Do You Follow the Star?

I've been thinking more about New Year resolutions, and I wonder how successful they would be if we treated them less as things we can do to help or better ourselves, and more as something we can offer up to God.

I was struck by a question I encountered yesterday. In a woman's group I belong to, one of the members asked, "Does anyone ever feel like God hates you?"

This is a common question. Many people see bad and wonder how God can even exist. People feel as if they are always being good, but nothing ever comes of it. Today's readings (especially the Gospel), however, shows us how important free will is and the overwhelming power of good:

And behold, the star that they had seen at its rising preceded them, until it came and stopped over the place where the child was. They were overjoyed at seeing the star, and on entering the house they saw the child with Mary his mother. They prostrated themselves and did him homage. Then they opened their treasures and offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed for their country by another way. (Matthew 2:9-12)

The Magi seek the star, which leads them to the Christ child. As believers in signs, they trust a dream, which tells them not to return to Herod. They chose to leave by another route and not risk the child's life. What faith they had!

God never gives you anything you cannot handle. We go through sufferings in life just as Christ suffered for us, on the cross and through human temptations and lamentations. These sufferings, if we so choose, can be signs which lead us closer to Christ. The priest said in the homily today - think of what Mary, who carries so many things in her heart, must have felt when she received the gifts from the Magi: gold, given only to Kings; frankincense, given in homage to the Savior; and myrrh, used in burials, given as a reminder of the baby's humanity and eventual death.

When we consider that God sent his only Son to suffer death on a cross for the redemption of our sins, and when we ponder the very essence of love and how we are on this earth because we were created of Love and for love, we cannot believe or even think God hates anyone. Only the Devil plants seeds of hate. When you feel weak and wonder why God is not intervening, ask yourself: "Have I offered this up to God? Have I asked God for help? Do I want a specific outcome or am I open to God's plans for me?"

Or are you thinking like Herod, and would like to try to fix the end game out of fear? And what of grace?

The Magi followed a star. We follow a much less elusive guide, and still, at times, we can feel lost. And while we are not guaranteed a happy life, we can have a joyful one. On this Solemnity of the feast of the Epiphany, allow the words of the second reading seep into your heart:

Brothers and sisters: You have heard of the stewardship of God’s grace that was given to me for your benefit, namely, that the mystery was made known to me by revelation. It was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit: that the Gentiles are coheirs, members of the same body, and copartners in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel. (Ephesians 3:2-3a, 5-6)

Have a blessed day! May you find the Christ child and be able to offer to him your most precious gift: that of self, and a devotion of your life in worthy adoration to our Lord.

"The Wise Men" by G.K. Chesterton

Step softly, under snow or rain,
 To find the place where men can pray;
The way is all so very plain
 That we may lose the way.

Oh, we have learnt to peer and pore
 On tortured puzzles from our youth,
We know all the labyrinthine lore,
 We are the three wise men of yore,
And we know all things but truth.

We have gone round and round the hill
 And lost the wood among the trees,
And learnt long names for every ill,
 And serve the made gods, naming still
The furies the Eumenides.

The gods of violence took the veil
 Of vision and philosophy,
The Serpent that brought all men bale,
 He bites his own accursed tail,
And calls himself Eternity.

Go humbly ... it has hailed and snowed...
 With voices low and lanterns lit;
So very simple is the road,
 That we may stray from it.

The world grows terrible and white,
 And blinding white the breaking day;
We walk bewildered in the light,
 For something is too large for sight,
And something much too plain to say.

The Child that was ere worlds begun
 (... We need but walk a little way,
We need but see a latch undone...)
The Child that played with moon and sun
Is playing with a little hay.

The house from which the heavens are fed,
 The old strange house that is our own,
Where trick of words are never said,
 And Mercy is as plain as bread,
And Honour is as hard as stone.

Go humbly, humble are the skies,
 And low and large and fierce the Star;
So very near the Manger lies
 That we may travel far.

Hark! Laughter like a lion wakes
 To roar to the resounding plain.
And the whole heaven shouts and shakes,
 For God Himself is born again,
And we are little children walking
 Through the snow and rain.



"God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/ We Three Kings" sung by The Barenaked Ladies and Sarah McLachlan (one of my favorite versions and Christmas songs)

I Will Wait For You (And Other Comforts and Converts)

The Convert By G. K. Chesterton

After one moment when I bowed my head
And the whole world turned over and came upright,
And I came out where the old road shone white.
I walked the ways and heard what all men said,
Forests of tongues, like autumn leaves unshed,
Being not unlovable but strange and light;
Old riddles and new creeds, not in despite
But softly, as men smile about the dead
The sages have a hundred maps to give
That trace their crawling cosmos like a tree,
They rattle reason out through many a sieve
That stores the sand and lets the gold go free:
And all these things are less than dust to me
Because my name is Lazarus and I live.

A BIG CONGRATULATIONS to Patheos blogger and super-awesome human being Leah Libresco on joining the Catholic Church today. Three sacraments in one day ain't too shabby. Welcome home, darling girl!

Here's a little Mumford, just because:



God bless you Leah! And prayers for my mother, whose birthday it is today. Cheers!

Catholic: What Up!

"So far as a man may be proud of a religion rooted in humility, I am very proud of my religion; I am especially proud of those parts of it that are most commonly called superstition. I am proud of being fettered by antiquated dogmas and enslaved by dead creeds (as my journalistic friends repeat with so much pertinacity), for I know very well that it is the heretical creeds that are dead, and that it is only the reasonable dogma that lives long enough to be called antiquated." --G. K. Chesterton

Marked with a Cross

‎"If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise.

Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death.

Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father.

I, at any rate, cannot separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot papers, are marked with a cross."

--G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy

Hakuna Matata

Week Nine of Ridiculosity:

one

It's called "The Fun Theory":




So fun!

"You're like a breath of April air, sir," he cried. " You're ozone after that fellow."

From the end of Chapter II of G.K. Chesterton's "The Ball and the Cross":

"Well, sir," said the editor of The Atheist, "where is the fight to be? Name the field, sir."

Evan stood thunderstruck. He stammered out something, he knew not what; he only guessed it by the answer of the other.

"Do I want to fight? Do I want to fight?" cried the furious Free-thinker. "Why, you moonstruck scarecrow of superstition, do you think your dirty saints are the only people who can die? Haven't you hung atheists, and burned them, and boiled them, and did they ever deny their faith? Do you think we don't want to fight? Night and day I have prayed—I have longed— for an atheist revolution—I have longed to see your blood and ours in the streets. Let it be yours or mine?"

"But you said ..." began MacIan.

"I know," said Turnbull, scornfully. "And what did you say? You damned fool, you said things that might have got us locked up for a year, and shadowed by the coppers for half a decade. If you wanted to fight, why did you tell that ass you wanted to? I got you out, to fight if you want to. Now, fight if you dare."

"I swear to you, then," said MacIan, after a pause. "I swear to you that nothing shall come between us. I swear to you that nothing shall be in my heart or in my head till our swords clash together. I swear it by the God you have denied, by the Blessed Lady you have blasphemed; I swear it by the seven swords in her heart. I swear it by the Holy Island where my fathers are, by the honour of my mother, by the secret of my people, and by the chalice of the Blood of God."

The atheist drew up his head. "And I," he said, "give my word."

For an extra read, here is my latest TIC post: "The Grotesque Iconography of Lady Gaga"

Happy Fourth Sunday of Advent-- Veni, Veni, Emmanuel!!

ADVENTure is out there!

Let me begin by saying my car is old. Let me follow this fact by saying how much I love my car. My father bought it many years ago with the intention of letting me drive it when I got my license at age 16 and, thus, buying himself a chauffeur to carpool his five younger children around.

I drove it for two years in high school and then left it at home for college, taking it back with me only two of my eight semesters. Once when my sister was driving it, a little gravel flew up and hit the windshield while she and my brother were leaving the boat house after practice. The front window now has a nice scar across the lower part of the window. I think it gives it character. When I graduated college, my parents gave it to me as a graduation gift since I was not living at home at the time and would need transportation for my reporting job.

Today is Day 2 of my car being completely frozen shut. Not only am I not amused, but I am sad. I miss my car. I have to drive to work with my Dad, which I don't mind, but on Thursday he is going to Illinois for business and then I will need my car to open sesame or else ...I may not be able to get myself to work! I don't mind snow or cold but ice is a whole nother monster. I had to salt the back steps last night after work because I didn't want my mother coming home from work at the hospital only to return as a patient. (Or anyone, for that matter!)

Today is the feast day of St. John of the Cross, a mystic and Doctor of the Church, who came from poverty and suffering, learning to love God through hardship, and thus finding beauty and knowledge. His most famous book is Dark Night of the Soul, is a Christian classic for good reason. It is the treatise he wrote based on a poem he also wrote, of the same title, about faith in God when one is feeling loneliness, despair and spiritual dryness. St. John of the Cross argues that it is the very hardships one experiences that brings one closer to God and helps one grow in spiritual maturity. In it, he wrote, "Spiritual persons suffer great trials from the fear of being lost on the road and that God has abandoned them… Their soul was taking pleasure in being in that quietness and ease, instead of working with its faculties."

Well, I can relate. I am not going through a "dark night of the soul" by any means, but it is the third week of Advent and I am feeling a lull. Perhaps it is because I am always cold. Perhaps it is because I now have a cold. Or perhaps this is what it feels like no longer living like I am trying to do all my work in a 24 hour period.

Either way, I am learning more and more in these post-college days not to rely on only myself and my abilities. I come from a family who values independence and I've lately been worried I find more certitude in me than God. St. Augustine said to "pray as if everything depends on God, and work as if everything depends on you." I've struggled to trust God these past few weeks. I'm leaning more towards him now, but perhaps too eagerly, trying to discern his will. I am still puzzled at the clues. And that's okay. I don't really want to know, it's more a curiosity. I like praying for all possibility to delight me. Like learning a foreign language, patience and persistence is key with prayer.

The Man Who Was Thursday's Poem

Today's poem is dedicated to the man who said, "The Christian faith has not been tried and found wanting. It has rather been found difficult and left untried." Oh yes, GKC himself!

"To St. Michael, in Time of Peace" by G.K. Chesterton

Michael, Michael: Michael of the Morning,

Michael of the Army of the Lord,

Stiffen thou the hand upon the still sword, Michael,

Folded and shut upon the sheathed sword, Michael,

Under the fullness of the white robes falling,

Gird us with the secret of the sword.

When the world cracked because of a sneer in heaven,

Leaving out for all time a scar upon the sky,

Thou didst rise up against the Horror in the highest,

Dragging down the highest that looked down on the Most High:

Rending from the seventh heaven the hell of exaltation

Down the seven heavens till the dark seas burn:

Thou that in thunder threwest down the Dragon

Knowest in what silence the Serpent can return.

Down through the universe the vast night falling

(Michael, Michael: Michael of the Morning!)

Far down the universe the deep calms calling

(Michael, Michael: Michael of the Sword!)

Bid us not forget in the baths of all forgetfulness,

In the sigh long drawn from the frenzy and the fretfulness

In the huge holy sempiternal silence

In the beginning was the Word.

When from the deeps of dying God astounded

Angels and devils who do all but die

Seeing Him fallen where thou couldst not follow,

Seeing Him mounted where thou couldst not fly,

Hand on the hilt, thou hast halted all thy legions

Waiting the Tetelestai and the acclaim,

Swords that salute Him dead and everlasting

God beyond God and greater than His Name.

Round us and over us the cold thoughts creeping

(Michael, Michael: Michael of the battle-cry!)

Round us and under us the thronged world sleeping

(Michael, Michael: Michael of the Charge!)

Guard us the Word; the trysting and the trusting

Edge upon the honour and the blade unrusting

Fine as the hair and tauter than the harpstring

Ready as when it rang upon the targe.

He that giveth peace unto us; not as the world giveth:

He that giveth law unto us; not as the scribes:

Shall he be softened for the softening of the cities

Patient in usury; delicate in bribes?

They that come to quiet us, saying the sword is broken,

Break man with famine, fetter them with gold,

Sell them as sheep; and He shall know the selling

For He was more than murdered. He was sold.

Michael, Michael: Michael of the Mustering,

Michael of the marching on the mountains of the Lord,

Marshal the world and purge of rot and riot

Rule through the world till all the world be quiet:

Only establish when the world is broken

What is unbroken is the word.

To Agree or to Disagree, What a Question

We agree about the evil; it is about the good that we should tear each other's eyes out. We all admit that a lazy aristocracy is a bad thing. We should not by any means all admit that an active aristocracy would be a good thing. We all feel angry with an irreligious priesthood; but some of us would go mad with disgust at a really religious one. Everyone is indignant if our army is weak, including the people who would be even more indignant if it were strong. The social case is exactly the opposite of the medical case. We do not disagree, like doctors, about the precise nature of the illness, while agreeing about the nature of health. On the contrary, we all agree that England is unhealthy, but half of us would not look at her in what the other half would call blooming health.

-- "The Homelessness of Man," from G.K. Chesterton's book 'What's Wrong With the World'