A month and some days

I have been a priest now for over a month, and though that doesn't sound too spectacular, it has afforded me opportunities I've waited a lifetime to experience.

Mass


I am tempted to spew out a JBC style commentary on every liturgy I've celebrated and talk through all my thoughts, fears, reactions, feelings and bewilderments in celebrating the liturgy for they are numerous and varied. I will say though that many years of discernment and 8 years of seminary and all that it entailed was worth just one mass!

I have to admit that I haven't been able to internalize what I am 'supposed' to be feeling when I am celebrating mass. I felt incredibly out of place the first few weeks - that is becoming less so now now that I am getting into a routine at the parish. It's a funny thing: having the privilege to celebrate the mass is something I have been preparing for for many years, but to actually do it you see that it is something that one can never be fully prepared for. You prepare for the mechanics of it, you discern if you are called to the altar in that capacity, but you cannot prepare for the internal workings of the Spirit. To consecrate bread and wine so that is become the BODY AND BLOOD OF GOD is too great to "prepare for". I think that every day and every mass will unfold for me the reality that I am participating in and the sacrifice I am offering.

That being said, the liturgy- the mass - has a whole new and dynamic meaning for me now and my participation has changed, not only on the level of the obvious, but internally. I "feel" closer to what is going on and I can sense the reality of it all a little bit more - it is very REAL for me now in a way that perhaps was hidden from me before. In reflecting on this only a little, I don't think that you need to be ordained a priest to have your spiritual senses heightened to what is going on in the mass and to become more engaged in it on all levels. I really want to help my people experience the depths and beauties of this most awesome reality - the mass!

Confession


"Why me?"

That's all I can say. God has chosen me, a sinner, to be His priest and be a vessel of His Mercy and Love in the sacrament of penance. When the faithful come to the sacrament, they are not coming to talk to "Fr so-and-so", they are coming to talk to Christ. They need Christ to forgive them of their sins and to come back into a relationship with God characterized by mercy. It is nothing about me that has brought them to the sacrament for it is not ME forgiving them, but God through ME - powerful and mind-blowing!

This has been - second only to the mass - the greatest joy of mine these past few weeks of priesthood. This is where I the priest have an opportunity to intimately touch the wounded-ness of individuals and let the loving mercy of God touch their hearts and bring Life back into their souls.

Wow!

In general


"It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you". These words of Christ and the words of the God to Jeremiah "Before I formed you in to womb, I knew you... a prophet to the nations, I dedicated you" have been close to my heart recently. This may be more characteristic of the diocesan priesthood than religious priests, but I was ordained and sent to a parish to work. I am finding it very easy to think to myself "what can I do" "how can I make MY mark" I and ME has been punctuating my mind a lot and I need to draw my thoughts back to the beautiful words of scripture and remind myself that I am not in this for myself. I have been ordained to be a priest of Jesus Christ and thus I need to be the priest Jesus wants me to be, not the most successful on Brandon may want to be.

I am experiencing the beautiful and rich joys of the priesthood: celebrating mass, hearing confessions, visiting the hospital, anointing the sick, praying with the dying, visiting the homebound, being a fatherly figure to a parish and being  and bringing a unique presence of God in the midst of a community. I am also experiencing the challenges: how do I plug myself into a community, what does it mean to be a priest, how do I live this out, what am I supposed to be doing,  am I being a priest for Brandon or for Christ, how do I give myself totally over to this vocation and yet not burn out???

This is an amazing vocation and an amazingly complicated vocation (as they all are). I am very young in the priesthood, but I would have to say that it has all been worth it for even just one day of it!

7th Sunday Ordinary Time: Your sins are forgiven

Humanity, in  the past two decades or so, has acquired an immunity and desensitization to much of the violence, gore, sex, horror and whatnot that gets presented to us in media.

Think about all the music, movies, TV, games and everything else that literally puts us in the midst of so much horrible things and scenes. We have become a people who don’t look away, gasp, get repulsed or sick at seeing these images.

Don’t get me wrong; I am a media junkie. I love so many genres of music, movies and television and many that presents much of this stuff. I love a good movie of war, violence, horror, etc. Who doesn’t?

My point is not to demonize anything media related. I only mean to point out and make us aware of the reality that we have in so many ways become immune and desensitized to nearly everything put forth in our favorite media. It is something interesting to think about and realize. I think that part of taking ownership of ourselves is knowing ourselves and recognizing the blind spots in our lives, and I think this is one blind spot that all of us have.

There is another blind spot we need to acknowledge that predates R rated films by millennia, that is the magnitude of the effects of sin in our lives.

Two episodes of the mercy towards the sinfulness of humanity are shown to us.

Isaiah shows us of God essentially telling the people “I know your sins. I know how weak and vulnerable you are. But you know what, I love you. I love you and I forgive you. Let’s move on”. In the Gospel, Christ is presented with a man lowered through the roof of his house! What is telling about this encounter is that instead of healing his paralysis, Christ forgives him of his sin.

The Gospel gives us no indication of disappointment on the man’s part, but I think many of us feel it inside when we really think about it. If we came to Christ and wanted some physical ailment healed and, instead, He forgave us of our sins, would we be disappointed?

Sin has stripped something out of the core of our souls. It has left an emptiness and yearning inside of us the we have become all too often immune to in it affects. Because there is a hollowness inside of us, we naturally try to fill it up and it often gets filled with sin. Because that hole appears and feels filled, we don’t realize it is even there or the hazards of it. So we go days, weeks, months or years without really thinking about sin. We live in the midst and stench of that sin and we don’t even recognize it. We don’t feel sorrowful , shameful, embarrassed, or guilty. We essentially numb ourselves to sins effects because we have fooled ourselves into thinking that we aren’t hurting ourselves or others and we end up justifying our actions.

We are desensitized to sin!

But God does see this and He desires nothing more than to fill that hole with His love, mercy and the intimacy of a relationship with Him. This healing is essential to our salvation and our coming to know and experience God and the beauty of life.

When Christ says, “Your sins are forgiven”, He is performing a greater miracle than the physical healing of the man’s paralysis by saying “Rise, pick up your mat and walk”.

When a priest utters, “I absolve you of your sins” in the sacrament of Confession, he too is performing that awesome and essential miracle: the forgiveness of sins.

This is our last Sunday of Ordinary Time for a couple months. We enter the season of Lent this Wednesday when we will dive deep into the reality of sin and death before we immerse ourselves in the mystery of life and resurrection at Easter.

We need to not only acknowledge blind spots in our lives like our immunity to violence in film and TV, but also the effects of sin in our lives. We need to start yearning for those words of forgiveness, mercy, intimacy and love.

We need to start recognizing our need for those words of Christ “Child, your sins are forgiven”.