over a huge rock, and thinking about the trout that would be hiding in the pool below if it were a mountain creek.

Finally I arrived at the place I now realize was my destination all along. Below the chapel and across the creek from it, there is a clearing surrounded by logs stood on their ends to form seats. I guess they've been there since the Springs opened four years ago, and now they're pretty rotten. They look as if they'd fall apart if you tried to sit on them. But off to one side is a little bench that makes a fine place to sit.

I like this place because opposite the chapel is a simple cross at least ten feet high. Big enough, in fact, for a real crucifixion. And so it can be a powerful place to consider, to try truly imagine what it means to die on a cross. Pierced yet not so wounded as to die from the wounds. Positioned just so as to be hanging, and not able to breathe without pulling yourself up by those very wounds. Weakening and finding it harder and harder to draw breath, Each breath an agony and a struggle. Abandoned by friends, scorned and ridiculed.

In his homily today, Fr. Louie said that traditionally we think of prayer, fasting, and works of charity (almsgiving) as the spiritual exercises of Lent. He suggested a fourth -- remembering. Remembering exactly what Jesus did for us on that cross, what he suffered, what he gave up, and how he surrendered utterly to his Father's will. And he did it for us -- not some universal "we the people" kind of "us", but for you, personally and individually, and for me. That is our journey this Lent, to remember.

Lessons I Learned From My Dog, Part 2

Hope springs eternal with Moose.

He can be crashed out in my office for literally hours while I work, but if I get up he is up too, like he is on springs or like an instantly inflatable dog. He looks at me with his head erect and his ears up: "Are we going somewhere? Are we? Are we? Maybe ride in the car? Or play ball?" If I just go to the bathroom or pick something up off the printer, he goes and takes a couple of laps around his bed, then settles back down. But you know he is alert for any sign of action.

If I go into the kitchen, he is alert for certain sounds. He knows the sound of the freezer door opening when you go to get ice for a drink, and quickly comes and parks next to the ice tray, where he is locked on every movement from tray to glass, determined not to miss the opportunity for an ice cube or two.

He also knows the sound of salad. What sound does salad make, you say? You got me. But he hears it, whatever it is, and comes to sit patiently behind me as I cut up ingredients for the salad. The vet told me a long time ago that some Labs love fruits and vegetables, and that these foods were much better for him and lower in calories than dog treats. So he has learned that salad = treat.

Slimy part off that cucumber that's been in the fridge a while? Yum.
Cherry tomato with a bad spot? De-lish.
Lettuce...sweet lettuce. Nectar.
Carrots? Crunchy goodness.
Bell pepper innards? The best.

When your standards are low enough that you'll eat socks, plastic bags, toilet paper, cat poop, and used Q-Tips, I guess even the lowest forms of real food must be delightful.

He is extremely polite. While he waits, he sits perfectly still, doing his laser-lock thing on whatever the object of his desire might be. But he never makes a sound, never gets under foot, never makes a pest of himself. That is, unless the sight of him eyeing whatever you're eating bothers you.

And his technique is exquisitely refined. While we're eating dinner, he'll be crashed out near the table, seemingly oblivious to his surroundings. But once we're done, maybe sitting and talking and sipping a glass of wine, we'll look up and there he is, locked on to whatever's left on the table. Never makes a move or a sound, but he's hard to miss, 85 lbs. of animal attention, staring intently at the scraps of dinner or the ice in our water glasses.

I confess that sometimes he does gets on my nerves. It IS unnerving. But the fact is, his behavior gets rewarded, not just sometimes but every.single.time. He acts this way because his hope is always rewarded.

So why do we not hope in the Lord the same way, with the same perfect conviction and patience? Yesterday's reading from Sirach said it well:

"...has anyone hoped in the LORD and been disappointed?
Has anyone persevered in his commandments and been forsaken?
has anyone called upon him and been rebuffed?"

Hope in the Lord, steadfast, patient hope, will be rewarded every.single.time. Now that Lent has begun, hope must be deeply ingrained within us, along with patience. We have forty days of preparation ahead of us, and if we work for those forty days, it's not going to be all fun and games.

But we prepare in steadfast hope, knowing that Easter, like Spring, is coming. Christ will take our sin and pain and suffering and work, and transform it through his death and resurrection into new life -- a better way of living in this life, and a better life to come.

Moose, my earthy and earthly teacher, has taught me well the rewards of patience and hope in this life. But in his quiet yet persistent way he teaches me something deeper about how to live this life in a way that leads to the next.

Trust

I will be brief this morning because I have to leave momentarily for a retreat at St. Francis Springs on preparation for Lent. After watching the market dive another 250 points yesterday, it seems we could all use a dose of trust in the Lord, and I thought today's reading from Sirach was very timely:

...when you come to serve the LORD,
stand in justice and fear,
prepare yourself for trials.
Be sincere of heart and steadfast,
incline your ear and receive the word of understanding,
undisturbed in time of adversity.
Wait on God, with patience, cling to him, forsake him not;
thus will you be wise in all your ways.
Accept whatever befalls you,
when sorrowful, be steadfast,
and in crushing misfortune be patient;
For in fire gold and silver are tested,
and worthy people in the crucible of humiliation.
Trust God and God will help you;
trust in him, and he will direct your way;
keep his fear and grow old therein.

Amazing things always seem to happen when I spend time at The Springs, so hopefully I'll receive inspiration for tomorrow's post. I will at least try to "incline (my) ear and receive the word of understanding".

May God bless you all and keep you safe today!

It's the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

This has been an anxious week. Being a Six, I don't really need a good reason to feel anxious, just being alive is often all I really need. Some may call this existential dread, angst or some other high-minded label. Really I was just edgy, and for good reason.

The economy is in the tank. Do I need to recount all the bad things that happened this week? Passage of a $787 billion stimulus bill ostensibly designed to help the economy caused the stock market to plumb new lows (gallows humor: the stock market has dropped so much that my 401k is now a 201k). Jobless claims through the roof -- 5MM people out of work. Home foreclosures up 80%+. And so on.

At our church and at other institutions here in Greensboro, people stream in every day for help with food, rent, utilities...the basic necessities. This week there was a confab of local churches and charitable organizations trying to coordinate their response to the local humanitarian crisis. A few years ago this type of meeting might have brought a couple of dozen representatives. At this week's meeting more than 100 came. And it's much worse elsewhere than here.

So far my business has help up OK, but we are actively in business development mode. Clients are still spending, but also acting squirrelly and overly deliberate. We need work. We have a pending proposal out for a study that would be by far the largest single assignment our company has ever won in its five-year history, to be conducted in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. So far beaten the odds by becoming one of two finalists, the other being a far larger multi-national firm. We are the darkhorse. The decision is due next week.

It's tax time, and of course as a small business owner I always look forward to the quadruple witching hour in April -- taxes due to the U.S. Treasury and NC Department of Revenue for 2008 plus quarterly tax payments to both. The biggest checks I'll write all year.

Then yesterday came the announcement that the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales, the order of priests that has staffed my parish of St. Paul the Apostle, will be "turning over the parish to the care of the diocese" at the end of June. This has been the bogeyman of our parish probably since before the Paulists pulled out 15 or so years ago. Diocesan priests! Head for the hills! Who will be our new pastor? No clue. That one is in the hands of Bishop Jugis and his staff -- and God.

And yet against all odds, the trajectory of my mood has been upward. One of the most important tasks of my own spiritual journey has been to learn to master my own anxiety. For anxiety is my perpetual companion, in good times and bad. My nature I think is to see it and experience anxiety more clearly and intensely than others do, but I think we all have it, and we all react to it, knowingly or unknowingly.

And let's be clear -- I am powerless against anxiety. You are too. I have been fortunate in my life to have had teachers to show me this aspect of my essential nature, and to work with it. One such teacher and friend is Marilyn who first taught to name my fear, my anxiety, and in so doing to reduce its power over me.

Another is Fr. Jim O'Neil, former pastor of St. Paul's and an Oblate priest. At a Finance Council meeting some years ago he read the following from a little yellow book as our opening prayer:

Do not look forward to the mishaps of this life with anxiety, but await them with perfect confidence so that when they do occur, God, to whom you belong, will deliver you from them. He has kept you up to the present; remain securely in the hand of his providence, and he will help you in all situations. When you cannot walk, he will carry you. Do not think about what will happen tomorrow, for the same eternal father who takes care of you today will look out for you tomorrow and always. Either he will keep you from evil or he will give you invincible courage to endure it.

If ever there was a prayer for times like these, that's it. He was quoting St. Francis de Sales from a little pamphlet called "Golden Counsels of Saint Francis de Sales", and my copy is dog-eared and almost crumbling from use as it lays in front of me now. It was that last line -- "Either he will keep you from evil or he will give you invincible courage to endure it" -- that rang my bell that night and began to help me see how our just and loving God stands by us, loves us and carries us through all the trials of this life.

In Jesus Christ his son we have an ally who has conquered not only anxiety but death itself. He did this not by being all-powerful and all-Divine but by being powerless and human. Jesus knew and experienced anxiety and every other human emotion exactly as we do. Can you not feel his anxiety at Gethsemane?

He was in such agony and he prayed so fervently that his sweat became like drops of blood falling on the ground.

He knows what it's like. He really does. And that is what gets me through weeks like this one.

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat (or drink), or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?

Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they?

Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?

Why are you anxious about clothes? Learn from the way the wild flowers grow. They do not work or spin. But I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was clothed like one of them. If God so clothes the grass of the field, which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow, will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith?

So do not worry and say, 'What are we to eat?' or 'What are we to drink?' or 'What are we to wear?' All these things the pagans seek. Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom (of God) and his righteousness, and all these things will be given you besides."

Countdown to Lent, Part 3

Last in the series of posts on ideas for spiritual practices for Lent. Please feel free to add your own in the comments...

Almsgiving

1. Double up on your regular contributions to your church or favorite charity.
   
   
2. Deposit what you would have spent on #3 above into a collection jar, and donate it to your church or charity.
   
   
3. If you already work as a volunteer for your church or another charity, see if you can increase the hours you donate by 50% or 100%.
   
   
4. The next time you see a homeless person standing at an intersection, try opening your wallet and giving them whatever cash is in your wallet. All of it. I confidently predict that in doing this you will learn something about yourself you did not know.
   
   
5. Donate non-perishable food or to the food pantry at church or the local food bank.
   
   
6. Go on a mission trip. If you can’t actually take the trip during Lent, at least find one and commit to going.

That's all, folks, I hope you found this helpful or at least thought-provoking.

Countdown to Lent, Part 2

Lent Minus 6 days and counting...some ideas for Lenten spiritual practices related to:

Fasting

For Catholics, numbers 1 and 4 are "required". However it seems to me that if you do these two because you "have to", neither will have much value.

"When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites. They neglect their appearance, so that they may appear to others to be fasting. Amen, I say to you, they have received their reward.
But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you may not appear to be fasting, except to your Father who is hidden. And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you."

1. Try following Catholic teaching on Fasting during Lent, shall we say, religiously? On Ash Wednesday and Good Friday eat only one full meal and two (very) light meals that together add up to no more than the full meal.
   
   
2. Try fasting – the real thing, not the Catholic Lite version. Don’t eat any solid food for an entire day, or any beverages that have any significant calories like milk, juice or soft drinks. Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are particularly good days to do this.
   
   
3. A Golden Oldie: Abstain throughout Lent from one or two pleasurable foods or drinks you typically enjoy as a treat. Last year I passed on Starbucks for 6 ½ weeks (a personal addiction). For you maybe it’s ice cream, Krispy Kreme, or chocolate.
   
   
4. Abstain from eating meat on Ash Wednesday and all Fridays. Catholicism 101. It never seemed like much of a sacrifice to eat fish instead of meat, so for extra credit, try not eating fish, eggs or dairy products either. (I wonder if vegans should abstain from fruits and vegetables, and only eat meat & fish?)
   
   
5. Sign up to participate in The H2O Project.
   
   
6. Participate in Operation Rice Bowl.
   
   
7. Fast from a non-food item -- TV, Facebook, texting, a hobby
   

Countdown to Lent, Part 1

Ash Wednesday is only a week away, so it’s a good time to start thinking about Lent and planning the spiritual practices we’ll use to prepare ourselves for Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter.

Traditional Lenten spiritual practices revolve around prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, so over the next few days I’ll be offering some suggestions under each category, including some golden oldies and one or two that might be a little radical. Just whatever you choose to do, do it as cheerfully and as privately as possible.

Prayer

1. Read the daily readings every day and reflect on them. You can do the reflection in the car on the way to work, during breakfast, lunch, or a break.
   
   
2. Take 15 minutes at the same time each day to pray and reflect.
   
   
3. Attend daily Mass (at least) once a week.
   
   
4. Receive the sacrament of Reconciliation.
   
   
5. Pick one of the Gospels and read it from start to finish over the course of Lent. (After Easter read Acts of the Apostles.)
   
   
6. Read one or more spiritual books. May I suggest The Return of the Prodigal Son by Henri Nouwen -- the ultimate Lenten book about the ultimate Lenten parable.
   
   
7. Go on a retreat. Doesn’t have to be an organized thing with a group of people necessarily, it could be just you taking some alone time to be with God in a place away from your usual earthly distractions. If you live in central North Carolina or south central Virginia, I highly recommend the St. Francis Springs Prayer Center near Stoneville, NC.
   
   
8. Join a Bible study group.
   
   
9. There are a ton of Bible study resources on the Web. I’ve been using Bible.org off and on, and listened to an entire sermon on the seventh and eighth chapters of Mark last night. See if you can find one that resonates with you.
   
   
10. Listen to Christian music. There are loads of musicians out there making great music about the Gospel, and their music can be a great way to bring us closer to God. On the contemporary Christian front, some artists to check out are Jeremy Camp, Chris Tomlin, Third Day, Building 429, Casting Crowns, Tree 63, David Crowder Band, Aaron Shust, MercyMe, and good ol’ Rich Mullins. Country and bluegrass also offer some great, if more traditional tunes, from the likes of Doc Watson (What A Friend We Have In Jesus – a cappella – wow), Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, The Stanley Brothers, Amy Grant, Alison Krauss and Union Station (There Is a Reason, A Living Prayer). And don’t forget those classic Catholic liturgical tunemeisters The St. Louis Jesuits, Marty Haugen, David Haas, Ed Bolduc, and Jesse Manibusan.

Tomorrow I’ll offer some thoughts on fasting, then finish up on Friday with almsgiving. In the meantime I’d love to hear your thoughts and additions to the list. What else have you tried, especially during Lent, that you found powerful?

Water

In today's readings we begin the three-part story of Noah and the Great Flood. Having heard the story yesterday of Abel's death at the hands of Cain, today's readings begin with God's great disappointment with man's evil ways, to the point he actually says "...I am sorry that I made them." He resolves to make things right by wiping the slate clean and starting over with the family of the one person on earth judged to be righteous -- Noah.

This is a familiar story, beautiful in its own way in spite of the destruction of the earth by flood. As we see so many times in the Bible, death and destruction are not final, but rather lead to resurrection and redemption. That is a theme we'll hear a lot about during Lent and the Easter season, so I'll save that one for later.

Another recurrent theme in this story is the cleansing and saving power of water, and how God uses water as an instrument of grace. We see it in Moses bringing forth water from the rock, John's baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, and the use of baptism as an initiation rite in the early church.

Water is of course essential to life, and it is something we in the U.S. have the luxury of taking for granted. Our water is safe to drink pretty much anywhere you can get it, and you can get it pretty much anywhere.

In Honduras, water seems to be plentiful. No less than eleven rivers have their source on the heights of El Celaque, the highest mountain in Honduras. But unlike here, you can't drink water from the tap without suffering serious consequences. Even when you take a shower, you have to be careful not to swallow the water lest you should pick up some nasty parasite or bacteria.

But as bad as that sounds to us as water-spoiled Americans, it is still better than the situation in parts of Africa and other areas, where women commonly travel miles -- ten or 20 or more -- to find water and bring it back to their families. Back in the day when my wife Pat worked on organizing the local CROP Walk, it was a very long walk indeed (10 miles? do any of you remember?). The point was to mimic the distance these women had to go to find fresh water. Over time, the CROP Walk was shortened to its present 10 km. because, well, not that many Americans will willingly walk 10 miles, even when they're not carrying 40 or 50 lbs. of water.

The scarcity of water in places like sub-Saharan Africa undermines the health and safety of those who live there, and is one more link in the chain of poverty.

Last night I heard about a way to break that chain, one village at a time. One night a month, we have a meeting of the Parish Pastoral Council and all of the major groups and commissions in the Parish. This year we started for the first time meeting all on the same night, so we could share with each other what we're all up to and to get to know each other better. So far it's been well received, though we're still working out the kinks.

The very last report last night was from Susan Rabold who is in charge of youth ministry. Starting tomorrow (Feb. 18) the high school youth are going to participate in The H2O Project, which is designed to raise funds for drilling wells to supply fresh water in areas where it is scarce.

Participants in the project forgo all beverages except water for two weeks, and contribute an amount of money equal to what they would have spent for each beverage they did not consume. Money raised goes to drill wells and bring fresh clean water to places that previously had none. The middle school youth have already raised $1000, and the high school kids are hoping to raise the rest of the $2500 to drill one well. They are hoping to drill that well in the home village of our beloved custodian, Michael.

Susan told me that it's a lot harder to do than it's sounds -- no juice, no soda, no coffee (!), no wine (!!!), nothing but agua. Makes you realize just how blessed we are in this country by the abundance of things we have to drink in addition to clean, safe tap water.

Obviously this would be a great act of sacrifice and spiritual practice for Lent. If you'd like to help, you can contact Susan via the St. Paul's parish website link on the left of this page. Let's see if you can make it two weeks!

God used the waters of the Great Flood to cleanse the earth of human sin. Wouldn't it be awesome if through this simple act we could use the waters from one well to cleanse a village in Africa of thirst, hardship and disease!

Posting Comments/Becoming a Follower of Emmaus Road

Thanks to those of you who have left comments for me on any of my posts so far. I really appreciate your feedback and look forward to more back-and-forth with you on past and future posts. I also appreciate the emails of encouragement I have received. You can always email me at robarnett@triad.rr.com if you prefer not to have your words splashed over the World Wide Web.

Some of you have told me you've had trouble leaving comments, so here's the skinny on what you need to do. Probably the easiest thing to do is get a Google account (Blogspot/Blogger are part of Google, as soon we all will be). Go to Google.com and click "sign in" in the upper right corner. When you get to the sign-in page, click the link to Create an account now (or just follow this link). The rest is pretty easy.

Once you're signed in and you come back to Emmaus Road, be sure to click the link on the left to become a follower of Emmaus Road. You'll be notified any time I post new content. (h/t to Colleen and Paul for showing the way!)

Thank for reading -- I love you all!

Today's readings did not exactly spark immediate revelations (even after repeated readings), so I am looking elsewhere for inspiration. The Holy Spirit never fails, so stay tuned...

Unclean

Kaluapapa is a small settlement on an isolated peninsula of the island of Molokai in Hawaii. Surrounded on three sides by water, and separated from the rest of the island by 1600 ft. cliffs, Kaluapapa became the site of a famous leper colony in the mid-19th century.

Leprosy arrived in Hawaii in 1848, and the first victims arrived at Kaluapapa in 1866. There was literally nothing there -- no housing, potable water, food -- just the barren land. Victims arrived there by ship and were unceremoniously dumped off:

"...the leprosy victims, arriving by ship, were sometimes told to jump overboard and swim for their lives. Occasionally a strong rope was run from the anchored ship to the shore, and they pulled themselves painfully through the high, salty waves, with legs and feet dangling below like bait on a fishing line.

The ship's crew would then throw into the water whatever supplies had been sent, relying on currents to carry them ashore or the exiles swimming to retrieve them."

Such was the fear of this terrible disease. Father Damien deVeuster, a 33-year old Catholic priest from Belgium, arrived in 1873 to minister to the sick. Not only did he take care of the sick, he helped them build a life, indeed a civilization, on this lonely spit of land.

Father Damien did more than simply administer the faith: he built homes, churches and coffins; arranged for medical services and funding from Honolulu, and became a parent to his diseased wards.

He truly entered into the leper's life of suffering and isolation, contracting the disease himself and eventually giving his life in service to these outcasts in 1879. Fr. Damien has competed the first two steps toward canonization as a saint, having been declared venerable by Pope Paul VI in 1977, and blessed by Pope John Paul II in 1995. (H/T to Visit Molokai visitmolokai.com )

To be a leper in those days was to be ultimate societal outcast, just as it was in the time of Moses in today's first reading. Anyone found to be unclean by reason of leprosy had to live outside the camp and declare to everyone his profound state of alienation:

"The one who bears the sore of leprosy shall keep his garments rent and his head bare, and shall muffle his beard; he shall cry out, 'Unclean, unclean!' "

Of course nothing had changed by Jesus's time in today's Gospel. So in this context it is remarkable that a leper would be bold enough to approach Jesus in the first place. Was he moved by faith in Jesus after hearing tales of other healings? Or was he just so desperate for relief and reunion with civilization that he figured he had nothing to lose? There had to be some of both, but his faith rings out in the leper's simple statement "If you wish, you can make me clean." He didn't really even ask to be healed, not directly anyway.

Moved with pity, [Jesus] stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, "I do will it. Be made clean."

Think about that. "Moved with pity..." Jesus again entered into the experience of someone separated from "normal" life and who probably considered himself accursed and rejected by God, and was moved by pity for the man. He felt his pain and rejection, hurt feelings and hurting body.

"...he stretched out his hand, touched him..." What a radical act of compassion! Jesus, the Ultimate Jew, violated a law given to His ancestors by His very Father centuries before. It was unspeakable. But such was the power of His love for this poor man that not even the Law could stand between Jesus and the salvation of this leper. "I do will it. Be made clean." Wow.

We all carry some burden, some rock -- our leprosy -- that we feel is so grave that not even God can can overcome it. We hold it tight.

"There is something in us humans that keeps us clinging to our sins and prevents us from letting God erase our past and offer us a completely new beginning. Sometimes it seems I want to prove to God that my darkness is too great to overcome...Do I truly want to be so totally forgiven that a totally new way of living becomes possible? Do I trust myself and such a radical reclamation? Do I want to break away from my deep-rooted rebellion against God and surrender myself so absolutely to God's love that a new person can emerge? Receiving forgiveness requires a total willingness to let God be God and do all the healing, restoring, and renewing." -Henri Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son

Jesus is there, patiently waiting for us ask the question inside the statement of faith, "If you wish, you can make me clean."

"I do will it. Be made clean."

With love to Marilyn and Fr. Louie, who showed me that my darkness was no match for the the love of Christ.

Loaves and Fishes on the Road to Honduras

Five weeks from today I leave for Honduras with 17 other people on a mission to build houses with Habitat for Humanity. This will be my third trip, and incredibly, this time I’m the leader.

The first time, in March of 2007, I went with my wife Pat and not a single other person I knew. Honduras was a shock, my first exposure to Third World poverty and desperate, subsistence living. Walking through a slum with the group, we were confronted with the sight of child no more than three years old, standing guard at the gate to his house with a knife in his hand. The look on his face told me that, even at three, he could and would use that knife. It is an image that still haunts me.

And yet the people that we met – outside the barrio at least – were universally happy and incredibly grateful for the little that they had. Not only that, but they shared what they had with truly Christ-like generosity.

I could feel the tectonic plates shifting inside me, but I didn’t yet grasp what was going on. But I knew I had to go back.

And so I did. In March of 2008 I went with a different group that included my son Dan and Butch Sherrill from the previous year’s group. I could write a book about our leaders, Margaret and Miguel Rubiera, even after so brief a time as ten days together. The light of Christ burns brightly in these two, and I am humbled at the prospect of trying to fulfill the leadership responsibilities they so joyfully and graciously fulfilled. Margaret was the quintessential Mom to all two dozen of us, and Miguel (Jefe Segundo) was an effective yet hilarious mix of Father Flanagan, Ricky Ricardo and Gen. George Patton. There is so much to tell about that trip, and in time perhaps I will tell it.

We can all point to times in our lives when an event or situation changed our perspective or even the direction of our lives. That was Honduras II for me.

For now, suffice it to say that the trip turbocharged my spiritual journey and rearranged the spiritual tectonic plates yet again into a new and more Spirit-filled configuration. My prayer life changed for the better, and I began to pray more frequently and ardently to know God’s will for me, and for Him to grant me the grace to carry it out.

And so it was one day last summer I was praying, and it came to me that I needed to lead the next trip. I mentioned this to Pat the other day, and she’s like, “So what did that sound like, was it like a big booming voice saying ‘Rob, Rob, lead the trip to Honduras’?” Not really, and I didn’t get knocked off my horse like Saul either. I just knew.

Recruiting people for the trip was tougher than I ever dreamed, though in retrospect maybe the economy had something to do with that…do you think? I tried to encourage people to not let money be a barrier to going, that somehow we’d find the money. And sure enough, one of the people on the trip told me they knew someone that would love to go, but couldn’t afford it. Now I had what I’d asked for and no clue where the money was coming from.

Segue to today’s Gospel reading:

Mk 8:1-9

In those days when there again was a great crowd without anything to eat, Jesus summoned the disciples and said, "My heart is moved with pity for the crowd,
because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat.
If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will collapse on the way,
and some of them have come a great distance." His disciples answered him, "Where can anyone get enough bread to satisfy them here in this deserted place?"
Still he asked them, "How many loaves do you have?" They replied, "Seven."
He ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then, taking the seven loaves he gave thanks, broke them, and gave them to his disciples to distribute, and they distributed them to the crowd. They also had a few fish. He said the blessing over them and ordered them distributed also.
They ate and were satisfied.
They picked up the fragments left over—seven baskets.
There were about four thousand people.

Jesus was moved with pity for the crowd (that empathy thing again), and the disciples were clueless about where the food would come from. And yet, just from the resources they had with them – seven loaves, two fish, and faith – there came enough food not only to feed four thousand but to have plenty left over.

And so I found myself earlier this week meeting with Lisa Reynolds at the Habitat offices, with Gerard Davidson, a Habitat board member, former trip leader, soon-to-be advisor-in-chief for yours truly, going over trip details including the budget. To this point, Lisa has done virtually all of the heavy lifting on trip preparation (aside from recruiting), and has done a masterful job of it. Gerard led my first trip to Honduras, and I can’t tell you what a blessing I consider it to be having him along this time.

To make a long story short, we found the money to fund the trip for the person who didn’t have the resources to go, and then some. Not only that, our “seven baskets of fragments” will be enough to make a nice contribution to Habitat Honduras as well. I felt like I was flying when I left the Habitat office – the Spirit had come through in the clutch again.

I confess that a few months ago I had wigged out a bit when recruiting wasn’t going so well, but that’s part of the territory that comes with being an Enneagram Six like me. But I settled down once I realized I was truly inadequate for this job (which I still am), but that if I let go of control and handed over the reins to the Spirit, that would create the space for great things to happen.

And so they have – we have continued to add to our numbers, even at this late date. Word came late this week that there could be as many as four more people joining us from Grace UMC, which could bring us to 22.

Lisa has a quote on her email signature I’ll share with you because it is so true:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. -Marianne Williamson

“They ate and were satisfied.
They picked up the fragments left over—seven baskets.”

Groanings

This week’s readings have tracked the creation story in Genesis and Jesus’ ministry of healing in Mark. The story of creation and The Fall of course presage the oncoming of Lent in ten days or so, by reminding us why we need those forty days of reconciliation in preparation for entering into the Paschal Mystery during the Easter season. Lent is a time of preparation just as Advent is, yet this year somehow I feel the need to “prepare for the preparation” as it were, and to prepare to make the most of Lent.

Looking back on this week’s readings, though, I am struck by two stories in particular from Mark’s gospel. On Thursday we heard the story of the Greek woman whose daughter was possessed by a demon. When she begged the Lord to drive out the demon, He told her "Let the children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs." Jesus’ mission was to the Jews, not the Gentiles (which would be Paul’s job). Yet she persisted, "Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children's scraps." Moved by her faith, Christ drove out her daughter’s demon.

One lesson that can be drawn from this story revolves around the power of faith, and the need for persistence in prayer. I don’t presume to understand the Lord’s initial reticence to heal her daughter. On the surface it seems counter to our understanding of God’s love for each of us. And yet because of her faith and persistence, the Lord relented.

I have to confess that prayer is still a mysterious process to me, and never more so than when I am petitioning the Lord for something specific. Sometimes I can pray myself in circles: “Lord please grant me X, but if that’s not Your will, then don’t.” Maybe I’m trying to mimic Jesus’ prayer at Gethsemane: "Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me; still, not my will but yours be done." And yet even then, when we are open to accepting God’s will, there is a place for persistence in our petitions. Sometimes it’s the persistence that purifies our motives as it tests our resolve. It reminds me of one of the threads in Randy Pausch’s now-famous Last Lecture, when he talks about obstacles to our goals ("brick walls"), and how they let us prove how badly we want something.

Another possibility is that God’s will is not a static thing. We often think of GOD’S WILL as if it is some monolithic, unchanging thing. And yet there are many stories in the Bible of God’s will changing. One that comes to mind is Abraham’s almost-comical conversation with the LORD in Genesis 18 about the fate of the city of Sodom -- "Please, let not my Lord grow angry if I speak up this last time…”. The point is, maybe God’s love for us is so great that His will can actually change if our faith in His love is great enough.

The other story is from Friday (February 13) in which Jesus cures the deaf man who also has a speech impediment. Sometimes it’s easy to gloss over stories like this one, because there are so many stories of Jesus curing people, driving out demons, or raising people from the dead. Often there is a lesson or insight from small details in the story that made it particularly notable for the Gospel writer and worthy of recording.

One such detail is this verse: “He put his finger into the man's ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him, " Ephphatha!" (that is, "Be opened!") When I read this, I thought, “What was the groan about?” Is this the same groaning Paul mentions in Romans 8: “In the same way, the Spirit too comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings”?

It seems pretty safe to say that Jesus was full of empathy for the crowds that followed him and the sick who came to be healed. As he puts His fingers into the man’s ears and touched his tongue, by His great empathy He entered into the experience of living as a deaf man, of total understanding of what it was like to try to speak and not be understood. And even for Jesus the experience was so powerful that he prayed to the Father with “inexpressible groaning”. And from that knowledge came the power to heal.

So why is it so hard for us to believe that He understands our own deafness and inability to communicate? He knows our every iniquity, weakness and deficiency of character, and understands what it’s like to carry the rock of our guilt around every single day. And He loves us anyway.

Lessons I Learned From My Dog, Part 1

'I have an extraordinary dog. Yeah, I know everybody says that about their dog, but in the case of Moose, it is a verifiable, empirical fact.

It's not just his good looks, which are obvious, nor his many talents, like being able to retrieve a ball hurled 100 yards down a mountainside into a laurel thicket, which is still pretty amazing. Nor is it his friendly and easygoing manner.

What sets Moose apart as a dog is that he is my teacher. I guess this makes this sort of a "man bites dog" story, to use one of the well-worn expressions I learned in journalism school, because we normally think of the teaching going only one way in the human-dog relationship.

What sets Moose apart as a teacher is that he has taught me volumes about God and about life. I cannot look at him without seeing the Divine Spark in his bright eyes and wagging tail, indeed in his whole philosophy of life.

Moose's philosophy of life is based on one thing: joy. Joy is not the same thing as happiness, though the two frequently coexist in Moose. As Henri Nouwen put it: "Joy is an experience of knowing that you are unconditionally loved and that nothing -- sickness, failure, emotional distress, oppression, war, or even death -- can take that love away....We can be unhappy about many things, but joy can still be there because it comes from the knowledge of God's love for us."

I love Moose unconditionally, which he knows down deep in his bones. He knows I love him even when he pulls a stunt like he did last night. Pat and I went to play tennis last night, and when we're both gone we debate whether to put him in his kennel in the garage or leave him in the house. The garage is cold right now, so I left him in the house.

Unfortunately I did not close the door to my office and all the bathrooms as I normally do. So when we got back, I went up to my office only to hear Pat call me, "Rob, you've got to come see what Moose did." There in our bathroom, Moose had taken an entire, brand-new roll of toilet paper off the dispenser. Based on the available forensic evidence, he then systematically shredded the entire roll and apparently consumed at least half of it. I know this a) because it was gone, and b) because I find his papier mache deposits out in the yard.

You see Moose is hopelessly addicted to paper, and we had acted as enablers. Sometimes I get upset about this stuff, but more often now I just laugh. He can't help himself, and I can't help loving him.

I think Moose also knows God loves him unconditionally, and that is the ultimate source of his joy. That kind of joy empowers you to engage life with the throttle wide open, drinking in every relationship and experience like the finest wine. I've learned a lot about this kind of joy from watching and studying him over the last six years.

Nowhere is this joy more apparent than when he plays ball. He lights up when I get the ball out -- the very appearance of his face changes and his body becomes alert and focused. He locks in like a laser on the ball right up until it's thrown, flung, hit or shot downrange and then he's off like a bolt of lightning. He gauges the range and general direction visually then locates the ball by smell.

As he's searching his joy is palpable. His big otter tail (a lethal weapon) spins like a helicopter rotor, something it only does when he's retrieving. He has a big ol' grin on his face and is full of a manic energy and focus that can only be satisfied by finding that ball. And when he does find it, he gallops back to me with his ears back and an even bigger grin, fairly oozing the pure joy of being outside, of running with the wind in your face. He is totally and completely immersed in the here and now, the present moment. It's infectious.

I rarely felt that kind of joy until I met Moose. But I am convinced that he is a personal gift from God to me, sent to teach me something important about how to live my life. He and I love each other unconditionally, but more importantly he has taught me, time and again, just how deeply and unconditionally God loves me, just like God loves Moose.

Happy 7th Birthday, Moose!

P.S. Thank you Lisa for helping bring Moose into my life six years ago!

In the beginning...

Welcome to my new blog, Emmaus Road.

The story of the apostles meeting Jesus on the road to Emmaus has always been a powerful one for me. After Jesus' death they were despondent because they were sure that their great hope for the future had been extinguished by the cross. And yet in their very darkest hour Jesus came and walked with them.

Of course they didn't recognize Him, even though they were strangely and powerfully moved by His presence. "Then they said to each other, 'Were not our hearts burning (within us) while he spoke to us on the way and opened the scriptures to us?'" It was only after he broke bread with them that their eyes were opened and they realized he had traveled with them that afternoon on the road, and that indeed he had never left them at all.

That story is the story of our lives. We walk along the road, in good times and bad, sometimes scarcely aware of His presence. Especially in the hard times, like the patch of road we're walking right now, He can seem far away. And then something happens, and just like we've been struck with a bolt of grace, we know at once that He IS there, always WAS there...and always will be.

My prayer is that through these musings and your responses that we will all become more aware as we walk along of Christ's incredible, life-affirming, comforting, loving presence every step of the way.