Holy Family

Our readings for the Feast of the Holy Family are:

1. Sirach 3: 2-6
2. Psalms 128: 1-2, 3, 4-5
3. Colossians 3: 12-21
4. Matthew 2: 13-15, 19-23

• Learning humility?
• Caring for the elderly gives you a whole new outlook on life.  Things that you used to take for granted, like getting a fork full of food to your mouth, somehow becomes a significant challenge at some point.  When you were a kid, falling was just a part of having a good time.  For your aging father or mother, a fall could mean the beginning of the end.  Most of all, it teaches you to be humble, to shift your priorities to meet the needs of someone else, to see past disabilities, annoying habits, to God present in your life as someone lonely, confused, looking for help and comfort in a world suddenly grown so very strange.  And at bottom, we fear that all that loss of dignity and more is just around the corner for us as well.
• Think of a time when your priorities suddenly got shifted.  How did you respond?
• Did things ever get back to "normal"?
• How did that experience change you?

• Enjoying the work of your hands
• We all want to feel that hard work and determination will have predictable outcomes in our lives, that there is a cosmic justice at work and that we all get what's coming to us, in this life and the next.  Anything less demoralizes us, saps our drive, makes us indifferent.
• Have you ever gotten more than you deserve from effort that you have put into something?
• How did that make you feel?
• Did you want to do that same thing again?
• How does your work ethic jive with the grace of Jesus in your life?

• Hold still, I'm removing that splinter from your eye
• Admonishing each other is so hard.  If our own house is not in order, all that we end up doing is criticizing someone close to us for resembling us.  Or we see something in someone's life that needs a nudge, and we cannot bring ourselves to say anything for fear of what sort of reaction we will get from them.
• Has anyone ever told you of something in your life that needed mending?
• How did you receive that initially?
• What gave them the right to say that to you?
• What sort of community would be open to such corrections?

• The power of God
• I think that Hollywood's preoccupation with superhero movies lately might reflect a deep desire in our hearts for men and women of courage, who have the resolve to do the right thing, and have the resources to make things happen.  We don't want to don a cape and fly off to prevent some disaster, it would be enough to know that somewhere, some superhero will hear the call and answer.
• Sadly, we hardly ever get what we want in this life.  The supply of superheroes seems pretty well spent.  So that means that we all have to be heroes, we all have to look out for those weaker and more vulnerable than we are.
• Who are the heroes in your life?
• What did they have to do or say to earn that status?
• What have you learned from them?
• Would they be proud of you if they could see you today?

• Preparation for Reconciliation:

1. Where are the opportunities for humility in action in my life?
2. How can I be free from my own expectations of what's right and just?
3. Where is God calling me to be prophetic?
4. Where is God calling me to be someone's hero?

God of many heroes

This God of ours must have nerves of steel
Entrusting frail, fickle folk like you and me
To safeguard His children in this world of His
To be the Samaritan who rescues His fallen.

The question is, who has the time?
Even Spiderman needs to sleep from time to time,
I have the mortgage to pay, tuition to tend,
A demanding career that puts beans on the table.

All of these things demand steady time and attention,
I live in an unforgiving world with no second chances
If you miss a payment, forget your heating bill,
Show up late to work.

Surely, out of all these people on the planet,
There is someone who can help,
Some agency commissioned to extend a helping hand
Why me God, why not someone else?

How do I make room in my life
For the unexpected needs, the "I didn't see that coming?"
A little appreciation would go a long ways
Toward making me willing.

Believe me, I will be the first in line to help Jesus
If he needs directions to an inn with vacancies,
Or how to get to the nearest Jewish settlement
Here in Egypt.  Just show me who He is.

After all, there's only one Jesus, right?
How much time and attention can He need?
I cannot save every puppy in the pound,
Can I?

Merry Christmas!