I have been packing a suitcase this week to head up to Seattle for a few days for the wedding of my niece Sarah to her soon-to-be husband John. As I was going through my closet choosing the “civilian clothes” I will need for the traveling and non-wedding time I noticed how full my closet has become…again. When I was assigned to St. Lucy Parish three years ago I did a pretty good job at culling much of the accumulation of clothes, books and other things that seem to gather unnoticed during the years. How did my closet get so full again?
I’m not a hoarder nor am I a clothes hound who wears a different outfit all the time and yet my closet is full again. Venerable Fulton J. Sheen in his book “The Seven Capital Sins” talks about the deadly sin of covetousness in this way, “Covetousness is an inordinate love of the things of this world. Such love becomes in hindrance if one is not guided by a reasonable end, such as suitable provisions for one’s family or the future, or one is too solicitous in amassing wealth or two parsimonious and dispensing it.” (p 81)
Surely we can agree my excess clothing in the closet is not a “solicitous amassing of wealth” nor would we consider it the “parsimonious dispensing” of the abundance…but we could agree a little spring cleaning is in order on a regular basis. It may seem silly and perhaps it may not be a deadly/capital sin and yet we could see the beginning of the sin taking hold in the heart of a person.
Where should we begin, maybe in the sweater area. I recently purchased two WWME 50th Anniversary sweaters and these went next to the 6 black and one blue pullover sweaters already in my closet, in addition to two cardigans, 4 sweater vests and the two zipper sweaters. Let’s do the math 2+6+1+2+4+2=17. Do I really need 17 sweaters? I certainly could rationalize having them all. Different styles. Different weight of cloth. Different needs for different days. Yes, all of this is true and added to this reasoning I have worn each sweater during this past winter. And yet, do I need 17 sweaters? No. So what am I to do? Simply put, to weed out the excess to begin to dispense of the amassing.
And while this may be a trivial beginning it is a spiritual exercise in so many different ways. When we begin to desire the things rather than use them for what they were intended, to be worn not to hang in a closet, we then we begin to fall into the sin of covetousness. And this can have very damaging effects on our spiritual and emotional life in living as a son/daughter of God.
Bishop Sheen continues with this powerful indictment of the sin, “The tragedy of our modern life is that so many put their pleasures in “desires” rather than in “discovery”. Having lost the one purpose of human living, namely God, they seek substitutes in the petty things of earth. After repeated disappointments, they begin to put their happiness not in a pleasure, but in the hunt for it, in butterfly existences that never rest long enough at any one moment to know their inner desires; running races hoping they will never end; turning pages but never discovering the plot; knocking at doors of truth and then dashing away lest its portholes be opened and they be invited in. Existence becomes a flight from peace, rather than an advance; a momentary escape from frustrations instead of its sublimation in victory.” (p 92)
Bishop Sheen’s reflection on these capital sins was written in 1939 and the truth of his words echoes through time because our sins remain the same. The true victory is turning over to God what is God’s and seeking his healing grace in the struggle to be free of the chains binding us to the objects around us and being able to hold gently the love which invites us into a greater joy, a greater peace, a greater life. Find a closet, whether it is in your home or in your heart and begin to dispense of the extras holding you back from God and find in this letting go a space to breath and break free.
God Bless
Fr. Mark

This weekend our Catholic Church celebrates Good Shepherd Sunday as a time to pray and talk about the vocation of priesthood and to honor those men who have followed Jesus in this vocation of love. Last week, in my letter, I talked about he ongoing call to vocation and how the focus needs to be on the “how we are being called” in following Jesus Christ.
In my life I have been blessed to know many great priests who have sought to follow God. One of my most fond memories is of Fr. Alex Affonso (may he rest in peace) with whom I served for a little over two years. Knowing Fr. Alex was a blessing in many ways. During the first months of our ministry together we were speaking about something and he recommended that I read the Encyclical by St. Pope John XXIII entitled “Sacerdotii Nostri Primordia” “On the Priesthood” St. Pope John XXIII wrote this reflecting on the life and priesthood of St. John Vianney who is the patron of parish priests.
It was in my conversations with Fr. Alex and reading this beautiful Encyclical that my understanding of “how we are being called” began to really take hold in my life. St. John XXIII and Fr. Alex wrote and talked about the dynamic and changing life of a parish priest. St. John XXIII writes about serving the people as a good shepherd, “Following in the footsteps of the great apostles of all ages, he knew that the best and most effective way for him to contribute to the salvation of those who would be entrusted to his care was through the cross. It was for them that he put up with all sorts of calumnies, prejudices and opposition, without complaint; for them that he willingly endured the sharp discomforts and annoyances of mind and body that were forced upon him by his daily administration of the Sacrament of Penance for thirty years with almost no interruption; for them that this athlete of Christ fought off the powers of hell; for them, last of all, that he brought his body into subjection through voluntary mortification. (#71)
In my copy of this Encyclical I have underlined and read this passage over and over again because the cross we bear continues to be blessed in being called but the gift continues to stretch and bless us in our service of God’s holy people.
I would often reflect on Fr. Alex’s own vocation story that started with his family’s conversation to Catholicism in Pakistan and the ostracization of their extended family because of this conversion. His studies in the seminary and service as a priest in his home country. But ultimately it was the lessons learned watching him serve the people where the understanding of the cross and the “how we are being called” was fixed in my heart.
Fr. Alex had cancer in his jaw bone that prevented him from speaking clearly, eating comfortably and was in constant pain…with all this he simply wanted to serve. One of my greatest sadnesses was having to ask him not to preach at Mass because of this problem. I remember the pain in his eyes but in the days, weeks and months to come I also saw the determination of a good shepherd as he faithfully, although in pain at times, continued with speech therapy and working on his accent to once more be able to proclaim the word of God.
I saw a man of kindness and prayer, once more from St. John XXIII, “The thing that keeps us priests from gaining sanctity” — the Cure of Ars used to say — “is thoughtlessness. It annoys us to turn our minds away from external affairs; we don’t know what we really ought to do. What we need is deep reflection, together with prayer and an intimate union with God.” The testimony of his life makes it clear that he always remained devoted to his prayers and that not even the duty of hearing confessions or any other pastoral office could cause him to neglect them. “Even in the midst of tremendous labors, he never let up on his conversation with God.”(#37) The simple kindnesses of listening, visiting and sharing time were often the comments you would hear. He prayed constantly around these works of kindness and one of the greatest blessing of my life was to pray with him the Divine Office on the final day of his life knowing that even then he was praying for our Catholic Church.
Please pray for vocations.

God Bless
Fr. Mark

(Prayer for discernment)
An honest prayer to discern God’s will

40 Hours Vocations Vigil

The next two weeks I am going to be sharing with you a little about priesthood and how the Church calls us to be in communion with one another. One of the greatest blessings in my priesthood is working in the Worldwide Marriage Encounter. (WWME) I know I seem to repeat myself often in this but one of the foundational principals that we work with in WWME is that the Sacraments of Marriage and Holy Orders are linked in their support and blessing of each other in growing the blessing within the lives of the priest and the husband and wife.
As a priest we are often asked how were we “called” or to tell our vocation story. This is easy enough done but for me it often misses the point because one of the great insights that I have gained in being a Marriage Encounter priest is that it is not so much “how we were called” but more importantly it is “how we are being called” in our vocation today and every day of our lives. I certainly love to share the story of God’s persistent love for me in how he continued to offer the gift of priesthood even when I was straying and living less than a saintly life but it is in the continuous call to conversion that the true and everlasting love story gracefully unfolds.
This, for me, is where the intersection of the two vocations, marriage and priesthood truly cross paths. The call to true conversion is an invitation to conform our lives to the great other, God and our spouse in each and every movement of love. This conforming can be like my morning walks. At least 90% of the time my morning walk follows a very set routine. I begin about the same time each morning, I wear the same shoes for the walk, I take the same route each and every time. It is a routine that becomes wonderful because it removes the where, how far and which way from my time of thought and prayer. But there is also a temptation: that I stop seeing, hearing and feeling the world around me. The temptation to spend too much time focussing on me and not on God’s blessings around me as I do my morning ramblings. And I do fall into this “not noticing” way too many times. Yet, there are the times when I am stopped in my tracks and see, hear or feel something different. It is here I am invited to conform myself to the other and focus away from my “self” and let the other enter into a conversation of love. When I allow this to happen my senses begin to see and notice the differences and even gaze in wonder at a house, a tree or a vista I had never noticed before even though I had walked the path a thousand times. Focussing on the now helps the walks to become an encounter with much more than just the steps, the breath and the exercise which is the real purpose for the walk.
This is also why, as I said above, we need to focus not on the “how we were” but more on the “how we are being” called in our vocation, whether it is marriage or a vocation to priesthood/consecrated religious life. The nostalgia of how I was called needs to be confronted with the cross of how I am being called in the reality a living encounter with Jesus Christ in the people I am called to serve as a priest. In the same way marriage is also a living encounter with Jesus Christ in the sacrificial love of husband and wife as they encounter the cross in the gift of self to the other. And very much like the walk, it is a continual rediscovering and opening our eyes to the other in our midst as we enter into conversations of hope, joy and a deeper understanding of the other. Our challenge is to stay attentive to the other that dwells deep within but is also apart continuously searching and re-engaging in the blessing and newness of love and life. It is the living encounter with the other’s abundance and generosity of Eucharistic love. Fr. Ronald Rolheiser O.M.I. shares with us these beautiful words about this encounter, “The Eucharist is God’s kiss. As Andre Dubus so succinctly puts it, “Without the Eucharist, God becomes a monologue.” He’s right. We need more than words, we need to be physically touched. This is what happens in the Eucharist and it is why the Eucharist, and every other Christian sacrament, always has some tangible, physical element to it––a laying on of hands, a consuming of bread and wine, an immersion in water, an anointing with oil. An embrace needs to be physical, not only something imagined.” (p 33 for “Our One Great Act of Fidelity”)
Our invitation is to live this Eucharistic embrace in our sacramental love of husband and wife, as priest and church. This is the true blessing, the true encounter with God who is love.
God bless
Fr. Mark

ps. Our next Marriage Encounter weekend is May 18-20, come and join me in this act of love.

www.sanjosewwme.org

The Octave of Easter is almost coming to an end. What is the Octave of Easter you may ask? Well, in truth, I really didn’t know about the Octave of Easter until my mid 30’s when as a teacher I began to attend more daily Masses. And often, because I taught mainly in Catholic Schools, I would attend weekday Masses after Easter because of vacation time, I noticed a difference. So what is the Octave of Easter. First and foremost it is the “eight days” of Easter beginning with Easter Sunday and ending on the Second Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday) During these eight days, “The Liturgy of Easter Week indicates that every day within the Octave is treated the same as the original solemnity of Easter.” (from “CatholicCulture.org)
Now this is news!
I will share with you a slightly longer quote about the Octave:“Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! The comprehension and joy of this amazing gift of Christ conquering sin and death by His death and resurrection cannot be confined to just one day. The Church as a mother understands the needs of man. Within the liturgical calendar there is a built-in pattern that corresponds to human rhythms: times of preparation and penance building up to major feasts with celebrations that are prolonged, and multi-level feast days spread throughout the year. The Easter Octave gives us time to impress upon our souls the mysteries, joys and graces of the greatest feast of the Church. Each day of the Octave the liturgy dwells on the mysteries of the resurrection of Christ and our own resurrection through the sacrament of Baptism.” (from “CatholicCulture.org)
So not only does the Church give you 40 days to prepare for Easter but she gives you 8 days to let the mystery fully sink into our hearts and minds. I bring this up because, like many people, we can hit the event, Easter in this case, and then quickly move on to what’s next. Not taking the time to let the joy, the blessing, the mystery and the grace fully take hold in our hearts. And it is very important that we allow the mysteries of life to rest peacefully in our hearts.
When I was ordained a priest on June 4, 2005 my pastoral assignment at St. Martin of Tours parish didn’t begin until July 1st. During the 26 days between those two wonderful days, I celebrate Masses of Thanksgiving at St. Maria Goretti on June 5, at St. Catherine of Alexandria on June 12 and finally at St. Anthony Parish in Greencreek Idaho on June 19. These great celebrations, along with daily Mass allowed me to peacefully begin to feel at home with the mystery of God calling me to the priesthood. It was a time allowing me to anticipate with great joy my first days, months and years of serving God’s holy people.
We can often forget the great gift that is given to us daily and the Octave of Easter is meant to help us remember how we are called to share the good news. I know that it is hard for many people to attend daily Mass and certainly the Octave for this year has almost passed us by….but….there still is the last day of the Octave of Easter which is the Second Sunday of Easter. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have the Church jammed packed with people again. Really, wouldn’t that be wonderful.
Here is were we rest in the mystery and do the good work of calling family, friends and neighbors to come and celebrate with us each week. Our baptismal call is to be prophetic witnesses to God’s call of forgiveness and mercy. See you in the Eucharist.

God Bless
Fr. Mark