Blowing on sparks....

"Fan into a flame the gift that God gave you when I laid my hands on you. God's gift was not a spirit of timidity, but the Spirit of power, and love, and self-control." 

2 Timothy 1:6-7

 This is the scriptural passage I chose to put on my ordination prayer card.  I think it's a marvelous image for spiritual reflection... I know as an Eagle Scout and pyro it certainly speaks to my heart! There's a visceral sense of contentment and achievement and even joy when you blow gently and steadily on a smoldering little almost-fire and feel and hear and smell it grow into a merrily burning blaze, or even a bonified bonfire.

I'm coming up on celebrating one year of priesthood in a week, and what a year it's been!  Very full, very challenging, very joyful.  I like that quote even more now than when I chose it.  There are SO many challenges that the Church faces in our increasingly broken and hostile world.  There are SO many challenges each one of us faces as we try to hear and respond to the Lord's beguiling whisper in our hearts.  And, at the same time, there are far more sparks of the Holy Spirit in hearts and minds, just waiting to be gently blown into a blaze. 

What could be more fascinating than the care of souls?  To be entrusted with shepherding and encouraging and challenging and cajoling God's adopted sons and daughters, one's own brothers and sisters in Christ!  It is a fearful and joyful and awesome thing.  I've just been given the tiniest taste of it in this first year, perhaps even a hearty helping, as I prefer.

And, at the same time, one's own soul is to be shepherded.  To go within and encounter the Lord of Heaven and Earth... to be docile and listening and open in the midst of many duties and responsibilities, each one of them sacred, and at the same time, potentially, an obstacle to hearing the Lord's voice. 

And what an arsenal!  What tools, what means of grace!  The big guns: Confession, the Eucharist, Prayer!  So many saints and angels, such a cloud of witnesses and examples!

God, Father of Heaven and Earth, I thank you and praise you and glorify your name for the gift of your Son, Jesus Christ, for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and for your call to me, and to all your sons and daughters.  Set us ablaze with love for You and for one another.  Help us to see the sparks of life and love in the midst of storms, and darkness, and confusion. Amen!

3 New Deacons for our Diocese!

It was a great joy and privilege to concelebrate the Ordination Mass yesterday afternoon at St. Peter's Cathedral where Ryan Ford, Nick Thompson, and Terry Saunders were ordained deacons!  Transitional deacons Ford and Thompson are now entering their last year of formation for the priesthood, while Deacon Saunders is a permanent deacon.  There is a nice article about all three of them in the most recent issue of the U.P. Catholic.  Thank God for such good and faithful men willing to lay down their lives in service to the Lord and His Church!

It was a particularly proud day for St. Anne's Parish in Escanaba, where both Deacon Ryan and Deacon Terry are parishioners.  Deacon Nick is from Resurrection Parish in Menominee, MI.

Fr. Larry and I are VERY excited to have Deacon Ryan with us this summer at St. Michael's.  He spent last summer at the Cathedral, so this will be a further chapter of pastoral experience and growth for him.

The three deacons had a nice reception here at St. Michael's in the Zyrd Parish Center for their immediate family.  Towards the end, Deacon Ryan got up and had some kind words of thanksgiving to share.

Bishop Sample and his mother Joyce both came as well.  After the reception, some of the Boy Scouts who are working on the Ad Altare Dei Religious Award (the name means "towards the altar of God") helped out with the clean-up.  They had also been at the reception.  Bishop Sample graciously agreed to take a picture with us:

We finished the day with a dip in Lake Superior!  I don't have any pictures, I'm sorry to say!  Fr. Tim Ekaitis had to make up for wimping out on Thursday when I jumped in off some rocks in the midst of a kayak trip and he didn't!  So, Fr. Larry, Fr. Tim, Deacon Ryan and I went out to the beach in the moonlight and made three bold plunges into the lake.  VERY refreshing!  The swimming season has begun!  One of Fr. Larry's and my pastoral goals for Deacon Ryan is that he fill out a little bit - it takes a little extra insulation to be able to "bear" swimming in Lake Superior!

How do Christians live in the world? Wisdom from the Early Church...

Every year, the following reading is one of my favorites. It is a strange thing to be strangers and sojourners in a world that is good, broken, and passing. We are pilgrims, this is not our final home. At the same time, we hope for the restoration of all things in Christ. Read, enjoy, ponder, share your thoughts!  - Fr. Ben

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from Universalis

The 2nd Reading from the Office of Readings for Wednesday of the 5th Week of Easter.

From a letter to Diognetus

The Christian in the world

Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life. Their teaching is not based upon reveries inspired by the curiosity of men. Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine. With regard to dress, food and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign.

And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. They play their full role as citizens, but labour under all the disabilities of aliens. Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not expose them. They share their meals, but not their wives. They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law.

Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many; they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything. They suffer dishonour, but that is their glory. They are defamed, but vindicated. A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult. For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life. They are attacked by the Jews as aliens, they are persecuted by the Greeks, yet no one can explain the reason for this hatred.

To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen. The body hates the soul and wars against it, not because of any injury the soul has done it, but because of the restriction the soul places on its pleasures. Similarly, the world hates the Christians, not because they have done it any wrong, but because they are opposed to its enjoyments.

Christians love those who hate them just as the soul loves the body and all its members despite the body’s hatred. It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven. As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.

Responsory

I am the light of the world. He who follows me can never walk in darkness; he will possess the light which is life, alleluia.

In me is all grace of way and of truth, in me all hope of life and of strength. He who follows me can never walk in darkness; he will possess the light which is life, alleluia.

Closing Prayer

O God, you love innocence and restore it.
Turn the hearts of your servants towards you:
let us be firm in faith and effective in good works.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,God for ever and ever.
Amen.