THE FUNERAL OF MY UNCLE OZZIE – A time for self-revelation and retrospection.

My mother, Regina, my aunt, Ruth, and my uncle, Ozzie.

THE FUNERAL OF MY UNCLE, OSCAR JERNSTROM: A time of self-revelation and retrospection.

As Catholics, it is ingrained into us at an early age to do a daily self-examination of our soul, our state of being with God, with our neighbor, and with ourselves. We do not always do this consciously, but rather on a subconscious level be it rumination or an examination of conscience.

The death of someone we love and/or admire triggers within our human hearts a discernment of what life is all about. I have a bumper sticker that says, “What if the Hokey Pokey IS what it is all about?”, an existential question, indeed! Is life only about self-gathering around us those things we want in life, including our relationships with others? Or, is there some other purpose to life than just procreating a new generation of human beings and occupying time and space for a number of decades?

I have come to think of life as a vast school curriculum for the human soul; a time of deep and experiential learning. Our lives are not about acquiring, but about learning how to love as God loves. Our lives are about how to become human in the manner that God intended humanity to be when God created us. I am not an expert in world religions, though I must confess that the Eastern religions notion of reincarnation can be a comforting thought. If one fails in one lifetime, one is held back a grade, so to speak, to try again. Our Christian notion of life is a bit more drastic and grim, for it holds a pass/fail outcome at the end of life. If we pass, we go on to eternal life heaven. If we fail, we go to spend eternity in everlasting torment in hell. (AN ASIDE: There was once a Far Side Cartoon with two panels. The first was of an individual entering heaven and being given a harp, with the caption, “Welcome to heaven. Here is your harp.” The other panel depicted an individual entering hell. As he entered, a devil hands him an accordion with the caption, “Welcome to hell, here is your accordion.”) As Christians, early on in life we learn to get serious about what our lives are all about for there will be significant consequences at the end of our lives. (As Sr. Angeline once told my 2nd grade class. “Ten of you will be going to hell when you die.” A sobering thought for a 2nd grader, even though we knew which 10 individuals would be eternally damned.) We use the life of Jesus in the Gospels and the wisdom found in the letters of Paul, Peter, James, and John as our guide in living our lives with purpose and love. The following is not so much a reflection on my uncle, Oscar Jernstrom, but more about how his death has impacted my life. It is ultimately about how well I am learning the lifelong curriculum of love in my own life.

It should be noted that what follows is taken from the quick thoughts I wrote on Facebook in the wee hours of the night and early in the morning, while the thoughts and feelings were fresh and still a bit raw.

The last two days were spent en route to Pittsburgh, to be at my Uncle Oscar’s wake, his funeral, the funeral luncheon, and en route home again. These days were significant, as most days surrounding a funeral are. The death of a loved one is a significant rite of passage that not just impacts the one who is deceased, but impacts the lives of all whom the deceased has touched while alive. It causes the survivors to wrestle with the age old question of what lies “beyond the pale”. It tests the faith of survivors. Is there really a God, a heaven and a hell? What will I experience when I see God face to face? (This reminds me of the old Henny Youngman joke, “What do you say to God when God sneezes?”) Has my relationship with the deceased ended permanently, or does it continue long after the body of the deceased has been buried? It also makes us reflect on our own death and our own fear of death. Woody Allen expressed this succinctly in a joke he composed during his days of doing stand-up comedy. “I’m not afraid of death. I just don’t want to be there when it happens.” Or for those more existentially minded individuals out there, the joke that Steven Wright once told, “Last night I was playing solitaire with tarot cards. Five people died.”

 

(back row) My mom, Regina, my aunt Ruth. (front row) My uncle, Bob, and my uncle, Ozzie.

Anxiety

Traveling to Pittsburgh, PA for my uncle’s funeral and being with my Pittsburgh family triggered all sorts of thoughts and emotions for me. Emotionally, it was a time filled with anxiety, sorrow, joy, discomfort, fatigue, connectedness, and ultimately, self-affirmation. Hard to imagine 48 hours filled with all of that.

The anxiety arose out of not having traveled very much since the first of the three hip surgeries. Because of the MRSA infection that made me hipless for 6 months, following that first hip replacement and the multiple surgeries to drain the infection, my left leg has never fully regained all the muscle tissue that had atrophied. This led to being so reliant on the right leg, that that leg had to have the hip replaced, and, then this past Fall, the knee replaced. The anxiety arose out of knowing that with all the walking through airports, I would be working those artificial joints like they have never been worked before! Then there was the TSA, but as I posted earlier, I haven’t been that intimately touched in a long while so it was, in its own way, more a pleasurable experience than a disturbing experience.

Some anxiety also arose from being separated from Ruthie. Back in 2005, I did 3 weeks of Spanish immersion in San Antonio. It was mind-lifting and educational in many different ways (I found it fascinating is that the priests and seminarians with whom I studied knew all the $2.00 Margarita bars in the barrio). It was also torture being away from my bride, Ruth.

In theological terms, the word ontological is used to describe the subtle but very real transformation that occurs in a sacrament. I discovered how much being married to Ruth had utterly changed me, not in the sense that we are codependent on one another, but in the sense that after all these years (41 married, 49 since we started to date) we truly had become one heart and one flesh. To be separated for any length of time from Ruth is spiritually and emtionally painful. That 3 weeks in San Antonio were incredibly torturous for the both of us. When I had finally gotten back to the airport after that very long 3 weeks, I expected my daughter, Beth, to pick me up from the airport because Ruthie had to work that night. Imagine my great surprise and overwhelming joy to see my lovely bride walk up to me at the baggage claim! She had called in sick, so she could meet me at the airport, and, unbeknownst to me, had arranged a welcome home party for me. From that time onward to go somewhere without Ruth is difficult for me, for she is such a part of who I am. So, there was some “separation anxiety” in my mix of emotions. We, of course, talked multiple times by phone on Tuesday, and three times on Wednesday, twice by phone and once home, in person when she arose to go to work.

So with all this anxiety why go at all? Easily answered, my Uncle Ozzie. My Uncle Ozzie and Aunt Mary are like second parents to me. Judging by what has been said by many, I am not the only one who feels thus connected to the both of them. Though I can count on one hand the number of times we have been in the same room over the past 20 years or so, the connectedness to these two very special people has remained rock solid intact. It was not a matter of having to go, it was a necessity for me to go and honor the man I loved and valued almost as much as my own father.

(from left to right) My mom, Regina, my uncle, Bob, my grandfather, Oscar, my uncle, Ozzie, my cousin, Greta, and my aunt, Ruth.

Sorrow

In forty years of church ministry, I have been at, presided at, and played music for many, many funerals. As stated earilier funerals are a pivotal part in people’s lives. We celebrate their lives touching our own. We celebrate their relationship with the God who created them. Ozzie’s life had touched so many lives, and I believe that it was a result of his life being so intimately connected to the God who created him.

The Jewish philosopher, theologian and Rabbi, Martin Buber in his theological masterpiece, I And Thou, expressed three places or thresholds in which we encounter God. The first, is in nature and the wonders  of God around us. The second, is in our inner personal relationships with others which Buber describes as windows through which we gaze on the face of God. The third, is that interior place known only to the individual in which the individual and God meet and interact.

It is that second threshold in which we encounter God that is the most operative at the death of a loved one. In our love relationship with another, we see and experience the presence of God.

I have often expressed that my greatest experience of God has been in my married relationship to Ruth. While Ozzie probably never quite expressed his relationship to my Aunt Mary in similar terms, I am quite sure he would acknowledge that to be true, too. It was extremely sorrowful to know that Ozzie would not be occupying that familiar corporal form he inhabited for over 91 years. To not hear his voice, hear the stories he would tell, to experience him in person, is a tremendous loss.

That is a hole in one’s life that can never be filled. The Lutheran theologian and pastor, Dietrich Bonhoeffer expresses this so well. “There is nothing that can replace the absence of someone dear to us, and one should not even attempt to do so. One must simply hold out and endure it. At first that sounds very hard, but at the same time it is also a great comfort. For to the extent the emptiness truly remains unfilled one remains connected to the other person through it. It is wrong to say that God fills the emptiness. God in no way fills it but much more leaves it precisely unfilled and thus helps us preserve — even in pain — the authentic relationship.”

Sorrow is an important emotion to acknowledge and experience. It means that something very important is missing in our lives. The sorrow expressed at the loss of a person is in its own way the ultimate compliment, the penultimate affirmation, for it means that that person we have lost had enriched and added so much value to our own lives. It was this sorrow I felt deeply at both Ozzie’s wake and funeral.

My Aunt Mary and Uncle Ozzie’s wedding photograph.

Joy

I would like to express something about the joy I have experienced in my two days in Pittsburgh.

In many ways, my family has been part of a family “diaspora” over all these years, separated by a long distance from all my cousins on both sides of the family. Because my father’s work placed him and us in the upper Midwest with a part of that time in Chicago and a longer span of time spent in Minnesota, the chance to connect to my East coast family was limited often to the two week vacations we would spend in the Pittsburgh area when we would stay either with our Aunt Ruth and Uncle Joe, or, as Bill and I experienced, with our Uncle Ozzie and Aunt Mary. Going to Pirate games at old Forbes Field with our 2nd cousin Regie Walsh, playing with our cousins Jerry, Mary Greta, and Reg Jernstrom and visiting my Uncle Bob and Aunt Babe and their children Ann, Bob, Tommy, Linnea, Mary Grace, and, of course my mom’s cousin Jill, and her husband, Big Jim and, of course their son, little Jimmy Ertzman (I can’t recall whether I am spelling their last name correctly), and Jill’s mom, my mother’s Aunt Sarah.

Sadly, as Bill, Mary, and I began high school, the trips out East every Summer began to get fewer and fewer. After my ordination to the diaconate, I remember Ruthie and I driving out to Pittsburgh with our daughters Meg and Beth to visit all my cousins. It was important to me that Ruth and half of our children (Andy and Luke were busy working) get to meet these wonderful people who were so important to me as I was growing up.

On that trip, I observed how close all my cousins were to one another. They were one another’s best friends. While it sounds a bit idyllic, there appeared to be no inner family resentments, but rather a blessed harmony. I was so graced by what I observed and grieved what I had been missing all the time I was away. It reminded me of the closeness of Ruthie’s family and I remember being envious of the closeness they have with one another and how I (nicknamed Wag) was adopted into the sibling relationship Ruthie shares with her brothers and sisters.

The joy I felt on Tuesday and Wednesday, as sad as the occasion was, was that reconnection to my Pittsburgh family. To be with them, to grieve the loss of Ozzie with them, was in a sense a joy to me. I was one with them again. We have all grown up since those days in the 50’s and 60’s. We have all married and had our own families, and yet, the solidarity of the past returned as if it never had passed. I wasthe only one present with a Minnesotan accent, (NOTE: In contradiction to that wretched Cohen Brother movie, “Fargo”, only a very few Minnesotans, generally with surnames like Christiansen [chris-JOHN-son] or Johannsen [yo-HAHN-son] say ufta [OOF-tah], youbetcha [u-BETCH-ah], and donchaknow [doh-chah-NO]. Incidentally, Fargo is in North Dakota and not Minnesota. Minnesota has lakes and trees. North Dakota’s state tree is a telephone pole and the State’s topography is flatter than a pancake.), the cultural oddity immersed in Pittsburgh culture and surrounded by that remarkable Pittsburgh manner of speaking. However, everyone immediately made me feel entirely at home. There is a hospitality inherent to Pittsburgh which is a bit different from what we call in Minnesota, “Minnesota Nice”. (NOTE: Minnesota Nice is not genuinely nice. Minnesota Nice is just a way of saying “passive aggressive” behavior.) Even the folks at the hotel treated me with a friendship that is not always present in Minnesota (provincialism is a trademark of the multiple cultures of Minnesota).

I want to thank my Pittsburgh cousins for being so wonderfully gracious to me. You are very special to me. Though we live so far apart, you are never far from my thoughts and never have been over these long years of separation. My sister, Mary Ruth, while she was alive, was very good about keeping connected to our PIttsburgh family, our Cleveland family (Bobby, Maryjo, and Kelly) and our Virginia family (we haven’t forgotten about you Kathy and Cheryl. I hope the chance to visit you comes soon, too!). Thank you for being in my life. You bring so much joy to my life.

My cousins (left to right): Jerry, Tommy, Linnea, me, Regie, Maryjo, Ann, Mary Grace, Aunt Mary, and Bob.

Fatigue and Self-affirmation

Lastly, the emotions of fatigue, discomfort, and self-affirmation. The fatigue was largely related to doing so much in very short span of time. Church ministry doesn’t allow much in the way of time away, because of the demands ministry makes in one’s life. While my life is not the 24/7 lives of the dairy farmers around New Prague, my life is usually 24/6 (that is if a funeral doesn’t take away my one day off a week). While it was imperative for me to be at my Uncle’s funeral, it was also imperative that I fly in on Tuesday and leave Wednesday afternoon to get back to my church responsibilities.

I was up at 4 am on Tuesday and out of the house by 5:30 am, to get to the park and ride, shuttle to the airport, check in with the airline and the TSA, and then fly to Pittsburgh, find where the baggage is, find where the car rental is, drive in a new city, find where the hotel is, find the funeral home, be present at the wake, and, crash sometime around 8 pm. So much for Day 1.

Day 2, up at 6 am, pack everything, eat breakfast, check out, go to the church, look over the intercessions, funeral, burial, funeral luncheon, back on the road to the airport, check in the rental car, check in luggage with the airline, get frisked by the TSA, find the terminal, fly back to the Twin Cities, find luggage, find shuttle to the Park and Ride, drive home, and get there by 8:30 pm. Almost the end of Day 2.

When I pulled into the driveway at 8:30 pm, I received a call from my cousin Regie Jernstrom who wanted to make sure I got home safe. (Thank you Regie, you are so thoughtful!) Then I noticed I received a call from Bruzek Funeral home alerting me to the death of a parishioner. At 8:45 pm I called the funeral home, arranged a time to meet the grieving family on Thursday to plan the funeral being held on Saturday, and then realized I had not eaten since the luncheon.

The day ended with me popping some popcorn, which the dog insisted that I share with her, until it was time for Ruth to get up and go to work. I waved goodbye to Ruthie as she drove off to work at 9:30 pm, opened the refrigerator and saw the Brandy Manhattan she made for me on a shelf. I got a couple of ice cubes, sat down, and sipped the drink. My intention was to watch the news and then the first part of Colbert before unpacking the suitcase and going to bed. I never made it to the sports. Fatigue combined with brandy, sweet vermouth, and three maraschino cherries makes a sleeping potion that is hard to resist. When I awakened, the TV still on, it was 12:30 am and I had to reorient myself to time and place. I then unpacked the suitcase, set up my CPAP, crawled into my pajamas and crashed. Four hours later, I was up and at it again, greeting Ruth when she got home from work at 8 am, eating my toast and banana and 16 ounces of Dunkin Donut coffee, and off to church by 9:30 am.

I am still feeling a bit of the fatigue as I type this out. But it is a good kind of fatigue. Is there discomfort? Of course, I demanded a lot from all my artificial joints (As they say in agrarian society, I feel a bit held together by bailing wire and bubble gum). But the artificial joints held up and did what they were required to do. They are a bit sore, but that is why there is aspirin and Tylenol. The pain and soreness will pass. I will return to Anytime Fitness tomorrow (today that is) and walk a couple of miles on the treadmill, increasing my distance and endurance.

On the occasion of my Uncle Ozzie and Aunt Mary’s 50th wedding anniversary. (from left to right) Uncle Ozzie, my brother, Bill, and my Aunt Mary.

And, finally, self-affirmation. This is related to the anxiety about which I first wrote. The major question that brought on anxiety was whether I could make the trip after having had 6 years of surgery with all the recovery that accompanies surgery (In 2011 alone I had 5 surgeries. From 2012 to 2016, 4 more surgeries.). It is easy to possess some self-doubt after all of that. The death of my Uncle forced me to face my fears, my anxiety, and compelled me to take chances. I did all of it, and not only survived, but thrived, albeit with my limitations still being what they are.

To be back home embraced by my beloved, Ruth, is heaven. To have been to Pittsburgh in the welcome embrace of my Aunt Mary and all of my cousins was also heaven. If the embraces of those we love are heaven on earth, imagine the divine embrace of God that Ozzie is now feeling.

At Ozzie’s funeral we sang a couple of hymns that Minnesota liturgical music composer, David Haas wrote years ago (“The Lord Is My Light And My Salvation”, and “You Are Mine.”). David also set new words to an old Irish/Scott folksong melody named “Marie’s Wedding.” I would like to conclude with the text he wrote for that melody.

Onward to the Kingdom

Refrain: Sing we now, and on we go; God above and God below; Arm is arm, in love we go Onward to the kingdom.

  1. Star above to show the way, Through the night and in today, With the light we won’t delay Onward to the kingdom. (refrain)
  2. Come now sisters, brother all, Time to heed the Lord’s call, We will travel standing tall Onward to the kingdom. (refrain)
  3. In the promised land we’ll be, One with God, where all are free, The deaf will hear, the blind will see When we reach the kingdom. (refrain)

THE WOMAN AT THE WELL, AND OUR OWN JOURNEY THROUGH OUR STAGES OF FAITH

THE WOMAN AT THE WELL , AND OUR OWN JOURNEY THROUGH THE STAGES OF FAITH

There is so much that can be written and has already been written about this remarkable encounter that Jesus had with the Samaritan woman at the well.  The part of the story that stood out for me the most upon hearing and proclaiming it this past weekend is the conclusion of the story.

‘Many of the Samaritans of that town began to believe in him. When the Samaritans came to him, they invited him to stay with them; and he stayed there two days. Many more began to believe in him because of his word, and they said to the woman, “We no longer believe because of your word; for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is truly the savior of the world.”’ (New American Bible)

It is this final statement of the Samaritan villagers to the Samaritan woman that is so very profound. In their statement they are saying to her, we no longer believe because you tell us to believe, we have come to believe through our own initiative. The Samaritan villagers arrived at a very advanced level of faith development. To develop this a little more I first need to address first the stages of faith development.

When I was in graduate school at the St. Paul Seminary, part of my study consisted on the stages of faith. The one I remember the most is the 6 stages of faith development proposed by James Fowler. These stages of faith are: 1) Intuitive-Projective; 2) Mythic-Literal; 3) Synthetic-Conventional; 4) Individuative-Reflective; 5) Conjunctive Faith;  and, 6) Universalizing Faith.

 I know that all the fancy terms used for faith development sound like a bunch of psychological babble. However, allow me to break it all down in understandable terms.

 Stage 1: The Intuitive-Projective stage is one in which pre-school children receive most of their ideas of God from their parents and society. It is a magical time in which fantasy and reality get mixed up. Children will believe that Superman is real and can actually fly. Fire breathing dragons are real, and witches and wizards can actually cast spells. All of this pertains to the mythical stories of the Bible as well.

 Stage 2: The Mythic-Literal stage is that time in which children reach school age. The magic begins to disappear and they interpret reality more logically. There is no actual Superman who can fly faster than a speeding bullet, but is understood to be a character in a story. They will accept the stories told them by their parents and their religious faith community but understand them in literal terms. For example, God actually created the universe in six 24 hour earth days, and rested on the seventh day. Or, Moses and the Israelites actually passed on dry land through the immensity of the Red Sea. Noah actually got 1 female and 1 male of every species on the Ark (though why on earth would he insisted on saving wood ticks or mosquitoes is still beyond me).

 Stage 3: The Synthetic-Conventional stage occurs around the age of 12 and 13 years, when the adolescent begins to think abstractly. It is the time when we seek to discover who we are in light of those we know. We seek to belong. We look for God in our interpersonal relationships. We want a God who knows us and values us. It is at this stage we begin to adopt the belief system of a faith community and may look at all others outside our system of belief as flawed. We will get upset when someone questions our beliefs. There are many adults who will never venture beyond this stage of faith development.

 Stage 4: The Individuative-Reflective stage begins to occur around 19, 20, 21 years of age. We begin to question the beliefs we have been taught. Is what we have been taught really true? Fowler says that Stage 3 is like a fish in water, who doesn’t question the water. Stage 4 is the fish out of the water reflecting on the water. We wonder about the authenticity of our beliefs. Needless to say, this is a very traumatic and uneasy time in life. We don’t believe because someone outside of ourselves tells us to believe. We have got to see it for ourselves. Fowler says that this is the period in life when people become non-religious. Some people will remain at this stage the rest of their lives.

 Stage 5: The Conjunctive Faith stage is when people believe not because some religious authority or faith community has told them to believe. Rather, people, after questioning their faith through Stage 4 accept and make a serious personal decision to own their faith on their own terms. Fowler says that this is when one’s faith is open to paradox. It is when we become comfortable with God as mystery, strange, and unavailable at the same time we are equally aware of God’s closeness and clarity. We advance beyond the myths and taboos we were taught and are ready to embrace truths outside our narrow understanding of truth.

 Stage 6: The Universalizing Faith stage is reached only by a very few people. People at this stage advance beyond themselves realizing that they are already living in the Reign of God. The self is no longer the center of the universe. Fowler states that they find their center in the participation of God. Their lives are far simpler and, as Fowler observes, more intensely liberating, subversively so. Examples of people whom Fowler believes would be at this Stage would be Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, Thomas Merton, Dag Hammerskjold, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

 ‘Jesus said to her, “Believe me, woman, the hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You people worship what you do not understand; we worship what we understand, because salvation is from the Jews. But the hour is coming, and is now here, when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth; and indeed the Father seeks such people to worship him. God is Spirit, and those who worship him must worship in Spirit and truth.”’ (NAB)

 In the Gospel, the woman at the well is well into developing her stages of faith. She is seeking to deepen her relationship to and understanding of God. Jesus acknowledges this in his conversation with her. He also points out to her that she and all of us clearly have a long way to go before we reach that elusive stage 6.

 The Samaritans in the Gospel believed in Jesus at first because of what the Samaritan woman told them. They questioned Jesus and their belief in him during the few days he stayed with them. It was then that they told the Samaritan woman that they now owned their belief in Jesus not because of what she had said, but by what they heard for themselves.

Throughout my life, I have found my faith journey in all five of these stages. I questioned my faith long before my 19th birthday, actually 12 years of age, when in looking at a consecrated host I asked myself, “Is what they say really true? Is this really the Body and Blood of Christ?” I didn’t leave my faith all the while I was questioning it, but continued to ask the questions about the validity of my faith.

There have been two instances in my life that awakened me to that which was beyond myself. My journey beyond Stage 4 occurred at the birth of my first son, Andy, when I encountered God in that delivery room. The second occurred when I encountered my mortality at the age of 25 years during the first of many tacycardias. To feel my heart suddenly racing along at 240 beats a minute, I realized how fragile life truly is. When the 18 mg of Adenosine that was administered to me in the E.R. hit my heart slowing it immediately from 240 beats a minute to 70 beats a minute, I wondered if my life was about ready to end, and wondered what lay beyond death. (Fortunately 20 years after the first episode my problem was resolved by the then experimental procedure in the 1990’s known as Radio Ablation.)

These two instances, when I was very young broke the stagnation that had become my faith life. At first, I migrated back to Stage 3 to rediscover the teaching and myths of the Catholic Church. Then, I began to reenter Stage 4 and then quickly moved into Stage 5 as I entered the Masters in Pastoral Arts degree program at the Seminary. Since that time, I continue to move between Stage 4 and Stage 5. I find myself in the present at Stage 5 of my faith development. I am comfortable with knowing God as an unknown Transcendent Mystery who is immanently present to me, or, as Benedictine Sister Joan Chittester defines God, “Changing Changelessness.”

Where do we find ourselves in our faith development? Are we stuck at Stage 3 in which we believe in Jesus because others tell us to believe? Do we find ourselves in Stage 4 in which we find ourselves skeptical of what others have told us, and question everything the Church has proclaimed about Jesus? Or, do we find ourselves like the Samaritans in the village at Stage 5, where we have come to believe not because we are forced to believe, but believe because we have chosen to believe and make the story of who Jesus is part of our own story?

I believe in God not because the Church has told me to believe in God, though the Church has been the fertile ground into which my belief in God has grown. It is the very fallibility of the Church, with all its goodness and faults as a human institution, that has led me beyond the structure of the Church to the God who knew me before my parents conceived me. This is not to mean that somehow I am over and above the rest of our Church. On the contrary, I am in communion as a very fallible human being with all the rest of my very fallible human brothers and sisters in search of eternal communion with the God who created us.

This is so very well expressed in Marty Haugen’s hymn masterpiece, “Eye Has Not Seen.”* While all the verses are very movingly composed, it is the fourth verse that is so utterly stunning. Marty writes in that verse, “We sing a mystery from the past, in halls that saints have trod, yet ever new the music rings to Jesus, Living Song of God.” It is a comfort to know that perhaps at the time of our death we will finally reach that ever elusive Stage 6 of Universalizing Faith and become one with the One who is the center of all life.

 

*”Eye Has Not Seen”, music and text by Marty Haugen. © 1982, G.I.A. Publications, Inc.

For the Victims of Corporate Greed – Psalm Offering 4 Opus 7

Psalm Offering 4, Opus 7

Prayer Intention: For the victims of corporate Greed.

“The thought of my affliction and my homelessness is wormwood and gall! My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me.  But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end. (Lamentations 3:19-22)

 In the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 16, Jesus tells the story of the Rich Man and the poor beggar, Lazarus. The Rich Man, who has grown wealthy on the backs of the poor, lives life lavishly, feasting on the delights of wealth while Lazarus lives in destitution outside the Rich Man’s door. Jesus tells us that the Rich Man dies and goes to eternal damnation, while Lazarus ascends into everlasting happiness and life.

This pattern of the rich growing richer and the poor growing poorer remains true to the present day. The wealthy continue to prey on the vulnerable taking whatever they can to increase their wealth. Our forests are denuded, our water and food poisoned, our air unbreathable, and our land despoiled all to increase the wealth of the very few. Even basic healthcare is taken away from the poor who are in need of it the most so that the rich will not have to pay higher taxes. Jesus issues a stern warning to those who rely on their wealth for happiness, that one cannot serve God and serve Mammon (the god of wealth). Psalm 49 reminds us that in riches, humanity lacks wisdom and are like beasts that are destroyed.

THE MUSIC

(c) 2017 by Deacon Bob Wagner OFS. All rights reserved.

The overall form of the music is in three part ABA form. The A melody begins with a loud fanfare of open chords and glissandos, followed by ascending and descending triplets in both hands. The A melody is in the key area of E based on the Greek mixolydian mode. The B melody continues in the E Greek mixolydian mode at a much slower tempo, modulates briefly to a D dorian mode, then back to the E mixolydian mode. The A melody is recapitulated only to be in the key area of B Greek locrian mode, returning at the Coda to E mixolydian mode.

There is a heavy, frantic, oppressive, and relentless quality to the A melody. The acquiring of great wealth carries a great price to those who obsessively grasp at it and for those who are destroyed by it. There is a somber, pensive quality to the B melody, the wreckage of human life scattered about following the wake of the grasping rich, only to find the storm of the grasping rich descending upon them once more.

THE TRANSFIGURATION OF JESUS – a reflection on the 2nd Sunday of Lent, year A

At the Transfiguration of Jesus, the apostles see Jesus transformed. Gone was the former carpenter, now itinerant rabbi. Before them was Jesus clothed in the glory of his full nature, human and divine. Today, Jesus holds out to us the promise of our own Transfiguration when we will become as he is. While the fullness of our own Transfiguration will happen when Jesus comes again, the time to begin our Transfiguration is now, this very day. To become Transfigured requires us to change.

Human beings fear change. We always want things to remain the same. I remember the time I visited a 90 year old man in the hospital. When I asked how things were going, he replied, “It’s hell getting old, kid!” We all fear getting old and the limitations it places into our lives. We grieve the losses of what once had been. The last 17 years have been pretty tough on me. Physically I have undergone a lot of change, so much so, that I joke about walking down the street only to find one of my arms has fallen off. I call out to my son, Luke, “Quick! Pick my arm up before the dog begins to play with it!”  The physical limitations which are a part of my life possess a hidden blessing. These limitations have placed more spiritual focus into my life, transforming me into a better person and opening my eyes and my heart to the wonders God has worked in my life.

To become Transfigured requires us to let go of past things, and, while grieving the losses of what once had been, look forward to what we will become. Our pathway to the Transfiguration is through the Paschal Mystery of Jesus. To experience the fullness of what he would become, Jesus had to embrace the losses of his passion and death first, before he could experience the glory of his Resurrection.

Beginning today, we start our journey to our Transfiguration. Let us take the time to appreciate what God has done in our lives. Let us be prepared to let go of who we once were so that we can become who God calls us to be. Let us grieve the losses we experience along the way, but keep our eyes focused on the time when we stand on the mountain top alongside Moses, Elijah, and Jesus, at our own Transfiguration.

Our Transgender God – A reflection on Isaiah 49, Matthew 6, and John 1

Can a mother forget her infant,

be without tenderness for the child of her womb?

Even should she forget,

I will never forget you. (Isaiah 49:15)

“Look at the birds in the sky;
they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns,
yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are not you more important than they?
Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your life-span?
Why are you anxious about clothes?
Learn from the way the wild flowers grow.
They do not work or spin.
But I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor
was clothed like one of them.
If God so clothes the grass of the field,
which grows today and is thrown into the oven tomorrow,
will he not much more provide for you, O you of little faith?
So do not worry and say, ‘What are we to eat?’
or ‘What are we to drink?’or ‘What are we to wear?’
All these things the pagans seek.
Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.” (Matthew 6: 26-32)

OUR TRANSGENDER GOD – A Reflection on Isaiah 49, Matthew 6, and John 1

The title of this reflection is rather provocative isn’t it? Calling God “transgender” seems a bit radical, but is it? These two scripture readings, used on the 8th Sunday of Ordinary Time, clearly indicate a female and a male image of God. Clearly Isaiah’s reference to God is as the Divine Mother. Jesus’ reference is clearly a Divine Father image. Which is it? It is both/and.

Referring to God as transgender is a misnomer, for God transcends our human notion of male and female. God is made only in the image of God’s self. However, as females and males, we are both made in the image and the likeness of God. This is an important distinction. It is we who are creatures of God, not the other way around. God is not made in either a female or male image. It is we, female and male, who are made in God’s image. As these two scripture passages clearly illustrate, God cannot be confined to our finite human images. God transcends all of that.

To muddy these waters of gender all the more, while Mary is the Theotokus, the mother of God, Jesus, the Logos, the Word of God, is the mother of Mary. How can this be? In the beautiful Prologue to the Gospel of John we read these words.

“In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God,

and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things came to be through him,

and without him nothing came to be.

What came to be through him was life,

and this life was the light of the human race;

the light shines in the darkness,

and the darkness has not overcome it.” (John 1:1-5)

It is clear that all things came to be, were created, through the Logos, the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God. John’s Gospel makes it clear that it was through Jesus that his mother, Mary, was created. And it was through her that Jesus was born into our world. This is somewhat reminiscent of the question, “What came first? The chicken? Or the egg?” The One through whom Mary was created, was created through Mary. Welcome to the mystery and the paradox of God.

What can we conclude from this musing?

When we encounter God, we encounter the One who defies all human knowledge. God is a vast mystery filled with wonder. We are unable to wrap our minds around God. Human comprehension and understanding of God is not quantifiable. Instead we enter into mystery of God and experience the wonder and love of God as both the Divine Mother who birthed us into life and nurtures us, and the Divine Father who provides for us, watches over us, and protects us.

Our inability to understand God will enable us to be content and at peace with all the other mysteries we encounter in our lives. There are plenty of mysteries. The mystery of adolescence, the mystery of growing older, the mystery of our own God given gifts, the mystery of love, the mystery of  relationships, the mystery of our spouses, the mystery of sexuality and all of its components, the mystery of illness, the mystery of death, and, the mystery of that which lies beyond death.

And through all these encounters with the mysteries in our lives, we will know that we can always fall back on God as our Divine Mother and our Divine Father, whose tremendous love for us is the greatest mystery of all.

For the Refugees of the World – Psalm Offering 3, Opus 7

Judah has gone into exile,
after oppression and harsh labor;
She dwells among the nations,
yet finds no rest:
All her pursuers overtake her
in the narrow straits. (Lamentations 1:3)

The music I composed below wells up from the plight of the world’s refugees which is as acute now as since the 30’s and 40’s of the 20th century. Refugees from the war torn Middle East, Southern Sudan, Latin America face untold dangers fleeing the horrors that have destroyed their lives. We hear of the “coffin ships” fleeing the poverty and starvation of the Potato Famine and British religious persecution in the mid-1800’s. These refugees are encountering the same in their attempts to find peace and a livelihood elsewhere in the world.

The response on the part of most European nations has been exemplary to the horror these refugees have faced. Under donald trump, my nation no longer can bear the inscription upon the Statue of Liberty proudly, its message virtually erased by trump and his administration’s cruel and immoral banning of refugees. He has brought such shame to the noble aspiration of the Founders of this nation. That sin and the ghosts of all the innocent refugees he has denied access will haunt him for ever.

The music below is my musical prayer for all refugees. May they find peace in God.

(c) 2017, by Deacon Bob Wagner. All rights reserved.)

For the music theorists out there. The form of this music for piano is A B bridge (development of A and B) recapitulation of A to Coda. There are two prominent motifs, one melodic and the other rhythmic. The opening two measure melodic motif is repeated throughout the music as is the rhythmic decoration (the 32nd note triplet followed by the dotted eighth note). The recurring accompaniment pattern in the left hand is reminiscent of a “Berceuse” (lullaby) from Chopin I once performed as a music major over 40 years ago. As is characteristic with much of the music in Opus 7, the melody is simple but possesses a haunting melancholy yearning that is never quite resolved. The melody is written in the Dorian mode (one of the scales the ancient Greeks created). It is not the typical minor key with which we are familiar.

Right relationships and the law – a preemptive homily for the 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

My granddaughter, Alyssa and our Great Pyr, Henri, being in right relationship. (photo by Deacon Bob Wagner)

With executive orders flying out of the White House willy nilly, and accusations of “so-called” judges blocking these orders because they violate the Constitution of the United States, the readings for this coming Sunday on the law and the intent of the law is very timely. Were I to give a homily for this weekend, this is how I would approach it.

HOMILY FOR THE 6TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A, 2017

When we look at a symbol what do we see? A symbol is more than just what is seen on the surface. Take the American flag as an example. On the surface, the American flag is a rectangular piece of cloth. Imprinted in the upper left corner of the flag is a blue field upon which 50 white stars are placed. The remainder of the flag has 13 bars of alternating red and white color running horizontally across the flag. On its surface value, the American flag is a very colorful collage of red, white and blue colors and shapes.

However, symbols cannot be taken just on their surface value. Each symbol possesses a depth of emotional and intellectual meaning for the one seeing it. The American flag will instill in the viewer a feeling of pride, a feeling of sacrifice, and a feeling of reverence. A Nazi Germany flag with a red field, with an interior white circle upon which is imprinted a black Swastika, instills in the viewer an emotion of dread and anger, and the knowledge of the atrocities committed by its followers.

The same approach we take to symbols must also be taken for laws. On the surface, laws are rules that citizens are required to follow. We have laws governing business and corporation transactions. We have laws governing human behavior. We have laws governing the protection of the environment. We have laws governing how goods are produced. We have laws governing the growing, selling, and preparation of the food we eat. On the surface, a law tells us what to do and we, as citizens, are required to follow it.

However, laws are more than just mere words on paper that human beings are required to blindly follow. Laws possess a hidden depth of meaning. At a much deeper level, laws are about the inter-relationships that human beings have with one another, and with the environment. Laws are created to either respect or disrespect these relationships. A law that discriminates or demeans another human being for whatever reason is considered a bad, or immoral law. A law that supports and protects another human being is considered a good, or moral law. It is the depth of meaning to law that Jesus is addressing in today’s gospel.

Religious law is about the inter-relationship that human beings have with God, and how that relationship is lived out in relationship with other human beings, and with God’s creation, including all of nature. Jesus teaches that there is more to law than just merely going through the motions of following it. Anybody can do that.

The Pharisees and the Sadducees were good at obeying the letter of the law, so much so, that instead of worshiping God who created the law, they  worshiped the letter of the law, not God. They were guilty of the sin of idolatry by making the law their false idol. Blind obedience to the letter of the law prevented them from seeing the relationship that God intended when the law was first created.

To drive this point home, Jesus gave the people some very extreme examples of how they had to get beyond the letter of the law so that they could be in touch with the “right relationship” that God intended by the law.

It is not enough to refrain from killing another human being. One must first address the anger that drives another human being to murder. One must not just refrain from committing adultery. One must first address the lust that drives a husband or wife to commit adultery. One must not just refrain from bringing a gift to the altar when involved in a personal conflict with another human being. One must first address the conflict and resolve and heal the brokenness that conflict has created with the other person. Then, only then, can a gift be brought to the altar. Jesus emphasizes that one must always look beyond the letter of the law to see revealed the intent behind the law, to see the relationship that must be respected and protected behind the law.

To just follow the letter of the law is not enough for salvation. Mere lip service to the law is not enough.  To faithfully follow the law, we must allow the spirit of the law to penetrate our hearts, minds, and souls, allowing our right relationship with God to direct our thoughts, our words, and our actions.

Being the light on the mountaintop. A homily for the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Syrian refugees on the Aegean Sea. (Photo: Filip Singer, European Pressphoto Agency)

HOMILY FOR THE 5TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, YEAR A, 2017

What does it mean when Jesus says, “Your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.”?

Isaiah the prophet spoke to us in the first reading today. “Thus says the LORD: Share your bread with the hungry, shelter the oppressed and the homeless; clothe the naked when you see them, and do not turn your back on your own. Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your wound shall quickly be healed; your vindication shall go before you, and the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.”

There was a news story this past week about the Greek Fishermen from the Island of Lesbos who, from the year 2015 to the present, have rescued from the Aegean Sea over 800,000 refugees fleeing the war raging in Syria. Upward of 3000 Syrian people arrive on the shores of the island every day. One of the fishermen, Costas Pinteras said, “Up until this year, the sea for me meant fishing. This year, it has changed things. Now, it means fishing for people. The consequences have been a drop in my income because when I see someone in urgent need when I’m out fishing, I drop everything and go to help, because my work is not as important as saving human lives. The worst thing is the drowned people, drowned mothers, drowned children. The pictures I saw during those incidents which I was seeing almost on a daily basis would come back to me while I was trying to sleep in bed at night. I kept seeing repeated pictures of the same incidents as nightmares. I couldn’t sleep at all.”

Another person, Aphrodite Vatis, who runs a hotel on the island and is now busy looking after the refugees in a refugee camp on the Island said, “It’s (the refugees)  changed, first of all, my daily reality. I wake up now and the first thing I have to do is go to my family’s hotel and see, are there boats arriving? How can we help them? And this is in the morning. I have children, I have a husband. I have my own business. And so, the daily things that we take for granted, I was able to realize that I took a lot of things for granted very quickly, even just a moment of free time, a moment of spending with your own children. These are the things that I miss because there is no more free time. Also, moments of feeling carefree, they don’t exist any more because we see what is going on around us in other parts of the world. And, it has come to our doorstep.”

In the light of what Costas, Aphrodite and the prophet Isaiah have said, let us visit again the words of Jesus which we have just heard in the Gospel today. “You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lamp stand, where it gives light to all in the house. Just so, your light must shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.”

Jesus tells all of us who are baptized that we must be the light of God for the world. All good things, all light originates with God. It is only being in relationship with God that we can experience God’s light. If our relationship with God is true, it will compel us to go forth and produce good deeds so that those good deeds will shine a path of glory to God for all people to follow.

In the letter from St. James, he emphasizes more is required to be God’s light for the world than just prayer. Our prayer life with God must compel us to do good works.  St. James writes, “What good is it, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him?  If a brother or sister has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,” but you do not give them the necessities of the body, what good is it? So also faith of itself, if it does not have works, faith is dead. For just as a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” In other words, when Jesus tell us to do good deeds, is not a suggestion. It is a command.

Costas and Aphrodite are ordinary people, and more than likely belong to the Greek Orthodox Church. Like all of us ordinary people, they do the things we all do. They go out and work and provide for the well-being of their families. These two very ordinary people have a faith and a relationship with Jesus that has compelled them to do incredible and extraordinary things from which so much good and light is produced. As Aphrodite says, “moments of feeling carefree, they don’t exist anymore because we see what is going on around us in other parts of the world. And, it has come to our doorstep.” Drawing from the deep well of their faith in God and their relationship with Jesus Christ, Costas and Aphrodite, and all those who live on the Island of Lesbos, have set their light on the mountain top for all to see. From this little island in the Aegean Sea, these simple, ordinary people have become the light of Christ to all the world.

How about you and me? How brightly does our light shine to all in the world? Does the light from our good works shine a path of glory to God for all to follow? Is it a bright light like that which shines from a Lighthouse? Or, is it our light like the dim light from a flashlight whose batteries are dying. In the Vigil Prayers from the Catholic Order of Christian Funerals, these words are prayed for the deceased. “Blessed are those who have died in the Lord; let them rest from their labors for their good deeds go with them.” The light from our good deeds not only lights a path for others to God. It lights our path to our God when we die. How bright a light will we produce?

 

Just who is blessed? A homily for the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time

What does Jesus mean by the word blessed?

The Gospel of Prosperity is a way that a few false Christian religious leaders like to justify the disparity of wealth in our nation. These false teachers rationalize that God rewards those who are righteous with great wealth and power, and punishes those who are sinful with poverty and destitution. This is a false theology of wealth and power. It is baseless in scripture and for lack of a term, it is a pile of hooey. Yet this misguided and false teaching is widely disseminated among the rich and the powerful. These false teachers would say that the rich and the powerful are “blessed.”

The life and words of Jesus define what is truly blessed. Jesus used the gifts he was given to better the lives of those who were most in need. There was no quid pro quo attached by Jesus for any of the miracles he worked for people, whether it was curing an illness or injury, exorcizing a demon, calming the storm at sea, feeding the 5000 with the multiplication of loaves and fish. Everything that Jesus did for others was derived out of a motive of love, not profit. Jesus asked for nothing in return. This is what it means to be blessed.

What determines a person’s state of blessedness is not the person’s economic status. It is not a temporal state of being. Rather, to be blessed is directly linked to one’s spiritual and emotional state. Who is blessed in the eyes of God?

In the first reading, the prophet Zephaniah writes those who seek humility and justice are blessed by God. St. Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians declares that God has chosen the foolish to shame the wise, the weak of the world to shame the strong, and the lowly and despised of the world, “those who count for nothing,” to reduce to nothing those who are powerful. Those who are blessed, writes St. Paul,  boast of nothing but our Lord Jesus Christ.

Those who are truly blessed are those who come to the humble recognition that all good things come from God. All our gifts, all our talents, all our skills are not ours, but that which God has given to us so that we, in turn, can give to those more in need. Like peeling an onion, this requires us to peel from ourselves all the false things people have attached to us. This require for us to peel away all the false things we have attached to ourselves until there is nothing left but the very core of who we are.

Jesus tells us that once we have peeled away all the falsehoods in which we have been clothed, and clothed ourselves only in God, it is then, and only then, when we will experience the kingdom of God, experience comfort, mercy, and satisfaction. It is only then that we will experience true greatness and be able to see God. It is only then that we are truly blessed.

In short, one becomes blessed when one realizes that all good one has originates in God, and as one uses that good for the benefit of others, returns to God.

We often assign the word “blessed” to people who seem larger than life like Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Jr., Dorothy Day, Mahatma Ghandi, and Pope Francis. However, we are all called to be blessed and we know many people who are indeed blessed. If we think for a moment, we will recognize many in our lives who are truly blessed.

Just today, I heard a story about the Greek fishermen from the Island of Lesbos who, in the year 2015,  rescued over 500,000 Syrian refugees fleeing the horrific violence of Syria. These fishermen sacrificed their livelihood of fishing to go and rescue the many women, children and men who were drowning in the sea when their flimsy boats capsized and fell apart in the waters of the sea. Many of the women they saved were pregnant. One fisherman was asked in an interview whether he knew these people he was rescuing were Syrians. He said these people were human beings and it mattered not what country they came from. They were human beings in need of help and that was the most important thing for him, something, I am ashamed to say, that we as Americans have forgotten in recent months. These fishermen are blessed. Jesus reminds us today that if we seek to be blessed, we must possess the humility to realize that all good originates in God and must return to God by using the good we have received from God in service to those most in need.

This is best expressed in the Prayer that is attributed to St. Francis of Assisi.

“Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love;
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
It is in dying to self that we are born to eternal life.”

Encountering Love

ENCOUNTERING LOVE: A reflection of Buber’s “I and Thou.”

While in graduate school, the one book I read that has altered the way I see God in the world was Martin Buber’s theological masterpiece, I And Thou. Within that slim but difficult volume, is one distinct message. God is in love with us. The first sentence of the book said it all. “In the beginning was relation.” This is a restatement of the very first sentence of the Bible, “In the beginning was creation.” (Genesis 1:1) Within that very simple declarative sentence is infused the great love of God for all that God has created. Buber then reveals the ways in which we are able to encounter God’s love. Buber calls these meeting places with God, thresholds.

The first of these thresholds is nature. The delicate petals of a flower, the hymn of praise heard in birdsong, the lush green of a forest, the magnificent colors of a sunrise and sunset, the light display of the Aurora Borealis, the immensity of the ocean, the majestic height of mountains, and the awe striking display of power within a thunderstorm are all meeting places in which we encounter God.

There is something that is stirred within us when the “self of God” is revealed in nature. We are utterly changed. We no longer take for granted the petal of a flower. We hear God sing to us in the joy of a bird greeting the dawn. Our vision is expanded as the array of color of a sunrise or sunset passes through the retinas of our eyes into our souls. The dance of light displayed in the Aurora Borealis fills our hearts with wonder. The immensity of the ocean or the height of a mountain reveals to us our own insignificance. The great power of the thunderstorm strips from us the superficiality of our own power, displaying to ourselves our own naked helplessness. Encountering the great love of God in nature utterly alters us.

The second of these thresholds is our interpersonal relationships. Buber calls these interpersonal relationships windows, through which we look upon the face of God.

The first of these interpersonal relationships is that which is shared between a mother and her baby. Think of the mother cradling her baby in her arms, pressing the baby to her breast and nursing her baby. Think of the attentive, loving care of the mother for her baby’s every need. Is it any wonder that scripture speaks of our relationship with God as one of an infant nursing at the breast of God our Mother?

The second of these interpersonal relationships is that of the love expressed between two lovers. The loving caress, the touch of a kiss, the full and loving embrace of two lovers, the lilting, musical play of a lover’s voice, the joy upon seeing one’s lover, the way our lover’s smile makes our own heart smile, are all ways of encountering the loving presence of God.

I have said and will continue to say to the time that I die, that my greatest experience of God has been in my wife, Ruth. In her arms I feel God embrace me. In her gentle touch, God caresses me. From her lips I hear God say, “I love you,” and, “I forgive you.” As I gaze into her deep, brown eyes, I look upon the face of God.

The third of these interpersonal relationships is that which we share with others. In the companionship between two good friends, in the helping hand to those who are in need, in the laughter and the tears we share with others, in all the loving interactions we have with others, we encounter the love of God.

The third threshold is that place within ourselves in which we encounter the mystery of God. Imprinted into our very DNA is the DNA of our God who knew us, even before we were conceived in our mother’s womb. Of all the three thresholds of Buber, this is the one that is the least concrete and objective, and the most abstract and subjective.

This threshold is as unique to each individual as each snowflake is individual. The experience of God at this level is not something that can be replicated and passed on to others. It is something that is so intimate and so beyond human expression that words will never capture its full significance.

I encountered this threshold very powerfully at the birth of my son, Andy. Standing behind the doctor and in watching my son, my baby, emerge from Ruthie’s womb is best described as standing in the Holy of Holies. It was my Moses’ experience of encountering the flaming bush. It was my witnessing the creation of the universe and the resurrection of Jesus. The presence of God so filled that delivery room that I reached out into the air around me and physically touch God’s face. It was so powerful that I was unable to sleep the remainder of that night, pondering, contemplating what I had just experienced.

I encountered this threshold again in a single chord. I was driving home from the St. Paul Seminary in which I had an evening class. As I drove along Mississippi Boulevard, I listened to a recording of Aaron Copland’s “Appalachian Spring Suite.” In this musical suite of the major melodies from Copland’s ballet, “Appalachian Spring,” just following the vibrant variations on the Shaker Hymn, “Simple Gifts,” the tempo of the music slows and the dynamics grow quieter. At that point, one simple chord is sounded. I had listened to this musical piece countless times, however, this night, driving along Mississippi Boulevard in St. Paul, within that one simple chord played by the orchestra, I heard God’s voice, and I wept. I wept so hard that I began to sob and had to pull over to the side of the road until I quit sobbing and could safely continue my journey home. All the way home, I contemplated the sound of God’s voice in that simple chord, and, like my experience of God in the delivery room, could not sleep the rest of the night.

I encountered this threshold another time, sitting at the death bed of a parishioner. She was comatose and in the long process of dying. The head of her bed was raised so that she could breathe easier. Her family gathered around her bed, as I sat down next to her, took her left hand into my left hand, and began the prayers of the Commendation of the Dying. As I began the words of the closing prayer, “Go forth, Christian soul, from this world in the name of God the Father who created you,” her eyes suddenly opened and she looked directly at my eyes, but it was not me she was seeing. She was looking through me to the presence of God directly behind me. I continued the prayer, “ in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, who suffered for you, in the name of the Holy Spirit, who was poured out upon you, go forth faithful Christian. May you live in peace this day, may your home be with God in Zion, with Mary, the virgin Mother of God, with Joseph and all the angels and saints.” and as I concluded the prayer with an “Amen,” she closed her eyes and died. There was the sound of a collective intake of air from her family as they realized what had just happened, and a murmur from one to the other of “did you see what just happened?” After a little while, I took leave of the family, went back to my parish office and sat in silence for about three hours contemplating the experience of God I had had.

One other powerful experience of this threshold was in a hospital in the middle of the night in mid-October of 2011. I had just had my 5th surgery in as many months, the incision on my left leg opened again to release the poison of the MRSA infection I got from a hip replacement in June. I was in pain, and despairing as to if I would ever be cured of this infection that had left me without a hip for such a long time. I prayed the same prayer I had prayed the moment I was told I had MRSA, to be cured of this infection, wondering whether God heard my prayer at all. Unable to sleep, I picked up my iPod, put on my earphones and played the James Chepponis setting of Mary’s “Magnificat” from the Gospel of Luke. As the woman on the recording began to sing, “Proclaim the greatness of God; rejoice in God, my Savior! Rejoice in God, my Savior!” the pain lessened, and a calm settled within my spirit. I knew at that moment my prayer had been answered. Two and a half months later, the MRSA was killed and I was able to finally get an artificial hip.

I mention these four examples of Buber’s third threshold because of an encounter I had with God at Mass two weeks ago. I was playing the music for the 10 am Mass at St. John the Evangelist, one of the three church sites in the parish of St. Wenceslaus. I was doing what I call “liturgical cocktail music” that is, playing the keyboard and cantoring at the same time. (For some reason that elicits for me an image of the piano/singer in cocktail bars.) This encounter happened immediately following the consecration of the bread and wine in the Eucharistic prayer, and the singing of the Memorial Acclamation. As Fr. Dave Barrett continued the Eucharistic Prayer, the words he was praying came alive for me. I heard them in ways I had never heard them before. It was God proclaiming Divine friendship and love for all people. It was God declaring the inclusive expression of love to all creation at the beginning of time. It was a declaration that all of humanity and all of creation is swept up into this magnificent gesture and expression of love.

Since 1977, I can safely say that I have celebrated over 8,300 Masses. This is just the Sunday Masses and does not include the weekday Masses, funerals, weddings, Confirmation Masses and other Masses celebrated for various reasons. Why has it taken me so long? One would think that in the countless number of Masses at which I have been since I was born, the countless number of Masses at which I have played and directed choirs, the countless number of Masses at which I have assisted as a deacon, I would have heard this epiphany from God long before this one particular Sunday. There was nothing different in the inflection of Dave’s voice as he prayed the Eucharistic Prayer, nor anything remarkable about the playing or the singing of the Memorial Acclamation. However, at this one time, seemingly, just for me, the “self of God” was revealed to me again. When I left St. John’s, I drove to Memorial Park and  on that cold, winter day, parked in an isolated area and meditated upon that which I had just experienced. This reflection is the cumulative expression of that which I encountered that Sunday morning at Mass.

Buber is so correct. The encounters we have with God are numerous and often leave us unable to express in any adequate terms that which we have experienced. Each and every one of these encounters are personal, precious, and life-altering. They are those gifts that God gives to us to remind us that we are dearly loved and we are never, ever alone. For a moment, just a moment, the revelation of that which awaits beyond death is made known to us, and leaves us speechless and in awe.